“I said you should go away,” the boy said.
Teal lifted a hand to his cheek. “They hurt you,” she said. “Very badly. But my blood’s in you and I won’t rest until you’ve found peace. But not this way. Merlin’s right, Prince. There’s still time to do good.”
“They don’t want good,” the boy answered. “I gave them good, but they didn’t like it.”
“You don’t have to concern yourself with them now,” Merlin said, as another disturbance shook the room. “Turn the weapons from Mundar. Do it, Prince.”
The boy’s hand loitered over the wooden battlements. Merlin intuited that these must be the logical representation of Mundar’s defense screens. The boy fingered one of the serrated formations, seemingly on the verge of moving it.
“It won’t do any good,” he said.
“It will,” Merlin said.
“You’ve brought them too near,” the boy said, sweeping his other hand across the massed regiments, in all their colours and divisions. “They didn’t know where I was before, but now you’ve shown them.”
“I made a mistake,” Merlin admitted. “A bad one, because I wanted something too badly. But I’m here to make amends.”
Now it was Baskin’s turn to step closer to the boy. “We have half a life in common,” he said. “They stole a life from you, and tried to make me think it was my own. It worked, too. I’m an old man now, and I suppose you’re as old as me, deep down. But we have something in common. We’ve both outgrown war, whether those around us are willing to accept it or not.” He lowered down, upsetting some of the soldiers as he did—the boy glaring for an instant, then seeming to put the matter behind him. “I want to help you. Be your friend, if such a thing’s possible. What Teal said is true: you do have her blood. Not mine, now, but it doesn’t mean I don’t want to help.” He placed his own hand around the boy’s wrist, the hand that hovered over the wooden battlements. “I remember these games,” he said. “These toys. I played them well. We could play together, couldn’t we?” Slowly, with great trepidation, Baskin risked turning one of the battlements around, until its fortifications were facing outward again.
The boy said: “I wouldn’t do it that way.”
“Show me how you would do it,” Baskin said.
The boy took the battlement and shifted its position. Then he took another and placed them in close formation. He looked up at Baskin, seeking both approval and praise. “See. That’s better, isn’t it?”
“Much better,” Baskin said.
“You can move that one,” the boy said, indicating one of the other battlements. “Put it over there, the other way round.”
“Like this?” Baskin asked, with a nervous, obliging smile.
“A little closer. That’s good enough.”
Merlin realised that he had been holding his breath while this little exchange was going on. It was too soon to leap to conclusions, but it had been a while since the room had last shook. Hardly daring to break the fragile spell, he slipped into a brief subvocal exchange with Tyrant. His ship confirmed that the rain of kinetics had ceased.
“Now for the tricky part,” Merlin murmured, as much for himself as his audience. “Prince, listen to me carefully. Rebuild those defenses. Do it as well as you can, because you need to protect yourself. There’s hard work to do—very hard work—and you need to be at your strongest.”
“I don’t like work,” the boy said.
“None of us do. But if you’re bored with this game, I’ve got a much more interesting one to play. You’re going to engineer a peace, and hold it. It’s going to be the hardest thing you’ve ever done but I’ve no doubt that you’ll rise to the challenge.”
Struxer whispered: “Those fleets aren’t exactly ready to set down their arms, Merlin.”
“I’ll make them,” he said. “Just go give the Prince a running start. Then it’s over to him.” But he corrected himself. “Over to all of you, in fact. He’ll need all the help he can get, Struxer.” Merlin leaned in closer to the boy, until his mouth was near his ear. “We’re going to lie,” he said, confidingly. “We’re going to lie and they’re going to believe us, those fleets. Not forever, but long enough for you to start making peace seem like the easier path. It’s a lot to ask, but I know you’re up to it.”
The boy’s face met Merlin’s. “Lie?”
“You’ll understand. Tyrant: open a channel out to those ships. The whole binary system, as powerful a signal as you can put out. Hijack every open transmitter you can find. And translate these words, as well as you can.” Then he frowned to himself and turned to Teal. “No. You should be the one. Better that it comes from a native speaker, than my garbled efforts.”
