The Best of All Possible Worlds

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The Best of All Possible Worlds Page 13

by Karen Lord


  I laughed out loud, not least because I detected more than a touch of Freyda Mar in that statement.

  Then Tarik spoke up. “As more people learn about the mission’s work, there is a growing sense that it would be fitting if one or both of the single Sadiri on the team were to find wives by the end of the year as a sort of symbol of success for the broader undertaking.”

  My features struggled to find the right response to this news and settled on pained incredulity. “That’s ridiculous. For what Dllenahkh and Joral are doing, those people should have Sadiri princesses lined up for them when they get back rather than speculating about every ragtag and bobtail they happen to work with.”

  Dllenahkh’s eyebrows went up, as expected. “I am not familiar with that phrase, but if the tone is any indication, I would have to say that you are hardly in that category.”

  “Most kind,” I scoffed. “Look, you guys feel free to keep searching, but I’ve got some contacts at the Ministry of Family Planning, and once you’re both registered, we can draw up a list of candidates of a certain caliber.”

  “Most kind,” Dllenahkh said blandly, but for a moment I felt a strange flash of something electric, almost as if he were angry.

  “Well, it’s the least I can do for unwittingly blocking your prospects,” I said lightly, hiding my bewilderment at his reaction.

  “I think it is an excellent idea,” Joral said. “You could register too.”

  “I …” I faltered, trying to find a good excuse. Qeturah was already convinced I needed therapy, and I wanted to keep the Sadiri on my side. “I don’t see why not. Set a good example and all that. But let’s be sensible about this. You’ve got more choices now. Women are coming to you and inviting you to visit them. You could even return to the Seelie Court, maybe convince a few to become fully Sadiri. It might take a little time, but …”

  Nasiha looked amused, whether at my backpedaling or at the idea of Joral as Sadiri missionary to Elven women, I wasn’t sure. “Well, Joral, what do you think of this option?” she asked.

  Joral pondered for a while, then snapped out, “Unacceptable.”

  I was not the only one startled at the sharpness of his tone. Everyone seemed to straighten slightly as he went on with increasing intensity.

  “I want a wife, and children, and a family of my blood. I want sons and daughters who will look like my brothers and sisters who are gone, who will speak Sadiri and learn of Sadira and practice the mental disciplines. I want to see them married and grow old enough to see my grandchildren and great-grandchildren. I am the last of my line, the sole survivor of my family, like so many others on the homesteadings. The Councillor is right; why should any of us seek to be a member of a harem? Why should we desire frivolous things? I want—”

  “Joral—”

  “Leave him be.” Shockingly, the fierce words that cut off Dllenahkh’s attempt to bring Joral back to proper Sadiri behavior came from Nasiha. She knelt before Joral and spoke passionately. “We desire these things too. These are good things to desire, right and appropriate things. We shall see these things come to pass for you and for others. Your line will not die out.”

  I backed away, a lump in my throat. Collective grief is one thing, but the Sadiri are very scary when they get intense. I turned to see Lian watching wide-eyed from a distance and gladly found my excuse to leave.

  “Lian, you’re not going to help out Joral any time soon, are you?” I murmured.

  Lian answered with a head shake, still staring past me, awed at the sight of overwrought Sadiri.

  “Well, if you have a sister or a friend to recommend to Joral instead, that would be a nice gesture.”

  “I’ll look into it,” Lian said absently. “I keep forgetting how important this is to them, you know?”

  “I’m just as bad,” I said morosely. “Teasing you about Joral. Treating him like a boy and not a man. Treating Dllenahkh like …”

  Lian eyed me with great interest. “Like?”

  I frowned, trying to think. “I dunno. As if he’ll always be around to be my sidekick. Like I’ll never have to share him with a wife and children and—hah, from all they’re saying, grandchildren too. Don’t laugh at me, Lian, but I was jealous of that woman monopolizing his time and attention. I’ve never felt like that before.”

  “Hmm,” said Lian. “Well, I won’t laugh at you.”

  We walked away and gave them some privacy, but later on I caught Nasiha alone just as she was coming out of her quarters.

  “So,” I began cautiously, “is it too early to congratulate you?”

