It was ac-tu-al-ly only a few min-utes af-ter they walked away from Sis-ter Futi that Ki''el''s to-ken pulsed with qi. The three of them had bare-ly be-gun think-ing about what to do next, and Ki''el had be-gun think-ing about the space ring that the three of them shared, which Xam was tak-ing care of, and the only thing with-in it that mat-tered to her: the Aether Sword that Sobon had left her.


    But no, she made her apolo-gies and turned back, to find Futi half fac-ing one of the wall glyphs, her eyes glow-ing bright-ly from with-in. She turned as Ki''el ap-peared in the door, that light not dim-ming as she spoke.


    "Ah, my apolo-gies, Young Sis-ter Ki''el. As it hap-pens there is a re-quest that you may be well suit-ed for, if you are in-ter-est-ed."


    And that is how, half an hour lat-er, Ki''el found her-self in a pond, fetch-ing and wash-ing riv-er stones.


    Some-how, when Sis-ter Futi spoke of the task, she made it sound like some-thing no-ble and use-ful. An Out-er Dis-cio-ple had some need for a large num-ber of medi-um sized, plain rocks with min-i-mal qi, and if there should be any qi, it should not be Wind na-tured. There should be min-i-mal or no con-t-a-m-i-na-tion with any-thing else--moss would need to be re-moved, and any-thing more than a thin lay-er of riv-er slime was too much. For their pur-pos-es, it was not ac-cept-able to break a large rock into pieces, and shap-ing the stones with qi would de-feat the pur-pose.


    And so a dif-fer-ent out-er dis-ci-ple helped Ki''el bal-ance on a fly-ing stone rod as he took the two of them down far be-low the Moon-stone Is-lands and to a near-by riv-er. This dis-ci-ple spoke only briefly with her, his tone blunt and his eyes dis-tant, his face youth-ful but sug-gest-ing sev-er-al more years than it showed. When Ki''el in-tro-duced her-self, he only glared and did not speak, and Ki''el thought that more than ar-ro-gant, the man''s face seemed un-in-tel-li-gent, as though he did not have the room in his mind to hold what-ev-er he was think-ing of and a con-ver-sa-tion at the same time. This dis-ci-ple grudg-ing-ly de-liv-ered her to the ground, promised to fetch her some hours lat-er, and then left, leav-ing Ki''el alone near a for-eign riv-er with only a sect-pro-vid-ed space ring to hold stones in.


    It was not a small riv-er, ei-ther, and Ki''el found af-ter some quick div-ing that there were more rocks of the size she was search-ing for deep-er into the riv-er than at the edges, and so she spent her time div-ing and re-turn-ing to the edge, over and over, build-ing up a large pile of rocks. In truth, Ki''el did not find the task ob-jec-tion-able, not at first and not hours lat-er, when she had ac-cu-mu-lat-ed what she deemed to be a good quan-ti-ty of fist-sized riv-er stones. The riv-er wa-ter was not quite the same as sea-wa-ter, but she felt more at home in the riv-er than she had felt even in Sobon''s home in Emer-ald Val-ley.


    The space ring she was giv-en was more dif-fi-cult to use than she ex-pect-ed, and did not look like the ones by Lai Shi Po, and so in-stead of putting each stone in once she had it, she made a stack of them on the edge of the riv-er, and once the stack was a good size, she set to check-ing them, wash-ing them, and only then putting them away, find-ing that she need-ed to fo-cus in-tent-ly but care-ful-ly on mov-ing each stone in.


    She was cu-ri-ous to find that per-haps one in twen-ty of the stones that she had picked up out of the riv-er had what she sus-pect-ed was too much qi for the as-sign-ment, and for now, she sim-ply set those aside. Only once she had col-lect-ed per-haps a hun-dred stones did she look at the pile of qi laden stones and touch them, con-sid-er-ing them with her qi sens-es, or per-haps more cor-rect-ly, her aether sense. She did not know which was which, not ex-act-ly, but as she stud-ied the stones, she felt that the en-er-gy that col-lect-ed in the riv-er stones was not like her aether rings, but it was also not like the en-er-gy in her qi core. In-stead, most of it felt...


    Ki''el felt her thoughts in-ter-rupt-ed when at last the gift of her mas-ter Sobon ac-ti-vat-ed in her mind. It was an odd thing, and when it had been of-fered to her, it seemed a dif-fi-cult con-cept for the Tidal Coro-na--a pow-er-ful for-eign thing that Ki''el did not un-der-stand, most-ly--to try to ex-plain. Its best trans-la-tion of the gift was some-thing like an add-to, ar-ti-fi-cial-mind, and now it stirred.


