Infinite Stars

by Bryan Thomas Schmidt

  Although Eldrin couldn’t read about life on other worlds, he listened voraciously when his console narrated his lessons in the privacy of his bedroom. Most animals fought and killed on instinct. Only humans developed codes of warfare. As Eldrin saw it, their ability to act with honor was what set humans apart from unthinking predators. To act without honor diminished their humanity. If he fought using advanced technology, it violated the codes of fair combat. And yet… without the warning his mother had given them, more people would have died. He couldn’t reconcile the conflicted halves of his moral code. One of his worst arguments with Althor had been two years ago, a debate that culminated with his brother calling it “unmitigated idiocy” to hold “misplaced honor” above the advantage of technology. Eldrin didn’t know which had angered him more, that Althor called him an idiot for the principles he valued or that his then twelve-year-old brother used the word “unmitigated,” which Eldrin had never even heard before then, let alone understood.

  Fine. He understood perfectly well now the unmitigated nature of his stupidity. He loved his brother, but he hated what Althor represented. Why the hell did he have to choose between honor and advantage? He had killed three people last year, two with his sword and one with his bare hands. He would live with that guilt for the rest of his life, knowing he had taken them from their families, their lives, their dreams. Were his mother’s people better somehow, that with their star-spanning technology, they could kill millions instead of three? This was moral?

  Eldrin closed his eyes. Breezes blew across his face, carrying the scent of the plains, yet even that sweetness couldn’t soothe him. He had no sanctuary. Only the folk music of Dalvador helped. It offered simple melodies, the minor creations of a minor people on a minor world that had no real effect in the greater scheme of interstellar civilization. Limited it might be, but it gave him solace against the agony of his thoughts. Lifting his head, he took a deep breath.

  And he sang.

  * * *

  Althor straightened up, his back aching. His father’s farm spread out across the plains, with Dalvador to the south and the Stained Glass Forest to the north. He enjoyed working here, unlike many of his other chores. He liked the physical labor. Today he harvested bubbles: small yellow ones with fruity pulp inside, pale and tart; long bubbles, crunchy, with flavor that burst on your tongue; translucent bubbles that spilled nectar when cut open. He didn’t understand how people on other worlds ate. Their food had no constancy. Some of it was plant, some animal, some this, some that. How did they even know what to call food? He had to admit, though, that time he had eaten a prime rib steak, he hadn’t minded. Not at all. Damn, that had tasted good.

  Regardless, he wanted to be done with his work. He had a gaming session tonight with his JagWars team. His friends. He had far more of them on the interstellar mesh than here in the village. It gave him less privacy, though. Imperialate Space Command monitored the kids who played mesh games. Althor had realized it when military academies started sending him recruiting messages every time his team won a competition.

  Music drifted over the plains. He paused, holding his scythe in one hand and a cluster of stalks in the other. All around him, people were stopping their work to listen, a woman in a pale tunic tilting her head to one side, a man with graying hair gazing toward the Stained Glass Forest, a child smiling as she stopped loading bubbles into her basket. The song floated on the air, incomparably beautiful. Althor closed his eyes, letting it wash over him. The melody spiraled in a baritone aria, then soared into a man’s tenor range. A chill went through him. Yes, he knew that song. For all that he had never understood Eldrin, he stood in awe of his brother’s voice.

  Their friends knew only that they liked to hear Eldrin sing. He was the firstborn heir to the Bard, so it was fortunate he had a good voice. Althor saw what they didn’t understand. The origins of the human settlement on Lyshriol had been lost after the fall of the Ruby Empire. By the time his mother’s people regained star travel and found their ancient colonies, the settlement here had lost most of its technology. No one knew why the people on Lyshriol had neither written language nor the ability to learn one. However, the Memories, those women who studied their entire lives to preserve the knowledge of Dalvador, remembered their more recent history and culture with astonishing recall. They kept Dalvador in their minds—and the Bard sang their memories for his people.

  Althor’s family had been singers for as long as anyone remembered. Geneticists may have even engineered their ancestors for their incredible voices. Whatever the origins of that gift, Eldrin had inherited its full span. He had sung all his life, practicing without even thinking about it. His five-octave range outclassed even the most famous singers on the mesh. The only person Althor knew who sang better was their father. Neither he nor Eldrin seemed to comprehend their talent. They shrugged at the thought. The father was the Bard. Eldrin was his heir. Of course they could sing.

  The people of Dalvador were fortunate Eldrin had been born first, because Althor knew he couldn’t sing worth spit. He couldn’t even figure out how you knew if you hit the right notes. At best, he croaked. Now he stood, awash in the glory of a voice that could have made Eldrin famous across a thousand worlds, and Althor felt small. He would never create anything as remotely spectacular—or as pure—as the music his father and brother took for granted, an ability to sing that for some inconceivable reason meant nothing to them, so much less than their ability to wield a sword.

  Althor thought otherwise. Someday he would leave here to fight a war beyond anything either Eldrin or their father could imagine. What Althor excelled at—his ability to kill—had its true value in what it protected. He would fight because that was all he could do, unlike his father and brother, who had a greater calling.

