all your life. Now it's time to demand something back. Do you understand?"
"I'm not sure," I said.
"Who you are has always had to make room for what you are," Jane said. "You know that."
I nodded. It had.
"Part of that was because you were young, and what you are is so much larger than who you are," Jane said. "You can't expect a normal eight-year-old or even a fourteen-year-old to understand what it means to be something like what you are. But you're old enough now to understand it. To get an appreciation for it. To know how you can use it, for something besides trying to stay up late."
I smiled, amazed that Jane remembered me trying to use the treaty to stay up past my bedtime.
"I've watched you in the last year," Jane said. "I've seen how you interact with Hickory and Dickory. They've imposed a lot on you because of what you are. All that training and practicing. But you've also started asking more of them. All those documents you've had them give you."
"I didn't know you knew about that," I said.
"I was an information officer," Jane said. "This sort of thing is my job. My point is that you've become more willing to use that power. You are finally taking control of your life. What you are is starting to make room for who you are."
"It's a start," I said.
"Keep going," Jane said. "We need who you are, Zoe. We need you to take what you are - every part of what you are - and use it to save us. To save Roanoke. And to come back to us."
"How do I do it?" I asked.
Jane smiled. "Like I said: Demand something back," she said.
"That's unhelpfully vague," I said.
"Perhaps," Jane said, and then kissed me on the cheek. "Or maybe I just have faith that you're smart enough to figure it out on your own."
Mom got a hug for that.
Ten minutes later I was fifteen klicks above Roanoke and climbing, heading for an Obin transport, thinking about what Jane had said.
"You will find that our Obin ships travel far more quickly than your Colonial Union ships," Hickory said.
"Is that right," I said. I wandered over to where Hickory and Dickory had placed my luggage and picked out one of the suitcases.
"Yes," Hickory said. "Far more efficient engines and better artificial gravity management. We will reach skip distance from Roanoke in a little under two days. It would take one of your ships five or six days to reach the same distance."
"Good," I said. "The sooner we get to General Gau the better." I unzipped the suitcase.
"This is a very exciting moment for us," Hickory said. "This is the first time since you have lived with Major Perry and Lieutenant Sagan that you will meet other Obin in person."
"But they know all about me," I said.
"Yes," Hickory said. "The recordings of the last year have made their way to all Obin, both in unedited and digest form. The unedited versions will take time to process."
"I'll bet," I said. "Here we are." I found what I was looking for: the stone knife, given to me by my werewolf. I had packed it quickly, when no one was looking. I was just making sure that I didn't imagine packing it.
"You brought your stone knife," Hickory said.
"I did," I said. "I have plans for it."
"What plans?" Hickory asked.
"I'll tell you later," I said. "But tell me, Hickory," I said. "This ship we're going to. Is there anyone important on it?"
"Yes," Hickory said. "Because it is the first time that you have been in the presence of other Obin since you were a child, one of the members of Obin's governing council will be there to greet you. It very much wants to meet with you."
"Good," I said, and glanced at the knife. "I very much want to meet with it, too."
I think I actually made Hickory nervous right then.
PART III Chapter Twenty-Two
"Demand something back," I said to myself as I waited for the Obin council member to greet me in my state-room. "Demand something back. Demand something back."
I'm definitely going to throw up, I thought.
You can't throw up, I answered myself. You haven't figured out the plumbing yet. You don't know what to throw up into.
That at least was true. The Obin don't excrete or take care of their personal hygiene the same way humans do, and they don't have the same issues with modesty that we do when they're with others