The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy: 2014 Edition

by Rich Horton

  Trouble was, there wasn’t time for a next year.

  By midnight (couldn’t sleep, oddly enough) I was fairly sure how it had to be done.

  Before you start grinning to yourself at my presumption, I had no logical explanation for my conclusions. Flightlines, patterns of behaviour, life cycles, cover crops, mating seasons, wind directions; put them together and you’ll inevitably flush out the truth, which will then elude you, zig-zag running through the roots of the long variables. I knew.

  I knew, because I used to hunt with my father. He was, of course, always in charge of everything, knew everything, excelled at everything. We never caught much. And I knew, when he’d drawn up the lines of beaters, given them their timings (say three Glorious Sun Ascendants and two Minor Catechisms, then come out making as much noise as you can), positioned the stillhunters and the hounds and the horsemen, finally blown the horn; I knew exactly where the wretched animal would come bursting out, so as to elude us all with the maximum of safety and the minimum of effort. Pure intuition, never failed. Naturally, I never said anything. Not my place to.

  So: I knew what was going to happen, and that there was nothing much I could do about it, and my chances of success and survival were—well, not to worry about that. When I was in Outremer, I got shot in the face with an arrow. Should’ve killed me instantly; but by some miracle it hung up in my cheekbone, and an enemy doctor we’d captured the day before yanked it out with a pair of tongs. You should be dead, they said to me, like I’d deliberately cheated. No moral fibre. Ever since then—true, I shuddered to think how the estate would get on with my brother in charge, but it survived my father and grandfather, so it was clearly indestructible. Besides, everyone dies sooner or later. It’s not like I’m important.

  Marhouse insisted on coming with us. I told him, you stay here, we’ll need a wise, experienced hand to take charge if it decides to burn out the castle. For a moment I thought he’d fallen for it, but no such luck.

  So there were three of us: me, Ebba, Marhouse. The idea was, we’d follow the Ridgeway on horseback, looking down on either side. As soon as we saw smoke, Ebba would ride back to the castle and get the gear, meet us at the next likely attack scene. I know; bloody stupid idea. But I knew it wouldn’t happen like that, because I knew how it’d happen.

  Marhouse had on his black-and-white—that’s breastplate, pauldrons, rerebraces and tassets. I told him, you’ll boil to death in that lot. He scowled at me. He’d also fetched along a full-weight lance, issue. You won’t need that, I told him. I’d got a boar-spear, and Ebba was carrying the steel crossbow my father spent a whole year’s apple money on, the year before he died. “But they’re just to make us feel better,” I said. That got me another scowl. The wrong attitude.

  Noon; nothing to be seen anywhere. I was just daring to think, perhaps the bloody thing’s moved on, or maybe it’d caught some disease or got itself hung up in a tree. Then I saw a crow.

  I think Ebba saw it first, but he didn’t point and say, “Look, there’s a crow”. Marhouse was explaining some fine point of decoying, how you go about establishing which tree is the principal turning point on an elliptical recursive flight pattern. I thought: that’s not a crow, it’s just hanging there. Must be a hawk.

  Ebba was looking over his shoulder. No, not a hawk, the profile’s wrong. Marhouse stopped talking, looked at me, said, “What are you two staring at?” I was thinking, Oh.

  I’m right about things so rarely that I usually relish the experience. Not this time.

  Oh, you may be thinking, is a funny way of putting it. But that was the full extent of it: no elation, no regret, not even resignation; to my great surprise, no real fear. Just: oh, as in, well, here we are, then. Call it a total inability to feel anything. Twice in Outremer, once when my father died, and now. I’d far rather have wet myself, but you can’t decide these things for yourself. Oh, I thought, and that was all.

  Marhouse was swearing, which isn’t like him. He only swears when he’s terrified, or when something’s got stuck or broken. Bad language, he reckons, lubricates the brain, stops it seizing up with fear or anger. Ebba had gone white as milk. His horse was playing up, and he was having to work hard to keep it from bolting. Amazing how they know.

  On top of the Ridgeway, of course, there’s no cover. We could gallop forward, or turn around and gallop back; either case, at the rate the bloody thing was moving, it’d be on us long before we could get our heads down. I heard someone give the order to dismount. Wasn’t Marhouse, because he stayed mounted. Wouldn’t have been Ebba, so I guess it must’ve been me.

