The Ender Quintet (Omnibus)

by Card, Orson Scott

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Qing-jao sat before her terminal, her eyes closed, thinking. Wang-mu was brushing Qing-jao’s hair; the tugs, the strokes, the very breath of the girl was a comfort to her.

  This was a time when Wang-mu could speak freely, without fear of interrupting her. And, because Wang-mu was Wang-mu, she used hair-brushing time for questions. She had so many questions.

  The first few days her questions had all been about the speaking of the gods. Of course, Wang-mu had been greatly relieved to learn that almost always tracing a single woodgrain line was enough—she had been afraid after that first time that Qing-jao would have to trace the whole floor every day.

  But she still had questions about everything to do with purification. Why don’t you just get up and trace a line every morning and have done with it? Why don’t you just have the floor covered in carpet? It was so hard to explain that the gods can’t be fooled by silly stratagems like that.

  What if there were no wood at all in the whole world? Would the gods burn you up like paper? Would a dragon come and carry you off?

  Qing-jao couldn’t answer Wang-mu’s questions except to say that this is what the gods required of her. If there were no woodgrain, the gods wouldn’t require her to trace it. To which Wang-mu replied that they should make a law against wooden floors, then, so that Qing-jao could be shut of the whole business.

  Those who hadn’t heard the voice of the gods simply couldn’t understand.

  Today, though, Wang-mu’s question had nothing to do with the gods—or, at least, had nothing to do with them at first.

  “What is it that finally stopped the Lusitania Fleet?” asked Wang-mu.

  Almost, Qing-jao simply took the question in stride; almost she answered with a laugh: If I knew that, I could rest! But then she realized that Wang-mu probably shouldn’t even know that the Lusitania Fleet had disappeared.

  “How would you know anything about the Lusitania Fleet?”

  “I can read, can’t I?” said Wang-mu, perhaps a little too proudly.

  But why shouldn’t she be proud? Qing-jao had told her, truthfully, that Wang-mu learned very quickly indeed, and figured out many things for herself. She was very intelligent, and Qing-jao knew she shouldn’t be surprised if Wang-mu understood more than was told to her directly.

  “I can see what you have on your terminal,” said Wang-mu, “and it always has to do with the Lusitania Fleet. Also you discussed it with your father the first day I was here. I didn’t understand most of what you said, but I knew it had to do with the Lusitania Fleet.” Wang-mu’s voice was suddenly filled with loathing. “May the gods piss in the face of the man who launched that fleet.”

  Her vehemence was shocking enough; the fact that Wang-mu was speaking against Starways Congress was unbelievable.

  “Do you know who it was that launched the fleet?” asked Qing-jao.

  “Of course. It was the selfish politicians in Starways Congress, trying to destroy any hope that a colony world could win its independence.”

  So Wang-mu knew she was speaking treasonously. Qing-jao remembered her own similar words, long ago, with loathing; to have them said again in her presence—and by her own secret maid—was outrageous. “What do you know of these things? These are matters for Congress, and here you are speaking of independence and colonies and—”

  Wang-mu was on her knees, head bowed to the floor. Qing-jao was at once ashamed for speaking so harshly.

  “Oh, get up, Wang-mu.”

  “You’re angry with me.”

  “I’m shocked to hear you talk like that, that’s all. Where did you hear such nonsense?”

  “Everybody says it,” said Wang-mu.

  “Not everybody,” said Qing-jao. “Father never says it. On the other hand, Demosthenes says that sort of thing all the time.” Qing-jao remembered how she had felt when she first read the words of Demosthenes—how logical and right and fair he had sounded. Only later, after Father had explained to her that Demosthenes was the enemy of the rulers and therefore the enemy of the gods, only then did she realize how oily and deceptive the traitor’s words had been, which had almost seduced her into believing that the Lusitania Fleet was evil. If Demosthenes had been able to come so close to fooling an educated godspoken girl like Qing-jao, no wonder that she was hearing his words repeated like truth in the mouth of a common girl.

