Fantasy For Good: A Charitable Anthology

by George R. R. Martin

  “Immaculada,” he said, calling out her name.

  She must have heard the panic in his voice because suddenly it was her that soothed and reassured him. “Shhhh, I know,” she said, over and over. “I know. Don’t cry for me, my love. I can feel it all. I can hear everything. It is all here in the darkness. I am not alone.”

  But he couldn’t help himself.

  He cradled the dead woman in his arms and carried her through the corridors of the Sultan’s palace for one last time, breaking his heart as he turned every corner with her for the last time. He didn’t know where he was going until he was there, standing beneath the pendulum of the Grand Mechanism.

  Suli didn’t realize what he heard at first, the tick-tock and whirr of the gears in the guts of the machine, then the bell chimed, struck by the huge hammer just once, and he saw the body in his arms and the smile on her dead face, and it all started to make sense. He knew it had to be something to do with the book, that in reading it the Odalisque had somehow let time’s divinity back into the world. He didn’t understand how or why, and yet again it wasn’t something he needed to understand. He was nothing more than her eunuch, why should it be important that he understand anything? He wasn’t a raveller. He wasn’t the chronophage who had found the truth. He wasn’t even Suli, the woman who had given her blood and bones to be the voice of God. He was nothing more than a man. A craven coward of a man, a schemer, a survivor. He wasn’t even a hero with a magical blade or a destiny to fulfil, he was just a man.

  He stood there beneath the huge pendulum curiously comforted by the slow regular tick tock tick tock as it moved from extreme to extreme over his head. Time had begun again after all of these years.

  It was time.

  The chronophage had been right all those years ago, he had discovered God. Now it was time for Suli to give her back to the clock just as all those years ago he had given another woman he loved to it.

  He laid her down gently. He couldn’t see for the tears streaming down his face but he found the lever that released the cage.

  She didn’t scream.

  Why would she? The clock had been kind to her. It always was.

  The late JAY LAKE won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in Science Fiction in 2004, and since then he was astonishingly prolific in multiple genres. He wrote ten novels, hundreds of short stories and he edited the Polyphony anthology series for Wheatland Press.

  In 2008, Jay was diagnosed with colon cancer, and in May 2014 he passed away. His frank and brutally honest blog has given his fans and admirers a unique window into his journey, and everyone should read it.

  www.jlake.com

  Little Pig, Berry Brown

  and the Hard Moon

  Jay Lake

  Little Pig sat in the thin-leaf tree and watched Mother Sun dance upon the water. She-of-the-Sky made silver sparkle in the creek below the bear fur that wrapped the girl in warmth. Little Pig smiled, but folded her laughter within—noise out of place could bring a hungry cat.

  Stick, Little Pig’s only toy and best and greatest friend, opened her tiny carved mouth. “Child, child, sitting in a tree, what sort of furry fruit do you be?”

  Little Pig swallowed another laugh, though her body shook and swayed against the thin-leaf’s bark. “Silly Stick,” she whispered, then put her friend within her own mouth for silence and safekeeping.

  *~*~*~*

  Later Brother Spear returned from his hunt with her mother and the rest of the clan to fetch Little Pig down from the safety of the thin-leaf tree. He was covered in mud and sweat and blood that stank of the Tusk Beast, breath steaming in the evening as the stars cut away his heat in tiny ribbons to feed their secret jealousies. His glittering eyes were narrow-closed, but the axe of his anger did not seem held high for Little Pig. She hugged to his chest as he carried her home, and kept quiet as a nesting mouse, still sucking on Stick and wishing she could ask her friend about the fire in Brother Spear’s face.

  Soon enough she found the reason, when they returned to the Hard Moon Camp.

  Her clan had different camps for different moons. Each was in a place that drew good fortune from the cold skies and sheltered the People from whatever harmed them most in that season of Sister Moon’s journey through the year.

  The People’s Hard Moon Camp was in a shallow bowl atop a bluff near the Biggest River. The bowl was for luck in saving enough food for the Ice Moon and Dying Moon camps soon to come. The bluff kept the People above the animals in the scrub forest surrounding the Biggest River. As they crossed the ridge, she smelled blood, and saw that this night there was fire, big as any prayer-fire, meat on drying frames spread before the flames. Close to the fire, Oldest Woman and Broken-Eye knelt next to someone wrapped in too many furs.

