Author's Note:
Next chapter isn't finished, so I don't know how long it'll take. But if you want me to post it when it's done, please review.
Thanks, korinth, for reviewing. I've implemented your suggestions.
Enjoy! :)

1

"…So the D'ni as a rule were proud, and such was their downfall. The wonders, the feats of their civilization only added to that pride."
"But you learned about them. You didn't get proud, did you?"
Atrus's face softened at his small daughter's keen question. "No, for my grandmother carefully guarded me against that."
"Then why don't we use it?" pressed Yeesha.
Her father's confusion showed in a mild frown. "Explain."
"Why didn't we take the D'ni technology? Not their civilization; not even all of it. Why don't we have a single aspect of their achievements?"
Atrus nodded respectfully, appreciating his daughter's sharp mind as he always did. "Because it was all D'ni technology. It would not have been our own."
"But we could've changed it to suit our purposes. Borrowed ideas already discovered."
Her father smiled faintly. "It would still not be ours," he said simply, and resumed his teaching.

• • •

And so, from her seventh year onward, Yeesha and her father disagreed.
Her arguments shifted from humoring her father to frustrating him. Not a class went by, it seemed, where she didn't criticize some aspect of his lecture.
"But why go through the same inventing process? It's like reinventing the wheel because our people group didn't invent it, itself."
"The wheel is an invention common to all peoples. Ages aren't."
"How can we know the wheel is in common unless we interact with other peoples? And how could it have spread barring the sharing of technology with less advanced cultures?"
"Sharing universally helpful tools is one thing. Sharing potentially dangerous techniques is another."
"Are you calling Ages dangerous?"
"Of course." Her father's gaze was mild. "Look what they did to my father."
"Who was raised with just enough D'ni civilization to make him proud, and not enough of it to keep him sane."
The rest of the class tended to ignore the debates between father and daughter, though a few clung to every word.
Yeesha's sickly mother Catherine was ashamed of her daughter's audacious behavior. "Can you not respect your father?"
"But I do respect him," the nine-year-old insisted. "I just think there's something wrong with his ideas."
"Then question him in private!" cried her mother. "Why must you cause discord?"
Yeesha frowned, perplexed. "What discord? Our debates have nothing to do with the masses."
"The masses still hear them."
"And they no doubt laugh at the girl rude enough to question her own father—and a renowned father, at that." This public disapproval of her actions kept her from having friends. The other children were forbidden to speak with her.
"Then why do you do it?" Mother's voice sounded tired, frail.
Yeesha carelessly shrugged. "Just the scientist in me, I guess. Question everything."
Her mother sounded disappointed. "I see."
Yeesha kept arguing.

• • •

"Yeesha?" a hidden voice whispered.
An exited trill went up her spine. "Yes?" she returned in the same tone.
"Insolent daughter of Atrus?"
Yeesha laughed. "That would be me."
A boy stuck his head out from behind the boxes, glancing around. "Come on," he said quickly. "My father wants to meet you."
And so she met Pello, son of Herin.
Herin, getting on in years, greeted her warmly. "Any defender of D'ni is welcome here." The odd gleam in his eye intrigued her.
"I'm the only one," Yeesha sprightly admitted. "But thanks."
Herin chuckled. "So you think, dear. So you think."
This disturbed the girl. Was she really stirring the discord her mother said she was? Nonetheless, she took Herin up on his offer.

• • •

One day Herin had called together a group of friends. "Come, child," he beckoned to her. "Tell us grayhairs your reasonings."
Yeesha spoke carefully, not criticizing her father in any way. She refused to turn the people against her father. She may disagree with him, but she would not have him overthrown. She could see his reasons for doing most of what he did, and wise ones they were. But were not risks involved with any advancement?
This thought she kept completely to herself.
During the discussion, she noticed a D'ni symbol on Herin's table, exposed by a rip in the tablecloth.
Curious, she swiftly brushed the cloth aside, glimpsing the other words and committing them to memory. Though Father insisted that they were entirely separate from D'ni, they used the same language and writing—learned such from the same book, too: the Rehevkor.
As quickly as she moved the cloth, Herin's son Pello swept it back, fear in his eyes.
Her amiable smile and chatter didn't waver, and she nodded at Pello. She glanced at Herin, seeing that he'd missed the encounter. Good, for Pello's expression had told Yeesha what the old D'ni chest held.
Books.

• • •

With much prodding and threatening Yeesha got Pello to let her see them.
They managed it at a festival. Everyone was out enjoying themselves, so it was quite easy for them to sneak back to his dwelling. Uneasily, he opened the chest.
Yeesha gasped, seeing more than she'd expected. Indeed, the chest was filled as tightly as possible with nothing but—
She lifted the vial from among the books. "D'ni ink," she whispered in awe. Yeesha shot Pello a daring grin and poured a few drops of the precious ink into one of the test tubes she kept on hand.
Pello gulped.
Swiftly, she thumbed through the books, skimming the descriptive panel until she came across what she wanted.
"See this?" she showed him the flaw. "This Age is unstable."
And with that, she tore a page from the Book. Pello's eyes grew wide, and he paled. He swallowed, made a little sound, but didn't rise to the challenge her face offered.
Mildly disappointed, she buried the marred book at the bottom. "Keep your father out of that one."
"He's never in them," whispered Pello.
Yeesha shrugged, and left with her treasures.

• • •

At first her new obsession worried her father.
"Why do you study ink-making, Yeesha?"
"It fascinates me, Father, how different inks dry differently, color differently, age differently."
He had accepted her explanation, but her mother hadn't.
"Beware of your grandfather's footsteps, Yeesha."
However Mother had linked Yeesha to the megalomanic Gehn, she'd never discovered. It did make her think before she acted, evaluating everything to make sure she wasn't following her grandfather's footsteps.
Yeesha absorbed her studies, learning the main of ink-making within a few years, Pello following suit. Her next area of study heightened her father's concern.
"Why study bookmaking? Is it not enough to let others make the paper you write on?"
"No," Yeesha replied. "For this, too, fascinates me."
Atrus's eye was on her almost constantly from that time forward. Knowing Yeesha's love for writing, he feared what she would do with that ability.
By eighteen, she had learned the basics of both ink and book making, filling journals with all possible details. She'd also developed her own version of the ancient D'ni formula. All she needed was to test it.

• • •

It took a year, but she was able to quietly have a book made with her paper and a vial filled with her ink.
Yeesha decided not to bother with copying a forbidden Age as a test—it would take too much time; be too big. She would write two Linking Books herself. One to go somewhere; the other to return. If she had it wrong, neither would work. If she had it right, both would work, barring flaws in her own writing.
By the next year's Festival, she had both books ready. On that day, she disappeared.
Taking other peoples' things with her.