FSF, May-June 2010 Read online

  Let me be clear: I like Scalzi's sense of humor; I like his characters; I find his novels entertaining. They're not always deeply thought-provoking, but then again, that's not always what I want. The question is, can he write a good book without any of these hallmarks of his previous work?

  The answer is a definitive yes.

  The God Engines are literal. Gods—captured and broken—are the power source used to drive the starship which Captain Ean Tephe commands. Each ship is powered by one such god. These gods have been defeated by the God to whom everyone in Tephe's society owes and offers obeisance and perfect faith; defiled, they exist to serve.

  As you can imagine, they don't take well to the service, and there are ways to command them, most of which involve a very special iron—first-made iron, defined as iron which is born in the heart of a star, as it died and strew itself into the darkness. What humanity can produce in its forges is third-made iron.

  The hierarchy of first, second and third is important. First-made is the iron that can kill gods, and it's necessary: the gods in this universe are very real, and they are not very pleasant.

  Captain Ean Tephe serves God. He, like every single member of his crew—or any starship's crew—has a faith that is not a matter of lip-service; he believes. He has no reason not to believe. God grants some portion of his power directly to his followers in the forms of talents—medallions that confer specific abilities when worn; he binds the gods that serve as engines in their captivity. Faith in God gives God power; it is an unassailable truth.

  Each ship also has a priest, to make sure faith remains strong.

  The universe of Ean Tephe is a dark, disturbing place; faith has kept it stable—until now. Followers of captive gods still survive in small pockets and something is attacking the colonies; something with enough power to cause doubts about the supremacy of God.

  In the course of this novella, Ean Tephe will find out more than he ever wanted to know about the difference between faith, belief, and truth. Ean Tephe is given a mission to bolster God's power in the face of the coming war, and in this universe it's possible to meet God in the flesh—and to begin to question the very foundation of one's own life, even if doubt means death.

  This is a much darker work than anything that Scalzi has published to date. But there's something ineluctably his own about the work itself; Captain Tephe is a man who would be at home in any of Scalzi's other universes. He is smart, perceptive, pragmatic; he is, if not kind, not cruel, and in his handling of a first-contact situation, there are elements of similar encounters in the Old Man's universe. But he isn't in any other universe, and therefore his choices and his responses are of necessity different.

  And because this is all true, there's really only one place for the novella to go—there is justice, of a sort, in this universe, and it is a very, very cold comfort.

  * * * *

  The last of the three books comes under the important and much-valued class—in my reading life—of Comfort Novel. Ilona Andrews has written three novels in the Kate Daniels paranormal/contemporary series; this one is a bit of a departure. Not as much of a departure as the Scalzi, but a departure nonetheless.

  Rose Drayton is a competent young woman living on a shoestring budget as an illegal immigrant in the U.S., which seems like a familiar story, except for her country of origin. She lives on the Edge, in a world between ours (the Broken) and the Weird, where magic and the innate ability to harness it defines power—as does birth.

  In so many of the contemporary fantasies these days, the protagonist is a loner, often a militant one. But it's hard to be much of a loner when you're the sole support of what's left of your family. Rose has two younger brothers: Jack and his older brother Georgie. The very first thing that happens in the opening pages of the novel—so I feel safe in considering it out of the spoiler zone—is that Grandpa Cletus has to be shot. Again.

  He was a much-loved father figure, because the Draytons’ father is entirely absentee, and when he died, Georgie missed him so much he brought him back. Unfortunately, Georgie's power can animate the dead; it can't actually return them to life. And Georgie was a lot younger at the time. Therefore Rose is stuck with a revenant who looks and frequently sounds like her grandfather, but who likes to eat dogs’ brains when he manages to get loose from the chains that keep him in the shed.

  The second thing that happens is Rose notices what's left of Jack's new shoes—the ones she bought so that he could have his own shoes when he went to school, which is starting soon. Rose has scrimped and saved for a long time to be able to afford those shoes, and she is frustrated, stressed and unhappy. It's not easy to make money when you live on the Edge. It's not easy to be a parent when you're young, either, but Rose manages.

