Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction

by Leigh Grossman

  No kidding, Jeremiah thought.

  “You might like to know,” Brenn continued. “You were awarded the Feldman Fellowship in Anthropology. I also submitted your dissertation to the Academy of Planetary Studies.” He paused. “Jeremiah, you won the Goldstone Prize.”

  “What?” Jeremiah’s hand tightened on the stem of the crystal goblet that held his water.

  “I think this was the first time a Gold-stone winner couldn’t attend the ceremony,” Brenn said. “Your award monies will be held for you until—well, until you can claim them.”

  After a pause, Brenn said, “Your family sends their love. We are all proud of you.”

  Then the disk went silent.

  The stem of Jeremiah’s goblet suddenly snapped. He stared at the line of red that welled from the cut on his hand. Then he dropped the glass, and it shattered across the mosaic tiles on the floor.

  “Jeremiah?” Khal started to reach toward him.

  “No!” He pushed back his chair with a jerk, then rose to his feet and strode away from the table. Beyond the horseshoe arch, he entered a lofty corridor. Darkwood paneled one wall but the other was glassplex. It looked out into pure sky.

  Far below, the Teotec Mountains rolled away, wreathed in the mists and carpeted by richly growing snowfirs, the Forest of the Clouds. Lake-of-Shad-ows made a dark blue glimmer in the north and Lake-of-Tears glinted silver-blue in the south. Far to the east, the snow-covered tip of Mount Shadows Peak lifted into the sky. The panoramic view mocked him, a reminder that he lived in a gilded prison, forbidden the freedom promised by that spectacular landscape.

  The hall ended in a round chamber with its back wall and floor carved from the cliff itself. The other walls were glassplex that polarized to mute the Sun’s glare. The chamber wedged into the cliff like a bubble on that great, sheer expanse of rock.

  A bench jutted out from the back wall. Jeremiah dropped onto it, rested his elbows on his knees, and put his head in his hands.

  Boots sounded in the entrance. He looked up to see the captain of his Calanya escort. Then Khal appeared behind her.

  “You may wait in the morning room,” she told the guard.

  After the captain left, Khal sat on the bench near Jeremiah. She spoke with care. “These honors you received—they mean much, yes?”

  “What does it matter?” He stared into the sky that arched around the chamber. “I’ll never be able to accept them.”

  “It might help to talk.”

  That was a switch. Usually he was the one who wanted her to open up. Now she sat quietly, neither pushing nor withdrawing into her reserve.

  After a while, he spoke. “The doctorate is what I was working on all those years in Dahl. They don’t normally grant it without final processes I couldn’t do here. But they gave it to me anyway.” He swallowed. “The fellowship is a research grant awarded each year for work that led to a doctorate in anthropology.”

  “Given to only one person? Out of everyone?”

  “Yes. But it’s no big deal.”

  “No?” She regarded him. “I think this doctorate of yours and this prestigious Feldman Fellowship are far greater honors than you admit.”

  It had never occurred to Jeremiah that he would win the Feldman. Although he did well in research, the fellowship usually went to someone who also had a top record in academic courses. His grades were nothing to boast about. Research was what he loved, usually to the detriment of his classes.

  What dazed him, though, was the Goldstone. He had no idea what possessed the Academy to give it to him. It always went to a seasoned faculty member in a major academic department. For a graduate student to win for a doctoral dissertation was unheard of. It assured him of a good shot at any academic job he wanted. He stood on the verge of realizing his dreams—and Coba had stolen them.

  Khal was watching him. “This Goldstone, what does it mean?”

  Jeremiah swallowed. “It means that people I don’t deserve to call my colleagues think my work is the best done in our field this last year.” He turned to her. “Don’t you see? This is all I’ve ever wanted. You’ve taken my dreams.”

  Quietly she said, “It was a mistake to play the disk.”

  “Let me go, Khal. Let me go home.”

  “Even if I could take away the Calanya Oath, which I can’t, we could never let you leave now. You know too much.”

