The Summer Queen

by Joan D. Vinge

  “Good,” he said softly, in his faintly accented Tiamatan. “That’s good … that’s as it should be.” He smiled.

  Fate turned away from him, moving uncertainly as she matched the sudden input of her eyes to the feedback of her other senses. She faced Moon, gazing at her for a long moment, and although her eyes were still like shuttered windows, Moon knew by the expression on her face that she saw. Fate’s tentative smile widened, growing strong with her belief. “Lady … Moon … I remember you,” she murmured. “Oh, yes, I do, my dear.… I remember the moment when you came to my door, like a lost child.… I remember the moment when I placed the mask of the Summer Queen on your head.” She moved forward to touch Moon’s face in turn, almost caressingly, and Clavally’s, which she had never seen. “You are much as I imagined you, Clavally Bluestone,” she said contentedly. Clavally’s hand squeezed hers.

  Fate turned back to Gundhalinu again, and this time her hands rose to touch the shining filaments that lay against her skin. “I see so much more clearly, this time. I never saw this clearly, when I had my sight before the Departure. Even my dreams of how clearly I saw are not like this—” Her hands trembled faintly.

  “This is the best sensor system available that doesn’t require surgery.”

  “Thank you,” Fate murmured. Her restless eyes held his for a long moment. “I had forgotten.…”

  “My promise?” he asked. “I didn’t. But it took some time to get a special request through the maze of bureaucratic red tape, I’m afraid.”

  “Justice Gundhalinu,” Clavally said, asking the question Moon’s lips refused to form, “why did you do this?”

  He looked at her, as if for a moment he couldn’t imagine why she would even ask such a thing. And then he glanced at Fate again, at her gaze moving everywhere with glad distraction. “To right an old wrong.”

  “Do you mean the Departure?” Moon asked; thinking he meant all the things that they had lost, that had been taken away from them like Fate’s sight when the Hegemony abandoned them.

  “Oh, you beauties!” Fate leaned down to stroke the cats that were winding around her legs. “Look at you, I never dreamed you were so many colors.…”

  BZ shook his head, his own eyes holding Moon’s, but filled with a secret he did not share with her. “An older wrong than that—and a more personal one.”

  Fate straightened up again, with a squirming cat under each arm. “You are a sibyl, Justice Gundhalinu,” she said, gazing at him, at the trefoil hanging against his shirt. It was not a question. But he said, “Yes,” his voice oddly strained.

  Moon’s fingers touched her own sibyl sign, as she realized all at once that everyone in this room was a sibyl. She watched BZ’s eyes flicker from face to face, as if he had suddenly realized the same thing. His gaze came back to her again, touching her face, her pale, plaited hair; glancing down at her pragmatic native clothing. His hands tightened unobtrusively over the deep-blue fabric of his simple, ordinary shirt. She saw in his eyes then no Queen, no Chief Justice.

  She remembered with sudden clarity a moment half a lifetime ago, when she had been a stranger lost in this strange city-world at Festival time. How his eyes had gazed at her then, and pierced her heart like light through windowglass.…

  He looked away abruptly. “I have to be getting back,” he murmured. “My staff thinks I’m on my lunch break.”

  Fate smiled at him, letting go of her cats. She held out her hands in wordless farewell. He touched them briefly, as Moon watched in silent envy. “Bless you,” Fate said.

  He smiled back at her. “Fate’s blessing is what I’ll need, to accomplish my work here,” he said. He nodded to them all, not meeting Moon’s eyes again as he started toward the door.

  “Wait—” Moon said. He turned back, waiting as she picked up her untouched meat pie from the table. “Don’t leave without something to eat on the way … Justice Gundhalinu.” She put the food self-consciously into his hands, an excuse to reach out and touch him, for even a moment, across the impossible distance that separated them. His fingers closed over hers briefly, warmly, as he took the food from her hands. He smiled at her, this time looking directly into her eyes. She saw the hunger there, before he turned away again. He looked back at her once more as he went out; he was still looking at her as the door closed between them, cutting off her view.

