“What wall?” they asked her.

  “Across the road,” she said.

  “Who would build a wall across a road?” they asked.

  “Like the ones I’ve seen in other towns. Not a real wall. Just a line of stones. Haven’t you seen it?”

  “I saw you putting stones out into the road. Do you know how hard we work to keep it clear?” said one of the men.

  “Of course. If you didn’t keep it clear everywhere else,” said Virlomi, “no one would see where the wall was.” She spoke as though what she said were obvious, as though he had surely had this explained to him before.

  “Walls keep things out,” said a woman. “Or they keep things in. Roads let things pass. If you build a wall across, it isn’t a road anymore.”

  “Yes, you at least understand,” said Virlomi, though she knew perfectly well that the woman understood nothing. Virlomi barely understood it herself, though she knew that it felt right to her, that at some level below sense it made perfect sense.

  “I do?” said the woman.

  Virlomi looked around at the others. “It’s what they told me in the other towns that had a wall. It’s the Great Wall of India. Too late to keep the barbarian invaders out. But in every village, they drop stones, one or two at a time, to make the wall that says, We don’t want you here, this is our land, we are free. Because we can still build our wall.”

  “But…it’s only a few stones!” cried the exasperated man who had seen her building it. “I kicked a few out of my way, but even if I hadn’t, the wall wouldn’t have stopped a beetle, let alone one of the Chinese trucks!”

  “It’s not the wall,” said Virlomi. “It’s not the stones. It’s who dropped them, who built it, and why. It’s a message. It’s…it’s the new flag of India.”

  She was seeing comprehension in some of the eyes around her.

  “Who can build such a wall?” asked one of the women.

  “Don’t all of you add to it? It’s built a stone or two at a time. Every time you pass, you bring a stone, you drop it there.” She was filling her pitchers now. “Before I carry these pitchers back, I pick up a small stone in each hand. When I pass over the wall, I drop the stones. That’s how I’ve seen it done in the other villages with walls.”

  “Which other villages?” demanded the man.

  “I don’t remember their names,” said Virlomi. “I only know that they had Walls of India. But I can see that none of you knew about it, so perhaps it was only some child playing a prank, and not a wall after all.”

  “No,” said one of the women. “I’ve seen people add to it before.” She nodded firmly. Even though Virlomi had made up this wall only this morning, and no one but her had ever added to one, she understood what the woman meant by the lie. She wanted to be part of it. She wanted to help create this new flag of India.

  “It’s all right, then, for women to do it?” asked one of the women doubtfully.

  “Oh, of course,” said Virlomi. “Men are fighters. Women build the walls.”

  She picked up her stones and gripped them between her palms and the jar handles. She did not look back to see if any of the others also picked up stones. She knew, from their footfalls, that many of them—perhaps all—were following her, but she did not look back. When she reached what was left of her wall, she did not try to restore any of the stones the man had kicked away. Instead she simply dropped her two stones in the middle of the largest gap in the line. Then she walked on, still without looking back.

  But she heard a few plunks of stones being dropped into the dusty road.

  She found occasion twice more during the day to walk back for more water, and each time found more women at the well, and went through the same little drama.

  The next day, when she left the town, she saw that the wall was no longer a few stones making a broken line. It crossed the road solidly from side to side, and it was as much as two hands high in places. People made a point of stepping over it, never walking around, never kicking it. And most dropped a stone or two as they passed.

  Virlomi went from village to village, each time pretending that she was only passing along a custom she had seen in other places. In a few places, angry men swept away the stones, too proud of their well-kept road to catch the vision she offered. But in those places she simply made, not a wall, but a pile of stones on both sides of the road, and soon the village women began to add to her piles so they grew into sizable heaps of stone, narrowing the road, the stones too numerous to be kicked or swept out of the way. Eventually they, too, would become walls.

  In the third week she came for the first time to a village that really did already have a wall. She did not explain anything to them, for they already knew—the word was spreading without her intervention. She only added to the wall and moved quickly on.

  It was still only one small corner of southern India, she knew. But it was spreading. It had a life of its own. Soon the Chinese would notice. Soon they would begin tearing down the walls, sending bulldozers to clear the road—or conscripting Indians to move the stones themselves.

  And when their walls were torn down, or the people were forced to remove their walls, the real struggle would begin. For now the Chinese would be reaching down into every village, destroying something that the people wanted to have. Something that meant “India” to them. That’s what the secret meaning of the wall had been from the moment she started dropping stones to make the first one.

  The wall existed precisely so that the Chinese would tear it down. And she named the wall the “flag of India” precisely so that when the people saw their walls destroyed, they would see and feel the destruction of India. Their nation. A nation of wallbuilders.

  And so, as soon as the Chinese turned their backs, the Indians walking from place to place would carry stones and drop them in the road, and the wall would grow again.

  What would the Chinese do about it? Arrest everyone who carried stones? Make stones illegal? Stones were not a riot. Stones did not threaten soldiers. Stones were not sabotage. Stones were not a boycott. The walls were easily bypassed or pushed aside. It caused the Chinese no harm at all.