    { Start-up, Phase 2 of 3, is ready to be-gin } a small win-dow in her mind told her. { This start up phase re-quires in-ter-ac-tion and can be de-layed. Do you wish to con-tin-ue? }


    Ki''el con-sid-ered, but when she could feel no sign of qi or dan-ger near her, found a place where she could sit with her feet in the riv-er, and fo-cused on the win-dow. [ Con-tin-ue. ]


    { Start-up Phase 2 re-quires you and to un-der-stand sev-er-al terms in or-der to in-ter-act prop-er-ly. The for-eign phrase (aug-ment) you trans-lat-ed as (add-to) is more cor-rect-ly (a thing added in while you re-main whole), specif-i-cal-ly, you will not suf-fer for it be-ing there. The for-eign phrase (aether AI) that you trans-late as (ar-ti-fi-cial-mind) is not in-cor-rect, but specif-i-cal-ly, it is (a com-plete mind with-out pur-pose or ego), specif-i-cal-ly, a mind that does not nat-u-ral-ly re-quire free-dom or in-de-pen-dence. }


    Ki''el frowned at those thoughts. They were all very clear in her mind; Ki''el could imag-ine that if she had been asked to ex-plain them to some-one, she might have used sim-i-lar words, but per-haps not quite the same. The flow of its thoughts was very sim-i-lar to her own, but clear-ly not hers. It was not that hard to tell that it was there, now that it was ac-tive, and there was no pain or dis-com-fort. She felt a lit-tle con-fu-sion... but she had known it was there, and ac-cept-ed it.


    { Dur-ing the first phase, I stud-ied your mind in or-der to do no harm while at-tempt-ing to join you. Dur-ing the sec-ond phase, you will need to show how you wish to in-ter-act with me. Un-til you are more com-fort-able, I will do noth-ing un-less you ask, and I will only do what you ask, even if I can do more. I be-lieve this is what you wish. Do you agree? }


    Ki''el was tempt-ed to speak out loud to it, but caught that in-stinct be-fore she did much more than breathe in. Both with-in the sect, and be-yond it, she did not want to get caught hav-ing a trea-sure as for-eign as this thing, as she was still wor-ried what oth-ers would think and do about it. So she only took a deep breath, feel-ing the cool wa-ter around her feet and an-kles, and let it out. [ Yes. ]


    { There are sev-er-al re-quests you will be able to make of me. I can help you re-mem-ber the rock and its aether. I can help you re-mem-ber what Sobon said about aether. I can help you vi-su-al-ize things. I can at-tempt to un-der-stand it and tell you what I think. I will not do any of these things un-less you ask. }


    Ki''el con-sid-ered. [ How do you think this match-es what Sobon said about aether? ]


    { Sobon spoke of Gen-e-sis and Con-sump-tion aether as pat-terns that ei-ther flowed end-less-ly out or end-less-ly in. These stones show those kind of pat-terns. }


    Ki''el had been on the edge of hav-ing the same thought be-fore the... aether AI? in-ter-rupt-ed her. She looked back at the pile of stones, not-ing that there were some of each there, stones that seemed to drink in the lo-cal aether and stones that seemed to leak it, but none of them were strong sen-sa-tions. In-stead, the ones that leaked aether only felt like a small swelling of the world around them, and the ones that drank only seemed to shrink the aether slight-ly.


    But... if the nat-ur-al en-er-gy of the stones was aether, and not qi, how did qi users make use of them?


    { Some of those an-swers ex-ist with-in me. You do not rec-og-nize the phrase (data-base), but it is a store of knowl-edge that Sobon left for you. Much of it was giv-en to her by oth-ers, but there are some places where he left her own thoughts. }


    That made Ki''el''s blood stir. [ I wish to know what Sobon left me. ]


    { Most of Sobon''s thoughts are about spe-cif-ic things, and you will hear them when you ask a ques-tion that she can an-swer. But she left you a note. I would have told you when we were done, but I can tell you now. }


    Ki''el closed her eyes, feel-ing the wa-ter, and took an-oth-er breath, in and out. [ Tell me now. ]


    [ Ki''el. ] Sobon''s in-ner voice was there, still with an echo of Alas-si''s voice to it. Be-cause Ki''el had known Sobon when he had first land-ed on the world--or, she found out lat-er, not when he first land-ed, but the sec-ond time--and been in the body of a squir-rel, she still did not think of the woman whose body Sobon had lived in re-cent-ly as Sobon''s true form, and some part of her did not like hear-ing that woman''s voice as part of the mes-sage. Still, she fo-cused on the words, and the feel-ing of the per-son be-hind them.


