Fools, thought Qing-jao. If the gods wanted you cured, they wouldn't have sent the plague in the first place.
At once she realized that she was the fool. Of course the gods could send both the disease and the cure. If a disease came, and the cure followed, then the gods had sent them. How could she have called such a thing foolish? It was as if she had insulted the gods themselves.
She flinched inwardly, waiting for the onslaught of the gods' rage. She had gone so many hours without purification that she knew it would be a heavy burden when it came. Would she have to trace a whole room again?
But she felt nothing. No desire to trace woodgrain lines. No need to wash.
She looked at her hands. There was dirt on them, and yet she didn't care. She could wash them or not, as she desired.
For a moment she felt immense relief. Could it be that Father and Wangmu and the Jane-thing were right all along? Had a genetic change, caused by this plague, freed her at last from a hideous crime committed by Congress centuries ago?
Almost as if the news reader had heard Qing-jao's thoughts, she began reading a report about a document that was turning up on computers all over the world. The document said that this plague was a gift from the gods, freeing the people of Path from a genetic alteration performed on them by Congress. Until now, genetic enhancements were almost always linked to an OCD-like condition whose victims were commonly referred to as godspoken. But as the plague ran its course, people would find that the genetic enhancements were now spread to all the people of Path, while the godspoken, who had previously borne the most terrible of burdens, had now been released by the gods from the necessity of constant purification.
“This document says that the whole world is now purified. The gods have accepted us.” The news reader's voice trembled as she spoke. “It is not known where this document came from. Computer analysis has linked it with no known author's style. The fact that it turned up simultaneously on millions of computers suggests that it came from a source with unspeakable powers.” She hesitated, and now her trembling was plainly visible. “If this unworthy reader of news may ask a question, hoping that the wise will hear it and answer her with wisdom, could it not be possible that the gods themselves have sent us this message, so that we will understand their great gift to the people of Path?”
Qing-jao listened for a while longer, as fury grew within her. It was Jane, obviously, who had written and spread this document. How dare she pretend to know what the gods were doing! She had gone too far. This document must be refuted. Jane must stand revealed, and also the whole conspiracy of the people of Lusitania.
The servants were looking at her. She met their gaze, looking for a moment at each of them around the circle.
“What do you want to ask me?” she said.
“O Mistress,” said Mu-pao, “forgive our curiosity, but this news report has declared something that we can only believe if you tell us that it is true.”
“What do I know?” answered Qing-jao. “I am only the foolish daughter of a great man.”
“But you are one of the godspoken, Mistress,” said Mu-pao.
You are very daring, thought Qing-jao, to speak of such things unbidden.
“In all this night, since you came among us with food and drink, and as you led so many of us out among the people, tending the sick, you have never once excused yourself for purification. We have never seen you go so long.”
“Did it not occur to you,” said Qing-jao, “that perhaps we were so well fulfilling the will of the gods that I had no need of purification during that time?”
Mu-pao looked abashed. “No, we did not think of that.”
“Rest now,” said Qing-jao. “None of us is strong yet. I must go and speak to my father.”
She left them to gossip and speculate among themselves. Father was in his room, seated before the computer. Jane's face was in the display. Father turned to her as soon as she entered the room. His face was radiant. Triumphant.
“Did you see the message that Jane and I prepared?” he said.
“You!” cried Qing-jao. “My father, a teller of lies?”
To say such a thing to her father was unthinkable. But still she felt no need to purify herself. It frightened her, that she could speak with such disrespect and yet the gods did not rebuke her.
“Lies?” said Father. “Why do you think that they are lies, my daughter? How do you know that the gods did not cause this virus to come to us? How do you know that it is not their will to give these genetic enhancements to all of Path?”
His words maddened her; or perhaps she felt a new freedom; or perhaps she was testing the gods by speaking; very disrespectfully that they would have to rebuke her. “Do you think I am a fool?” shouted Qing-jao. “Do you think that I don't know this is your strategy to keep the world of Path from erupting in revolution and slaughter? Do you think I don't know that all you care about is keeping people from dying?”
“And is there something wrong with that?” asked Father.
“It's a lie!” she answered.
“Or it's the disguise the gods have prepared to conceal their actions,” said Father. “You had no trouble accepting Congress's stories as true. Why can't you accept mine?”
“Because I know about the virus, Father. I saw you take it from that stranger's hand. I saw Wang-mu step into his vehicle. I saw it disappear. I know that none of these things are of the gods. She did them– that devil that lives in the computers!”
“How do you know,” said Father, “that she is not one of the gods?”
This was unbearable. “She was made,” cried Qing-jao. “That's how I know! She's only a computer program, made by human beings, living in machines that human beings made. The gods are not made by any hand. The gods have always lived and will always live.”
For the first time, Jane spoke. “Then you are a god, Qing-jao, and so am I, and so is every other person– human or raman– in the universe. No god made your soul, your inmost aiua. You are as old as any god, and as young, and you will live as long.”
Qing-jao screamed. She had never made such a sound before, that she remembered. It tore at her throat.
“My daughter,” said Father, coming toward her, his arms outstretched to embrace her.
She could not bear his embrace. She could not endure it because it would mean his complete victory. It would mean that she had been defeated by the enemies of the gods; it would mean that Jane had overmastered her. It would mean that Wang-mu had been a truer daughter to Han Fei-tzu than Qing-jao had been. It would mean that all Qing-jao's worship for all these years had meant nothing. It would mean that it was evil of her to set in motion the destruction of Jane. It would mean that Jane was noble and good for having helped transform the people of Path. It would mean that Mother was not waiting for her when at last she came to the Infinite West.
Why don't you speak to me, O Gods! she cried out silently. Why don't you assure me that I have not served you in vain all these years? Why have you deserted me now, and given the triumph to your enemies?
And then the answer came to her, as simply and clearly as if her mother had whispered the words in her ear: This is a test, Qing-jao. The gods are watching what you do.
A test. Of course. The gods were testing all their servants on Path, to see which ones were deceived and which endured in perfect obedience.
If I am being tested, then there must be some correct thing for me to do.
I must do what I have always done, only this time I must not wait for the gods to instruct me. They have wearied of telling me every day and every hour when I needed to be purified. It is time for me to understand my own impurity without their instructions. I must purify myself, with utter perfection; then I will have passed the test, and the gods will receive me once again.