“I don’t believe it. You’re making this up.”
“No … no. It’s true.”
“You have women of your own there?”
“Women of my … Well, it’s not like that, not ownership … ahhh, not possession.”
“What about children?”
“What about them?”
“How’re they treated, educated?”
He sighed, sketched in some details from his own childhood.
After a while she let him go to sleep. He awakened several times during the night, conscious of the strange room and bed, of Jedrik breathing softly beside him. Once, he thought he felt her shoulders shaking with repressed sobs.
Shortly before dawn, there was a scream in the next block, a terrifying sound of agony loud enough to waken all but the most hardened or the most fatigued. McKie, awake and thinking, felt Jedrik’s breathing change. He lay tense and watchful, awaiting a repetition or another sound which might explain that eerie scream. A threatening silence gripped the night. McKie built an image in his mind of what could be happening in the buildings around them: some people starting from sleep not knowing (perhaps not caring) what had awakened them; lighter sleepers grumbling and sinking back into restless slumber.
Finally, McKie sat up, peered into the room’s shadows. His disquiet communicated itself to Jedrik. She rolled over, looked up at him in the pale dawn light now creeping into the shadows.
“There are many noises in the Warrens that you learn to ignore,” she said.
Coming from her, it was almost conciliatory, almost a gesture of apology, of friendship.
“Someone screamed,” he said.
“I knew it must be something like that.”
“How can you sleep through such a sound?”
“I didn’t.”
“But how can you ignore it?”
“The sounds you ignore are those which aren’t immediately threatening to you, those which you can do nothing about”
“Someone was hurt.”
“Very likely. But you must not burden your soul with things you cannot change.”
“Don’t you want to change … that?”
“I am changing it”
Her tone, her attitude were those of a lecturer in a schoolroom, and now there was no doubt that she was being deliberately helpful. Well, she’d said she was his teacher. And he must become completely Dosadi to survive.
“How’re you changing things?”
“You’re not capable of understanding yet. I want you to take it one step at a time, one lesson at a time.”
He couldn’t help asking himself then:
What does she want from me now?
He hoped it was not more sex.
“Today,” she said, “I want you to meet the parents of three children who work in our cell.”
If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual
—The Dosadi Lesson: A Gowachin Assessment
Aritch studied Ceylang carefully in the soft light of his green-walled relaxation room. She had come down immediately after the evening meal, responsive to his summons. They both knew the reason for that summons: to discuss the most recent report concerning McKie’s behavior on Dosadi.
The old Gowachin waited for Ceylang to seat herself, observing how she pulled the red robe neatly about her lower extremities. Her features appeared composed, the fighting mandibles relaxed in their folds. She seemed altogether a figure of secure competence, a Wreave of the ruling classes—not that Wreaves recognized such classes. It disturbed Aritch that Wreaves tested for survival only through a complex understanding of sentient behavior, rigid performance standards based on ancient ritual, whose actual origins could only be guessed; there was no written record.
But that’s why we chose her.
Aritch grunted, then:
“What can you say about the report?”
“McKie learns rapidly.”
Her spoken Galach had a faint sibilance.
Aritch nodded.
“I would say rather that he adapts rapidly. It’s why we chose him.”
“I’ve heard you say he’s more Gowachin than the Gowachin.”
“I expect him soon to be more Dosadi than the Dosadi.”
“If he survives.”
“There’s that, yes. Do you still hate him?”
“I have never hated him. You do not understand the spectrum of Wreave emotions.”
“Enlighten me.”
“He has violated my essential pride of self. This requires a specific reaction in kind. Hate would only dull my abilities.”
“But I was the one who gave you the orders which had to be countermanded.”
“My oath of service to the Gowachin contains a specific injunction, that I cannot hold any one of my teachers responsible for either understanding or obeying the Wreave protocols of courtesy. It is the same injunction which frees us to serve McKie’s Bureau.”
“You do not consider McKie one of your teachers?”
She studied him for a moment, then:
“Not only do I exclude him, but I know him to be one who has learned much about our protocols.”
“What if I were to say he is one of your teachers?”
Again, she stared at him.
“I would revise my estimations of him—and of you.”
Aritch took a deep breath.
“Yet, you must learn McKie as though you lived in his skin. Otherwise, you will fail us.”
“I will not fail you. I know the reasons you chose me. Even McKie will know in time. He dares not spill my blood in the Courtarena, or even subject me to public shame. Were he to do either of these things, half the Wreave universe would go hunting him with death in their mandibles.”
Aritch shook his head slowly from side to side.
“Ceylang! Didn’t you hear him warn you that you must shed your Wreave skin?”
She was a long time responding and he noted the subtle characteristics which he’d been told were the Wreave adjustments to anger: a twitching of the jowls, tension in the pedal bifurcations …
Presently, she said:
“Tell me what that means, Teacher.”
