Xenocide Part 11

Secret Maid

Is it true that in the old days, when you sent out your starships to settle many worlds, you could always talk to each other as if you stood in the same forest? We a.s.sume that it will be the same for you. When the new fathertrees have grown, they'll be present with you. The philotic connections are unaffected by distance. But will we be connected? We'll be sending no trees on the voyage. Only brothers, a few wives, and a hundred little mothers to give birth to new generations. The voyage will last decades at least. As soon as they arrive, the best of the brothers will be sent on to the third life, but it will take at least a year before the first of the fathertrees grows old enough to sire young ones. How will the first father on that new world know how to speak to us? How can we greet him, when we don't know where he is?

Sweat ran down Qing-jao's face. Bent over as she was, the drops trickled along her cheeks, under her eyes, and down to the tip of her nose. From there her sweat dropped into the muddy water of the rice paddy, or onto the new rice plants that rose only slightly above the water's surface.

"Why don't you wipe your face, holy one?"

Qing-jao looked up to see who was near enough to speak to her. Usually the others on her righteous labor crew did not work close by-- it made them too nervous, being with one of the G.o.dspoken.

It was a girl, younger than Qing-jao, perhaps fourteen, boyish in the body, with her hair cropped very short. She was looking at Qing-jao with frank curiosity. There was an openness about her, an utter lack of shyness, that Qing-jao found strange and a little displeasing. Her first thought was to ignore the girl.

But to ignore her would be arrogant; it would be the same as saying, Because I am G.o.dspoken, I do not need to answer when I am spoken to. No one would ever suppose that the reason she didn't answer was because she was so preoccupied with the impossible task she had been given by the great Han Fei-tzu that it was almost painful to think of anything else.

So she answered-- but with a question. "Why should I wipe my face?"

"Doesn't it tickle? The sweat, dripping down? Doesn't it get in your eyes and sting?"

Qing-jao lowered her face to her work for a few moments, and this time deliberately noticed how it felt. It did did tickle, and the sweat in her eyes tickle, and the sweat in her eyes did did sting. In fact it was quite uncomfortable and annoying. Carefully, Qing-jao unbent herself to stand straight-- and now she noticed the pain of it, the way her back protested against the change of posture. "Yes," she said to the girl. "It tickles and stings." sting. In fact it was quite uncomfortable and annoying. Carefully, Qing-jao unbent herself to stand straight-- and now she noticed the pain of it, the way her back protested against the change of posture. "Yes," she said to the girl. "It tickles and stings."

"Then wipe it," the girl said. "With your sleeve."

Qing-jao looked at her sleeve. It was already soaked with the sweat of her arms. "Does wiping help?" she asked.

Now it was the girl's turn to discover something she hadn't thought about. For a moment she looked thoughtful; then she wiped her forehead with her sleeve.

She grinned. "No, holy one. It doesn't help a bit."

Qing-jao nodded gravely and bent down again to her work. Only now the tickling of the sweat, the stinging of her eyes, the pain in her back, it all bothered her very much. Her discomfort took her mind off her thoughts, instead of the other way around. This girl, whoever she was, had just added to her misery by pointing it out-- and yet, ironically, by making Qing-jao aware of the misery of her body, she had freed her from the hammering of the questions in her mind.

Qing-jao began to laugh.

"Are you laughing at me, holy one?" asked the girl.

"I'm thanking you in my own way," said Qing-jao. "You've lifted a great burden from my heart, even if only for a moment."

"You're laughing at me for telling you to wipe your forehead even though it doesn't help."

"I say that is not not why I'm laughing," said Qing-jao. She stood again and looked the girl in the eye. "I don't lie." why I'm laughing," said Qing-jao. She stood again and looked the girl in the eye. "I don't lie."

The girl looked abashed-- but not half so much as she should have. When the G.o.dspoken used the tone of voice Qing-jao had just used, others immediately bowed and showed respect. But this girl only listened, sized up Qingjao's words, and then nodded.

There was only one conclusion Qing-jao could reach. "Are you also G.o.dspoken?" she asked.

The girl's eyes went wide. "Me?" she said. "My parents are both very low people. My father spreads manure in the fields and my mother washes up in a restaurant."

Of course that was no answer at all. Though the G.o.ds most often chose the children of the G.o.dspoken, they had been known to speak to some whose parents had never heard the voice of the G.o.ds. Yet it was a common belief that if your parents were of very low status, the G.o.ds would have no interest in you, and in fact it was very rare for the G.o.ds to speak to those whose parents were not well educated.

