The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 2016 Edition

by Rich Horton

  The next words she whispered against its lips could be heard clear across the courtroom.

  “In the name of Nyx the Nightwalker, Queen in Exile, I anoint you, Alban Idris the Antler-Crowned, Ruler of the Valwode. Take the Veil with her blessing, and do with it as you will.”

  Something silent but surging, like seeing a tree grow from seed to sapling to oak in a matter of seconds, moved through the statue. It let out a noise like a thunderclap, of agony and of triumph, and threw back its head. The antler crown burst from its skull: rack, tier, and tangle rising high.

  “No!” screamed Loreila, springing to rip them away from each other. “No, I forbid it!” She snatched Analise by the throat, pressing that soft flesh with her terrible fingers until spots of blood began to well. Analise’s eyes bulged. Her face went dusky and mottled. No sound escaped her. No sound was possible.

  Then Loreila just . . . stopped.

  She stopped, and Analise fell from her, and crashed down near Gideon, retching for breath. He moved closer, helplessly.

  “Ana,” he said. “Ana, hold on.”

  Loreila the Winter-Touched hung above them in the air, hunched forward, her yellow eyes wide with shock. Her mouth fell open, her jaw unhinged and swinging. Froth gathered at the corners of her lips. Gideon could count all her tiny, pointed teeth. Seeking the source of her disgruntlement, her long, white-spackled fingers found it in the spearhead that jutted from her chest. It was obsidian, shaped like a lozenge, and dripping her strange blue blood all down the front of her yellow dress. It vibrated in time with her dying heartbeat. Loreila grasped the slippery spearhead and tried to pull it from her, but succeeded only in slicing open her hands.

  The statue behind her . . .

  Gideon recognized it. His first creation. Rough-hewn and craggy as granite, the red cape of office pinned by a ruby broach at its shoulder. Its face was impassive, as if the stone of it had never been quickened to life.

  Alban Idris the Antler-Crowned held up its hand. “Enough, sibling. The pretender is finished.”

  “Yes, sovereign.”

  The captain let Loreila’s corpse fall. She slid off the spear and into a heap on the floor.

  The ruler of the Valwode crouched down, reaching for Analise and holding her delicately in the curve of its arm. It touched its mouth to hers again, as though it had not been able to bear their interval apart. Something in its exhale seemed to gentle the harshness of her own breathing. Sighing with relief, Analise threw her arms around its neck and buried her face in the purple silk it wore.

  “Thank you. Thank you—I was so afraid. I could not breathe.”

  “Ana,” it murmured, stroking her hair from her face, cradling her close. “Sweet Ana. Beloved Ana. Will you not stay? Stay here in Dark Breakers. Live among us. You, who taught me speech. Who taught our hearts to beat. Help me now. Stand at my side, and I will name you consort and councilor and grant you anything your heart desires.”

  Analise disengaged herself and sat back, huddling her knees to her chest. She looked at Gideon, who, with the last of his strength leaving him, could do no more than glare back at her.

  “What about him?” she asked flatly.

  “Him.”

  Every statue in the courtroom had gathered around them now, circle upon circle of them, silently, blank of face and fierce of eye. A prison of living marble.

  “He shall stand trial for genocide,” said Alban Idris the Antler-Crowned. “He shall be found guilty. And he will die for the deaths he dealt us.”

  Analise did not look shocked. She did not look sorry. She did not, Gideon thought, look very much of anything. For the first time since he had met her, he could not read her. But still he would stare at her until they put out his eyes or closed them for him.

  All she did was sigh. Then, heaving herself to her feet, Analise Field stood over him, putting her body between his and death. And she said, “You’ll have to go through me first.”

  “They let us leave, but before they did, the sovereign lifted the onus Loreila had laid upon him—that thing that made him create statues willy-nilly—and, and it was like they ripped the spine from him. He collapsed. He was already weak beyond . . . He’s, he’s not woken since.”

  Analise rubbed her eyes before she realized what she was doing and stopped in disgust. Her fingers were ink-stained and blood-spattered and she did not know what else. “He’s banished, you know. He can’t stay here. The sovereign said, said if Gideon is ever caught in Breaker House when the walls open again, he will be dragged through and summarily executed for war crimes. We can’t even let him stay here the night.”

