Two three hours after going to see Strongheart, the Earth people came back to their shelter again. It had been a strange meeting, Starlight told me later. In one way, Strongheart and Newjohn were just as excited as anyone else to have the Earth people among them, and they were proud proud too that it should happen when they were the bosses of their two grounds, because that would help to make sure that they were remembered in the stories of the future. But at the same time both of them were full of worries and doubts.

The Earth people were kind and polite.

‘Eden is beautiful,’ Deep said to Strongheart, ‘and the people are wonderfully welcoming.’

‘Thankyou, thankyou!’ Strongheart bowed low and gestured to them to sit down on the piles of skins that were arranged under the tall whitelantern tree in middle of his big big shelter. ‘We were raised well by our first mother, Gela, who came from Earth just like you.’

‘I notice you always talk about Gela here, Head Guard,’ Gaia said, when they were all squatting on the skins, by the big warm tree trunk, ‘and not so much about Tommy.’

‘Well, he was a bad man, wasn’t he?’ Strongheart said. ‘He disobeyed President and brought Gela here against her wishes, when she was only doing what President asked.’

Helpers came with mugs of badjuice and barks piled high. There were different kinds of flowercakes. There were little sweetbat hearts, smoked over a fire and stuffed with stumpcandy. There were small strips of dried spearfish.

‘Those red cakes are from Brown River where Newjohn comes from, across the Dark and way way down alpway,’ Strongheart told the Earth people. ‘The white ones are from Rockway Edge. The spearfish comes from way out on the bright water near—’

He broke off. High people always had food that came from far away – it was one of their ways of showing their reach and their power – but it had just occurred to him that, if you came from Earth, the distance these cakes and fish had travelled wouldn’t seem far at all, and he didn’t want to seem like some silly boasting kid.

The Earth people nibbled at the food and sipped at their badjuice. It was obvious they didn’t like it – last time they’d tried our food it had made them ill – but they pretended they did. Strongheart only picked at the food himself, and Newjohn selected a bit of dried spearfish and chewed at the edge of it, watching the Earth people with his clever pointy face.

‘What we wanted to ask you, Head Guard,’ Deep bowed as he wiped his hands and mouth with the strip of fakeskin Strongheart’s helpers had given him, ‘is if you would mind us spending a couple or three wakings exploring the forest here. We’re interested to learn more about the animals and trees. It will help us understand Eden better.’