Joan D. Vinge - Worlds End

Joan D. Vinge

Synopsis:

Volume 2 in the Snow Queen Cycle. Now at last, Joan D. Vinge, best selling author of The Return of the Jedi Storybook, returns to the universe of her award-winning Snow Queen, with a novel as dazzling, as compelling, as the future classic (Arthur C. Clarke). BZ Gundhalinu, police officer of the Hegemony, member of the elite tech class of the ruling planet Kharemough, left the planet Tiamat before the Stargate closed, cutting himself off forever from the simple barbarian girl who gave him back his sense of self worth. Moon Dawntreader Summer is now the Summer Queen, and BZ knows he can never again be her lover. But the strict Kharemoughi codes of honor have made him an outcast, too, and he selects a remote outpost of the Hegemony for his new assignment: Four, a planet where the police work is tough and never-ending, and where he can try to forget. Four boasts great mineral wealth, which attracts all the rogues and ruffians of the universe to the vast, uncharted wilderness known as Worlds End. Travellers to that region allude to unimaginable horrors, but few actually return to speak of it. Worlds End has swallowed up countless numbers of prospectors, including BZs brothers. When BZs obsession with Moon and his concern for his family interfere with the performance of his duties, he is granted leave and he sets out for Worlds End. His quest: to rescue his brothers from the wilderness and restore the familys lost honor and lost wealth. But something else is calling him. A sibyl has told him about the ruined city of Sanctuary, on the edge of Fire Lake. A mysterious force is at work there, a force that disrupts the fabric of space and time, a force that may yield up the secrets of Old Empire technology. But before BZ can unlock the puzzle, he must face the evil deep inside himself-and in breathtaking passages of sheer storytelling power, Vinge makes Worlds End an extraordinary novel of one mans search for himself-his soul-his love-and his destiny.

JOAN D. VINGE reached the top of national bestseller lists in 1983 with The Return of the Jedi Storybook. Her novel The Snow Queen (1980) won the Hugo Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, and established her as a major novelist. She lives in Chappaqua, Mew York, and maintains close ties to her hometown, San Diego, California.

Books by Joan D. Vinge

The Outcasts of Heavens Belt

Fireship

Eyes of Amber and Other Stories (collection)

The Snow Queen

Psion

Worldss End

Phoenix in the Ashes (collection)

for jim, my dearest friend and severest critic who made me follow this journey to its end.

The mind of man is capable of anything-because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future.

- Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

Nothing of him that doth fade

But cloth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

- William Shakespeare, The Tempest

Shall I bring the prisoners to your office, Inspector? the voice from his desk speaker asked him. And again, when he didnt answer, Inspector Gundhalinu?

Gundhalinu turned away from the high window at last, from the view of Foursgate shrouded in mist, the rococo pattern of rain tracks on the glass. He had been looking at the Pantheon; it was just visible from where his office lay, its multiple domes of azure and gold ceramic half obscured by newer, more graceful structures. He took an antique watch from his pocket, glancing absently at the time looking at the watch itself, turning it over an dover for the feel of its comfortable familiarity in his hand. He sighed. The hour was getting late-but not late enough that he could postpone this final duty for another day.

Besides, he had no more days left. The ceremonies at the Pantheon were due to begin today at sunset, and they would drag on through half of tomorrow. Crowds were gathering there already gathering from all over Number Four to see him. The thought made him grimace. These were only the first of too many ceremonies that he would have to wade through, like streams, on the way to where he wanted to go.

He had put off the meaningless honors, the public displays of adoration, for as long as possible, using his wound and his weakness as excuses. But he had spent the hard-won privacy of his convalescence working obsessively, trying to put what was left of his personal life in order before he became public property forever. He knew what he would see if he faced himself in a mirror; he had not gone near one since his release from the hospital. But he had endured far worse things than his own reflection too recently to let it bother him, or stop him. There had been no time for weakness, or pain, or doubt there never would be again.

He moved back to his desk. His hand reached for the speaker plate at last; hesitated, as more seconds slipped by. The judgment he was about to pass was only a formality, a decision made weeks ago concerning an act that should have been done years ago. And yet he needed more time.

He touched the speaker-plate. Ossidge. Im still reviewing the evidence. Ill let you know when Im ready.

Right, Inspector. There was no discernible emotion in the disembodied voice, even though his sergeant had been waiting for more than an hour down in the detention wing. Ossidge was a phlegmatic lump, stolid and unquestioning. Gundhalinu tried to imagine what Ossidge would make of Worlds End, or what it would make of him. The irresistible force and the immovable object. But then, he couldnt imagine that Ossidge would ever even dream of making that trip; making the Big Mistake

He dropped into the seductive softness of his desk chair, letting it re-form around him. Just for a moment Just for a moment adrenaline stopped spilling into his bloodstream, and he was vulnerable. If he could only close his eyes, empty his mind and meditate, have one uninterrupted moment of peace, before He pushed himself up out of his seat angrily, wincing as the abrupt motion hurt the half-healed wound on his side. He forced the pain out of his mind, as he had done over and over again for the past month.

He needed this time, this final stolen hour, for something more important than rest. So much had changed, and was about to change, in his life. He needed time to remember who he was.

He touched his belt buckle, pressing the hidden speaker button on its built-in recorder. The recorder had a direct memory feed, which he had used when he had kept the journal-to keep it private, pointless mental digressions and all. But now he left it on voice, hearing it mimic his own speech, the sounds familiar yet sufficiently distorted to seem almost impersonal.

The voice said, Today I arrived at Worlds End

He turned back to the window, frowning at the rain tracks on the pane. Rain again. Doesn t it ever stop? But he knew the answer. No more than time does. He sat down on the deep sill, resting his forehead against the glass, letting the utter exhaustion of his body and mind hold him there. He watched as his breath condensed into fog, obliterating the present, and felt the empty room behind him fill up with ghosts.

day 1.

Today I arrived at Worlds End. Its still difficult for me even to believe Im thinking those words. But Ive decided to record everything I experience here, as completely as possible. The notes of a reasonably objective observer can only be an improvement over the mass of lurid misinformation about this place. And if anything should happen-never mind

The shuttle trip from Foursgate was uneventful to the point of tedium. I could almost have believed that I was simply another tourist sightseeing on a strange world except that there were only two other people on the flight, and neither one of them looked pleased about their destination. I didnt speak to them, and they returned the favor. The sky was overcast for almost the entire trip; I saw nothing of the world so far below. For all I knew we could have been circling Foursgate for two hours instead of covering half a planet.