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  Copyright ©2008 by Spilogale, Inc.

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  THE MAGAZINE OF

  FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION

  August * 59th Year of Publication

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  NOVELLAS

  THE POLITICAL PRISONER by Charles Coleman Finlay

  NOVELETS

  CHILDRUN by Marc Laidlaw

  BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE! by Richard Mueller

  SHORT STORIES

  AN OPEN LETTER TO EARTH by Scott Dalrymple

  ANOTHER PERFECT DAY by Steven Popkes

  BOUNTY by Rand B. Lee

  DEPARTMENTS

  EDITORIAL by Gordon Van Gelder

  BOOKS TO LOOK FOR by Charles de Lint

  BOOKS by Chris Moriarty

  FILMS: NOT WITH A BANG, BUT WITH THE SEX PISTOLS by Lucius Shepard

  COMING ATTRACTIONS

  CURIOSITIES by David Langford

  COVER BY KENT BASH FOR “THE POLITICAL PRISONER”

  GORDON VAN GELDER, Publisher/Editor

  BARBARA J. NORTON, Assistant Publisher

  ROBIN O'CONNOR, Assistant Editor

  KEITH KAHLA, Assistant Publisher

  HARLAN ELLISON, Film Editor

  JOHN J. ADAMS, Assistant Editor

  CAROL PINCHEFSKY, Contests Editor

  JOHN M. CAPPELLO, Newsstand Circulation

  The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (ISSN 1095-8258), Volume 115, No. 2 Whole No. 675, August 2008. Published monthly except for a combined October/November issue by Spilogale, Inc. at $4.50 per copy. Annual subscription $50.99; $62.99 outside of the U.S. Postmaster: send form 3579 to Fantasy & Science Fiction, PO Box 3447, Hoboken, NJ 07030. Publication office, 105 Leonard St., Jersey City, NJ 07307. Periodical postage paid at Hoboken, NJ 07030, and at additional mailing offices. Printed in U.S.A. Copyright © 2008 by Spilogale, Inc. All rights reserved.

  Distributed by Curtis Circulation Co., 730 River Rd. New Milford, NJ 07646

  GENERAL AND EDITORIAL OFFICE: PO BOX 3447, HOBOKEN, NJ 07030

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  CONTENTS

  Department: Editorial by Gordon Van Gelder

  Novelet: Childrun by Marc Laidlaw

  Department: Books To Look For by Charles de Lint

  Department: Books by Chris Moriarty

  Novella: The Political Prisoner by Charles Coleman Finlay

  Short Story: An Open Letter to Earth by Scott Dalrymple

  Department: Films: Not With a Bang, But With the Sex Pistols by Lucius Shepard

  Short Story: Another Perfect Day by Steven Popkes

  Short Story: Bounty by Rand B. Lee

  Novelet: “But Wait! There's More!” by Richard Mueller

  FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION MARKET PLACE

  Department: CURIOSITIES: Adrift in the Stratosphere, by Professor A. M. Low (1937) by David Langford

  Coming Attractions

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  Department: Editorial by Gordon Van Gelder

  In my copious free time, when I'm not steering the good ship F&SF or trying to keep up with our two-year-old assistant editor (she already wields her red crayon like an old pro), I serve as an administrator for the Philip K. Dick Award.

  The PKD Award pays tribute to Phil Dick's memory every year by honoring the best science fiction book published originally in paperback format. I've been one of the administrators since 1994 or thereabouts. In addition to presenting the winners their checks, the gig also encompasses fundraising, procuring books for the judges, and overseeing the whole judging process.

  That judging process varies from year to year and one of these days I really ought to offer up some thoughts on the whole question of juried awards vs. popular awards. But right now, I want to tell you a bit about the judging process in 2007.

