An alert reader has informed me that The Willows has folded and thus it is no longer possible to acquire the issue with my story in it.

It's nice to be presented with a problem I can solve.

You may now read "The Replacement" for free here.

ABSENT FROM FELICITY

( Fortinbras is not Hamlet )

Also, happy Shakespeare's birthday!

This is a rarity: my only completed science fiction story.

( Sundered )

Context here.
Inciting rant here.
papersky is collecting offerings here.

Also, happy Shakespeare's Birthday (Observed).

( solidarity forever )

He looks at the ship and says, "I don't deserve this."

They all stare at him: the tall fair people, the wizard, his friends. "Nonsense, my boy," the wizard says, making a good recovery. "Of course you do. You wouldn't be here if you didn't."

"No," he says, more certain now. "It's not . . . right."

They don't understand him. The tall fair people mostly look bored, a little offended. "You won't get a second chance," warns one of them--he can't tell them apart anymore. His friends are distressed. "But you have to, sir," says one--he has a hard time telling them apart sometimes, too. "You've been so ill."

"Yes, I know. You think I'm dying. But if that's true, isn't this a cheat?"

The tall fair people are definitely offended now. The wizard drags him aside, fingers as gnarled and hard as oak doubtless leaving bruises. "Speak a little fairer, my friend," the wizard advises in a grim whisper.

"I don't mean it's a cheat for them," he protests. "It's their ship. But if I'm dying, shouldn't I have the courage and the honesty to, well, die? And if I'm not dying . . ."

The wizard raises bushy eyebrows. "If?"

"Why should I get to escape being tired and in pain and lonely?"

"You--"

"I failed," he says levelly. "You know that as well as I do. That the quest succeeded is ultimately a happy accident, nothing more. I do not deserve this gift."

"Perhaps it isn't a question of deserving," the wizard suggests.

"Oh, but it is. It's my reward for doing a job none of you wanted." He laughs, bitterly, at the expression on the wizard's face. "Did you really think I didn't know? That that's exactly what it is? My reward for madness and pain and failure. And you know something? Even if I do deserve it, I don't want it. Let one of them"--with a wave at his friends, clustered anxiously on the shore--"go. Any one of them deserves it more than I."

"You are ill."

"It hasn't killed me yet."

"What are you going to do?"

For the first time in--weeks? months? years? He can't remember how long it's been since he last smiled, and the expression is achingly unfamiliar on his face. He says truthfully, almost joyfully, "I have absolutely no bloody idea."

And he turns and walks away.