The Best of All Possible Worlds

by Karen Lord

  “Beg pardon?” I said in Standard, genuinely confused as to his meaning.

  Still speaking Sadiri, Joral tried for greater precision. “It is possible that he is awake, but his eyes are not open, he is not moving, and his mind … his mind is closed.”

  I stood still, completely at a loss. “What do you want me to do?”

  “I do not know,” he replied with simple honesty.

  “Nasiha, Tarik—” I began.

  “He would not wish them to see him like this.”

  Something about the way he said it gave me a clue. “This has happened before,” I accused him, a statement, not a question.

  He nodded, stood up, and stepped aside, leaving the way clear for me to enter. I stared at him then went in slowly, not knowing what to expect.

  Dllenahkh lay on his side in the narrow government-issue cot, not quite fetal but certainly curled into himself, the blanket pulled up to just below a bare shoulder. There were signs that he was awake. The firm grip of his left hand on his right wrist, the tension around his eyes as his eyelids pressed tightly closed, and his shallow, uneven breathing all spoke of distress.

  I knelt by his head, too astonished to feel awkward. “Dllenahkh? Will you get up?”

  Feeble, I know, but amazingly it got a response. “I am tired,” he said slowly. “Leave me alone.”

  “For some reason, I don’t think I should,” I replied. To my own incredulous ears, my voice sounded as ordinary as if discussing an inspection checklist. “I think you should get up and come for a walk with me.”

  He remained still for a while, but his eyes opened, though they kept looking carefully past me. I glanced around for something to help restart the conversation and saw an undershirt and tunic neatly folded nearby. Trust a Sadiri to have a breakdown but still not neglect the small domestic rituals.

  “Here’s your shirt,” I said inanely. “Let’s put it on, shall we?”

  Still looking away, he heaved a great sigh and sat up slowly. He allowed me to maneuver the undershirt over his head, then heavily moved his arms to finish putting it on. His hair was mussed, and I resisted the urge to pat it back into place.

  “What’s happened to you?” I whispered.

  “Overextended myself,” he mumbled. “So much anger back there. So tiring to keep it out.”

  I knew there was more to it than that, but I said nothing, only handed him the tunic and looked around for his boots.

  “There,” I said at last with a weak attempt at cheerfulness. “You’re all ready. Let’s go.”

  Joral joined us as we came outside, discreetly ignoring his superior’s rumpled appearance—or so I thought. Then I realized he was distracted by Lian. Already dressed, the Commissioner’s aide was trotting past with biosensor in hand.

  “Something’s tripped a perimeter alarm,” Lian explained. “Fergus is on it, but he wanted a sensor reading to be sure.”

  I was glad for the diversion. We could pretend we were still functional when lurching from crisis to crisis; it was the time for quiet and introspection that was dangerous. We jogged along behind, following Lian up a low hill to where Fergus was already in place, half kneeling with his pistol held point down but ready. He gestured for us to approach cautiously.

  I didn’t see it at first against the blond color of the grass, but then it moved—a short-haired animal rather like a wild dog in size and shape. The creature snuffled around briefly, tossed its head in the air as if sneezing from the dust, and then turned away to lope down the other side of the hill.

  Joral was the first to unfreeze. Mute, expressionless, he simply turned around and quickly went back the way we had come. I watched him go, frowning in puzzlement.

  “Wild dog?” Lian asked in hushed tones.

  “Savanna dog. I’ve never seen one before, but I hear they show up sometimes in this region,” Fergus said. “They shouldn’t be any trouble as long as we don’t bother their pups.”

  The two Science Council officers came rushing up the hill with Joral, biosensors at the ready. We followed them as they swept ahead for readings, followed them right to the sloping crest of the hill, and crouched there, obedient to their silent, frantic hand signals. I peeked through the coarse grass that fringed the crumbling edge and saw them: a small pack of dogs comfortably at home in the den they had made, sheltered and safe in the cleft of a small valley.

  “No,” said Dllenahkh.

  His voice sounded so strange that I looked at him sharply, immediately afraid that he was slipping into that frozen depression again. He felt my concerned gaze and turned to me.

