“But what if it did mean something, when he asked?” she persisted. “What if I’m right?”
Tet Sang had told Guet Imm the truth—he’d never been interested in Fung Cheung in that way. Even if his inclinations had lain in that direction, his intimatefamiliarity with Fung Cheung’s personality would have put him off. But if Guet Imm liked Fung Cheung, perhaps it would make her feel better to believe she was not alone.
“What’s the point of talking about ‘what if’?” he said, in a tone to make it clear he’d said all he would on the topic.
Guet Imm could take that for confirmation of his interest in Fung Cheung if she liked. She would not be the first to suspect Tet Sang of harbouring feelings for Fung Cheung going beyond pure brotherhood.
Guet Imm finished her work, letting Tet Sang’s underrobe fall over the new dressing. “It should be changed every few hours. Call me and I’ll do for you.”
She paused, slanting a tentative look at him.
“So, youarea woman?” she said. “The scriptures say there are souls who lose their way after they die. They go into the wrong body by accident when they are reborn. There was a nun at my tokong like that. She was a son to her parents before she decided to follow the deity.”
Guet Imm would accept whatever answer Tet Sang gave her. Yet he hesitated. He put on his outer robes without speaking and went to the edge of the shelter, looking out at the forest.
He hadn’t thought too hard about the new identity he had assumed—a long time before now, it felt. Putting on men’s clothes, a man’s name, had been a practical choiceamid the chaos of the war. It wasn’t like there had been anything left of what had gone before. There had been no one to consult, to challenge, to remember the person Tet Sang had been before the breach.
He’d never had to consider the questions that came to him now. The words were strange on his tongue as he spoke.
“What does it mean to be a woman or a man?” he said. “I live the life of a man, but my heart hasn’t changed from when I was a woman. This”—he gestured at himself—“is the body of a woman. But it carries the sins of a man.”
“Women can be sinful too, you know,” said Guet Imm.
Tet Sang smiled without amusement. “Oh, yes? What doyouknow of sin, sister?”
“It’s true, what do I know?” said Guet Imm sadly. “I never had a chance to find out. I went into seclusion too young. I was not clever like you, brother. It never occurred to me to look beyond the Order.”
It was like Tet Sang had been walking on a sunlit path until Guet Imm said these last words and plunged him into shadow. Chilled, he said, “What do you mean?”
Guet Imm was sitting on the ground, legs crossed. It was a position Tet Sang knew in his very bones. One could hold it through hours of meditation.
“You always questioned the Order, I think,” she said. “Even before you left your tokong.”
Tet Sang froze.
“You were a follower of the Pure Moon, weren’t you?” said Guet Imm. “There were only twenty-one votaries at Permatang Timbul. That, a layperson might know. But the others…”
There hadn’t just been nuns at the tokong of the Pure Moon at Permatang Timbul. They had had their full complement of cooks and cleaners and labourers, who looked after the votaries; orphans and the indigent and the elderly, whom the votaries looked after in their turn.
“You would only know how many died if you were there,” said Guet Imm.
There was a roaring in Tet Sang’s ears. Stupid,stupidto lower his guard. What had he thought? That she’d simply forget what he’d let slip?
“You didn’t have to be a nun to hear about the purges,” he said through the roaring. “The Protectorate razed the tokong to the ground. The news was all over town.”
Guet Imm blinked. “The mata did it? It was bandits who came to my tokong.”
“There are enemies on both sides of the war,” said Tet Sang. Then he realised the implications of what she’d said. “Wait. If the bandits destroyed your tokong, why did you join us? You thoughtwewere bandits.”
“I lost my job and you came to me, all in one day,” said Guet Imm. “Obviously, the deity sent you to me. One way or another, I had to follow you.
“At first, I thought she wanted me to take revenge,” sheadded. “I bought a knife with the money you gave me, so I could do it while you were sleeping. I could have used poison—that would have been cleaner—but I wasn’t sure I could find the right herbs in time.”
“You came so you could kill us?” said Tet Sang. “After I gave you money?”
Guet Imm flapped a dismissive hand. “What is money?”
“Spoken like an anchorite,” said Tet Sang. “Of course money has no meaning, when you’ve been living off people’s donations all your life!”
