Yoon Ha Lee's Blog, page 10

Thanks to dormouse_in_tea, Peter Berman, and Yune Kyung Lee. Inspired by odd thoughts on stellar evolution and the quirky tabletop roleplaying game Puppetland by John Tynes (out of print, but was published in a twofer with Tynes’ metagame RPG Power Kill).

Forthcoming in Tor.com.

Science fantasy. An undead dragon who bakes cupcakes, her museum at the center of the universe, and what her daughter learns growing up. Thanks to Yune Kyung Lee. Forthcoming in Beneath Ceaseless Skies March 2014.

Military sf forthcoming in War Stories, ed. Jaym Gates and Andrew Liptak. What happens when I think about the plausibility of mecha. Thanks to Yune Kyung Lee.

Thanks to Sonya Taaffe, Peter Berman, and Yune Kyung Lee. Published in Clarkesworld Magazine.

Wine of immortality, dolls, and a general who is not, after all, only for show.

The magician’s son crouched over the wooden horse that his father had made for them. The two of them had sneaked out when the night drew down over tower and shore and sea like a blanket sewn bright with comets and constellations and the ebbing crescent of the moon. They had listened so carefully for the downwards footsteps of the magician, and of his great yawn (he had a very loud yawn), and the quiet that indicated, they hoped, that he had curled up in bed with one of his books.

At first it had been wonderful. They had ridden along the night winds, trading riddles and rhymes and the occasional half-formed limerick, and skimmed the foam-pearled waves. The horse had whickered softly, lowly, and hippocampuses with their wide green eyes and tangle-curled manes and their songs, sweet and barbed like mer-song toward the high tilt of the midnight stars. The magician’s son wasn’t sure he trusted them–their teeth, white like shells scoured pale, looked very sharp–but the horse flicked its ears friendly fashion, and the hippocampuses sang back and didn’t come too close, so that was all right.

They went up into the sky, then, and saw the dark humped shapes of islands that might have been sea serpent coils, it was impossible to tell. They saw bioluminiscent jellyfish in ever-changing kaleidoscope drifts. They saw flowers that rose from the depths of the sea and sank back down, all between one breath and the next, and perfumed the air with a scent like that of lilacs and limes. Sometimes the wind blew warm and sometimes it blew cold, and in every case the magician’s son could all but taste the ice-fruit of stars at the tip of his tongue when he breathed it.

It was on the way home, hurrying to be back in bed before the sun rose and the magician caught them, that the mishap happened. They were on the way back into the tower, through the window they had left open. But the horse was tired after the long night of wonders they had witnessed, and when there was a sudden gust, he careened into the side of the tower. He swerved so that the magician’s son would not be harmed, but in the process his foreleg cracked at the knee, and dangled perilously as he limped into the room and onto the bed.

The magician’s son put blankets around the injured horse, then, and ran for his father in tears. His father had heard the collision, and was already on his way up the stairs. The magician didn’t ask what had happened. You didn’t have to be a magician, or a father, for that matter, to know. Instead, he told his son to pet the horse’s yarn mane and soothe the horse while he went to his workshop to begin the repair.

First the magician took measurements from the other foreleg. Then, with a net of morning glory eyes and seagull cries, the magician captured a solid beam of sunlight. He carved the sunlight into another leg–magicians have their ways–and then used a sander to smooth it so that its light sparkled and glimmered and glowed amber-welcoming.

At last he went upstairs, to where his son was waiting with anxious eyes, and fastened the replacement leg on. “Be more careful next time,” he said, not too reprimanding. The horse nuzzled him with its worn wooden nose. Then he yawned his great yawn and invited them both downstairs to breakfast, and they all went together, whole of limb and whole of heart.

For SR. Prompt: sander, son.

I love the variety of prompts people send me, and the things I learn from them.  In this case, the internet made my job much easier.  The only power tool I have any experience with is a variable heat gun (fountain pen repair), so I had to do a little research.

