WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Irish rocker and anti-poverty campaigner Bono will appeal to Democrats and Republicans during a visit to Washington this week to spare U.S. development assistance programs from cuts as Congress tries to avert the looming “fiscal cliff” of tax hikes and spending reductions early next year.
The U2 lead singer’s visit comes as the Obama administration and congressional leaders try to forge a deal in coming weeks to avoid the economy hitting the “fiscal cliff” – tax increases and spending cuts worth $ 600 billion starting in January if Congress does not act.
Analysts say the absence of a deal could shock the United States, the world’s biggest economy, back into recession.
Kathy McKiernan, spokeswoman for the ONE Campaign, said Bono will hold talks with congressional lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials during the November 12-14 visit.
During meetings he will stress the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance programs and the need to preserve them to avoid putting at risk progress made in fighting HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, she said.
Bono, a long-time advocate for the poor, will argue that U.S. government-funded schemes that support life-saving treatments for HIV/AIDS sufferers, nutrition programs for malnourished children, and emergency food aid make up just 1 percent of the U.S. government budget but are helping to save tens of millions of lives in impoverished nations.
The One Campaign would not elaborate which lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials Bono will meet.
On Monday, Bono will discuss the power of social movements with students at Georgetown University. He will also meet new World Bank President Jim Yong Kim for a web cast discussion on Wednesday on the challenges of eradicating poverty.
Q.My husband weighs twice as much as I do, yet we take the same dose of over-the-counter medications, as recommended on the packaging. Shouldn’t weight be a factor?
A. There is little information about using weight as a factor in adjusting doses of either prescription or over-the-counter medications, said Dr. Steven A. Kaplan, director of the Iris Cantor Men’s Health Center at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell hospital.
“We are beginning to study different responses by weight,” he said, but he and other researchers have reached no conclusions on recommendations for therapy.
“In my own field, urology,” he added, “my opinion is that it is more likely for the recommended dose to be ineffective in a larger person rather than to be toxic in a thinner adult.”
Some prescription drugs, like chemotherapy agents, already have their dosages adjusted for weight because of their highly toxic nature. As for over-the-counter drugs, recommended doses generally tend to be weighted in favor of safety rather than efficacy, Dr. Kaplan said.
He and other doctors emphasized the importance of following package directions. For example, acetaminophen (like Tylenol) can present a life-threatening risk if the liver cannot process a high dose. If you find that the recommended dose does not work for you, Dr. Kaplan said, speak to your doctor.
C. CLAIBORNE RAY
Readers may submit questions by mail to Question, Science Times, The New York Times, 620 Eighth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10018, or by e-mail to question@nytimes.com.
SAN FRANCISCO — The Facebook page for Gaston Memorial Hospital, in Gastonia, N.C., offers a chicken salad recipe to encourage healthy eating, tips on avoiding injuries at Zumba class, and pictures of staff members dressed up at Halloween. Typical stuff for a hospital in a small town.
But in October, another Facebook page for the hospital popped up. This one posted denunciations of President Obama and what it derided as “Obamacare.” It swiftly gathered hundreds of followers, and the anti-Obama screeds picked up “likes.” Officials at the hospital, scrambling to get it taken down, turned to their real Facebook page for damage control. “We apologize for any confusion,” they posted on Oct. 8, “and appreciate the support of our followers.”
The fake page came down 11 days later, as mysteriously as it had come up. The hospital says it has no clue who was behind it.
Fakery is all over the Internet. Twitter, which allows pseudonyms, is rife with fake followers, and has been used to spread false rumors, as it was during Hurricane Sandy. False reviews are a constant problem on consumer Web sites.
Gaston Memorial’s experience is an object lesson in the problem of fakery on Facebook. For the world’s largest social network, it is an especially acute problem, because it calls into question its basic premise. Facebook has sought to distinguish itself as a place for real identity on the Web. As the company tells its users: “Facebook is a community where people use their real identities.” It goes on to advise: “The name you use should be your real name as it would be listed on your credit card, student ID, etc.”
Fraudulent “likes” damage the trust of advertisers, who want clicks from real people they can sell to and whom Facebook now relies on to make money. Fakery also can ruin the credibility of search results for the social search engine that Facebook says it is building.
Facebook says it has always taken the problem seriously, and recently stepped up efforts to cull fakes from the site. “It’s pretty much one of the top priorities for the company all the time,” said Joe Sullivan, who is in charge of security at Facebook.
The fakery problem on Facebook comes in many shapes. False profiles are fairly easy to create; hundreds can pop up simultaneously, sometimes with the help of robots, and often they persuade real users into friending them in a bid to spread malware. Fake Facebook friends and likes are sold on the Web like trinkets at a bazaar, directed at those who want to enhance their image. Fake coupons for meals and gadgets can appear on Facebook newsfeeds, aimed at tricking the unwitting into revealing their personal information.
Somewhat more benignly, some college students use fake names in an effort to protect their Facebook content from the eyes of future employers.
Mr. Sullivan declined to say what portion of the company’s now one billion plus users were fake. The company quantified the problem last June, in responding to an inquiry by the Securities and Exchange Commission. At that time, the company said that of its 855 million active users, 8.7 percent, or 83 million, were duplicates, false or “undesirable,” for instance, because they spread spam.
Mr. Sullivan said that since August, the company had put in place a new automated system to purge fake “likes.” The company said it has 150 to 300 staff members to weed out fraud.
Flags are raised if a user sends out hundreds of friend requests at a time, Mr. Sullivan explained, or likes hundreds of pages simultaneously, or most obvious of all, posts a link to a site that is known to contain a virus. Those suspected of being fakes are warned. Depending on what they do on the site, accounts can be suspended.
In October, Facebook announced new partnerships with antivirus companies. Facebook users can now download free or paid antivirus coverage to guard against malware.
“It’s something we have been pretty effective at all along,” Mr. Sullivan said.
Facebook’s new aggressiveness toward fake “likes” became noticeable in September, when brand pages started seeing their fan numbers dip noticeably. An average brand page, Facebook said at the time, would lose less than 1 percent of its fans.
But the thriving market for fakery makes it hard to keep up with the problem. Gaston Memorial, for instance, first detected a fake page in its name in August; three days later, it vanished. The fake page popped up again on Oct. 4, and this time filled up quickly with the loud denunciations of the Obama administration. Dallas P. Wilborn, the hospital’s public relations manager, said her office tried to leave a voice-mail message for Facebook but was disconnected; an e-mail response from the social network ruled that the fake page did not violate its terms of service. The hospital submitted more evidence, saying that the impostor was using its company logo.
Eleven days later, the hospital said, Facebook found in its favor. But by then, the local newspaper, The Gaston Gazette, had written about the matter, and the fake page had disappeared.
Facebook declined to comment on the incident, and pointed only to its general Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.
The election season seems to have increased the fakery.
California Republicans have suffered a painful thrashing, and the prognosis isn't good. Recovery is far from certain.
Until last week, it was possible to be guardedly optimistic about the ultimate restoration of a healthy two-party system in California. Political power is cyclical. California at its core is centrist, even if tilted left. Surely the GOP someday would bounce back.
But now it's hard to argue with the numbers. The California electorate is changing in composition and creed. The GOP must change with it or become permanently powerless. Yet it is bogged down on the right and becoming weaker.
It's practically impossible to envision Californians electing a Republican governor in the future, certainly not in the next gubernatorial election, in 2014. Talk to GOP pros and none can suggest a realistic, credible challenger to Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown.
Especially after voters accepted his tax increase, Brown looks like a shoo-in for reelection, assuming he runs. And it's hard to imagine this 74-year-old career pol not running. His life is politics and governing.
Business will back Brown because he'll be the only moderate check on a Legislature dominated by liberal Democrats. Republicans will be virtually useless.
Let's count the election day wounds:
Mitt Romney lost to President Obama by a landslide 21 percentage points in a state that used to consistently side with the Republican nominee.
Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein drew only token Republican opposition and won by 23 points.
Democrats, at last count, were gaining four congressional seats in California.
The stunner was the state Assembly, where Democrats apparently achieved a historic supermajority to match the party's similar feat in the Senate. This means there's virtually nothing that Democrats can't pass on their own in Sacramento, relegating Republicans to mathematical irrelevancy.
But it doesn't stop there.
The Republican slice of registered voters in California slipped below 30%. Only eight years ago it was nearly 35%. Democrats are 44%.
And about that loud anti-tax mantra, the Republicans' favorite rallying cry: Most voters aren't listening.
Two tax-increase measures were approved by Californians. Brown's Prop. 30 won by a surprising 8 points. Prop. 39, ending a tax break mainly for out-of-state corporations, was approved by 20 points.