“What would you like me to say?”
Merlin smiled. He told her. It did not take long.
“This is Teal of the Cohort,” she said, her words gathered within the sensorium, fed through Tyrant, pushed out beyond the ruins of Mundar, through the defense screens, out to the waiting fleets, onward to the warring worlds. “I came here by Waynet, a little while ago. But I was here once before, more than a thousand years ago, and I knew King Curtal before you set him on the throne. I stand now in Mundar, ready to tell you that the time has come to end this war. Not for an hour, or a day, or a few miserable years, but forever. Because what you need now is peace and unity, and you don’t have very long to build on it. A Husker attack swarm is approaching your binary system. We slipped ahead of them through the Waynet, but they will be here. You have less than a century … only a handful of decades. Then they’ll arrive.” Teal shot a look at Merlin, and he gave her a tiny nod, letting her know that she was doing very well, better than he could ever have managed. “Ordinarily it would be the end of everything for you. They took my ship, and I’m with a man who lost a whole world to them. But there’s a chance for you. In Mundar is a great mind. Call him the Iron Tactician for now, although the day will come when you learn his true name. The Iron Tactician will help you on the road to peace. And when that peace is holding, the Iron Tactician will help you prepare. The Tactician knows of your weapons, of your fusion ships and kinetic batteries. But in a little while he will also know the weapons of the Cohort, and how best to use them. Weapons to shatter worlds—or defend them.” Teal drew breath, and Merlin touched his hand to her shoulder, in what he hoped was a gesture of comradeship and solidarity. “Hurt the Tactician, and you’ll be powerless when the swarm arrives. Protect it—honour it—and you’ll have an honest chance. But the Tactician would sooner die than take sides.”
“Good,” Merlin breathed.
“He’s my blood,” Teal continued. “My kin. And I’m staying here to give him all the protection and guidance he needs. You’ll treat me well, because I’m the only living witness you’ll ever know who can say she saw the Huskers up close. And I’ll do what I can to help you.”
Merlin swallowed. He had not been expecting this, not at all. But the force of Teal’s conviction left him in no doubt that she had set her mind on this course. He stared at her with a searing admiration, dizzy at her courage and single-mindedness.
“You’ll withdraw from the space around Mundar,” Teal said. “And you’ll cease all hostilies. A ship will be given free passage to Havergal, and then on to the Waynet. You won’t touch it. And you won’t touch Mundar, or attempt to claim the Tactician. There’ll be no reminders, no second warnings—we’re beyond such things now. This is Teal of the Cohort, signing off for now. You’ll be hearing more from me soon.”
Merlin shook his head in astonishment. “You don’t have to do this, Teal. That was … courageous. But you’re not responsible for the mess they’ve made of this place.”
“I’m not,” she said. “But then again we had our chance when we traded with them, and instead of helping them to peace we took one side and conducted our business. I don’t feel guilty for what happened all those years ago. But I’m ready to make a change.”
“She does have an excellent command of our language,�
�� Baskin said.
“And she’s persuasive,” Struxer said. “Very persuasive.”
Merlin made sure they were no longer transmitting. “You all know it’s a lie. There’s no attack swarm heading this way—not how Teal said it was. But there could be, and for a few decades there’d be no way of saying otherwise, not with the sensors you have now. Here’s what matters, though. You’ve been lucky so far, but somewhere out there you can be sure there is a Husker swarm that’ll eventually find its way to these worlds. A hundred years, a thousand … who knows? But it will happen, just as it did to Plenitude. The only difference is, you’ll be readier than we ever were.” Then he turned to direct his attention to the boy. “You’ll have the hardest time of all, Prince. But you have friends now. And you have my confidence. I know you can force this peace.”
For all the toys and battlements, some spark of real comprehension glimmered in the boy’s eyes. “But when they found out she lied…”
“It’ll take a while,” Merlin said. “And by then you’ll just have to had made sure they’ve got used to the idea of peace. It’s not such a bad thing. But then again, you don’t need me to tell you that.”
“No,” the boy reflected.
