Necessity by Jo Walton Read Free Book Online Page B

circular temple down in the harbor district. Permission to build temples in the other cities was one of the terms of the new agreement. But they didn’t like to discuss religion. It always seemed to make them uncomfortable.
    â€œI have no new information, and no objection,” she said, her eyes veiled behind her lilac and beige outer lids.
    We voted, and to my relief there was a clear majority for following the plan. Aroo abstained. I set up the committee on investigation of other cultures, then formally closed the session for the day. Halius proposed an emergency meeting for the next morning, when we’d have more information from the ship. We voted, and it passed overwhelmingly. I knew I could count on Crocus to count the votes and analyze them, but I could tell at a glance that these votes cut across our usual party lines.
    So we were to follow the plan, and the plan called for us to squeeze out as much from the humans as we could before they came down. Crocus rolled down to join me and Dad where we were talking with Klymene and Aroo.
    â€œI’m going back to talk to the ship,” Klymene said. “Will you come out to the spaceport?”
    â€œI think that we should go to Thessaly first,” Dad said, including me in his glance.
    â€œI ought to go to Thessaly to pay respects too,” Aroo said. “First I will hurry home, and tell our ship that you will teach us the space human language. Perhaps I can find a volunteer to begin learning it immediately. Then when I have dealt with that, I will go briefly to Thessaly, and then out to the spaceport.”
    â€œWe’ll call for you on our way,” Dad said.
    â€œThank you,” Aroo said, giving a Saeli sideways head-bow, and left.
    â€œWho can we send to take a message to Porphyry?” I asked Dad.
    â€œHe’ll be here already, at Thessaly,” he said.
    Here for Pytheas’s wake, of course. “We should go and talk to him now,” I said. I was tired but excited.
    â€œYou did well in the chair,” Dad said. I glowed in his approval.
    â€œCan this really be human recontact, at last?” I asked, hardly able to believe it even now.
    â€œIt’s wonderful,” Dad said. “We’ll have so much to learn from each other. So much history to exchange. And we’ll be able to visit Earth, and their new planets. All that art!”
    â€œNo art raids on Earth!” I said, smiling at the impossibility.
    Dad gave a little laugh. “I wouldn’t put it past the Amazons if they had the means. Art exchange, now—wouldn’t it be something if we could get them interested in joining in!”
    â€œThey might want to join in the Olympics and other athletic contests, and be prepared to put some of their art in as prizes,” I said, excited at the thought. “It’s something we could suggest. It’s such a great way of having it circulate.”
    â€œAnd it keeps the young hotheads focused on competing instead of killing each other,” Dad said, soberly. He remembered the art raids, of course, and had lost his mother and friends to them. It was hard to keep in mind, when they seemed to me like old history.
    â€œWe should bring up such participation in negotiations,” Crocus said.
    â€œThey might even have made some new art in the centuries since. They must have. I wonder what it’s like?” I asked.
    â€œIt will be so interesting to find out, and to talk to humans,” Crocus said, then stopped. “You are humans too. What should we call them?”
    â€œEarth humans?” Klymene suggested.
    â€œBut we all come from Earth,” Crocus said. “Space humans?”
    â€œPerhaps they’ll have space Workers,” I said.
    â€œI would like that very much,” Crocus said.
    â€œMaybe we can call them by the name of their ship, or their civilization, when we know it,” Dad said.
    â€œI will come with you to the spaceport,