  And that's the thing about Rose. She manages. She loses her temper sometimes, but so would anyone else, and she clearly loves her brothers, while on occasion wanting to strangle them, or at least turn the hose on them. They, in turn, protected and raised by her, are in many ways normal pre-teen boys; they love comics, action figures, toys, and they interact like brothers. In other ways, however, they live on the Edge, like Rose does; Georgie is a ten-year-old Necromancer. Jack is an eight-year-old shapeshifter.

  And Rose is determined to give them as much of a normal life as she can, although Rose herself is blessed—or cursed—by a strong magical talent. That talent was noted in her school days, and is part of the reason she lives in isolation: She's half-blood, but politically no commoner could possibly have that power, so it's been determined that she must have some noble's blood in her. That, and she would make very powerful babies for the right family.

  Since that's out of the question on all fronts—and since she spent a chunk of her adolescence being hunted and almost kidnapped by people who want to own her or sell her to the nobility—she keeps her head down and tries not to attract attention.

  Enter William and Declan. William is a handsome stranger with an edge who nonetheless likes action figures and comics; she meets him while shopping with the boys in the Broken. He asks her out. She says no.

  Declan doesn't ask her out; he appears, armed with a very large sword, in the vicinity of her front porch, where she's armed herself with a crossbow. She tells him to scram because she isn't interested in haring off to be a noble's mistress and breeding ground, and he tells her that she'll do whatever he wants, in the end.

  But...before she can truly learn to hate or fear him on a more than knee-jerk level, he does the only possible thing a man in his position could that would make a difference: he saves the life of her baby brother, who would otherwise have died at the hands of—well, the jaws of—inexplicable, terrifying, and not entirely corporeal hounds who appear to hunt and eat magic.

  If Declan were exactly what he seems to be, the book wouldn't work nearly as well—but Declan is actually on his own mission in the Edge, and in the end, he, Rose, and William have to work together to save the small community of people with whom Rose has grown up.

  Andrews has come up with an interesting magic system, and an interesting universe to go with it—but what makes this book shine are the characters themselves. Rose is impulsive but she's responsible and she's decent, and I found myself really, really admiring her. When her worst enemy shows up at her doorstep asking for help, Rose can acknowledge that Leanne was a hideous, malicious witch in high school—and that, malicious or not, that crime doesn't deserve the punishment her lack of help will cause.

  Jack and Georgie are pitch perfect, and there are some truly touching scenes between Jack and William, and Georgie and Declan, that both fit the story and add a level of emotional reality to characters that, rough edges and all, just cry out for a sequel.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Novelet: THIEF OF SHADOWS by Fred Chappell

  A collection of Fred Chappell's stories was recently published in the Czech Republic, titled (in Czech) Things Beyond Us. On tour there, Fred and his wife Susan enjoyed the spectacular vistas of
Prague and countryside and the iridescence of the Pilsener beer, almost as much fun in a bottle as outside it.

  His new story is in the same series of fantasy stories as “Dance of Shadows” (March 2007 issue), “The Diamond Shadow” (Oct/Nov. 2007), and “Shadow of the Valley” (Feb. 2009).

  "You know who I am?"

  "Yes,” I said. “You are Master Astolfo. Everyone knows."

  "You know then something of my station?"

  I had to think quickly. An ill-chosen word might be an insult. An insult could well be fatal. “You are Master Astolfo of the shadow trade, the wealthiest dealer and most knowledgeable connoisseur of shadows in the city of Tardocco, in the province of Tlemia."

  "Then you have me at a disadvantage,” he said, “for I know nothing of you."

  I could not see what advantage I might have, backed against the wall of a dim corridor of his great manse, with the point of his sword at my throat, and a hulking, ominously silent manservant at his side. Astolfo seemed no murderous sort; he was a stocky, almost pudgy, man with an air of deliberate nonchalance and a relaxed gaze that betrayed no particular animosity. Yet his blade had come to his hand with swift efficiency when the big one brought me to him from his garden.

