Ancillary Mercy Read online

  “And I,” I replied, “didn’t think the Presger understood the difference between one sort of human and another.”

  “Oh, no, they don’t,” she replied. “I do, though. Or, you know, I understand the idea of it. In the abstract. I don’t actually have a lot of experience at it.”

  Governor Giarod, ignoring this, said, “Translator, there’s a very good tea shop over this way.” She gestured aside. “I’m sure they’ll be serving something interesting.”

  “Interesting, eh?” said Translator Zeiat. “Interesting is good.” And she and System Governor Giarod headed off across the concourse, not coincidentally away from the temple, and from Station Administration.

  I made to follow them, but stopped at a signal from Kalr Five, still behind me. Turned to see Citizen Uran coming toward me across the scuffed white floor. “Fleet Captain,” she said, and bowed.

  “Citizen. Shouldn’t you be studying Raswar?”

  “My tutor is in line, Fleet Captain.”

  Uran’s Raswar tutor was Ychana, and had relatives who lived in the Undergarden. That answered my question about what the line was meant to protest. I considered that a moment. “I haven’t seen any Undergarden residents in line. Not from this distance, anyway.” Of course, it was possible those who were in line had exchanged their very non-Radchaai tunics for more conventionally Radchaai jackets, shirts, and gloves.

  “No, Fleet Captain.” Uran’s head dipped downward, just barely, just for an instant. She’d wanted to look down at the ground, away from me, but had resisted the impulse. “There’s a meeting.” She’d switched to Delsig, which she knew I understood. “It’s just starting now.”

  “About the line?” I asked, in the same language. She made a tiny gesture of affirmation. “And our household wasn’t invited?” I understood why none of my household had been invited to the last meeting, and could see good reasons why it would be convenient for none of us to be party to this one. But still, we had been living in the Undergarden, and I didn’t much like our being regularly excluded. “Or are you representing us?”

  “It’s… it’s complicated.”

  “It is,” I acknowledged. “I don’t want to intimidate anyone, or dictate policy, but our quarters are in the Undergarden.”

  “People mostly understand that,” Uran replied. “It’s just…” Hesitation. Real fear, I thought. “You are Radchaai. And you’re a soldier. And you might prefer better neighbors.” I might be in favor of reassigning housing in the Undergarden, or even shipping Ychana residents downwell whether they wanted to go or not, to get them out of the way. “I’ve told them you don’t.”

  “But they have no reason to believe that.” Neither did Uran, for that matter. “I’m too busy to attend the meeting just now. I think Lieutenant Tisarwat should be invited.” She was still asleep, and would wake hungover. “But the meeting will decide for themselves. If the lieutenant is invited, tell her I said to only listen. She’s to stay quiet unless she’s explicitly asked to comment. Tell her that’s an order.”

  “Yes, Radchaai.”

  “And suggest to the meeting that if the Ychana join the line, they be sure to be on their very best, most patient, behavior, and wear gloves.” Few things were as disconcerting and embarrassing to Radchaai as bare hands in public.

  “Oh, no, Radchaai!” Uran exclaimed. “We’re not thinking of joining the line.” I couldn’t help but notice that we, but said nothing. “Security is nervous enough. No, we’re thinking of giving out food and tea to the people waiting.” She bit her lip, just a moment. “And to the priests.” Her shoulders hunched a bit, as though she expected angry words, or a blow.

  She had spent most of her life downwell, picking tea in the mountains on Athoek. She had family among those striking field workers whose example Eminence Ifian now took. Uran had been personally involved in a previous strike, though she’d been quite small at the time and probably didn’t remember it. “Do you need funds for it?” I asked, still in Delsig. Her eyes widened. She had not expected that reaction. “Let me know if you do. And remember that groups of more than two or three will likely make Security unhappy.” Even two or three might do that. “I’ll try to make time to talk with the head of Security myself today. Though I’m very busy, and it might not be for a while.”

  “Yes, Radchaai.” She bowed and made as if to leave, but halted suddenly, eyes widening. An outcry behind me, a dozen voices or more exclaiming in anger and dismay. I turned.