The shame for Republicans is that they could have helped Democrats pass similar tax measures in the Legislature and, in turn, won major concessions. Most important for their allies in business, they probably could have gained relief from a thicket of stifling environmental regulations. They also could have owned public pension reform and, perhaps, passed a meaningful state spending cap.
Republicans claim Brown wouldn't buck labor opposition to reforms. The governor counters that skittish Republicans never would pinpoint a concession they'd accept in trade for their tax votes.
Whatever, it's opportunity lost. Those days of GOP bargaining leverage are history.
And when business interests and conservatives complain about liberal domination of the Legislature and labor buying votes, they should blame Republicans. They're supposed to provide the opposition. But they've allowed themselves to become so weak they're helpless.
Apple and HTC ended their 32-month intellectual property battle Saturday, dismissing all lawsuits and announcing a confidential, 10-year license agreement that extends to current and future patents held by the tech giants.
“The most significant aspect of this deal is that it’s the first patent license Apple extended to an Android device maker,” intellectual property expert Florian Mueller told Wired by e-mail. “This is good news for consumers because it will allow HTC to focus on competing with Samsung and other Android device makers while compensating Apple for its contributions to innovation.”
Apple is engaged in legal battles in courtrooms around the globe in order to wage “thermonuclear war” against Android — a “stolen product,” according to former CEO Steve Jobs. Namely, Apple has been involved in lawsuits with Android hardware manufacturers Samsung, Motorola and HTC over patent-infringement claims ranging from hardware design to user interface elements to core operating system functionalities. At stake is the way smartphones and tablets look and operate, as well as how much they cost and where they’re available for sale as licensing fees and sales injunctions go into effect.
One of the first shots fired in this intellectual-property war came when Apple sued HTC in March 2010 over 10 patents related to user interface design. HTC was found to be in violation of one, a 1996 data-detecting function used to automatically convert URLs and phone numbers in e-mail and messages into live links that directly open into other apps, like a browser or phone dialer. This delayed the launch dates of products like the HTC One X earlier this year due to a brief import ban.
Mueller wrote in a blog post that the sudden settlement is both surprising and unsurprising: The timing was unexpected because neither party had significant leverage over the other, but it makes sense that Apple would come to a suitable agreement with HTC, and that HTC would eventually accept whatever terms Apple set forth, prior to any other Apple-Android suits being settled.
The conditions of the licensing agreement between the two parties are confidential, but likely hefty. With HTC being a much smaller threat, market share-wise, than other competitors like Samsung and Motorola, perhaps Apple softened its terms in order to cut its losses and dedicate money to worthier endeavors.
Indeed, both companies indicated they have bigger priorities to tend to. Apple’s and HTC’s CEOs issued statements in the settlement announcement saying the companies want to focus on innovation rather than costly intellectual-property legal battles.
“HTC is pleased to have resolved its dispute with Apple, so HTC can focus on innovation instead of litigation,” HTC CEO Peter Chou said.
“We are glad to have reached a settlement with HTC,” Apple CEO Tim Cook echoed. “We will continue to stay laser focused on product innovation.”
Will this renewed focus on innovation extend to Apple’s many other IP suits, like the ongoing Apple v. Samsung case in the United States, or the iPhone maker’s issues with Motorola Mobility (one such suit was thrown out by a federal judge last week)?
“After today’s announcement, there’s a chance that Apple will be able to strike some deals without having to litigate,” Mueller said. “But Samsung and Google are probably more difficult to do a deal with than HTC. These deals will happen but it’s impossible to predict how quickly the arrangements will fall into place.”
Although Apple and HTC reached a truce, the patent arms race will likely continue for quite some time.
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain‘s BBC could be doomed unless it makes radical changes, the head of its governing trust said, after its director general quit to take the blame for the airing of false child sex abuse allegations against a former politician.
BBC Trust chairman Chris Patten said on Sunday confidence had to be restored if the publicly funded corporation was to withstand pressure from rivals, especially Rupert Murdoch‘s media empire, which would try to take advantage of the turmoil.
“If you’re saying, ‘Does the BBC need a thorough structural radical overhaul?’, then absolutely it does, and that is what we will have to do,” Patten, a one-time senior figure in Prime Minister David Cameron‘s Conservative Party and the last British governor of Hong Kong, told BBC television.
“The basis for the BBC’s position in this country is the trust that people have in it,” Patten said. “If the BBC loses that, it’s over.”
George Entwistle resigned as director general on Saturday, just two months into the job, to take responsibility for the child sex allegation on the flagship news programme Newsnight.
The witness in the Newsight report, who says he suffered sexual abuse at a care home in the late 1970s, said on Friday he had misidentified the politician, Alistair McAlpine. Newsnight admitted it had not shown the witness a picture of McAlpine, or approached McAlpine for comment before going to air.
Already under pressure after revelations that a long-time star presenter, the late Jimmy Savile, was a paedophile, Entwistle conceded on the BBC morning news that he had not known – or asked – who the alleged abuser was until the name appeared in social media.
The BBC, celebrating its 90th anniversary, is affectionately known in Britain as “Auntie”, and respected around much of the world.
But with 22,000 staff working at eight national TV channels, 50 radio stations and an extensive Internet operation, critics say it is hampered by a complex and overly bureaucratic and hierarchical management structure.
THOMPSON’S LEGACY
Journalists said this had become worse under Entwistle’s predecessor Mark Thompson, who took over in the wake of the last major crisis to hit the corporation and is set to become chief executive of the New York Times Co on Monday.
In that instance, both director general and chairman were forced out after the BBC was castigated by a public inquiry over a report alleging government impropriety in the fevered build up to war in Iraq, leading to major organizational changes.
One of the BBC’s most prominent figures, Newsnight presenter Jeremy Paxman, said since the Iraq report furore, management had become bloated while cash had been cut from programme budgets.
“He (Entwistle) has been brought low by cowards and incompetents,” Paxman said in a statement, echoing a widely-held view that Entwistle was a good man who had been let down by his senior staff.
Prime Minister Cameron appeared ready to give the BBC the benefit of the doubt, believing that “one of the great institutions of this country” could reform and deal with its failings, according to sources in his office.
Patten, who must find a new director general to sort out the mess, agreed that management structures had proved inadequate.
“Apparently decisions about the programme went up through every damned layer of BBC management, bureaucracy, legal checks – and still emerged,” he said.
“One of the jokes I made, and actually it wasn’t all that funny, when I came to the BBC … was that there were more senior leaders in the BBC than there were in the Chinese Communist Party.”
Patten ruled out resigning himself but other senior jobs are expected to be on the line, while BBC supporters fear investigative journalism will be scaled back. He said he expected to name Entwistle’s successor in weeks, not months.
Among the immediate challenges are threats of litigation.
McAlpine, a close ally of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, has indicated he will sue for damages.
Claims for compensation are also likely from victims who say Savile, one of the most recognizable personalities on British television in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, sexually abused them as children, sometimes on BBC premises.
INQUIRIES
Two inquiries are already under way, looking at failures at Newsnight and allegations relating to Savile, both of which could make uncomfortable reading for senior figures.
Police have also launched a major inquiry into Savile’s crimes and victims’ allegations of a high-profile paedophile ring. Detectives said they had arrested their third suspect on Sunday, a man in his 70s from Cambridgeshire in central England.
Funded by an annual license fee levied on all TV viewers, the BBC has long been resented by its commercial rivals, who argue it has an unfair advantage and distorts the market.
Murdoch’s Sun tabloid gleefully reported Entwistle’s departure with the headline “Bye Bye Chump” and Patten said News Corp and others would put the boot in, happy to deflect attention after a phone-hacking scandal put the newspaper industry under intense and painful scrutiny.
He said that “one or two newspapers, Mr. Murdoch’s papers” would love to see the BBC lose its national status, “but I think the great British public doesn’t want to see that happen”.
Murdoch himself was watching from afar.
“BBC getting into deeper mess. After Savile scandal, now prominent news program falsely names senior pol as paedophile,” he wrote on his Twitter website on Saturday.
It is not just the BBC and the likes of Entwistle and Patten who are in the spotlight.
Thompson, whom Entwistle succeeded in mid-September, has also faced questions from staff at the New York Times over whether he is still the right person to take one of the biggest jobs in American newspaper publishing.
Britain’s Murdoch-owned Sunday Times queried how Thompson could have been unaware of claims about Savile during his tenure at the BBC as he had told British lawmakers, saying his lawyers had written to the paper addressing the allegations in early September, while he was still director general.
She had not expected her fingernails to feel as if they had been hollowed out.