    [ I''m sure I didn''t say much lead-ing up to when I had to leave. This is per-haps the only way I could pos-si-bly tell you the truth, and I''m not sure you''re ready for it all yet. For cer-tain, you will not find many of the se-crets use-ful for many years, if you ever do. ]


    [ I need to tell you one im-por-tant thing, Ki''el, and that is that you have been more im-por-tant... to me, per-son-al-ly, than any-one else I''ve met on this plan-et. I was alone on a vi-o-lent world. Be-fore any-one else found me or did any-thing mean-ing-ful to help me, you gave me hope that there was any-thing at all on this damned world worth fight-ing for. What-ev-er hap-pens, if I can do some-thing to save you, I will. Liv-ing with-out some-thing to fight for is not liv-ing, Ki''el. ]


    If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    With-in the mes-sage, Ki''el could feel buried thoughts and feel-ings, ones not un-like the things Lui had man-aged to pry from Sobon by the end. Ki''el knew that she was still too in-ex-pe-ri-enced to know much, but these buried thoughts were clear-ly things that were heavy on Sobon''s mind.


    [ But more than that, ] Sobon''s men-tal voice cleared, but it was not as though a fog lift-ed, but more like it was placed be-hind walls, caged. [ I wor-ry that the world may need you. It''s un-kind of me to ask, but I hope that you will find a way to be-come tru-ly strong. Strong enough to face the strongest peo-ple in this world, by my side or with-out me. I be-lieve that you can do it, and if you are will-ing, I will do every-thing I can to teach you. ]


    Ki''el could not de-scribe the feel-ing that went through her at that thought. It was like watch-ing a beau-ti-ful thing hap-pen in the dis-tance--a wa-ter-fall, a bird div-ing and catch-ing a fish, a leap-ing dol-phin--but it rolled through her, crash-ing through her in ways she would nev-er have ex-pect-ed some-thing could. She found her bare feet clench-ing in the riv-er mud, and her fin-gers caught on the edges of the rock she sat on. It seemed a very wild thing for Sobon to say she want-ed, and wilder still for her to tru-ly be-lieve.


    And Ki''el could not im-me-di-ate-ly find it in her to ques-tion Sobon. If her mas-ter be-lieved she could reach the same heights that Sobon could, then Ki''el im-me-di-ate-ly thought it must be so, even if it made no sense to her at all. And if Sobon said that she should...


    Ki''el felt her heart beat-ing heav-i-ly, felt the sun-warmed rocks on her hands and the cool wa-ter on her feet, and lis-tened to the rest of the mes-sage while hold-ing her breath.


    [ I... could tell you why now, but I think I''d bet-ter wait. If I''m wrong, you''ll prob-a-bly know by now, but if I''m right, it''s a se-cret you''ll have to keep close, and per-haps it''s just bet-ter not to be think-ing about it. So fo-cus for now on learn-ing and grow-ing, and just know that I''m wait-ing for you. As-sum-ing I''m still out there, when you''re ready to hear the se-crets, just ask the Coro-na to con-tact me. We''ll prob-a-bly talk by re-lay be-fore then, but I don''t think we''ll meet in per-son for a long time. And we prob-a-bly won''t even do that for a while, even if I''m right. ]


    [ There are com-pli-cat-ed things go-ing on, but leave those to me for now. Take care of your-self, Ki''el, and I hope you nev-er feel alone. ]


    Ki''el only let out her breath and sucked in an-oth-er when the pain in her chest got to be too much. I hope you nev-er feel alone, she heard in her mind, and she un-der-stood what her mas-ter was re-al-ly say-ing. I know that pain, and I hope you do not feel it.


    She looked up at the sky, at the Moon-stone Is-land sect in the dis-tance, and al-though she prob-a-bly could have found a way to send Sobon a mes-sage, in-stead she sim-ply whis-pered, "I hope you do not feel it ei-ther."


    <hr>


    Over the next hour, Ki''els "aug-ment", or "aether AI," con-tin-ued to demon-strate what it could do a lit-tle bit at a time, com-mu-ni-cat-ing only through the lit-tle box in her mind, and then all at once, it sim-ply switched to say-ing some-thing else, a larg-er box ap-pear-ing all at once.