  “We can’t move him!” Desdemona protested. She sat on the edge of Gideon’s bed, so close that her black hair fell across his chest, but she did not touch him, afraid to take her cousin’s flayed and swollen hand in hers.

  “Des, he’s in a coma,” Chaz Mallister said quietly. For once his mouth had lost its smirk, his voice the nasty edge of cattiness that was its wont. “I don’t know what all this business about walls opening and walking statues and wicked queens might be. But I know Alderwood needs to be in a hospital. I’ve rung the ambulance. They’re on their way.”

  When Desdemona did not answer, Analise did. “Thank you,” she said, and pressed his hand gratefully, withdrawing it the next instant with a flush of apology at the streaks she had left on his pristine cuff. “Miss Mannering—Desdemona. Gideon can’t return here when he leaves the hospital. Or ever. You know that, don’t you? If he does, Dark Breakers will swallow him . . . ”

  “Yes,” Desdemona growled. “Yes, all right? Yes.”

  “I rang Elliot Howell too,” Chaz put in quickly. “He and Nixie will meet you at Seafall Emergency Center.”

  “No,” said Analise, standing up from her chair. She stumbled at her own swiftness and backed away toward the door. “I’m not going. Tell them . . . I’ve left Seafall. Tell them I’ve gone home. Elliot knows where to write me.” Her gaze flickered to Gideon’s ashen face. “Goodbye.”

  She was the first thing he looked for when he woke, his eyes battered by the bright hospital lights, his ears no less pierced by the shrill silence than his arms were by the tubes that had kept him hydrated and alive for who knew how long. He saw Desdemona, her hand fast in Chaz Mallister’s, but she was napping against Chaz’s shoulder and was not aware he had awakened. Gideon did not bother to linger long over Chaz Mallister, whose face held no surprise except weariness. He watched his mother for a while. She stood at the window looking out, a stylish net veil obscuring half her profile. She smoked cigarette after cigarette, rigidly and stoically. As the smoke wreathed her head, Gideon thought of dragons. Next his gaze went to Queen Nyx, who wore a man’s pinstriped suit, with a fedora slanting slyly over her forehead. She perched on Elliot’s knee and spoke quietly into his ear.

  But it was Elliot who first caught Gideon’s curious gaze. A light leapt into his own. If anything, those round blue eyes grew rounder and bluer. He exclaimed something that Gideon could not hear through the suffocating crush of comprehension and disappointment.

  Ana was not there.

  PART FOUR: LETTERS HOME

  Dear Ana,

  How we all get on here without you I’ll never know. Even Nixie seems out of temper, although I can’t tell if it’s the gestation process or grief over the loss of her throne that has her so peevish. I mean, she gave it up. The antler crown was hers to give, and her blessing with it. But it’s gone now, for good and true, and she’ll never wear it again, and she’ll never go home. I don’t think she knew how she’d mourn it. Nor can I understand the depths of her loss.

  She clings to me one moment, reviles me the next, and all I can do is bring her pickles and ice cream when she asks it of me. Am I a wise man? I’m a damned lucky one anyway.

  Out of desperation the other evening, I mentioned sending her to the countryside for some fresh air. She didn’t say a word but got out her suitcase and started packing before I had time to consult the train tab
les. I’m sending her to you with my compliments. Don’t thank me. I know you’ve always wanted a pregnant exiled Gentry queen of your own. Isn’t it your birthday soon?

  Gideon was released from hospital two weeks ago and went back to his garret to finish recuperating. I visited last week only to find him returning home from work. Yes, work. He’s taken a factory job. A front-line man at Alderwood Typewriters.

  He did not seem too shocked to see me. Invited me in for tea, gracious as you please. He’s got more furniture in his room now. Table and chairs. Cups, plates. A hotplate of his own. Actually, I think he stole it from your room.

  “Cat got your tongue?” I asked, for though he was not what I’d call dour exactly, he was more quiet than usual.

  “I’ve taken a vow of silence,” he said, pouring me out a vile brew and the sugar to sweeten it with. “Until I learn to keep a civil tongue in my mouth.”