Suzanne DeChillo/The New York Times
Josmery Batista, 34, with her children: Analisse, 4, left; Erika, 10; and Jeremy, 1. Ms. Batista is receiving chemotherapy treatment.
For the past 100 years, The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund has provided direct assistance to children, families and the elderly in New York. To celebrate the 101st campaign, an article will appear daily through Jan. 25. Each profile will illustrate the difference that even a modest amount of money can make in easing the struggles of the poor.
Last year donors contributed $7,003,854, which was distributed to those in need through seven New York charities.
Josmery Batista, 34, had braced herself for many of the side effects that would result from her palliative chemotherapy treatment. She knew about the dizzy spells, the head pain and the body aches, just as she knew about the fatigue, which weakens her so much at times that she is unable to bathe her infant son or even to hold him.
But when her nails became so brittle that she could not properly wash dishes, a development as alarming as it was discouraging, she sought comfort and reassurance from one of her new friends walking the same path.
Ms. Batista, a single mother of three, knows that she is blessed to have found a support group of others, like her, who are undergoing cancer treatment, and she gains additional courage from the memory of friends who did not survive. She also knows how blessed she is to have sisters to lean on for help.
But friends and siblings alone are not what fortify her will to survive.
“My children give me the strength to fight this illness, this disease,” Ms. Batista said. “My support system has been a great help. But what keeps me going is my kids.”
Five months into her pregnancy with her son, Jeremy Tavarez, now 1, Ms. Batista began to experience excruciating pain from her neck to her midsection. She had no idea what was wrong. When she sought help, examinations ruled out ailments like arthritis or liver problems. Tests for cancer would have involved radiation and, thus, potential harm to the baby, so Ms. Batista waited until after the birth to be tested further. Last November, one month after her son’s birth, Ms. Batista was told she had Stage 4 breast cancer. The disease has since spread to her liver and her bones.
She receives chemotherapy treatment every 21 days at Elmhurst Hospital Center, near her home in Flushing, Queens, and is then required to take pills for the next 14 days. The side effects of that medication are the cause of much of her discomfort.
Petite yet resilient, Ms. Batista is driven to take Tylenol instead of a nap. She will weather the lethargy and endure the pain to ensure that her son and her other two children, Erika, 10, and Analisse Tavarez, 4, can have as normal a life as possible. Whenever she is able to, she plays with her children, accompanies them to school or helps them with homework.
“Even though she’s battling every day, going to the hospital and stuff like that, she doesn’t let her kids fully know, and they’re happy,” said Ms. Batista’s sister Dalisa Batista, who assists with child care.
Josmery Batista, who came to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 1998, had been employed for 13 years as a jewelry sample maker in Manhattan. She has been unable to work since her treatment began and is living month to month as a result.
She receives $450 a month in food stamps and collects $868 monthly in workers’ compensation, a payment that is set to expire in January. Ms. Batista says her children’s father also provides $400 a month in child support. Her rent is $1,100 a month.
With her finances tight, Catholic Charities Brooklyn and Queens, one of the agencies supported by The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund, granted Ms. Batista $500 from the fund in September to cover five weeks of child care when she is at treatment and her relatives are unavailable. The agency also supplies the family with food from the Queens North Community Center pantry, which is affiliated with Catholic Charities.
“She stays very strong,” said Dalisa, who describes her sister as an inspiration. “I never really see her crying at home. She doesn’t cry in front of the kids.” Dalisa added that her niece Erika, who is still too young to fully grasp the severity of her mother’s situation, boosted morale with a child’s innocent honesty.
“Her daughter always gives her strength because she always tells her, ‘You’re beautiful with no hair,’ ” Dalisa said. “She tells her stuff like ‘I don’t want you to wear wigs. You’re beautiful to me.’ ”
The future holds many questions, but estimates are that Josmery Batista will be receiving treatments for at least the next six months. She says she will continue to do what she has been doing all along, basking in the love of those around her.
“I live my life as normal as possible, and I push myself to do the things I need to do,” Ms. Batista said. “I’m not going to allow the illness to dictate how I’m going to carry my life and what I need to do as a mother.”
“Jenni feels the guilt and I feel the burden.” Michele Fitzgerald, in debt for the loans she took out for her daughter Jenni’s college education.
When Michele Fitzgerald and her daughter, Jenni, go out for dinner, Jenni pays. When they get haircuts, Jenni pays. When they buy groceries, Jenni pays.
It has been six years since Ms. Fitzgerald — broke, unemployed and in default on the $18,000 in loans she took out for Jenni’s college education — became a boomerang mom, moving into her daughter’s townhouse apartment in Hingham, Mass.
Jenni pays the rent.
For Jenni, 35, the student loans and the education they bought have worked out: she has a good job in public relations and is paying down the loans in her name. But for her mother, 60, the parental debt has been disastrous.
“It’s not easy,” Ms. Fitzgerald said. “Jenni feels the guilt and I feel the burden.”
There are record numbers of student borrowers in financial distress, according to federal data. But millions of parents who have taken out loans to pay for their children’s college education make up a less visible generation in debt. For the most part, these parents did well enough through midlife to take on sizable loans, but some have since fallen on tough times because of the recession, health problems, job loss or lives that took a sudden hard turn.
And unlike the angry students who have recently taken to the streets to protest their indebtedness, most of these parents are too ashamed to draw attention to themselves.
“You don’t want your children, much less your neighbors and friends, knowing that even though you’re living in a nice house, and you’ve been able to hold onto your job, your retirement money’s gone, you can’t pay your debts,” said a woman in Connecticut who took out $57,000 in federal loans. Between tough times at work and a divorce, she is now teetering on default.
In the first three months of this year, the number of borrowers of student loans age 60 and older was 2.2 million, a figure that has tripled since 2005. That makes them the fastest-growing age group for college debt. All told, those borrowers owed $43 billion, up from $8 billion seven years ago, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
Almost 10 percent of the borrowers over 60 were at least 90 days delinquent on their payments during the first quarter of 2012, compared with 6 percent in 2005. And more and more of those with unpaid federal student debt are losing a portion of their Social Security benefits to the government — nearly 119,000 through September, compared with 60,000 for all of 2007 and 23,996 in 2001, according to the Treasury Department’s Financial Management Service.
The federal government does not track how many of these older borrowers were taking out loans for their own education rather than for that of their children. But financial analysts say that loans for children are the likely source of almost all the debt. Even adjusted for inflation, so-called Parent PLUS loans — one piece of the pie for parents of all ages — have more than doubled to $10.4 billion since 2000. Colleges often encourage parents to get Parent PLUS loans, to make it possible for their children to enroll. But many borrow more than they can afford to pay back — and discover, too late, that the flexibility of income-based repayment is available only to student borrowers.
Many families with good credit turn to private student loans, with parents co-signing for their children. But those private loans also offer little flexibility in repayment.
The consequences of such debt can be dire because borrowers over 60 have less time — and fewer opportunities — than younger borrowers to get their financial lives back on track. Some, like Ms. Fitzgerald, are forced to move in with their children. Others face an unexpectedly pinched retirement. Still others have gone into bankruptcy, after using all their assets to try to pay the student debt, which is difficult to discharge under any circumstances.
The anguish over college debt has put a severe strain on many family relationships. Parents and students alike say parental debt can be the uncomfortable, unmentionable elephant in the room. Many parents feel they have not fulfilled a basic obligation, while others quietly resent that their children’s education has landed the family in such difficult territory.
Soon after borrowing the money for Jenni’s education, Ms. Fitzgerald divorced and lost her corporate job. She worked part-time jobs and subsisted on food stamps and public assistance.
First you found out that the number of registered Republicans in California has dipped below 30%, which means we are fast approaching the day when the entire state membership can fit into two golf carts.
To make matters worse, of the 1 million people who used a new online voter registration system this election cycle, only 20% registered as Republicans. And 60% of those who registered were under 35, which means your future's not looking great.
Then the dominoes really started to fall.
Gov. Brown's Proposition 30, the first general, statewide tax hike in two decades, passed so easily that the ghost of Howard Jarvis threw himself in front of a truck.
Proposition 32, an all-out attempt to defang public employee unions, got pummeled despite an infusion of last-minute anti-labor cash from Arizona.
What could be worse? I'll tell you what. In the state Legislature, Democrats won supermajorities in both houses. Do you know what that means? It's like handing your teenager a credit card, a checkbook and the car keys so he can drive to an all-night orgy.
Meanwhile, on the national front, two states said yes to recreational marijuana and three states said yes to same-sex marriage. And Mitt Romney proved that when your only loyal supporters are aging white men who still drive Buicks and watch "Matlock" reruns — in a country with an ever more diverse population — you're cooked.