  The line, which had snaked quietly down the length of the concourse, had broken in the middle, one Security struggling with a citizen, another raising her stun stick, the space around them clear—the citizens nearest had removed to a safer distance.

  “Stop!” I shouted, my voice carrying across the entire concourse, my tone guaranteed to immobilize any military in the near vicinity. Absently I noted that Five, behind me, had tensed at the sound. But Security was not military. The stun stick came down, and the citizen cried out and collapsed.

  “Stop!” I shouted again, and this time both Security turned their heads to me as I strode toward them, Five behind me.

  “All respect, Fleet Captain,” said the Security still holding the stun stick. The stricken citizen lay on the ground, giving out a series of gasping moans. Uran’s Raswar tutor. I had not recognized her from a distance. “You don’t have authority in this matter.”

  “Station,” I said aloud, “what happened?”

  It was the Security kneeling on the ground beside Uran’s tutor who answered. “Head of Security ordered us to disperse the line, Fleet Captain. This person refused to go.”

  This person. Not this citizen. “Disperse the line?” I asked, making my voice as calm and even as possible without dropping into ancillary blankness. Uran’s tutor still gasped on the ground. “Why?” Silently, I said, “Station, please send Medical.”

  “They’re on their way, Fleet Captain,” said Station in my ear.

  At the same time, the kneeling Security said, “I just follow my orders, Fleet Captain.”

  I said, “I will see the head of Security right now.”

  Before either Security could reply, Head of Security Lusulun’s voice sounded behind me. “Fleet Captain!”

  I turned. “Why did you order the line dispersed?” I asked, with no courteous preamble. “It looked perfectly peaceable to me, and lines generally play themselves out eventually.”

  “This isn’t a good time for public unrest, Fleet Captain.” Lusulun seemed genuinely puzzled at my question, as though its answer were obvious. “It’s peaceable now, but what if the Undergarden Ychana join it?” I considered, for a moment, how I might answer that. Said nothing, and Lusulun went on, “I intended to speak to you, in fact. If something like that were to happen I might…” She lowered her voice. “I might need your assistance.”

  “So,” I said, several replies coming to mind. I discarded them as impolitic. “You guessed correctly that I have been in more than one annexation. And I’ve learned more than a few lessons from it, some of them at great cost. I will share one of them with you now: most people don’t want trouble, but frightened people are liable to do very dangerous things.” That included soldiers and Station Security, of course, but I didn’t say that. “If I were to set soldiers on the concourse, everything you fear—and worse—would come to pass.” I gestured toward Uran’s tutor, whose gasping had lessened, but who still could not move. A medic knelt beside her. The two Security stared at me, at Head of Security Lusulun. “I speak from experience. Let the line be the line. Let your security be present but not threatening. Treat all the citizens here with equal courtesy and respect.” I wondered if Security had known Uran’s tutor was Ychana, just by looking at her. I couldn’t always see the differences, but no doubt most people who lived here could. I suspected Security’s reaction would have been less severe if the citizen who had refused to go had not been Ychana. But suggesting it would not have been helpful at that particular moment. “Let them all have their say,”
I continued. Lusulun stared at me for five seconds, saying nothing. “Station Security is here to protect citizens. You can’t do that if you insist on seeing any of them as adversaries. I’m speaking from personal experience.”

  “And if they see us as adversaries?”

  “How can it possibly help to prove them right?” Silence again. “I know exactly how dangerous it sounds, but please. Please take my advice.” She sighed, and made a frustrated gesture. “Let Medical tend to this citizen, and let her go about her business. Let the rest of the line know that a mistake was made”—no need to say who had made that mistake, or what it had been—“and they can continue waiting in line.”

  “But…,” began Lusulun.

  “Tell me, Head of Security,” I interrupted before she could say more, “when were you going to order the priests of Amaat to disperse?”

  “But…,” she said again.

