Tanith By Choice: The Best of Tanith Lee
Tanith Lee
Tanith By Choice
Tanith By Choice
Tanith Lee
NewCon Press
England
First edition, published in the UK September 2017
by NewCon Press
NCP 133 (hardback)
NCP 134 (softback)
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This collection copyright © 2017 by Ian Whates
All stories copyright © the estate of Tanith Lee, reprinted with the kind permission of John Kaiine
Introduction copyright © 2017 by Ian Whates
Story notes copyright © 2017 by individual authors as detailed.
Cover art © 2017 by John Kaiine
“Red As Blood” copyright © 1979, first appeared in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.
“The Gorgon” copyright © 1982 first appeared in Shadows 5 (Doubleday).
“Bite-me-Not or Fleur de Fur” © 1989 first appeared in Forests of the Night (Unwin Hyman).
“Jedella Ghost” copyright © 1998 first appeared in Interzone.
“Medra” copyright © 1984 first appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine.
“The Ghost of the Clock” copyright © 2003 first appeared in The Dark (Tor).
“Cold Fire” copyright © 2007 first appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine.
“The Crow” copyright © 2010 first appeared in Disturbed by Her Song.
“White As Sin, Now” copyright © 1989 first appeared in Forests of the Night (Unwin Hyman).
“After the Guillotine” copyright © 1985 first appeared in Amazing Science Fiction.
“Taken at His Word” copyright © 2010 first appeared in The Bitten Word (NewCon Press).
“The Isle is Full of Noises” copyright © 2000 first appeared in The Vampire Sextette (SFBC).
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-910935-57-6 (hardback)
978-1-910935-58-3 (softback)
Cover art by John Kaiine
Interior layout by Storm Constantine
Minor editorial meddling by Ian Whates and Allison Rich
Contents
Introduction: Remembering Tanith by Ian Whates
Red as Blood
The Gorgon
Bite-me-Not or Fleur de Fur
Jedella Ghost
Medra
The Ghost of the Clock
Cold Fire
The Crow
White as Sin, Now
After the Guillotine
Taken at His Word
The Isle is Full of Noises
Acknowledgements
If my sword is broken, my words, they will never be.
See you on the battlefield.
Remembering Tanith
Ian Whates
Tanith Lee is one of the finest writers to ever grace the field of speculative fiction.
I generally shy away from asserting such things with conviction, framing them with qualifiers such as ‘in my opinion’, because no such statement can ever be objective. Any review of a book, a film, an author’s ability… all such things are coloured by our own personal filters and prejudices, which precludes them being wholly objective. At the end of the day, it’s all a matter of opinion, no matter how well-informed we might consider that opinion to be.
In this particular instance, however, I’ll make an exception: Tanith Lee is one of the finest writers to ever grace the field of speculative fiction.
I vividly recall John Kaiine telling me at the 2015 Eastercon that Tanith only had months to live. I cried; we both did, clinging to each other in the middle of the bar at a Heathrow hotel. Less than two brief months later, the news I’d been dreading arrived.
Tanith has left one hell of a legacy. The author of around 100 novels and several hundred short stories, she wrote two episodes of the iconic TV series Blake’s 7, was the first woman to win the British Fantasy Award – which she followed with two World Fantasy Awards, shortlistings for all manner of accolades including Nebula and BSFA Awards – and in 2013 she received a ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ from the organisers of World Fantasycon… Yet I still encounter people who say, “I’ve heard of Tanith Lee but I’ve never actually read anything by her.”
My response to that is simple: “Do.”
I first met Tanith when she was Guest of Honour at Eastercon, the British National Science Fiction Convention, in 2008. I had lunch with Ian Watson, Tanith, and her husband, John Kaiine. Shortly afterwards, John bought a copy of the anthology Myth-Understandings, which features all women authors. A week later, Tanith emailed to say she had read and loved the book and so wished she could have been in it. Could she please submit a story for my next anthology? Could she…? Tanith’s “Under Fog (The Wreckers)” subsequently featured in the Subterfuge anthology, and was selected for Stephen Jones’ Year’s Best Horror.
Nor was this to be an isolated example of Tanith’s modesty. In 2011 Tanith was present when I announced a new series of books, Imaginings. She congratulated me and said how much she would have loved to be a part of the series. I was dumbfounded: I could have published a whole book by Tanith Lee…? Her collection Cold Grey Stones duly appeared as volume one, selling out in six weeks. Then, in the summer of 2013, I received a phone call from John, saying that he and Tanith knew I was bound to be busy at World Fantasycon, but they were wondering if I could possibly find the time to conduct Tanith’s interview for her Lifetime Achievement Award. I have never felt more honoured.
In addition to being a consummate writer, Tanith was one of the most supportive professionals I have ever encountered, eager to read the work of others and offer encouragement, support, and, where she felt the writing merited it, praise. Being told that you are a writer of rare talent by someone of Tanith’s calibre goes an awful long way.
