John C. Wright - One Bright Star to Guide Them.pdf - John C. Wright - widez2

One Bright Star to Guide Them

by John C. Wright

John C. Wright is the author of nine novels, ranging from the far-future science fiction of his “Golden

Age” trilogy to the “Chronicles of Chaos” fantasy novels. Recently he has shown a knack for expanding

on the work of other writers, including several stories that follow from William Hope Hodgson’s “The

Night Land,” a sequel to A. E. van Vogt’s The World of Null-A, and most recently a story called “Guyal

the Curator” that is slated to appear in an anthology in tribute to Jack Vance’s “Dying Earth.”

Mr. Wright’s first F&SF story is a fantasy we think you’ll find to be most memorable. Enjoy.

“ When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I

became a man, I put away childish things .”

—I Corinth. 13.11

* * * *

1. Tommy

“I should be happy,” Thomas S. Robertson muttered to himself, fumbling for the latchkey to his Brighton

flat. Perhaps he had had a pint too many at the local pub; perhaps he had too desperately tried to

celebrate.

His key ring fell from an unsteady glove, bounced on the stair near his shoe, and spun away into the dried

rosebushes the concierge had planted between the concrete strip of the sidewalk and the street.

Thomas Robertson sighed, and his breath was white with cold. Was it worth searching for his keys, in the

dark, in the October fog, at this hour of night? Perhaps he should shout and wake the concierge. The

concierge might be put out, but Thomas was soon to leave this comfortable old building anyway, and

move into the stark glass boxlike high-rise in the midst of the most modern part of London. The company

had arranged to move his things; the modern apartment was provided as part of his promotion.

Many of the officers of the company, ambitious men younger than he was, had slapped him on the back

or shaken his hand with envy at the party this evening.

It was that envy that had finally driven him out into the foggy night, to find the old stone-and-wood public

house where Irish dockworkers sometimes swapped tall tales of mermaids and of little people, of selkie

and of banshee and of stern, pale kings from the fairy world.

Those tales he knew and loved; he had more reason to believe them than most people, although it was

easy to forget that, now that he was grown.

Those tales were one more thing to lose, when he moved away to London.

He doffed his gloves, bent down to feel through the thorns for his key, and grunted as he bent; bending

was not so easy anymore, now that he was on the wrong side of forty and losing his hair. Middle aged, if

he lived to be eighty. (But last year Bridesmith from Accounts had passed away at sixty-two. Heart

trouble. Middle aged for him had been thirty-one.)

A thorn scratched his ungloved hand; he pulled it back. Now he sat in the dry leaves heaped by the

roadside, drained and defeated, sucking mournfully on his pricked finger. It did not even seem worth the

effort to shout and wake the concierge to let him in, for if he went in-of-doors, and slept, the morning

would come all the sooner.

Light came from a wrought-iron lamppost not far away. The street was empty, and here and there a

lonesome tree lifted its bare and crooked twigs to the cold sky. To one side was an old Anglican Church,

built nine hundred years ago, with a statue of St. George standing atop a pillar in the midst of the

churchyard gardens, overlooking the street, as if standing sentry over the road.

The other way along the street loomed new construction. Squat black warehouses dominated in the

nearer ground; beyond them rose faceless glass monstrosities, including Thomas’s office building. He

always walked that way in the morning, turning his back on the church, and leaving St. George behind

him. But then St. George was always there in the evening, when he turned about again to come home.

Thomas felt a solemn, silly mood, like the seriousness of a child. He closed his eyes. “St. George,” he

said in a soft voice, “Help me find the key I have lost. I want to open the door to my home.”

Without opening his eyes, he plunged his hand into the rosebush. Thomas’s hand closed on something

warm and furry, which yowled and turned and clawed him. When he yanked his hand back, the animal

was riding his arm on white-hot needles of pain.

With a startled yell, Thomas shook off the yellow-eyed thing clinging to his arm. It was a black cat. The

cat spun neatly in the air and landed on its feet in Thomas’s lap.

On a slim silver chain around its neck, the cat wore a silver key, intricately inscribed. The teeth of the key

were large and square; the hilt was crowned with a circle inscribed about a cross, divided into equal

fours.

The cat was as black as moonless midnight, with no spot of white in its fur. Its eyes were sardonic; they

were yellow as gold, and the pupils were opened up wide.

Thomas was swept with a blinding joy. “Tybalt!” he cried, “It’s you! You’ve come back! Oh, you’ve

come back! It’s been so long....”

He stood up, trying to seize and hug the black cat. The cat twisted out of his grasp, spun and landed on

its feet. The chain fell off over the cat’s sleek head; the key fell with a chime to the stone of the stairs, and

lay, shimmering silver-white in the light from the lamppost.

“Have you forgotten how to talk?” asked Thomas. “Are you under an enchantment?”

