Joan Vinge - The Summer Queen

Gundhalinu had been told the rules of this choosing, but he had never actually witnessed it. He watched as the exhausted, dull-eyed men around him suddenly came alive, leaning forward, calling out numbers with an eagerness he had never seen them show about anything before. The three who won got a break from the grueling drudgery of their work routine, and the chance to spend a night in a place that actually resembled civilization, with beds, showers, and real food, while they traded in the harvest they had brought for the small rewards that made their lives bearable until the time when they were set free from this living death.

“Treason?” Piracy said. “You got a number?”

Gundhalinu looked up, startled; realizing that he had not said anything, as usual. He had not even been sure they would let him play. Sudden excitement and hope filled him until he shone like the rest. He licked his cracked lips, and said, “Twenty-three.”

Piracy nodded, and pushed up onto his knees. He held the game piece cupped between his hands, shaking it, prolonging the ecstatic moment when anything was possible for the men around him. And in that moment Gundhalinu understood what had made him their leader. When the game piece fell, three men would not only have the journey itself as a reward—they would have the days in between of looking forward to it. Even the losers would win those days of pleasant anticipation, of deciding what small, precious item not tied to their own survival that they would put in a request for… .

Piracy held his hands out, bathed in golden light, and let the game piece drop.

Whoops of triumph and curses of frustration made a deafening cacophony in Gundhalinu’s ears, which had grown too used to silence. He pushed forward, seeing the number face up in the sand, seeing that it made him a loser. The loss caught in his chest like a barb; he swore. The others shrugged and shook their heads, accepting defeat like they accepted everything else. But he felt stunned as he realized how much the sudden, real hope of winning had meant to him, now that it had suddenly been taken away.

He tried to focus on an adhani; unable even to remember one, as Piracy announced the winners. They were congratulated by the losers, more roughly than was necessary, but taking it with smug good humor. He felt bodies begin to move, jarring him as they rose and went their separate ways back to their huts to sleep. There was more conversation than usual, more animation, even laughter. He forced his own unwilling body to get up, suddenly aware of every ache and strained muscle; not understanding why only he felt worse, not better. Maybe because the rest of them knew this would all end for them someday; only he had no other hope that he still dared to believe in.

“Hey,” somebody said. “Look at Treason.”

Gundhalinu stiffened, and turned toward Accessory, who was pointing at him.

“He’s got the green light,” Accessory said. “Look!”

The others began to turn back, staring in curiosity, as Gundhalinu suddenly lunged at him, knocking him to the ground.

Gundhalinu sat on Accessory’s chest with his hands around the other man’s neck. “Joke about that again, you bastard, and I’ll stuff your lying tongue down your throat—”

“I’m not lying!” Accessory squealed, prying at his hands. More hands were on him, dragging him off of Accessory, holding him back.

“He’s not lying, Treason,” Piracy said. He stepped in front of Gundhalinu, meeting his furious stare. He held up a fragment of polished metal, let Gundhalinu see his reflection in a sudden blaze of sunlight, and the green light on his collar shining like a star.

Gundhalinu stopped struggling, seeing his own mouth fall open. His hands rose to the collar around his throat, as the men holding him let him go; as the rest clustered behind Piracy, staring at him.

“You said he was a term,” Accessory muttered, getting to his feet. “I thought he only got the green light the hard way.”

“I was … lam,” Gundhalinu whispered, still gazing at his reflection, seeing a man he barely recognized press grimy fingers to his throat; detecting the faint warmth given off by the light on his collar.

“Maybe it’s a mistake,” someone said. Gundhalinu spun around, glaring at him.

Piracy put a hand on Gundhalinu’s shoulder. “They don’t make mistakes like that around here, Treason,” he said quietly. “I’ll radio the post. Guess you’re going along this trip after all. One way.” His mouth quirked slightly. “Congratulations. We might even miss you, a little. …”

Gundhalinu nodded, barely, meeting his eyes. “I won’t forget you, either. I won’t forget any of this.”

Piracy gave him a long stare, and shrugged. “Better if you do, Treason,” he said. “It’s better if you do.”

Gundhalinu shook his head, looking down. “I couldn’t if I wanted to,” he whispered.

“Guess your dream was true, Treason,” Bluekiller said.

Gundhalinu glanced up. “I guess it was,” he murmured, with a strained laugh.

He took a step, suddenly afraid that he was still moving through a dream. They parted ranks for him, the way the convicts had parted ranks for a man with a green light on the day he had arrived. He passed through them, his shadow walking a golden road through the dawn. He reached his hut and crawled inside, still followed by the benediction of their stares, as if he had become a peculiar sort of hero. He lay down on his pallet of rags with a sigh. And then, against all odds, he went’to sleep.

TIAMAT: Carbuncle

Reede Kullervo stood on the hidden balcony that overlooked the reception hall, leaning against the rail in voyeuristic fascination, watching the gathering below as he had watched it for hours, all-seeing but unseen. This was only one of many hidden rooms and secret observations points in the palace; he had been shown them all, after the Queen’s arrest, by members of the Sibyl College. The aging blind woman who was the College’s head had ordered them to protect him when the Blues arrived to flush him out; and they had, even the two whose pregnant daughter was Tammis Dawntreader’s widow. He remembered Merovy Bluestone’s quiet, pragmatic manner as she had treated his illness; he remembered her eyes… .

He sighed, filling up his vision with the motion and color of the crowded hall below. He could not remember now whether he had created these quirks of design when he had dreamed of what Carbuncle would be, or whether they had been added later, somewhere in the long, lost centuries between his once-and-future lives.

He was grateful for them, whether it had been foresight or not; because they had saved his life, and because now they let him observe the closing of a circle which he had helped to bring about. The party below, where offworlder officials and Tiamatans mingled in a fragile dance of diplomacy, celebrated the return of Chief Justice BZ Gundhalinu.

He did not dare show himself down there while a single Kharemoughi lingered, afraid that his face, or some random response, might reveal the Smith to the unwanted attention of the Golden Mean. And so he had watched from here as the hall slowly filled, studying the variegated colors of skin and hair and clothing, the varieties of ostentation, sophistication, and simplicity; savoring the sensuous pleasure of the patterns they inscribed on his mind.

The Queen had moved among them, her movements seemingly random except to his observation. His eyes told him that she drifted near the entrance to the hall too often, looked toward it too much, smoothed back her hair and checked the time repeatedly, with restless impatience.

Until the moment they had both been waiting for, without entirely realizing it, had come at last—Gundhalinu had arrived. The music, and all motion, had stopped in the hall: dancing, eating, gossiping, politicking, all suddenly frozen into a magnificent tableau.