  First time, it swooped down low over our heads—about as high up as the spire of Blue Temple—and just kept on going. We were frozen solid. We watched. It was on the glide, like a pigeon approaching a laid patch in a barley field, deciding whether to pitch or go on. Very slight tailwind, so if it wanted to come in on us, it’d have to bank, turn up into the wind a little bit to start to stall, then wheel and come in with its wings back. I honestly thought: it’s gone too far, it’s not going to come in. Then it lifted, and I knew.

  Sounds odd, but I hadn’t really been looking at it the first time, when it buzzed us. I saw a black bird shape, long neck like a heron, long tail like a pheasant, but no sense of scale. As it came in the second time, I couldn’t help but stare; a real dragon, for crying out loud, something to tell your grandchildren about. Well, maybe.

  I’d say the body was about horse-sized, head not in proportion; smaller, like a red deer stag. Wings absurdly large—featherless, like a bat, skin stretched on disturbingly extended fingers. Tail, maybe half as long again as the body; neck like a swan, if that makes any sense. Sort of a grey colour, but it looked green at a distance. Big hind legs, small front legs looking vaguely ridiculous, as if it had stolen them off a squirrel. A much rounder snout than I’d expected, almost chubby. It didn’t look all that dangerous, to be honest.

  Marhouse is one of those people who translate fear into action; the scareder he is, the braver. Works against people. No warning—it’d have been nice if he’d said something first; he kicked his horse hard enough to stove in a rib, lance in rest, seat and posture straight out of the coaching manual. Rode straight at it.

  What happened then—

  Marhouse was five yards away from it, going full tilt. The dragon probably couldn’t have slowed down if it had wanted to. Instead—it actually made this sort of “pop” noise as it opened its mouth and burped up a fat round ball of fire, then lifted just a little, to sail about five feet over Marhouse’s head. He, meanwhile, rode straight into the fireball, and through it.

  And stopped, and fell all to pieces; the reason being, there was nothing left. Horse, man, all gone, not even ash, and the dozen or so pieces of armour dropping glowing to the ground, cherry-red, like they’d just come off the forge. I’ve seen worse things, in Outremer, but nothing stranger.

  I was gawping, forgotten all about the dragon. It was Ebba who shoved me down as it came back. I have no idea why it didn’t just melt us both as it passed, unless maybe it was all out of puff and needed to recharge. Anyway, it soared away, repeated the little lift. I had a feeling it was enjoying itself. Well, indeed. It must be wonderful to be able to fly.

  Ebba was shouting at me, waving something, the crossbow, he wanted me to take it from him. “Shoot it,” he was yelling. Made no sense to me; but then again, why not? I took the bow, planted my feet a shoulders’ width apart, left elbow tucked in tight to the chest to brace the bow, just the fingers on the trigger. A good archery stance didn’t seem to have anything to do with the matter in hand—like playing bowls in the middle of an earthquake—but I’m a good archer, so I couldn’t help doing it properly. I found the dragon in the middle of the peep-sight, drew the tip of the arrow up to find it, and pressed the trigger.

  For the record, I hit the damn thing. The bolt went in four inches, just above the heart. Good shot. With a bow five times as strong, quite possibly a clean kill.

&nbs
p; I think it must’ve hurt, though, because instead of flaming and lifting, it squirmed—hunched its back then stretched out full-length like a dog waking up—and kept coming, straight at me. I think I actually did try and jump out of the way; just rather too late. I think what hit me must’ve been the side of its head.

  I had three ribs stoved in once in Outremer, so I knew what was going on. I recognised the sound, and the particular sort of pain, and the not quite being able to breathe. Mostly I remember thinking: it won’t hurt, because any moment now I’ll be dead. Bizarrely reassuring, as if I was cheating, getting away with it. Cheating twice; once by staying alive, once by dying. This man is morally bankrupt.

  I was on my back, not able or minded to move. I couldn’t see the dragon. I could hear Ebba shouting; shut up, you old fool, I thought, I’m really not interested. But he was shouting, “Hold on, mate, hold on, I’m coming,” which made absolutely no sense at all—

  Then he shut up, and I lay there waiting. I waited, and waited. I’m not a patient man. I waited so long, those crunched ribs started to hurt, or at least I became aware of the pain. For crying out loud, I thought. And waited.