  “Breaking that vow for me, are you? Honored.”

  And Deep Lords, Ana, do you know he laughed?

  “It’s easy to be civil with you, Howell. If a Gentry Queen as ancient as Athe and powerful as an earthquake goes soft for your sunny nature, it must come as no surprise that even I can refrain from biting your head off over a tea tray.”

  “Speaking of which, Alderwood—and I’ve no desire to provoke you into the aforementioned biting off of my head—but this tea is ghastly.”

  “You should try my soup.”

  “Ah—no thanks.”

  And that’s how it was. He invited me back for supper next night, and Nixie too. Gideon—who’s never invited me or anyone to anything that I can remember, and who never before could mention my wife without his jaw clenching hard as iron. When we parted, he gave me a present, “For Queen Nyx,” he said. “Or really, for the child she carries.”

  Ana, it was a box of little wooden animals. He had whittled and painted each of them by hand. Bear cubs in bright red vests. Monkeys wearing green hats with gold tassels. Giraffes in ball gowns. Zebras in tuxedos. Spotted hyenas in polka dot dresses and pink high heels.

  “I didn’t know you worked in wood,” I said, too moved to say anything cleverer. And he smiled, which flummoxed me more than his laugh had. I don’t think I’d ever seen such a smile from him, without that edge that cuts you.

  “I used to. Long ago. My fingers are clumsy at it, but . . . ” He shrugged. “I’m learning. I don’t think your baby will be too harsh a critic. Not until she’s older anyway. I used vegetable dye so they’ll be safe for her to teethe on.”

  “Thank you.” I hugged him then; I’d never done such a thing before, but I couldn’t help it. Gideon was stiff as a board and thin as a broom, but for just a second, he hugged me back. And that amazed me most of all.

  That’s all I have to report, Ana. I hope you’re well. Kiss my wife for me. But not the way I’d kiss her if you please. Or . . . Well, if you must. I’ll just sit here and imagine it, thank you.

  Your friend,

  Elliot

  Dear Miss Field,

  Please find enclosed last year’s birthday present, which for one reason or another I neglected to give you. May it serve you well.

  Howell told me that Lyrebird Publishing is due to release Seafall Surrenders in the spring. Please accept my congratulations.

  Gideon Azlin Alderwood

  Mr. Alderwood,

  Thank you for the typewriter. It seems an efficient machine. As you can read for yourself, it works. If it ever ceases to do so, I am sure it will make a fine doorstop.

  Knowing how you sometimes forget to buy toilet paper, I have included an Advanced Reading Copy of Seafall Surrenders. Also herein, a box of “Feisty Tips,” quite the best black tea in the Wold. I do not know what you made Elliot drink, but I can’t have you poisoning my friends in my absence.

  A. Field

  P. S. Keep the hot plate.

  PART FIVE: RECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES

  Nyx left the dawn before he arrived.

  “It is best the boy does not meet me yet, or for some time. His wounds go deep, and my presence but exacerbates them.” She smiled wryly. “This I learned at our dinner together, though he was too polite to flinch whenever I spoke or smiled.”

  “He doesn’t have to stay,” Analise protested, following Nyx outside. They had lived together a month in perfect peace, staying up late and talking, unpacking and organizing the house, shopping, cooking, feasting, reading, singing each other the songs of their separate worlds. She was almost as alarmed at losing her odd but oddly soothing companion as at the thought of Gideon’s arrival.

  Gideon leaving Seafall. Gideon coming to Feisty Wold. Gideon, seeing the old farmhouse she’d bought with her advance. Gideon, on her front porch. She could not imagine him but as the broken and bleeding thing she’d abandoned at Breaker House.

  “You, you don’t have to leave at all, Nixie,” Analise stammered. “I can send him right on his way. In fact, I don’t even need to answer the door. This is my house, after all. I get to say who enters or leaves it. And anyway . . . How do you even know he means to come here?”

  Nyx smirked. The blue-black marks on her face danced. She took her suitcase in hand, and kissed Analise full on the mouth.

  “I will walk into town, Ana, and take the train from there. It will do me good. And the Infanta here.” She patted her rounded belly.

  “Walk into town?” Analise wailed the words. “Nixie, it’s the better part of ten miles!”