  “They are disrupting the ordinary operation of this station. I’d say they’re causing Station Administrator Celar a good deal more trouble than these citizens here.” I gestured toward the ragged remnants of the line surrounding us.

  “I don’t know, Fleet Captain.” But the mention of Administrator Celar had had its effect.

  “Trust me. I have done this sort of thing before, in situations a good deal more potentially explosive than this one.” And my officers would never have given the orders that Head of Security Lusulun had today, not unless they had been prepared to kill a large number of people. Which not infrequently they had been.

  “If things go wrong, will you help?” asked Lusulun.

  “I will not order my soldiers to fire on citizens.”

  “That wasn’t what I asked.” Indignant.

  “You may not think so,” I replied, “you may not have intended to ask that. But that would be the result. And I won’t do it.”

  She stood a moment, doubtful. Then something decided her—her own thoughts, my mention of the bulky and beautiful Administrator Celar, a word, perhaps, from Station. She sighed. “I’m trusting you.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “Fleet Captain.” Station’s voice in my ear. “There’s a message for you from downwell. A Citizen Queter has requested that you be a witness to her interrogation. I ordinarily wouldn’t trouble you right now, but if you mean to attend, you’ll have to leave in the next hour.”

  Queter. Uran’s older sister. Raughd Denche had blackmailed her into trying to kill me. Or thought she had. Instead Queter had tried to kill Raughd herself. “Please tell the district magistrate that I’ll be there as soon as I can.” I wouldn’t have to say anything more. Kalr Five, who had been standing near me the entire time, would arrange the details for me.

  In the tea shop, Governor Giarod and Translator Zeiat sat at a table laden with food—bowls of noodles and of sliced fruits, platters of fish. An attendant stood watching, appalled, as Governor Giarod said, “But, Translator, it’s not for drinking. It’s a condiment. Here.” She pushed the noodles closer to the translator. “Fish sauce is very good on this.”

  “But it’s a liquid,” replied Translator Zeiat, reasonably enough, “and it tastes good.” The tea shop attendant turned and walked hastily away. The idea of drinking a bowlful of oily, salty fish sauce was too much for her, apparently.

  “Governor,” I interrupted, before the conversation could go further. “Translator. I find I have urgent business downwell that can’t be delayed or avoided.”

  “On the planet?” asked Translator Zeiat. “I’ve never been on a planet before. Can I come with you?”

  The fish sauce must have been as much as Governor Giarod could take. “Yes. Yes, by all means, visit the planet with the fleet captain.” She hadn’t even asked what my business was. I wondered if her eagerness was for being rid of Translator Zeiat, or being rid of me.

  5

  Xhenang Serit, the seat of Beset District, sat at the mouth of a river where it came down out of the mountains into the sea, black and gray stone buildings close around the river mouth, spread along the seashore and up the green hillsides. It was (at least in its central neighborhoods) a city of bridges, of streams and fountains—in courtyards, in the outer walls of houses, running down the centers of boulevards—so that the sound of water was with you everywhere you went.

  The district’s detention center was up in the hills, out of sight of the main part of the city. It was a long, low building with several inner courtyards, the whole surrounded by a two-meter-high wall that, if it had been on the other side of the hilltop, would have blocked any view of the sea. Still, the setting was pleasant enough, with grass and even some flowers in the courtyards. All of Beset District’s long-term or complicated cases were sent here, nearly all of them destined for interrogation and re-education.

  There was, it appeared, no facility for visitors to meet with inmates, not counting the actual interrogation rooms. At first, in fact, the staff objected to my seeing Citizen Queter at all, but I insisted. Ultimately they brought her to me in a corridor, where a long bench sat under a window that looked out on the black stone wall and a stretch of thin, pale grass. Kalr Five stood some meters away, impassive and disapproving—I had made her stay out of earshot in order to give at least the illusion of privacy. Sphene stood beside her, just as impassive. It had kept close to Five since we’d left the station, partly, I thought, to annoy her. The ancillary still behaved as though the shattered tea set meant nothing to it, but I suspected it always knew where that red, blue, and gold box was. Five had left it on the station, and told Kalr Eight that if Sphene had stayed behind, she’d have been sure to bring the box with her.

