The Terrorists of Irustan (2 page)

The mother’s veil hid all but the outline of her forehead and the shadows of her eyes. She was small, and the lines of her dress, a simple beige beneath the blue veil, swelled over a matronly figure. There was something tragic in the angle of her body, the unmoving folds of her veil where they broke over her hands. Zahra’s heart ached suddenly, and she realized she didn’t know if the woman had other children.

The clerk fell silent, and Adil Muhid said, “Greetings, Chief Director.”

Qadir said, “Greetings to you, Kir Muhid. This is a great day for both of us.”

Zahra stood watching as Muhid took a step forward, and Qadir walked to meet him. The two men stood alone in the center of the room, each touching his heart with his right hand, then opening his fingers to the other. Qadir looked older than he had in Zahra’s bedroom. The brutal light made scars of the lines around his eyes. Perspiration beaded his bare scalp.

“Chief Director,” Muhid said loudly, for all to hear. “I bring you this girl to add to your household. This girl—”

A slight sound disrupted his prepared speech. Zahra looked sidelong through her veil. It was not the child who had sobbed, but the mother.

There was nothing Muhid could do but pretend he hadn’t heard, and Qadir, tactfully, did the same. Muhid pressed on. “This girl is well-behaved. She will give you no trouble.”

“I’m sure of it,” Qadir answered. “Thank you.”

When Muhid held out his hand to his daughter and the child hesitated, Zahra was overwhelmed by the import of this event. Had she, at eight, been reluctant at her own cession? Had her mother wept? She could not remember. Her memories were full of the joy of being with Nura, of studying, of learning. Would this child feel the same?

When she buttoned the little pink veil, she felt the warmth of the small head, saw the shimmer of the silk as the girl trembled, and her heart faltered.“Kir Muhid,” Qadir said. “You will be proud of this girl. Please call at any time for news of her.”

The mother wavered on her feet, and the women around her moved closer, holding her steady. Zahra’s breast ached with the woman’s pain. It was elemental; it had substance. It was a presence in the room, an unexpected and unwelcome guest.

Muhid and Qadir touched hearts once again, and the clerk stepped forward to receive their signatures on a stiff yellow certificate stamped with the seal of the directorate. The ceremony was finished. No woman’s voice had been heard, no female acknowledged other than the girl being ceded. Zahra kept her hands on the child’s shoulders as the men said their farewells and Muhid marshalled his household out of the evening room. The child shook from head to foot. At the door, her mother looked back once, and then, in a swirl of blue silk, she was gone, leaving her daughter behind in a house of strangers.

Zahra’s mouth felt dry as ashes as she looked down at the tiny veiled creature beside her. This was a child, a human being, beloved by her mother, with fears and hopes and feelings of her own. She could not think now who had made this decision. What would become of this girl who now belonged to Qadir’s household, and whom she was to train? What if the child didn’t like her? What if she didn’t like the work?

Had Zahra not spent her entire life disciplining her emotions, she would have trembled too.

two

*   *   *

The Maker sent his Second Prophet to enlighten Irustan, the second world. It was said that later prophets would be false, but be assured, a new voice speaks truly for a new world.

—First Homily,
The Book of the Second Prophet

Z
ahra lay
on her bed, staring up and out through the window. The moons had not yet risen, and the met-olives framed a view of brilliant stars in a black sky. The cooler hummed softly. Lili had tucked the girl, little Ishi, into her cot, the flowered quilt smoothed over her, the plush toy under her chin.

She was a beautiful child. Zahra had been surprised by her loveliness. She had known she was bright, had known her test scores and evaluations; but she hadn’t considered how she might look. At dinner, Qadir had said lightly, “Come, Ishi, we’re family now. Show us your face, so we’ll know each other if we meet in the hall!”

Ishi sat between the two of them with her untouched meal before her. Obediently, she reached for the button of her rill, fumbling at it until it fell away with a slither of pink silk. Her eyes flashed from Zahra’s face to Qadir’s, and then swiftly back to Zahra’s.

Lili stepped forward from her usual station at the side table. “The chief director wants to see your face, little sister," she said in her dry voice. “And it will be much easier to eat your dinner. Don’t you see that the medicant has removed her verge?”

