Gene Wolfe - In Green's Jungles

"I've heard him try to lie, and he's a very bad liar, just as I am. Jahlee's far better, as you divined at once."

"Bad thing! God say!"

A frosty smile crossed Maliki's face. "Your bird doesn't trust her."

"No," I said. "I do, but he doesn't."

Jahlee grinned at me, leaning back against the rough wall of logs, beautiful enough to rend a thousand hearts.

"I liked you, Calde," Maliki said. "We all did. General Saba used to say you were the slickest character she ever met, man or woman, and it was a blessing from the goddess that you were so good, because you would have made a terrible enemy. There, I've given you a fine clue. It should help."

I shook my head. "By telling me you were a Trivigaunti? I knew it almost as soon as we met, and confirmation is of no value. As for my supposed cleverness, it doesn't exist, as you should be able to see for yourself. You no more know who I am than I know who you are. The only difference is that I'm aware of my ignorance. You think I'm Calde Silk, which I find so flattering that I have difficulty denying it. You're quite wrong, nonetheless."

Jahlee asked, "If we sleep here, will we wake up in the morning? Wake up here, I mean?"

"I don't know. I doubt it."

"Then I'm not going to go to sleep. You and Hide will have to keep me awake. I'll keep you awake, too." There was mockery as well as sensuality in her eyes.

Maliki snorted.

I said, "I'd like to find out more about the situation here. Sinew's prisoners attacked this village, clearly. Where did they come from?"

She pointed. "The old city. It's full of them."

"I doubt it. It wasn't even full of inhumi when some mercenaries cleared it for me, though there were more than we liked. They will be far fewer now. Sinew's prisoners are or were their slaves?"

"Yes. We call them inhumans."

"Those men at the gate were afraid we were inhumans. Is that correct? They wanted to see my wrists; they were looking for the marks of shackles, I suppose."

"Right. I knew you were not as soon as I saw the girl's hair. No woman here has hair that well cared for. Did you notice Bala's?"

"I thought it clean and neatly arranged. So is your own."

"Thank you. But if I were to take it down, even you would see the difference."

Jahlee bowed, her long sorrel hair falling over her face.

I said, "I'm surprised the inhumi dare let their slaves have arms."

"I am, too," Jahlee told us, straightening up.

Maliki said, "They take precautions, I feel sure."

"No doubt. Jahlee, you've been here before. May I say that?"

"You just did."

"So I did. May I assume this wasn't done-I mean the arming of the slaves-when you were here?"

She nodded. "There weren't so many humans here then, I think."

"And how long ago was that?"

"I don't know."

"Years?"

She spoke to Maliki, "I was just a little girl when they put me on the lander."

"A lucky girl," Maliki replied.

"Oh, I don't know. I'd stay here if I could."

"But you are only a dream. I know. I hope you can manage without my sympathy."

"That's wrong, what the Rajan and Cuoio have been saying." Jahlee leaned forward, as sincere as I have ever seen her. "This is the real us. They talk like we're really back on Blue, but that's just the thing you bury. We're here."

"I believe the last part, girl."

I had been considering the village, Maliki's judgeship of it, and my son's part in it; and I asked, "Are most of you from Trivigaunte? You must be, since you employ its high speech for names and titles. Shauk and Karn must be Trivigaunti names-they're certainly not names I was familiar with in Viron. Bala is probably a Trivigaunti name as well."

Maliki nodded. "About two-thirds of us are, and the rest are from all over. Your son from Viron, for example."

"He's never seen the city; he was born on Blue. Still, I understand what you mean-he's of Vironese culture."

"Right. When I first got to Viron, I knew it was going to seem very foreign, but I was surprised at how foreign it was just the same. So many things we took for granted at home nobody had heard of there. Now Sinew seems familiar. I mean besides being a friend, which he is. I spent a few months in Viron once and got to know a few of you. The other foreigners here in Qarya are from cities I never heard of at home."

Jahlee sighed. "It must be a big whorl, the Long Sun Whorl, Do you think it's too far for us, Rajan?"

"I doubt that it's nearly as far as the place we visited with the Duko." I turned back to Maliki. "I want to ask you about your lander and the people who came with you from Trivigaunte; but first, I'd like to mention that Patera Quetzal was from this whorl. I know that now. Do you remember Patera Quetzal? He was our Prolocutor."

"Oh, yes."

"For years I've wondered how he reached the Long Sun Whorl. We were told that no landers had left before we got to Mainframe. Were you with us on the airship when we went to Mainframe?"

Smiling, Maliki shook her head.

"That eliminates one of my guesses. I thought you might have been the lieutenant who was in charge of us while we were prisoners."

Still smiling, she said, "I'm older than you think, Calde."

"Old enough, and wise enough, to tell me how Patera Quetzal reached the Long Sun Whorl from Green?"

She pursed her lips. "Before anybody got here? You're saying he was an inhumu."

I nodded.

"That explains a great deal. I never thought of that back then. In fact, I had never heard of them."

"Neither had I, but I think the inhumi must have been one of the sources for our devil legends. If that's correct, he didn't come to the Long Sun Whorl alone."

"They can fly through the emptiness between Green and Blue. Did you know that, Calde?"

I nodded again.

"Then they could have flown to the Long Sun Whorl the same way."

Jahlee said, "It's too far."

Maliki made a little sound of contempt. "You lived here as a child, so you're an expert."

"No, I'm not. But I know a few simple things and that's one. You asked about this once in Gaon, Rajan, and I told you I didn't know."

I said, "I remember."

"And I don't. But I do know this. He didn't fly like the inhumi fly to Blue and back. It can't be done, because no inhumu can do without air for that long. Are you sure no landers left before the time you were talking about?"

I shook my head. "On the contrary. That information was surely incorrect, though I think it was given us then in good faith."

"Then that's the answer, and why ask us? The landers go down full and come back empty, if people let them."

Maliki's smile grew bitter. "That was my mistake, you see, Calde."

"Call me Horn, please."

She ignored it. "We knew that. The men who went on board had no idea, but our goddess had told the Rani. So I went with them, and the generalissimo and I thought I could report back in a year or two. I went as her spy, if you want to put it like that. But I have done my level best for this colony, and the reason I came originally is no great secret anymore."

"I think I'm beginning to understand. You said

Sinew was your general here, the rais-man.

Trivigaunte would never have accepted a male general. Was Bala born there, by the way?"

"With all that yellow hair? Certainly not. Her father was, but her mother was one of the women our men picked up here."

"I see."

"What I am about to say is apt to sound conceited, and I hate to sound conceited." There was no hint of humor in Maliki's voice or face. "But a good many landers have landed here, and the colonists in most of them have not done anything like as well. Their men fight the inhumi and their inhumans, and die, and their women scatter. Most die, too, in the jungle. But a few get into other colonies, and that was how it was with Bala's mother. We accepted any women we could get in those days."