  Nasiha struggled, keeping her face neutral and her chin aggressively up, but then she exhaled and glared at me with a kind of proud defeat. “It is remarkable how you are able to be so perceptive in some areas and so obtuse in others. Yes, it is too early. It will be too early until, as Joral said, I can see my great-grandchildren. Then you may congratulate me.”

  “I won’t be alive then,” I said cheekily. “I’ll leave you a congratulations message that you can open whenever it seems right to you.”

  Nasiha gave me a determined look. “I believe young parents will become a new Sadiri tradition. You may yet be alive to see the fourth generation, perhaps even the fifth.”

  I nodded, imagining it and finding it good. “I’d stick around just for that. Maybe even tweak a gene to be sure.”

  She completely shocked me in the next moment. She put a hand on my shoulder not at all affectionately but more as if she were bracing me for something. “It would be advantageous for us to seek the assistance of suitable non-Sadiri for the education and care of our child. Tarik and I have agreed that given your experience and knowledge of the Sadiri language and culture, you would be the natural choice.”

  “Ah,” I said, panicked and wide-eyed under the strong grip of her hand. “This is an important duty. What does it entail?”

  “You would function as an elder member of the family. A godparent, if you will.”

  “Then … I would be honored,” I replied in wonderment.

  Nasiha seemed to calm down at this assurance. She released my shoulder, tilted her head, and considered me. “You were not fooling us earlier. Something about marriage frightens you.”

  I opened my mouth to remonstrate, and she raised a silencing hand. “Do not try to lie to me. Remember, I have documented your empathic and telepathic data, and I know a little about your ex-fiancé. I understand your difficulty.”

  “You do?” I said. Nasiha in the role of supportive confidante was boggling my mind.

  “Yes. You have concerns that you may influence your spouse without intending to or that you may again be influenced without your knowledge. These are rational concerns, but your inability to deal with them properly is turning them into irrational fears.”

  “What do you suggest I do?” I said almost meekly.

  “You must learn how to shield your emotions and thoughts. You must learn how to protect yourself and others. There are aspects of the Sadiri disciplines that can help you achieve this. It is a practical solution.”

  “It is,” I agreed. My sense of relief at her blunt but insightful summary was so great that I felt myself grow an extra centimeter, as if a burden had literally been lifted from my back. I wondered, not for the first time, if the Sadiri had any concept of therapy in the gentle, lengthy Cygnian sense. I doubted it. It might just have been Nasiha, but there was an attitude of going straight in with a sharp blade instead of beating around the bush.

  “Excellent,” she barked out. “We will start tomorrow.”

  She walked away, leaving me stunned and not a little fearful of what the morrow might bring.

  RIDI, PAGLIACCIO

  “Training with Nasiha going well?” asked Qeturah absently, tapping out a report with a practiced staccato rhythm.

  We were working in a place called Crue, a midsize town that straddled a few key trade routes. The population was large but constantly changing: merchants, tourists in transit to more in
teresting places, and of course our fellow civil servants keeping the wheels of government moving smoothly (or, to quote Gilda at her most cynical, keeping the speed bumps of government before the greased wheels of commerce). It had little to offer in terms of taSadiri culture, but we were there for a teleconference of a more agreeable kind. The midpoint of the mission schedule was approaching, and the media wanted to give us a little attention. Qeturah and Dllenahkh had been interviewed, and the rest of the team got a piece of the spotlight as well. It was also a good time to catch up on paperwork and reports in actual offices with full-size desks, courtesy of the local branch of Central Government.

  “Quite well,” I replied, not hiding my pleased surprise. “She’s almost patient with me, but not too much. Keeps me sharp, y’know?”

  “Those early mornings alone would keep you sharp,” she said drily.

  Of course Nasiha would not sacrifice her own meditation time for me, so I had the dubious honor of rising even earlier than the average Sadiri for my training. “Well, she’d better let me off just this once, because tonight’ll be a late one.”

