The Terrorists of Irustan

by Louise Marley

  Tomas’s smile widened. “Thanks, Johnnie. Got some news for you.” He put his tray down next to Jin-Li’s. He glanced around dramatically. “They were in Onani’s office today, again!”

  “Who?”

  “The Irustani! Pretty important group—the chief director, Samir Hilel, and that medicant.” Jin-Li’s sudden and total attention made Tomas giggle. “Thought you’d be interested!”

  “What happened? What did they say?”

  Tomas shrugged elaborately, earrings dancing. “Sullivan was hot, Onani was cool.”

  “Tomas.” Jin-Li gripped Tomas’s fleshy forearm. “Tell me.”

  Tomas dropped his provocative manner. “Onani talked about what the dead men had in common, the women, the children. Chief director said it was nonsense. Said he didn’t see the pattern.”

  “And the medicant?” Jin-Li’s voice was barely audible.

  “What about her?”

  “What did she say?”

  Tomas spread his hands. “What could she say? She agrees with her husband, of course. She’s a woman, she knows nothing.” He wriggled with delight. “Sullivan was absolutely scarlet!”

  “Why? Why was Sullivan angry?”

  “Because Onani put him in his place,” Tomas said. “And because he told IbSada he’d leave it to him, Irustani business. Hilel wasn’t too happy about that, but IbSada was. Gratified. Power back in his own hands.” He giggled again.

  Relief made Jin-Li giddy. It was going to be all right. Despite Zahra’s challenge. They couldn’t get the message! If only Zahra would leave well enough alone now . . .

  Jin-Li wrapped the soy cheese in a napkin and stood up. “I have to go, Tomas. Something I have to do.”

  Tomas pouted. “What, Johnnie? You’re off the hook now, you know? We could have some fun! Where are you headed?”

  “Just an errand,” Jin-Li said. And then, smiling, “Tell you what, Tomas. Meet me later. Take a boat to the reservoir.”

  Tomas’s round cheeks flushed with pleasure. “Great, Johnnie. I’ll meet you in the common room. About two hours?”

  Jin-Li nodded, and hurried out of the meal hall.

  The streets of the Akros were quiet. The white sun dropped swiftly behind the hills, and a hot, still evening enclosed the city. Most Irustani households were settling in for the night as Jin-Li parked the cart behind Zahra’s clinic.

  In less than twenty minutes, the door to the dispensary opened enough to spill a wedge of light across the sidewalk. Jin-Li smiled in the dusk, feeling happier than she had in many weeks. She ran lightly up to the door and slipped inside.

  Once Jin-Li was in the dispensary, Zahra turned off the light and locked the door. She led the way to her office, and then locked that door as well. She turned on the desk lamp, and drew off her cap and veil before turning to face Jin-Li.

  “I heard about the meeting,” Jin-Li said in a rush. “I did as you asked. Exactly as you said.”

  “I know,” Zahra said. She looked tired, but somehow younger than she had the last time they had met. Her full lips curved upward, and the blue of her eyes was less intense, less layered than it had been. She gave a small laugh and rubbed her fingers over her eyes. “This has been an incredible day,” she said. She sank back against the edge of the desk and sat on it with a rustle of her long skirts. Jin-Li stayed where she was, standing very close, looking down at Zahra’s tousled long hair, her slender hands as they tried to straighten it. Jin-Li reached to help her undo the clasp, and Zahra shook her hair free. She lifted it up, letting the air cool her neck.

  “This morning, I saw no future for myself,” she said in a throaty voice. “And now—it’s as if it’s been given back to me!”

  “Has it?” Jin-Li asked. She thought she could watch Zahra like this forever, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright, long hair tumbling over her shoulders.

  But the effervescent mood bubbled away too quickly. Zahra laughed again, but ironically. “Listen to me,” she said. “As if 1 could make it all go away. Make it not have happened!”

  Jin-Li couldn’t bear the change. She wanted to see Zahra smile, see her eyes sparkle. “Please,” she said. “Start at the beginning. The whole story.” Zahra went behind her desk and sat down. She gathered her hair in one hand, and fastened it again with the clasp. “You may be sorry you asked, Jin-Li. You may wish you had never met me.”