Once upon an oceantide, there lived a sea witch. Her home was not upon shore or cliff, but in a cup of woven kelp that had a tendency to drift. To deal with this, she had fashioned an anchor of crowns and bracelets linked together with chainmail belts and the indestructible tresses of long-haired princes. This freed her up to deal with important things, like herding clownfish (clownfish were very time-consuming that way, excellent hobby) and knitting moonlight/North Wind fiber blend whenever she needed a new sweater.

One day, however, a serpent moved in from one of the adjacent seas. The serpent was a marvel of spikes and scales and glowing blue eyes, and he liked playing rough. At first the witch paid him little heed. But after the fifth time she had to devise a new anchor so her home wouldn’t drift off toward the latest storm, she decided that enough was enough.

First she secured her most fragile belongings. She didn’t own anything made of paper–water and paper didn’t mix well, after all–but she had a collection of spellbooks and herbals written painstakingly in nautilus and conch shells, in the scratchy language of witches. Not to mention her grandmother’s lace, one of the few luxuries from the land, all cobweb delicacy and dewdrop embellishments, and her glass cabinet of medicines distilled from all the seaside herbs.

Then she hauled up the anchor and guided the cup, bobbing like a leaf, toward the serpent. Locating the serpent wasn’t difficult. He had discovered a watchtower on a lonely island, and was currently striking at its stones with his coils, laughing a laugh of tempest hisses when the tower’s inhabitants clung to each other. “I can see why they chased you out of wherever you came from,” the witch muttered to herself.

She scooped water from the sea and raised up a harpoon of sharp ice, and cast it toward the serpent’s eye. The serpent reared back and slapped its tail once, twice, thrice. A great wave broke toward the witch in her little boat-cup, and the tentacles of krakens and staring eyes of the monsters of the deep were visible through the rush of water.

“You think you know storms and monsters?” the witch said dryly. The serpent’s tongue lolled out, daring her. The witch raised up another harpoon, and this time it flew true to its target, for all the thrashing of the waves and the lashing of the tentacles.

The serpent blinked as though it had gotten a taste of something too sweet (serpents are not known for their love of confections), and then it burst apart into a tapestry of serpent-shaped bubbles, a vast foam-picture swirling upon the restless surface of the sea. The sea monsters looked nonplussed, to say the least. From above, the bubble-serpent would look like a tapestry of crystal beads, of pearlescent tears, of moonstruck filaments gathered lace-fashion.

The witch said to the very quiet sea monsters, “I’m going to leave him that way until the next full moon”–it was the full moon tonight, as it so happened–”and come back and see if he’s learned to behave himself.” She smiled suddenly, broadly. “By the way, I feel the need to take a nap and I’d prefer a calm sea. Would you mind–?”

The sea monsters dived very quickly, but not so quickly that the sea was made turbulent.

In the meantime, for the next moon-cycle, the watchtower’s bemused inhabitants enjoyed the view of the transformed serpent. After that, the serpent was much better behaved, and decided to clean the local shores of bottle-glass and netting.

As for the witch, she did consider leaving the serpent that way, but if he had to be good so did she, so there was that.

For affreca. Prompt: sea battle.

Most of my experiences of the sea are not nearly this exciting; we used to go to Galveston in the summers, back when I lived in Houston.  If I ever encounter anything like this, I’ll be sure to let y’all know.

The court of the dogs met in a pack, in a circle in woods at the edge of the world where the night falls off into distances of infinite wild smells: pine, and water ever-running, and that sharp unshadowy tang of borders unbraided. There were huskies pale-eyed, and tall stern poodles, and German shepherds, and other dogs besides, including a beagle with his tricolor coat. Although the velvet blackness was pierced through with stars and stirred with luminous nebular drifts, there was no moon.

The beagle bayed at the absent moon, once and twice and thrice, and the other dogs took up the chorus. The first time no moon rode to silver the woods, nor the second, nor the third. Crickets quieted; frogs went silent. They knew.

“There’s no question,” said one of the German shepherds. “She’s slipped her leash one time too many.”

“She has to face the consequences, then,” the beagle returned. He had a quiet voice, but they heeded it well, in the court of the dogs. “She can’t claim ignorance, and it’s no excuse anyway.”