  And thought: now just a minute.

  It hurt so much, hauling myself onto my side so I could see. I was in tears.

  Later, I figured out what had happened. When Ebba saw me go down, he grabbed the boar-spear and ran towards me. I don’t imagine he considered the dragon, except as an inconvenience. Hold on, I’m coming; all his thoughts in his words. He got about half way when the dragon pitched—it must’ve swooped off and come in again. As it put its feet down to land, he must’ve stuck the butt of the spear in the ground and presented the point, like you do with a boar, to let it stick itself, its momentum being far more effective than your own puny strength. As it pitched, it lashed with its tail, sent Ebba flying. Whether or not it realised it was dead, the spear a foot deep in its windpipe before the shaft gave way under the pressure and snapped, I neither know nor care. By the marks on the ground, it rolled three or four times before the lights went out. My best estimate is, it weighed just short of a ton. Ebba—under it as it rolled—was crushed like a grape, so that his guts burst and his eyes popped, and nearly all his bones were broken.

  He wouldn’t have thought: I’ll kill the dragon. He’d have thought, ground the spear, like boar-hunting, and then the tail hit him, and then the weight squashed him. So it wouldn’t have been much; not a heroic thought, not the stuff of song and story. Just: this is a bit like boar-hunting, so ground the spear. And then, perhaps: oh.

  I think that’s all there is; anywhere, anytime, in the whole world.

  I tried preserving the head in honey. We got an old pottery bath and filled it and put the head in; but eight weeks later it had turned green and it stank like hell, and she said, for pity’s sake get rid of it. So we boiled it out and scraped it, and mounted the skull on the wall. Not much bigger than a big deer; in a hundred years’ time, they won’t believe the old story about it being a dragon. No such thing as dragons, they’ll say.

  Meanwhile, for now, I’m the Dragonslayer; which is a joke. The duke himself threatened to ride over and take a look at the remains, but affairs of state supervened, thank God. Entertaining the duke and his court would’ve ruined us, and we’d lost so much already.

  Twice I’ve cheated. Marhouse was straight as a die, and his end, I’m sorry, was just ludicrous. I keep telling myself, Ebba made a choice, you must respect that. I can’t. Instead of a friend, I have a horrible memory, and yet another debt I can’t pay. People assume you want to be saved, no matter what the cost; sometimes, though, it’s just too expensive to stay alive. Not sure I’ll ever forgive him for that.

  And that’s that. I really don’t want to talk about it anymore.

  The Oracle

  Lavie Tidhar

  There was a time of rains.

  They lashed the old hill and the cobbled market, driving traders under awnings, robotnik beggars into litter-strewn alcoves, revelers into bars and sheesha pipe emporiums. The smell of lamb fat, slowly melting over rotating skewers of meat, flavored the air, mixing with the sweetness of freshly-baked baklava and the tang of cumin, and strong bitter coffee served with roasted cardamoms.

  This was in old, old Jaffa, amidst the arches and the cobblestones, a stone-throw from the sea: you could still smell the salt and the tar in the air, and watch, at sunrise, the swoop and turn of solar kites and their winged surfers in the air. But not in the rain, and not at night.

  The Oracle’s name had once been Cohen and she was, it was true, related to St. Cohen of the Others. This was rumored but not widely confirmed.

  You were no doubt wondering about the children of Central Station. Wondering, too, how a strigoi was allowed to come to Earth. This is Womanhome, remember. This is the womb from which humanity crawled, tooth by bloody nail, toward the stars.

  But it is an ancestral home, too, to the Others, those children of the digitality. In a way, this is their story.

  Once, the world was young.

  Palestine and Israel, those two entities overlapping each other both geographically and historically, were still unmerged. They were two conflicting histories, two warring stories, not yet unified into one narrative. It was before the return of the refugees, before the infamous Messiah Murder, before the Second Aliyah and the establishment of New Israel on Mars. Before Jaffa became an Arab city again, separate from Jewish Tel Aviv, before Central Station became their buffer zone, the uncanny valley in which they met.