  Yet it would provoke them into making the Indian people feel the boot of the oppressor.

  The walls were like a mosquito bite, making the Chinese itch but never bleed. Not an injury, just an annoyance. But it infected the new Chinese Empire with a disease. A fatal one, Virlomi hoped.

  On she walked through the heat of the dry season, working her way back and forth, avoiding big cities and major highways, zigzagging her way northward. Nowhere did anyone identify her as the inventor of the walls. She did not even hear rumors of her existence. All the stories spoke of the wall-building as having begun somewhere else.

  They were called by many names, these walls. The Flag of India. The Great Indian Wall. The Wall of Women. Even names that Virlomi had never imagined. The Wall of Peace. The Taj Mahal. The Children of India. The Indian Harvest.

  All the names were poetry to her. All the names said freedom.

  6

  HOSPITALITY

  From: Flandres%A-Heg@idl.gov

  To: mpp%administrator@prison.hs.ru

  Re: Funds for idl prisoners

  The office of the Hegemon appreciates your continuing to hold prisoners for crimes against the International Defense League, despite the lack of funding. Dangerous persons need to continue in detention for the full term of their sentences. Since IDL policy was to allocate prisoners according to the size and means of the guardian countries, as well as the national origin of the prisoners, you may be sure that Romania does not have more than its fair share of such prisoners. As funds become available, the costs incurred in prisoner maintenance will be reimbursed on a pro rata basis.

  However, given that the original international emergency is over, each guardian nation’s courts or prison supervisors may determine whether the international law(s) which each IDL prisoner violated is still in force and conforms with local laws. Prisoners should not be held for crimes which are no longer crimes, even if the original sentence has not been fully served.

  Categories of laws that may not apply include research restrictions whose purpose was political rather than defensive. In particular, the restriction against genetic modification of human embryos was devised to hold the league together in the face of opposition from Muslim, Catholic, and other “respect-for-life” nations, and as quid pro quo for accepting the restrictions on family size. Prisoners convicted under such laws should be released without prejudice. However, they are not entitled to compensation for time served, since they were lawfully found guilty of crimes and their conviction is not being overturned.

  If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

  Sincerely,

  Achilles de Flandres, Assistant to the Hegemon

  When Suriyawong brought Achilles out of China, Peter knew exactly what he meant to do with Achilles.

  He would study him for as long as he considered him harmless, and then turn him over to, say, Pakistan for trial.

  Peter had prepared very carefully for Achilles’s arrival. Every computer terminal in the Hegemony already had shepherds installed, recording every keystroke and taking snapshots of every text page and picture displayed. Most of this was discarded after a fairly short time, but anything Achilles did would be kept and studied, as a way of tracing all his connections and identifying his networks.

  Meanwhile, Peter would offer him assignments and see what he did with them. There was no chance that Achilles would, even for a moment, act in the interest of the Hegemony, but he might be useful if Peter kept him on a short enough tether. The trick would be to get as much use out of him as possible, learn as much as possible, but then neutralize him before he could dish up the betrayal he would, without question, be cooking up.

  Peter had toyed with the idea of keeping Achilles locked up for a while before actually letting him take part in the operations of the Hegemony. But that sort of thing was only effective if the subject was susceptible to such human emotions as fear or gratitude. It would be wasted on Achilles.

  So as soon as Achilles had had a chance to clean up after his flights across the Pacific and over the Andes, Peter invited him to lunch.

  Achilles came, of course, and rather surprised Peter by not seeming to do anything at all. He thanked him for rescuing him and for lunch in virtually the same tone—sincerely but not extravagantly grateful. His conversation was informal, pleasant, sometimes funny but never seeming to try for humor. He did not bring up anything about world affairs, the recent wars, why he had been arrested in China, or even a single question about why Peter had rescued him or what he planned to do with him now.

  He did not ask Peter if there was going to be a war crimes trial.

  And yet he did not seem to be evading anything at all. It seemed as though Peter had only to ask what it had been like, betraying India and subverting Thailand so all of south Asia dropped into his hands like a ripe papaya, and Achilles would tell several interesting anecdotes about it and then move on to discuss the kidnapping of the children from Ender’s group at Command School.

  But because Peter did not bring it up, Achilles modestly refrained from talking about his achievements.

  “I wondered,” said Peter, “if you wanted to take a break from working for world peace, or if you’d like to lend a hand around here.”

  Achilles did not bat an eye at the bitter irony, but instead he seemed to take Peter’s words at face value. “I don’t know that I’d be much use,” he said. “I’ve been something of an orientalist lately, but I’d have to say that the position your soldiers found me in shows that I wasn’t a very good one.”

  “Nonsense,” said Peter, “everyone makes an error now and then. I suspect your only error was too much success. Is it Buddhism, Taoism, or Confucianism that teaches that it is a mistake to do something perfectly? Because it would provoke resentment, and therefore wouldn’t be perfect after all?”

  “I think it was the Greeks,” said Achilles. “Perfection arouses the envy of the gods.”

  “Or the Communists,” said Peter. “Snick off the heads of any blades of grass that rise higher than the rest of the lawn.”

