New Frontiers (24 page)

Before Hari-ibn-Hari could express his undying thanks, the bearded, gnomish storyteller who was known throughout the bazaar as the Daemon of the Night, asked coldly, “How much does the sultan pay you for these stories?”

*   *   *

THUS IT CAME
to pass that Hari-ibn-Hari, accompanied by Fareed-al-Shaffa and the gray-bearded Daemon of the Night, knelt before the grand vizier. The workmen refurbishing the golden ceiling of the grand vizier's chamber were dismissed from their scaffolds before the grand vizier asked, from his chair of authority:

“Why have you asked to meet with me this day?”

The three storytellers, on their knees, glanced questioningly at one another. At length, Hari-ibn-Hari dared to speak.

“Oh, magnificent one, we have provided you with a myriad of stories so that your beautiful and virtuous daughter, on whom Allah has bestowed much grace and wisdom, may continue to delight the sultan.”

“May he live in glory,” exclaimed Fareed-al-Shaffa in his reedy voice.

The grand vizier eyed them impatiently, waiting for the next slipper to drop.

“We have spared no effort to provide you with new stories, father of all joys,” said Hari-ibn-Hari, his voice quaking only slightly. “Almost every storyteller in Baghdad has contributed to the effort.”

“What of it?” the grand vizier snapped. “You should be happy to be of such use to me—and my daughter.”

“Just so,” Hari-ibn-Hari agreed. But then he added, “However, hunger is stalking the Street of the Storytellers. Starvation is on its way.”

“Hunger?” the grand vizier snapped. “Starvation?”

Hari-ibn-Hari explained, “We storytellers have bent every thought we have to creating new stories for your lovely daughter—blessings upon her. We don't have time to tell stories in the bazaar anymore—”

“You'd better not!” the grand vizier warned sternly. “The sultan must hear only new stories, stories that no one else has heard before. Otherwise he would not be intrigued by them and my dearly loved daughter would lose her head.”

“But, most munificent one,” cried Hari-ibn-Hari, “by devoting ourselves completely to your needs, we are neglecting our own. Since we no longer have the time to tell stories in the bazaar, we have no other source of income except the coppers you pay us for our tales.”

The grand vizier at last saw where they were heading. “You want more? Outrageous!”

“But, oh far-seeing one, a single copper for each story is not enough to keep us alive!”

Fareed-al-Shaffa added, “We have families to feed. I myself have four wives and many children.”

“What is that to me?” the grand vizier shouted. He thought that these pitiful storytellers were just like workmen everywhere, trying to extort higher wages for their meager efforts.

“We cannot continue to give you stories for a single copper apiece,” Fareed-al-Shaffa said flatly.

“Then I will have your tongues taken from your throats. How many stories will you be able to tell then?”

The three storytellers went pale. But the Daemon of the Night, small and frail though he was in body, straightened his spine and found the strength to say, “If you do that, most noble one, you will get no more stories and your daughter will lose her life.”

The grand vizier glared angrily at the storytellers. From her hidden post in the veiled gallery, Scheherazade felt her heart sink. Oh father! she begged silently, Be generous. Open your heart.

At length the grand vizier muttered darkly, “There are many storytellers in Baghdad. If you three refuse me I will find others who will gladly serve. And, of course, the three of you will lose your tongues. Consider carefully. Produce stories for me at one copper apiece, or be silenced forever.”

“Our children will starve!” cried Fareed-al-Shaffa.

“Our wives will have to take to the streets to feed themselves,” wailed Hari-ibn-Hari.

The Daemon of the Night said nothing.

“That is your choice,” said the grand vizier, as cold and unyielding as a steel blade. “Stories at one copper apiece or I go to other storytellers. And you lose your tongues.”

“But magnificent one—”

“That is your choice,” the grand vizier repeated sternly. “You have until noon tomorrow to decide.”

*   *   *

IT WAS A
gloomy trio of storytellers who wended their way back to the bazaar that day.

“He is unyielding,” Fareed-al-Shaffa said. “Too bad. I have been thinking of a new story about a band of thieves and a young adventurer. I think I'll call him Ali Baba.”

“A silly name,” Hari-ibn-Hari rejoined. “Who could take seriously a story where the hero's name is so silly?”

“I don't think the name is silly,” Fareed-al-Shaffa maintained. “I rather like it.”

As they turned in to the Street of the Storytellers, with ragged, lean, and hungry men at every door pleading with passersby to listen to their tales, the Daemon of the Night said softly, “Arguing over a name is not going to solve our problem. By tomorrow noon we could lose our tongues.”

Hari-ibn-Hari touched reflexively at his throat. “But to continue to sell our tales for one single copper is driving us into starvation.”

“We will starve much faster if our tongues are cut out,” said Fareed-al-Shaffa.

The others nodded unhappily as they plodded up the street and stopped at Fareed's hovel.

“Come in and have coffee with me,” he said to his companions. “We must think of a way out of this problem.”

All four of Fareed-al-Shaffa's wives were home, and all four of them asked the storyteller how they were expected to feed their many children if he did not bring in more coins.

“Begone,” he commanded them—after they had served the coffee. “Back to the women's quarters.”

The women's quarters were nothing more than a squalid room in the rear of the hovel, teeming with noisy children.