It was a wipeout, a blitz, a disaster.
So now what?
Glad you asked, because as it happens, I've got some advice for the leaders and members of the California's shrinking Grand Old Party.
Your first option is to cut and run. Frankly, I regularly hear from Republicans who so despise California and everything it stands for, I'm surprised they keep subjecting themselves to so much misery. Wouldn't it be better to sell everything, pack up the station wagon and move to Georgia or Kentucky? They think, act and vote red in those states, and they probably hate California at least as much as you do.
But here's another option. You could sit tight here in the Golden State, wait for the Democrats to screw things up in Sacramento even more than they already have, and then raise your hand when the situation cries out for the voice of fiscal prudence.
The first thing you're going to have to do, though, is remake the GOP. And by that I mean that you have to get rid of the Neanderthals who dominate the party. Then you need to start grooming and promoting some common-sense fiscal moderates, provided you can locate any.
What do I mean by that?
If someone believes Barack Obama is a socialist, Communist, Marxist, Muslim, radical, black liberation theologian, non-citizen, illegitimate president or Manchurian Candidate, forget about him. He may have a shot at a career in talk radio, but he's not going to make it in California politics.
And you're not going to breathe new life into the GOP with someone who believes the answer to the state's problems is to deport a couple million Latinos, unless they're working in the garden at extremely low rates.
You should also nix anyone who believes that gay people have chosen a "lifestyle" in the way they might choose toothpaste or a pair of shoes, and can be "converted" with enough hard work and Bible study.
I know, I know. We're really thinning the field here. And I'm not even done.
Epic fantasy has become the literature of more. We equate it with more pages than the average book, more books than the average series. There are more characters, more maps, more names and more dates. The stories and the worlds are bigger to contain all of this more. And when all the books have been devoured, the fans want more.
For my just-released anthology, Epic: Legends of Fantasy, I compiled a collection of stories that demonstrate the heights the subgenre is capable of attaining; including works by George R. R. Martin, Brandon Sanderson, Patrick Rothfuss, Robin Hobb, Tad Williams, Ursula K. Le Guin and other legends of the field, the anthology attempts to survey all that is epic in the short form and bring the best of it to you in a single volume.
In this exclusive excerpt from the anthology, Mary Robinette Kowal presents a tale that exemplifies what epic fantasy is all about.
By Mary Robinette Kowal
Light dappled through the trees in the family courtyard, painting shadows on the paving stones. Li Reiko knelt by her son to look at his scraped knee.
“I just scratched it.” Nawi squirmed under her hands.
Her daughter, Aya, leaned over her shoulder studying the healing. “Maybe Mama will show you her armor after she heals you.”
Nawi stopped wiggling. “Really?”
Reiko shot Aya a warning look, but her little boy’s dark eyes shone with excitement. Reiko smiled. “Really.” What did tradition matter? “Now let me heal your knee.” She laid her hand on the shallow wound.
“Ow.”
“Shush.” Reiko closed her eyes and rose in the dark space behind them.
In her mind’s eye, Reiko took her time with the ritual, knowing it took less time than it appeared. In a heartbeat, green fire flared out to the walls of her mind. She dissolved into it as she focused on healing her son.
When the wound closed beneath her hand, she sank to the surface of her mind.
“There.” She tousled Nawi’s hair. “That wasn’t bad, was it?”
“It tickled.” He wrinkled his nose. “Will you show me your armor now?”
She sighed. She should not encourage his interest in the martial arts. His work would be with the histories that men kept, and yet…”Watch.”
Pulling the smooth black surface out of the ether, she manifested her armor. It sheathed her like silence in the night. Aya watched with obvious anticipation for the day when she earned her own armor. Nawi’s face, full of sharp yearning for something he would never have, cut Reiko’s heart like a new blade.
“Can I see your sword?”
She let her armor vanish into thought. “No.” Reiko brushed his hair from his eyes. “It’s my turn to hide, right?”
- - -
Halldór twisted in his saddle, trying to ease the kink in his back. When the questing party reached the Parliament, he could remove the weight hanging between his shoulders.
With each step his horse took across the moss-covered lava field, the strange blade bumped against his spine, reminding him that he carried a legend. None of the runes or sheep entrails he read before their quest had foretold the ease with which they fulfilled the first part of the prophecy. They had found the Chooser of the Slain’s narrow blade wrapped in linen, buried beneath an abandoned elf-house. In that dark room, the sword’s hard silvery metal — longer than any of their bronze swords — had seemed lit by the moon.
Lárus pulled his horse alongside Halldór. “Will the ladies be waiting for us, do you think?”
“Maybe for you, my lord, but not for me.”
“Nonsense. Women love the warrior-priest. ‘Strong and sensitive.’” He snorted through his mustache. “Just comb your hair so you don’t look like a straw man.”
A horse screamed behind them. Halldór turned, expecting to see its leg caught in one of the thousands of holes between the rocks. Instead, armed men swarmed from the gullies between the rocks, hacking at the riders. Bandits.
Halldór spun his horse to help Lárus and the others fight them off.
Lárus shouted, “Protect the Sword.”
At the Duke’s command, Halldór cursed and turned his horse from the fight, galloping across the rocks. Behind him, men cried out as they protected his escape. His horse twisted along the narrow paths between stones. It stopped abruptly, avoiding a chasm. Halldór looked back.
Scant lengths ahead of the bandits, Lárus rode, slumped in his saddle. Blood stained his cloak. The other men hung behind Lárus, protecting the Duke as long as possible.
Behind them, the bandits closed the remaining distance across the lava fields.
Halldór kicked his horse’s side, driving it around the chasm. His horse stumbled sickeningly beneath him. Its leg snapped, caught between rocks. Halldór kicked free of the saddle as the horse screamed. He rolled clear. The rocky ground slammed the sword into his back. His face passed over the edge of the chasm. Breathless, he recoiled from the drop.
As he scrambled to his feet, Lárus thundered up. Without wasting a beat, Lárus flung himself from the saddle and tossed Halldór the reins. “Get the Sword to Parliament!”
Halldór grabbed the reins, swinging into the saddle. If they died returning to Parliament, did it matter that they had found the Sword? “We must invoke the Sword!”
Lárus’s right arm hung, blood-drenched, by his side, but he faced the bandits with his left. “Go!”
Halldór yanked the Sword free of its wrappings. For the first time in six thousand years, the light of the sun fell on the silvery blade bringing fire to its length. It vibrated in his hands.
The first bandit reached Lárus and forced him back.
Halldór chanted the runes of power, petitioning the Chooser of the Slain.
Time stopped.
- - -
Reiko hid from her children, blending into the shadows of the courtyard with more urgency than she felt in combat. To do less would insult them.
“Ready or not, here I come!” Nawi spun from the tree and sprinted past her hiding place. Aya turned more slowly and studied the courtyard. Reiko smiled as her daughter sniffed the air, looking for tracks. Her son crashed through the bushes, kicking leaves with each footstep.
As another branch cracked under Nawi’s foot, Reiko stifled the urge to correct his appalling technique. She would speak with his tutor about what the woman was teaching him. He was a boy, but that was no reason to neglect his education.
Watching Aya find Reiko’s initial footprints and track them away from where she hid, Reiko slid from her hiding place. She walked across the courtyard to the fountain. This was a rule with her children; to make up for the size difference, she could not run.
She paced closer to the sparkling water, masking her sounds with its babble. From her right, Nawi shouted, “Have you found her?”
“No, silly!” Aya shook her head and stopped. She put her tiny hands on her hips, staring at the ground. “Her tracks stop here.”
Reiko and her daughter were the same distance from the fountain, but on opposite sides. If Aya were paying attention, she would realize her mother had retraced her tracks and jumped from the fountain to the paving stones circling the grassy center of the courtyard. Reiko took three more steps before Aya turned.
As her daughter turned, Reiko felt, more than heard, her son on her left, reaching for her. Clever. He had misdirected her attention with his noise in the shrubbery. She fell forward, using gravity to drop beneath his hands. Rolling on her shoulder, she somersaulted, then launched to her feet as Aya ran toward her.
Nawi grabbed for her again. With a child on each side, Reiko danced and dodged closer to the fountain. She twisted from their grasp, laughing with them each time they missed her. Their giggles echoed through the courtyard.
The world tipped sideways and vibrated. Reiko stumbled as pain ripped through her spine.
Nawi’s hand clapped against her side. “I got her!”
Fire engulfed Reiko.
The courtyard vanished.
- - -
Time began again.
The sword in Halldór’s hands thrummed with life. Fire from the sunset engulfed the sword and split the air. With a keening cry, the air opened and a form dropped through, silhouetted against a haze of fire. Horses and men screamed in terror.
