Driftwood by Marie Brennan

Author:Marie Brennan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Collections & Anthologies, Alien Contact, Space Exploration
Publisher: Tachyon Publications
Published: 2020-08-14T04:00:00+00:00

The Outsider

THE MAP IS OLD, and it isn’t even the original version. A copy of a copy of a copy, and Febrenew has two more stashed away somewhere else, in case he wakes up one morning to discover this latest specimen is what Driftwood has decided to take away. Even with those for insurance, this map is one of the first things he grabbed when the mud began to flood in from the mire above. The oldest version always hangs on the wall in Spit in the Crush’s Eye. It’s the closest thing to sacred that Febrenew has.

Dreceyl peers at it, squinting in the floating light that still bathes the amphitheater in its gentle glow. “I can’t read any of this.”

“None of us can,” Febrenew says. “Chara e Pretyi is gone, and its language with it. All the places marked there are gone. Between you and me, I doubt any of the words would be readable even if Chara e Pretyi were still here; we’ve probably made mistakes while copying it. But that’s not the point.”

He rolls up the map as he speaks, tucking the beanbags into his pockets once more, and with Dreceyl’s help slides it back into the cylindrical leather case. Then, to everyone’s surprise, he begins to walk away, back to his makeshift bar, leaving the stage for others to claim.

“You aren’t going to leave it on the memorial?” Ioi asks.

Febrenew stops and shrugs. “Why should I? Kuondae’s a heartless thing, but I agree with her on one point. I don’t think he’s dead.”

He holds up the map case, as if in explanation. Spread, its vaguely square shape is wider than he is tall, and he isn’t short by any current standards. “Driftwood’s a damn big place,” he says. “And Last works in the Shreds more often than not—but not always. So what if we haven’t seen him in a while? Could be he’s just gone out to the Edge. Maybe for a job, or maybe just to get some time away. I do believe the stories about him—heard too much from my predecessors not to—and if I were him, I’d get tired of living among us, with the kinds of tales people tell about him. Making him out to be more than he is.” He glares at the recorder at the front of the stands, who meets his gaze without blinking.

Then Febrenew turns his attention to everyone else. “But here’s the thing he’d want you all to remember. This place? It’s your home. Not this place—” He stamps one foot against the cracked slates of the amphitheater’s floor. “But Driftwood. The whole of it, more than any single bit, and the people in it as much as the ground we stand on. Those of us who are Drifters, anyway . . . but when you get down to it, all of us.”

“Is that why he’s survived?” Dreceyl asks. “Because he’s made Driftwood his home, instead of any one bit of it?”

A twitch of the hand is

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