  "My name is Falco,” I said. “I am of an honorable family in the southern provinces."

  "You are most likely from Caderia or thereabouts, as I judge your accent. That is a country of homely small farms. It is not long since you left off trudging a furrow behind the larger end of a mule. I see hay-wisps protruding from your ears."

  I made no reply to these calmly spoken truths. I was not surprised. Astolfo's reputation was that no one knew more than he and that few were wiser.

  "Furthermore, Falco is a name you bestowed upon yourself. ‘Clodpoll’ or some other clownish appellation is your true name. You are a bumpkin trying on the airs of a town bravo and you have stolen over my garden wall in the dark of night, intending to do me grievous harm and to take what is mine."

  "That is not so,” I said. “I came a-purpose to meet you and to talk with you."

  "Why could you not come by the light of the sun and knock at the gate and make yourself known in respectable fashion? This midnight sneakery may harvest ill."

  "I tried the respectable,” I replied, “and your man here turned me away like a louse-ridden beggar without a word. I believed I would gain more careful attention entering by stealth. I believed you would apprehend me and be curious."

  He lowered his point but did not scabbard the blade. “So you formed a plan and it has worked as you hoped. You must feel rather proud."

  "Do I look proud to you?"

  He surveyed me with a glance almost desultory. “Well, let us see. Pied hose you wear and a greasy leather doublet that I judge a hand-me-down, black harness-leather shoes with the out-of-fashion square toes. You very wisely chose to enter here unarmed, but the two steel rings at your belt show that you habitually wear a rapier or long sword that is now doubtless in the hands of a tavern keeper who holds it as a favor to you or to secure a gaming or wenching or toping debt. In fine, you are a hot-blood lazybones who has run away from a dull farm and a phlegmatic, thick-handed father. You are one of scores who seek each year the streets of Tardocco to hinder the foot traffic of the honest citizenry and to play mischief when the moon is risen. This is you, Sir Lumpfart, and a hundred like you."

  This pretty speech succeeded in its purpose of angering me and it was well that I had not carried my sword hither. If I had drawn upon him, Astolfo would have skewered me like a piglet on a spit. “If all you say is true, then I must acquire more urbane ways,” I said. “And that is why I have sought you out."

  "You think me to be some mincing dancing master, some type of finger-kissing courtier?” He cocked his head to his left side. “No. You believe me to be a great thief, a felon who steals the shadows of the gentry and makes himself wealthy thereby. You believe I have acquired all the arts and skills of shadow-taking and you hope I will impart them to you so that you may go abroad and plunder and pilfer and ruin my trade to pile yourself up riches. You would pay me to make you my ‘prentice, though all you possess in the way of fortune is but one eagle, four cuerdi, and twenty dati."

  I was so startled that I patted the waist of my doublet to confirm the absence of the pouch I saw in his hand. His reputation as a pickpurse was legend, but how had he done the trick? I had kept my eyes upon him the whole time. I felt now more strongly than ever that I should acquire his tutelage. “I will admit that I formed some such fancy. You find me naive, I expect."

  "I find you backward,” he said, “and probably incurably so. Here is your purse."

  He tossed the pouch toward me, but when I reached, it was not there. It had returned to his hand.

  "That is a childish trick."

  "Its purpose was only to demonstrate how very backward you are and it has succeeded. Now how shall you argue your case?"

  Racking my brains for a stratagem, I suddenly understood that only the truth would deliver me; there was no point in trying to deceive or cozen or blind-bag this man. I would tell him all, not omitting how I had rapped my older brother Osbro on the noggin with a spade and robbed his pockets and stole a chalice from a priest-house and arrived at Tardocco hidden in a manure cart headed to the municipal gardens. Perhaps by amusing this Astolfo I could bring him round. Whatever was shaming to me would be pleasant to him.