  Our five judges used an online message board (private and password-protected ... and no, the password wasn't “VALIS") to discuss the eligible titles as they read ‘em. As usual, the judges agreed about some books, disagreed on others, and debated the meaning of the award. Business as usual. But as the year progressed, I found myself tuning in regularly just to read one of the judges’ comments. They were articulate, well-reasoned, engaging, and backed by extensive knowledge of the field. Sometimes I agreed with ‘em, sometimes I didn't, but they were always interesting,

  In short, they were everything I look for in a book reviewer, so I spent six months biding my time so as not to affect the judging process. As soon as the judges had settled on giving the award (this year it went to to M. John Harrison for Nova Swing), I jumped in and asked Chris Moriarty to sign on as one of our reviewers.

  The name might not be familiar to you, since Chris hasn't published much short fiction, but both of Chris's novels—Spin State and Spin Control—were finalists for the PKD Award and the latter won. The former was also a finalist for the Spectrum and Prometheus Awards and earned Chris a nomination for the John W. Campbell Award as well. (Hmm, maybe I should use this editorial to discuss the various awards, if only to explain the difference between the John W. Campbell Award and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. On second thought, we'd be here all day if I started on ‘em.)

  So anyway, you'll find Chris's first column in this issue. Feel free to use our message board at www.fandsf.com to sound off about it ... or anything else in the magazine.

  A couple of notes about our reviewing process: our columnists are basically free to review whatever books they choose, so long as the books are appropriate for F&SF. (Much as I like Robert Sapolsky's science books and biographies of world leaders, I don't think F&SF is the venue for reviewing them.) Publishers and authors can always send books directly to our reviewers—and Charles de Lint's mailing address is always printed at the end of his column—but if you're thinking of sending a book to us for review consideration, your best bet is to send them here to us in Hoboken. We divvy up the titles every month and send them out to the reviewers so they won't all wind up covering the same two or three titles. Last month we received 134 different books.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Novelet: Childrun by Marc Laidlaw

  Over the course of our fifty-nine years, F&SF has published quite a few stories about bards, including Manly Wade Wellman's tales of John the Balladeer and Phyllis Eisenstein's Alaric stories. If Gorlen Vizenfirthe and his stone hand didn't come to mind at once when those other bards were named, it's probably because his two previous F&SF appearances slipped by you. (They were in our Oct/Nov. 1995 and Sept. 1996 issues if you want to look them up.) We're pleased to welcome him back after his long absence ... and we promise that you'll be seeing more of him soon.

  The first thing Gorlen heard, as he mounted toward the walled village at the top of the rise, was the sound of children, their voices tumbling down the rutted track to greet him long before he saw a single villager. This meant his first sight of the pinched gray roofpeaks and ochre chimneyspikes above the wall came accompanied by the peculiar mix of dread and longing that he always felt at the sound of children playing. Were they laughing in delight or screaming in terror? It was an old question, and in the first and most memorable instance—when the correct answer had actually mattered—he had guessed wrong. He had lived with that mistake ever since. It
had been his sister's voice then, yes, and he had thought her carried away by laughter; but it was something far different that had carried her off to a place he had no real desire to follow. He hadn't understood his mistake until he'd heard the sound of his childhood home, nestled in a sandy cove along the Pavinine Coast, being crushed beneath the weight of a gargantoise that had chosen that spot and those tarry timbers for the construction of its spitdaub-and-driftwood broodpile, where it would lay its oozy eggs and nest and doze for seven days. The cries of his parents he never heard, although they must have made some noise before the witless immensity smothered them. After that, he heard only the crashing of waves, the snoring of the huge armored amphibian. It was no wonder the sound of unseen children caused a surge of emotion, for they recalled the very instant of his orphaning.

  That was one song he had never written, it occurred to him. A theme for which he could imagine no suitable tune to strum.

  Why had he only thought of this now?

