The Snow Queen

by Joan D. Vinge

  “Sparks?” Fate’s voice called him back; the sheltering city closed around him, keeping him from the Lady’s curses, denying that they even existed at all.

  “It was so ugly—it was all wasted’ I couldn’t—” He shook his head. “But I’m going to do it right this time. I can gut a dead mer, I’m not some superstitious Mother lover any more.” Remembering the disdain of the Hounds, which had been all too plain even without words; remembering Arienrhod’s soothing condescension as she set free the devils of doubt and self-disgust he carried back with him to Carbuncle. And then she had handed him the gilded vial of the water of life, without comment.

  “No, I suppose you’re not, are you?” Again the regret. “Death is never an easy thing to face. That’s why we all long to taste the water of life. And we take it for ourselves because our own death is the hardest thing of all ... We do what we think we have to.” She reached out, searched the air for his arm.

  “Uh, not to interrupt—” A stranger’s voice came at them over his shoulder. “Got a delivery here.”

  Sparks turned, looking up with Fate at the two figures standing in the alley, one drab, one inhuman—”You!”

  The faceless face of the servo Pollux regarded him with unchanging nothingness, but Tor’s gray eyes registered along a scale from incomprehension to acute chagrin. “Dawntreader?” She shifted from foot to foot. “Hey, uh ... Well, how’ve you been, kid? Looks like you’ve done all right for yourself,” raising an eyebrow. “I hardly recognized you.”

  “No thanks to you if I have.”

  “Yeah, well ...” She glanced away self-consciously. “Hi, Fate. Got your new load of trims together finally. You want Pollux to stack them for you?”

  Fate began to push her trays aside, clearing a path to the door. “I’ll show him where. I didn’t know you were a friend of Sparks’s, Tor.”

  “She isn’t.” Sparks stood up and stood aside as Pollux moved unconcernedly toward the step, towing the floating platform of containers. He watched Fate disappear inside, moving easily into familiar surroundings, and Pollux after her. But he blocked Tor as she tried to follow, with an arm across the doorway. “Uh-uh.” He backed her around and up against the building wall. “Let’s talk.

  About what you did to me at the starlbaiting. About what you did with everything I owned, after you cleaned me out.”

  Tor pressed back against the peeling paint, her eyes looking everywhere but at his face. “Listen, Sparks, I’m really sorry about that, you know? I really hated sticking you like that, I mean, you were so trusting ... and so stupid ... But I owed my life to Hardknot over at the Sea and Stars; I lost part of the casino’s daily take I was delivering up the line. If I didn’t pay it back shed’ve had it taken out of my hide, you know what I mean? It was either you or me, rfrankly. And I figured it’d teach you a lesson you needed, anyway.” She shrugged, beginning to recover her nerve.

  “What did you do with my stuff?”

  “Pawned it, what do you think?”

  He laughed once. “How much did you get for it?” almost casualy.

  “Birdseed, what do you th—” Her voice choked off as his arm came up and across her throat, pinning her against the wall again. “Ye gods!” She squirmed, trying to look away from something in his eyes. “What’s gotten into you, kid?”

  “I learned your lesson.” He put more pressure against the arm, enjoying the expression on her face. “And now you owe me, Tor, and I coulu take it out of your hide right now.”

  “You—you wouldn’t do that?” He felt her swallow in sudden fright; her hands came up, tightened over his arm. “What are you—”

  “Sparks, what are you doing!” Fate’s astonished voice.

  He blinked as the haze of his wounded pride cleared, and let Tor go. “You aren’t worth the trouble.”

  Tor sighed noisily, feeling her throat with her hands. “Just—just a misunderstanding, Fate. I’ll get you the money, kid. I mean, come payday—”

  “Forget it.” He turned away, feeling his face hot with anger and embarrassment, wondering how much of it Fate could see. But something Tor had blurted in the diarrhea of her excuses caught in his mind, at the root of his bad humor, and he turned back again with calculated vengeance showing. “On the other hand—no, don’t forget about it. You owe me. and I’m going to tell you how you can pay me back. And there might even be something in it for you, if you play it right.” He pulled out his credit card, and held it up to her face.