There is one other side to Tanith that should never be underestimated: her sheer sense of fun. Helen and I enjoyed a number of nights out and about in the pubs and bars of Hastings with Tanith and John. Tanith’s capacity to laugh, to put on silly voices and indulge in pure daftness, her glee at hearing sea shanties sung in a back bar, her appreciation of a spontaneous joke, and her overriding zest for life, these are the qualities that even now remain freshest in my mind.
Tanith’s greatest legacy is, of course, her writing. She has left such a wealth of stories spanning fantasy, horror, science fiction and beyond, that selecting a ‘Best of’ would be a challenge for anyone and is a task I would never dream of taking on; so instead I invited others to do it for me.
Tanith By Choice contains a selection of Tanith’s finest stories, as picked by many of the people who knew her best. I hope it will delight established fans and new readers alike. Above all else, these are stories that deserve to be read and if there is any justice in the world they always will be. A few of the stories are accompanied by introductory notes from the author. I considered removing these for consistency’s sake but refrained. Why would anyone want to delete words written by Tanith Lee?
Tanith passed away in May 2015, at the age of 67, finally succumbing to the cancer that had plagued her in later life.
I miss her. I suspect I always will.
Ian Whates
Cambridgeshire
July 2017
Red as Blood
The beautiful Witch Queen flung open the ivory case of the magic mirror. Of dark gold the mirror was, dark gold like the hair of the Witch Queen that poured down her back. Dark gold the mirror was, and ancient as the seven stunted black trees growing beyond the pale blue glass of the window.
“Speculum, speculum,” said the Witch Queen to the magic mirror. “Dei gratia.”
“Volente Deo. Audio. “
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“Mirror,” said the Witch Queen. “Whom do you see?”
“I see you, mistress,” replied the mirror. “And all in the land. But one.”
“Mirror, mirror, who is it you do not see?”
“I do not see Bianca.”
The Witch Queen crossed herself. She shut the case of the mirror and, walking slowly to the window, looked out at the old trees through the panes of pale blue glass.
Fourteen years ago, another woman had stood at this window, but she was not like the Witch Queen. The woman had black hair that fell to her ankles; she had a crimson gown, the girdle worn high beneath her breasts, for she was far gone with child. And this woman had thrust open the glass casement on the winter garden, where the old trees crouched in the snow. Then, taking a sharp bone needle, she had thrust it into her finger and shaken three bright drops on the ground. “Let my daughter have,” said the woman, “hair black as mine, black as the wood of these warped and arcane trees. Let her have skin like mine, white as this snow. And let her have my mouth, red as my blood.” And the woman had smiled and licked at her finger. She had a crown on her head; it shone in the dusk like a star. She never came to the window before dusk: she did not like the day. She was the first Queen, and she did not possess a mirror.
The second Queen, the Witch Queen, knew all this. She knew how, in giving birth, the first Queen had died. Her coffin had been carried into the cathedral and masses had been said. There was an ugly rumour – that a splash of holy water had fallen on the corpse and the dead flesh had smoked. But the first Queen had been reckoned unlucky for the kingdom. There had been a plague in the land since she came there, a wasting disease for which there was no cure.
Seven years went by. The King married the second Queen, as unlike the first as frankincense to myrrh.
“And this is my daughter,” said the King to his second Queen. There stood a little girl child, nearly seven years of age. Her black hair hung to her ankles, her skin was white as snow. Her mouth was red as blood, and she smiled with it.
“Bianca,” said the King, “you must love your new mother.” Bianca smiled radiantly. Her teeth were bright as sharp bone needles.
“Come,” said the Witch Queen, “come, Bianca. I will show you my magic mirror.”
“Please, Mamma,” said Bianca softly, “I do not like mirrors.” “She is modest,” said the King. “And delicate. She never goes out by day. The sun distresses her.”
That night, the Witch Queen opened the case of her mirror. “Mirror. Whom do you see?”
“I see you, mistress. And all in the land. But one.”
“Mirror, mirror, who is it you do not see?”
“I do not see Bianca.”
The second Queen gave Bianca a tiny crucifix of golden filigree. Bianca would not accept it. She ran to her father and whispered, “I am afraid. I do not like to think of Our Lord dying in agony on His cross. She means to frighten me. Tell her to take it away.”
The second Queen grew wild white roses in her garden and invited Bianca to walk there after sundown. But Bianca shrank away. She whispered to her father, “The thorns will tear me. She means me to be hurt.”
When Bianca was twelve years old, the Witch Queen said to the King, “Bianca should be confirmed so that she may take Communion with us.”
“This may not be,” said the King. “I will tell you, she has not been Christened, for the dying word of my first wife was against it. She begged me, for her religion was different from ours. The wishes of the dying must be respected.”
“Should you not like to be blessed by the Church,” said the Witch Queen to Bianca. “To kneel at the golden rail before the marble altar. To sing to God, to taste the ritual Bread and sip the ritual Wine.”
“She means me to betray my true mother,” said Bianca to the King. “When will she cease tormenting me?”