The dogs didn’t fear the dark, which wasn’t absolute in any case. They knew what it was to hunt for mice and voles and sleek fast rabbits in the woods; they knew what it was to follow scent-trails like smoke-knit puzzles. But the moon was the crown of the hunt, in her way. It was not proper for her to miss her allotted days in the sky.

“Summon her for the sentencing, then,” said a small fierce corgi, head craned back as far as it would go to peer up into the sky’s forever depths.

The beagle bared his teeth, although it was clear that it wasn’t the corgi bitch he was irritated with. “Summoning it is, then,” he said. He bayed again, and the chorus of the court of the dogs resounded through the void with its empty expanses, its glimmer of constellations.

Faraway, the moon heard the summons, and was chastened. She rode back upon feet of wind and winter and smoke-ghost longings, of hunters’ oaths and lovers’ cries, of the crisp last curls of nighttide. She came before them a hind of white and gray, of mist-colored eyes.

“You’ve neglected your duties,” the beagle said to her. “Do you have any defense to offer?”

The moon moved restlessly upon her hooves, leaving a scent-trail of violet shores, the violence of colliding stars, the dead devouring knots deep in the hearts of galaxies where everything went to be stretched dead. “Nothing,” she said, “except that I wanted to see–” The longing in her voice was unmistakable. “–I wanted to run the way prey runs, and see the way prey sees, in this universe where everything from entropy to the everywhere hand of gravity is a predator.”

“You’re right,” the beagle said, and his voice might have been a little gentler. “It’s not a defense. But it is a reason. And perhaps we’ve leashed you too tightly. It’s not much of a hunt, after all, if only the hunter can run.”

From then on, they kept the moon leashed, but gave her a span of darkness to run in, so that she could weave in and out of the month, chased–but not only caught–by the dogs at their hunt.

For CO. Prompt: law; dogs (beagle).

Although I’d get a cat if I were to get a pet, I do like dogs.  It’s just that I wouldn’t have the energy to keep up with one.

Also, little-known fact: I technically have a New York state bowhunter’s license and I was taught the theory of how to hunt a deer.  In real life, I doubt I’d manage to get near one even if I tried.

The conqueror king was always hungry, that was what they said. He had a high crown of beaten gold savage-bright with charnel rubies and spinels and garnets, the roast browns of deep amber and hard-edged topaz. He had robes of prickly brocade lined with the furs of rare animals: the boar with involute tusks, the crested stag, even the black-and-gold leopard that spoke prophecies at the turning of the year. (That last he only wore for religious occasions.)

And he had a table at his high hall, itself hung about with bramble-branches made of bronze wire and glinting copper leaves. The platters were piled high with slabs of meat carved from the great cattle of the valley, glazed thick with sour-sweet sauce of apricots. Bowls of rice steamed jasmine-fragrant next to delicate fishcakes topped with slant-cut greens that grew only in the king’s gardens. Not much in the way of desserts, to be sure. The king didn’t have much of a sweet tooth; he considered blood and fire the sweetest of all. The cooks had their own thoughts about this, especially a certain pastry chef who never got to bake the cookies of her heart’s desiring, but they kept those to themselves.

But most luxurious of all were the dishes reserved for the king. For the king held feasts great and grievous every time he conquered one of the small city-states that bordered his nation. Sorcerer-priests served him who fashioned chalices of rough clay to commemorate each victory, and the lifeless hands of the vanquished queens, kings, generals were pressed against the red clay. The king drank spiced dark wines from some of these chalices, and broths of blood, and nourished himself on the knowledge of his stature.

And even so, the king hungered.

He turned again to his sorcerer-priests. He liked to look at the stars: at the hunter constellation that was bright in the winter sky, at the hunter’s starry intimation of dagger at belt, of bow, of arrows. I will devour the spirits that live in the house of the stars, he said, and set them to making him a new set of chalices.

People in the conqueror king’s country looked at the sky at night then, and were afraid: they did not know from one evening to the next whether there would be holes in the sky, where the blush of nebulas and the glitter-scatter of stars would shine no more. But they could not speak against the king.