  It was a time when Jerusalem was still ruled by the Jews. A time when computers could be seen and held, big clumsy things not yet spored. The Conversation had already began, but it was halting, limited, its bandwidth capped, its reach terminating in Earth’s orbit. It was before we sent out spiders to seed the solar system with hubs and nodes and gateways and mirrors, before the Chinese built Lunar Port, before the Exodus ships and Jettisoned and the seeding of the Belt with life.

  In that world, so unlike our own, this world of prehistory, almost, when North America was still a power and old Europe slumbered, China hungered, India blossomed, and Brazil and Nigeria shot upward like trees reaching for the sky, in that world, and into the city of Jerusalem, there came a scientist.

  Historical dramas show him, sometimes, arriving like a gunslinger would. In the Phobos’ studio production of The Rise of Others, Matt Cohen is played by Elvis Mandela, coming into Jerusalem on horseback in an intentional echo of the Messiah Murder (though the messiah had come in on the traditional white donkey). But that was fiction, which is to say, exaggeration. The truth is that Matt Cohen came by conventional, for the time, jet airplane into the old airport in Tel Aviv (this was before Central Station became the city’s hub), and took a taxi to Jerusalem, riding high into the mountains with their twisting sharp turns. Nor was he alone. Two of his research team were with him, Balazs and Phiri, crammed uncomfortably into the back seat of the taxi with their bulky equipment.

  Matt sat in the front, next to the driver, an Arab man wearing fake Gucci sunglasses. Matt blinked in the glare of the light. His pressed white shirt was crumpled from the flight, already beginning to stain with sweat from the hot Mediterranean clime he was unused to. He wished he had invested in a pair of sunglasses, fake or not, like the driver. In a way, coming here had been an act of last resort.

  But we’re distracted. So easily, like a child with a toy. Something cheap and shiny, like a kaleidoscope. Turn it one way and see Matt Cohen. Turn it another and you see the birth of Others, another still and you see the Oracle as she is, or as she was.

  Life is a series of moments forever sliding out of your grasp. If you are human. From nothing, to nothing, amen, amen.

  But for the Others recall is being. Moments exist in parallel, have existed, will exist. The life of Others is permutations, it is a kaleidoscope forever turning and turning.

  The Oracle was born Ruth Cohen, on the outskirts of Central Station, near the border with Jewish Tel Aviv
. She grew up on Levinsky, by the spice market, with the deep reds of paprika and the bright yellow of turmeric and the startling purple of sumac coloring the days. She had never met her famous progenitor.

  This was before even Zhong Weiwei first came to Central Station, for when he met her she was already the Oracle, and no longer Ruth Cohen, who had been a girl and a woman before she became Joined. She had been a part of the world, before.

  This was in the time when Central Station was merely a bus station, if a giant one, when the robotniks still fought in the wars and were not yet discarded to beg for spare parts. Ruth never knew her famous progenitor. Have we already said that? Memory for us exists in a numinosity of potentials. He was her grandmother’s grandfather, having met a Jewish girl in Jerusalem during the days of the Emergence, and got her with child, as they once said.

  Matt Cohen never died, you know. Or perhaps he did, and new Matt Cohens were fashioned out of the workshops of Sangorski & Sutcliffe, the famous Makers of Simulacra. Certainly people have claimed to meet him, centuries later. Perhaps it was true, too, that he was of the first humans to be Translated into the Conversation, there to reside in the cores of the Others, those heavily-guarded, vast quantum processors deep in the earth and scattered in solar space. He had passed, like Jesus or Elron or Ogko, from the realm of the living into the world of myth, and there remained, for as long as human memory remains: a myth-imago forever half-remembered.

  The truth was that Matt had a headache. The taxi deposited them on the outskirt of the Old City, and left them there, with their luggage, in the approaching dusk. Church bells mixed with the call of mosques. Orthodox Jews clad in black walked past arguing intensely. It was cooler up in the mountains. Matt was grateful for that, least.

  “So,” Phiri said.

  “So,” Matt said.

  “This is it,” Balazs said. They looked at each other, these three disparate men, weary after the long flight, and moving from country to country, lab to lab, sometimes in the dead of night, in a hurry, sometimes leaving notes and equipment behind, sometimes one step ahead of irate landlords, or other creditors, or even the law.