She concentrated on using all of her senses. Almost at once everything intensified. It was just as if she was in her physical body. She was home! The air had a different aroma somehow, she thought, fuller of wild roots and bushes, but how strange—the air itself had a loneliness in it, an odor of waiting … of suspension. She shook her head, unable to put what she felt into words. The air felt as if it was waiting for … people. For an instant Ma-ah felt close to men and women who would come, to that very spot. Unseen but felt voices seemed to murmur around her as if, unbeknown to her, she was surrounded by people in other times, close enough to touch, but divided by some invisible barrier.

It was as if … here, outside … she could sense people happening but not formed here in this particular focus. But there was activity all about—as there had been activity and tribes all around Rampa and her, though they’d never come near enough … never…. Ma-ah felt close to some personal revelation, and again she was frightened, overly excited. Yet another part of her was very calm, just waiting for the ignorant parts to understand.

She was outside, she thought. When she and Rampa had lived there before, how lonely they’d been. They’d never questioned their isolation, they’d just accepted it. Now she was shaking: Just who were her people? Where did she and Rampa come from? Why couldn’t they remember? And this Outside, how far did it go? They’d only traveled so far in it. The Speakers’ settlement had definite boundaries. How was it that she and Rampa had never wondered about that in the past? Or had they? Did they know and had they forgotten?

As she stood there a wind began to rise. It was gentle enough, yet it, too, had odors in it that she couldn’t place. How odd, she thought. She looked up at the sky and gasped involuntarily. She’d come from the sky! She knew it, could feel the rush in her belly as she made the descent from far up, down through the clouds.

It was impossible, of course; people didn’t come from the sky. At first Ma-ah thought that her consciousness was simply confused, but her thoughts were clear and distinct and her reasoning was functioning. The odd impression continued:

She came down….

In something like a round bird with open eyes on all sides, from … some large settlement … far above the clouds; she descended in a bird of metal that detached itself from something else—