Or anyway, they couldn’t speak against the king publicly. But the pastry chef saw the haunted look even in the eyes of the sorcerer-priests, whom she had suspected weren’t nearly as terrible as most people thought they were. She went to her home in the servant’s quarters in the evening and spoke to her grandmother, who had, in the days of the conqueror king’s more peacefully inclined father, been a poet of some note.

“I must go to court,” the poet said as she rummaged through her closet for some of her old finery. She had kept it in good condition, and while it would be out of fashion, why, she was old enough not to care about such things.

So the poet went to court, despite all the pastry chef’s attempts to dissuade her, and while most people didn’t recognize her, some of the older sorcerer-priests knew her by the beautiful blue-and-gold robe she wore. She went up to the high table, as casual as you please, and the king, noting the stranger (he didn’t recognize her either), ordered her brought before him. He asked who she was and what she thought she was doing there.

The poet looked at the collection of chalices and held out her hands. She had not eaten poorly, these past years; but she had not eaten abundantly, either. Her bones, however fine, were clearly visible through her fine skin. “Most people have to be satisfied with being hungry the old-fashioned way, sire,” the poet said, very dryly.

“I have transcended hunger,” the king said, not yet angry. Probably he saw the poet as a novel form of challenge to be conquered.

“That’s very good for you, sire,” the poet said. “In that case, I would beg a bowl of rice from your table, and I won’t trouble you again.”

Still not angry, he acceded to this, and had his servants ensure that the bowl was a generous one; he would not have it said that he was a miser in his gifts, on the occasions that he chose to give any.

The poet thanked him for the rice and left. She ate well that night. And she never returned to the king’s hall, which she considered satisfactory.

As for the king, he determined to forget the woman, but her remarks were an irritant that bothered him more and more as the days went by. At last he found out who she was, and demanded to have her brought before him in the hopes that she would have some solution to his neverending hunger, but by then she had retired to some monastery in the mountains (so they said), and even the king’s threats could not uncover her location. Vexed, the king gave up his exotic tastes and began eating only (mostly) rice in an effort to find out what the old poet knew. He never did figure it out.

For Nancy Sauer. Prompt: the constellation Orion.

Wikipedia on Orion (constellation) was inspirational, particularly the segment on the Pharaoh Unas.  I wouldn’t cite Wikipedia in an academic paper, but for secondary world inspiration, it’s great.

Lia found the ghost in the shards of the mirror. It was a shadowed ragged thing, hair hanging in its eyes except for the missing patch that took out most of its left eye (right eye? she had trouble with that sometimes) and part of its forehead. Nice hair, too, dark with a hint of ripple in it, water-silky. She liked to think that, anyway.

She was supposed to be playing with the kids next door, but the kids next door had gone inside half an hour ago to watch a cartoon. They had the volume up way loud and she could hear it through the walls, tinny voices and muffled bass. That was all right. Out here she could look at the broken mirror, even if it wasn’t supposed to have been dumped in their backyard, and taste tomorrow’s rain on the back of her tongue and breathe in the leaf-rot smell of autumn.

She eyed the mirror speculatively. Tomorrow it wouldn’t be here anymore. Tonight, even. Da would come out and see what she was looking at, and he wouldn’t approve. She had to do something right now.

The ghost had become less shy and was looking at her sidewise, craning its head as best it could. It couldn’t seem to move very well around the broken empty pieces, as though it were fenced in or nailed down or some such thing. The eye that wasn’t messed up blinked mournfully at her.

Lia didn’t think it was going to harm her. But she had to get the ghost out of there, and then maybe it might be able to tell her what was going on. It hadn’t escaped her notice that its mouth was cracked just at the corner, even though the glass hadn’t fallen out yet.

So Lia set to work patching up the holes, reasoning that the ghost would be able to step out on its own once she did that. (If that didn’t work, she’d have to come up with a backup plan. She didn’t have a backup plan. But one thing at a time.) She crowded the holes closed with moss browning at the edges, and with leaves web-worn to brown mesh, and seeded tufts of grass. She closed over the cracks with cobwebs–which she thought she was very brave to do, considering how much she hated spiders–and pine sap that made the dirt stick to her fingers. She considered trying spit, but she didn’t think spit was nearly as good as pine sap.