    { Start-up phase 3 is now ready. Dur-ing this phase, I need you to trust me, as I will at-tempt to put thoughts into your mind. I will not put in any-thing you do not ask me for, and I will do it very care-ful-ly. If you wish to wait be-fore try-ing this, we can. Do you wish to con-tin-ue? }


    Ki''el had gone from sit-ting on the rock to wad-ing fur-ther into the riv-er, but not so far that she was swim-ming, not now. She paused and turned her head, frown-ing. She... did not like things in-trud-ing into her mind, but she had al-ready ac-cept-ed this aug-ment, and she trust-ed Sobon com-plete-ly. [ Yes. ]


    Al-though it took a mo-ment and there was a first at-tempt that did not quite work, af-ter only a mo-ment, Ki''el found her-self pic-tur-ing a young Il-lan girl much like her-self, and she un-der-stood from the im-age that it was the aug-ment. The girl held out a hand, and in the hand was a thought, an in-tent, and Ki''el knew that she could name the aug-ment if she wished. And then the girl closed one hand and opened the oth-er, and in it was a short, con-nect-ed se-ries of thoughts, sug-gest-ing that she could choose to have an an-swer giv-en to her as a whole thought if she wished, but it would not be done un-til she was ready.


    A mo-ment lat-er, the girl dis-ap-peared, and Ki''el let out her breath in a dis-ori-ent-ed huff, squeez-ing her eyes shut. The im-age had giv-en her a slight headache; it was not more than that, but she didn''t like the sen-sa-tion. It was... not so strong that she hat-ed it, not yet, but she def-i-nite-ly did not feel like this was some-thing she want-ed right now. "Do not do that," she said out loud, tak-ing an-oth-er breath.


    { I will not do it un-til and un-less you ask. Some things are more eas-i-ly ex-plained with a whole thought, but it will nev-er be the only pos-si-ble way. }


    Ki''el took an-oth-er breath and let it out. She shook her head. "I think that is enough for now."


    { I will not do any-thing more un-til you ask for me again. } A mo-ment af-ter Ki''el had read the last mes-sage, the men-tal box dis-ap-peared, and Ki''el felt... more or less nor-mal.


    Still, she stood there for a long mo-ment in the riv-er, and when it was clear that the aug-ment was in-deed not com-ing back, she turned back to the small pile of nat-u-ral-ly aether-in-fused stones by the riv-er. Al-though she did not know what to do with the stones, or even if there was any-thing re-mote-ly use-ful to do with them, she went over and sat by them. Al-though some part of her was dis-pleased that some-thing else touched her mind--and was still there, though it did noth-ing--Ki''el forced those thoughts from her mind, try-ing to think of what she would have done, what she would have thought, if the whole con-ver-sa-tion had not hap-pened.


    Sobon had talked of the end-less flows out and in as only an-oth-er kind of cy-cle, like her left and right pow-er cy-cle rings, but it did not make sense, not ex-act-ly. It felt odd to her that she could find ex-am-ples so eas-i-ly in na-ture of things that showed the same out-ward and in-ward flows, but when she sim-ply sat and touched the stones for a time, con-tem-plat-ing them, she could sense some-thing.


    It was like a mem-o-ry in the stones, only, a mem-o-ry with-out self. If Ki''el put one out-stone and one in-stone next to each oth-er, the mem-o-ry of the two was the same--the end-less flow of the riv-er, some-times pulling at the stones, some-times push-ing at the stones. Only, the two stones had to-geth-er split that one mem-o-ry, so that one stone re-mem-bered the push-ing, and one stone re-mem-bered the pulling.


    The two to-geth-er form some-thing more, Ki''el mused, re-leas-ing the stones, and feel-ing her stom-ach rum-ble. She looked up at the sky, re-al-iz-ing that it had some-how got-ten much lat-er in the day than she had ex-pect-ed, but there was no sign of the sect Out-er Dis-ci-ple who said he would re-turn to get her.


    So Ki''el pulled out her sect to-ken and at-tempt-ed to fo-cus on Sis-ter Futi, puls-ing a sim-ple mes-sage with in-tent when she thought she was touch-ing the oth-er woman''s spir-it. [ Not picked up yet? ]


    There was only a heart-beat be-fore an ir-ri-tat-ed qi pulse came in re-ply, and with-in only a few min-utes, an-oth-er out-er dis-ci-ple ap-peared, this one a some-what more adult-look-ing woman who had shaved her head clean ex-cept, for a long pony-tail at the back. This woman was rid-ing what looked like a wo-ven mat made from a sin-gle liv-ing tree sapling, with its roots in a soil ball at the cen-ter. As she ap-proached, Ki''el no-ticed a rock hov-er-ing above her palm. "You are Ki''el?"