  She turned back again, slowly, to find both Clavally and Fate watching her. She felt her face redden; looked down, away from their unspoken curiosity.

  “He is a good man,” Clavally said at last, with what sounded like surprise. “I wouldn’t have thought it was possible, especially in an offworlder who has so much power.”

  “They really aren’t so different from us,” Moon murmured. She pushed at her sleeves, raising her head again. “They’re only human. They want the same things we want.…”

  Fate shook her head, her face caught in a strange expression as she looked at Moon. But then she looked down at her own hands, turning them over and back, over again. She moved away, going cautiously across the room to the painted wooden storage chest below the diamond-paned window. She raised the lid and began to search through its contents. With a soft exclamation she pulled something out, and held it up. Light flashed, the random beam spearing Moon’s eye. She realized that it was a mirror Fate was holding.

  As she watched, Fate turned toward the light to look at her own reflection, which she had not seen even dimly in almost twenty years. Her hand rose slowly, visibly trembling, to touch the deep lines of age on her face, the whiteness of her hair, that had not been that way when she had last looked into a mirror. Her hand fell away again. Still slowly, carefully, she placed the mirror back in the chest and closed the lid. Turning to face them, she found in their eyes the affirmation of what she had seen with her own. “I still feel like the same person I was before. Where did this body come from…?” She spread her hands helplessly.

  Moon glanced down; felt Clavally do the same beside her. She made herself look up again, seeing the woman she had always known, standing suddenly in a different light. “Fate,” she said, as realization struck her. “Mask Night—”

  Fate straightened, her face brightening as her thoughts left the last Festival, coming back into the present, and reaching toward the future. “Yes, of course—” she said, starting back toward them across the room, holding up her hands. “I can work again, on my own. Only a few masks, but very special … My dear, you shall have one fit for a Queen.”

  TIAMAT: Carbuncle

  “… as you can see on your displays, the record clearly supports Citizen Wayaways. The data shows both a desire among the people and an historical precedent for replacing the Summer Queen with one chosen by the Winters on our return. This is usually done during what they call the Festival, when they celebrate the Prime Minister’s visit.…”

  Echarthe’s data flashed on the screen in front of Gundhalinu where he sat, surreptitiously folding a scrap of food wrapper into smaller and smaller triangles. He looked up, his hands hidden below the edge of the torus table that dominated the council chamber. His eyes touched briefly on the members of the Judiciate and his government staff seated around him; he pictured the Summer Queen’s Sibyl College and the Tiamatan civic leaders who had once occupied those same seats. Only one figure was unchanged from that image to this one … Kirard Set Wayaways.

  He found Wayaways looking back at him, as if the Tiamatan had had him under observation all the while. Wayaways smiled faintly, knowingly; that smile which he had come to detest more than any expression he had ever seen on a human face, because it had the ability to blind him like a beam of light with his own irrational, gut-knotting rage.… He forced himself to meet Wayaways’ stare unflinchingly, closing the fist of his concentration around his anger, suffocating it with self-discipline.

  Wayaways had insinuated himself into the awareness of everyone in this room, become a constant presence in their halls. He was the official representative for the City Council, lobb
ying for the return of the mer hunts—working against the Queen whose most loyal supporter he had once been, according to rumor.

  He had come to Gundhalinu’s office a few weeks past, oozing charm and secret knowledge, hinting with barely concealed malice that if the Judiciate did not grant permission for the mer hunts to begin again, he would provide the Council with certain information about the real nature of the relationship between the Hegemonic Chief Justice and the Summer Queen.

  Gundhalinu had listened in silence, and then played back to Wayaways the record of everything he had said, which Gundhalinu had discreetly edited even as he spoke, eliminating all the potentially incriminating details, leaving only a damning litany of attempted bribery and coercion. “I know you have friends,” he had said softly. “I have friends too. Leave now, while you’re still free to do it.”

  Wayaways had taken him at his word; there had been no more direct attacks. Instead, Wayaways had simply gone around him, gotten to the other members of the Council behind his back. He no longer pressured them directly to reinstate the mer hunts, because Gundhalinu had overridden the Council’s vote and ruled that it was traditionally a matter of Tiamatan law, and under the Summer Queen’s control. And so Wayaways had followed him doggedly down that path of argument, and turned Tiamatan law back on him, in one swift, vicious thrust.

