preces meæ non sunt dignæ

[jovahs_heiress]

Isabella thinks it's time to start spreading the word. Before she ascends to Archangelhood. She'll have more work on her plate, then, and it will be easier if she can trust more people with the details of how she's carrying it out.

Alleluia should be the one to tell Delilah. But she's going to tell Serah herself.

"I have been thinking about telling your auntie Serah about magic-and-everything," Isabella says to Damaris one morning. Magic-and-everything has been a term unto itself; it encompasses the magic, and where it is from, and the nature of Jovah and Jane. "Do you want to be there when I do?"

Comments

[campanas]

"We're not supposed to tell people but now we can tell you!"

[jovahs_heiress]

"But what can you do?" Serah wants to know.

"Almost anything you can think of. Not quite, but almost," says Isabella. "...This is how I healed Ithiel."

Ithiel is a perfectly healthy angel around Damaris's age, and there is a certain amount of hubbub surrounding him; it comes and goes. His father has never been identified. He doesn't have any younger siblings.

"I thought Jovah - I thought you prayed and -" Serah breathes.

[carillons]

Damaris shakes her head. "Magic," she says.

[jovahs_heiress]

"But - but then why would Jovah have, if he were willing that Ithiel be healed...?"

Isabella bows her head. "He was willing; it didn't matter to him either way. It was not something he could do."

"You're saying you can do things Jovah can't do. I can't believe I'm hearing this - you're to be Archangel - the spiritual leader of the entire world!"

[carillons]

"Mom is smarter than Jovah," says Damaris, indelicately.

[campanas]

"Jovah can do what Mommy tells him, and only some of those things," says Keziah, nodding.

[jovahs_heiress]

"What they mean," says Isabella quietly, "is that Jovah isn't, exactly, a god. He's technological - from such an advanced civilization that we can't tell the difference from down here unless we're told. Without magic, anyway."

"One of - of Caleb's inventions?" says Serah. "I can't believe I'm hearing this -"

"Caleb didn't invent it. Our ancestors did, and they destroyed almost all of the other technology they had," says Isabella. "But it's in the sky, and it can respond when we pray for weather, or seeds, or medicine."

"Where does it get those things, then, if it can't just will them into existence divinely?" exclaims Serah. "Jovah is a much simpler explanation - remember you taught me about simpler explanations -"

"Jovah is a simpler explanation for what you have seen," Isabella says. "But not for what I've seen, and not for everything I can show you if you'd like me to."

[carillons]

"I've seen where Jovah keeps all the plants that make the seeds," Damaris chimes in. "There's these huge rooms with special electric lights and plants growing in long troughs and machines that take care of the plants and harvest their seeds to send them down when we pray."

[campanas]

"And he talks!" adds Keziah. "If you get close enough. He'll say right out what he is."

[jovahs_heiress]

"But this is all impossible," says Serah.

"Not really," says Isabella. "I would have said it was unlikely, too, but - Alleluia knew before I did."

"Alleluia?" asks Serah, scandalized. "But she's an oracle!"

"That's why she knows," says Isabella. "The oracles at Sinai always know. That way if something goes wrong with the sky ship, they can go up, and fix it - it can instantly transport people from the Sinai oracular chamber to itself, although the way I do it with magic is more comfortable. Alleluia knew Jovah hadn't healed Ithiel and wanted to know how I did it - I wanted to know how she knew it wasn't him. We traded secrets."

[carillons]

"And now Alleya's our friend and she knows all about magic!" says Damaris.

[jovahs_heiress]

"Caleb knows, too, and their children know - and Micaiah, of course, learned everything when I did. Ariel and Peninnah are too young to keep it discreet - and the reason I had you babysit those two and not these, a few months ago, was because we were going to a party where there was a lot of magic."

"I had wondered," murmurs Serah.

"Is this too much revelation for one day already or do you want to hear the rest?" asks Isabella.

"I - I don't know."

[carillons]

"Maybe you should do some magic, Mom," Damaris suggests. "Just a little. To show it's for real."

[jovahs_heiress]

[I think that's a good idea,] Isabella agrees to everyone in the room.

Serah lets out a soft cry.

[campanas]

[It's okay! It's just the brainphone!] says Keziah encouragingly.

[carillons]

[I like the brainphone a lot! You can use it to talk to anybody who has it, no matter where they are! But if you don't want to be talked to you can make it say you're busy instead!]

[campanas]

[Not quite wherever they are,] corrects Keziah. [Uncle Nathaniel is too far away now.]

[carillons]

[Well, if they're in the world,] says Damaris. [But he's not.]

[jovahs_heiress]

"If they're in the world," says Serah blankly.

"That's the rest of it," sighs Isabella. "I got the magic from another world. There are many, and I've been to several. It used to be that anyone who knew how to ask could go to any world they liked, any time - but the machine that used to do that has broken. Nathaniel was visiting another world at the time, and he can't come home until the machine is fixed."

"I thought you said your magic could do anything."

"Almost," says Isabella. "Only almost."

[carillons]

"And almost anything is still a lot of things!" says Damaris. "But it's not always all the things you want."

[jovahs_heiress]

"So that's what you meant when you said he moved out," says Serah faintly. "Gone as far away as the Samarian settlers went -"

"Farther," says Angela. "In a way. The settlers came from another planet. You can travel there, by moving through space. The other worlds can only be reached by magic - not the kind I have; a sort that acts randomly - or with the help of the machine I mentioned, which is a person where Jovah is not, and which is broken. It has broken before, and come back; but it may take a long time. It was a decade, last time."

"Randomly?" says Serah.

"It doesn't scoop you up and deposit you," Isabella puts in hastily. "It offers you a door, that normally leads someplace in your own world, and makes it lead to the hub between the worlds instead. You don't have to go if you don't want to; you can close the door without going through. Although if you ever do find one of these, please tell me by brainphone, right away."

[carillons]

"The hub is called Milliways!" says Damaris. "It's really busy and it has a huge window all down one side that shows stars exploding."

[campanas]

"And there is a bar who is a lady and she can't talk but she can write!"

[jovahs_heiress]

"Sweet Jovah singing," murmurs Serah. "Or - maybe not. I had wondered why you became so suddenly noncommittal about the faith. I don't remember what excuse you gave."

"I told you," murmurs Isabella, "that I thought everyone would come to understand Jovah in due time and there was little point to my rushing things."

"Why didn't you tell me then?"

"I didn't know how you'd take it. Or if you could keep it secret."

"What am I supposed to tell Daniel?"

"You can tell him the truth, if you like. I'm ready for more people to know. No singing it from rooftops, but individual people - can be told."

[carillons]

"And you're an individual person and Daniel is an individual person!" says Damaris.