The Long List Anthology Volume 7, page 15
Queen Jaref the Third
Dear madam,
Nine is such a lot of years, isn’t it? Nearly a decade! I am willing to reduce my tithe to a mere seven (7) years, at no small cost to myself — changing the terms of a contract is a terrible expense, particularly in these degenerate days when even queens are reduced to ransoming children for a few meager years-worth of power.
In light of Miss Connelly’s long stay, I have had to waive the usual contractual obligations surrounding the consumption of fairy food. She has eaten well in her time at the Night Court. (Until this morning, when I gave her nectar in a cup that was — apparently — insufficiently purple and instigated an entirely disproportionate response. I was forced to offer her a quite extravagant number of witch-cakes in recompense.)
My attendant still has not returned with the elusive Mr. Tiger.
Queen Jaref the Third
Dear madam,
Perhaps you are not a mortal mother after all but an ancient enemy seeking to destroy me by unleashing your hellspawn in my court.
The witch-cakes had some unforeseen effects on Miss Connelly (flight, invisibility, minor prophecy, et cetera). She escaped my attendants and went rollicking through the Black Realms for several hours, during which time she perpetrated unspeakable acts against the pixies and instigated a border-war with the Tartaran trolls.
She’s sleeping now, although still slightly translucent and hovering several inches above the bed, looking improbably innocent. That’s the wrong word — innocence implies the existence of sin, and we don’t believe in sin down here. I mean, she looks small and fragile but somehow infinite. Like a rosebud or an apple-seed, something with ten thousand futures folded neatly inside it.
I suppose she is probably not an agent of my ancient enemies after all but merely a child. I wouldn’t know, as I never had
In consideration of Coraline’s temperament and your own (I’m sure considerable) distress, I am prepared to waive the tithe altogether.
Jaref
Madam,
I couldn’t sleep last night. What, I wondered, could prevent a mother from claiming her daughter?
I sent my spiders to investigate. They found you lying atop an unmade bed, awake, wearing a blue apron with “How May I Help You” embroidered in yellow thread across the chest. Your lips were chapped and bitten, your hair unwashed. You clutched a stuffed tiger tight in your right hand, as if it were precious.
They found any number of curious objects scattered across your floors — bills with red lettering, a purple cup with an entirely inaccurate depiction of a unicorn on its side, a tattered-looking pamphlet featuring a maniacally happy woman holding a placid baby beneath the words Beating the Baby Blues! — but no curses or demons, no impediments or injuries. Nothing at all preventing you from calling me.
I confess I cannot imagine the good fortune of having a child like Coraline (canny as a crow and twice as wild, imperious, unmanageable, stubborn as stones — all the qualities, in short, which I would have hoped to find in my own heir) only to abandon her. I wish I believed in sin, so I would have a name for such wicked wastefulness.
Perhaps it would be better if you did not speak my name. Perhaps it would be better for Coraline to remain with the woman who took her rather than the woman who let her go.
Queen Jaref the Third, Empress of the Black Realms
Dear Miss Connelly,
I owe you an explanation.
I tried for centuries to have a child of my own. Those things which are rare in your world (witching and wish-granting, alchemy and augury) are common here, and what is easy for your kind (birth, death, democracy) is quite difficult for mine.
I squandered all my power on it, and it wasn’t enough. Now I spend my days scheming and pilfering, stealing mortal children and pretending, for an hour or two, that they are mine.
To think that you would forsake the very thing I wanted so badly…. I’m afraid I lost my temper. I should not judge you so harshly. I should know better than anyone: we do not all get to choose whether or not we are mothers.
But now you do.
Whatever you decide, you should know that she still asks for you. She has forgotten much of the world above, as mortals tend to, but not you. I suspect that, even if she spends eternity in the Night Court, she will still pause sometimes and frown, as if she has misplaced something very dear to her.
It is the seventh night. When the moon sets, the time for choosing will be over. But until then — if you call, I must answer.
Jaref
Dear Miss Connelly,
I had convinced myself that you wouldn’t do it. I had begun to believe I would wake to find Corrie’s bird-nest curls still beside me.
But you called my name three times in a voice like dust and heartache, even though you are young and alone and tired, even though you are poor and it cost you dearly. Because you love her more than you love yourself.
You called and I came and Coraline leapt from my arms so fast I didn’t have time to say goodbye or to consider not letting her go. (Would I have done it? Would I have used the last of my power to break our contract? Perhaps. Perhaps I, too, love her more than myself.)
I wish you hadn’t called. I’m glad you did. Perhaps you could call again, now and then.
There was a moment just before I vanished when she looked at me with something fervent and fierce in her face, something precious— Well. I would not want her to forget me.
J
My dear Constance,
I never thought to hear from you so soon! I’m touched that Coraline would launch such a drastic and effective campaign on my behalf, and unspeakably grateful for the solution you proposed.
