"We've got minutes and minutes," said Grace. "Millions of them, really. You're the ones who seem to have only a few. So much hurry that you jump the gulf from star to star overnight. It strains credulity, of course, since lightspeed is supposed to be an insuperable barrier, but then, not believing you're the same people my friend saw on the planet Divine Wind also strains credulity, so there we are. Supposing that you really can travel faster than light, what does that tell us about where you're from? Aimaina takes it for granted that you were sent to him by the gods, more specifically by his ancestors, and he may be right, it's in the nature of gods to be unpredictable and suddenly do things they've never done before. Myself, though, I find that rational explanations always work out better, especially in papers I hope to get published. So the rational explanation is that you come from a real world, not from some heavenly never-never land. And since you can hop from world to world in a moment or a day, you could come from anywhere. But my family and I think you come from Lusitania."
"Well, I don't," said Wang-mu.
"And I'm originally from Earth," said Peter. "If I'm from anywhere."
"Aimaina thinks you come from Outside," said Grace, and for a moment Wang-mu thought the woman must have figured out how Peter came into existence. But then she realized that Grace's words had a theological meaning, not a literal one. "The land of the gods. But Malu said he's never seen you there, or if he did he didn't know it was you. So that leaves me right back where I started. You're lying about everything, so what good does it do to ask you questions?"
"I told you the truth," said Wang-mu. "I come from Path. And Peter's origins, so far as they can be traced to any planet, are on Earth. But the vehicle we came in--that originated on Lusitania."
Peter's face went white. She knew he was thinking, Why not just noose ourselves up and hand them the loose ends of the rope? But Wang-mu had to use her own judgment, and in her judgment they were in no danger from Grace Drinker or her family. Indeed, if she meant to turn them in to the authorities, wouldn't she already have done so?
Grace looked Wang-mu in the eyes and said nothing for a long while. Then: "Good fish, isn't it?"
"I wondered what the glaze was. Is there sugar in it?"
"Honey and a couple of herbs and actually some pig fat. I hope you aren't some rare combination of Chinese and Jew or Muslim, because if you are you're now ritually unclean and I would feel really bad about that, it's so much trouble getting purified again, or so I'm told, it certainly is in our culture."
Peter, heartened now by Grace's lack of concern with their miraculous spaceship, tried to get them back on the subject. "So you'll let us see Malu?"
"Malu decides who sees Malu, and he says you're the ones who'll decide, but that's just him being enigmatic."
"Gnomic," said Wang-mu. Peter winced.
"Not really, not in the sense of being obscure. Malu means to be perfectly clear and for him spiritual things aren't mystical at all, they're just a part of life. I myself have never actually walked with the dead or heard the heroes sing their own songs or had a vision of the creation, but I have no doubt that Malu has."
"I thought you were a scholar," said Peter.
"If you want to talk to the scholar Grace Drinker," she said, "read my papers and take a class. I thought you wanted to talk to me."
"We do," said Wang-mu quickly. "Peter's in a hurry. We have several deadlines."
"The Lusitania Fleet, now, I imagine that's one of them. But not quite so urgent as another. The computer shut-down that's been ordered."
Peter stiffened. "The order has been given?"
"Oh, it was given weeks ago," said Grace, looking puzzled. Then: "Oh, you poor dear, I don't mean the actual go-ahead. I mean the order telling us how to prepare. You surely knew about that one."
Peter nodded and relaxed, glum again.
"I think you want to talk to Malu before the ansible connections are shut down. Though why would that matter?" she said, thinking aloud. "After all, if you can travel faster than light, you could simply go and deliver your message yourself. Unless--"
Her son offered a suggestion: "They have to deliver their message to a lot of different worlds."
"Or a lot of different gods!" cried his father, who then laughed uproariously at what certainly seemed to Wang-mu to be a feeble joke.
"Or," said the daughter, who was now lying down beside the table, occasionally belching as she let the enormous dinner digest. "Or, they need the ansible connections in order to do their fast travel trick."
"Or," said Grace, looking at Peter, who had instinctively moved his hand to touch the jewel in his ear, "you're connected to the very virus that we're shutting down all the computers in order to eliminate, and that has something to do with your faster-than-light travel."
"It's not a virus," said Wang-mu. "It's a person. A living entity. And you're going to help Congress kill her, even though she's the only one of her kind and she's never harmed anybody."
"It makes them nervous when something--or, if you prefer, somebody--makes their fleet disappear."
"It's still there," said Wang-mu.
"Let's not fight," said Grace. "Let's just say that now that I've found you willing to tell the truth, perhaps it will be worthwhile for Malu to take the time to let you hear it."
"He has the truth?" asked Peter.