  “No,” he repeated with the most brilliant and beautiful smile that I never expected to see on a Sadiri. “Not a savanna dog. Sadiri. Look.”

  He gazed down intently into the valley, and one by one, first adults and then pups, they went from a panting, relaxed demeanor to closed-jawed alertness. Their noses pointed inquiringly at the air—Who? Who? Then they looked at Dllenahkh, looked straight at him through all the brush and grass. Their jaws relaxed once more as if grinning in welcome, and their short whiplike tails thumped the ground and whisked the grass in slow, cautious approval.

  “Sadiri dogs, so far from home,” murmured Dllenahkh. “The taSadiri must have brought them. So few remain now. The Science Council keeps them under protection.”

  Nasiha and Tarik did not once take their eyes off the scene below them, nor did they set down their biosensors, but their free hands met and clasped together with a quiet passion that was like a promise. Joral’s face was more conflicted: subtle shades of anger and grief mingled with awe and gratitude. Dllenahkh … the first brilliance had faded, tempered with sorrowful acceptance, but still he smiled.

  I don’t know how long the team stayed on the hill—the Cygnians watching the Sadiri, the Sadiri watching the dogs. I left them there and went for a short walk and a cry before going back to camp. I wanted to be the first to tell Dr. Daniyel all about it when she woke up.

  HAPPY FAMILIES

  “So,” I said to Qeturah, “I have this friend …”

  She gave me a smile. It was the classic opening line for any counseling session. “Go on,” she prompted.

  “Well, they’ve got some fairly strict ethics about stuff like … telepathy and emotional control and such. They feel pretty strongly about it. Thing is, they’ve had to deal with a situation where someone was operating without those ethics.”

  “I see,” she said. “Did they feel vulnerable in this situation?”

  “Maybe they did. Maybe they felt they were strong enough to handle any direct attack. But I think what’s worse is that they felt responsible for others who might be hurt by this person.”

  “The person without the ethical standards,” she queried.

  “Yes. Because no one else seemed to think that there was anything wrong with how that person was behaving. Maybe they couldn’t see it, or maybe they thought it was normal. I don’t know. I think I’m kind of afraid to ask.”

  “What do you want for your friend?” she asked quietly.

  “I want them to feel … like they don’t always have to be responsible for other people. Like it’s okay to not be the strong one all the time. Maybe even okay to ask for help.”

  She was silent for a while. “Well,” she said carefully, “you can let your friend know that if they ever want to ask for help, I’m here to listen, I won’t judge, and I have ways of getting things done without breaching confidentiality.”

  I swallowed, feeling a thickness in my throat. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you. I hope I can get my friend to come talk to you directly.”

  Some people might think it’s kind of strange having your boss also be your doctor and psychiatrist, but we were a small team and Qeturah was a very good small-team leader. She took an interest in everyone, and she knew instinctively which voice to use and which hat to wear in which context. There were a lot of hats to juggle over the next few days. Central Government wanted the Sadiri and the Commissioner to come in for an
inquiry about the situation in Candirú, which remained volatile. The day after the flight from Candirú, we were off to Ophir, the nearest town with full facilities for teleconferencing.

  Dllenahkh gave his brief testimony first. There was a Sadiri savant among the investigators, and though he spoke little, he looked at Dllenahkh as if cataloging any and every sign of unusual behavior. Superficially, Dllenahkh seemed fine to me apart from an air of constant preoccupation, yet I was aware that unexpectedly discovering a much-loved breed of hometown fauna isn’t really what you might call a complete cure. That Sadiri savant must have seen something I missed, because during the tea break, Qeturah was kept in for a brief private consultation that then turned into orders for me.

  “Delarua, you know the Montserrat region pretty well?” she said as soon as she emerged from the meeting room.

  “I’ve got some family there; why?” I asked. Instinct honed by years of experience in the Civil Service made me drain my teacup and reach for an extra slice of cake to add to my napkin. It was good cake, and I didn’t want a little thing like duty getting in the way of enjoying it.