I have drawn up a new contract — not the first of its kind, but perhaps the first on such agreeable terms — outlining everything we discussed: shared custody, exceptions for Christmas and Beltane, joint expenditures, et cetera. When she comes of age, she may either inherit the Black Realms as my lawful heir or pursue her undergraduate degree (an expense I will, of course, defray — although you should raise the issue with your local ministers, as it seems exorbitant).
Should you find the terms to your liking, tell Coraline to eat the enclosed six (6) pomegranate pips. Expect me at midnight on the next equinox.
J
P.S. I would be obliged if you would pack the purple cup and Mr. Tiger, this time.
* * *
A former academic and adjunct, Alix E. Harrow is a NYT-bestselling and Hugo-award winning writer living in Virginia with her husband and their two semi-feral kids. She is the author of The Ten Thousand Doors of January, The Once and Future Witches, and various short fiction.
Sunrise, Sunrise, Sunrise
By Lauren Ring
Astounding Long List
221/0
Every day, it goes like this: I wake to golden light, with the surface of a star just beyond my wide viewport window. As the hours pass, a supernova forms, enveloping my little research vessel. I check my monitoring equipment, I eat my favorite meals, and then in the evening, I die.
I’m quite content with this looped life. I have learned to sunbathe in the late afternoon rays of the supernova, stretching out my belly like a cat. The shifting plasma and dancing flares outside can mesmerize me for hours. When the end comes, there is no pain, just the sensation of bright acuity that comes before the burn. At times, I idly wonder if this is my heaven.
I know my days well, so I am caught by surprise when an astronaut falls past my window. Seeing that dark figure against the warm dawn-like glow of the dying star jolts me out of my sleepy reverie. This is new. This is wrong.
I watch, curious, as the astronaut reaches toward my ship. At the closest point of her trajectory, I can see inside her helmet. Her eyes are wide and desperate. Her mouth moves, speaking words I cannot hear.
I wonder how I must look to her. It’s been a long time since I have thought of myself through the eyes of another.
Trapped on course by inertia, the astronaut soars past and is incinerated in the molten sun. Her death is barely a blip on my solar data readout. It’s a shame, and fascinating, but by the next today, it will be as if she had never existed.
222/0
I burn, and wake, with no time at all in between. The one thing I miss is my dreams. I can’t have them anymore, no matter how long I nap on the warm metal that lines the single room of my ship. Seeing that astronaut felt like a dream. My memory of her will be trapped in this loop with me for all eternity. Another immortal death.
Although I try to go about my day as normal, I can’t help but watch the clock. The last pack of dehydrated ice cream, which I have enjoyed every day, tastes like sour ash this time.
Seven hours into the loop, the astronaut falls past my window again. I press my palm to the thick glass, appreciating the power of my ship’s heat shielding. My window is cool and impenetrable. The astronaut reaches for me. The astronaut burns.
233/0
It’s been a dozen loops now, and I can safely conclude that the astronaut has been trapped in my little temporal bubble, sucked in like a moth to a flame. I watch her fall from the safety of my starship home and wonder if she remembers as I do. Each day, her mouth moves in the same way.
She falls again. Dark sweat-slick hair sticks to her forehead and globules of tears float freely in her helmet. This time, I’m ready with a camera, recording her last words.
She burns.
I play back the video, acutely aware of my role in this dance. If I were a better person, I wouldn’t need to know what the astronaut was saying in order to rescue her. If I were a worse person, it wouldn’t matter either. There’s no better or worse person here, though, just me, and I want to know.
The video of the astronaut plays on all my monitors as the star begins to swell behind me. I watch myself mirrored in the webcam display and try out different sounds.
“Help” is easy enough to figure out. “Help me,” she’s saying, over and over again. It’s the last word that catches my attention and spurs me into action.
“Help me, Amaranthe.”
How does she know my name?
234/0
The astronaut falls again, and this time I catch her. The mechanical arm on the side of the ship was meant for sample collection, but I know the astronaut’s exact trajectory and speed, so it’s easy enough to nudge her close enough to grab onto my ship.
Hand over hand, she approaches the airlock. I can feel my heart racing as the doors hiss open, but I keep to procedure, and wait for everything to stabilize. My hand trembles on the unlock button. It blinks green, and I press it.
The astronaut steps inside and removes her helmet. Her eyes are clear and golden as a nebula, her hair is as black as space. Little burn marks mar her cheeks where her own tears boiled against her.
“Amaranthe, thank God,” she says, breaking two hundred days of silence. “I’ve been trying to rescue you.”
“Rescue me?” My eyes narrow. If this stranger disrupts my peaceful loop, I’ll never forgive her. Maybe I should have left her falling outside. “What do you mean? Who are you?”
“My name is Jet,” she says as she strips off her gloves. “Just Jet. I’m part of the crew on a long-haul ship, just happened to be passing through this system. Not a scientist or anything. Your looping nova here is a bit of a tourist destination now.”
“A tourist destination?” I repeat, feeling suddenly exposed. This isn’t heaven, then: peace does not have an audience.
“Yeah, but no one’s gotten close enough before to realize there was someone still alive on this ship. I got curious, tracked down the crew manifest.” Jet sat down to tug off her boots. “So here I am. Miscalculated a little, though. Like I said, not a scientist. Thanks for grabbing me, else I’d have burned right up.”
