The Mammoth Book of the Best of Best New SF

by Gardner Dozois

  This is what I did in the world that people can see. In the twists of other times and spaces, I did similar things, horrible, irrevocable things, to the man. I killed him. I killed him in such a way that he would never come to life again, not in any possible place, not in any possible time. I wiped Marek Lambrois from existence. Thoroughly. And with his death, the other glims died, like lights going out, lights ceasing to exist – bulb, filament, and all. Or like the quick loss of all sensation after a brain is snuffed out.

  Irrevocably gone from this time line, and that was what mattered. Keeping this possible future uncertain, balanced on the fulcrum of chaos and necessity. Keeping it free, so that I could go back and do my work.

  I left Marek lying there, in the main street of Heidel. Others could do the mopping up; that wasn’t my job. As I left town, on the way back to my house and my life there, I saw that I wasn’t alone in the dawn-lit streets. Some had business out at this hour, and they had watched. Others had heard the commotion and come to windows and porches see what it was. Now they knew. They knew what I was, what I was to be. I walked alone down the road, and found Bex and her father both sound asleep in my room.

  I stroked her fine hair. She groaned, turned in her sleep. I pulled my covers up to her chin. Forty years old, and as beautiful as a child. Safe in my bed. Bex. Bex, I will miss you. Always, always, Bex.

  I went to the living room, to the shroud-covered furniture. I sat down in what had been my father’s chair. I sipped a cup of my father’s best barley malt whiskey. I sat, and as the suns of Ferro rose in the hard iron sky, I faded into the distant, dying future.

  THE UNDISCOVERED

  William Sanders

  William Sanders lives in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. A former powwow dancer and sometime Cherokee gospel singer, he appeared on the SF scene in the early ’80s with a couple of alternate-history comedies, Journey to Fusang (a finalist for the John W. Campbell Award) and The Wild Blue and the Gray. Sanders then turned to mystery and suspense, producing a number of critically acclaimed titles under a pseudonym. He credits his old friend Roger Zelazny with persuading him to return to SF, this time via the short-story form; his stories have appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and numerous anthologies, earning him a well-deserved reputation as one of the best short-fiction writers of the last decade. He has also returned to novel writing, with books such as The Ballad of Billy Badass and the Rose of Turkestan and The Bernadette Operations, a new SF novel, J., and a mystery novel, Smoke. Some of his acclaimed short stories have been collected in Are We Having Fun Yet? American Indian Fantasy Stories. (Most of his books, including reissues of his earlier novels, are available from Wildside Press, or on Amazon.com.) His stories have appeared in our Ninth, Eleventh and Fifteenth annual collections.

  In the funny and compassionate story that follows, which was on the Final Nebula and Hugo ballots a couple of years back, he settles one of the great controversies of all time by demonstrating who wrote Shakespeare’s plays (Shakespeare did, of course. What did you think?), but also shows us how, under other circumstances, some of the plays might have come out just a bit differently – especially if they were being performed for a somewhat different audience. . . .

  SO THE WHITE MEN are back! And trying once again to build themselves a town, without so much as asking anyone’s permission. I wonder how long they will stay this time. It sounds as if these have no more sense than the ones who came before.

  They certainly pick the strangest places to settle. Last time it was that island, where anyone could have told them the weather is bad and the land is no good for corn. Now they have invaded Powhatan’s country, and from what you say, they seem to have angered him already. Of course that has never been hard to do.

  Oh, yes, we hear about these matters up in the hills. Not many of us actually visit the coastal country – I don’t suppose there are ten people in this town, counting myself, who have even seen the sea – but you know how these stories travel. We have heard all about your neighbor Powhatan, and you eastern people are welcome to him. Was there ever a chief so hungry for power? Not in my memory, and I have lived a long time.

  But we were speaking of the white men. As you say, they are a strange people indeed. For all their amazing weapons and other possessions, they seem to be ignorant of the simplest things. I think a half-grown boy would know more about how to survive. Or how to behave toward other people in their own country.

  And yet they are not the fools they appear. Not all of them, at least. The only one I ever knew was a remarkably wise man in many ways.