The ghost seemed to like this very much. Its smile was becoming more of a real smile, its eye a real eye. But Lia didn’t want to stop there. She knew she could do better for it. The ghost smiled the most when she used moss and leaves and grass–maybe it hated spiders the way she did–so that was what she used to make the ghost clothes like the fancy ruffle-and-lace ones she saw in the history books Da liked to read, and fine tall boots, and long gloves.

Then the ghost sat up out of the mirror, leaving drifts of shadow behind it. Leaves were caught in its hair and fell from its fine coat of smoke and dust and roots. “Thank you,” it said. Then it was gone, that moment’s glimpse, and Lia cried out.

But she looked up at the leaf-slanted light, and her eyes widened. Her backyard was crowned with trees, tall terrible trees bigger than anything she had ever seen. And she understood then that people weren’t the only ones who had ghosts.

For Anonymous. Prompt: ghost; improvement.

I have found my share of treasures in woods and parks and playgrounds.  My mother was forever fishing odd things out of my pockets, having learned the hard way that if you run grass-and-flower-filled pockets through the laundry, the stains won’t come out.  I especially liked to collect moss, although perhaps I should have left it alone.

They hadn’t left him very good ink. It would have to do. Still, when he tilted the bottle back and forth, he noticed the slight sediment, and sighed. Well, it wasn’t as though he expected to get much more use out of this fountain pen anyway, with its cap-band that rotated round and round, and the slight brassing of the clip, and the worrying rattle it sometimes made.

The paper wasn’t much better. He didn’t know how he was supposed to work with something to small. They had given him a study with a fine desk, and a profusion of lanterns, enough to make him wonder if they were trying to set the ceiling afire. (Of course not. He knew that. But.) A polished board to write on, only slightly scratched at one corner, and blotting paper upon which he could see mirror-writing poetry in dusky violet. (Normally he didn’t care for violet. But it was different when it was a reversed glimpse of someone’s love-note.)

But the paper, the paper–the paper was a smallish sheet, no taller than his forearm, and half again as wide. Perfectly adequate to write a letter to a friend or a challenge to an enemy, or possibly to make a paper airplane with. Not so good for his purposes.

Still, he had what he had, and he might as well make the most of it. He inked up the fountain pen (lever filler, at least the lever didn’t stick like the other one) and wiped off the nib and feed with his sleeve. Horrible habit, but he wore black shirts for a reason, and at this point it wasn’t as though it mattered. The light in the room guttered just a little, but he ignored it, and besides, there was still plenty to see by.

He bent slightly in spite of himself, feeling the preliminary ache in his shoulders. But his hand, his hand was steady. And he began to draw.

He drew tiny hatches that coalesced into shadowy gradients. He drew perfect round little dots and joined them together into ropes like pearls, or dewdrops, or blood falling down long shanks of bone. He drew sweeping curves that made him think of swallows in their flight, or kelp abandoned on the shore, or hair unbound and falling through his fingers.

In a careless moment, his thumb brushed the side of the nib. He wiped the ink off on his sleeve, and waited for it to dry.

He straightened, breathing in and out calmly, meditatively. While the ink almost certainly wasn’t waterproof, and almost certainly would fade over time, he had only one chance to get this right.

Then he inked slow straight lines, arrow-earnest and unsmiling. Sometimes you needed to know the fastest way home, after all. He inked spirals, devastating in the distances they implied, drawing around their bright-sweet haze, and globes, some of them flattened. The occasional grace note of an ellipse.

At last the lanterns were flickering low, later, much later. Much more than a day later, for sure. He always knew. Carefully, he inked the last line and capped his pen. He closed his eyes. Time to sleep.

The lanterns in the room keened bright again, and the paper fluttered to the floor, but the man was already snoring.

For storme. Prompt: “inked spirals.”

I can’t even remember how I got into fountain pens.  I make no claims that the hobby is practical, but I love my (small) pen collection, and the experience of working with ink, smudges and all.  (No spills yet, knock wood.)