  Tor looked at it blankly, “Huh?” She reached for it, hesitant; he pulled it away.

  “You’re a runner for the Sea and Stars, you said. You must know plenty about who controls what here in the Maze, you must hear a lot of interesting gossip around ... ?”

  “Oh, no—I don’t know anything, kid. I keep my ears closed.” She shook her head, shutting her eyes against temptation. “I just run a few errands on the side, for a little extra credit at the tables, that’s all.”

  “Don’t give me that.” He frowned. “But maybe you don’t know enough to find out the things I want to know.” Inspiration struck him, blinding. “I know somebody who does, so it doesn’t matter! You can get the information out of him. and I can’t. You’re going to take care of it for me, take care of him. understand?”

  “No.” She shook her head cguin. “What the hell have you gotten into, anyway? What’re you trying to get me into?”

  “I work for somebody too. somebody—up the line. Somebody who wants to know what the opposition’s doing. And there’s a man named Herne who knows it all. only he’s down on his luck. You’re going to pick him up and help him oat; and he’s going to be so grateful he’s going to tell you anything you want to know.”

  “Ha! I know a Herne, a big spender, and if he’s down on his luck now he can rot. Him and some of his buddies were drug ugly, and he tried to—” The word wouldn’t come out; her hands tightened over the seal of her coveralls. “I had bruises in places I wouldn’t show my own mother before Pollux pulled him of! me and changed his mind.” She glanced past Fate’s silent witnessing at the phlegmatic metal being in the doorway. “He may be a dumb machine, but he’s a damn sight more of a man than the ones who program him.”

  Sparks grinned at the borrowed vision of Herne’s discomfiture. “He really must have been drugged out of his mind to pick on a—”

  Tor’s face reddened, her fists came up. “Listen. Summer, you don’t joke about a thing like that with a Winter woman!”

  His grin fell away abruptly. “By “r—by the gods, that’s not what I meant! If it’s the same Herne. you’ve got nothing to worry about. He won’t give you any trouble this time. You’ll find him near the Parallax View. I’]] pay the expenses, and make it worth your while; just make sure that he never knows why you’re doing it. Don’t ever mention me.” He lowered his voice, turning away from Fate. “If I

  don’t get what I want, you’ll regret it, and even Pollux won’t be enough to keep you safe.”

  Tor’s pallid face turned paler; he felt a brief surprise as he realized that she believed him. “Meet me back here at the same time in—one week.”

  “Yeah, sure,” she said weakly, and oozed out from behind the barricade of his body. “Come on, Pollux, let’s go.”

  “Whatever you say, Tor.” He stepped down off the porch and followed her away. She hit him spitefully on the chest, went on down the alley rubbing her hand.

  “Shut up, you damn junk pile; I’m going to trade you in on a dog’

  Fate was sitting again, decorating the naked, gaping mask form as though it were the only reality in the universe. She did not speak to him, or look up with any of her eyes.

  Sparks felt his elation implode as he saw her withdrawing from him—as though she too were setting herself apart from him; or as though he had done it for her.

  “You said I’d find a way to solve the problem. And I’ve done it.”

  “Yes. I suppose you have.” She picked up a piece of satin cloth.

 
“I thought you didn’t make moral judgments.”

  “I try not to. We all choose our own paths to hell. But some of the choices are easier to watch than others ... I don’t like to watch my friends being hurt.”

  “I just said that. I wouldn’t hurt her.” But he knew that just for a moment he had been inches from it. And that was the moment that Fate had seen.

  “

  “Today’s word is tomorrow’s deed,”“ she quoted softly. “And I consider you my friend, too.”

  “Still?”

  “Yes, still.” She looked up at him, but without smiling. “Take care. Sparks. Life isn’t woven from a single thread, you know.”

  “All right.” He shrugged, not really understanding. “I’ll see you again, Fate.”

  She smiled at last, but it wasn’t the smile he had been waiting for. “In one week, at this same time.”

