Gravity Wells (Short Stories Collection)

Month of the Quill. Day one. Slaves restive. Hungry. Told them I was bankrupt. They thought I was lying.

Those muties will have to learn to believe me.

Slavemonger T'Prin came onstage wearing his trademark leather and leopard skins and immediately broke into his hit single 'Month of the Quill.' The throbbing beat reached into the audience like a grimy fist, grabbed every blood-meat heart, and squeezed with a grip that tore away candy-assed restraints. It was a sonic drug, an injection of Primo Primeval that mixed with the other chemicals in the mob's bloodstream to make a groin-grinding stew. Maybe the preachers were right when they said T'Prin was morally bankrupt; but bankrupt boys could still kick ass and the preachers shouldn't forget it. When Slavemonger played, the audience demanded to be slaves; and they were, by God, they were.

How many times had T'Prin walked down this narrow lane? How many times had he slunk away, from the law courts, avoiding the high street for fear of meeting someone he knew, someone who would ask about the proceedings against him? How many times had he come this way with his head reeling, wondering what tricks he could use when the bailiffs served him with another summons? Yet in all those times, he'd never before noticed the little shop tucked between the out-of-business bakery and the run-down travel agency: a little shop with its window caked in dirt and a door sign reading EXOTIC CURIOS.

In the land of Ithlandril, at the confluence of the rivers Udalanar and Surandimir, not far from the Plains of Occlanoue where Garth One-Finger fought the Battle of Kennings Mill against Malevon Darkstrider and the forces of Hnurn, a day's march from the Jhallawel Forest so famous for Ba'ullahnut berries and the nomadic Quinquopel horses, there was a village named Fe'Huulin's Rest, not named after Fe'Huulin the Gray, as you might expect, but after his son by the beauteous Ellandewollinir, Fe'Huulin d'Ellandewollinir, sometimes called Fe'Huulin Vallamarn or more simply Fe'Huulin of the Seven Dancing Servants of R'ynnhwn; and though the village had the reputation throughout the length and breadth of Adragharzh as a place of wealth and prosperity, second only to the cities of the Diacrectic League in the Archipelago Isles of Dragon Longing, it happened that a certain slavemonger named T'Prin, on the first day of the Month of the Quill (or more fully, Quillaamer'xhanderzjee), discovered that, though filled with rue, he must file a writ of surrendered suzerainty before the Judges of Ulm.

One ducat and eighty-seven pence. That was all. And sixty pence of it was in coppers. Coppers saved one and two at a time by haggling with the meatmonger and the wine merchant and the temple prostitutes until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times T'Prin counted it. One ducat and eighty-seven pence. And the next day was the slave auction.

Listen. T'Prin was a slavemonger in the last days of slaves, when everybody owned them and made excuses. Owners said they couldn't just free the slaves because they were like children in adult bodies, too naive to get along in the world. And it wasn't a good time to start paying them as hired hands, because crop prices were down. And slaves really were happier with someone else taking all the responsibilities.

T'Prin was a slavemonger in the last days of slaves, when shipping embargoes by emancipated countries reduced incoming supplies, when local slave owners felt guilty about buying new slaves, when the market fell through. He had been an honest businessman in a trade that people once said was necessary. He kept his stock healthy and always gave customers good value.

Still, through no fault of his own, he found he was bankrupt. And he had no idea what to tell his family.

A man sits beside a pond. It is night. The sky is full of stars, but he does not see them.

He throws pebbles into the water one by one. Each one gives a blooping splash, and rippling circles glide outward from the point of impact. When the ripples have died down enough that he cannot see them in the starlight, he throws another pebble.

His name is T'Prin. This afternoon, creditors came to his dirty shop on the edge of town and told him to get out. They had a written order from the Tribunal. They refused to let him remove a single thing from the premises, not even his father's small library of books.

He had hated his job. He had hated treating people like animals. But as his father lay dying, the old man made T'Prin swear to keep the business going. It was the only thing his father had to leave the world. His mark. His legacy. T'Prin couldn't find the courage to say what a shabby little legacy it was, so he made the oath his father demanded.

Tonight the business is gone, the oath broken. A friend told T'Prin he should be glad to get out of that squalid place. And so he should be.

He throws another pebble. It disappears beneath the water. Its ripples disappear slowly. The surface of the pond becomes clear as if the pebble had never been thrown.

T'Prin throws another pebble.

'Mistah T'Prin—he broke.'

Reaper

I could tell this Call would be a traffic fatality. It was a Friday evening in early March, the pavement was icy, and the sun was low on the horizon, at the precise spot to strike drivers' eyes as cars came around the curve. My compass pointed to that curve and my hourglass was almost empty.

A dozen of my fellow Reapers were already there—we were certainly going to make network news tonight. Most of the other Reapers sprawled indolently on the snow of the embankment beside the road; one boy who looked fourteen years old was showing off by pretending to make angels in the snow. (Of course, his ethereal body left no mark.) He thought making angels was very funny. I was about to instruct him on the way that sacrilegious flippancy can extend a soul's period of penance when my eye was caught by another Reaper pacing anxiously on the highway's median.

She appeared to be in her twenties, her eyes as clear as the eyes of doves, her body glorious in a Reaper's celestial raiment. (Praise God I am no longer tormented by the hormones that inflame a man's physical body.) Her gaze was fixed on the traffic speeding down from the north; from time to time, she leaned out over the lanes of cars for a better view, like a woman waiting for her lover to appear. Her scythe lay abandoned on the muddy snow behind her.