  “Who is Demosthenes?” asked Wang-mu.

  “A traitor who is apparently succeeding better than anyone thought.” Did Starways Congress realize that Demosthenes’ ideas were being repeated by people who had never heard of him? Did anyone understand what this meant? Demosthenes’ ideas were now the common wisdom of the common people. Things had reached a more dangerous turn than Qing-jao had imagined. Father was wiser; he must know already. “Never mind,” said Qing-jao. “Tell me about the Lusitania Fleet.”

  “How can I, when it will make you angry?”

  Qing-jao waited patiently.

  “All right then,” said Wang-mu, but she still looked wary. “Father says—and so does Pan Ku-wei, his very wise friend who once took the examination for the civil service and came very very close to passing—”

  “What do they say?”

  “That it’s a very bad thing for Congress to send a huge fleet—and so huge—all to attack the tiniest colony simply because they refused to send away two of their citizens for trial on another world. They say that justice is completely on the side of Lusitania, because to send people from one planet to another against their will is to take them away from family and friends forever. That’s like sentencing them before the trial.”

  “What if they’re guilty?”

  “That’s for the courts to decide on their own world, where people know them and can measure their crime fairly, not for Congress to decide from far away where they know nothing and understand less.” Wang-mu ducked her head. “That’s what Pan Ku-wei says.”

  Qing-jao stilled her own revulsion at Wang-mu’s traitorous words; it was important to know what the common people thought, even if the very hearing of it made Qing-jao sure the gods would be angry with her for such disloyalty. “So you think that the Lusitania Fleet should never have been sent?”

  “If they can send a fleet against Lusitania for no good reason, what’s to stop them from sending a fleet against Path? We’re also a colony, not one of the Hundred Worlds, not a member of Starways Congress. What’s to stop them from declaring that Han Fei-tzu is a traitor and making him travel to some faraway planet and never come back for sixty years?”

  The thought was a terrible one, and it was presumptuous of Wang-mu to bring her father into the discussion, not because she was a servant, but because it would be presumptuous of anyone to imagine the great Han Fei-tzu being convicted of a crime. Qing-jao’s composure failed her for a moment, and she spoke her outrage: “Starways Congress would never treat my father like a criminal!”

  “Forgive me, Qing-jao. You told me to repeat what my father said.”

  “You mean your father spoke of Han Fei-tzu?”

  “All the people of Jonlei know that Han Fei-tzu is the most honorable man of Path. It’s our greatest pride, that the House of Han is part of our city.”

  So, thought Qing-jao, you knew exactly how ambitious you were being when you set out to become his daughter’s maid.

  “I meant no disrespect, nor did they. But isn’t it
true that if Starways Congress wanted to, they could order Path to send your father to another world to stand trial?”

  “They would never—”

  “But could they?” insisted Wang-mu.

  “Path is a colony,” said Qing-jao. “The law allows it, but Starways Congress would never—”

  “But if they did it to Lusitania, why wouldn’t they do it to Path?”

  “Because the xenologers on Lusitania were guilty of crimes that—”

  “The people of Lusitania didn’t think so. Their government refused to send them off for trial.”

  “That’s the worst part. How can a planetary government dare to think they know better than Congress?”

  “But they knew everything,” said Wang-mu, as if this idea were so natural that everyone must know it. “They knew those people, those xenologers. If Starways Congress ordered Path to send Han Fei-tzu to go stand trial on another world for a crime we know he didn’t commit, don’t you think we would also rebel rather than send such a great man? And then they would send a fleet against us.”

  “Starways Congress is the source of all justice in the Hundred Worlds.” Qing-jao spoke with finality. The discussion was over.

  Impudently, Wang-mu didn’t fall silent. “But Path isn’t one of the Hundred Worlds yet, is it?” she said. “We’re just a colony. They can do what they want, and that’s not right.”

