Speaker for the Dead

begging you to let me know what Pipo knew."
      "You'll never know what Pipo knew, because he was a good and kind and loving person who--"
      "Who took a lonely, frightened little girl and healed the wounds in her heart." As he said it, his hand rested on Quara's shoulder.
      It was more than Novinha could bear. "Don't you dare to compare yourself to him! Quara isn't an orphan, do you hear me? She has a mother, me , and she doesn't need you, none of us need you, none of us!" And then, inexplicably, she was crying. She didn't want to cry in front of him. She didn't want to be here. He was confusing everything. She stumbled to the door and slammed it behind her. Quim was right. He was like the devil. He knew too much, demanded too much, gave too much, and already they all needed him too much. How could he have acquired so much power over them in so short a time?
      Then she had a thought that at once dried up her unshed tears and filled her with terror. He had said that Miro and his sister went out to the piggies every day. He knew. He knew all the secrets.
      All except the secret that she didn't even know herself, the one that Pipo had somehow discovered in her simulation. If he ever got that, he'd have everything that she had hidden for all these years. When she called for the Speaker for the Dead, she had wanted him to discover the truth about Pipo; instead, he had come and discovered the truth about her.
     
     
     
      The door slammed. Ender leaned on the stool where she had sat and put his head down on his hands.
      He heard Olhado stand up and walk slowly across the room toward him.
      "You tried to access Mother's files," he said quietly.
      "Yes," said Ender.
      "You got me to teach you how to do searches so that you could spy on my own mother. You made a traitor out of me."
      There was no answer that would satisfy Olhado right now; Ender didn't try. He waited in silence as Olhado walked to the door and left.
      The turmoil he felt was not silent, however, to the hive queen. He felt her stir in his mind, drawn by his anguish. No, he said to her silently. There's nothing you can do, nothing I can explain. Human things, that's all, strange and alien human problems that are beyond comprehension.
      And he felt her touch him inwardly, touch him like the breeze in the leaves of a tree; he felt the strength and vigor of upward-thrusting wood, the firm grip of roots in earth, the gentle play of sunlight on passionate leaves. The feeling faded as the hive queen retreated from his mind. The strength of the tree stayed with him, the calm of its quietude replaced his own tortured silence.
      It had been only a moment; the sound of Olhado, closing the door still rang in the room. Beside him, Quara jumped to her feet and skipped across the floor to his bed. She jumped up and bounced on it a few times.
      "You only lasted a couple of days," she said cheerfully. "Everybody hates you now."
      Ender laughed wryly and turned around to look at her. "Do you ?"
      "Oh, yes," she said. "I hated you first of all, except maybe Quim." She slid off the bed and walked to the terminal. One key at a time, she carefully logged on. A group of double-column addition problems appeared in the air above the terminal. "You want to see me do arithmetic?"
      Ender got up and joined her at the terminal. "Sure," he said. "Those look hard, though."
      "Not for me," she said boastfully. "I do them faster than anybody."

13
     
    Ela
     
     
      MIRO: The piggies call themselves males, but we're only taking their word for it.
      OUANDA: Why would they lie?
      MIRO: I know you're young and naive. but there's some missing equipment.
      OUANDA: I passed physical anthropology. Who says they do it the way we do it?
      MIRO: Obviously they don't. (For that matter, WE don't do it at all.) Maybe I've figured out where their genitals are. Those bumps on their bellies, where the hair is light and fine.
      OUANDA: Vestigial nipples. Even you have them.
      MIRO: I saw Leaf-eater and Pots yesterday, about ten meters off, so I didn't see them WELL, but Pots was stroking Leaf-eater's belly, and I think those belly-bumps might have tumesced.
      OUANDA: Or they might not.
      MIRO: One thing for sure. Leaf-eater's belly was wet-- the sun was reflected off it-- and he was enjoying it.
      OUANDA: This is perverted.
      MIRO: Why not? They're all bachelors, aren't they?