Joan Vinge - World's End

I looked down at the picture and the trefoil still lying in my hands, knowing that she hadn't given those things lightly to a stranger. She had told me the truth. She had lost her child, and her suffering was real enough. I know about loss. . . .

The trefoil threw spines of reflected light into my eyes, making them tear. I remembered suddenly how tears had come into my eyes on the day that I told my father I was leaving home . .

. though I never imagined

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then that it would be forever. I would have broken down like Hahn, if I'd known--

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WORLD S END

It was hard enough to keep my composure as I saw his face. "How much ... how much time have thou to spend with us, before thou must leave?" he asked me. He was standing in the High Hall, erect and dignified in the uniform that he wore even at home, the symbol of his pride as head of a family as old and honorable as any on

Kharemough. But his voice sounded strangely weak as he asked the question.

"A little over a month." I smiled as I answered, trying to believe that it was a long time. The limpid counterpoint of a choral work by Tithane filled the silence between us, and eased the ache in my throat. I stared out the wide windows at the sky. Pollution aurora marred the perfect blue, a constant reminder of Kharemough's

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overworked orbital industries--the price we paid for our leadership in the Hegemony.

"We must notify thy mother. She will surely want to see thee once more ... if her work will allow it."

I didn't answer, afraid that anything I said would be the wrong thing. Suddenly my chest hurt. I recited an adhani under my breath. Mother had gotten fed up with us all when I was only five. I could count on the fingers of my hands the times I'd seen her since then. She spent her time on another continent halfway around the world, leading archeological excavations of Old Empire ruins. ... I had heard so many times as a child that I

wasn't to blame that I was sure it must somehow have been my fault. She didn't come home before I left Kharemough.

"Are thou certain this is the right course? After all, thou're only a boy--" I saw the trembling of his hands, which he usually controlled so well.

"Father, I'm nearly twenty standards. I already have more degrees than HK and SB put together.

I can't spend the rest of my life studying, preparing for something--" For something I would never have. "I'm a grown man. And I'm

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not thy heir. It would be dishonorable for me to live here any longer." But more than that, living with my brothers had finally become unbearable.

"Scholarship is a respected calling in its own right.

Thou could at least remain here on Kharemough, and teach--"

"No." I bit my lip, seeing the pain in his eyes. But the pain of staying would be far worse.

"Thou know . . ." His mouth resisted the words.

". . thou know that I'm not young. It's true that thou're last in line to inherit. But to leave Kharemough ... If something were to happen to thy brothers--"

"Nothing will happen to them, Father " If only it would! The violence of the thought almost blinded me. I

blinked and glanced away, afraid that he would read it in my

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eyes, and know.. .. "What could happen to them here?"

With malicious spite, my mind showed me half a dozen fatal possibilities.

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He shook his head, leaning against the ancient mantelpiece below the picturescreen. "What, indeed. A

weakling and a parasite, left in control of our holdings when I'm gone." His hand clenched. "Thy mother has no interest in her responsibilities here. And without thee to oversee--"

"They won't listen to me when . . . when HK is head of family. It's better if I leave, better for the family."

He sighed. "If only SB had gone in thy place; as he should have, years ago. If only he had been born with thy sense of honor, or HK with thy intelligence. . . ." He looked up at me. "Or if thou had been born first." His eyes held mine, searching.

I took a deep breath, suddenly finding the courage to say what I had never dared to say before.

"Father, I

know the wisdom of the laws. They were intended to keep society in the control of the ones most capable of running it well. But... but here in our family, they don't

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WORLD S END

. . . they don't seem ..." I went on in a rush, "By our sainted ancestors, Father, can't thou disinherit them? It would be justice--"

"Enough!" He pushed away from the mantel, rigid with anger. "You've said enough! It's not in my hands.

You will not mention it again."

You. Not thou. It stung like a slap. "Forgive me, Father."

I bowed, whispering, "I had no right." I kept my burning face averted. "May I have . . . your permission to leave you?"

"No."

I started as I felt his hands on my shoulders. I looked up into his dark eyes as clear as garnets. He had been an old man when I was born, but now for the first time in

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my life I saw that he was old.

"Thou are all I have that makes me proud," he said, and he hugged me, for the first time since my childhood.

I was so surprised that I almost pulled away. "I would give up my life for thee, gladly ... but I cannot go against the laws." And yet his eyes implored me to understand something more--something that was beyond his power, but not beyond mine.

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"I know," I said, answering only his words. I looked down. I still felt his touch, even after his hands dropped away. I gazed out the window at the gnarled gray stone of the pinnacle on which the main house sat. I felt the overwhelming weight of a thousand years of tradition pressing down on me, immobilizing me. "I--I would like to go down to the places of our ancestors now, and meditate."

He nodded, his face stern with disappointment. He turned away from me, leaning heavily against the mantel.

"Yes. Say a prayer for us all."

I started for the door. He called suddenly, "Where will thou be stationed?"

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"Tiamat."

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"Tiamat!" He was himself again as I looked back at him. "The people there are little more than barbarians.

I can arrange a better assignment for thee, one where at least thou will be dealing with civilized citizens--"

I shook my head. "No, Father. I chose this myself."

Because it had seemed the most exotic, the most alien, among the choices I had: a world like something out of the Old Empire romances I read constantly.

Tiamat was a world of water and ice, whose small population lived mostly in a state of bucolic backwardness.

There was only one major city on the entire world, a notorious tourist stopover--a fantastic relic of the Old

Empire, called Carbuncle "because it was both a jewel and a fester." The Hegemony controlled Tiamat directly

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for a hundred and fifty years at a time, leaving the natives to fend for themselves for another century as Tia mat's twin suns entered the periapsis of their orbit around the black hole that was its stargate. Then gravitational instabilities closed the Gate to starship travel for a hundred years, and anyone left behind faced a lifetime of exile. Half the population of the planet became exiles, too, as they moved to higher latitudes to escape their suns' increased radiation. And the ritual of the Change sacrificed the Snow Queen, who had ruled for a hundred and fifty years, to the sea the Tiamatans worshipped.