  Nyx winked much as Elliot might have done. “Would that it were twice as long!” She placed her free hand on Analise’s shoulder, and Analise felt it as a benediction. “Fear not I will tell you to be kind to the boy. Does he deserve your kindness? No. But he comes to thank you, as is proper. And if he lays gifts at your feet, it is no more than your valor merits. Let him wallow. It will relieve him and please you.”

  “It will not please me!” Analise flashed.

  “Will it not?”

  At her look, Analise wisely swallowed whatever lie she’d been about to utter. With a slight nod, Nyx flicked her chin with a careless hand and went on her way, blue-black braids gleaming like some deep summer evening under the white winter sunlight.

  What could Analise do but spend the day cooking and cleaning? When she tried to write that evening, she found she could not concentrate, but went to bed early instead, despairing of sleep. To her surprise, a dreamless repose claimed her almost as soon as her head touched the pillow. Or rather, as soon as she crushed the pillow over her head, pounded it with her fists, kicked ineffectually at the mattress, and groaned.

  “Gideon Alderwood,” she said, “the moment you say anything mean, you’re out. No, if you even raise your eyebrow the wrong way . . . if you so much as sneer at me, I’m slamming my door in your face and you can go sing for a new roommate in Seafall. I’ll be through with you. We’ll be through. Do you hear me?”

  Somewhere mid-fret, she slept.

  When she awoke, clear-headed and smiling for no reason she could discern, it was to another bright cold sky shining through her window.

  And a hesitant knock at her door.

  These were the things he would tell her:

  1. Miss Field, I have decided that if you don’t take me back, I am going to jump out of a very high window.

  2. No. I know. That’s blackmail. Never mind. All right. How about an ultimatum? Take me back, love me, live with me again, or I’ll throw you out a window and see how you like it.

  3. Goddamn it.

  4. Ana, I didn’t mean it.

  5. I don’t know how to say what I mean anymore.

  6. Or mean what I say.

  7. Miss Field, forget forcible defenestration. Let me be plain. I need you to kiss me like you kissed that last monster I made, the one you stole, my greatest work and the closest thing I’ll ever know of a supreme being outside yourself. Kiss me like you want to make me ruler over all the Valwode, like you want to execute me for the crime of wanting to kiss you, like you forgive me, or I will die of
suffocation because you are the only air I ever want to breathe.

  8. . . . Please?

  Gideon sighed. A month and change of enforced silence hadn’t worked half as well as he’d hoped. He had wanted to learn something of gentleness. He had bitten his tongue against stinging retort thirty-six times a day. He had never once used his smile as a weapon. He had tried to remember what it was to love the work of his hands, as she did hers.

  Maybe it would be better to say nothing at all.

  But this was Analise. Analise who devoured words. Who breathed them, dreamed them, summoned them. He would need to say something to her. She deserved that—and, well, everything—but for now something would have to do. Something simple, so he wouldn’t mangle it.

  Like the truth.

  Gideon Alderwood stood just beyond the screen. He held up a crate of toilet paper. “I brought these for you. Overdue.”

  Analise raised her eyebrows. She craned her neck to peer past him. A battered jalopy was parked crookedly in the dirt driveway, its rusty frame appearing to be held together by nothing but paper clips and promises. She glanced back at him. Not quite into his eyes. Not yet.

  Gideon wore what looked to be his work clothes, plain but clean: brown trousers with suspenders, a worn shirt with the sleeves rolled up enough to show a string of black letters tattooed up his arms. It was not her writing, which surely had been scrubbed off at the hospital, but they were her words. His right arm read simply, “Seafall rose up from the waves one Gentry Moon,” and his left, “I could hear the city breathing.”

  He wore no vest or tie. No marks of clay anywhere about him, but a whittling knife strapped to his belt. He had foregone a hat, and his hair was long enough to be tied back. This he had done, but the dark strands escaping their thong awoke a restless longing in Analise’s hands that she’d thought she had freed herself from.

  Analise shoved her hands into the pockets of her green dressing gown and gazed down at herself in dismay. The secondhand velvet was threadbare. The ivory lace at the elbows was more hole than eyelet.