NEW2ASCA: Freedom Is Standing in the Light (TOS, PG) 1/3
Mary Ellen Curtin
Author: name withheld by author's request
Series: TOS
Part: 1/3
Rating: PG
Codes: NR (not revealed); character death; hankie alert
Summary: The mysterious city-dweller on a remote world
has devoted his life and wealth to hearing travellers'
tales. He rescues a young outlaw from the hills, and
his quest comes to an end.
Introduction:
"Freedom is Standing in the Light" was first published
in 1980 in SUN AND SHADOW, a zine dedicated to the
"hurt/comfort" theme in the Kirk/Spock relationship, a
theme that was very popular among "relationship" fans
in the pre-slash era. Reaction to the story was
overwhelmingly positive. Many many fans claimed that it
was the best piece of fan fiction ever published. A
review in UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR 9 (1981) called it "gut-
wrenching ...heartbreaking ... [and] unforgettable ....
The lyric quality meshes with the legend-like aura of
the tale."
"Freedom" is appearing online with the explicit
approval of the author, who wishes to remain anonymous.
Ze has stated: "I don't want e-mail. Fans have praised
me generously in the past; I hope they will give their
feedback to new writers who really want and need it."
Comments about the story should be posted to the
newsgroup. The poster asks long-time fans who recognize
the story not to mention the author's name in public
fora, to protect hir privacy as much as possible.
This story is being posted as part of the "Foresmutters
Project", an anarchic effort to make some of the best
old Star Trek fanfiction available online. No work will
be posted without the express consent of the author or
hir estate.
Disclaimer & Copyright notice: Copyright 1980 by
Carol Ann Frisbie (PULSAR PRESS). Star Trek is the
property of Paramount/Viacom. This is a work of
noncommercial
amateur fan fiction; it is not published for profit or
material gain. The author and the posters have no
intent to infringe any intellectual property rights
held by the owners of existing copyrights in Star Trek
or its derivative works. PULSAR PRESS owns the right to
first publication of this story. The author retained
the right to publish derivative works and accordingly,
published a "de-Trekked" version professionally in
1987. The author retains copyright to this original
version of this work. If you wish to dispute the
posting of this story on the 'net, *please* correspond
directly with Mary Ellen Curtin
(mecu...@alumni.princeton.edu) and Judith Gran
(judy...@aol.com) as the author is emphatic about
maintaining hir anonymity in cyberspace.
Archiving: ASC/EM *only*, for now.
- - -
Freedom Is Standing in the Light
A tree cracked the pavement where the cobbles met the
wall and grew up as tall as a man. To the man who
watched from the deep window or the arched doorway
across the alley, it seemed to happen apart from the
ebb and flow of Arketh traffic, outside time.
One day there was nothing but the whitewashed wall,
scarred by overburdened carts and stick-wielding boys,
then the young tree stood man high, swinging its green
and silver leaves, throwing its graceful shadow over
the plaster and the cobbles.
The watcher had no illusions. When a club was needed,
or a fire, the living tree would be slain; yet it was
the tree in the alley he watched, not the plantings in
his water garden.
He had chosen his house because of its location in the
alley. The hillmen took this narrow way from the north
gate to the free quarter of the city. Any free man was
wise to do so. Kahnsmen policed lesser forms of life
from the wide ways the nobles took. So all the
travelers from the steppes passed this door, marching
south for adventure, selling their daughters into
slavery, bringing their beasts and barter and stories.
It was the stories he bought, paying round silver coins
for tales of the wild clans who lived up on the edge of
the world. During the day a succession of small boys
had cried his need to the passing crowds, pointing to
the large, pointed ear drawn on his wall. At night he
visited the inns, ignoring the drinks he ordered to
listen to travelers' tales as if he believed them.
He was accounted rich without belonging to any clan. No
one knew who his people were. Some said Southron; some
said he flew in over the ice and was looking for a way
back. several times he had made up parties of hillmen
to guide him on the Edge, and once he had forced them
to take him clear to the ice, losing half the guides
and all the animals, but he paid the clans well, and as
the years passed he was accepted. It was a saying in
the marketplace that a man might grow ears as long as
he liked if he grew his purse longer.
This night the sun set in bloom of sulphur and brass.
The sky faded to a red-brown dusk as the first wind
blew the fine, fine dust in from the desert. When the
light was gone and the traffic with it, he left off
watching the tree and went to prepare his meal. He had
no servant to intrude on his solitude. He closed the
door to the house, but left the gate open that lead
from the alley to the garden.
Water was wealth in these lowlands. He would not hoard
it. Many hillmen, descending the stone passes and
canyons from the Edge where water was free, would have
suffered want of it but for that unlocked gate. At
first the lowlanders had stolen from him -- a little,
not enough to make him move -- but he had ignored them.
Now there was less of it.
When he had eaten it was still too early to go out. As
the silt sifted down underfoot the air cleared, and he
waited in the garden, watching the stars brighten the
dark. Arketh was a moonless world, far out at the tip
of one spiral arm of the galaxy. Its dark sky was only
sparsely spangled with stars, so the central knot of
brilliance that filled one quarter of the dome drew the
eye to its magnificence. That blaze was the heart of
the galaxy, and beyond it, obscured by the glory, was
the other arm, where his homeworld circled its sun.
The watcher's face was lean and dark, without much
expression. When he heard the uneven rush of running
feet and tattered figure skidded through the gate, he
turned to face the intruder without alarm. A long
knife leveled at his chest he ignored. The runner was a
youth, scarcely more than a boy, dressed in the long
woolen shirt of the hillmen. The belt at his waist held
an assortment of gear and weapons. His brown legs were
bare to the knee where his soft boots tied. His long
hair was light, his eyes green or amber, bright with
total concentration and with pain. The snapped-off
shaft of a throwing stick protruded from the back of
his thigh and hampered his stride. Blood ran down his
leg into his fur-lined boot. Other running feet
clattered over the cobbles -- the hard-shod feet of
city dwellers.
"In there," said the watcher, with a slight inclination
of his head toward the arched entry to the house.
The runner hesitated, the knife still poised for
action; then he jumped for shelter as his pursuers ran
past the door, checked, and doubled back. Five of them
spilled into the garden, giving tongue all at once,
like a pack of hounds that tolerate each other for the
sake of the prey.
They were sons of the city's lesser nobility by the
clothes they wore, too young to be Kahnsmen yet, but
eager to grow into it. Each of them had a weapon
pointed at the watcher.
The leader silenced them with a snarl. "A running man,
where is he?"
Dark eyes studied each face in turn, seeming not se the
threat. Finally the watcher shrugged.
"You must have lost him. No one but you is here
uninvited. Search if you wish."
His indifference daunted them. They had no authority.
The leader's voice cracked in indignation as he
replied. "Be glad this one isn't. He's killed three
Kahnsmen. He'd as soon cut your throat as give you good
evening."
The watcher made no reply, and one of the pack plucked
at the leader's arm.
"He wouldn't go to ground right here in Spenarr; let's
watch the gate."
With an insolent nod and no apology for their
intrusion, the leader consented. The watcher followed
them and, for the first time in many years, closed the
iron gate and barred it. Then he returned to the pool
and stood watching the small life there until all sound
had died away. Gossamer fins fanned the water;
languorous weeds swayed on the surface.
End part 1/3
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