"What's your name?" asked Qing-jao.

"Si w.a.n.g-mu," said the girl.

Qing-jao gasped and covered her mouth, to forbid herself from laughing. But w.a.n.g-mu did not look angry-- she only grimaced and looked impatient.

"I'm sorry," said Qing-jao, when she could speak. "But that is the name of--"

"The Royal Mother of the West," said w.a.n.g-mu. "Can I help it that my parents chose such a name for me?"

"It's a n.o.ble name," said Qing-jao. "My ancestor-of-the-heart was a great woman, but she was only mortal, a poet. Yours is one of the oldest of the G.o.ds."

"What good is that?" asked w.a.n.g-mu. "My parents were too presumptuous, naming me for such a distinguished G.o.d. That's why the G.o.ds will never speak to me."

It made Qing-jao sad, to hear w.a.n.g-mu speak with such bitterness. If only she knew how eagerly Qing-jao would trade places with her. To be free of the voice of the G.o.ds! Never to have to bow to the floor and trace the grain of the wood, never to wash her hands except when they got dirty...

Yet Qing-jao couldn't explain this to the girl. How could she understand? To w.a.n.g-mu, the G.o.dspoken were the privileged elite, infinitely wise and unapproachable. It would sound like a lie if Qing-jao explained that the burdens of the G.o.dspoken were far greater than the rewards.

Except that to w.a.n.g-mu, the G.o.dspoken had not not been unapproachable-- she had spoken to Qing-jao, hadn't she? So Qing-jao decided to say what was in her heart after all. "Si w.a.n.g-mu, I would gladly live the rest of my life blind, if only I could be free of the voice of the G.o.ds." been unapproachable-- she had spoken to Qing-jao, hadn't she? So Qing-jao decided to say what was in her heart after all. "Si w.a.n.g-mu, I would gladly live the rest of my life blind, if only I could be free of the voice of the G.o.ds."

w.a.n.g-mu's mouth opened in shock, her eyes widened.

It had been a mistake to speak. Qing-jao regretted it at once. "I was joking," said Qing-jao.

"No," said w.a.n.g-mu. "Now you're lying. Then you were telling the truth." She came closer, slogging carelessly through the paddy, trampling rice plants as she came. "All my life I've seen the G.o.dspoken borne to the temple in their sedan chairs, wearing their bright silks, all people bowing to them, every computer open to them. When they speak their language is music. Who wouldn't want to be such a one?"

Qing-jao could not answer openly, could not say: Every day the G.o.ds humiliate me and make me do stupid, meaningless tasks to purify myself, and the next day it starts again. "You won't believe me, w.a.n.g-mu, but this life, out here in the fields, this is better."

"No!" cried w.a.n.g-mu. "You have been taught everything. You know all that there is to know! You can speak many languages, you can read every kind of word, you can think of thoughts that are as far above mine as my thoughts are above the thoughts of a snail."

"You speak very clearly and well," said Qing-jao. "You must have been to school."

"School!" said w.a.n.g-mu scornfully. "What do they care about school for children like me? We learned to read, but only enough to read prayers and street signs. We learned our numbers, but only enough to do the shopping. We memorized sayings of the wise, but only the ones that taught us to be content with our place in life and obey those who are wiser than we are."

Qing-jao hadn't known that schools could be like that. She thought that children in school learned the same things that she had learned from her tutors. But she saw at once that Si w.a.n.g-mu must be telling the truth-- one teacher with thirty students couldn't possibly teach all the things that Qing-jao had learned as one student with many teachers.

"My parents are very low," said w.a.n.g-mu. "Why should they waste time teaching me more than a servant needs to know? Because that's my highest hope in life, to be washed very clean and become a servant in a rich man's house. They were very very careful to teach me how to clean a floor." careful to teach me how to clean a floor."

Qing-jao thought of the hours she had spent on the floors of her house, tracing woodgrains from wall to wall. It had neer once occurred to her how much work it was for the servants to keep the floors so clean and polished that Qing-jao's gowns never got visibly dirty, despite all her crawling.

"I know something about floors," said Qing-jao.

"You know something about everything," said w.a.n.g-mu bitterly. "So don't tell me how hard it is to be G.o.dspoken. The G.o.ds have never given a thought to me, and I tell you that that is worse!" is worse!"