  He would fight so their voices could never be silenced.

  II. CHILD OF THE SKY

  The bow broke with a loud crack that vibrated in the air. Althor swore and dropped the pieces on the ground. He had rolled up his sleeves, and sunshine warmed his arms. The archery target stood at the other end of this clearing in the plains with several arrows stuck in its center, perfectly positioned. Too bad he couldn’t shoot any more. He was done for the day. Again, damn it.

  “Another one broke?” a man asked.

  Althor turned to see his father watching him. “The glasswood is too brittle.”

  Eldrinson came over. “I had hoped this new bow would last longer.”

  “Apparently not.” Althor scowled with his frustration. “What’s the point of being this strong if either I hold back so much, I’m useless as an archer, or else I break my bows?” In the past two years, since Eldrin had gone offworld, Althor had kept growing, until he stood more than a head taller than his father. It wasn’t just his height, either, but his musculature. Sometimes he felt as if he would sink into the ground with the weight of his body.

  “I need a better bow,” Althor said.

  His father considered the broken pieces on the ground. “This is the best we’ve done. I don’t think we can make it stronger.”

  Althor crossed his arms. “Yes. We can.” He was working with an engineer at the starport to construct a bow from a composite material better suited to his needs than glasswood.

  Eldrinson frowned. “Not a fair bow.”

  “You say as a man of honor, I must meet my opponent in fair combat.” Althor lowered his arms. “How is it honor when I can’t even use the same weapons?”

  “You break the bows because of your strength.” Eldrinson spoke as if this somehow answered the question. Althor supposed it did. His size and strength came from his offworld heritage.

  “It still feels wrong,” Althor said.

  His father seemed more thoughtful than angry. He turned and walked toward the edges of the clearing. Beyond him, in the distance, Dalvador basked under the sun.

  Eldrinson turned to him. “Ultimately the decision is yours. I won’t deny you that choice.”

  Althor nodded.
Beyond his father, he saw a trail of bubbles forming in the plains. Someone was running through the reeds; Soz it looked like. At twelve, she seemed less a child every day. She wore a blue dress like other girls in the village, but as she neared them, he saw the ripped sleeves and smudged hem. She had probably been planning military campaigns with her friends again and launching them against their confused brothers, who didn’t know what to make of being attacked by girls. Althor suspected at least some of them liked it far more than they were willing to admit.

  Althor smiled as she came up to them. “My greetings, commander.”

  Although Soz laughed, she shifted back and forth on her feet, too restless to stay still.

  Eldrinson regarded her curiously. “What is it, Soshoni?”

  “Mother says you need to come to the house.” Soz glanced at Althor, then back at their father. “She said hurry.”

  “All right,” Eldrinson said. “Tell her that I will be right there.”

  Soz nodded and took off running, leaving a floating river of pollen above the plains.

  * * *

  “Come on.” Soz tugged on Althor’s arm. “We can hear them from the tower. They’re in the room right next to it, that alcove that looks over the courtyard.”

  Althor pulled away his arm. “I’m not going to eavesdrop.”

  Soz glared at him. “Fine. Stay here.” She headed up the spiral stairs of the tower, disappearing around its curve. Then she called, “It’s only your life they’re arguing about, after all.”

  “What?” Startled, Althor followed, ducking his head so it didn’t hit the ceiling. “Why would they argue about me?” He rarely got into trouble, unlike Soz or their brother Del. He envied their willingness to push boundaries.

  “Not you exactly,” Soz said. They didn’t have enough room to walk together, so she went first, maneuvering her way up the narrow tower much more easily than him. “But it affects you.”

  “What affects me?”

  “Lord Avaril. Grandfather’s cousin.”

  Althor froze. “What are you talking about?”

  She turned to him, standing in the curve of the stairs. “Avaril has raised another army. They’re coming through the mountains.”

  Althor stared at her. Lulled by more than two years of peace, he had assumed the failure of Avaril’s last attack meant he was done. Of course it was a stupid assumption. This war had been going since their father’s birth, when he became the Dalvador Bard instead of Avaril, and it would continue on through the generations until one clan decimated the other. And this time Althor was sixteen, a man in Dalvador, old enough to ride into battle.

  “Come on.” He motioned his sister up the stairs. “Climb faster.”

  * * *

  Eldrinson paced across the alcove, and Roca stood watching him. “What the hell did you expect me to do?” she said. “Pretend I didn’t know they were coming?”

  He came over to her. “You know how I feel about this.”

  She scowled. “I won’t let your obsessed cousin attack our family again.”

  “You must leave it alone, Roca. This is my home, my people, and my world.”

  She didn’t want this argument, not again. “Althor stays here.”

  Eldrinson just looked at her. He didn’t even seem angry, only sad.

  “Damn it,” she said. “You can’t take him with you.”

  “It is his decision, not mine or yours.”

  “Like hell. By the laws of my people, he won’t reach his full majority for another nine years.”

  Eldrinson banged his fist against his thigh. “We don’t live with your people. We live with mine. He is an adult.”