  “I didn’t think you would come,” Queter said, in Radchaai, without any courteous preamble, or a bow. She wore the plain gray jacket, trousers, and gloves that were standard issue for any citizen who didn’t have the wherewithal to purchase anything else. Her hair, which she used to braid and tie back with a scarf, was cut short.

  I gestured an acknowledgment of her words, and an invitation to sit on the bench. Asked, in Delsig, “How are you?”

  She didn’t move. “They don’t like me to speak anything but Radchaai,” she said, in that language. “It won’t help with my evaluation, they tell me. I’m fine. As you see.” A pause, and then, “How is Uran?”

  “She’s well. Have they been giving you her messages?”

  “They must have been in Delsig,” Queter said, with only a trace of bitterness.

  They had been. “She wanted very badly to come with me.” She had wept when I’d told her that Queter had asked that she not.

  Queter looked away, toward the end of the corridor where Five stood, Sphene beside her, and then back. “I didn’t want her to see me like this.”

  I had suspected as much. “She understands.” Mostly she did. “I’m to give you her love.” That struck Queter as funny. She laughed, brief and jagged. “Have you had any outside news?” I asked, when she didn’t say anything. “Did you know the fieldworkers on the mountain tea plantations have all stopped work? They won’t go back, they say, until they’re given their full wages, and their rights as citizens are restored.” Fosyf Denche had cheated her fieldworkers for years, kept them in debt to her, and being transportees from Valskaay they’d had no one beyond the tea fields to speak up for them.

  “Hah!” Suddenly, fiercely, she smiled. Almost like her old self, I thought. Then the smile was gone—though the fierceness was still there. Mostly hidden. Her arms still straight at her sides, she made her gloved hands into fists. “Do you know when it’s going to be? When I ask they tell me it’s not good for me to worry about it. It won’t help with my evaluation.” Definitely bitter that time.

  “Your interrogation? I’m told it’s tomorrow morning.”

  “You’ll make sure they don’t do anything they aren’t supposed to?”

  And she hadn’t thought I would come. “Yes.”

  “And when they… when they re-educate me? Will you be there?”

  “If you w
ant me to, I’ll try. I don’t know if I can.” She didn’t say anything, her expression didn’t change. I switched languages, back to Delsig. “Uran really is doing well. You’d be proud of him. Shall I let your grandfather know you’re all right?”

  “Yes, please.” In Radchaai still. “I should go back. They get nervous here if anything doesn’t go according to routine.”

  “I apologize for causing you difficulties. I wanted to see for myself that you were well, and I wanted you to know that I had come.” A brown-uniformed guard approached the end of the corridor behind Queter, obviously having been waiting for the least signal that our conversation might be over.

  Queter said only, “Yes.” And went with the guard away down the corridor, the very image of calm and unconcern, except that her hands were still clenched into fists.

  I took the cable tram back down the hill, Xhenang Serit spread black and gray and green below me, the sea beyond. Five and Sphene on the seats behind me. Kalr Eight was with Translator Zeiat at a manufactory down by the water, watching a slithering, silver mass of dead fish tumble into a wide, deep vat, while a visibly terrified worker explained how fish sauce was made. “So, why do the fish do this?” asked Translator Zeiat, when the worker stopped for breath.

  “They… they don’t have much choice in the matter, Translator.”

  Translator Zeiat thought about that a moment, and then asked, “Do you think fish sauce would be good in tea?”

  “N… no, Translator. I don’t think that would be entirely proper.” And then, trying, I supposed, to salvage some shred of sense out of the experience, “There are these little cakes that are shaped like fish. Some people like to dip them in their tea.”

  “I see, I see.” Translator Zeiat gestured understanding. “Do you have any of those here?”

  “Translator,” said Kalr Eight, before the worker was forced to admit that no, she did not have any fish-shaped cakes at this particular moment, “I’m sure we can find you some later today.”