  “I want you to go with Councillor Dllenahkh to the Benedictine monastery at Montserrat. They’ve got a Sadiri priest and some monks housed there, and they’ll help him realign his nodes or reverse his polarity or whatever it is he needs done to him. Fergus will fly you in today and pick you up Sunday afternoon.”

  Serendipity and guilt knocked jointly on my conscience. “Um … it’s a silent monastery. Do you need me to stay there with him or just take him there?”

  Qeturah frowned slightly. “I thought he was your friend. I want to have someone nearby to check on him, and you’re a familiar face. We can’t spare Joral; he’s got all the reports of their meetings.”

  I felt even guiltier. “No, I didn’t mean … What I meant was, d’ you mind if I take a couple of days to visit my sister? I’ll make sure Dllenahkh can reach me at any time, and I’ll get her to drive me back to the monastery the day before Fergus returns for us.”

  I bit my tongue. I hoped she wouldn’t think I was just taking advantage, though in a way I was, but it was for a good cause, an appropriate cause, even.

  Her face cleared. “Of course. All my family’s in Tlaxce, and I keep forgetting what it’s like when your kin are farther afield. Take a couple of days. Just don’t miss that shuttle.”

  “No, ma’am,” I said in relief.

  She glanced down at my stash of cake with a smile. “And yes, I do want you to leave immediately.”

  The half-hour trip was fairly quiet. I spent the first ten minutes of it psyching myself up, then excused myself to go to a monitor at the back of the shuttle and call my sister. Just to be sure, I called her personal communicator first, not her house comm. She answered in seconds, audio only.

  “Identify,” she said, her tone offhand and slightly rushed.

  Of course. I was calling from a general government comm, so my ID wouldn’t show up. “Maria, it’s Grace. How are you? How’re the children?”

  There was a slight, shocked pause, and the video flipped on. She hadn’t changed too much. A little fuller around the face, maybe, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. “Grace? How are you! Where are you! My goodness, it’s not a birthday or a special occasion—what’s happening?”

  I smiled. At least she seemed happy to see me. “Work’s happening. I’ll be in Montserrat for a few days. Think I could pop by for a quick visit?”

  “Yes!” Her response was breathless and wholeheartedly sincere. “The children will be so happy to see you, especially Rafi, and Ioan is always complaining that you never come by.”

  My heart lightened. It was going to be just fine. “Well, then, don’t tell them; let me surprise them! Is it all right if I land in the backyard in … oh … about three hours’ time?”

  She began to giggle. “Sure! Oh, this is amazing! I can’t believe it. Oh!”

  There was a voice in the background. She turned suddenly, one hand reaching out to swiftly kill the vid. “Nothing, dear! Coming in a moment!” She whispered hastily, audio-only. “Must go! See you soon! Bye!” Then the link died.

  I sighed, smiling slightly. Blood is blood, you know? There’s too much shared history and too many cross-connecting bonds to ever totally extract yourself from that half-smothering, half-supporting, muddled net called family.

  Speaking of which …

  “Dllenahkh,” I said, coming back to my seat at the front of the shuttle. “I’m going to abandon you for a couple of days, but you have my comm ID and you can call me any time. You know that, right?”

  He gave me a vaguely bemused look. “I have the comm IDs of all the members of the mission team. However, given that I am going to a monastery, the chances of anything happening over the next two days that I should need to report are—”

  “I know, I know,” I interrupted with a grin. “However vanishingly small a chance it might be, you can call me, okay?”

  He paused and seemed to recollect something, then graciously said, “Thank you. And you may call me as well, should you wish to do so.”

  I was warmed by his awkward little dip into small talk for the sake of courtesy.

  When we landed, a part of me almost expected the Sadiri priest to come flying out, grab Dllenahkh by the head, look deeply into his eyes, and exclaim, “My God, get this man to a meditation chamber, stat! Can’t you see his rudimentary telepathic integument is about to disintegrate?”

  Or not. But the image almost made me giggle, which would have been unfortunate.