Ishi’s eyes pled with Zahra. They were a soft gold-flecked brown, and they surprised in Zahra a deep pool of feeling she had not known existed. It was like coming upon a lake while walking, a deep and beautiful lake, undiscovered until just this moment.

Zahra said gently, “Lili is my anah, Ishi. And now she is yours, too. Let’s do as she suggests.” She took hold of Ishi’s cap and lifted the entire veil over her head, releasing a cascade of straight dark hair that fell every which way. She could not resist touching it, smoothing it back, tasting the silky strands with her fingers.

“Ah,” Qadir smiled. “We meet at last, Ishi. Welcome to my household.”

Zahra regarded the child in silence. Her skin was the texture and color of the dusky pearls imported by the offworlders. Her nose was straight and small above a soft mouth, a pointed chin. Ishi dropped her eyes. Her lashes against her cheeks resembled the wings of a patapat resting on a mock rose.

“Ishi,” Zahra murmured. “Can you say hello to the director?”

The little girl lifted her head and met Zahra’s eyes. “Yes,” she said. Her voice was high, and a little shaky. “Hello, Director.” Her eyes went to him, and then back to Zahra. “Hello, Medicant.”

The pool of emotion welled. Zahra put her hand to her throat. “I’d like you to call me Zahra,” she said.

Ishi’s eyes reddened and her lip trembled. “Mumma—my mother—said I should call you Medicant, and I should do everything you tell me,” she said.

“Ah,” Zahra said. “Well, now I’ve told you to call me Zahra. That makes it all right, doesn’t it?”

Ishi bit her lip. Qadir met Zahra’s glance. “Don’t you like your dinner, Ishi?” he asked.

“Yes, Director,” she answered. She picked up her fork and tried a bite of fish, the spicy psar from the tiny salt sea, fried golden in oil from the met-olive groves, studded with desert salt. She chewed it slowly and swallowed, her slender throat working. One finger crept up to wipe her eyes and then slipped back to her lap. When Zahra saw her surreptitiously drying the finger on her dress, she put her own fork down.

Lili stepped forward again. “You must eat, Ishi,” she said impatiently. “It’s a special dinner, just for you.”

Obediently, Ishi tried again. Another morsel of psar disappeared, with obvious effort.

“Never mind, Lili,” Zahra said. She put her hands on the table edge. “You know, Qadir, I’m not very hungry tonight either. Will you excuse us, Ishi and me?”

He nodded, winking at her, and she rose. “Ishi,” she said. “Wouldn’t you like to come see our room? Your bed? Your things from—your things are up there now.”

Ishi climbed out of her chair and followed Zahra out of the dayroom and down the hall toward the stairs. Just as Zahra put her foot on the bottom stair, the child said shyly, “Medicant? I mean, Zahra?”

Zahra stopped and turned back, brows lifted. “Yes, Ishi.”

“Would you mind—could we see your clinic first?”

The pool of emotion became a fountain. Zahra smiled down into the girl’s eyes. “I’d love that,” she said. She reached up and pulled her own veil off her head, as she had Ishi’s, and tossed it over her shoulder in an untidy splash of gray silk. She took the child’s hand, tender fingers half the length of her own. “Come on, Ishi. I’ll show you my—our—clinic.”

*   *   *

Ishi examined everything solemnly, the dispensary, the two surgeries, the medicator. By the time they went upstairs, her eyelids drooped and she yawned. Lili was waiting, scowling at Zahra for keeping the child up so long. She peeled off the pink dress and hung it up. Ishi stood in just her shift.

Zahra noted her slender legs and delicate shoulders, every bone outlined by fragile skin. Too thin, she thought. She planned a regimen of vitamins and minerals and enzymes, the best the medicator could offer, as Lili saw to tooth-brushing and face-washing. Lili dropped a white nightshift over Ishi’s head and folded her efficiently into bed.

The anah stood back then with an air of having finished her chores. “Do you need anything else, Medicant?”