  “He’s still an Imperial citizen.” Roca felt as if she were trying to climb an impossibly steep hill. “Legally he is a child. As his parent, I forbid him to go.”

  “You will tell him this yourself?”

  She tried to project a certainty she didn’t feel. “Yes.”

  “And then what? Will you also forbid his leaving home for this military school where he intends to apply next year? That won’t work, either.”

  She hated knowing he was right. Yes, she could stop Althor now, even have soldiers from the battle cruiser in orbit come down and hold him in his room. To say he would never forgive her was the understatement of the century, even more so than with Eldrin, for Althor was a natural for the military, whereas Eldrin had never liked warfare. It would be hypocrisy to force Althor to stay here against his will and then let him go offworld to attend the Dieshan Military Academy.

  “We can destroy Avaril’s forces from orbit,” Roca said. She would gladly blast his army into smoldering oblivion.

  “This is my fight.” Eldrinson took hold of her shoulders. “You say we have to follow the laws of your people. Well, your own laws don’t allow you to interfere with my world.” He lowered his arms. “You can’t just go dropping bombs on my people when it suits your purposes.”

  “Colonel Majda agrees with me.”

  “Majda and her soldiers are up there to protect you. Not me.”

  “They protect my family.”

  He spoke coldly. “I can’t stop your military from forcing Althor to stay here, nor can I stop you from having your orbital defense system obliterate my cousin’s forces. But if you do this, Roca, don’t come back to our home.” His gaze never wavered. “I love you more than life, more than I ever believed a man could love a woman. But if you take away my self-determination, my pride, and my honor, I cannot live with you.”

  What could she say? She had spent decades fighting for her husband’s right to be considered an equal among her people. The Assembly had even tried to nullify the marriage when she first wed him, claiming an uneducated farmer on a backwater world had no business marrying an heir of their ancient royal line. She had stood up to them then and at every turn since. In return, Eldrinson accepted the changes she brought to his world, not only the technology but the differences in how she approached life. They had raised their children with her worldview as much as his, and because they worked together, the children thrived. The older ones constantly challenged them, but for all their youthful rebellions, they were miracles. Would she throw all that to the wind because she couldn’t accept the results of the life she and Eldrinson had spent so many years building together? They had taught the children their principles of morality, and tomorrow Althor would act on those principles by riding with his father into war. She couldn’t forbid him to go.

  Roca didn’t have to speak; she could tell Eldrinson knew her decision. Perhaps he saw the answer in her face or felt it in his ability to empathize with her. He pulled her close and they held each other, but she knew his grief as well as her own.

  * * *

  The family gathered in the Hearth Room to listen to the broadcast. Althor knew it would play throughout settled space, sent by a technology that accessed a universe where the laws of relativistic physics didn’t apply. It allowed them to enjoy a concert that took place light years away.

  Del draped his lanky self across one of the armchairs in front of the fireplace, and Chaniece sat in the chair next to him. At fifteen, they were both a year younger than Althor, fraternal twins as different as fire and cool water.

  Althor settled into the armchair next to Soz. She was sitting on one end of the sofa, taking apart a pulse revolver. She had filched it from the starport as if that were a perfectly normal act rather than a challenge to their parents. She was still simmering about the fight they had overheard today between their mother and father. Their words had left Althor with much to think about.

  His brother Vyrl ambled into the room and sprawled on the other end of the sofa, exhausted from his daily work out, all long arms and legs at thirteen. Ten-year-old Denric sat in another armchair reading a holo-book, some adventure thing. Shannon was off somewhere, probably in the stables with the lyrine. Aniece was reading too, a book for seven-year-olds about fluffy animals. The toddler Kelric trundled around the room on pudgy legs, golden l
ike their mother and large for his age.

  “Opera,” Del grumbled. “I hate it.”

  “That’s because you yell instead of singing.” Soz never looked up from her pulse revolver. “You sound awful.”

  “Oh, shut up,” Del said.

  “That’s enough, you two.” Roca walked into the room. “Del, you have such a beautiful voice. Why do you only sing those loud songs?”

  Vyrl yawned and stretched his arms. “How long before this broadcast starts, anyway?” which fortunately covered Del’s muttered Fuck that well enough that their mother didn’t hear.

  “Soz, for gods’ sake, is that a gun?” their mother said. “Put it down.”

  Soz looked up at her. “It can’t shoot. I took apart the ignition mechanism.”

  Their father came into the room. “My greetings, everyone,” he said amiably. He took his seat in the armchair across from the fire, next to Althor, and stretched his booted feet out on the red-and-gold carpet. Roca was standing to one side, by the wall behind the circle of chairs. Althor suspected she was too nervous to sit. Kelric toddled over to her and she scooped him into her arms. He settled contentedly into her embrace.

  “Soz, did you hear me?” their mother said. Almost simultaneously, their father said, “Denric, you need to put the book away. You too, Aniece.”

  Denric kept reading. “I’m almost finished.”

  “You don’t have time to finish.” Soz twisted the stock of the revolver. “The broadcast starts in less than two minutes.”