The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 26 (Mammoth Books)

by Gardner Dozois

  Jetsun will serve as shuttle pilot for one of these first excursions and as backup on another. He and others perform daily checks on the vehicle in its hangar harnesses, just as other techs strive to ensure the reliability of every mechanical and human component. Our hopes and our anxieties contend. At my urging, the Bodhisattva of U-Tsang go from deck to deck, assisting in our labors and transmitting positive energies to every bay and to all those at work in them.

  Twelve hours after Captain Photrang eased Kalachakra into orbit around Guge, Minister T comes to me to report that the Yellow Hat artists in U-Tsang have finished a mandala based on a design that they, not I, chose as our most esteemed entry. Eagerly, I ask whom these Bodhisattva selected.

  Lucinda Gomez, a teenager from Amdo Bay, has taken the laurel.

  Neddy asks the monks to transport the mandala in its pie-shaped shield to Bhava Park, a commons here in Kham Bay, and they do. A bird camera in the park transmits the mandala’s image to public screens and to vidped units everywhere. Intricate and colorful, it sits on an easel amid a host of tables and many happily milling Kalachakrans. Because we’re celebrating our arrival, I don’t watch on a screen but stand in Bhava Park before the thing itself. Banners and prayer flags abound. I hail the excited Lucinda Gomez and all the artist monks, congratulate them, and also speak to many onlookers, who heed my words smilingly.

  The Yellow Hats chant verses of consecration that affirm their fulfillment of my charge and then extend to everyone the blessings of Hope and Community implicit in the mandala’s labyrinthine central Palace. Kyipa, almost six, reaches out to touch the bottom of the encased mandala.

  “This is the prettiest,” she says.

  She has never before seen a finished mandala in its full artifactual glory.

  Then the artist monks start to carry the shield from its easel to a tabletop, there to insert narrow tubes into it and send the mandala’s fixed grains flying with focused blasts of air—to symbolize, as tradition dictates, the primacy of impermanence in our lives. But before they reach the table, I lift my hand.

  “We won’t destroy this sand mandala,” I announce, “until we’ve planted a viable settlement on Guge.”

  And everyone around us in Bhava Park cheers. The monks restore the mandala to its easel, a ton of colored confetti drops from suspended bins above us, music plays, and people sing, dance, eat, laugh, and mingle.

  Kyipa, holding her hands up to the drifting paper and plastic flakes, beams at me ecstatically.

  In our shuttle-cum-lander, we glide from the belly of Kham Bay toward Gliese 581 g, better known to all aboard the Kalachakra as Guge, “The Land of Snow.”

  From here, the amiable dwarf star about which Guge swings resembles the yolk of a colossal fried egg, more reddish than yellow-orange, with a misty orange corona about it like the egg’s congealed albumin. I’ve made it sound ugly, but Gliese 581 looks edible to me and quickly trips my hunger to reach the planet below.

  As for Guge, it gleams beneath us like an old coin.

  In our first week on its surface, we have already built a tent camp in one of the stabilized climate zones of the nearside terminator. Across the tall visible arc of that terminator, the planet shows itself marbled by a bluish and slate-gray crust marked by fingerlike snowfields and glacier sheets.

  On the ground, our people call their base camp Lhasa and their rugged territory all about it New Tibet. In response to this naming and to the alacrity with which our fellow Kalachakrans adopted it, Minister T wept openly.

  I find I like the man. Indeed, I go down for my first visit to the surface with his blessing. (Simon, my father, already bivouacs there, to investigate ways to grow barley, winter wheat, and other grains in the thin air and cold temperatures.) Kyipa, of course, remains for now on our orbiting strut-ship—in Neddy’s stateroom, which he now shares openly with the child’s grandmother, Karen Bryn Bonfils. Neddy and Karen Bryn dote on my daughter shamelessly.

  Our descent to Lhas won’t take long, but, along with many others in this second wave of pioneers, I deliberately drop into a meditative trance. I focus on a photograph that Neddy gave me after the mandala ceremony at the arrival celebration, and I recall his words as he presented it:

  “Soon after you became a teenager, Greta, I started to doubt your commitment to the Dharma and your ability to stick.”