When the fire died away, a woman stood between Halldór and the bandits.
Halldór’s heart sank. Where was the Chooser of the Slain? Where was the warrior the sword had petitioned?
A bandit snarled a laughing oath and rushed toward them. The others followed him with their weapons raised.
The woman snatched the sword from Halldór’s hands. In that brief moment, when he stared at her wild face, he realized that he had succeeded in calling Li Reiko, the Chooser of the Slain.
Then she turned. The air around her rippled with a heat haze as armor, dark as night, materialized around her body. He watched her dance with deadly grace, bending and twisting away from the bandits’ blows. Without seeming thought, with movement as precise as ritual, she danced with death as her partner. Her sword slid through the bodies of the bandits.
Halldór dropped to his knees, thanking the gods for sending her. He watched the point of her sword trace a line, like the path of entrails on the church floor. The line of blood led to the next moment, the next and the next, as if each man’s death was predestined.
Then she turned her sword on him.
Her blade descended, burning with the fire of the setting sun. She stopped as if she had run into a wall, with the point touching Halldór’s chest.
Why had she stopped? If his blood was the price for saving Lárus, so be it. Her arm trembled. She grimaced, but did not move the sword closer.
Her face, half-hidden by her helm, was dark with rage. “Where am I?” Her words were crisp, more like a chant than common speech.
Holding still, Halldór said, “We are on the border of the Parliament lands, Li Reiko.”
Her dark eyes, slanted beneath angry lids, widened. She pulled back and her armor rippled, vanishing into thought. Skin, tanned like the smoothest leather stretched over her wide cheekbones. Her hair hung in a heavy, black braid down her back. Halldór’s pulse sang in his veins.
Only the gods in sagas had hair the color of the Allmother’s night. Had he needed proof he had called the Chooser of the Slain, the inhuman black hair would have convinced him of that.
He bowed his head. “All praise to you, Great One. Grant us your blessings.”
- - -
Reiko’s breath hissed from her. He knew her name. She had dropped through a flaming portal into hell and this demon with bulging eyes knew her name.
She had tried to slay him as she had the others, but could not press her sword forward, as if a wall had protected him.
And now he asked for blessings.
“What blessings do you ask of me?” Reiko said. She controlled a shudder. What human had hair as pale as straw?
Straw lowered his bulging eyes to the demon lying in front of him. “Grant us, O Gracious One, the life of our Duke Lárus.”
This Lárus had a wound deep in his shoulder. His blood was as red as any human’s, but his face was pale as death.
She turned from Straw and wiped her sword on the thick moss, cleaning the blood from it. As soon as her attention seemed turned from them, Straw attended Lárus. She kept her awareness on the sounds of his movement as she sought balance in the familiar task of caring for her weapon. By the Gods! Why did he have her sword? It had been in her rooms not ten minutes before playing hide and seek with her children.
Panic almost took her. What had happened to her Aya and Nawi? She needed information, but displaying ignorance to an enemy was a weakness, which could kill surer than the sharpest blade. She considered.
Their weapons were bronze, not steel, and none of her opponents had manifested armor. They dressed in leather and felted wool, but no woven goods. So, then. That was their technology.
Straw had not healed Lárus, so perhaps they could not. He wanted her aid. Her thoughts checked. Could demons be bound by blood debt?
She turned to Straw.
“What price do you offer for this life?”
Straw raised his eyes; they were the color of the sky. “I offer my life unto you, O Great One.”
She set her lips. What good would vengeance do? Unless… “Do you offer blood or service?”
He lowered his head again. “I submit to your will.”
“You will serve me then. Do you agree to be my bound man?”
“I do.”
“Good.” She sheathed her sword. “What is your name?”
“Halldór Arnarsson.”
“I accept your pledge.” She dropped to her knees and pushed the leather from the wound on Lárus’s shoulder. She pulled upon her reserves and, rising into the healing ritual, touched his mind.
He was human.
She pushed the shock aside; she could not spare the attention.
- - -
Halldór gasped as fire glowed around Li Reiko’s hands. He had read of gods healing in the sagas, but bearing witness was beyond his dreams.
The glow faded. She lifted her hands from Lárus’s shoulder. The wound was gone. A narrow red line and the blood-soaked clothing remained. Lárus opened his eyes as if he had been sleeping.
But her face was drawn. “I have paid the price for your service, bound man.” She lifted a hand to her temple. “The wound was deeper…” Her eyes rolled back in her head and she slumped to the ground.
Lárus sat up and grabbed Halldór by the shoulder. “What did you do?”
Shaking Lárus off, Halldór crouched next to her. She was breathing. “I saved your life.”
“By binding yourself to a woman? Are you mad?”
“She healed you. Healed! Look.” Halldór pointed at her hair. “Look at her. This is Li Reiko.”
“Li Reiko was a Warrior.”
“You saw her. How long did it take her to kill six men?” He pointed at the carnage behind them. “Name one man who could do that.”
Would moving her be a sacrilege? He grimaced. He would beg forgiveness if that were the case. “We should move before the sun sets and the trolls come out.”
Lárus nodded slowly, his eyes still on the bodies around them. “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”
“What?”
“How many other sagas are true?”
Halldór frowned. “They’re all true.”
- - -
The smell of mutton invaded her dreamless sleep. Reiko lay under sheepskin, on a bed of straw ticking. The straw poked through the wool fabric, pricking her bare skin. Straw. Her memory tickled her with an image of hair the color of straw. Halldór.
Long practice kept her breath even. She lay with her eyes closed, listening. A small room. An open fire. Women murmuring. She needed to learn as much as possible, before changing the balance by letting them know she was awake.
A hand placed a damp rag on her brow. The touch was light, a woman or a child.
The sheepskin’s weight would telegraph her movement if she tried grabbing the hand. Better to open her eyes and feign weakness than to create an impression of threat. There was time for that later.
Reiko let her eyes flutter open. A girl bent over her, cast from the same demonic mold as Halldór. Her hair was the color of honey, and her wide blue eyes started from her head. She stilled when Reiko awoke, but did not pull away.
Reiko forced a smile, and let worry appear on her brow. “Where am I?”
“In the women’s quarters at the Parliament grounds.”
Reiko sat up. The sheepskin fell away, letting the cool air caress her body. The girl averted her eyes. Conversation in the room stopped.
Interesting. They had a nudity taboo. She reached for the sheepskin and pulled it over her torso. “What is your name?”
“Mara Halldórsdottir.”
Her bound man had a daughter. And his people had a patronymic system — how far from home was she? “Where are my clothes, Mara?”
The girl lifted a folded bundle of cloth from a low bench next to the bed. “I washed them for you.”
“Thank you.” If Mara had washed and dried her clothes, Reiko must have been unconscious for several hours. Lárus’s wound had been deeper than she thought. “Where is my sword?”
“My father has it.”
Rage filled Reiko’s veins like the fire that had brought her here. She waited for the heat to dwindle, then began dressing. As Reiko pulled her boots on, she asked, “Where is he?”
Behind Mara, the other women shifted as if Reiko were crossing a line. Mara ignored them. “He’s with Parliament.”
“Which is where?” The eyes of the other women felt like heat on her skin. Ah. Parliament contained the line she should not cross, and they clearly would not answer her. Her mind teased her with memories of folk in other lands. She had never paid much heed to these stories, since history had been men’s work. She smiled at Mara. “Thank you for your kindness.”
As she strode from the room she kept her senses fanned out, waiting for resistance from them, but they hung back as if they were afraid.
The women’s quarters fronted on a narrow twisting path lined with low turf and stone houses. The end of the street opened on a large raised circle surrounded by stone benches.
Men sat on the benches, but women stayed below. Lárus spoke in the middle of the circle. By his side, Halldór stood with her sword in his hands. Sheltering in the shadow by a house, Reiko studied them. They towered above her, but their movements were clumsy and oafish like a trained bear. Nawi had better training than any here.
Her son. Sudden anxiety and rage filled her lungs, but rage invited rash decisions. She forced the anger away.
With effort, she returned her focus to the men. They had no awareness of their mass, only of their size and an imperfect grasp of that.
Halldór lifted his head. As if guided by strings his eyes found her in the shadows.
He dropped to his knees and held out her sword. In mid-sentence, Lárus looked at Halldór, and then turned to Reiko. Surprise crossed his face, but he bowed his head.
“Li Reiko, you honor us with your presence.”
Reiko climbed onto the stone circle. As she crossed to retrieve her sword, an ox of a man rose to his feet. “I will not sit here, while a woman is in the Parliament’s circle.”
Lárus scowled. “Ingolfur, this is no mortal woman.”