  “I question the claim that a majority of Tiamatans are dissatisfied with the Queen and want her replaced,” Gundhalinu said. “This data is hardly proof of that. And even if it was, we are not in a position to rule on deposing her—”

  “We aren’t talking about deposing her ourselves, Justice,” Echarthe interrupted. “Their own traditions will take care of that. I’m only recommending we see to it that they carry those traditions out, when the Assembly finally arrives.”

  “Then we’d really have cause to celebrate,” Sandrine said, with a sour smile. “If that Motherloving bitch was gone, and Winters were running things, it would solve our whole problem with the local government giving us the access we need to the water of life.” Laughter and murmurs of agreement spread around the table.

  “Bigotry and threats against a local head-of-state are not something I consider a subject for humor,” Gundhalinu snapped. Beside him, Vhanu raised his eyebrows.

  Sandrine frowned, his irritation showing. “I wasn’t aware that I was saying something humorous.”

  “Either that, or treasonous,” Gundhalinu said, feeling himself frown. “I’ve made it plain that prejudiced behavior toward the people of Tiamat is not acceptable from our Police force. It is not acceptable from members of my government either.”

  “BZ,” Vhanu murmured in Sandhi, gently nudging Gundhalinu’s arm. “We’re among friends here, after all. We’re all Technician, we understand each other. A situation like this is difficult enough, under the best of circumstances, and the circumstances are hardly the best. Allow us a little slack, won’t thou?”

  Gundhalinu took a deep breath. “I suppose thou’re right,” he said softly, answering in Sandhi. The language of his own people was beginning to sound alien to him again, he realized. He had even begun to think in Tiamatan.

  “You have defended our rights as a people eloquently since you’ve come here, Justice Gundhalinu,” Wayaways said. “My people are deeply grateful to you for that.” He lifted his hands in something like a shrug. “Why are you suddenly against something like the Change, which has been a tradition of ours far longer even than the cycle of your departures and returns?”

  “Precisely because it is such an ancient tradition,” Gundhalinu said, under control again. “There is a new order here now, and the laws of the Change no longer serve any useful function. It has become an act of barbarism. I’ve supported most of the innovations that your Queen made during our absence, because they were positive, and in keeping with the kind of relationship I want to build between our peoples, now that our relationship has become permanent. But human sacrifice is something which has become indefensible—”

  “But it’s a part of our religious system.” Wayaways pointed at the data on the screen, his voice taking on an indignant edge. His eyes mocked Gundhalinu, coldly knowing. “You defended the Queen’s protection of the mers on those grounds, did you not? Shouldn’t we be the ones to determine whether the Change rituals still have a meaningful function for us? Do you have some particular personal interest in the Summer Queen’s well-being, that makes you resist anything that might threaten her?”

  Gundhalinu felt Vhanu’s eyes on him suddenly; heard the other officials around the table begin to murmur among themselves. “I’ve stated my reasons for restricting the practice. I don’t need to defend them further,” he said flatly.

  “The fact remains, Justice,” Vhanu said, “that removing the Summer Queen would be in our best interests. She’s an intractable fanatic. She reigns for life, and she’s not likely to die of natural causes any time soon. I think we should seriously consider this opportunity to get rid of the Queen.”

  Gundhalinu looked at him, away again quickly, unsure of his own expression.

  “The Prime Minister and the Assembly are going to raise bloody hell if they don’t find the water of life waiting for them.” Borskad, the Minister of Trade, said.

  “And riots instead of celebrations,” Wayaways murmured. “I can guarantee that feelings will run high, that there will undoubtedly be public protests and even incidents of violence, if you attempt to suppress a ritual which is such a fundamental part of our culture.”

  “Are you threatening the Hegemony, Citizen Wayaways?” Gundhalinu asked, his voice brittle.

  Wayaways stiffened, and settled back into his seat.