"Why weren't you afraid to speak to me?" asked Qing-jao.

"I decided not to be afraid of anything," said w.a.n.g-mu. "What could you do to me that's worse than my life will already be anyway?"

I could make you wash your hands until they bleed every day of your life.

But then something turned around in Qing-jao's mind, and she saw that this girl might not not think that was worse. Perhaps w.a.n.g-mu would gladly wash her hands until there was nothing left but a b.l.o.o.d.y fringe of tattered skin on the stumps of her wrists, if only she could learn all that Qing-jao knew. Qing-jao had felt so oppressed by the impossibility of the task her father had set for her, yet it was a task that, succeed or fail, would change history. w.a.n.g-mu would live her whole life and never be set a single task that would not need to be done again the next day; all of w.a.n.g-mu's life would be spent doing work that would only be noticed or spoken of if she did it badly. Wasn't the work of a servant almost as fruitless, in the end, as the rituals of purification? think that was worse. Perhaps w.a.n.g-mu would gladly wash her hands until there was nothing left but a b.l.o.o.d.y fringe of tattered skin on the stumps of her wrists, if only she could learn all that Qing-jao knew. Qing-jao had felt so oppressed by the impossibility of the task her father had set for her, yet it was a task that, succeed or fail, would change history. w.a.n.g-mu would live her whole life and never be set a single task that would not need to be done again the next day; all of w.a.n.g-mu's life would be spent doing work that would only be noticed or spoken of if she did it badly. Wasn't the work of a servant almost as fruitless, in the end, as the rituals of purification?

"The life of a servant must be hard," said Qing-jao. "I'm glad for your sake that you haven't been hired out yet."

"My parents are waiting in the hope that I'll be pretty when I become a woman. Then they'll get a better hiring bonus for putting me out for service. Perhaps a rich man's bodyservant will want me for his wife; perhaps a rich lady will want me for her secret maid."

"You're already pretty," said Qing-jao.

w.a.n.g-mu shrugged. "My friend Fan-liu is in service, and she says that the ugly ones work harder, but the men of the house leave them alone. Ugly ones are free to think their own thoughts. They don't keep having to say pretty things to their ladies."

Qing-jao thought of the servants in her father's house. She knew her father would never bother any of the serving women. And n.o.body had to say pretty things to her her. "It's different in my house," she said.

"But I don't serve in your house," said w.a.n.g-mu.

Now, suddenly, the whole picture became clear. w.a.n.g-mu had not spoken to her by impulse. w.a.n.g-mu had spoken to her in hopes of being offered a place as a servant in the house of a G.o.dspoken lady. For all she knew, the gossip in town was all about the young G.o.dspoken lady Han Qing-jao who was through with her tutors and had embarked on her first adult task-- and how she still had neither a husband nor a secret maid. Si w.a.n.g-mu had probably w.a.n.gled her way onto the same righteous labor crew as Qing-jao in order to have exactly this conversation.

For a moment Qing-jao was angry. Then she thought: Why shouldn't w.a.n.g-mu do exactly as she has done? The worst that could happen to her is that I'd guess what she was doing, become angry, and not hire her. Then she'd be no worse off than before. And if I didn't guess what she was doing, and so started to like her and hired her, she'd be secret maid to a G.o.dspoken lady. If I were in her place, wouldn't I do the same?

"Do you think you can fool me?" asked Qing-jao. "Do you think I don't know that you want me to hire you for my servant?"

w.a.n.g-mu looked fl.u.s.tered, angry, afraid. Wisely, though, she said nothing.

"Why don't you answer me with anger?" asked Qing-jao. "Why don't you deny that you spoke to me only so I'd hire you?"

"Because it's true," said w.a.n.g-mu. "I'll leave you alone now."

That was what Qing-jao hoped to hear-- an honest answer. She had no intention of letting w.a.n.g-mu go. "How much of what you told me is true? About wanting a good education? Wanting to do something better in your life than serving work?"