  Perhaps it was the name of the village, crudely scratched in a marker of weathered wood, stabbed into the rocky soil at the side of the path:

  CHILDRUN

  A designation based upon an ancient misspelling, enshrined by years? A founder's surname? Or perhaps a place with long runs like those for kenneled hounds, devoted to the cartwheels of lively tykes? Or it might be based upon some other etymology, a rustic homophone, completely unrelated to youngsters.

  At any rate it was a name, and the walled village promised rest, food, some coins to be earned sitting by a tavern fire strumming his eduldamer. He had been many days in these drear defiles, spat upon from unseen heights by green sleet and mossy gravel, wondering if the trail he'd picked would ever lead him anywhere. He'd found no sign of the hard black mineral supposedly mined by gargoyle sculptors in these mountains, which meant he might as well turn back. But he needed replenishment. Green mold covered his remaining bread and cheese, rendering them indistinguishable from one another. He prayed that even if Childrun's folk were illiterate, there might be some seasoned chefs among them. This thought quickened his step.

  The city was gated, far from unusual in these lands; and the gates were locked, which was somewhat stranger. Childrun had the look of a place beseiged, although it was far from apparent what it might contain worth subjecting to attrition.

  He eventually discovered a small bolt-hole plugged with a wooden block on which he rapped as hard as he could. Given that his right hand was entirely formed of polished black stone, this amounted to a fair bit of noise.

  After a moment, the block was withdrawn and a lumpish face appeared narrowly framed in the stone slit. “Ull?"

  "Gorlen Vizenfirthe, my good man, wandering bard, practiced mainly in eduldamer but not afraid to admit the occasional smokebag solo is also something of a specialty, provided you supply one. I can hardly carry the apparatus on my own, you understand. I travel alone and lightly equipped, seeking only secure lodgings and permission to regale your neighbors with such tunes as I have collected along my route or devised myself."

  "Owzzat? Grroff!"

  "Perhaps I might” (here, unstrapping his eduldamer, swinging it down so it lay across his abdomen, and striking the keys sharply with the side of his black stone hand to bring out a bright harmonic like a shaft of sunlight cutting between the darkening mountain ridges) “offer a sample of select favorites?” But before he could get more than a few bars into “The Laggard's Weal,” the wooden chock snugged straight back into its slot. The face was gone.

  Gorlen took a step back, two, and looked up at the wall that kept him from his potential customers. Appealing to the guard was anything but; this was not a soul he could hope to touch with music, or not his brand of it anyway. But still, down from the heights came the sound of children, and he suspected that if their sound could reach him out here, his might reach them in there.

  Leaning against the threshold, he began to play with abandon—not a drinking song such as he might have employed to win the guard's affection, nor a sophisticated tirundel, but a simple cheerful melody, accompanied at full voice. It was one part of a rondel, incomplete, fairly begging for other voices to join it. It was the aural equivalent of a sugarfrost vendor's cart bell, jingling down the lanes of a sweaty summer city. Not a child had been born who could keep from running to such a sound.

  And indeed, there was a hitch in the juvenile clamor. The screams and shouts of the children faltered at one pass, as if all had been playing together in the same courtyard; as if they had heard the music swirling and fallen silent in unison. He softened the rondel a notch, so they would have to move closer if they wished to hear him better. Gorlen kept one ear attuned for the sound of footfall; and although his ears were keen indeed, he heard no rush of children. What he heard instead was something harsher—a raw braying sound, coarse and greedy, that went on and on. He heard the children no longer. Perhaps they had all run inside, safe into their houses, away from this horrible din. His own playing, he realized, had also fallen off ... although involuntarily. He bent his whole being toward making something of the sound, and even gave serious consideration to turning and striding quickly away from Childrun.

  For better or worse, the decision was made for him by the movement of the sealed gate, which now swung outward, opening. The same porridgey face he'd seen before, framed by a thick rough swaddling of coarse black wool, in cowl and cloak, swam up between the halves of the gate. “Marmsesgetin."