  Do not make that gesture at me. I tell you that there was a white man who lived right here in our town, for more than ten winters, and I came to know him well.

  I remember the day they brought him in. I was sitting in front of my house, working on a fish spear, when I heard the shouting from the direction of the town gate. Bigkiller and his party, I guessed, returning from their raid on the Tuscaroras. People were running toward the gate, pouring out of the houses, everyone eager for a look.

  I stayed where I was. I could tell by the sound that the raid had been successful – no women were screaming, so none of our people had been killed or seriously hurt – and I didn’t feel like spending the rest of the day listening to Bigkiller bragging about his latest exploits.

  But a young boy came up and said, “They need you, Uncle. Prisoners.”

  So I put my spear aside and got up and followed him, wondering once again why no one around this place could be bothered to learn to speak Tuscarora. After all, it is not so different from our tongue, not nearly as hard as Catawba or Maskogi or Shawano. Or your own language, which as you see I still speak poorly.

  The captives were standing just inside the gate, guarded by a couple of Bigkiller’s brothers, who were holding war clubs and looking fierce, as well as pleased with themselves. There was a big crowd of people by now and I had to push my way through before I could see the prisoners. There were a couple of scared-looking Tuscarora women – one young and pretty, the other almost my age and ugly as an alligator – and a small boy with his fist stuck in his mouth. Not much, I thought, to show for all this noise and fuss.

  Then I saw the white man.

  Do you know, it didn’t occur to me at first that that was what he was. After all, white men were very rare creatures in those days, even more so than now. Hardly anyone had actually seen one, and quite a few people refused to believe they existed at all.

  Besides, he wasn’t really white – not the kind of fish-belly white that I’d always imagined, when people talked about white men – at least where it showed. His face was a strange reddish color, like a boiled crawfish, with little bits of skin peeling from his nose. His arms and legs, where they stuck out from under the single buckskin garment he wore, were so dirty and covered with bruises that it was hard to tell what color the skin was. Of course that was true of all of the captives; Bigkiller and his warriors had not been gentle.

  His hair was dark brown rather than black, which I thought was unusual for a Tuscarora, though you do see Leni Lenapes and a few Shawanos with lighter hair. It was pretty thin above his forehead, and the scalp beneath showed through, a nasty bright pink. I looked at that and at the red peeling skin of his face, and thought: well done, Bigkiller, you’ve brought home a sick man. Some lowland skin disease, and what a job it’s going to be purifying everything after he dies. . . .

  That was when he turned and looked at me with those blue eyes. Yes, blue. I don’t blame you; I didn’t believe that story either, until I saw for myself. The white men have eyes the color of a sunny sky. I tell you, it is a weird thing to see when you’re not ready for it.

  Bigkiller came through the crowd, looking at me and laughing. “Look what we caught, Uncle,” he said, and pointed with his spear. “A white man!”

  “I knew that,” I said, a little crossly. I hated it when he called me “Uncle.” I hated it when anyone did it, except children �
�� I was not yet that old – but I hated it worse when it came from Bigkiller. Even if he was my nephew.

  “He was with the Tuscaroras,” one of the warriors, Muskrat by name, told me. “These two women had him carrying firewood – ”

  “Never mind that.” Bigkiller gave Muskrat a bad look. No need to tell the whole town that this brave raid deep into Tuscarora country had amounted to nothing more than the ambush and kidnapping of a small wood-gathering party.

  To me Bigkiller said, “Well, Uncle, you’re the one who knows all tongues. Can you talk with this white-skin?”

  I stepped closer and studied the stranger, who looked back at me with those impossible eyes. He seemed unafraid, but who could read expressions on such an unnatural face?

  “Who are you and where do you come from?” I asked in Tuscarora.

  He smiled and shook his head, not speaking. The woman beside him, the older one, spoke up suddenly. “He doesn’t know our language,” she said. “Only a few words, and then you have to talk slow and loud, and kick him a little.”

  “Nobody in our town could talk with him,” the younger woman added. “Our chief speaks a little of your language, and one family has a Catawba slave, and he couldn’t understand them either.”