  Wang-mu nodded her head at the end, as if she thought she had utterly prevailed. Qing-jao almost laughed. She would have laughed, in fact, if she hadn’t been so angry. Partly she was angry because Wang-mu had interrupted her many times and had even contradicted her, something that her teachers had always been very careful not to do. Still, Wang-mu’s audacity was probably a good thing, and Qing-jao’s anger was a sign that she had become too used to the undeserved respect people showed to her ideas simply because they fell from the lips of the godspoken. Wang-mu must be encouraged to speak to her like this. That part of Qing-jao’s anger was wrong, and she must get rid of it.

  But much of Qing-jao’s anger was because of the way Wang-mu had spoken about Starways Congress. It was as if Wang-mu didn’t think of Congress as the supreme authority over all of humanity; as if Wang-mu imagined that Path was more important than the collective will of all the worlds. Even if the inconceivable happened and Han Fei-tzu were ordered to stand trial on a world a hundred lightyears away, he would do it without murmur—and he would be furious if anyone on Path made the slightest resistance. To rebel like Lusitania? Unthinkable. It made Qing-jao feel dirty just to think of it.

  Dirty. Impure. To hold such a rebellious thought made her start searching for a woodgrain line to trace.

  “Qing-jao!” cried Wang-mu, as soon as Qing-jao knelt and bowed over the floor. “Please tell me that the gods aren’t punishing you for hearing the words I said!”

  “They aren’t punishing me,” said Qing-jao. “They’re purifying me.”

  “But they weren’t even my words, Qing-jao. They were the words of people who aren’t even here.”

  “They were impure words, whoever said them.”

  “But that’s not fair, to make you cleanse yourself for ideas that you never even thought of or believed in!”

  Worse and worse! Would Wang-mu never stop? “Now must I hear you tell me that the gods themselves are unfair?”

  “They are, if they punish you for other people’s words!”

  The girl was outrageous. “Now you are wiser than the gods?”

  “They might as well punish you for being pulled on by gravity, or being fallen on by rain!”

  “If they tell me to purify myself for such things, then I’ll do it, and call it justice,” said Qing-jao.

  “Then justice has no meaning!” cried Wang-mu. “When you say the word, you mean whatever-the-gods-happen-to-decide. But when I say the word, I mean fairness, I mean people being punished only for what they did on purpose, I mean—”

  “It’s what the gods mean by justice that I must listen to.”

  “Justice is justice, whatever the gods might say!”

  Almost Qing-jao rose up from the floor and slapped her secret maid. It would have been her right, for Wang-mu was causing her as much pain as if she had struck her. But it was not Qing-jao’s way to strike a person who was not free to strike back. Besides, there was a far more interesting puzzle here. After all, the gods had sent Wang-mu to her—Qing-jao was already sure of that. So instead of arguing with Wang-mu directly, Qing-jao should try to understand what the gods meant by sending her a servant who would say such shameful, disrespectful things.

  The gods had caused Wang-mu to say that it was unjust to punish Qing-jao for simply hearing another person’s disrespectful opinions. Perhaps Wang-mu’s statement was true. But it was also true that the gods could not be unjust. Therefore it must be that Qing-jao was not being punished for simply hearing the treasonous opinions of the people. No, Qing-jao had to purify herself because, in her heart of hearts, some part of her must believe those opinions. She must cleanse herself because deep inside she still doubted the heavenly mandate of Starways Congress; she still believed they were not just.

  Qing-jao immediately crawled to the nearest wall and began looking for the right woodgrain line to follow. Because of Wang-mu’s words, Qing-jao had discovered a secret filthiness inside herself. The gods had brought her another step closer to knowing the darkest places inside herself, so that she might someday be utterly filled with light and thus earn the name that even now was still only a mockery. Some part of me doubts the righteousness of Starways Congress. O Gods, for the sake of my ancestors, my people, and my rulers, and last of all for me, purge this doubt from me and make me clean!