Merlin nodded, hoping the boy—what remained of the boy—felt something of the confidence and reassurance he was sending out. “I have to go soon. There’s something I need on Havergal, and I’d rather not wait too long until getting my hands on it.”
“Whatever authority I still have,” Baskin said, “I’ll do all that I can to assist.”
“Thank you.” Then Merlin turned back to the Prince. “I hope you won’t be alone again. I’ll leave the immersion suits behind, and a few spares. But even when Teal and Struxer and Baskin can’t be with you, you don’t have to be without companionship.” He dipped his head at the ranged formations. “There are two other boys who used to enjoy games like this, but like you their hearts were always elsewhere. They could come here, if you liked. I think you’d get on well.”
Doubt flickered across Teal’s brow. He nodded at her, begging her to trust him.
“They could come,” the boy said, doubtfully. “I suppose.”
“Merlin,” Teal said.
“Yes?”
“I’m not sure if we’ll see each other again, after you’ve left this place. And I know it isn’t going to be safe out there, whatever sort of cease-fire we end up with. But I want you to know two things.”
“Go on.”
“I’m glad you saved me, Merlin. If I never showed my gratitude until now…”
“It wasn’t needed. The war took too much from both of us, Teal. There was nothing else that had to be said. You’ll do all right here, I know it. Maybe I’ll drop back.”
“You know you won’t,” Teal said. “Just as you’ll never go back to Plenitude.”
“And the other thing?”
“Take your ship, take your syrinx, and find your gun. For me. For your mother, your brother, for all the dead of Plenitude, for all the dead of the Shrike, for all who died here. You owe it to all of us, Merlin.”
He made to speak, but between one moment and the next he decided that words were superfluous. They met eyes for one last time, and an acknowledgement passed between them, a recognition of obligations met, duties faced, of good and bold hopes for better times.
Then he dropped out of the sensorium.
He was through into Tyrant in a matter of seconds. “Get us out of here,” he said. “Suspend all load ceilings. If I break a few bones, they’ll just have to heal.”
“Complying,” Tyrant said.
Merlin’s little dark ship was bruised and lame, but the acceleration still came hard and sudden, and he came very close to regretting that offhand remark about his bones.
“When you have a chance,” he said, “transfer Gallinule’s sensorium through to the Iron Tactician. All of it—the whole of the Palace of Eternal Dusk.”
“While keeping a copy here, you mean?”
“No,” Merlin said. “Delete it. Everything. If I ever need to walk those corridors again, or watch my mother looking sad, I’ll just have to go back to Mundar.”
“That seems … extreme.”
“Tell that to Teal. She’s made more of a sacrifice than I’ll ever know.”
Tyrant punched its way through the thinning debris cloud. Merlin studied the navigation consoles, watching with a fascinated distraction as the ship computed various course options, testing each against the last, until it found what promised to be a safe passage to …
“No,” Merlin said. “Not the Waynet. Not until we’ve gone back to Havergal and claimed that syrinx.”
“Did you not study the data, Merlin? I looked at it closely, after your inspection of the syrinx.”
“It’s real.”
“Real, but damaged beyond safe use. More risky to use than the syrinx you already have. I’d have mentioned it sooner, but…”
“What do you mean, damaged?”
“Probably before Pardalote ever sold it on, Merlin. I doubt there was any intention to deceive. It’s just that a broken syrinx is very hard to distinguish from a fully functioning one. Unless you’ve had quite a lot of experience in the matter.”
“And you kept that from me?”
“I was curious, Merlin. As were you. Another artificial intelligence. I thought we might at least see what this Iron Tactician was all about.”
Merlin nodded sagely. Occasionally he reached a point where he felt that little was capable of surprising him. But always the universe had something in store to jolt him out of that complacency. “While we’re on the subject, then. That little stunt you pulled back there, when I tried to shoot Struxer with the gamma-cannon…”
“You’d have come to regret that action, Merlin. I merely spared you endless years of racking remorse and guilt.”
“By contravening a direct order.”
“Which was foolish and unnecessary and born entirely out of spite. Besides, I was the damaged party, not you.”