  By now the crowd was getting noisy, everyone pushing and jostling, trying to get a look at the white man. Everyone was talking, too, saying the silliest things. Old Otter, the elder medicine man, wanted to cut the white man to see what color his blood was. An old woman asked Muskrat to strip him naked and find out if he was white all over, though I guessed she was really more interested in learning what his male parts looked like.

  The young Tuscarora woman said, “Are they going to kill him?”

  “I don’t know,” I told her. “Maybe.”

  “They shouldn’t,” she said. “He’s a good slave. He’s a hard worker, and he can really sing and dance.”

  I translated this, and to my surprise Muskrat said, “It is true that he is stronger than he looks. He put up a good fight, with no weapon but a stick of firewood. Why do you think I’m holding this club left-handed?” He held up his right arm, which was swollen and dark below the elbow. “He almost broke my arm.”

  “He did show spirit,” Bigkiller agreed. “He could have run away, but he stayed and fought to protect the women. That was well done for a slave.”

  I looked at the white man again. He didn’t look all that impressive, being no more than medium size and pretty thin, but I could see there were real muscles under that strange skin.

  “He can do tricks, too,” the young Tuscarora woman added. “He walks on his hands, and – ”

  The older woman grunted loudly. “He’s bad luck, that’s what he is. We’ve had nothing but trouble since he came. Look at us now.”

  I passed all this along to Bigkiller. “I don’t know,” he said. “I was going to kill him, but maybe I should keep him as a slave. After all, what other chief among the People has a white slave?”

  A woman’s voice said, “What’s going on here?”

  I didn’t turn around. I didn’t have to. There was no one in our town who would not have known that voice. Suddenly everyone got very quiet.

  My sister Tsigeyu came through the crowd, everyone moving quickly out of her way, and stopped in front of the white man. She looked him up and down and he looked back at her, still smiling, as if pleased to meet her. That showed real courage. Naturally he had no way of knowing that she was the Clan Mother of the Wolf Clan – which, if you don’t know, means she was by far the most powerful person in our town – but just the sight of her would have made most people uneasy. Tsigeyu was a big woman, not fat but big like a big man, with a face like a limestone cliff. And eyes that went right through you and made your bones go cold. She died a couple of years ago, but at the time I am telling about she was still in the prime of life, and such gray hairs as she had she wore like eagle feathers.

  She said, “For me? Why, thank you, Bigkiller.”

  Bigkiller opened his mouth and shut it. Tsigeyu was the only living creature he feared. He had more reason than most, since she was his mother.

  Muskrat muttered something about having the right to kill the prisoner for having injured him.

  Tsigeyu looked at Muskrat. Muskrat got a few fingers shorter, or that was how it looked. But after a moment she said, “It is true you are the nearest thing to a wounded warrior among this brave little war party.” She gestured at the young Tuscarora woman. “So I think you should get to keep this girl, here.”

  Muskrat looked a good deal happier.

  “The rest of you can decide among yourselves who gets the other woman, and the boy.” Tsigeyu turned to me. “My brother, I want you to take charge of this white man for now. Try to teach him to speak properly. You can do it if anyone can.”

  KNOWE ALL ENGLISH AND OTHER CHRISTIAN MEN:

  That I an Englishman and Subjeckt of Her Maiestie Queene Elizabeth, did by Misadventure come to this country of Virginia in the Yeere of Our Lord 1591: and after greate Hardshipp arriued amongst these Indians. Who haue done me no Harme, but rather shewed me most exelent Kindnesse, sans the which I were like to haue dyed in this Wildernesse. Wherefore, good Frend, I coniure you, that you offer these poore Sauages no Offence, nor do them Iniurie: but rather vse them generously and iustly, as they haue me.

  Look at this. Did you ever see the like? He made these marks himself on this deerskin, using a sharpened turkey feather and some black paint that he cooked up from burned wood and oak galls. And he told me to keep it safe, and that if other white men came this way I should show it to them, and it would tell them his story.