    "Yes," she said, gath-er-ing her-self up. "You are--"


    "I''ll bring you back." She low-ered the mat all the way un-til Ki''el could sim-ply step on it, and then it lift-ed off very quick-ly and eas-i-ly back to-wards the Is-lands. "Apolo-gies. Broth-er Zhon is very bad about hold-ing to promis-es like that, but keeps ac-cept-ing re-quests that he should not. What did they ask you to do here?"


    "Gath-er-ing riv-er stones, with-out qi."


    "Ah." She looked up. "Don''t re-sent the work. Some-day you too will find just how nice it is to be able to ask peo-ple to do some-thing ab-surd, so that you can con-tin-ue your work. You can call me Sis-ter Pin." The woman, stand-ing on the mat, clasped her hands and made a half bow, turn-ing her head down-wards, and Ki''el matched the woman''s pos-ture re-spect-ful-ly.


    "Sis-ter Pin. A plea-sure." Ki''el straight-ened, and the oth-er woman did so as well, im-me-di-ate-ly. "Thank you. Is this float-ing tree yours?"


    "Yes." Pin knelt down and gen-tly touched the soil ball at the cen-ter. "I have raised it for the last three years, but only re-cent-ly have I been able to chan-nel my own qi through it. It is tricky, be-cause it was not a spir-it plant to be-gin with, but that is my Way. Now it is able to com-mu-ni-cate with me, a lit-tle."


    Ki''el could sense that, in-deed, the plant had some-thing like a spir-it through it, but most-ly what she felt was Sis-ter Pin push-ing her own qi through her feet and into the tree, where it ac-ti-vat-ed some kind of ar-ray stone with-in the root ball. That stone, plus the arrange-ment of the plant''s wo-ven and twist-ed trunk, seemed re-spon-si-ble for the fly-ing ef-fect. "It is im-pres-sive work."


    "When I was still in the Less-er House, I thought so too, but in truth they ex-pect every-one to make use of the Fly-ing Stones. The ar-ti-fi-cial merid-i-ans with-in the tree are not a good match for it, I think. We''re here."


    Ki''el had been split-ting her at-ten-tion be-tween the tree mat and the ap-proach-ing is-land, and was not tak-en by sur-prise when Sis-ter Pin came up right next to the Less-er House. She stepped off and bowed, match-ing Pin''s ear-li-er ges-ture. "Thank you very much, Sis-ter Pin."


    "You seem to have a good soul, Sis-ter Ki''el," Pin re-turned the ges-ture. "Good for-tune to you, and don''t let the Less-er House up-set you. We all had to go through it."


    Ki''el nod-ded and straight-ened, turn-ing away, and by the time she had reached the door, Sis-ter Pin was long gone.


    Ki''el, when she turned in her space ring of stones, was only told by Sis-ter Futi that she had re-ceived sect points for her work, and then was im-me-di-ate-ly of-fered an-oth-er job weed-ing an herb gar-den, which she took with a bit of con-fu-sion. Rather than be-ing picked up by an-oth-er out-er dis-ci-ple, she was di-rect-ed down a se-ries of paths through the trees. When she fol-lowed the di-rec-tions, she found her-self sur-prised to emerge into a small clear-ing, still on the same small is-land that con-tained the Less-er House, where a clear-ly not-young man was sit-ting on a box, smok-ing a pipe in front of a small hut. He did not have a clas-sic Djang look, but one that Ki''el did not quite rec-og-nize.


    All around the hut, in every di-rec-tion, were rows and rows of low plants, all shad-ed by the for-est around them.


    "You are Sis-ter Ki''el. A plea-sure to meet you, I think." The sect broth-er who was smok-ing there seemed to put his pipe out with less than a ges-ture, and tucked it into an in-ner pock-et of his vest. "Sis-ter Futi does not warm up to peo-ple quick-ly, but she doesn''t hate you, and she sent you here, so she thinks you can be trust-ed not to screw this up. I am Both-er Arex."


    "Most-ly, what I ex-pect you to do is no harm. If you have even a mo-ment''s ques-tion as to whether some-thing is a weed, do not pick it. Some of these herbs have been grow-ing for years and still look like sin-gle half-grown blades of grass or pop-py leaves. Don''t weed an area un-til I point out which plants are sup-posed to be in it, and if there is any ques-tion at all, ask first. Is that clear?"


    Ki''el nod-ded, and got to work, won-der-ing just what oth-er tasks she would end up do-ing, and when ex-act-ly she would have the time to be-gin to com-pre-hend the com-plex-i-ties of qi and aether, and the mys-te-ri-ous aug-ment that her mas-ter had left her.