Zahra watched Ishi bury her face in the soft pillow. “No, nothing,” she said absently. Lili nodded, and left the room, closing the door behind her with a soft click. Ishi raised her head suddenly and then laid it down again. “Ishi,” Zahra murmured. “Are you comfortable?”

“Yes, Medi—yes, Zahra,” the little voice piped.

Zahra hesitated, in some obscure way wanting something more, not wanting the child to fall asleep and leave her alone with her thoughts. Silly, she told herself. “Good night then,” she said.

“G’night,” Ishi answered, her voice muffled by the pillow.

Zahra took off her gray dress and hung it next to her dressing table, the veil with it. Her own nightshift lay ready, and she pulled it on before she washed her face and undid the coil of her hair. She lay down to stare up at the blank ceiling, listening to the child breathe. She felt unaccountably anxious. What if Ishi should stop breathing? What if the child got up in the night and fell, and she didn’t hear her?

Zahra grimaced in the dark at her foolishness. She rolled to her left to face the little cot. Ishi’s hair spread in soft brown strands across the white pillow.

Just as Zahra closed her eyes she heard a tiny sound, a gasp choked almost to nothing. She lifted her head to hear with both ears. It came again in a moment, a squeak, a muffled sob quickly buried under the flowered quilt. Zahra was out of her bed in a flash, kneeling beside the cot.

“Ishi,” she said. “Child, what is it?”

She peeled the covers back to show the little girl with her face turned into her pillow, her thin shoulders shaking. “Ishi,” Zahra repeated. “Won’t you tell me what’s wrong?”

“Mu—Mumma,” the child sobbed. “My mumma always kisses me good night. Nobody kissed me good night!”

“Oh, oh, I’m so sorry!” Zahra hesitated a moment, and then patted Ishi’s back, awkwardly, feeling large and clumsy. “You know, we’re not used to children here. We don’t have any.” She paused. “We’ll learn, though. We will. I will.”

Zahra bent forward and pulled back Ishi’s fine hair to find a little bit of exposed cheek, damp and sticky with tears. When had she last kissed anyone of her own volition? Her own mother? Her father? Too long ago for her to remember. Feeling strange, she kissed Ishi’s wet cheek. The plush toy had fallen to the floor, and she picked it up to tuck it under the child’s arm.

As she smoothed the quilt, she tasted the salt of Ishi’s tears on her own lips. She felt as if she were drowning in a sea of emotion, guilt, anxiety, elation—and gratitude. She closed her eyes for a moment, sending thanks to the One for this precious gift that had come to her.

When she opened her eyes, she saw Nura, looking out of the old oak frame, her practical gaze seeming to include them both. Zahra missed her still, grieved for her. She wished she were here now, to advise her how to care for this child.

She smoothed Ishi’s hair with gentle strokes until the child’s breathing slowed to the even rhythms of sleep. “Good night, little sister,” Zahra whispered. “Good dreams.”

*   *   *

The alarm from the clinic roused Zahra from her own dreams sometime after midnight. She spoke to the flashing panel to stop its buzzing, hoping not to wake the child. She rubbed her eyes and blinked, letting herself rise bit by bit to full awareness.

Irustan’s swarm of tiny moons had risen, their layered orbits scattering them across the night sky like pearls from a broken necklace. Their white light filled her bedroom and glinted off Ishi’s cheek. Zahra pushed back herquilt. She would have to rouse Lili. She wouldn’t leave Ishi unattended, not this first night.

She splashed cold water on her face and drew a brush quickly through her hair. Adrenaline rose in her blood to power her through this emergency, whatever it was. She rang for Lili as she hurried to dress, pulling her medicant’s coat on over her nightshift, clipping her hair back carelessly, only caring about keeping it free of her veil and out of her eyes. Her sandals were ready beside the door. She was just pulling on her veil and buttoning the verge when Lili tapped on her door.

“Lili, stay with the child, will you?” Zahra said tersely. “I must go to the clinic.”

“I know,” Lili said calmly. “I heard the alarm. Asa is on his way down.”

“Good.” Zahra hurried into the corridor, not running, but walking swiftly. Haste was rarely helpful in these nighttime calls; but neither would she want to cause further injury or illness by being too slow.