  Yes, I suppose it must be like a wampum belt, in a way. Or those little pictures and secret marks that the wise elders of the Leni Lenapes use to record their tribe’s history. So clearly he was some sort of didahnvwisgi, a medicine man, even though he did not look old enough to have received such an important teaching.

  He was always making these little marks, scratching away on whatever he could get – skins, mostly, or mulberry bark. People thought he was crazy, and I let them, because if they had known the truth not even Tsigeyu could have saved him from being killed for a witch.

  But all that came later, during the winter, after he had begun to learn our language and I his. On that first day I was only interested in getting him away from that crowd before there was more trouble. I could see that Otter was working himself up to make one of his speeches, and if nothing else that meant there was a danger of being talked to death.

  Inside my house I gave the stranger a gourd of water. When he had eased his thirst I pointed to myself. “Mouse,” I said, very slowly and carefully. “Tsis-de-tsi.”

  He was quick. “Tsisdetsi” he repeated. He got the tones wrong, but it was close enough for a beginning.

  I held my hands up under my chin like paws, and pulled my upper lip back to show my front teeth, and crossed my eyes. I waggled one hand behind me to represent a long tail. “Tsisdetsi,” I said again.

  He laughed out loud. “Tsisdetsi,” he said. “Mus!”

  He raised his hand and stroked his face for a moment, as if thinking of something. Then without warning he turned and grabbed my best war spear off the wall. My bowels went loose, but he made no move to attack me. Instead he began shaking the weapon above his head with one hand, slapping himself on the chest with the other. “Tsagspa,” he cried. “Tsagspa.”

  Crazy as a dog on a hot day, I thought at first. They must have hit him too hard. Then I realized what was happening, and felt almost dizzy. It is no small honor when any man tells you his secret war name – but a stranger, and a prisoner!

  “Digatsisdi atelvbvsgo’i,” I said, when I could finally speak. “Shakes Spear!”

  I am him that was call’d William Shakspere, of Stratford-upon-Auon, late of London: a Player, of Lord Strange his Company, and thereby hangs a Tale.

  Look there, where I am pointing. That is his name! He showed me that, and he even offered t
o teach me how to make the marks for my own. Naturally I refused – think what an enemy could do with something like that!

  When I pointed this out, he laughed and said I might be right. For, he said, many a man of his sort had had bad luck with other people making use of his name.

  It hapt that our Company was in Portsmouth, hauing beene there engaug’d: but then were forbid to play, the Mayor and Corporation of that towne being of the Puritann perswasion. For which cause we were left altogether bankrupt: so that some of our Players did pawne their Cloathing for monny to return Home.

  Perhaps someone had cursed him, since he sometimes said that he had never meant to leave his own country. It was the fault of the Puritans, he said. He did not explain what this meant, but once he mentioned that his wife and her family were Puritans. So obviously this is simply the name of his wife’s clan. Poor fellow, no wonder he left home. The same thing happened to an uncle of mine. When your wife’s clan decides to get rid of you, you don’t have a chance.

  But I, being made foolish by strong Drinke, did conceive to hyde my selfe on a Ship bownd for London. Which did seeme a good Idea at the Time: but when I enquyr’d of some sea-faring men, they shewed me (in rogue Jest, or else mayhap I misconstrew’d their Reply, for I was in sooth most outragiosly drunk) the Moonlight, which lay at the Docke. And so by night I stole aboord, and hid my selfe vnder a Boate: wherevpon the Wine did rush to my heade, and I fell asleepe, and wal’d not till the Morrow: to finde the Ship at sea and vnder Sayle, and the morning Sun at her backe.

  Naturally it was a long time before we could understand each other well enough to discuss such things. Not as long as you might think, though. To begin with, I discovered that in fact he had picked up quite a bit of Tuscarora – pretending, like any smart captive, to understand less than he did. Besides that, he was a fast learner. You know that languages are my special medicine – I have heard them say that Mouse can talk to a stone, and get it to talk back – but Spearshaker was gifted too. By the time of the first snow, we could get along fairly well, in a mixture of his language and mine. And when words failed, he could express almost any idea, even tell a story, just by the movements of his hands and body and the expression of his face. That in itself was worth seeing.