Jonathan Strahan: The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year. Volume 10

Crawling out of the brambles back into the woods, Ashiban found the Sovereign sitting on the ground, still weeping. As Ashiban came entirely clear of the thorns, the girl stood and helped Ashiban to her feet and then, still crying, not saying a single word or looking at Ashiban at all, turned and began walking east.

THE NEXT DAY they found a small stream. The Sovereign lay down and put her face in the water, drank for a good few minutes, and then filled the bottle and brought it to Ashiban. They followed the stream’s wandering east-now-south-now-east-again course for another three days as it broadened into something almost approaching a river.

At the end of the third day, they came to a small, gently arched bridge, mottled gray and brown and beige, thick plastic spun from whatever scraps had been thrown into the hopper of the fabricator, with a jagged five- or six-centimeter jog around the middle, where the fabricator must have gotten hung up and then been kicked back into action.

On the far side of the bridge, on the other bank of the stream, a house and outbuildings, the same mottled gray and brown as the bridge. An old, dusty groundcar. A garden, a young boy pulling weeds, three or four chickens hunting for bugs among the vegetables.

As Ashiban and the Sovereign came over the bridge, the boy looked up from his work in the garden, made a silent O with his mouth, turned and ran into the house. “Raksamat,” said Ashiban, but of course the Sovereign must have realized as soon as they set eyes on those fabricated buildings.

A woman came out of the house, in shirt and trousers and stocking feet, gray-shot hair in braids tied behind her back. A hunting gun in her hand. Not aimed at Ashiban or the Sovereign. Just very conspicuously there.

The sight of that gun made Ashiban’s heart pound. But she would almost be glad to let this woman shoot her so long as she let Ashiban eat something besides grubs first. And let her sit in a chair. Still, she wasn’t desperate enough to speak first. She was old enough to be this woman’s mother.

“Elder,” said the woman with the gun. “To what do we owe the honor?”

It struck Ashiban that these people – probably on the planet illegally, one of those Raksamat settler families that had so angered the Gidanta recently – were unlikely to have any desire to encourage a war that would leave them alone and vulnerable here on the planet surface. “Our flier crashed, child, and we’ve been walking for days. We are in sore need of some hospitality.” Some asperity crept into her voice, and she couldn’t muster up the energy to feel apologetic about it.

The woman with the gun stared at Ashiban, and her gaze shifted over Ashiban’s shoulder, presumably to the Sovereign of Iss, who had dropped back when they’d crossed the bridge. “You’re Ashiban Xidyla,” said the woman with the gun. “And this is the Sovereign of Iss.”

Ashiban turned to look at the Sovereign. Who had turned her face away, held her hands up as though to shield herself.

“Someone tried to kill us,” Ashiban said, turning back to the woman with the gun. “Someone shot down our flier.”

“Did they now,” said the woman with the gun. “They just found the flier last night. It’s been all over the news, that the pilot and the Sovereign’s interpreter were inside, but not yourself, Elder, or her. Didn’t say anything about it being shot down, but I can’t say I’m surprised.” She considered Ashiban and the Sovereign for a moment. “Well, come in.”

Inside they found a large kitchen, fabricator-made benches at a long table where a man sat plucking a chicken. He looked up at their entrance, then down again. Ashiban and the Sovereign sat at the other end of the table, and the boy from the garden brought them bowls of pottage. The Sovereign ate with one hand still spread in front of her face.

“Child,” said Ashiban, forcing herself to stop shoveling food into her mouth, “is there a cloth or a towel the Sovereign could use? She lost her veils.”

The woman stared at Ashiban, incredulous. Looked for a moment as though she was going to scoff, or say something dismissive, but instead left the room and came back with a large, worn dish towel, which she held out for the Sovereign.

Who stared at the cloth a moment, through her fingers, and then took it and laid it over her head, and then pulled one corner across her face, so that she could still see.

Their host leaned against a cabinet. “So,” she said, “the Gidanta wanted an excuse to kill all us Raksamat on the planet, and shot your flier out of the sky.”

“I didn’t say that,” said Ashiban. The comfort from having eaten actual cooked food draining away at the woman’s words. “I don’t know who shot our flier down.”

“Who else would it be?” asked the woman, bitterly. The Sovereign sat silent beside Ashiban. Surely she could not understand what was being said, but she was perceptive enough to guess what the topic was, to understand the tone of voice. “Not that I had much hope for this settlement you’re supposedly here to make. All respect, Elder, but things are as they are, and I won’t lie.”

“No, of course, child,” replied Ashiban. “You shouldn’t lie.”

“It’s always us who get sold out, in the agreements and the settlements,” said the woman. “We have every right to be here. As much right as the Gidanta. That’s what the agreement your mother made said, isn’t it? But then when we’re actually here, oh, no, that won’t do, we’re breaking the law. And does your mother back us up? Does the Assembly? No, of course not. We aren’t Xidylas or Ontrils or Lajuds or anybody important. Maybe if my family had an elder with a seat in the Assembly it would be different, but if we did, we wouldn’t be here. Would we?”

“I’m not sure that’s entirely fair, child,” replied Ashiban. “When the Raksamat farmsteads were first discovered, the Gidanta wanted to find you all and expel you. They wanted the Assembly to send help to enforce that. In the end my mother convinced everyone to leave the farmsteads alone while the issues were worked out.”

“Your mother!” cried the woman, their host. “All respect, Elder, but your mother might have told them to hold to the agreement she worked out and the Gidanta consented to, in front of their ancestors. It’s short and plain enough.” She gestured at the Sovereign. “Can you tell her that?”

The front door opened on three young women talking, pulling off their boots. One of them glanced inside, saw Ashiban and the Sovereign, the other woman, presumably a relative of theirs, standing straight and angry by the cabinet. Elbowed the others, who fell silent.

Ashiban said, “I don’t speak much Gidantan, child. You probably speak more than I do. And the Sovereign doesn’t have much Raksamat. I lost my handheld in the crash, so there’s no way to translate.” And the Sovereign was just a girl, with no more power in this situation than Ashiban herself.

The man at the end of the table spoke up. “Any news?” Directed at the three young women, who had come in and begun to dish themselves out some pottage.

“We didn’t see anything amiss,” said one of the young women. “But Lyek stopped on their way home from town, they said they went in to take their little one to the doctor. It was unfriendly. More unfriendly than usual, I mean.” She sat down across the table with her bowl, cast a troubled glance at the Sovereign, though her tone of voice stayed matter-of-fact. “They said a few people in the street shouted at them to get off the planet, and someone spit on them and called them stinking weevils. When they protested to the constable, she said it was no good complaining about trouble they’d brought on themselves, and wouldn’t do anything. They said the constable had been standing right there .”