I thought to myself she must be a newcomer to our Calling, anxious to do it correctly. I do not wish to belittle the angels who supervised us, but they were not good at talking to mortals. They didn't give clear and specific instructions; they failed to provide the firm guidance that most of my fellow humans needed. As in so many cases where Heaven spoke ambiguously, I was forced to step in and declare the truth more plainly.

'Greetings, sister,' I said in my most comforting voice. 'Are you troubled?'

She threw a distracted glance my way, then turned back toward the cars. 'I'm fine.'

'You don't look fine,' I said. 'You look like a woman who's worried she'll make a mistake.'

She gave me another look, but this time surprised.

'There's no cause for worry, sister,' I went on. 'Heaven has made our jobs very simple. The compass leads us to our Charges. The hourglass tells us when to act. The scythe cuts the cord that binds spirit to flesh. Then we may joyously greet the freed soul in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ who judges most…'

I had lost her attention. She took a few impatient steps away from me and peered out over the traffic again.

I was not upset. I have been ignored before. Human nature is devilishly proud and often spurns those who try to help.

'Are you worried about the violence?' I asked. She moved away from my voice, but I followed her. Many try to flee from unpleasantness when they would be happier facing it. 'I realize most new Reapers are sickened by the blood,' I said. 'I would guess you come from genteel society and have never seen the horrors of mutilation and disease. I promise you, though, you'll get used to the ugliness. Everyone does. We may still find it distasteful but not intolerably repugnant. We—'

'Shut up!' she snapped, wheeling to face me. 'I'm finding you intolerably repugnant. Blood is just blood. You, you're—'

A truck horn trumpeted up the road, like Gabriel signaling all Reapers of Souls to their preordained missions. A tractor-trailer had been cut off by a lane-hopping sports car; then there was a chaos of brakes, ice, sun, the trailer jackknifing, the truck heeling over on one side as the driver tried to regain the road. The front grill of the truck passed through my insubstantial body as eighteen wheels of death crossed the median into oncoming traffic.

I forced my eyes to stay open. It was an exercise of discipline. I didn't want to watch, so I did. The destruction had a brutal sort of grandeur, like a dance of giants: some parts dizzyingly swift, others slow but inexorable. Brakes squealed and horns blared a musical accompaniment on top of an ongoing percussion of metal on metal.

The spectacle was so dazzling, I came close to forgetting my purpose…but then I saw the fourteen-year-old Reaper scrambling into the overturned tractor-trailer and I remembered my duty.

The Reaping was routine—my Charge was a mousy sort of man in his forties, impaled on the shaft of his steering wheel. The sand in my hourglass was down to the last few grains even as I arrived, but I had been a Reaper for nearly a decade and was adept at my work. Reaching into his solar plexus, I found his silver cord, pulled it out, and levered my scythe under it. As the last grain ran out, a sharp clean jerk severed the cord.

I sang a hymn of thanksgiving, as an example to the other Reapers. I tried to raise my voice loud enough for them to hear over the thundering din around me.

The moment the mousy man's soul slid from his body, he began apologizing. He assumed full blame for the accident…an example of self-centered pride, since he was not the cause, merely the effect. He also assumed blame for unhappiness in his own life and the lives of those he loved, and blame for various future miseries that would result from his death. In short, he was hysterical, and his remorse wasn't worth a cinder. I left him to babble and went in search of the young woman I'd been trying to instruct.

I found her on the embankment, sitting beside the body of a sixteen-year-old boy. Apparently he'd been thrown from one of the cars in the pileup below us. (Boys his age defy seat-belt laws… more self-centered pride.) His head was bloody, his hair spangled with beads of safety glass glinting red in the sunset. The Reaper woman rested her hand on his arm in a tender way I thought ill advised. 'It doesn't do to become too attached,' I told her as I drew near. 'It can only interfere with doing your duty. You aren't even watching your hourglass. How will you know when his time runs out?'

'It already did,' she said. She reached around behind her back and produced the hourglass for my inspection. It was as full as a newborn baby's. 'I saved him,' she said, looking at the hourglass as if she could hardly believe it herself.

'I don't understand.'

'I didn't take him. The time came and I didn't cut his cord. After a while, the hourglass filled up again.'

'Do you know what you've done?' I shouted at her.

'I've saved him. He's already stopped bleeding.' The boy stirred under her hand. 'He's going to be all right.'

'Nothing is going to be all right! You've committed a monstrous sin, don't you see that? You're supposed to do penance; you're supposed to do as you're told. You've defied the will of Heaven. You've spit on our Savior's mercy!'

'He reminds me of my brother,' she said, stroking the boy's cheek. I turned my head away, sickened. 'I've been following him for weeks,' she went on. 'His name's John. He hates being called Johnny, but his mother still does it to tease him. He plays hockey…tries different ways to comb his hair to impress girls…'

'He's an ordinary teenager, nothing more,' I said, grabbing her arm and yanking her smartly to her feet. 'You've jeopardized your immortal soul on a whim I can't begin to understand. Don't you hold your soul precious? Don't you understand the risks? I had a sister…should I damn myself forever for some woman who merely reminds me of her?'

But it was too late to reason with her. The air around us grew suddenly warm and clean, scented with the breath of roses. I pushed the woman away from me and rushed a few steps down the embankment. For a moment, I glimpsed the radiant hand of an angel reaching out of nothingness to touch the woman's shoulder. Then she was gone.

At my feet, the boy lifted himself groggily on one elbow. Slowly shaking his head, he took the Name of our Lord in vain.

That was the kind of boy she had chosen to save.

For weeks afterward, I tried to put the incident out of my mind, but it repeatedly ambushed my thoughts. If I had one complaint about my role as a Reaper, it was my inability to affect the living