  Gorlen parsed this sentence as best he could, wondering at first if he had strayed farther than he'd realized in recent days, then recognizing a semblence of known speech in the dialect. He had not traveled these mountains before, but the speech betrayed some similarity to that of regions he knew well.

  "Ah ... I thank you,” he replied, stepping swiftly through the gate, only to be drawn up short by the sight of “Marm."

  "I do apologize,” said the pale young woman in her bright taut cap and beige floral skirts. There were ribbons about her head, and these in combination with the design of the headdress tipped him instantly to her profession. “Are you truly a traveling bard? For if so, you see, what luck! Please say that was you I heard playing the eduldamer. And was that not a round I heard? It has been so long. Please say it was you."

  "I will say almost anything you wish,” Gorlen responded, “and more besides, if you will give me the honor and pleasure of playing for you and your charges this evening."

  Her eyes grew wide. They were very green except where flecked with bits of copper. Also coppery were the strands of hair that mingled with the ribbons of her cap.

  "Am I correct in my intuition, Marm? That you are indeed the schoolmistress of this fortunate town?"

  "You are indeed,” she said. “But fortunate in what way?"

  "Why, to have you in such a position."

  Gorlen felt himself becoming carried away, and when she blushed, he sensed where this day would almost certainly lead him. So as not to leach away his luck, he bowed humbly and said, “Please do not think me untoward. I have seen caps of similar style in other towns, and I believe those ribbons, almost as pretty as your eyes, each indicate a formal mastery of educational subjects. So many, in fact, that I must put myself in the position of envying your students."

  "Well,” she said, with a sudden darkening of demeanor, “there is nothing to envy in that regard, as I fear you soon will see. For these ribbons, Mr...."

  "The Vizenfirthe is too unwieldy. Please do not trouble yourself with it. ‘Gorlen’ is the name I long to hear you utter."

  She gave him a sidelong glance, askance, and slipping her hand through his arm, began to lead him up a dim lane as the gate clanged shut behind them. “You are rather forward, Mr. Vizenfirthe."

  He tore his eyes away from a waxy red cylindrical talisman that hung from a leather cord around her neck, like a stubby scarlet wand marked with crescent imprints. Recalling himself, he said, “Ah! How lovely that sounds when you say it! I had always thought it a ghastly, bulky inconv
enience of a name, but on your lips...."

  She giggled. “Please. This way."

  "Do I then have you to thank for my admittance?"

  "Indeed. I heard your music. I could hardly let that pass. Although I fear you may end up wishing I had. Oh, I hope you do not resent me in the end."

  "Unlikely. I will go so far as to commit myself to an emphatic impossible! I am here to play for you and all who'll hear me."

  "Thank you. Thank you so very much.” And she squeezed his arm with great appreciation.

  It was about this time, as she led him up through steep winding streets, through many turnings that would have defied even a concentrated attempt at memorization, that he noticed how closely they were being watched. Not from every doorway, stoop or window, but from most of them; from half-ajar doors, from shabby curtains flicked momentarily aside, from peepholes and deep within alleys. Everyone stared as he passed, and he was immensely grateful for her company—her protection. He realized:

  "Great goodness! I have divined your occupation, but not your name!"

  "Ansylla,” she whispered, in a voice that acknowledged his fear for his safety was not unjustified. “Ansylla Chordacio."

  "Let me speculate, Ansylla, that strangers are not often seen in this town; and when they are, hardly welcomed.” This certainly put holes in his plans for sitting freely in a tavern. In such an environment of hostile suspicion, one might find nothing but resident inns.

  "It was not always thus, I regret to say, but recently ... over the last some odd years—in fact most of the time since my own arrival—it has been more and more as you perceive."

  "You are not then a native?"

  "Dear no. I was born in Riverend—"

  "Ah, the Spiral Bridge!"

  "You know it? Splendid! You will almost certainly have more recent tales of my home than I can recollect ... I hope you will share them this evening."