"All of it," w.a.n.g-mu said, and there was pa.s.sion in her voice. "But what is that to you? You You bear the terrible burden of the voice of the G.o.ds." bear the terrible burden of the voice of the G.o.ds."

w.a.n.g-mu spoke her last sentence with such contemptuous sarcasm that Qing-jao almost laughed aloud; but she contained her laughter. There was no reason to make w.a.n.g-mu any angrier than she already was. "Si w.a.n.g-mu, daughter-of-the-heart to the Royal Mother of the West, I will hire you as my secret maid, but only if you agree to the following conditions. First, you will let me be your teacher, and study all the lessons I a.s.sign to you. Second, you will always speak to me as an equal and never bow to me or call me 'holy one.' And third--"

"How could I do that?" said w.a.n.g-mu. "If I don't treat you with respect others will say I'm unworthy. They'd punish me when you weren't looking. It would disgrace us both."

"Of course you'll use respect when others can see us," said Qing-jao. "But when we're alone, just you and me, we'll treat each other as equals or I'll send you away."

"The third condition?"

"You'll never tell another soul a single word I say to you."

w.a.n.g-mu's face showed her anger plainly. "A secret maid never tells. Barriers are placed in our minds."

"The barriers help you remember not to tell," said Qing-jao. "But if you want want to tell, you can get around them. And there are those who will try to persuade you to tell." Qing-jao thought of her father's career, of all the secrets of Congress that he held in his head. He told no one; he had no one he could speak to except, sometimes, Qing-jao. If w.a.n.g-mu turned out to be trustworthy, Qing-jao to tell, you can get around them. And there are those who will try to persuade you to tell." Qing-jao thought of her father's career, of all the secrets of Congress that he held in his head. He told no one; he had no one he could speak to except, sometimes, Qing-jao. If w.a.n.g-mu turned out to be trustworthy, Qing-jao would would have someone. She would never be as lonely as her father was. "Don't you understand me?" Qing-jao asked. "Others will think I'm hiring you as a secret maid. But you and I will know that you're really coming to be my student, and I'm really bringing you to be my friend." have someone. She would never be as lonely as her father was. "Don't you understand me?" Qing-jao asked. "Others will think I'm hiring you as a secret maid. But you and I will know that you're really coming to be my student, and I'm really bringing you to be my friend."

w.a.n.g-mu looked at her in wonder. "Why would you do this, when the G.o.ds have already told you how I bribed the foreman to let me be on your crew and not to interrupt us while I talked to you?"

The G.o.ds had told her no such thing, of course, but Qing-jao only smiled. "Why doesn't it occur to you that maybe the G.o.ds want us to be friends?"

Abashed, w.a.n.g-mu clasped her hands together and laughed nervously; Qing-jao took the girl's hands in hers and found that w.a.n.g-mu was trembling. So she wasn't as bold as she seemed.

w.a.n.g-mu looked down at their hands, and Qing-jao followed her gaze. They were covered with dirt and muck, dried on now because they had been standing so long, their hands out of the water. "We're so dirty," said w.a.n.g-mu.

Qing-jao had long since learned to disregard the dirtiness of righteous labor, for which no penance was required. "My hands have been much filthier than this," said Qing-jao. "Come with me when our righteous labor is finished. I will tell our plan to my father, and he will decide if you can be my secret maid."

w.a.n.g-mu's expression soured. Qing-jao was glad that her face was so easy to read. "What's wrong?" said Qing-jao.

"Fathers always decide everything," said w.a.n.g-mu.

Qing-jao nodded, wondering why w.a.n.g-mu would bother to say something so obvious. "That's the beginning of wisdom," said Qing-jao. "Besides, my mother is dead."

Righteous labor always ended early in the afternoon. Officially this was to give people who lived far from the fields time to return to their homes. Actually, though, it was in recognition of the custom of making a party at the end of righteous labor. Because they had worked right through the afternoon nap, many people felt giddy after righteous labor, as if they had stayed up all night. Others felt sluggish and surly. Either one was an excuse for drinking and dining with friends and then collapsing into bed hours early to make up for the lost sleep and the hard labor of the day.

Qing-jao was of the kind who felt out of sorts; w.a.n.g-mu was obviously of the giddy kind. Or perhaps it was simply the fact that the Lusitania Fleet weighed heavily on Qing-jao's mind, while w.a.n.g-mu had just been accepted as secret maid by a G.o.dspoken girl. Qing-jao led w.a.n.g-mu through the process of applying for employment with the House of Han-- washing, fingerprinting, the security check-- until she finally despaired of listening to w.a.n.g-mu's bubbling voice another moment and withdrew.