  So I told him the whole of it, even the part where a scullery maid named Hana thwacked me in the cullions with a skillet for placing my hand where she had given no warrant while at the same time I was attempting to steal a wheaten loaf from the windowsill. And he, Master Astolfo, nodded gravely, as if he had forethought everything I said and found it banal.

  But then when he gave me a straight look in the eyes, piercing and unblinking, the question he asked surprised me. He gestured at his manservant and said, “What color are Mutano's shoes?” And added: “Don't look."

  I responded immediately. “A purplish black with gilt buckles."

  "Clean or soiled?"

  "A little mud on the edges of the soles."

  "From what source?"

  "I know not. How should I know such a thing?"

  "By observing. Do you not think it important to know?"

  "How then?"

  "If you had noticed that your own footwear bore a trace of that same mud, what might you think?"

  "That we had been sometime in the same place and I might have seen him there but did not recognize him here."

  "And also?"

  "That he saw me and remembers me."

  He looked me over again, bottom to top and back, and nodded. He hummed a snatch of music. “Tell me what you think: Is he to be pitched on a dung heap or can some use be made of an imbecile?"

  "If the imbecile be a willing and faithful fellow, he can be of great use,” I replied.

  "And the lunatic, what of his case?"

  "If his lunacy can be kept in a narrow space and brought to purpose, he could be of use."

  "And if this person were both lunatic and imbecile together?"

  "Then, “ I said, “I would have not one but two large chances to stand improvement."

  "Perhaps, but only if you are the sort to follow orders without question and without delay.” He hummed again that snatch of song and returned his sword to its sheath.

  It was this gesture that decided me once and for all that I had come to the right place, to the right master. He slid his blade into his sheath, which hung loose in ordinary fashion, without looking, without fumbling, in one smooth motion. I had seen swordsmen of tall repute, duelists and fencing masters, triumph in match upon hard-fought match, and with all of them, even the most expert, there was always that moment of awkwardness when they fitted the sword back into the sheath, just a minor gracelessness of no importance that was out of character. Nor did Astolfo guide the blade with the thumb-web of his left hand, as stage actors learn to do. Without glancing down, without hesitati
ng, he slid the weapon home and, so far as I was concerned, our pact was sealed.

  Master Astolfo, I thought, you do not know it yet, but you have gained the best, most ardent pupil of your arts that you shall ever have instructed.

  * * * *

  Well, that was a time ago, a passage of thirty-two moons, in fact, and the ordeal of my training was every bit as difficult as I had imagined it would be.

  The first task was to persuade him to accept me. I made so many promises, told so many bald-faced lies, pleaded, begged, and groveled so assiduously that I blush to recall the episode and will not retail it now. After that, it was drill after drill: plunging my hand into a small velvet bag prickly inside with fishhooks to bring forth the piddling coin he had placed there, boxing with the voiceless Mutano who always thumped me soundly, learning the use of the quasilune knife to cleave shadows from their casters (iron posts in the beginning, cats at the latter stages), blindfolded to feel cloth of every texture, tasting gorgeous wines I was not allowed to swallow.

  Always and ever, I was set to practice with various swords, the usual broadsword, the rapier, the saber and scimitar and the others, but most often and most carefully with that swift, slender graduated crescent blade Astolfo called the Deliverer, which can sever from even the most agile of performers his or her fleet shadow.

  If you are one of the curious, make this experiment: Choose a bright, windy day in springtime, attach to a head-high pole a banner of flimsiest blue silk to flap in the breeze, and slice it in two with your shiny Deliverer. Do not mangle it. The cut must be as clean and straight as if sheared by a keen-eyed tailor perched cross-legged on his cushion. This you must learn to do if your desire is to heap wealth by being a thief of shadows.

  Of course, Astolfo denied that he was a shadow thief at all, much less the acknowledged master of the art. “I deal in shadows,” he explained. “Clients come to me. I do not seek them out. Let others purloin as they will, I only traffic in commodities."