  Like the last grub in the sack, Little Pig thought, lonely and unlucky. None of the People should be so sad.

  “Stick,” she whispered, risking noise as Brother Spear made his quiet way down to the warm light. “Who is it?”

  “Child, child, clutching tight, count the People here tonight.”

  Brother Spear touched her back with his hand, signaling quiet, but she had Stick’s advice now and made good. Little Pig wasn’t very clever with numbers, but she knew names, and so she sang the list of the People in the voice only she could hear, behind her ears, looking for each one as she named them.

  Oldest Woman, hands so bent

  Sleeping Sister, dreaming much

  Broken-Eye, sees only night

  Walks On Rock, feet too big

  Berry Brown, mother of my heart

  There she stopped, for she did not see her mother anywhere. Little Pig was hungry then, for Berry Brown had always fed her. Little Pig was frightened then, for Berry Brown had always comforted her. Little Pig was worried then, for Berry Brown had always protected her. Berry Brown belonged to Little Pig the way Mother Sun belonged to Daughter Sky.

  Brother Spear stopped at the feet of Berry Brown, who was wrapped in the three magic furs and head close to the fire. “I have brought the child,” he said. Little Pig felt the rumble of his voice where her head lay against his chest. She held Stick close.

  Berry Brown had made Stick for her, carving her friend with a black-stone blade and the patience of rain, lending her breath into Stick’s mouth, kissing Stick’s hurts. Little Pig’s eyes salted like summer-killed meat, as she clutched her toy tight enough to make Stick squeak and shiver.

  Oldest Woman took the bear fur robe from Brother Spear and greeted Little Pig with a tiny dry kiss upon her forehead. Then she made Little Pig stand with her close to the fire, next to Berry Brown’s face, a soft little hand wrapped inside a trembling old one.

  “Who lies before us?” Oldest Woman asked. Her voice was not unkind, but Little Pig knew Oldest Woman could crack rocks with her will, and not even Boar Killer with his temper and his huge muscles would argue with her.

  “Child, child, before the fire, answer all Oldest Woman desires,” whispered Stick, squirming in her hand.

  “Berry Brown.” Little Pig stared at the unmoving eyes, lost in the sweating face like leaves in the creek. Her chest shuddered. “My mother.”

  “What has happened to her?” Oldest Woman asked.

  “I do not—” Little Pig began, then stopped.

  “Child, child, Berry went hunting, did not hear the Tusk Beast grunting.”

  Oldest Woman made a soft noise, inviting Little Pig’s next words to come out of her mouth.

  Little Pig closed Stick to her chest, just as Berry Brown used to hold Little Pig. “She was hurt by the Tusk Beast, wasn’t she?”

  A squeeze of the hand. Then: “What will become of her?”

  Little Pig waited for Stick to speak, but the toy was silent. Oldest Woman squeezed her hand again. What was she supposed to say?

  “She is my mother.” Little Pig’s voice was as slow as her thoughts. “She will not leave me behind.”

  Oldest Woman bent and whispered in Little Pig’s ear. As
she spoke, Little Pig could feel Stick straining to listen. “Berry Brown has gone beyond the reach of my hands’ skill or the depths of Broken-Eye’s wisdom. We cannot make her whole. Still, she might come home for you, child. But you must ask the Hard Moon and the sharp stars if this can be, and what words will bring her back.”

  “I will speak to the moon,” said Little Pig.

  Oldest Woman released her hand, brushed her hard, crooked fingers across Little Pig’s shoulder. “Go find your way, then.”

  *~*~*~*

  Little Pig climbed up toward the rim of the Hard Moon Camp’s small round valley. She took one of her paths, not the People’s trails, so she could visit her special places. The Hard Moon was not so old that she had lost the light. She touched her crystal rocks, the oldest bone, and the brown anthill. Stick always liked the special places, sometimes talked about the magic that dwelt in each, though right now Stick seemed to be silent. Thinking, perhaps. Mice scuttled away from Little Pig as she walked, while an owl sailed overhead, wide-winged and vigilant. Had the night-hunter come to take the last of Berry Brown’s spirit away?