  “You don’t want me to write about the Inside.”

  “In part. It is private to us.” She paused. “But your knowledge of Sevtar is more serious. His family wields immense power among the Skolians. If they ever learned what happened to him here, they would seek vengeance.”

  He shook his head. “I’ll never mention him.”

  “I have no right to risk the safety of my people.”

  Jeremiah rose to his feet and crossed to the curving wall. A misty cloud drifted by below the chamber. “I don’t deserve the Goldstone anyway. My work was incomplete.”

  Khal came to stand behind him, sliding her arms around his waist. He saw her reflected in the glass, looking out over his head at the breathtaking view.

  She spoke quietly. “I know you, Jeremiah. You would never rest until you created perfection. Even then you would be dissatisfied. I read this work of yours before I sent it to Earth. You deserve every honor they gave you.”

  He blinked. “You read my thesis?”

  “Yes. It took some time. My English is terrible.” She tilted her head. “It is strange to see the Twelve Estates through the eyes of an offworlder. But your love of Coba came through in all you wrote.”

  It meant a great deal to him to know she had liked his work. Even so, he couldn’t tell her what she wanted to hear, that his love of her world would make up for the loss of his own. So they stood in silence, watching the sky.

  After a while she said, “I attend the Council of Managers at Karn Estate soon. I have been thinking that, if you like, I will bring you with me.”

  He knew she never traveled with Calani. This was her way of trying to ease his unhappiness. “Yes. I would like that.”

  Some of the tension in her embrace eased. She drew him around so they faced each other, her arms still around his waist. “Before we leave for Council, Manager Tehnsa is coming here to visit. I would like you to play Quis with her.”

  That surprised him. Although Khal often had her Calani sit at Quis with Caryi, she usually chose experienced players. “Are you sure you want me to do it? Not Kev or Savan?”

  Khal nodded. “I hope an infusion of new ideas will strengthen her game. You see things in a different way.”

  “How about Hevtar?”

  “Hevtar?” She gave him a puzzled smile. “He’s a child.”

  “Not really.” Jeremiah thought back to their sessions. “He has a fresh outlook and he understands Tehnsa.”

  “He does have a remarkable style, doesn’t he?” A mother’s pride warmed her voice.

  “He does. And something else, Khal.”

  “Yes?”

  “Caryi needs a higher Level Calani. And an Akasi. Hevtar might consider it.” Given what Jeremiah had seen, Hevtar would consider it paradise.

  Khal dropped her arms. “Hevtar go to another Estate? As Akasi? Of course not. He is far too young.”

  “Aren’t most highborn boys here betrothed by fifteen?”

  “Well, yes,” she admitted. “In more conservative Estates.”

  Dryly he said, “Viasa is hardly a hotbed of radicalism.”

  She smiled slightly. “No, I suppose not.”

  “You have to let him grow up.”

  She considered him, then walked over to gaze out at the sky. “I would miss him. So would his father.”

  Jeremiah understood. The deep, abiding love Kev and Khal felt for their son showed in their every word and action toward him. For all that Khal resisted the idea of a betrothal, though, he suspected she realized the match made good sense. Caryi and Hevtar were young by most standards, but the conservative upper echelons of
Coban society encouraged early marriages among the highborn, to produce heirs. Tehnsa needed a Second Level, one with a fresh outlook, and Hevtar needed someone like Caryi who understood his moody, stratospheric intellect. The pairing would let him stay near Viasa, yet at the same time give him independence. He and Caryi would also have Viasa to guide them in governing Tehnsa.

  Jeremiah paused. “Khal—?”

  She turned to face him. “Yes?”

  “What happened? With Kev and you?”

  “We…had a disagreement.”

  He waited. “Yes?”

  It was several moments before she spoke. But this time she did answer. “He wanted more children. I didn’t.”

  “Hevtar is a wonderful young man.”

  “Yes. He is.” With difficulty she said, “I have always thought it important that I give my child my best personal attention. But I am also a Manager. I didn’t feel I could do both with more than one child.” She paused. “My refusal caused rancor. Kev stopped caring for… for Viasa.”