  “How tactful of you to wait till now to tell me,” I said, smiling.

  “But I never lost a deeper layer of faith. Today, I can say that all my unspoken doubt has burned off like a summer meadow mist.” He gave me the worn photo—not a hardened d-cube—that now engages my attention.

  In it, a Tibetan boy of eight or nine faces the viewer with a broad smile. He holds before him, also facing the viewer, a baby girl with rosy cheeks and with eyes so familiar that I tear up in consternation and joy. The eyes belong to my predecessor’s infant sister, who didn’t live long after the capture of this image.

  The eyes also belong to Kyipa.

  I meditate on this conundrum, richly. Soon, after all, the Yak Butter Express will set down in New Tibet.

  ASTROPHILIA

  Carrie Vaughn

  New York Times bestseller Carrie Vaughn is the author of a wildly popular series of novels detailing the adventures of Kitty Narville, a radio personality who also happens to be a werewolf, and who runs a late-night call-in radio advice show for supernatural creatures. The “Kitty” books include Kitty and the Midnight Hour, Kitty Goes to Washington, Kitty Takes a Holiday, and Kitty and the Silver Bullet, Kitty and the Dead Man’s Hand, Kitty Raises Hell, Kitty’s House of Horrors, Kitty Goes to War, and Kitty’s Big Trouble. Her other novels include Voices of Dragons, her first venture into young adult territory, and a fantasy, Discord’s Apple. Vaughn’s short work has appeared in Lightspeed, Asimov’s Science Fiction, Subterranean, Wild Cards: Inside Straight, Realms of Fantasy, Jim Baen’s Universe, Paradox, Strange Horizons, Weird Tales, All-Star Zeppelin Adventure Stories, and elsewhere. Her most recent books include the novels After the Golden Age and Steel; a collection, Straying from the Path, a new “Kitty” novel, Kitty Steals the Show, and a collection of her “Kitty” stories, Kitty’s Greatest Hits. She lives in Colorado. Coming up is another new “Kitty” novel, Kitty Rocks the House.

  In the powerful tale that follows, she shows us that even in a diminished, ecologically distressed near future, one still recovering from what was nearly an apocalypse and still concentrating on survival, sometimes the most important thing to do is to hang on to your dreams.

  AFTER FIVE YEARS of drought, the tiny, wool-producing household of Greentree was finished. First the pastures died off, then the sheep, and Stella and the others didn’t have any wool to process and couldn’t meet the household’s quota, small though it was with only five of them working at the end. The holding just couldn’t support a household and the regional committee couldn’t keep putting credits into it, hoping that rains would come. They might never come, or the next year might be a flood. No one could tell, and that was the problem, wasn’t it?

  None of them argued when Az and Jude put in to dissolve Greentree. They could starve themselves to death with pride, but that would be a waste of resources. Stella was a good weaver, and ought to have a chance somewhere else. That was the first reason they gave for the decision.

  Because they dissolved voluntarily, the committee found places for them in other households, ones not on the verge of collapse. However, Az put in a special request and found Stella’s new home herself. “I know the head of the place, Toma. He’ll take good care of you, but more than that his place is prosperous. Rich enough for children, even. You could earn a baby there, Stella.” Az’s wrinkled hands gripped Stella’s young ones in her own, and her eyes shone. Twenty-three years ago, Greentree had been prosperous enough to earn a baby: Stella. But those days were gone.

  Stella began to have doubts. “Mama, I don’t want to leave you and everyone—”

  “We’ll be fine. We’d have had to leave s
ooner or later, and this way we’ve got credits to take with us. Start new on a good footing, yes?”

  “Yes, but—” She hesitated, because her fears were childish. “What if they don’t like me?”

  Az shook her head. “Winter market I gave Toma the shawl you made. You should have seen him, Stella, his mouth dropped. He said Barnard Croft would take you on the spot, credits or no.”

  But what if they don’t like me, Stella wanted to whine. She wasn’t worried about her weaving.

  Az must have seen that she was about to cry. “Oh, dear, it’ll be all right. We’ll see each other at the markets, maybe more if there’s trading to be done. You’ll be happy, I know you will. Better things will come.”

  Because Az seemed so pleased for her, Stella stayed quiet, and hoped.