  * * *

  “Scuse me. buddy, have you seen a guy called H-Hcrne?” Tor broke off as the derelict’s face looked up at her, glaring with the use less hatred of a chained animal, and she realized that she had seen it before. Gaunt and bearded, it was still the same face: a dark off worlder face, a too-handsome face with eyes that were long lashed and beautiful and as cold as death. She stood for a moment staring down, pinched between the vise-fingers of the present and the past. This was Herne, the same Herne, whose eyes looking at her once had not seen a human being but a thing.

  But there was no sign of recognition when he looked up at her now, no acknowledgment of the irony of their reunion. She backed up a step from the stink of him, his filthy coveralls, remembering the richness of his clothes the last time. Maybe the drugs had gotten the last laugh on him after all ... She almost smiled. There were a half-empty bottle and a dented can with a handful of coins in it sitting on the box beside him. As she came along the alley she had seen a Blue lieutenant with incongruous pink freckles give him a citation for begging. But the truculent expectation faded from his face as her question registered; he inventoried her, and Pollux with her, in a quick, expressionless glance. “Maybe I know a Herne. Can’t seem to remember.” His hand closed significantly around the can. “Why?”

  She dug into a pocket, tossed her loose change into the can. “I hear he’s down on his luck. Maybe I want to change it.”

  “You?” He took a swig from the bottle, wiped his hand across his mouth. “Again, why?”

  “That’s between him and me.” She folded her arms, almost beginning to enjoy the game. “So where is he?”

  “I’m Herne,” grudgingly.

  “You?” She echoed his incredulity; laughed, going it one better. “Prove it.”

  “You bitch!”

  She leaped back from the memory of his brutal strength; but he only swayed forward on the box, would have fallen off it if Pollux had not put out a rigid hand to push him upright again. Tor stood staring, still beyond his reach, while she tried to assess what she had just seen. “So that’s what he meant. You’re a cripple!”

  His mouth twisted. “Who? Who sent you here?”

  “Nobody important.” She shrugged awkwardly. “I’m the one that wants to see you, Herne. I’m the one you better worry about.” She leaned against Pollux, ran a hand along the cool metal of his shoulder, smiling. “What do you figure you’d do to me, if our positions were reversed ... ?”

  Startled doubt tightened the muscles in his cheek. He studied her again, and Pollux. For a moment she thought she saw recognition; or maybe it was only the fear of recognition. How many enemies did a man like that have in a place like this ... how many real friends did he have in the whole universe? Herne slouched against the wall, resigned. “Do what you want, I don’t give a fuck.” He took another drink from the bottle.

  “No.” She shook her head, remembering Dawntreader and her own troubles with something nearing empathy. “Just asking. So how’s business?” She peered into the can.

  “Slow.” She felt him refusing to ask her her own business; a subtle tension filled the half of his body that still responded. Patrons from the Parallax View passed them by with averted eyes.

  “You’ve come a long way down, since the last time we met.”

  He didn’t remember. She was certain now, not sure if she was glad or sorry. “I’ve begged before; it never killed me.”

  She shifted her weight against Pollux, looked him over slowly. “I think it might, this time.”

  He glanced up, down again; didn’t answer.

  “I hear you really knew your way around the Maze before your-uh, accident.” She wondered what or who had done this to him. “I hear you really know which way the power flows, off world and on. Well, that’s worth something to me.”

  “Why?” sharply.

  “What’s it to you?” She countered, not sure what reason was going to come off her tongue that wasn’t the truth. “You ask a lot of questions for a beggar.”

  “I want to know why a Winter would want to know. There’s only one Winter—” He frowned.

  “There’s thousands of us, and we’re just as interested in making it big as your are, foreigner.” She unfastened a pocket and pulled out her credit card, held it up in front of him as Sparks had held his up to her. “Maybe I don’t want to be a loader forever. Maybe I want to get my slice before all of you go off world and take the cake with you.” She felt a dim surprise that the words made sense to her.

  He nodded, noncommittal, as though they even made sense to him. “You said it’s worth something. How much?” He squinted at the card face.

  “I don’t have much ... but it’s more than you’ve got. You even got a place to stay?”

