Father did not raise his voice. It was in the faintest whisper that he said, "First the gods. Second the ancestors. Third the people. Fourth the rulers. Last the self."
It was the clearest expression of the Path. It was the reason this world was settled in the first place. She had forgotten: If she was too busy to perform righteous labor, she was not on the Path.
She would never forget again. And, in time, she learned to love the sun beating down on her back, the water cool and murky around her legs and hands, the stalks of the rice plants like fingers reaching up from the mud to intertwine with her fingers. Covered with muck in the rice paddies, she never felt unclean, because she knew that she was filthy in the service of the gods.
Finally, at the age of sixteen, her schooling was finished. She had only to prove herself in a grown woman's task--one that was difficult and important enough that it could be entrusted only to one who was godspoken.
She came before the great Han Fei-tzu in his room. Like hers, it was a large open space; like hers, the sleeping accommodation was simple, a mat on the floor; like hers, the room was dominated by a table with a computer terminal on it. She had never entered her father's room without seeing something floating in the display above the terminal--diagrams, three-dimensional models, realtime simulations, words. Most commonly words. Letters or ideographs floating in the air on simulated pages, moving back and forward, side to side as Father needed to compare them.
In Qing-jao's room, all the rest of the space was empty. Since Father did not trace woodgrain lines, he had no need for that much austerity. Even so, his tastes were simple. One rug--only rarely one that had much decoration to it. One low table, with one sculpture standing on it. Walls bare except for one painting. And because the room was so large, each one of these things seemed almost lost, like the faint voice of someone crying out from very far away.
The message of this room to visitors was clear: Han Fei-tzu chose simplicity. One of each thing was enough for a pure soul.
The message to Qing-jao, however, was quite different. For she knew what no one outside the household realized: The rug, the table, the sculpture, and the painting were changed every day. And never in her life had she recognized any one of them. So the lesson she learned was this: A pure soul must never grow attached to any one thing. A pure soul must expose himself to new things every day.
Because this was a formal occasion, she did not come and stand behind him as he worked, studying what appeared in his display, trying to guess what he was doing. This time she came to the middle of the room and knelt on the plain rug, which was today the color of a robin's egg, with a small stain in one corner. She kept her eyes down, not even studying the stain, until Father got up from his chair and came to stand before her.
"Han Qing-jao," he said. "Let me see the sunrise of my daughter's face."
She lifted her head, looked at him, and smiled.
He smiled back. "What I will set before you is not an easy task, even for an experienced adult," said Father.
Qing-jao bowed her head. She had expected that Father would set a hard challenge for her, and she was ready to do his will.
"Look at me, my Qing-jao," said Father.
She lifted her head, looked into his eyes.
"This is not going to be a school assignment. This is a task from the real world. A task that Starways Congress has given me, on which the fate of nations and peoples and worlds may rest."
Qing-jao had been tense already, but now Father was frightening her. "Then you must give this task to someone who can be trusted with it, not to an untried child."
"You haven't been a child in years, Qing-jao. Are you ready to hear your task?"
"Yes, Father."
"What do you know about the Lusitania Fleet?"
"Do you want me to tell you everything I know about it?"
"I want you to tell me all that you think matters."
So--this was a kind of test, to see how well she could distill the important from the unimportant in her knowledge about a particular subject.
"The fleet was sent to subdue a rebellious colony on Lusitania, where laws concerning noninterference in the only known alien species had been defiantly broken."
Was that enough? No--Father was still waiting.
"There was controversy, right from the start," she said. "Essays attributed to a person called Demosthenes stirred up trouble."
"What trouble, in particular?"
"To colony worlds, Demosthenes gave warning that the Lusitania Fleet was a dangerous precedent--it would be only a matter of time before Starways Congress used force to compel their obedience, too. To Catholic worlds and Catholic minorities everywhere, Demosthenes charged that Congress was trying to punish the Bishop of Lusitania for sending missionaries to the pequeninos to save their souls from hell. To scientists, Demosthenes sent warning that the principle of independent research was at stake--a whole world was under military attack because it dared to prefer the judgment of the scientists on the scene to the judgment of bureaucrats many lightyears away. And to everyone, Demosthenes made claims that the Lusitania Fleet carried the Molecular Disruption Device. Of course that is an obvious lie, but some believed it."
"How effective were these essays?" asked Father.
"I don't know."
"They were very effective," said Father. "Fifteen years ago, the earliest essays to the colonies were so effective that they almost caused revolution."
A near-rebellion in the colonies? Fifteen years ago? Qing-jao knew of only one such event, but she had never realized it had anything to do with Demosthenes' essays. She blushed. "That was the time of the Colony Charter--your first great treaty."
"The treaty was not mine," said Han Fei-tzu. "The treaty belonged equally to Congress and the colonies. Because of it a terrible conflict was avoided. And the Lusitania Fleet continues on its great mission."
"You wrote every word of the treaty, Father."
"In doing so I only found expression for the wishes and desires already in the hearts of the people on both sides of the issue. I was a clerk."