“You will be charged with performing under Gowachin Law, performing as though you were another McKie. He adapts! Haven’t you observed this? He is capable of defeating you—and us—in such a way, in such a way that your Wreave universe would shower him with adulation for his victory. That cannot be permitted. Too much is at stake.”
Ceylang trembled and showed other signs of distress.
“But I am Wreave!”
“If it comes to the Courtarena, you no longer can be Wreave.”
She inhaled several shallow breaths, composed herself.
“If I become too much McKie, aren’t you afraid I might hesitate to slay him?”
“McKie would not hesitate.”
She considered this.
“Then there’s only one reason you chose me for this task.” He waited for her to say it.
“Because we Wreaves are the best in the universe at learning the behavior of others—both overt and covert.”
“And you dare not rely on any supposed inhibitions he may or may not have!”
After a long pause, she said:
“You are a better teacher than I’d suspected. Perhaps you’re even better than you suspected.”
“Their law! It is a dangerous foundation for nonauthentic traditions. It is no more than a device to justify false ethics!”
—Gowachin comment on ConSentient Law
While they dressed in the dim dawn light coming through the single window, McKie began testing what Jedrik meant by being his teacher.
“Will you answer any question I ask about Dosadi?”
“No.”
Then what areas would she withhold from him? He saw it at
once: those areas where she gained and held personal power.
“Will anyone resent it that we … had sex together?”
“Resent? Why should anyone resent that?”
“I don’t …”
“Answer my question!”
“Why do I have to answer your every question?”
“To stay alive.”
“You already know everything I …”
She brushed this aside.
“So the people of your ConSentiency sometimes resent the sexual relationships of others. They are not sure, then, how they use sex to hold power over others.”
He blinked. Her quick, slashing analysis was devastating.
She peered at him.
“McKie, what can you do here without me? Don’t you know yet that the ones who sent you intended you to die here?”
“Or survive in my own peculiar way.”
She considered this. It was another idea about McKie which she had put aside for later evaluation. Indeed, he might well have hidden talents which her questions had not yet exposed. What annoyed her now was the sense that she didn’t know enough about the ConSentiency to explore this. Could not take the time right now to explore it. His response disturbed her. It was as though everything she could possibly do had already been decided for her by powers of which she knew next to nothing. They were leading her by the nose, perhaps, just as she led Broey … just as those mysterious Gowachin of the ConSentiency obviously had led McKie … poor McKie. She cut this short as unprofitable speculation. Obviously, she had to begin at once to search out McKie’s talent. Whatever she discovered would reveal a great deal about his ConSentiency.
“McKie, I hold a great deal of power among the Humans and even among some Gowachin in the Warrens—and elsewhere. To do this, I must maintain certain fighting forces, including those who fight with physical weapons.”
He nodded. Her tone was that of lecturing to a child, but he accepted this, recognizing the care she took with him.
“We will go first,” she said, “to a nearby training area where we maintain the necessary edge on one of my forces.”
Turning, she led him out into the hall and down a stairway which avoided the room of the cage. McKie was reminded of Pcharky, though, thinking about that gigantic expenditure of space with its strange occupant.
“Why do you keep Pcharky caged?” he asked, addressing Jedrik’s back.
“So I can escape.”
She refused to elaborate on this odd answer.
Presently, they emerged into a courtyard nestled into the solid walls of towering buildings. Only a small square of sky was visible directly overhead and far away. Artificial lighting from tubes along the walls provided an adequate illumination. It revealed two squads facing each other in the center of the courtyard. They were Humans, both male and female; all carried weapons: a tube of some sort with a wandlike protrusion from the end near their bodies. Several other Humans stood at observation positions around the two squads. There was a guard station with a desk at the door through which McKie and Jedrik had emerged.
“That’s an assault force,” Jedrik said, indicating the squads in the courtyard. She turned and consulted with the two young men at the guard station.
McKie made a rough count of the squads: about two hundred. It was obvious that everything had stopped because of Jedrik’s presence. He thought the force was composed of striplings barely blooded in Dosadi’s cruel necessities. This forced him to a reevaluation of his own capabilities.
From Jedrik’s manner with the two men, McKie guessed she knew them well. They paid close attention to everything she said. They, too, struck him as too young for responsibility.
The training area was another matter. It bore a depressing similarity to other such facilities he’d seen in the backwaters of the ConSentiency. War games were a constant lure among several species, a lure which BuSab had managed thus far to channel into such diversions as weapons fetishes.
Through the omnipresent stink, McKie smelled the faint aroma of cooking. He sniffed.
Turning to him, Jedrik spoke:
“The trainees have just been fed. That’s part of their pay.”
It was as though she’d read his mind, and now she watched him for some reaction.
McKie glanced around the training area. They’d just been fed here? There wasn’t a scrap or crumb on the ground. He thought back to the restaurant, belatedly aware of a fastidious care with food that he’d seen and passed right over.