  When she finished tracing the line—and it took only a single line to make her clean, which was a good sign that she had learned something true—there sat Wang-mu, watching her. All of Qing-jao’s anger was gone now, and indeed she was grateful to Wang-mu for having been an unwitting tool of the gods in helping her learn new truth. But still, Wang-mu had to understand that she had been out of line.

  “In this house, we are loyal servants of Starways Congress,” said Qing-jao, her voice soft, her expression as kind as she could make it. “And if you’re a loyal servant of this house, you’ll also serve Congress with all your heart.” How could she explain to Wang-mu how painfully she had learned that lesson herself—how painfully she was still learning it? She needed Wang-mu to help her, not make it harder.

  “Holy one, I didn’t know,” said Wang-mu, “I didn’t guess. I had always heard the name of Han Fei-tzu mentioned as the noblest servant of Path. I thought it was the Path that you served, not Congress, or I never would have …”

  “Never would have come to work here?”

  “Never would have spoken harshly about Congress,” said Wang-mu. “I would serve you even if you lived in the house of a dragon.”

  Maybe I do, thought Qing-jao. Maybe the god who purifies me is a dragon, cold and hot, terrible and beautiful.

  “Remember, Wang-mu, that the world called Path is not the Path itself, but only was named so to remind us to live the true Path every day. My father and I serve Congress because they have the mandate of heaven, and so the Path requires that we serve them even above the wishes or needs of the particular world called Path.”

  Wang-mu looked at her with wide eyes, unblinking. Did she understand? Did she believe? No matter—she would come to believe in time.

  “Go away now, Wang-mu. I have to work.”

  “Yes, Qing-jao.” Wang-mu immediately got up and backed away, bowing. Qing-jao turned back to her terminal. But as she began to call up more reports into the display, she became aware that someone was in the room with her. She whirled around on her chair; there in the doorway stood Wang-mu.

  “What is it?” asked Qing-jao.

  “Is it the duty of a secret maid to tell you whatever wisdom comes to her mind, even if it turns out to be foolishness?”

  “You can say whatever you lik
e to me,” said Qing-jao. “Have I ever punished you?”

  “Then please forgive me, my Qing-jao, if I dare to say something about this great task you are working on.”

  What did Wang-mu know of the Lusitania Fleet? Wang-mu was a quick student, but Qing-jao was still teaching her at such a primitive level in every subject that it was absurd to think Wang-mu could even grasp the problems, let alone think of an answer. Nevertheless, Father had taught her: Servants are always happier when they know their voices are heard by their master. “Please tell me,” said Qing-jao. “How can you say anything more foolish than the things I have already said?”

  “My beloved elder sister,” said Wang-mu, “I really got this idea from you. You’ve said so many times that nothing known to all of science and history could possibly have caused the fleet to disappear so perfectly, and all at once.”

  “But it happened,” said Qing-jao, “and so it must be possible after all.”

  “What came to my mind, my sweet Qing-jao,” said Wang-mu, “is something you explained to me as we studied logic. About first and final cause. All this time you have been looking for first causes—how the fleet was made to disappear. But have you looked for final causes—what someone hoped to accomplish by cutting off the fleet, or even destroying it?”

  “Everyone knows why people want the fleet stopped. They’re trying to protect the rights of colonies, or else they have some ridiculous idea that Congress means to destroy the pequeninos. along with the whole colony. There are billions of people who want the fleet to stop. All of them are seditious in their hearts, and enemies of the gods.”

  “But somebody actually did it,” said Wang-mu. “I only thought that since you can’t find out what happened to the fleet directly, then maybe if you find out who made it happen, that will lead you to find out how they did it.”

  “We don’t even know that it was done by a who,” said Qing-jao. “It could have been a what. Natural phenomena don’t have purposes in mind, since they don’t have minds.”

  Wang-mu bowed her head. “I did waste your time, then, Qing-jao. Please forgive me. I should have left when you told me to go.”