  Of course, it was all very sedate and proper. I was intrigued that the Sadiri monks didn’t seem very distinct from the Benedictines. Their garb was different, but there was no separate building, no invisible bisecting line that said “Here be Sadiri.” The Cygnian guestmaster and his Sadiri counterpart showed us where Dllenahkh would be quartered, took us to the refectory for a little refreshment, and then saw Fergus and me to the door, where we bade Dllenahkh farewell.

  The flight to the homestead took less than ten minutes. I asked Fergus to set me down a little way from the main house so that the noise of the engines wouldn’t alert them. Fittingly enough, that meant I had the chance to run into one of my most favorite people in the world, my thirteen-year-old nephew Rafi. He was coming from the direction of the orchard, carrying a bucket of starfruit. At first he squinted at me in a very puzzled way, then recognition transformed his face into a wide-eyed, open-mouthed shout of happiness as he dropped the bucket and ran toward me. His exuberant warmth blew out uncontrolled like a hot gust of savanna wind, singeing me with a burning yet benign energy that matched his rough boy hug.

  Rafi has always been a beautiful boy, with his mother’s amber-brown skin, his father’s wavy brown and blond-streaked hair, and big brown eyes from both parents. He’s also my godson, and I adore him. He’d write me long letters filled with sketches and stories and send them by post that took at least a week to arrive. I’d always write back immediately, usually sending a small memory disk with games and other entertainment that I knew he’d enjoy. I doubted his parents were aware how often we corresponded. He had begged me not to tell them, and I indulged him, secretly glad to be the favorite aunt. I dreamed that we’d go traveling together when he was older and I was retired and properly eccentric. We’d ride elephants in the savanna, or join the crew of a sailing ship, or something.

  It felt silly to say it, so I never did, but I always felt like I’d never want any children of my own as long as I had Rafi.

  “You haven’t come to see me in ages,” he complained, tugging me by the hand to the main house.

  “Well, I’m here now.” I laughed. “Boy, go get that fruit. You can’t leave the bucket lying in the road so.”

  He gave a grimace and went to quickly gather up the scattered fruit. I snagged one from the bucket as he came back. There had been mangoes under the starfruit, and I hadn’t had a proper Montserrat mango in years. It was warm and fragrant when I held it to
my cheek.

  “Ahh,” I sighed.

  “If you came to visit me more often, you could have as many of those as you liked,” Rafi said pointedly.

  I smiled at him, pleased at his clean, honest indignation, mock persuasion, and adolescent sarcasm. “I love you too, boy.”

  “Maybe I should move to Tlaxce,” he hinted as we walked on to the house.

  “Maybe you should,” I said, even more pleased. As if Maria would let her golden boy out of sight, but at least he had thought about it.

  Maria came onto the veranda wearing a blue cotton dress, looking very matronly and homely with little Gracie clinging to her side, still sucking a thumb. She looked older than me, older in a way that only two children and homestead living can accomplish, but happy, both happy to see me and happy in general. I hugged her hard and tousled Gracie’s hair affectionately. She looked a bit too shy to hug just yet. She didn’t really know me.

  “Oh, Grace,” Maria sighed as she smiled at me and ushered me inside. “Only two days?”

  “I’m lucky it’s even that much,” I said, letting Rafi take my small bag. The living room was full of memories, all stuff my mother had handed over when she gave up the homestead after Papa’s death and retired to a condo on Tlaxce Lake.

  “Look who’s here, Ioan!” Maria called out.

  He came into the room, dusty and sweat-streaked from working outside. He wore his hair longer, brushing his shoulders, the gilt bands in the seal brown even more fiercely bleached by the sun. He was still lean, still handsome, still golden. He had been my fiancé once. My heart stumbled as a flood of half-remembered yearning seemed to pour out from him and envelop me. His eyes glowed with an inhuman warmth, and I thought I heard a whisper in his voice … Shadi. A strong memory to echo so loudly.

  “Hello, Ioan,” I said, and smiled proudly at how ordinary I sounded.

  “Shadi,” he said, breaking out into a huge, radiant smile. He’d always called me by my middle name. In a few quick steps he reached me and hugged me, picking me up half a meter from the ground in his fervor. “You came back. I knew you’d comeback.”