Merlin brooded. “I didn’t know you had it in you.”
“Then we’ve both learned something new of each other, haven’t we?”
He smiled—it was the only possible reaction. “But let’s not make too much of a habit out of it, shall we?”
“On that,” Tyrant said, “I think we find ourselves in excellent agreement.”
He felt the steering jets cut in, rougher than usual, and he thought about the damage that needed repairing, and the difficult days ahead. Never mind, though. Before he worried about those complications, he had a few small prayers to ask of his old, battered syrinx.
He hoped they would be answered.
Honorable Mentions: 2016
Joe Abercrombie, “Two’s Company,” Tor.com, January 12.
Nina Allan, “The Common Tongue, the Present Tense, the Known World,” Drowned Worlds.
______, “Ten Days,” Now We Are Ten.
Charlie Jane Anders, “Rager in Space,” Bridging Infinity.
Megan Arkenberg, “In the City of Kites and Crows,” Kalidotrope, Autumn.
______, “Palin Genesis,” Shimmer 29.
Kelley Armstrong, “The Culling,” Strangers Among Us.
Madeline Ashby, “Thieving Magpie,” After the Fall.
Charlotte Ashley, “A Fine Balance,” F&SF, November/December.
______, “More Heat Than Light,” F&SF, May/June.
Dale Bailey, “I Married a Monster from Outer Space,” Asimov’s, March.
Bo Balder, “Follow the White Line,” Clarkesworld, November.
Stephen Baxter, “Project Clio,” PS Publishing.
______, “The Venus Generations,” Bridging Infinity.
Peter S. Beagle, “The Green-Eyed Boy,” F&SF, September/October.
______, “The Story of Kao Yu,” Tor.com, December 7.
Gregory Benford, “Mice Among Elephants,” Bridging Infinity.
Terry Bission, “Robot from the Future,” F&SF, January/Febr
uary.
Michael Blumlein, “Choose Poison, Choose Life,” Asimov’s, October/November.
Brooke Bolander, “One Talon Can Crush Galaxies,” Uncanny 11.
Terry Boren, “Recursive Ice,” To Shape the Dark.
Desirina Boskovich, “The Voice in the Cornfields, the Word Made Flesh,” F&SF, September/October.
Chaz Brenchley, “In Skander, For a Boy,” Beneath Ceaseless Skies, January 2016.
Keith Brooke, “Rewrites,” Dragons of the Night.
______& Eric Brown, “Beyond the Heliopause,” Lightspeed, January.
Sarah Brooks, “Blackpool,” Shimmer 30.
______, “The Hunger of Auntie Tiger,” Interzone, 267.
Eric Brown, “Reunion on Alpha Reticuli II,” PS Publishing.
______, “Starship Coda.”
______, “Ten Sisters,” Now We Are Ten.
Tobias S. Buckell & Karen Lord, “The Mighty Singer,” Bridging Infinity.
Karl Bunker, “The Battle of Ceres,” Analog, July/August.
Pat Cadigan, “Six Degrees of Separation Freedom,” Bridging Infinity.
Vajra Chandrasekera, “Applied Cenotaphics in the Long, Long Latitudes,” Strange Horizons, September 16.
Robert R. Chase, “Conscience,” Asimov’s, January.
______, “Revenge of the Invisible Man,” Analog, October.
Gwendolyn Clare, “Nothing but the Sky,” Beneath Endless Skies, June 9.
Maggie Clark, “Seven Ways of Looking at the Sun-Worshippers of Yul-Katan,” Analog, April.
David Cleden, Rock Paper Incisors,” Interzone, 267.
Ray Cluley, “Sideways,” Interzone, September/October.
C.S.E. Cooney & Carlos Hernandez, “The Book of May,” Clockwork Phoenix 5.
Constance Cooper, “Carnivores of Can’t-Go-Home,” To Shape the Dark.
Paul Cornell, “Don’t You Worry, You Aliens,” Uncanny 13.
______, “The Lost Child of Lychford,” Tor.com Publishing.
The Year's Best Science Fiction--Thirty-Fourth Annual Collection Page 111