  “The Prime Minister and the Assembly are figureheads, with no real power,” Gundhalinu said impatiently, meeting other stares around the table, “and absolutely no understanding of the complexity of the issues involved here.”

  “But the Central Committee has plenty of influence,” Tilhonne said. “My uncle has already threatened to come here himself and find out what in the name of his sainted ancestors is going on, if we don’t reach some kind of compromise with the Queen. If we have riots when the Assembly comes, that will be all he needs to start an investigation. And that could ruin all our careers.” He looked exceedingly unhappy at the prospect.

  Gundhalinu barely controlled a frown, aware that Tilhonne’s concern was well-founded. He had autonomy here only as long as he did nothing that attracted too much negative attention. He stared at the Hegemonic Seal, the Eight Worlds symbolized by a sunburst on the wall across the room.

  Other voices around him were rising now, impatient, full of concern—all of them anxious about one thing, he was sure, and it was not the well-being of Tiamat’s Queen.

  “I move that we vote to accept the petition brought to us by Citizen Wayaways,” Borskad said, registering the motion on his screen. “That there will be a full Change, including the return of Winter to power by the traditional practices of their own theocratic rituals.”

  “I won’t allow it.” Gundhalinu said. His hand moved to his touchboard, clearing the screen with an automatic veto.

  Echarthe touched his own board again; one by one the others around the table did the same, as Wayaways watched, smiling, hands in his lap. Gundhalinu watched their feedback tally. As the votes became unanimous against him Borskad’s motion reappeared, inexorably, on all their screens.

  “Overridden, Justice,” Borskad said. He cracked his knuckles complacently. “The Tiamatans must be permitted to control their own government.”

  “I won’t allow it,” Gundhalinu repeated tonelessly. “I’ll have the Police stop them.”

  “You can’t do that, BZ.” Vhanu murmured, beside him. Gundhalinu turned, looking into his eyes. “Only I have that authority,” Vhanu said. Gundhalinu saw regret and discomfort in his gaze, but no doubt at all. “You can’t stop it.”

  Gundhalinu turned back, seeing the resolve and determination in all their faces. “Damn it, I will not permit
the Queen to be sacrificed!”

  “There’s no other choice, Justice,” Borskad said bluntly. “The Hegemony wants the water of life. We have to get it for them, one way or another, or they’ll find someone who can.”

  “There’s no other way.” Vhanu shook his head. “That woman and her troublesome demands are going to cost all of us our positions here—including your Chief Justiceship, BZ. I would rather see the Queen sacrificed than our entire government, wouldn’t you? After all the years of effort we put into achieving this goal, I for one am not ready to lose everything. But that is what will happen.”

  “Unless—” Wayaways dropped the single word among the rest, let its ripples spread until there was complete silence.

  “Unless what?” Gundhalinu forced himself to ask, knowing that his visible humility and hidden humiliation were required elements in Wayaways’ equation.

  “Unless you change your previous ruling and permit the mers to be hunted. Then we can all have what we wanted in the first place—the Hegemony gets the water of life, Tiamat profits from it, and you get to save the Queen. That way everyone is happy … except the Queen, perhaps, but I expect even she would prefer disappointment to death. I’m sure the people would agree to let her continue as Queen as long as we get what we want. She was actually quite an enlightened woman, for a Summer, until she developed this unfortunate religious fixation on the sacredness of the mers.…”

  The mutterings began again around the table; their tone was positive this time, urging him to agree. Wayaways sat in their midst without speaking, staring directly at him cross the torus of burnished native wood.

  “It makes a lot of sense,” Vhanu murmured in Gundhalinu’s ear, his voice both encouraging and conciliatory.

  Gundhalinu looked away from him, tight-lipped, and back at Wayaways again. The mers die or the Queen dies, Wayaways’ eyes said to him. You choose.

  “All right.…” Gundhalinu looked down. “All right,” he said again, his voice stronger, as if he were actually in control of the situation. “I’m rescinding my ban on the mer hunts. But there will be no more sacrifices, no more Changes in the old way. Summers and Winters will have to work out some other way of doing things from now on.”