  In the spring, Stella traveled to Barnard Croft, three hundred miles on the Long Road from Greentree, in the hills near the coast.

  Rain poured on the last day of the journey, so the waystation driver used a pair of horses to draw the wagon, instead of the truck. Stella offered to wait until the storm passed and the solar batteries charged up, but he had a schedule to keep, and insisted that the horses needed the exercise.

  Stella sat under the awning on the front seat of the wagon, wrapped in a blanket against the chill, feeling sorry for the hulking draft animals in front of her. They were soaked, brown coats dripping as they clomped step-by-step on the muddy road. It might have been faster, waiting for the clouds to break, for the sun to emerge and let them use the truck. But the driver said they’d be waiting for days in these spring rains.

  She traveled through an alien world, wet and green. Stella had never seen so much water in her whole life, all of it pouring from the sky. A quarter of this amount of rain a couple of hundred miles east would have saved Greentree.

  The road curved into the next green valley, to Barnard Croft. The wide meadow and its surrounding, rolling hills were green, lush with grass. A handful of alpaca grazed along a stream that ran frothing from the hills opposite. The animals didn’t seem to mind the water, however matted and heavy their coats looked. There’d be some work, cleaning that mess for spinning. Actually, she looked forward to it. She wanted to make herself useful as soon as she could. To prove herself. If this didn’t work, if she didn’t fit in here and had to throw herself on the mercy of the regional committee to find some place prosperous enough to take her, that could use a decent weaver . . . no, this would work.

  A half a dozen whitewashed cottages clustered together, along with sheds and shelters for animals, a couple of rabbit hutches, and squares of turned black soil with a barest sheen of green—garden plots and new growth. The largest cottage stood apart from the others. It had wide doors and many windows, shuttered now against the rain—the work house, she guessed. Under the shelter of the wide eaves sat wooden barrels for washing wool, and a pair of precious copper pots for dyeing. All comfortable, familiar sights.

  The next largest cottage, near the garden plots, had a smoking chimney. Kitchen and common room, most likely. Which meant the others were sleeping quarters. She wondered which was hers, and who’d she’d be sharing with. A pair of windmills stood on the side of one hill; their trefoil blades were still.

  At the top of the highest hill, across the meadow, was a small, unpainted shack. It couldn’t have held more than a person or two standing upright. This, she did not recognize. Maybe it was a curing shed, though it seemed an unlikely spot, exposed as it was to every passing storm.

  A turn-off took them from the road to the cottages, and by the time the driver pulled up the horses, eased the wagon to a stop, and set the brakes, a pair of men wrapped in cloaks emerged from the work house to greet them. Stella thanked the driver and jumped to the ground. Her boots splashed, her long woolen skirt tangled around her legs, and the rain pressed the blanket close around her. She felt sodden and bedraggled, but she wouldn’t complain.

  The elder of those who came to greet her was middle aged and worn, but he moved briskly and spread his arms wide. “Here she is! Didn’t know if you would make it in this weather.” This was Toma. Az’s friend, Stella reminded herself. Nothing to worry about.

  “Horses’ll get through anything,” the driver said, moving to the back of the wagon to unload her luggage.

  “Well then,” Toma said. “Let’s get you inside and dried off.”

  “Thank you,” Stella managed. “I just have a couple of bags. And a loom. Az let me take Greentree’s loom.”

  “Well then, that is a treasure. Good.”

  The men clustered around the back of the wagon to help. The bags held her clothes, a few books and letters and trinkets. Her equipment: spindles and needles, carders, skeins of yarn, coils of roving. The loom took up most of the space—dismantled, legs and frames strapped together, mechanisms folded away in protective oilskin. It would take her most of a day to set up. She’d feel better when it was.

  A third figure came running from the work house, shrouded by her wrap and hood like the others. The shape of her was female, young—maybe even Stella’s age. She wore dark trousers and a pale tunic, like the others.

  She came straight to the driver. “Anything for me?”

  “Package from Griffith?” the driver answered.

  “Oh, yes!”

  The driver dug under an oil cloth and brought out a leather document case, stuffed full. The woman came forward to take it, revealing her face, sandstone-burnished skin and bright brown eyes.