Reiko’s attention sprang forward. What did they think she was, if not mortal?
“You darkened a trollop’s hair with soot.” Ingolfur crossed his arms. “You expect me to believe she’s a god?”
Her pulse quickened. What were they saying? Lárus flung his cloak back, showing the torn and blood-soaked leather at his shoulder. “We were set upon by bandits. My arm was cut half off and she healed it.” His pale face flushed red. “I tell you this is Li Reiko, returned to the world.”
She understood the words, but they had no meaning. Each sentence out of their mouths raised a thousand questions in her mind.
“Ha.” Ingolfur spat on the ground. “Your quest sought a warrior to defeat the Troll King.”
This she understood. “And if I do, what price do you offer?”
Lárus opened his mouth but Ingolfur crossed the circle.
“You pretend to be the Chooser of the Slain?” Ingolfur reached for her, as if she were a doll he could pick up. Before his hand touched her shoulder, she took his wrist, pulling on it as she twisted. She drove her shoulder into his belly and used his mass to flip him as she stood.
She had thought these were demons, but by their actions they were men, full of swagger and rash judgment. She waited. He would attack her again.
Ingolfur raged behind her. Reiko focused on his sounds and the small changes in the air. As he reached for her, she twisted away from his hands and with his force, sent him stumbling from the circle. The men broke into laughter.
She waited again.
It might take time but Ingolfur would learn his place. A man courted death, touching a woman unasked.
Halldór stepped in front of Reiko and faced Ingolfur. “Great Ingolfur, surely you can see no mortal woman could face our champion.”
Reiko cocked her head slightly. Her bound man showed wit by appeasing the oaf’s vanity.
Lárus pointed to her sword in Halldór’s hands. “Who here still doubts we have completed our quest?” The men shifted on their benches uneasily. “We fulfilled the first part of the prophecy by returning Li Reiko to the world.”
What prophecy had her name in it? There might be a bargaining chip here.
“You promised us a mighty warrior, the Chooser of the Slain,” Ingolfur snarled, “not a woman.”
It was time for action. If they wanted a god, they should have one. “Have no doubt. I can defeat the Troll King.” She let her armor flourish around her. Ingolfur drew back involuntarily. Around the circle, she heard gasps and sharp cries.
She drew her sword from Halldór’s hands. “Who here will test me?”
Halldór dropped to his knees in front of her. “The Chooser of the Slain!”
In the same breath, Lárus knelt and cried, “Li Reiko!”
Around the circle, men followed suit. On the ground below, women and children knelt in the dirt. They cried her name. In the safety of her helm, Reiko scowled. Playing at godhood was a dangerous lie.
She lowered her sword. “But there is a price. You must return me to the heavens.”
Halldór’s eyes grew wider than she thought possible. “How, my lady?”
She shook her head. “You know the gods grant nothing easily. They say you must return me. You must learn how. Who here accepts that price for your freedom from the trolls?”
She sheathed her sword and let her armor vanish into thought. Turning on her heel, she strode off the Parliament’s circle.
- - -
Halldór clambered to his feet as Li Reiko left the Parliament circle. His head reeled. She hinted at things beyond his training. Lárus grabbed him by the arm. “What does she mean, return her?”
Ingolfur tossed his hands. “If that is the price, I will pay it gladly. Ridding the world of the Troll King and her at the same time would be a joy.”
“Is it possible?”
Men crowded around Halldór, asking him theological questions of the sagas. The answers eluded him. He had not cast a rune-stone or read an entrail since they started for the elf-house a week ago. “She would not ask if it were impossible.” He swallowed. “I will study the problem with my brothers and return to you.”
Lárus clapped him on the back. “Good man.” When Lárus turned to the throng surrounding them, Halldór slipped away.
He found Li Reiko surrounded by children. The women hung back, too shy to come near, but the children crowded close. Halldór could hardly believe she had killed six men as easily as carding wool. For the space of a breath, he watched her play peek-a-boo with a small child, her face open with delight and pain.
She saw him and shutters closed over her soul. Standing, her eyes impassive, she said. “I want to read the prophecy.”
He blinked, surprised. Then his heart lifted; maybe she would show him how to pay her price. “It is stored in the church.”
Reiko brushed the child’s hair from its eyes, then fell into step beside Halldór. He could barely keep a sedate pace to the church.
Inside, he led her through the nave to the library beside the sanctuary. The other priests, studying, stared at the Chooser of the Slain. Halldór felt as if he were outside himself with the strangeness of this. He was leading Li Reiko, a Warrior out of the oldest sagas, past shelves containing her history.
Since the gods had arrived from across the sea, his brothers had recorded their history. For six-thousand unbroken years, the records of prophecy and the sagas kept their history whole.
When they reached the collections desk, the acolyte on duty looked as if he would wet himself. Halldór stood between the boy and the Chooser of the Slain, but the boy still stared with an open mouth.
“Bring me the Troll King prophecy, and the Sagas of Li Nawi, Volume I. We will be in the side chapel.”
Still gaping, the boy nodded and ran down the aisles.
“We can study in here.” He led the Chooser of the Slain to the side chapel. Halldór was shocked again at how small she was, not much taller than the acolyte. He had thought the gods would be larger than life.
He had hundreds of questions, but none of the words.
When the acolyte came back, Halldór sent a silent prayer of thanks. Here was something they could discuss. He took the vellum roll and the massive volume of sagas the acolyte carried and shooed him out of the room.
Halldór’s palms were damp with sweat as he pulled on wool gloves to protect the manuscripts. He hesitated over another pair of gloves, then set them aside. Her hands could heal; she would not damage the manuscripts.
Carefully, Halldór unrolled the prophecy scroll on the table. He did not look at the rendering of entrails. He watched her.
She gave no hint of her thoughts. “I want to hear your explanation of this.”
A cold current ran up his spine, as if he were eleven again, explaining scripture to an elder. Halldór licked his lips and pointed at the arc of sclera. “This represents the heavens, and the overlap here,” he pointed at the bulge of the lower intestine, “means time of conflict. I interpreted the opening in the bulge to mean specifically the Troll King. This pattern of blood means — ”
She crossed her arms. “You clearly understand your discipline. Tell me the prophecy in plain language.”
“Oh.” He looked at the drawing of the entrails again. What did she see that he did not? “Well, in a time of conflict — which is now — the Chooser of the Slain overcomes the Troll King.” He pointed at the shining knot around the lower intestine. “See how this chokes off the Troll King. That means you win the battle.”
“And how did you know the legendary warrior was — is me?”
“I cross-referenced with our histories and you were the one that fit the criteria.”
She shivered. “Show me the history. I want to understand how you deciphered this.”
Halldór thanked the gods that he had asked for Li Nawi’s saga as well. He placed the heavy volume of history in front of Li Reiko and opened to the Book of Fire, Chapter I.
- - -
In the autumn of the Fire, Li Reiko, greatest of the warriors, trained Li Nawi and his sister Aya in the ways of Death. In the midst of the training, a curtain of fire split Nawi from Aya and when they came together again, Li Reiko was gone. Though they were frightened, they understood that the Chooser of the Slain had taken a rightful place in heaven.
Reiko trembled, her control gone. “What is this?”
“It is the Saga of Li Nawi.”
She tried phrasing casual questions, but her mind spun in circles. “How do you come to have this?”
Halldór traced the letters with his gloved hand. “After the Collapse, when waves of fire had rolled across our land, Li Nawi came across the oceans with the other gods. He was our conqueror and our salvation.”
The ranks of stone shelves filled with thick leather bindings crowded her. Her heart kicked wildly.
Halldór’s voice seemed drowned out by the drumming of her pulse. “The Sagas are our heritage and charge. The gods have left the Earth, but we keep records of histories as they taught us.”
Reiko turned her eyes blindly from the page. “Your heritage?”
“I have been dedicated to the service of the gods since my birth.” He paused. “Your sagas were the most inspiring. Forgive my trespasses, may I beg for your indulgence with a question?”
“What?” Hot and cold washed over her in sickening waves.
“I have read your son Li Nawi’s accounts of your triumphs in battle.”
Reiko could not breathe. Halldór flipped the pages forward. “This is how I knew where to look for your sword.” He paused with his hand over the letters. “I deciphered the clues to invoke it and call you here, but there are many — ”
Reiko pushed away from the table. “You caused the curtain of fire?” She wanted to vomit her fear at his feet.
“I — I do not understand.”
“I dropped through fire this morning.” And when they came together again, Li Reiko was no more. What had it been like for Aya and Nawi to watch their mother ripped out of time?
Halldór said, “In answer to my petition.”
“I was playing hide and seek with my children and you took me.”