  “I would never wish that.” Jin-Li pulled up the other chair and sat in it, leaning on the desk, waiting for Zahra to begin.

  * * *

  Zahra had known Jin-Li was coming. She could feel her presence, sense it, like knowing when the infrequent rains that fell over Irustan were imminent. She had given the excuse of some chore to do in the clinic, and hurried in through the surgery to look out the dispensary window. Jin-Li’s cart, parked in shadows, was almost invisible, but Zahra knew where to look.

  Now, in her office, she hesitated. If she told this woman—this friend—if she bared her soul to Jin-Li, what would that mean? Guilt had come to color every aspect of her life. Did she want to burden Jin-Li with it? Would it lighten her own load?

  Zahra looked down at the grain of the whitewood of her desk, the whorls and spirals, the small nicks and dents caused by years of use. When she looked back to Jin-Li’s smooth face, her heart jumped in her breast. Would Jin-Li judge, or absolve her?

  “All my life,” she began quietly, “has been about healing people. Trying to care for them. My teacher, Nura, had a single-minded dedication to her patients. I wanted to be like Nura.” She paused for breath. When she went on,her words tumbled over each other, piled up one upon the next. She told it quickly, poured it out in a flood.

  “All medicants have their share of patients they can’t help. We see sad things, hard things. But when Ishi came to me, when I learned what it was to love a child, to love her more than my own life, I lost my ability to separate myself, distance myself, from the tragedies. I treated a woman, a young mother, who was being beaten half to death by her husband. I couldn’t do anything to help her—oh, heal her injuries, file complaints with the directorate—but I had to send her back, keep sending her back. Eventually, he killed her. It was more than I could live with.

  “I’m not making excuses. But this is what happened. I never planned it. It seemed to just—just get started. And it was so easy. Too easy. For years I had been angry, struggling against things 1 couldn’t change. After all of this began, I wasn’t feeling angry anymore. That seemed good, until I realized I wasn’t feeling anything. No emotions at all, except for Ishi.”

  Jin-Li reached across the desk and took Zahra’s hand. “I know what it is to be angry. I watched my young sister die. I saw my mother’s face when my brother was killed.”

  “But you didn’t do—what I’ve done.” Zahra felt an irrational bubble of laughter in her throat. “It’s hard to say it, even now. It’s hard to speak it aloud.” “No need, then,” Jin-Li said. Fler hand was hard and dry, the palm calloused with work. “I think I know.”

  “You don’t know all of it, Jin-Li.”

  And Zahra told her everything, from the very beginning, leaving out only the names of the circle. She told Kalen’s story, and Maya B’Neeli’s, and Camilla’s. She didn’t hold back the details of Binya Maris’s death, or B’Neeli’s. She finished in a dry tone, “The shocking thing, Jin-Li, is that I could do it again. If I needed to.” She met Jin-Li’s gaze, her own eyes burning and dry. “If I wanted to.”

  She saw no judgment in Jin-Li’s face, no revulsion. The long, dark eyes were calm and clear.

  “Jin-Li,” she said. “Don’t you care what I’ve done?”

  Jin-Li’s expression didn’t change. “I care about you.”

  Zahra felt a wave of sadness, no more welcome than the absence of feeling she had felt for so long. Gently, she drew her hand from Jin-Li’s. “Better not,” she said. “But I thank you for it. From my heart.” She put her hand on the desk.

  “Zahra,” Jin-Li said. “Today—what happened today? Y
ou said you were given back your future.”

  “Oh.” Zahra had forgotten. Diya! Diya would not have Ishi after all! Ishi was safe, and that made joy flicker in her breast. And she herself might, after all, be safe. “Yes, something happened today. My apprentice—my Ishi— Qadir has decided she can stay with me a while longer, finish her studies.” “Is that so important?”

  Zahra hardly knew how to explain. It was the most important thing in her life. And yet, one day Ishi would leave, would have to leave, would have her own clinic, her own life. What control would she have over her life? Would she have a husband like Qadir, intelligent, disciplined, kind? Or would it be someone like B’Neeli? Qadir had not seen Diya’s nature—how could she trust him to understand another man’s?

