Ninefox Gambit

SERVITOR 244666 HADN’T intended to get caught. Of course, people rarely did. But it would have gotten away with its illicit snooping if it hadn’t been for a flickering glitch in the cindermoth’s variable layout, consequence of a moment’s power fluctuation. It had been coming out of Cheris’s quarters after having planted the bug. As luck would have it, another servitor, 819825, spotted it through the moment’s window between the brevet general’s quarters and the high halls that were, ordinarily, a right turn and a few minutes away.

It wasn’t that servitors were precisely forbidden to enter humans’ quarters. The maintenance work and routine chores that were their responsibility necessitated it, although they made a point of knocking as a matter of courtesy. Some of the humans would shoo them off if it was an inconvenient moment, but in general they didn’t think much of it, an attitude the servitors themselves had encouraged during the scant centuries of their sentience.

The servitors themselves, however, had their own rules to govern how they went about their duties. It was always fair to enter if duty required it, or, in rare cases like Cheris’s, if they were invited to socialize. It was not, according to servitor consensus, fair to drop bugs into the brevet general’s quarters for around-the-clock monitoring even if you were the lead servitor assigned to keep tabs on her whenever she was in the moth’s public areas.

At present, 244666 folded up its limbs, hinges neat and precise, and stared patiently at 819825, who had volunteered to serve as its guard or companion, take your pick. They were both shut up in one of the service corridors, dark except when they flashed prickly comments at each other, for remedial meditation. You could hear a lot here, especially with a servitor’s senses, although they were circumspect in how they used their scan capabilities. At the moment what they got was the occasional exchange between the humans below them, including a Kel joke or two; footsteps, superstitious one-two-three-four knockings on the walls, the whoosh of air circulating, the quiet whisking of other servitors hovering through the passages.

819825 had reported 244666 to the other servitors, and they had summoned it to explain itself. 244666 had shown up; it didn’t have many places to hide, and besides, it might have some philosophical differences with its fellows, but it didn’t want to defy the most important rules of servitor society.

819825, who had always had the most annoying prim streak, had explained to 244666 in exacting detail that the foundation of servitor society was courtesy, and that this differentiated them from the humans who ran their world, and that if they started deviating from it in small matters it would only be a matter of time before they slid into deviating from it in larger ones. Besides, the brevet general had been unfailingly polite to them. She deserved better consideration. It was the kind of lecture you expected to outgrow after your first few neural flowerings.

244666 thought to itself that this was all very well, but they mostly had the word of distant servitors as to Cheris’s character, and besides, no one with half a sentience could think that Shuos Jedao’s involvement boded well. It would have felt much easier knowing what went on in Cheris’s quarters at all times. Still, it hadn’t had a chance to activate the bug, its fellows had removed the thing anyway, and moreover it was impossible to eavesdrop on Jedao’s half of any conversation, something that they had had abundant opportunity to verify. It had to concede defeat. In the meantime, 244666 could have endured its confinement, however temporary, in true solitude, and instead 819825 had chosen to accompany it when it didn’t have to. It resolved to repay the kindness when they were done with this.