Again, Jedrik demonstrated the ease with which she read his reactions, his very thoughts.
“Nothing wasted,” she said.
She turned away.
McKie looked where her attention went. Four women stood at the far side of the courtyard, weapons in their hands. Abruptly, McKie focused on the woman to the left, a competent-looking female of middle years. She was carrying a … it couldn’t be, but …
Jedrik headed across the courtyard toward the woman. McKie followed, peered closely at the woman’s weapon. It was an enlarged version of the pentrate from his kit! Jedrik spoke briefly to the woman.
“Is that the new one?”
“Yes. Stiggy brought it up this morning.”
“Useful?”
“We think so. It focuses the explosion with somewhat more concentration than our equipment.”
“Good. Carry on.”
There were more training cadre near the wall behind the women. One, an older man with one arm, tried to catch Jedrik’s attention as she led McKie toward a nearby door.
“Could you tell us when we …”
“Not now.”
In the passage beyond the door, Jedrik turned and confronted McKie.
“Your impressions of our training? Quick!”
“Not sufficiently versatile.”
She’d obviously probed for his most instinctive reaction, demanding the gut response unmonitored by reason. The answer brought a glowering expression to her face, an emotional candor which he was not to appreciate until much later. Presently, she nodded.
“They are a commando. More functions of a commando should be interchangeable. Wait here.”
She returned to the training area. McKie, watching through the open door, saw her speak to the woman with the pentrate. When Jedrik returned, she nodded to McKie with an expression of approval.
“Anything else?”
“They’re awfully damned young. You should have a few seasoned officers among them to put a rein on dangerous impetuosity.”
“Yes, I’ve already set that in motion. Hereafter, McKie, I want you to come out with me every morning for about an hour. Watch the training, but don’t interfere. Report your reactions to me”
He nodded. Clearly, she considered him useful and that was a step in the right direction. But it was an idiotic assignment. These violent infants possessed weapons which could make Dosadi uninhabitable. There was an atavistic excitement in the situation, though. He couldn’t deny that. Something in the Human psyche responded to mass violence—really, to violence of any sort. It was related to Human sexuality, an ancient stirring from the most primitive times.
Jedrik was moving on, however.
“Stay close.”
They were climbing an inside stairway now and McKie, hurrying to keep up, found his thoughts locked on that pentrate in the hands of one of Jedrik’s people. The speed with which they’d copied and enlarged it dazzled him. It was another demonstration of why Aritch feared Dosadi.
At the top of the stairs, Jedrik rapped briefly at a door. A male voice said, “Come in.”
The door swung open, and McKie found himself presently in a small, unoccupied room with an open portal at the far wall into what appeared to be a larger, well-lighted area. Voices speaking so softly as to be unintelligible came from there. A low table and five cramped chairs occupied the small room. There were no windows, but a frosted overhead fixture provided shadowless illumination. A large sheet of paper with colored graph lines on it covered the low table
.
A swish of fabric brought McKie’s attention to the open portal. A short, slender woman in a white smock, grey hair, and the dark, penetrating stare of someone accustomed to command entered, followed by a slightly taller man in the same white. He looked older than the woman, except his hair remained a lustrous black. His eyes, too, held that air of command. The woman spoke.
“Excuse the delay, Jedrik. We’ve been changing the summation. There’s now no point where Broey can anticipate and change the transition from riots to full-scale warfare.”
McKie was surprised by the abject deference in her voice. This woman considered herself to be far below Jedrik. The man took the same tone, gesturing to chairs.
“Sit down, please. This chart is our summation.”
As the woman turned toward him, McKie caught a strong whiff of something pungent on her breath, a not unfamiliar smell. He’d caught traces of it several times in their passage through the Warrens. She went on speaking as Jedrik and McKie slipped into chairs.
“This is not unexpected.” She indicated the design on the paper.
The man intruded.
“We’ve been telling you for some time now that Tria is ready to come over.”
“She’s trouble,” Jedrik said.
“But Gar …”
It was the woman, arguing, but Jedrik cut her off.
“I know: Gar does whatever she tells him to do. The daughter runs the father. He thinks she’s the most wonderful thing that ever happened, able to …”
“Her abilities are not the issue,” the man said.
The woman spoke eagerly.
“Yes, it’s her influence on Gar that …”
“Neither of them anticipated my moves,” Jedrik said, “but I anticipated their moves.”
The man leaned across the table, his face close to Jedrik’s. He appeared suddenly to McKie like a large, dangerous animal—dangerous because his actions could never be fully predicted. His hands twitched when he spoke.
“We’ve told you every detail of our findings, every source, every conclusion. Now, are you saying you don’t share our assessment of …”
“You don’t understand,” Jedrik said.
The woman had drawn back. Now, she nodded.