The day she was thirteen, Bianca rose from her bed, and there was a red stain there, like a red, red flower.
“Now you are a woman,” said her nurse.
“Yes,” said Bianca. And she went to her true mother’s jewel box, and out of it she took her mother’s crown and set it on her head.
When she walked under the old black trees in the dusk, the crown shone like a star.
The wasting sickness, which had left the land in peace for thirteen years, suddenly began again, and there was no cure.
The Witch Queen sat in a tall chair before a window of pale green and dark white glass, and in her hands she held a Bible bound in rosy silk.
“Majesty,” said the huntsman, bowing very low.
He was a man, forty years old, strong and handsome, and wise in the hidden lore of the forests, the occult lore of the earth. He could kill too, for it was his trade, without faltering. The slender fragile deer he could kill, and the moon-winged birds, and the velvet hares with their sad, foreknowing eyes. He pitied them, but pitying, he killed them. Pity could not stop him. It was his trade.
“Look in the garden,” said the Witch Queen.
The hunter looked through a dark white pane. The sun had sunk, and a maiden walked under a tree.
“The Princess Bianca,” said the huntsman.
“What else?” asked the Witch Queen.
The huntsman crossed himself.
“By Our Lord, Madam, I will not say.”
“But you know.”
“Who does not?”
“The King does not.”
“Nor he does.”
“Are you a brave man?” asked the Witch Queen.
“In the summer, I have hunted and slain boar. I have slaughtered wolves in winter.”
“But are you brave enough?”
“If you command it, Lady,” said the huntsman, “I will try my best.”
The Witch Queen opened the Bible at a certain place, and out of it she drew a flat silver crucifix, which had been resting against the words: Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night. . . . Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness.
The huntsman kissed the crucifix and put it about his neck beneath his shirt.
“Approach,” said the Witch Queen, “and I will instruct you in what to say.”
Presently, the huntsman entered the garden, as the stars were burning up in the sky. He strode to where Bianca stood under a stunted dwarf tree, and he kneeled down.
“Princess,” he said, “pardon me, but I must give you ill tidings.”
“Give them then,” said the girl, toying with the long stem of a wan, night-growing flower which she had plucked.
“Your stepmother, the accursed jealous witch, means to have you slain. There is no help for it but you must fly the palace this very night. If you permit, I will guide you to the forest. There are those who will care for you until it may be safe for you to return.”
Bianca watched him, but gently, trustingly.
“I will go with you, then,” she said.
They went by a secret way out of the garden, through a passage under the ground, through a tangled orchard, by a broken road between great overgrown hedges.
Night was a pulse of deep, flickering blue when they came to the forest. The branches of the forest overlapped and intertwined, like leading in a window, and the sky gleamed dimly through like panes of blue-colored glass.
“I am weary,” sighed Bianca. “May I rest a moment?”
“By all means,” said the huntsman. “In the clearing there, foxes come to play by night. Look in that direction, and you will see them.”
“How clever you are,” said Bianca. “And how handsome.” She sat on the turf and gazed at the clearing.
The huntsman drew his knife silently and concealed it in the folds of his cloak. He stooped above the maiden.
“What are you whispering?” demanded the huntsman, laying his hand on her wood-black hair.
“Only a rhyme my mother taught me.”
The huntsman seized her by the hair and swung her about so her white throat was before him, stretched ready for the knife. But h
e did not strike, for there in his hand he held the dark golden locks of the Witch Queen, and her face laughed up at him, and she flung her arms about him, laughing.
“Good man, sweet man, it was only a test of you. Am I not a witch? And do you not love me?”
The huntsman trembled, for he did love her, and she was pressed so close her heart seemed to beat within his own body.
“Put away the knife. Throw away the silly crucifix. We have no need of these things. The King is not one half the man you are.”
And the huntsman obeyed her, throwing the knife and the crucifix far off among the roots of the trees. He gripped her to him and she buried her face in his neck, and the pain of her kiss was the last thing he felt in this world.
The sky was black now. The forest was blacker. No foxes played in the clearing. The moon rose and made white lace through the boughs, and through the backs of the huntsman’s empty eyes. Bianca wiped her mouth on a dead flower.
“Seven asleep, seven awake,” said Bianca. “Wood to wood. Blood to blood. Thee to me.”
There came a sound like seven huge rendings, distant by the length of several trees, a broken road, an orchard, an underground passage. Then a sound like seven huge single footfalls. Nearer. And nearer.
Hop, hop, hop, hop. Hop, hop, hop.
In the orchard, seven black shudderings.
On the broken road, between the high hedges, seven black creepings.
Brush crackled, branches snapped.
Through the forest, into the clearing, pushed seven warped, mis-shapen, hunched-over, stunted things. Woody-black mossy fur, woody-black bald masks. Eyes like glittering cracks, mouths like moist caverns. Lichen beards. Fingers of twiggy gristle. Grinning. Kneeling. Faces pressed to the earth.
“Welcome,” said Bianca.
The Witch Queen stood before a window of glass like diluted wine. She looked at the magic mirror.