The chief director’s house faced the avenue with an elegant drive, wide and well-kept. Only the wealthy could afford cars; the star’s energy was cheap, but heavy materials were expensive.

Zahra’s clinic, at the back of the house, faced toward the Medah. Its door opened onto a street wide enough only for cycles or the occasional electric cart. The clinic’s door opened directly from the short sidewalk into the dispensary. A few chairs and one long couch were simply arranged in a narrow, undecorated room. There was a high desk behind which Lili sat to receive the patients who came to see the medicant. Even the wealthy came to the back of the house to be treated. None complained. Irustani men avoided the medicant when they could, and if they had to see her, they preferred not to be observed.

Lili was all the assistant Zahra had. Like most Irustani women, she was uneducated, though she could read a bit. Her rigid adherence to convention often irritated Zahra, but she was needed. Only if one of the patients was a man, or if a wavephone call needed to be made, would Asa or perhaps Diya be summoned.

There were two surgeries, a large and a small one. In both, all equipment, the exam beds, the surgical domes, the wave boxes, were kept to one side, leaving the opposite side of the room bare. An elaborate screen divided each surgery from wall to wall. A man of the household, acting as escort, would sit on one side of the screen, protected from the sight of the medicant doing her work. Only the medicant’s certificate and a plaque quoting the Second Prophet met his eyes.

Zahra used the inner door from the house into the small surgery. A short hall led to the larger surgery, where the medicator was, and where Asa was already waiting behind the painted screen. She was glad to see him. Diya was an unwilling escort, invariably sitting stiff-necked, head turned to the wall, arms folded. Asa was far more congenial. He lifted his cane to Zahra in greeting, and shifted his clubbed foot to a more comfortable position. Through the open door of the surgery, a man’s figure was visible, outlined by moonlight shining through the windows of the dispensary.

An Irustani allows nothing to divert him from constant devotion to the One, neither work nor play, neither illness nor health, not love for woman nor love for child.

—First Homily,
The Book of the Second Prophet

Thus read the plaque beneath Zahra’s framed certificate. The Book proscribed all signs of weakness in men.

Zahra went around the dividing screen. A woman lay on the exam bed, moaning, half-conscious, her head rolling from side to side on the pillow.

Zahra strode to the dispensary door and shut it sharply. “You’d better stay, Asa,” she said to the screen.

“Of course, Medicant,” he answered. She smiled, though he couldn’t see it. Diya hated even hearing her talk to sick people. His discomfort didn’t matter to Zahra, but her patients sensed it. Everything was easier with Asa.

The woman was still veiled. She wore a loose fiber coat over a stained dress, and she lay on her side with her knees drawn up to her chest. At the sound of Zahra’s steps she gasped.

“It’s all right, sister,” Zahra said gently. “I’m the medicant. Zahra IbSada.” The woman tried to speak, but it came out as a sob, and she gasped again with the pain that caused.

“Easy now. Can you tell me your name?” Zahra asked. “Have you come here before?” Cautiously, she pulled back the coat, eliciting another moan as she drew the right sleeve free of the woman’s wrist. The left sleeve came off easily, but she had to lift the woman slightly to get the coat out from under her, and she groaned again. Zahra unbuttoned the rill of the woman’s veil as she urged, “What’s the trouble tonight, sister?”

The little panel fell away to show light-blue eyes with widely dilated pupils. The woman’s skin was waxy in appearance, clammy to the touch. Zahra laid the back of her hand against her patients forehead. “Can you talk? What’s happened to you? How long have you been like this?” She wrapped her long fingers around the woman’s thin wrist, and felt a rapid, thready pulse.

She reached behind her for the slender tube of the master syrinx and patched it quickly onto the inside of the woman’s left arm. She spoke to the medicator in a swift undertone. The tiny pump clicked delicately, reassuring the medicant that the saline she had ordered was being diffused into the vein in precise doses. She murmured to the machine again, making certain there was plasma replacer in the mixture. The woman was clearly in shock, whatever her other problems might be. Nura had taught Zahra carefully: stabilize first, diagnose second, treat third. The medicator would test the woman’s blood, add whatever else was needed.