  “If you think I have any value,” said Achilles, “I’d be glad to do whatever is within my abilities.”

  “Thank you for not saying ‘my poor abilities,’” said Peter. “We both know you’re a master of the great game, and I, for one, never intend to try to play head-to-head against you.”

  “I’m sure you’d win handily,” said Achilles.

  “Why would you think that?” said Peter, disappointed at what seemed, for the first time, like flattery.

  “Because,” said Achilles, “it’s hard to win when your opponent holds all the cards.”

  Not flattery, then, but a realistic assessment of the situation.

  Or…maybe flattery after all, because of course Peter did not hold all the cards. Achilles almost certainly had plenty of them left, once he was in a position to get to them.

  Peter found that Achilles could be very charming. He had a sort of reticence about him. He walked rather slowly—perhaps a habit that originated before the surgery that fixed his gimp leg—and made no effort to dominate a conversation, though he was not uncomfortably silent, either. He was almost nondescript. Charmingly nondescript—was such a thing possible?

  Peter had lunch with him three times a week and each time gave him various assignments. Peter gave him letterhead and a net identity that anointed him “Assistant to the Hegemon,” but of course that only meant that, in a world where the Hegemon’s power consisted of the fading remnants of the unity that had been forced on the world during the Formic Wars, Achilles had been granted the shadow of a shadow of power.

  “Our authority,” Peter remarked to him at their second lunch, “lies very lightly on the reins of world government.”

  “The horses seem so comfortable it’s almost as though they were not being guided at all,” said Achilles, entering into the joke without a smile.

  “We govern so skillfully that we never need to use spurs.”

  “Which is a good thing,” said Achilles. “Spurs being in short supply around here these days.”

  But just because the Hegemony was very nearly an empty shell in terms of actual power did not mean there was no real work to do. Quite the contrary. When one has no power, Peter knew, then the only influence one has comes, not from fear, but from the perception that one has useful favors to offer. There were plenty of institutions and customs left over from the decades when the Triumvirate of Hegemon, Polemarch, and Strategos had governed the human race.

  Newly formed governments in various countries were formed on shaky legal ground; a visit from Peter was often quite helpful in giving the illusion of legitimacy. There were countries that owed money to the Hegemony, and since there was no chance of collecting it, the Hegemon could win favor by making a big deal of forgiving the accruing interest because of various noble actions on the part of a government. Thus when Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia rushed aid to Italy, sending a fleet when Venice was plagued with a flood and an earthquake at the same time, they were all given amnesty on interest. “Your generous assistance helps bind the world together, which is all that the Hegemony hopes to achieve.” It was a chance for the heads of government to get their positive coverage and face time in the vids.

  And they also knew that as long as it didn’t cost them much, keeping the Hegemony in play was a good idea, since it and the Muslims were the only groups openly opposing China’s expansionism. What if China turned out to have ambitions beyond the empire it had already conquered? What if the world beyond the Great Wall suddenly had to unite just to survive? Wouldn’t it be good to have a viable Hegemon ready to assume leadership? And the Hegemon, young as he might be, was the brother of the great Ender Wiggin, wasn’t he?

  There were lesser tasks to be accomplished, too. Hegemony libraries that needed to try to secure local funding. Hegemony police stations all over the world whose archives from the old days needed to stay under Hegemony control even though all the funding came from local sources. Some nasty things had been done as part of the war effort, and there were still plenty of people alive who wanted those archives sealed. Yet there were also powerful people who wanted to make sure the archives were not destroyed. Peter was very careful not to let anything uncomfortable come to light from any of the archives—but was not above letting an uncooperative government know that even if they seized the archive within their own boundaries, there were other archives with duplicate records that were under the control of rival nations.

  Ah, the balancing act. And each negotiation, each trade-off, each favor done and favor asked for, Peter treated very carefully, for it was vital that he always get more than he gave, creating the illusion in other nations of more influence and power than he actually had.

  For the more influence and power they believed he had, the more influence and power he actually had. The reality lagged far behind the illusion, but that’s why it became all the more important to maintain the illusion perfectly.

  Achilles could be very helpful at that.

  And because he would almost certainly use his opportunities for his own advantage, letting him have a broad range of action would invite him to expose his plans in ways that Peter’s spy systems would surely catch. “You won’t catch a fish if you hold the hook in one hand and the bait in the other. You need to put them together, and give them a lot of string.” Peter’s father had said this, and more than once, too, which implied that the poor fellow thought it was clever rather than obvious. But it was obvious because it was true. To get Achilles to reveal his secrets, Peter had to give him the ability to communicate with the outside world at will.

  But he couldn’t make it too easy, either, or Achilles would guess what Peter really wanted. Therefore Peter, with a great show of embarrassment, put severe restrictions on Achilles’s access to the nets. “I hope you realize that there’s too much history for me simply to give you carte blanche,” he explained. “In time, of course, these restrictions might be lifted, but for now you may write only messages that pertain directly to your assigned tasks, and all your requests to send emails will need to be cleared by my office.”