  She almost ran into Brother Spear. He sat cross-legged, still covered in blood and muck, making tiny sparks as he chipped at the edge of his spear point.

  “I am sorry,” he told Little Pig without meeting her eye.

  She thought about that a moment. “You did not hurt Berry Brown.”

  More chips of the rock. “I led. Success is mine, failure mine.”

  “There is meat by the fire, for the Ice Moon and the Dying Moon.” Little Pig knew this without turning to look, as the dank blood smell lay upon the entire valley.

  Brother Spear finally lifted his chin to her. “There is no magic. Only spear and blood and bone. Tusk Beast took Berry Brown in trade for itself. Blood for blood.”

  “Child, child, Brother Spear is wrong, Berry has not yet sung her last song.”

  Little Pig squeezed Stick, a gentle hug of thanks and reassurance. “My mother is alive,” she told Brother Spear, touching his knee with her free hand.

  A smile ghosted across his face like a crane in the mist. “Go on. Follow Oldest Woman’s magic. Ask the moon. I only know the spear. It feeds us but it takes away as well.”

  “Like the Tusk Beast. Spears are our sharp teeth. You are the strong hand.”

  He bent once more to his work. Little Pig gave Brother Spear back his silence and moved on to talk to the moon.

  *~*~*~*

  She picked a tree that some great storm had driven down, and climbed the mossy, rotting trunk to sit among the insects and the tiny plants at the top. The perch gave her a view of the Hard Moon Camp and her mother’s body—a tiny dark smear before the fire circle when seen from here. If she faced away from the flames, the sky ghosted above her. The knives of the stars glittered sharp. The Hard Moon was beginning to rot and grow lean, and hungered already for the bed at Daughter Sky’s western verge. To the north was the faint, dull glow of the Ice Wall.

  “What shall I do, Stick?” Little Pig held her toy up in the moonlight. The tiny eyes squinted. The mouth pursed as in thought. Stick’s long wooden body twitched in Little Pigs’ hand. Then she smiled, ivory bright as any bone from the sand pits of the Biggest River.

  Little Pig had never seen Stick’s teeth before.

  “Child, child, ask the moon, she rules over every doom.”

  She kissed Stick. Stick kissed back—another first!—though it was a sting, like the bite of a tree ant, rather than the gentle press of Berry Brown’s lips. Then Little Pig set her legs apart, as Broken-Eye did when he was called to wrestle spirits from the weed smoke. She spread her arms wide, as Oldest Woman did when asking questions of the southern wind. She titled her head back, as Brother Spear did when calling to the wolves and bears and cats. Stick clung to her outstretched hand, and the Hard Moon swam at the top of her upward gaze.

  “Sister Moon,” Little Pig said quietly. She did not feel a need to shout. No voice was great enough to reach the moon if the moon was not ready to listen, and any voice should reach if the moon had turned her face to hear. “I have been told three times to speak to you. A thing thrice-told is a thing true through and through. Tell me if Berry Brown may live. Tell me what I can do to make her whole. Tell me what magic there is under your cold light.”

  She listened a while, to the whisper of the wind in the thin-leaf trees, and the call of a distant nighthawk hunting insects, and the puzzled, nervous snorts of the deer moving through the scrub brush.

  Sister Moon made no answer, but Stick twisted in Little Pig’s hand.

  She listened more, to the rustle of the mice scavenging under cover of darkness, and the mutter of the Biggest River remaking its bed every moment, and the faint ringing of the night’s cold pouring off the Ice Wall to the north.

  Still Sister Moon made no answer. Still Stick twisted, twitched, demanding attention.

  She listened a third time, to the faraway scream of some animal caught up by great rushing feathers, to the cough of a hunting cat, to the scrape of claws on rock.

  A third time Sister Moon made no answer. She was silent as she had ever been, edging through the sky toward her meeting with the western horizon.

  “What is it, Stick?” Little Pig asked, feeling no hope.