Qing-jao bowed her head. She knew the truth, and so did everyone else. It had been the beginning of Han Fei-tzu's greatness, for he not only wrote the treaty but also persuaded both sides to accept it almost without revision. Ever after that, Han Fei-tzu had been one of the most trusted advisers to Congress; messages arrived daily from the greatest men and women of every world. If he chose to call himself a clerk in that great undertaking, that was only because he was a man of great modesty. Qing-jao also knew that Mother was already dying as he accomplished all this work. That was the kind of man her father was, for he neglected neither his wife nor his duty. He could not save Mother's life, but he could save the lives that might have been lost in war.
"Qing-jao, why do you say that it is an obvious lie that the fleet is carrying the M.D. Device?"
"Because--because that would be monstrous. It would be like Ender the Xenocide, destroying an entire world. So much power has no right or reason to exist in the universe."
"Who taught you this?"
"Decency taught me this," said Qing-jao. "The gods made the stars and all the planets--who is man to unmake them?"
"But the gods also made the laws of nature that make it possible to destroy them--who is man to refuse to receive what the gods have given?"
Qing-jao was stunned to silence. She had never heard Father speak in apparent defense of any aspect of war--he loathed war in any form.
"I ask you again--who taught you that so much power has no right or reason to exist in the universe?"
"It's my own idea."
"But that sentence is an exact quotation."
"Yes. From Demosthenes. But if I believe an idea, it becomes my own. You taught me that."
"You must be careful that you understand all the consequences of an idea before you believe it."
"The Little Doctor must never be used on Lusitania, and therefore it should not have been sent."
> Han Fei-tzu nodded gravely. "How do you know it must never be used?"
"Because it would destroy the pequeninos, a young and beautiful people who are eager to fulfill their potential as a sentient species."
"Another quotation."
"Father, have you read the Life of Human?"
"I have."
"Then how can you doubt that the pequeninos must be preserved?"
"I said I had read the Life of Human. I didn't say that I believed it."
"You don't believe it?"
"I neither believe it nor disbelieve it. The book first appeared after the ansible on Lusitania had been destroyed. Therefore it is probable that the book did not originate there, and if it didn't originate there then it's fiction. That seems particularly likely because it's signed 'Speaker for the Dead,' which is the same name signed to the Hive Queen and the Hegemon, which are thousands of years old. Someone was obviously trying to capitalize on the reverence people feel toward those ancient works."
"I believe the Life of Human is true."
"That's your privilege, Qing-jao. But why do you believe it?"
Because it sounded true when she read it. Could she say that to Father? Yes, she could say anything. "Because when I read it I felt that it must be true."
"I see."
"Now you know that I'm foolish."
"On the contrary. I know that you are wise. When you hear a true story, there is a part of you that responds to it regardless of art, regardless of evidence. Let it be clumsily told and you will still love the tale, if you love truth. Let it be the most obvious fabrication and you will still believe whatever truth is in it, because you cannot deny truth no matter how shabbily it is dressed."
"Then how is it that you don't believe the Life of Human?"
"I spoke unclearly. We are using two different meanings of the words truth and belief. You believe that the story is true, because you responded to it from that sense of truth deep within you. But that sense of truth does not respond to a story's factuality--to whether it literally depicts a real event in the real world. Your inner sense of truth responds to a story's causality--to whether it faithfully shows the way the universe functions, the way the gods work their will among human beings."
Qing-jao thought for only a moment, then nodded her understanding. "So the Life of Human may be universally true, but specifically false."
"Yes," said Han Fei-tzu. "You can read the book and gain great wisdom from it, because it is true. But is that book an accurate representation of the pequeninos themselves? One can hardly believe that--a mammaloid species that turns into a tree when it dies? Beautiful as poetry. Ludicrous as science."
"But can you know that, either, Father?"
"I can't be sure, no. Nature has done many strange things, and there is a chance that the Life of Human is genuine and true. Thus I neither believe it nor disbelieve it. I hold it in abeyance. I wait. Yet while I'm waiting, I don't expect Congress to treat Lusitania as if it were populated by the fanciful creatures from the Life of Human. For all we know, the pequeninos may be deadly dangerous to us. They are aliens."
"Ramen."
"In the story. But raman or varelse, we do not know what they are. The fleet carries the Little Doctor because it might be necessary to save mankind from unspeakable peril. It is not up to us to decide whether or not it should be used--Congress will decide. It is not up to us to decide whether it should have been sent--Congress has sent it. And it is certainly not up to us to decide whether it should exist--the gods have decreed that such a thing is possible and can exist."
"So Demosthenes was right. The M.D. Device is with the fleet."
"Yes."
"And the government files that Demosthenes published--they were genuine."
"Yes."
"But Father--you joined many others in claiming that they were forgeries."
"Just as the gods speak only to a chosen few, so the secrets of the rulers must be known only to those who will use the knowledge properly. Demosthenes was giving powerful secrets to people who were not fit to use them wisely, and so for the good of the people those secrets had to be withdrawn. The only way to retrieve a secret, once it is known, is to replace it with a lie; then the knowledge of the truth is once again your secret."
"You're telling me that Demosthenes is not a liar, and Congress is."