  We were going out on the town. I’d discovered that both Dllenahkh and Joral had managed to duck Gilda’s cultural tours, and Qeturah thought we needed a little change of pace. She, Nasiha, and Fergus opted for something contemporary in the form of a holovid at the local cineplex, and the rest of us were going to risk a stage production by a touring company. It was certainly rustic, right down to the paper playbill and glossy poster tacked up outside the theater.

  “The End of the Laughter. I recognize this one,” said Joral. “Is this the adaptation of Enough, the taSadiri tale of a man who kills his unfaithful wife and her lover?”

  “No,” said Tarik, shaking his head firmly. “You have made a common error. In this one, he kills the man that he mistakenly thinks is her lover while her real lover gets away. This is an adaptation of the Ainya play Deception, not Enough.”

  “Okay, not meaning to muddy the waters,” I said, “but I’m fairly certain that what we have here is a version of Otello, one of the old Terran standards. Kills his not-unfaithful wife on the say-so of a man who was out to get him.”

  Lian approached the poster more closely and read the fine print at the bottom out loud. “Based on the Italian opera Pagliacci.”

  We crowded around the poster. “Who dies?” asked Tarik with interest. “And was the infidelity real or alleged?”

  “Is there some other production we might attend which does not illustrate that dysfunctional pair bonding is endemic in most cultures?” asked Dllenahkh with heavy disapproval.

  I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Everyone’s a critic. Come on. Let’s go in.”

  Lian was already making for the foyer, and I began to follow when I sensed something strange in the atmosphere. Turning back, I saw that the Sadiri had paused, almost in midstride, and were watching a pretty girl with tumbling black curls dashing toward a side alley, presumably on her way to the back entrance of the theater. She held a coat and a handbag tightly in one hand and a pair of shoes in the other, as if she had grabbed them while running out the door and hadn’t had time to pull herself together. It might have been better if she had, for she was wearing one of the skimpiest dresses I have ever seen. Her legs were pretty much uncovered, and I have no idea how she managed to run so fast with so little support for her upper assets. All the skin on view, and there was plenty, radiated a muted shimmer. I’ve seen some women try to imitate that look with silicon- and mica-rich lotions, hoping to be taken for a Zhinuvian woman with flexible limbs and even more flexible morals. It never looks the same.

  Heads everywhere were turning, not just the Sadiri ones. There was a small collective sigh when she disappeared from view. I stared at my colleagues in amazement.

  “You—all of you—you were looking that girl up and down!” I didn’t know whether to be appalled or hugely entertained.

  “First Officer Delarua,” Joral said in a tone so severe that he almost sounded like Dllenahkh in chastising mode, “while it is true that we are Sadiri and therefore not prone to mental distractions, we are more than capable of aesthetic appreciation of the feminine human form.”

  I had no answer to that, so I rounded on Tarik. “Well, then, you—you’re married!”

  “I am allowed to look,” he said uncertainly.

  “I’d confirm that with Nasiha if I were you,” I said skeptically.

  Dllenahkh’s voice was utterly composed. “There is no need to be concerned, Delarua. Sadiri possess far too much mental control to be susceptible to the mesmeric influence of Zhinuvians.”

  “Oh, and that makes it better, does it?” I said. I was this close to wagging a finger and calling them naughty boys, so I made myself back off. I went and whispered to Lian instead, and we broke down in quiet tears of laughter at the concept of horny Sadiri.

  Our seats were midhouse near the central aisle—decent enough for what we were seeing and hearing. It was of a style referred to as neo-opera. It combined an absence of technological enhancement with a blend of contemporary styles of music, which meant that the performers had to be both vocally powerful and versatile. I wish I had time to tell you about the whole neo-opera movement and how it relates to the rustica backlash against audio smoothing and augmentation in musical performance and realissimo effects in holovidding. I will say that there is a simplicity in the staging. Not minimalist—that’s another style—but a simplicity that pretends at amateurism but most definitely isn’t.

  I wasn’t the least surprised to find that the mysterious golden girl was the leading lady, Nedda. Only a diva could risk turning up that late and not expect to be fired. I was surprised at the modesty of her costume, covering to neck and ankle and wrist. She was good, perhaps a little weak in the singing but with a presence and expressiveness that made up for it. Her husband, Canio, was played by a tall, dark, brooding type who seemed destined to go the Othello route, because this girl was just too popular. In addition to having a lover, Silvio, she had also attracted the attentions—unwanted, alas—of Taddeo. Silvio was unexpectedly weedy and scholarly, but Taddeo was boyish and sweetly besotted, offering a kind of comic foil to the unrelenting and obsessive passion of the two older men.