  A single shake of his greasy, unkempt head.

  She swore. “That’s what I figured. You can stay at my place, for now. You need somebody around to feed you and clean up after you anyhow.”

  “I need money, not somebody to wipe my goddamn nose! Don’t waste my time.” He reached over his shoulder and scratched, grimacing.

  She watched him scratch. “It’s a wonder anybody gets close enough to put anything in that,” she gestured at the can. “What are you going to do when your clothes crawl right off your back some night?”

  “You want to take ‘em off tonight, instead, sweetheart?” He leered.

  Her mouth thinned; she forced it back into a smile. “You’re not my type, cripple. Pollux here does all my dirty work for me. He’s used to dragging around dead weights.”

  “Whatever you say, Tor,” Pollux droned benignly. There was an indefinable suggestion of approval in the toneless voice. She stood away from him again, a little uneasily. Sometimes it was hard to remember that he was nothing but a predictably programmed loading device.

  “You can have food and shelter as long as you’re worth it to me, Herne. Take it or leave it.” Take it or leave it, you bastard. I’m screwed either way.

  “I can’t keep up with what’s happening unless I get to circulate. I need money for that, I need a way to—”

  “You’ll get what you need—as long as I do.” As long as Dawntreader keeps his bargain with us.

  He leaned back, with a smile that was something ugly on his handsome face. “Then you’ve got yourself an advisor, sweetheart.” He stretched his arms, carefully.

  “I’ve got myself a big pain in the ass.” She picked up his battered can and emptied the coins out into her hand. “All right, Polly, cart him home.”

  - 19 -

  The limitless absence of light and life wrapped Moon’s senses in a smothering shroud, deprived her of all sensation. Falling into a bottomless well, she knew herself for the last feeble spark of life in a universe where Death reigned undisputed ... the consort of Death, whose intangible embrace sapped her of strength and sanity. She had come into this place outside life, searching for her lost love, by a gate she had passed through many times; but this time she had lost her way, and there was no one to answer her cries, no ear to hear them, no voice to carry ... Let me go home ...

  “Let me go home!” Moo
n sat up in bed, her voice beating back at her from the tight walls of the tiny room.

  “Moon, Moon—it’s only a nightmare. You’re safe with us now. Safe.” Elsevier’s arms were around her, gentling her, as Gran had comforted a child in the night; so long ago, so long ago ...

  The room filled her wet blinking eyes with painful artificial day; the threedy set into the wall fountained noise and motion—just as they had before she slipped down into uncertain sleep. Since the ordeal of the Black Gate, she could not stay in a darkened room. She swallowed a knot of aching grief, rested her head against Elsevier’s soft-robed shoulder, feeling the cool movement of air over the back of her own clammy nightshirt. The world slowly congealed around her, reaffirming her place in it; her heart stopped trying to tear itself out of her chest. She found herself listening for the sound of the sea.

  “It’s all right. I’m all right now.” Her voice still sounded thin and unconvincing ... the nightmare loss of strength and control had become a part of her waking existence. She sat up again, away from Elsevier’s reassuring presence, pulling strands of damp hair back behind her ears. “I’m sorry I woke you again. Elsie. I just can’t—” She broke off, ashamed of her helplessness, rubbing miserably at her eyes. They burned as though they were full of windblown sand. It was the third night in a row that her haunted dreams had carried through the thin partitions of the apartment. She saw weariness and worry settling deeper into the lines of Elsevier’s face as each day passed. “It’s stupid.” Her hands clenched. “I’m sorry, keeping you up all night with my stupid—”

  “No, Moon, dear.” Elsevier shook her head; the tenderness in the indigo eyes silenced Moon with surprise. “Don’t apologize to me. Nothing you could do would bother me. I’m the one who should be begging your pardon instead; it’s my fault that you have these dreams, my fault that you can’t wear your trefoil—” She glanced across the room at the sibyl sign lying alone on the single chest of drawers. “If I could take your fear on myself I’d do it gladly; it would be small penance for the wrong I’ve done you.” She looked away, her fingers massaging her arms.