  No, Jeremiah thought. He didn’t stop caring for you. “He never left Viasa.”

  “I offered. Other Estates expressed interest, despite the immense cost of his contract. He didn’t want to go. Why should he? Viasa is a good Estate.”

  Jeremiah shook his head. “The Calanya trade—that’s the only equivalent of divorce that exists for an Akasi.”

  “I don’t understand this word ‘divorce.’“

  “I know. That’s the problem.”

  A long standing heartache showed behind her reserve. “I would never have brought you here if Kev and I still lived as Akasi and Manager.”

  “He’s still your husband.”

  “You know my people no longer practice polygamy. You wrote this yourself in your study of us.”

  “But for Managers it’s still legal. No matter how you evade the description, you have both Kev and me.” He made himself say the truth he had avoided. “Kev will always come first for you.”

  “Jeremiah, no.” She started toward him, but stopped when he put up his hands as if to hold her off. “Surely you know what you mean to me.”

  “How can I know? You never say.” Pain edged his voice. “Oh, I know, you’re proud of your young trophy husband. But I’m not a prize. What happens when you tire of your ‘exotic prince’? When the novelty wears off and you want a man who understands and values your way of life?”

  “You’re wrong if you think you mean only that to—to Viasa.”

  He gave a laugh with more pain than humor in it. “You can’t even say ‘to me.’“

  She spread her hands, her body silhouetted against the sky. “Perhaps you want more from me than I know how to give.”

  Softly he said, “That works both ways, Khal.”

  * * * *

  A loud buzzing jarred Jeremiah awake. He opened his eyes into the darkness of his suite. Fumbling on the nightstand by the bed, he switched on the audiocom.

  “What?” he mumbled.

  “Jeremiah?” Khal’s tense voice came out of the audiocom.

  Her urgency pulled him awake. “What’s wrong?”

  “Can you read starship trajectory scans?”

  Puzzled, he said, “I took some astronomy in college. We covered the basics. But that was years ago.”

  “That’s more than any of us have.” She took a breath. “We need you in the observatory tower. Hurry. Please.”

  He sat up, reaching for his robe. “What happened?”

  “A starship.” Strain crackled in her voice. “It’s out of control and headed for Viasa.”

  * * * *

  Jeremiah ran through the Estate, surrounded by his escort. When they reached the observatory tower, he raced up the spiral stairs two at a time. They strode into the observatory, a domed room with a telescope run by antique gears. In sharp contrast, the gleaming consoles in the center of the room belonged to the modern computer network Viasa had been incorporating over the past year.

  Khal stood at the central console, still in her day clothes, with a cluster of aides. They looked as if they had worked straight through the night. Kev was leaning over the console, studying its screens, his hair and clothes tousled as if he too had just run here from the Calanya. It didn’t surprise Jeremiah to see him; Kev’s mathematical gifts went hand in hand with his Quis expertise. Holographic icons glowed above one screen and data spilled across another. A third projected a holographic trajectory map for a ship already within Coba’s atmosphere.

  As Jeremiah came up to them, Khal indicated the trajectory holo. “Can you interpret the map? We’ve never had reason to work with this aspect of the system. “

  Jeremiah hesitated, aware of the Outsiders present.

  Khal spoke quietly. “Break the Oath. Lives depend on what you know.”

  He nodded, then concentrated on the map. Kev moved aside, giving him a better view.

  “You’re right,” Jeremiah said. “The ship is headed for Viasa. I don’t think it is out of control, though.” He looked over the console. “Will this respond to my voice?”

  “Tell it your name.” Khal spoke into a comm on the console. “Saje, give access to the next voice identifier.” Then she nodded to Jeremiah.

  He spoke in the comm. “Jeremiah Coltman.”

  Saje, the computer, answered. “Access granted.”

  “Give me what you have on the incoming ship,” Jeremiah said. “Use graphics as much as you can.” He had always been better at interpreting images than numerical data.