  The performers were not Terran method actors. Method actors call up a strange mask of remembered emotion and fit it to the situation on stage. You can feel the reality of it, but something jars a tiny bit if you know what to look for. These ones were of the Ntshune verisimilitude school, which is very similar but can only be mastered by those with a touch of empathic ability. Basically, the actors draw on one another’s feelings, and sometimes one great actor is all that is needed to provoke the right emotions and reactions from the rest of the company.

  I’m mentioning this to give a reason for what I was doing. I was reading the actors.

  Sadiri ethics on telepathy do not match Ntshune ethics on empathy. To the Sadiri, thoughts may be shared but are still considered private for the most part, and emotions are definitely private and must be shielded against as much as possible. Most Ntshune are comfortable reading anyone’s emotions. It’s part of how we communicate. We wouldn’t pry for feelings that aren’t intended for us, but projected emotions are fair game. A lot of Ntshune-influenced Cygnian cultures have internalized this distinction.

  So when I turned and whispered excitedly to Dllenahkh that I was picking up real jealousy from one of the actors on stage, he gave me a look that made me feel like Joral on the receiving end of a lecture on Sadiri comportment. I was confused.

  During the intermission, he pulled me aside and asked sternly, “What has Nasiha been teaching you?”

  I gave him a very old-fashioned look. “What I did in there has nothing to do with what Nasiha is teaching me. I was simply reading the actors, as I always do.”

  He didn’t back down. “The training you are receiving will improve and focus your empathic abilities, making casual use particularly unethical at this stage. I thought that you
of all people would appreciate this.”

  “Dllenahkh! They’re actors! I’m not digging for state secrets; I’m trying to enjoy the play at another level! Now, lighten up, please. People are looking at us strangely. I don’t think they’ve ever seen a Sadiri arguing before.”

  He exhaled slowly. “I am not arguing.”

  I had only been teasing him, but there was a tiny bit of stress on the word “not,” and for a moment he closed his eyes a fraction longer than a blink. “Of course you aren’t,” I said quietly, suddenly repentant. “I won’t do it again if it bothers you, okay?”

  During the second act, I found myself distracted by Dllenahkh’s unusual moodiness. He sat beside me, his attention entirely on the stage, but there was a set to his features that spoke of endurance rather than enjoyment. I began to feel guilty, but then when I glanced at Joral and Tarik, they appeared absorbed and interested. Not just a general Sadiri thing, then.

  Then I saw it. It wasn’t empathy—it was clearly visible on the man’s face. Canio looked across at Nedda, and his eyes spoke murder.

  I grasped Dllenahkh’s arm. “Tell me you didn’t see that.”

  “Grace,” he remonstrated, firmly removing my hand.

  I did something then that was definitely unethical. In that rare moment of skin-to-skin contact between our hands, I reached out to read Canio. An ugly wave of jealousy and hatred came from Canio, washing over us like fouled water. Dllenahkh’s hand convulsed on mine, for a moment gripping so tightly that it hurt, then fell away quickly.

  “How did you do that?” He sounded more stunned than disapproving this time.

  “Shhh! Listen!” I whispered frantically. It wasn’t the right word perhaps, but he understood, because slowly, almost unwillingly, he put his arm along the back of my seat and rested his palm discreetly against my temple.

  I concentrated on the scene before me. It was a moment of high drama when Canio is acting the part of Pagliaccio and becomes so overwhelmed with jealousy and passion that he forgets he is on stage and pressures Nedda to tell him the name of her lover. When he picked up a knife, I shivered; when he chased her off the ministage, caught her, and stabbed her in the belly, I jumped and turned away. I wasn’t the only one in the audience who did so, but I was probably the only one whose disbelief hadn’t been suspended. Dllenahkh broke contact with my temple and gripped my shoulder reassuringly.

 

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