“You were in the heavens with the gods.”
“That’s something you tell a grieving child!”
“I — I didn’t, I — ” His face turned gray. “Forgive me, Great One.”
“I am not a god!” She pushed him, all control gone. He tripped over a bench and dropped to the floor. “Send me back.”
“I cannot.”
Her sword flew from its sheath before she realized she held it. “Send me back!” She held it to his neck. Her arms trembled with the desire to run it through him. But it would not move.
She leaned on the blade, digging her feet into the floor. “You ripped me out of time and took me from my children.”
He shook his head. “It had already happened.”
“Because of you.” Her sword crept closer, pricking a drop of blood from his neck. What protected him?
Halldór lay on his back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know…I was following the prophecy.”
Reiko staggered. Prophecy. A wall of predestination. Empty, she dropped to the bench and cradled her sword. “How long ago…?”
“Six thousand years.”
She closed her eyes. This was why he could not return her. He had not simply brought her from across the sea like the other “gods.” He had brought her through time. If she were trapped here, if she could never see her children again, it did not matter if these were human or demons. She was banished in Hell.
“What do the sagas say about my children?”
Halldór rolled to his knees. “I can show you.” His voice shook.
“No.” She ran her hand down the blade of her sword. Its edge whispered against her skin. She touched her wrist to the blade. It would be easy. “Read it to me.”
She heard him get to his feet. The pages of the heavy book shuffled.
- - -
Halldór swallowed and read, “This is from the Saga of Li Nawi, the Book of the Sword, Chapter Two. ‘And it came to pass that Li Aya and Li Nawi were raised unto adulthood by their tutor.’”
A tutor raised them, because he, Halldór, had pulled their mother away. He shook his head. It had happened six thousand years ago.
“‘But when they reached adulthood, each claimed the right of Li Reiko’s sword.’”
They fought over the sword, with which he had called her, not out of the heavens, but from across time. Halldór shivered and focused on the page.
“‘Li Aya challenged Li Nawi, saying Death was her birthright. But Nawi, on hearing this, scoffed and said he was a Child of Death. And saying so, he took Li Reiko’s sword and the gods smote Li Aya with their fiery hand, thus granting Li Nawi the victory.’”
Halldór’s entrails twisted as if the gods were reading them. He had read these sagas since he was a boy. He believed them, but he had not thought they were real. He looked at Li Reiko. She held her head in her lap and rocked back and forth.
For all his talk of prophecies, he was the one who had found the sword and invoked it. “‘Then all men knew he was the true Child of Death. He raised an army of men, the First of the Nine Armies, and thus began the Collapse — ‘”
“Stop.”
“I’m sorry.” He would slaughter a thousand sheep if one would tell him how to undo his crime. In the Saga of Li Nawi, Li Reiko never appeared after the wall of fire. He closed the book and took a step toward her. “The price you asked…I can’t send you back.”
Li Reiko drew a shuddering breath and looked up. “I have already paid the price for you.” Her eyes reflected his guilt. “Another hero can kill the Troll King.”
His pulse rattled forward like a panicked horse. “No one else can. The prophecy points to you.”
“Gut a new sheep, bound man. I won’t help you.” She stood. “I release you from your debt.”
“But, it’s unpaid. I owe you a life.”
“You cannot pay the price I ask.” She turned and touched her sword to his neck again. He flinched. “I couldn’t kill you when I wanted to.” She cocked her head, and traced the point of the blade around his neck, not quite touching him. “What destiny waits for you?”
“Nothing.” He was no one.
She snorted. “How nice to be without a fate.” Sheathing her sword, she walked toward the door.
He followed her. Nothing made sense. “Where are you going?” She spun and drove her fist into his midriff. He grunted and folded over the pain. Panting, Reiko pulled her sword out and hit his side with the flat of her blade. Halldór held his cry in.
She swung again, with the edge, but the wall of force stopped her; Halldór held still. She turned the blade and slammed the flat against his ribs again. The breath hissed out of him, but he did not move. He knelt in front of her, waiting for the next blow. He deserved this. He deserved more than this.
Li Reiko’s lip curled in disgust. “Do not follow me.”
He scrabbled forward on his knees. “Then tell me where you’re going, so I will not meet you by chance.”
“Maybe that is your destiny.” She left him.
Halldór did not follow her.
- - -
Li Reiko chased her shadow out of the parliament lands. It stretched before her in the golden light of sunrise, racing her across the moss-covered lava. The wind, whipping across the treeless plain, pushed her like a child late for dinner.
Surrounded by the people in the Parliament lands, Reiko’s anger had overwhelmed her and buried her grief. Whatever Halldór thought her destiny was, she saw only two paths in front of her — make a life here or join her children in the only way left. Neither were paths to choose rashly.
Small shrubs and grasses broke the green with patches of red and gold, as if someone had unrolled a carpet on the ground. Heavy undulations creased the land with crevices. Some held water reflecting the sky, others dropped to a lower level of moss and soft grasses, and some were as dark as the inside of a cave.
When the sun crossed the sky and painted the land with long shadows, Reiko sought shelter from the wind in one of the crevices. The moss cradled her with the warmth of the earth.
She pulled thoughts of Aya and Nawi close. In her memory, they laughed as they reached for her. Sobs pushed past Reiko’s reserves. She wrapped her arms around her chest. Each cry shattered her. Her children were dead because Halldór had decided a disemboweled sheep meant he should rip her out of time. It did not matter if they had grown up; she had not been there. They were six‑thousand years dead. Inside her head, Reiko battled grief. Her fists pounded against the walls of her mind. No. Her brain filled with that silent syllable.
She pressed her face against the velvet moss wanting the earth to absorb her.
She heard a sound.
Training quieted her breath in a moment. Reiko lifted her head from the moss and listened. Footsteps crossed the earth above her. She manifested her armor and rolled silently to her feet. If Halldór had followed her, she would play the part of a man and seek revenge.
In the light of the moon, a figure, larger than a man, crept toward her. A troll. Behind him, a gang of trolls watched. Reiko counted them and considered the terrain. It was safer to hide, but anger still throbbed in her bones. She left her sword sheathed and slunk out of the crevice in the ground. Her argument was not with them.
Flowing across the moss, she let the uneven shadows mask her until she reached a standing mound of stones. The wind carried the trolls’ stink to her.
The lone troll reached the crevice she had sheltered in. His arm darted down like a bear fishing and he roared with astonishment.
The other trolls laughed. “Got away, did she?”
One of them said, “Mucker was smelling his own crotch is all.”
“Yah, sure. He didn’t get enough in the Hall and goes around thinking he smells more.”
They had taken human women. Reiko felt a stabbing pain in her loins; she could not let that stand.
Mucker whirled. “Shut up! I know I smelled a woman.”
“Then where’d she go?” The troll snorted the air. “Don’t smell one now.”
The other lumbered away. “Let’s go, while some of ‘em are still fresh.”
Mucker slumped and followed the other trolls. Reiko eased out of the shadows. She was a fool, but would not hide while women were raped.
She hung back, letting the wind bring their sounds and scents as she tracked the trolls to their Hall.
The moon had sunk to a handspan above the horizon as they reached the Troll Hall. Trolls stood on either side of the great stone doors.
Reiko crouched in the shadows. The night was silent except for the sounds of revelry. Even with alcohol slowing their movement, there were too many of them.
If she could goad the sentries into taking her on one at a time she could get inside, but only if no other trolls came. The sound of swordplay would draw a crowd faster than crows to carrion.
A harness jingled.
Reiko’s head snapped in the direction of the sound.
She shielded her eyes from the light coming out of the Troll Hall. As her vision adjusted, a man on horseback resolved out of the dark. He sat twenty or thirty horselengths away, invisible to the trolls outside the Hall. Reiko eased toward him, senses wide.
The horse shifted its weight when it smelled her. The man put his hand on its neck, calming it. Light from the Troll Hall hinted at the planes on his face. Halldór. Her lips tightened. He had followed her. Reiko warred with an irrational desire to call the trolls down on them.
She needed him. Halldór, with his drawings and histories, might know what the inside of the Troll Hall looked like.
Praying he would have sense enough to be quiet, she stepped out of the shadows. He jumped as she appeared, but stayed silent.
He swung off his horse and leaned close. His whisper was hot in her ear. “Forgive me. I did not follow you.”
He turned his head, letting her breathe an answer in return. “Understood. They have women inside.”
“I know.” Halldór looked toward the Troll Hall. Dried blood covered the left side of his face.
“We should move away to talk,” she said.
He took his horse by the reins and followed her. His horse’s hooves were bound with sheepskin so they made no sound on the rocks. Something had happened since she left the Parliament lands.