"I'm telling you that Demosthenes is the enemy of the gods. A wise ruler would never have sent the Lusitania Fleet without giving it the possibility of responding to any circumstance. But Demosthenes has used his knowledge that the Little Doctor is with the fleet in order to try to force Congress to withdraw the fleet. Thus he wishes to take power out of the hands of those whom the gods have ordained to rule humankind. What would happen to the people if they rejected the rulers given them by the gods?"
"Chaos and suffering," said Qing-jao. History was full of times of chaos and suffering, until the gods sent strong rulers and institutions to keep order.
"So Demosthenes told the truth about the Little Doctor. Did you think the enemies of the gods could never speak the truth? I wish it were so. It would make them much easier to identify."
"If we can lie in the service of the gods, what other crimes can we commit?"
"What is a crime?"
"An act that's against the law."
"What law?"
"I see--Congress makes the law, so the law is whatever Congress says. But Congress is composed of men and women, who may do good and evil."
"Now you're nearer the truth. We can't do crimes in the service of Congress, because Congress makes the laws. But if Congress ever became evil, then in obeying them we might also be doing evil. That is a matter of conscience. However, if that happened, Congress would surely lose the mandate of heaven. And we, the godspoken, don't have to wait and wonder about the mandate of heaven, as others do. If Congress ever loses the mandate of the gods, we will know at once."
"So you lied for Congress because Congress had the mandate of heaven."
"And therefore I knew that to help them keep their secret was the will of the gods for the good of the people."
Qing-jao had never thought of Congress in quite this way before. All the history books she had studied showed Congress as the great unifier of humanity, and according to the schoolbooks, all its acts were noble. Now, though, she understood that some of its actions might not see good. Yet that didn't necessarily mean that they were not good. "I must learn from the gods, then, whether the will of Congress is also their will," she said.
"Will you do that?" asked Han Fei-tzu. "Will you obey the will of Congress, even when it might seem wrong, as long as Congress has the mandate of heaven?"
"Are you asking for my oath?"
"I am."
"Then yes, I will obey, as long as they have the mandate of heaven."
"I had to have that oath from you to satisfy the security requirements of Congress," he said. "I couldn't have given you your task without it." He cleared his throat. "But now I ask you for another oath."
"I'll give it if I can."
"This oath is from--it arises from great love. Han Qing-jao, will you serve the gods in all things, in all ways, throughout your life?"
"Oh, Father, we need no oath for this. Haven't the gods chosen me already, and led me with their voice?"
"Nevertheless I ask you for this oath."
"Always, in all things, in all ways, I will serve the gods."
To her surprise, Father knelt before her and took her hands in his. Tears streamed down his cheeks. "You have lifted from my heart the heaviest burden that was ever laid there."
"How did I do this, Father?"
"Before your mother died, she asked me for my promise. She said that since her entire character was expressed by her devotion to the gods, the only way I could help you to know her was to teach you also to serve the gods. All my life I have still been afraid that I might fail, that you might turn away from the gods. That you might come to hate them. Or that you might not be wor
thy of their voice."
This struck Qing-jao to the heart. She was always conscious of her deep unworthiness before the gods, of her filthiness in their sight--even when they weren't requiring her to watch or trace woodgrain lines. Only now did she learn what was at stake: her mother's love for her.
"All my fears are gone now. You are a perfect daughter, my Qing-jao. You already serve the gods well. And now, with your oath, I can be sure you'll continue forever. This will cause great rejoicing in the house in heaven where your mother dwells."
Will it? In heaven they know my weakness. You, Father, you only see that I have not yet failed the gods; Mother must know how close I've come so many times, how filthy I am whenever the gods look upon me.
But he seemed so full of joy that she dared not show him how much she dreaded the day when she would prove her unworthiness for all to see. So she embraced him.
Still, she couldn't help asking him, "Father, do you really think Mother heard me make that oath?"
"I hope so," said Han Fei-tzu. "If she didn't, the gods will surely save the echo of it and put it in a seashell and let her listen to it whenever she puts it to her ear."
This sort of fanciful storytelling was a game they had played together as children. Qing-jao set aside her dread and quickly came up with an answer. "No, the gods will save the touch of our embrace and weave it into a shawl, which she can wear around her shoulders when winter comes to heaven." She was relieved, anyway, that Father had not said yes. He only hoped that Mother had heard the oath she made. Perhaps she hadn't--and so she wouldn't be so disappointed when her daughter failed.
Father kissed her, then stood up. "Now you are ready to hear your task," he said.
He took her by the hand and led her to his table. She stood beside him when he sat on his chair; she was not much taller, standing, than he was sitting down. Probably she had not yet reached her adult height, but she hoped she wouldn't grow much more. She didn't want to become one of those large, hulking women who carried heavy burdens in the fields. Better to be a mouse than a hog, that's what Mu-pao had told her years ago.
Father brought a starmap up into the display. She recognized the area immediately. It centered on the Lusitania star system, though the scale was too small for individual planets to be visible. "Lusitania is in the center," she said.
Father nodded. He typed a few more commands. "Now watch this," he said. "Not the display, my fingers. This, plus your voice identification, is the password that will allow you to access the information you'll need."
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