  “We women of Irustan have no authority over ourselves. Our religion asserts the existence of a woman’s soul on the one hand, but on the other it denies the existence of her mind, her abilities. We hold on to our children as long as we can, but it’s not for us, the women, to say what becomes of them.” “Slavery,” Jin-Li Chung said. Her mouth was hard.

  “They call it protection.” Zahra stood up abruptly. “I’ve got to get back.” Jin-Li stood more slowly, reluctant to leave. “You have my number. Though I suppose you can’t use it.”

  Zahra gazed across the desk at the Earther woman. How beautiful Jin-Li seemed, how strong and capable—and free.

  “What is it?” Jin-Li asked.

  Zahra smiled a little. “It’s only that I wish I could go with you. Climb in your cart, just drive away.”

  “All right with me,” Jin-Li said gruffly.

  Zahra heard how bitter, how hopeless, her own voice was. “Oh, no,” she said. “There would be no place for me to go.”

  She turned off the lamp. The little moons shining through the small window cast a dim glow over the room. Zahra came around the desk and found Jin-Li in her path, and they stood facing one another for a long moment. When they came together their embrace was abrupt, a hard, hungry joining that forced the breath from Zahra’s lungs. Her breasts were pressed into Jin-Li’s chest, and she felt the tight binding that helped Jin-Li hide her own. She wondered what Jin-Li’s body was like beneath the binding, beneath her androgynous clothes.

  Zahra pulled back suddenly, shocked and confused. “Oh, no!” she cried softly.

  Jin-Li stepped back instantly, right to the wall. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry. My fault.”

  Zahra followed her, took one of her hands in both of hers. “No, not your fault. Both of us, together. But I—I can’t—this isn’t possible for me.”

  “I know that,” Jin-Li said. Her long eyelids hooded her eyes, her expression grew remote. “I always knew that,” Jin-Li added, but Zahra heard the tiny catch in her voice.

  They stood there, miserable, together and yet alone. Zahra searched for words.

  “My dear friend,” she said finally. “My life is not my own. My decisions are not my own. If I were free to drive away with you, I might decide to do it. I might make that choice. But I’ll never know.”

  “Forget it,” Jin-Li said roughly, in the voice of Longshoreman Chung, Offworld Port Force. “Please forget it.”

  Zahra caressed the rough hand she held in hers. “I’ll never forget it, Jin-Li,” she said softly. “Nor forget you.”

  She knew it sounded perilously like a farewell, but she couldn’t help it. She had a second chance, whatever burden of guilt she bore. Qadir had given her a second chance, and she meant to use it. She had offered up everything for her cause, and yet somehow she had failed. The cup had passed from her. Everything now rested in the hands of the One.

  A sound came to them from the surgery, a door opening and closing. From the dispensary came Ishi’s voice, worried, seeking. “Zahra? Zahra, where are you?”

  Zahra caught her breath. “Wait here!” she commanded swiftly, and left the office.

  “Ishi? I thought you were studying! What’s wrong?”

  Ishi met her in the hallway, and looked at her curiously. “What were you doing?” Ishi asked. “All the lights are off.”

  “Oh, I just turned them off,” Zahra said. “Just this moment. Come, let’s go to bed, shall we? I’ve done enough tonight.” She led the way into the surgery and opened the inner door.

  “Zahra,” Ishi said, “your veil!”

  Zahra put her hand to her head. “Oh, yes. Go on ahead, Ishi, I’ll get it. I forgot.”

  Ishi went through the door into the house, but she looked back over her shoulder as if afraid Zahra wouldn’t follow.

  Zahra smiled at her. “I’ll be up in just a moment.”

  When the door closed, Zahra hurried back to her office. The cap and veil lay where she had dropped them, but Jin-Li Chung was gone. Zahra picked up the veil slowly, looking around the little office for any sign of Jin-Li’s visit, finding none. Absurdly, her chest ached, just where their bodies had touched. Her step was heavy as she went into the dispensary to lock the outer door. She caught the brief flash of lights from Jin-Li’s cart as it pulled into the street and away. Its little motor was as quiet as a nightbird. Zahra lifted her hand, though she knew Jin-Li would never see it.

  thirty-seven

  * * *

  If a piece of fruit is rotten, do you leave it in the barrel to infect the rest? It is the nature of decay to spread, and so it is with sin. The sinful one must be removed from the community, prevented from tainting the innocent. There must be no hesitation, but only resolution. We are the chosen ones. It falls to us to keep Irustan pure.