  Toma scowled at her, but the woman didn’t seem to notice. She tucked the package under her arm and beamed like sunshine.

  “At least be useful and take a bag,” Toma said to her.

  Taking up a bag with a free hand, the woman flashed a smile at Stella, and turned to carry her load to the cottage.

  Toma and other other man, Jorge, carried the loom to the work house. Hefting the rest of her luggage, Stella went to the main cottage, following the young woman at a distance. Behind her, the driver returned to his seat and got the horses moving again; their hooves splashed on the road.

  Around dinner time, the clouds broke, belying the driver’s prediction. Some sky and a last bit of sunlight peeked through.

  They ate what seemed to her eyes a magnificent feast—meat, eggs, preserved fruits and vegetables, fresh bread. At Greentree, they’d barely got through the winter on stores, and until this meal Stella hadn’t realized she’d been dimly hungry all the time, for weeks. Months. Greentree really had been dying.

  The folk of the croft gathered around the hearth at night, just as they did back home at Greentree, just as folk did at dozens of households up and down the Long Road. She met everyone: Toma and Jorge, who’d helped with the loom. Elsta, Toma’s partner, who ran the kitchen and garden. Nik and Wendy, Jon and Faren. Peri had a baby, which showed just how well off Barnard was, to be able to support a baby as well as a refugee like Stella. The first thing Peri did was put the baby—Bette—in Stella’s arms, and Stella was stricken because she’d never held a wriggly baby before and was afraid of dropping her. But Peri arranged her arms just so and took the baby back after a few moments of cooing over them both. Stella had never thought of earning the right to have her implant removed, to have a baby—another mouth to feed at Greentree would have been a disaster.

  Elsta was wearing the shawl Stella had made, the one Az had given Toma—her audition, really, to prove her worth. The shawl was an intricate weave made of finely spun merino. Stella had done everything—carded and spun the wool, dyed it the difficult smoky blue, and designed the pattern herself. Elsta didn’t have to wear it, the croft could have traded it for credits. Stella felt a small spark of pride. Wasn’t just charity that brought her here.

  Stella had brought her work basket, but Elsta tsked at her. “You’ve had a long trip, so rest now. Plenty of time to work later.” So she sat on a blanket spread out on the floor and played with Bette.

  Elsta picked apart a tangle of roving, preparing to draft into the spindle of
her spinning wheel. Toma and Jorge had a folding table in front of them, and the tools to repair a set of hand carders. The others knit, crocheted, or mended. They no doubt made all their own clothing, from weaving the fabric to sewing, dark trousers, bright skirts, aprons, and tunics. Stella’s hands itched to work—she was in the middle of knitting a pair of very bright yellow socks from the remnants of yarn from a weaving. They’d be ugly but warm—and the right kind of ugly had a charm of its own. But Elsta was probably right, and the baby was fascinating. Bette had a set of wooden blocks that she banged into each other; occasionally, very seriously, she handed them to Stella. Then demanded them back. The process must have had a logic to it.

  The young woman wasn’t with them. She’d skipped dinner as well. Stella was thinking of how to ask about her, when Elsta did it for her.

  “Is Andi gone out to her study, then?”

  Toma grumbled, “Of course she is.” The words bit.

  Her study—the shack on the hill? Stella listened close, wishing the baby would stop banging her blocks so loudly.

  “Toma—”

  “She should be here.”

  “She’s done her work, let her be. The night’s turned clear, you know how she gets.”

  “She should listen to me.”

  “The more you push, the angrier she’ll get. Leave her be, dearest.”

  Elsta’s wheel turned and purred, Peri hummed as she knit, and Bette’s toys clacked. Toma frowned, never looking up from his work.

  Her bags sat by one of the two beds in the smallest cottage, only half unpacked. The other bed, Andi’s, remained empty. Stella washed, brushed out her short blond hair, changed into her nightdress, and curled up under the covers. Andi still hadn’t returned.

  The air smelled wrong, here. Wet, earthy, as if she could smell the grass growing outside the window. The shutters cracked open to let in a breeze. Stella was chilled; her nose wouldn’t stop running. The desert always smelled dusty, dry—even at night, the heat of the sun rose up from the ground. There, her nose itched with dust.