Suddenly, he felt foolish. Perhaps he was drunk. The cat could be any black cat.

Thomas Robertson stared down at the cat. “If you’re really Tybalt, the Prince of Cats, son of Carbonel,

please say something,” he whispered. “Say anything. Please.”

The cat began to wash his paws fastidiously.

Thomas said, “Don’t make me feel ridiculous. I remember you from when I was a schoolboy. There was

the well behind the ruined wing of Professor Penkirk’s mansion. Bombed during the war, and overgrown

with moss, the black windows and spooky walls surrounded the well on three sides, and a broken angel

was there. We knew it was a haunted well, we were sure. Penny and Richard and Sally and I, all of us

were playing there, when we found the key. It was the well of the nine worlds, and the key opened the

gateway....”

Thomas stooped and picked up the silver key. “I believe,” he said. “I remember everything. Richard

came back with the sword; Sally had the shard of the shattered magic glass; Penny, God rest her soul,

brought back Myrrdin’s book. I had this key. I lost it years ago, but here it is again. I know it. I know

you. I am not mad.”

Thomas looked overhead till he found the North Star, which was shining brightly above the clouds and

fogs. For a moment, he frowned as if searching his mind for something long forgotten, something precious

and lost. Then he smiled. He pointed the key at the North Star, and turned it clockwise. “Power of

heaven, unchained by me, come into the carven key.”

He pointed the silver key at the cat. “Unlock, unbind, release, set free; so says he who bears the key.”

He twisted it clockwise.

The black cat spoke in a voice as soft and clear as rippling water. “I am come to summon you to

tourney, Tommy, to face a knight of ghosts and shadows. No weapon of mankind can cut him; and once

he is called to come, no door nor gate can keep him out. Only one who knows his secret name can hope

to vanquish him. He is the champion of the Lord of Final Winter, who also is called the Shadow King. He

has been summoned to your world, now, and all of England is at hazard.” The black cat looked up at him

with eyes as yellow and mysterious as moonlight. “The call is given. Listen: you can hear the trumpet of

the Wild Huntsman. Will you go?”

“Now? Right now? In the middle of the night? Without packing a bag?”

“To fly upon the air, little Tommy, we needs must travel light. If you do not already carry all you need,

nothing you can put into a bag will help you now. Can you not hear the trumpets of the wild hunt?”

Thomas cocked his head. “I hear nothing but the cry of night birds in the air,” he sadly said.

“Your belief is weak. Those who refuse to understand cannot hear, even when the Call rings out as loud

as church bells. Come away; the lords of faerie summon you. The Enemy will conquer all, if none stand

to oppose his might.”

“I can’t just up and leave. I have work; I have rent to pay. But, see here, you’ve picked a good time. In

a week or so I’ll be ready to move; the company might give me some days off, and then I can schedule in

some time to go fight the knight of shadows, and....”

Thomas straightened, blinking. Schedule in some time to fight the knight of shadows?

“Tybalt,” he said slowly. “I’m not a child anymore. It’s been thirty years since we went to Vidblain, and

broke the Black Mirror of the Winter King, and restored Prince Hal to his throne at Caer Pendewen.

You can’t order me around like a schoolboy. I’ll help you, yes, certainly. But this time, I must know why

we’re doing what we’re doing, where we’re going, and by what plan. I can’t just go shooting off into the

blue. I have a life of my own. I have a future to think about. If I just disappear in the middle of the night,

I’ll be sacked, and have no future, no job, no place to stay.”

The black cat turned and slipped off down the stairs. Then the cat was in the street, and beginning to

slink away, a black shadow in the night. Thomas jumped down the stairs after him, crying, “Wait! Don’t

leave me! I’ll come! I’ll come!”

Pausing for nothing, Thomas ran joyfully down the street after the elusive black cat, his back to the

high-rises, his face toward St. George.

It was midnight, and the church bell solemnly and slowly began to ring, filling the starlit world with

echoes.

* * * *

2. Richard

It was November, and the days were dark.

“Thomas! How d’you, old man. Great to see you after all these years. Ah ... just great. I can spare you a

few moments. It’s a busy world, you know. Quite busy. Sit down.”

Richard Sommerville’s office was square and large, carpeted in red, walls hung with ugly modern

paintings in rich frames: mere colored blobs and jagged scrawls, without meaning or skill of execution.

Bookshelves filled two walls, crowded with expensive books of the type one never reads, but leaves

about to impress one’s guests. The windows were narrow and small, like archer’s slits, and through them

could be seen the snow on the road outside, churned black by automobile traffic.

Richard’s face was large and square as well. Age had thinned his hair and left baggy rings around his

narrowed eyes. His face had a tight, cautious look. He greeted Thomas with hearty words, but he smiled

only with his lips, never with his eyes.

John C. Wright - One Bright Star to Guide Them.pdf

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