  —Fourteenth Homily, The Book of the Second Prophet

  Zahra rose early the next morning. Ishi still slept, and Zahra smiled down at her flushed cheeks and tumbled hair. Zahra showered and dressed quickly, waking Ishi when she was done.

  “Oh, you let me sleep too late!” Ishi protested.

  “It’s all right. Qadir has an early appointment, and I’m going to have coffee with him. Come down when you’re ready.”

  Zahra felt as if she might float down the stairs to the dayroom. When had she last felt such energy? The blackness of the past months had vanished in the night. It seemed to her dazzled eyes that the star shone brighter today than it had in a long time. The tiles of the floor, the clean white walls, and the whitewood surfaces of the house glowed with reflected light.

  Qadir smiled and rose to kiss her cheek when she came into the dayroom. “This is a pleasant surprise, my dear,” he said. Diya came in a moment later, carrying Qadir’s case. He missed a step when he saw Zahra, and his face darkened.

  Qadir poured coffee. “Here, Zahra, share my breakfast. Cook sent in more than I can eat.” He pushed forward the plate of flatbread. She took some and poured oil into a saucer, feeling thoroughly and delightfully hungry.

  Diya and Qadir were on their way a short time later. Ishi ate breakfast with Lili while Zahra went on to the clinic. Their schedule for the day was light, and she planned to clean out the CA cabinet. In particular, she planned to dispose of one remaining small brown vial, labelled dikeh.

  She put on her medicant’s coat and went to the CA cabinet in the large surgery. She opened the door and cleared a path to reach for the little bottle. A voice behind her caused a premonitory chill to prickle her skin.

  “Medicant?”

  Slowly, Zahra drew her hand out of the CA cabinet. Almost without realizing it, she had picked up the brown bottle. The little vial was in her palm, hidden by her curled fingers.

  She said, “Diya? I thought you went with Qadir.”

  Diya spoke from the hall. “I dropped him at Water Supply, and I’m going on to the office. I came by to speak with you.”

  Zahra got to her feet, careful with the bottle in her hand. The brightness of the morning had grown harsh. The brilliance of the light burned her eyes. She closed the CA cabinet with a small click. “What is it, Diya?” she asked. “Are you ill?”

  She heard him take a step. “No, Medicant. I’m not ill.”

  “Yo
u can come into the surgery. I’ve closed the cabinet.”

  “I’d rather speak to you in your office.”

  Zahra hesitated. Diya shouldn’t be here. She had clearly heard his and Qadir’s plans for the day, and they did not include Diya’s presence in the clinic. She said, “Very well.” But she didn’t leave the surgery just yet. She turned and looked at the counter, trying to remember where it was.

  A small drawer under the counter opened at her touch without making a sound. An old-fashioned syringe, predecessor to the syrinxes of the medicator, lay in the back of the drawer, encased in antiseptic plastic. The syringe was small and slender, a clear plastic tube with a short metal needle that winked in the light. She slit the plastic and shook it out. She drew up the contents of the little bottle in her hand, and then capped the needle. She put the empty vial into the wave box and started the cycle. The syringe she dropped into a pocket of her coat.

  She didn’t look at Diya as she passed him in the hall. She went into her office and took her chair, regarding Diya above her verge. What happened now was up to him.

  He violated courtesy by closing the office door behind him. She acknowledged the offense with only the lifting of one eyebrow. “Diya?” she said, her voice throaty.

  “Medicant,” he said. He sat down in the chair across from her. His skin was shiny. His narrow features were tense, and his eyes flickered from side to side. “Medicant,” he repeated, and cleared his throat. “You’re going to tell the chief director you’ve changed your mind. About Ishi.”

  It was out. Zahra knew he had always wanted to give her an order, to assert his natural authority over her. A man of the household had precedence over a woman of the household. But he had never had an opportunity. He had steeled himself to this, worked himself up to it. And she knew he could not have done it unless he felt he had a weapon, something that gave him power over her.

  She kept her eyes fixed on his. “Changed my mind?”