  Holos of graphs and blurred space vessels appeared above several screens. Statistics flowed across others. The longer he studied the jumble of data, the more it baffled him. It was like poorly translated text, but in images instead of words. Saje couldn’t even ID the type of craft coming in, let alone give details. It could be anything from a windrider to a military dreadnought.

  Suddenly it hit him. “Saje, you use Allied standards, don’t you?”

  “That is correct,” Saje said.

  “Can you give me the analysis using Skolian protocols?”

  “Working.” The holos reformed—and this time they made sense.

  “It’s a Skolian ship,” Jeremiah said. “Civilian, I think.” He glanced at Khal. “It looks like a scout.”

  Relief washed across her face. She must have feared the same thing he hoped for, that the ship had come for him. If it were Skolian, though, that wouldn’t be the case. More likely it was off-course for the starport.

  “Will it miss Viasa?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure.” He studied the displays. The data was scrolling in Skolian glyphs now, which he couldn’t read, but he understood the holos. Sweat beaded on his temples despite the cool air. “If it doesn’t alter course, it will hit the city.”

  Khal exhaled. “Can we contact it?”

  “I think so.” He looked around. “Is your audiocom hooked into the computer’s long-range signaler?”

  “I don’t know. What does that mean?”

  “The signaler can contact the ship,” he said. “When the techs set up your system, they should have linked your audiocom into the signaler or else installed a long range comm. Did they discuss it with you?”

  “Not really. We had no need for it. This computer system does Estate management, not starship landing.” She regarded him. “Can you set it up?”

  “I don’t know how. But the computer might.” He leaned over the console. “Saje, can you talk to the incoming ship?”

  “At the moment, no,” it answered. “However, you are right that I may be able to link the audiocom into my signaler. I need details on the audiocom technology.”

  Khal spoke. “Look in the files on the Estate electrical systems under ‘intranet connections.’“

  “Working,” Saje said.

  Jeremiah studied the holos rotating above the console. “The ship has slowed some, but it’s still coming in too fast. If it hits Viasa, it could cause a lot of damage.”

  “We’re already evacuating, in
to the east canyon.” Khal turned to Kev. “You better go too. My aides can take you.”

  He shook his head. “I’m staying.”

  She stiffened, her dismay at hearing his voice obvious. “You must go with them, Kev. You might be hurt if you stay.”

  “I’m not going to leave you,” he told her.

  “You mustn’t endanger yourself.” She lifted her arm and he started to move, as if to take her hand. Then they stopped, obviously aware of the people watching them. Khal lowered her arm and Kev took a breath.

  Jeremiah stood at the console, awkward and self-conscious. He felt like an interloper. Seeing Khal and Kev together, so alike in background, outlook, and power within their separate spheres of accomplishment, he knew they were the two halves of Viasa. They shared a closeness he would never have with Khal, not if he spent his entire life here and Kev left tomorrow.

  Static suddenly erupted from the comm, accompanied by a man speaking Skolian Flag, “—read me? I repeat, I’m receiving your signal. Please respond.”

  For an instant Jeremiah’s mind blanked. Although he understood some Skolian Flag, he spoke almost none, and for the past four years he had heard only Teotecan.

  Then bits of his meager Skolian vocabulary came back. He leaned over the comm. “Know English you? Spanish? French?”

  The pilot switched into heavily accented Spanish. “This is Dalstern GH3, scout class II. Viasa, I need holomaps. These mountains are much trouble. The wind make problem also.”

  “Can you link your computers to our system here?” Jeremiah asked in Spanish. “We will help guide you down.”

  “I try.” He paused. “Do you receive?”

  Saje spoke in Teotecan. “His system uses ISC standard ninety-two. I can only process some of its input.”

  Khal looked at Jeremiah. “What does that mean?”

  He raked his hand through his curls. “Your system was never set up for this. It does have a lot of what we need, but most of it uses Allied standards. Saje is having trouble with the form of the incoming data.”