  “Child, child, you have grown, lay me down and walk alone.”

  “No!” she shouted, then swiftly sat to wait in silence. She had made far too much noise for being this distant from the fire and the rest of the People. A cat could come, or a wolf, or even one of the mountain teratornis. Stick twitched but held her peace.

  After a time, as the trees creaked and the breeze brought a musky scent of furry hunger, Little Pig whispered urgently to Stick. “You are my friend. Berry Brown made you for me. I cannot leave you behind.”

  “Child, child, think what she did, when Berry carved me from a stick.”

  “You’re Stick,” hissed Little Pig. “You watch over me when I am alone. You’re always close when the People are far. You protect me.”

  “Child, child, your mother is in me, and I am part of what she could be.”

  Little Pig studied Stick’s eyes. They were wide open now, a deep, shining black just as Berry Brown’s had been. Were, she thought as her stomach lurched. Just as Berry Brown’s were. The tiny teeth gleamed ivory-bright, and Stick’s narrow cheeks had rounded.

  “So you are her, and she is you?”

  Stick twitched. A nod.

  “I could keep you. Hold you close. Never let you leave. You’d always be with me!”

  Then Little Pig’s eyes were drawn back to the fire down within the bowl of the Hard Moon Camp. Berry Brown lay still upon the ground. Oldest Woman stood beside her, shadow bent and shaking, waiting for Little Pig to return.

  She could keep Stick close, always have her mother. But at the same time, Berry Brown would lie by the fire, unmoving and cooling. Like a stunned doe with the slaughter-knife trapped in her throat, leaping up unexpected into the forest to bleed out her pain until the People ran her down again and completed her life.

  Or Little Pig could lay down Stick—her toy, her friend, her companion, the always-touch of Berry Brown—and let the Tusk Beast’s work be finished.

  “I understand what Oldest Woman meant for me to learn from the moon,” she said.

  Stick lay quiet, as if knowing what was to come. Crying, Little Pig found her way back down the hill toward the firelight, scarcely noticing the bright eyes which watched from above. They were of the same night that had taken Berry Brown away from her, and so she gave them none of her concern.

  *~*~*~*

  Walking toward Oldest Woman, and the rest of the People who watched in shadowed silence, Little Pig could feel years settling upon her shoulders. Though she was still seasons from her own bleedings, she could not be a child when Berry Brown’s place among the People was empty.

  Her eyes were dry when she passed out of darkness.

  Oldest Woman’s voice rang with the autho
rity of rock splitting water. “Have you asked the Hard Moon what might be done?”

  Little Pig stroked Stick. “Yes, I have.” She looked around the fire, where the eyes of the People gleamed little different from the eyes of the beasts around the outer ring of the Hard Moon Camp.

  “And what answer did Sister Moon give you?”

  “Silence,” said Little Pig. She raised Stick above her head, turning slowly so that everyone might see what had become of her toy. If they could see it. “Silence, which told me everything. Silence, which told me that no matter what we do the sky circles onward and the seasons of the moon pass just the same. I can no more ask Sister Moon to turn back Berry Brown’s time than I can ask her to turn back the Ice time or the Dying time.”

  Oldest Woman stared a while at Little Pig, then smiled. It was thin smile, quick as a lightning stroke, but Little Pig saw it come and go, and like looking at lightning, was blinded for a moment. “And now that Berry Brown is gone where the skill of my hands cannot follow, where Broken-Eye’s wisdom cannot lead, what will you do for your mother?”

  Little Pig squatted on her heels next to Berry Brown and touched her mother’s pale face. The skin was chill, the eyes never moved even as her hand passed before them. She tugged the furs aside—bear, wolf and cat—and lay Stick down in the bruised skin between Berry Brown’s breasts. Stick smiled at her, showing not only the new teeth but a tongue and mouth within, far pinker than the black blood which had dried upon her mother.

  “I give Berry Brown back the toy which she had made for me,” Little Pig said slowly. “I will not be a child anymore, now that she is gone. My mother needs her spirit returned so that she can travel into the lands beyond the horizon where Sister Moon goes every night.”

  “Woman, woman, letting go, your mother’s love is bright as snow.”