As she walked up the stairs to her room, Qing-jao could hear w.a.n.g-mu asking fearfully, "Have I made my new mistress angry?" And Ju Kung-mei, the guardian of the house, answered, "The G.o.dspoken answer to other voices than yours, little one." It was a kind answer. Qing-jao often admired the gentleness and wisdom of those her father had hired into his house. She wondered if she had chosen as wisely in her first hiring.

No sooner did she think of this worry than she knew she had been wicked to make such a decision so quickly, and without consulting with her father beforehand. w.a.n.g-mu would be found to be hopelessly unsuitable, and Father would rebuke her for having acted foolishly.

Imagining Father's rebuke was enough to bring the immediate reproof of the G.o.ds. Qing-jao felt unclean. She rushed to her room and closed the door. It was bitterly ironic that she could think over and over again how hateful it was to perform the rituals the G.o.ds demanded, how empty their worship was-- but let her think a disloyal thought about Father or Starways Congress, and she had to do penance at once.

Usually she would spend a half hour, an hour, perhaps longer, resisting the need for penance, enduring her own filthiness. Today, though, she hungered for the ritual of purification. In its own way, the ritual made sense, it had a structure, a beginning and end, rules to follow. Not at all like the problem of the Lusitania Fleet.

On her knees, she deliberately chose the narrowest, faintest grain in the palest board she could see. This would be a hard penance; perhaps then the G.o.ds would judge her clean enough that they could show her the solution to the problem Father had set for her. It took her half an hour to make her way across the room, for she kept losing the grain and had to start over each time.

At the end, exhausted from righteous labor and eyesore from line-tracing, she wanted desperately to sleep; instead, she sat on the floor before her terminal and called up the summary of her work so far. After examining and eliminating all the useless absurdities that had cropped up during the investigation, Qing-jao had come up with three broad categories of possibility. First, that the disappearance was caused by some natural event that, at lightspeed, had simply not become visible yet to the watching astronomers. Second, that the loss of ansible communications was the result of either sabotage or a command decision in the fleet. Third, that the loss of ansible communications was caused by some planetside conspiracy. The first category was virtually eliminated by the way the fleet was traveling. The starships were simply not close enough together for any known natural phenomenon to destroy them all at once. The fleet had not rendezvoused before setting out-- the ansible made such things a waste of time. Instead, all the ships were moving toward Lusitania from wherever they happened to be when they were a.s.signed to the fleet. Even now, with only a year or so of travel left before all were in orbit around Lusitania's star, they were so far apart that no conceivable natural event could possibly have affected them all at once.

The second category was made almost as unlikely by the fact that the entire entire fleet had disappeared, without exception. Could any human plan possibly work with such perfect efficiency-- and without leaving any evidence of advance planning in any of the databases or personality profiles or communications logs that were maintained in planetside computers? Nor was there the slightest evidence that anyone had altered or hidden any data, or masked any communications to avoid leaving behind a trail of evidence. If it was a fleetside plan, there was neither evidence nor concealment nor error. fleet had disappeared, without exception. Could any human plan possibly work with such perfect efficiency-- and without leaving any evidence of advance planning in any of the databases or personality profiles or communications logs that were maintained in planetside computers? Nor was there the slightest evidence that anyone had altered or hidden any data, or masked any communications to avoid leaving behind a trail of evidence. If it was a fleetside plan, there was neither evidence nor concealment nor error.

The same lack of evidence made the idea of a planetside conspiracy even more unlikely. And making all these possibilities still less possible was the sheer simultaneity of it. As near as anyone could determine, every single ship had broken off ansible communications at almost exactly the same time. There might have been a time lag of seconds, perhaps even minutes-- but never as long as five minutes, never a gap long enough for someone on one ship to remark about the disappearance of another.

The summary was elegant in its simplicity. There was nothing left. The evidence was as complete as it would ever be, and it made every conceivable explanation inconceivable.

Why would Father do this to me? she wondered, not for the first time.

Immediately-- as usual-- she felt unclean even for asking such a question, for doubting her father's perfect correctness in all his decisions. She needed to wash, just a little, to take away the impurity of her doubt.

But she didn't wash. Instead she let the voice of the G.o.ds swell inside her, let their command grow more urgent. This time she wasn't resisting out of a righteous desire to grow more disciplined. This time she was deliberately trying to attract as much attention as possible from the G.o.ds. Only when she was panting with the need to cleanse herself, only when she shuddered at the most casual touch of her own flesh-- a hand brushing a knee-- only then did she voice her question.