Halldór limped on his left side. Reiko’s heart beat as if she were running. The trolls had women prisoners. Halldór bore signs of battle. Trolls must have attacked the Parliament. They walked in silence until the sounds of the Troll Hall dwindled to nothing.
Halldór stopped. “There was a raid.” He stared at nothing, his jaw clenched. “While I was gone…they just let the trolls — ” His voice broke like a boy’s. “They have my girl.”
Mara. Anger slipped from Reiko. “Halldór, I’m sorry.” She looked for other riders. “Who came with you?”
He shook his head. “No one. They’re guarding the walls in case the trolls come back.” He touched the side of his face. “I tried persuading them.”
“Why did you come?”
“To get Mara back.”
“There are too many of them, bound man.” She scowled. “Even if you could get inside, what do you plan to do? Challenge the Troll King to single combat?” Her words resonated in her skull. Reiko closed her eyes, dizzy with the turns the gods spun her in. When she opened them, Halldór’s lips were parted in prayer. Reiko swallowed. “When does the sun rise?”
“In another hour.”
She turned to the Hall. In an hour, the trolls could not give chase; the sun would turn them to stone. She unbraided her hair.
Halldór stared as her long hair began flirting with the wind. She smiled at the question in his eyes. “I have a prophecy to fulfill.”
- - -
Reiko stumbled into the torchlight, her hair loose and wild. She clutched Halldór’s cloak around her shoulders.
One of the troll sentries saw her. “Hey. A dolly.”
Reiko contorted her face with fear and whimpered. The other troll laughed. “She don’t seem taken with you, do she?”
The first troll came closer. “She don’t have to.”
“Don’t hurt me. Please, please…” Reiko retreated from him. When she was between the two, she whipped Halldór’s cloak off, tangling it around the first troll’s head. With her sword, she gutted the other. He dropped to his knees, fumbling with his entrails as she turned to the first. She slid her sword under the cloak, slicing along the base of the first troll’s jaw.
Leaving them to die, Reiko entered the Hall. Women’s cries mingled with the sounds of debauchery.
She kept her focus on the battle ahead. She would be out-matched in size and strength, but hoped her wit and weapon would prevail. Her mouth twisted. She knew she would prevail. It was predestined.
A troll saw her. He lumbered closer. Reiko showed her sword, bright with blood. “I have met your sentries. Shall we dance as well?”
The troll checked his movement and squinted his beady eyes at her. Reiko walked past him. She kept her awareness on him, but another troll, Mucker, loomed in front of her.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“I am the one you sought. I am Chooser of the Slain. I have come for your King.”
Mucker laughed and reached for her, heedless of her sword. She dodged under his grasp and held the point to his jugular. “I have come for your King. Not for you. Show me to him.”
She leapt back. His hand went to his throat and came away with blood.
A bellow rose from the entry. Someone had found the sentries. Reiko kept her gaze on Mucker, but her peripheral vision filled with trolls running. Footsteps behind her. She spun and planted her sword in a troll’s arm. The troll howled, drawing back. Reiko shook her head. “I have come for your King.”
They herded her to the Hall. She had no chance of defeating them, but if the Troll King granted her single combat, she might escape the Hall with the prisoners. When she entered the great Hall, whispers flew; the number of slain trolls mounted with each rumor.
The Troll King lolled on his throne. Mara, her face red with shame, serviced him.
Anger buzzed in Reiko’s ears. She let it pass through her. “Troll King, I have come to challenge you.”
The Troll King laughed like an avalanche of stone tearing down his Hall. “You! A dolly wants to fight?”
Reiko paid no attention to his words.
He was nearly twice her height. Leather armor, crusted with crude bronze scales, covered his body. The weight of feast hung about his middle, but his shoulders bulged with muscle. If he connected a blow, she would die. But he would be fighting gravity as well as her. Once he began a movement, it would take time for him to stop and begin another.
Reiko raised her head, waiting until his laughter faded. “I am the Chooser of the Slain. Will you accept my challenge?” She forced a smile to her lips. “Or are you afraid to dance with me?”
“I will grind you to paste, dolly. I will sweep over your lands and eat your children for my breakfast.”
“If you win, you may. Here are my terms. If I win, the prisoners go free.”
He came down from his throne and leaned close. “If you win, we will never show a shadow in human lands.”
“Will your people hold that pledge when you are dead?”
He laughed. The stink of his breath boiled around her. He turned to the trolls packed in the Hall. “Will you?”
The room rocked with the roar of their voices. “Aye.”
The Troll King leered. “And when you lose, I won’t kill you till I’ve bedded you.”
“Agreed. May the gods hear our pledge.” Reiko manifested her armor.
As the night-black plates materialized around her, the Troll King bellowed, “What is this?”
“This?” She taunted him. “This is but a toy the gods have sent to play with you.”
She smiled in her helm as he swung his heavy iron sword over his head and charged her. Stupid. Reiko stepped to the side, already turning as she let him pass.
She brought her sword hard against the gap in his armor above his boot. The blade jarred against bone. She yanked her sword free; blood coated it like a sheath.
The Troll King dropped to one knee, hamstrung. Without waiting, she vaulted up his back and wrapped her arms around his neck. Like Aya riding piggyback. He flailed his sword through the air, reaching for her. She slit his throat. His bellow changed to a gurgle as blood fountained in an arc, soaking the ground.
A heavy ache filled her breast. She whispered in his ear. “I have killed you without honor. I am a machine of the gods.”
Reiko let gravity pull the Troll King down, as trolls shrieked. She leapt off his body as it fell forward.
Before the dust settled around him, Reiko pointed her sword at the nearest troll. “Release the prisoners.”
- - -
Reiko led the women into the dawn. As they left the Troll Hall, Halldór dropped to his knees with his arms lifted in prayer. Mara wrapped her arms around his neck, sobbing.
Reiko felt nothing. Why should she, when the victory was not hers? She withdrew from the group of women weeping and singing her praises.
Halldór chased her. “Lady, my life is already yours but my debt has doubled.”
He reminded her of a suitor in one of Aya’s bedtime stories, accepting gifts without asking what the witchyman’s price would be. She knelt to clean her sword on the moss. “Then give me your firstborn child.”
She could hear his breath hitch in his throat. “If that is your price.”
Reiko raised her eyes. “No. That is a price I will not ask.”
He knelt beside her. “I know why you can not kill me.”
“Good.” She turned to her sword. “When you fulfill your fate let me know, so I can.”
His blue eyes shone with fervor. “I am destined to return your daughter to you.”
Reiko’s heart flooded with pain and hope. She fought for breath. “Do not toy with me, bound man.”
“I would not. I reviewed the sagas after you went into the Hall. It says ‘and the gods smote Li Aya with their fiery hand.’ I can bring Li Aya here.”
Reiko sunk her fingers into the moss, clutching the earth. Oh gods, to have her little girl here — she trembled. Aya would not be a child. There would be no games of hide and seek. When they reached adulthood, each claimed the right of Li Reiko’s sword…how old would Aya be?
Reiko shook her head. She could not do that to her daughter. “You want to rip Aya out of time as well. If Nawi had not won, the Collapse would not have happened.”
Halldór brow furrowed. “But it already did.”
Reiko stared at the women, and the barren landscape beyond them. Everything she saw was a result of her son’s actions. Or were her son’s actions the result of choices made here? She did not know if it mattered. The cogs in the gods’ machine clicked forward.
“Are there any prophecies about Aya?”
Halldór nodded. “She’s destined to — ”
Reiko put her hand on his mouth as if she could stop fate. “Don’t.” She closed her eyes, fingers still resting on his lips. “If you bring her, promise me you won’t let her know she’s bound to the will of the gods.”
He nodded.
Reiko withdrew her hand and pressed it to her temple. Her skull throbbed with potential decisions. Aya had already vanished into fire; if Reiko did not decide to bring her here, where would Aya go?
Her bound man knelt next to her, waiting for her decision. Aya would not forgive Reiko for yanking her out of time, anymore than Reiko had forgiven Halldór.
His eyes flicked over her shoulder and then back. Reiko turned to follow his gaze. Mara comforted another girl. What did the future hold for Halldór’s daughter? In this time, women seemed to have no role.
But times could change. Watching Mara, Reiko knew which path to choose if she were granted free will.
“Bring Aya to me.” Reiko looked at the sword in her hand. “My daughter’s birthright waits for her.”
For the past 100 years, The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund has provided direct assistance to children, families and the elderly in New York. To celebrate the 101st campaign, an article will appear daily through Jan. 25. Each profile will illustrate the difference that even a modest amount of money can make in easing the struggles of the poor.