She doesn’t remember. Clearly there are rules to this game of time, but no one gave me the handbook. I am a little grateful, though. Her deaths were not at all like mine. I doubt her mind would have survived such a fate. I try to choose my words carefully.
“What does it look like from the outside?” I cross the ship and place a hand against my window. The star’s roiling surface is just beginning to flare out of control.
“A bubble, pretty much. Blinks fast as hell. Something’s weird with time and space in here. Can’t get signals in, can’t get signals out. Not even that nova can escape.”
“But you’re here.” I turn to face her, backlit by the dying star. Wispy curls frame the angles of my face. I was beyond age, beyond beauty, beyond change. I’ve enjoyed becoming essence itself. Now I can feel the thoughts I left, creeping back into my psyche.
“I thought, if you made it in, maybe I could too.” She shrugs. “It was worth a shot. What happens when you try to fly out?”
“I haven’t tried,” I admit.
“Oh.” Jet falls silent. She rakes a hand through her short hair and stares at the budding supernova. I don’t blame her for her disappointment. There’s a reason I’m better off alone.
“I’m sorry you went to all that trouble for me. I’ll figure out how to get you back to your ship.”
“Okay.” Jet sighs and stops unbuckling her spacesuit. “I guess it’s none of my business.”
“It’s not,” I agree.
She sits on the floor and contemplates this while I go about my day. I eat the last packet of dehydrated ice cream, check my instruments, and do a little yoga by the light of the solar flares. For a while, I forget that I am not alone.
“What is it like?” Jet asks. I flinch. Nothing unexpected has happened for almost a year of todays, and I’m not used to newness anymore.
“What is what like?” I move into the next yoga pose, arching my spine and straightening my arms into a perfect warrior stance. I’ve had plenty of practice, after all.
“Dying,” says Jet. Her bravado cracks, just a little. “The loop. All of it. I have a crew, a family–when the star goes nova, will I just disappear?”
“You won’t feel a thing,” I say. It’s answer enough for all her questions.
That night, we burn together.
235/0
Jet is still there when I wake up. I think I’m dreaming before I remember that I can’t. She wakes a moment after I do, blinking hard and staring at her hands. She’s back in her spacesuit. The burn marks on her face are the same as before, and I feel a stab of guilt when I realize they will never fade. Maybe there’s some salve in the med kit.
“Did you feel the supernova?” I ask, stretching languidly. The star is at its dimmest, and the ship has a pleasant chill.
“No, you were right.” Jet takes off her helmet and presses her cheek against the window, peering up and away. “It’s like it never happened.”
“You’d better get used to that. I don’t have to worry about food, though, or air, or fuel. It’s a nice little life.”
Well, it was, until Jet showed up. Now everything is wrong. I hope that if I’m polite and help her leave, things can go back to normal. The stability of the last cycle is a good sign. If the loop is localized to my ship, it should stay when Jet departs.
Jet rummages through my rations and pulls out the last packet of ice cream.
“Mind if I have this?” she asks.
“I mind.” I cross the room and take it from her hands. “Listen, Jet, I’ve got a routine. I don’t mind if you stay here for a few loops, but please stay out of my way.”
“Right. Sorry.” Jet’s frown is a little crooked. It’s kind of endearing, but not enough to make me give her my food.
Instead, I start going through my files, looking for a way to send her home. It’s a nice challenge, actually. I haven’t done any good, hard calculating since the looping started. Jet tucks herself respectfully into a corner and watches the star seethe as I work.
I can’t find a solution before the nova swallows my ship, but that’s okay. I’ve got no shortage of second chances.
238/0
“You died.”
“Hm?” Jet rolls over on her blanket, propping her head up with one arm to face me. It’s been a few loops now, and I hate to admit it, but this strange freighter woman is growing on me. I want her to know the truth, at least, so she doesn’t make the mistake of getting attached to me in return.
“In the sun. Not like we die together, but before, when you were falling. You died a dozen times before I caught you.”
“That’s alright. I’m sure you tried your best, and I don’t remember it anyway.”
“I didn’t try. I let you fall.”
I catch the hint of a crooked frown on Jet’s face as she turns away. She runs her hand over her scarred face, over the bright red skin of brand new burns. When she turns back, she’s smiling.
“Well, hey,” she says, “I guess I can’t fault you for that. No one tried to rescue you either, did they?”
“I let you die,” I stammer. “Over and over again. You’re not upset by that?”
“A little, sure, but it makes sense. Besides, I’m here now. Some rescuer I turned out to be.”
Her compassion turns my stomach. I wish that instead of me, mission control had sent a saint. Maybe then Jet would have a worthy match.
I don’t reply, but I get up and set about my calculations. I work twice as hard today, calculating fuel reserves and flight trajectories sufficient for one suited woman to leave the gravitational pull of the star. Jet deserves to go back to her freighter crew. They must miss her. Anyone with half a heart would miss someone like her.