Once the women had left, the three storytellers squatted on the threadbare carpet and sipped at their coffee cups.

“Suppose this carpet could fly,” mused Hari-ibn-Hari.

Fareed-al-Shaffa hmphed. “Suppose a genie appeared and gave us riches beyond imagining.”

The Daemon of the Night fixed them both with a somber gaze. “Suppose you both stop toying with new story ideas and turn your attention to our problem.”

“Starve from low wages or lose our tongues,” sighed Hari-ibn-Hari.

“And once our tongues have been cut out the grand vizier goes to other storytellers to take our place,” said the Daemon of the Night.

Fareed-al-Shaffa said slowly, “The grand vizier assumes the other storytellers will be too terrified by our example to refuse his starvation wage.”

“He's right,” Hari-ibn-Hari said bitterly.

“Is he?” mused Fareed. “Perhaps not.”

“What do you mean?” his two companions asked in unison.

Stroking his beard thoughtfully, Fareed-al-Shaffa said, “What if all the storytellers refused to work for a single copper per tale?”

Hari-ibn-Hari asked cynically, “Would they refuse before or after our tongues have been taken out?”

“Before, of course.”

The Daemon of the Night stared at his fellow storyteller. “Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting?”

“I am.”

Hari-ibn-Hari gaped at the two of them. “No, it would never work. It's impossible!”

“Is it?” asked Fareed-al-Shaffa. “Perhaps not.”

*   *   *

THE NEXT MORNING
the three bleary-eyed storytellers were brought before the grand vizier. Once again Scheherazade watched and listened from her veiled gallery. She herself was bleary-eyed as well, having spent all night telling the sultan the tale of Ala-al-Din and his magic lamp. As usual, she had left the tale unfinished as the dawn brightened the sky.

This night she must finish the tale and begin another. But she had no other to tell! Her father had to get the storytellers to bring her fresh material. If not, she would lose her head with tomorrow's dawn.

“Well?” demanded the grand vizier as the three storytellers knelt trembling before him. “What is your decision?”

The three of them had chosen the Daemon of the Night to be their spokesperson. But as he gazed up at the fierce countenance of the grand vizier, his voice choked in his throat.

Fareed-al-Shaffa nudged him, gently at first, then more firmly.

At last the Daemon said, “Oh, magnificent one, we cannot continue to supply your stories for a miserable one copper per tale.”

“Then you will lose your tongues!”

“And your daughter will lose her head, most considerate of fathers.”

“Bah! There are plenty of other storytellers in Baghdad. I'll have a new story for my daughter before the sun goes down.”

Before the Daemon of the Night could reply, Fareed-al-Shaffa spoke thusly, “Not so, sir. No storyteller will work for you for a single copper per tale.”

“Nonsense!” snapped the grand vizier.

“It is true,” said the Daemon of the Night. “All the storytellers have agreed. We have sworn a mighty oath. None of us will give you a story unless you raise your rates.”

“Extortion!” cried the grand vizier.

Hari-ibn-Hari found his voice. “If you take our tongues, oh most merciful of men, none of the other storytellers will deal with you at all.”

Before the astounded grand vizier could reply to that, Fareed-al-Shaffa explained, “We have formed a guild, your magnificence, a storytellers' guild. What you do to one of us you do to us all.”

“You can't do that!” the grand vizier sputtered.

“It is done,” said the Daemon of the Night. He said it softly, almost in a whisper, but with great finality.

The grand vizier sat on his chair of authority getting redder and redder in the face, his chest heaving, his fists clenching. He looked like a volcano about to erupt.

When, from the veiled gallery above them, Scheherazade cried out, “I think it's wonderful! A storytellers' guild. And you created it just for me!”

The three storytellers raised their widening eyes to the balcony of the gallery, where they could make out the slim and graceful form of a young woman, suitably gowned and veiled, who stepped forth for them all to see. The grand vizier twisted around in his chair and nearly choked with fury.

“Father,” Scheherazade called sweetly, “is it not wonderful that the storytellers have banded together so that they can provide stories for me to tell the sultan night after night?”

The grand vizier started to reply once, twice, three times. Each time no words escaped his lips. The three storytellers knelt before him, staring up at the gallery where Scheherazade stood openly before them—suitably gowned and veiled.

Before the grand vizier could find his voice, Scheherazade said, “I welcome you, storytellers, and your guild. The grand vizier, the most munificent of fathers, will gladly pay you ten coppers for each story you relate to me. May you bring me a thousand of them!”

Before the grand vizier could figure how much a thousand stories would cost, at ten coppers per story, Fareed-al-Shaffa smiled up at Scheherazade and murmured, “A thousand and one, oh gracious one.”

*   *   *

THE GRAND VIZIER
was unhappy with the new arrangement, although he had to admit that the storytellers' newly founded guild provided stories that kept the sultan amused and his daughter alive.

The storytellers were pleased, of course. Not only did they keep their tongues in their heads and earn a decent income from their stories, but they shared the subsidiary rights to the stories with the grand vizier once Scheherazade had told them to the sultan and they could then be related to the general public.

Ten coppers per story was extortionate, in the grand vizier's opinion, but the storytellers' guild agreed to share the income from the stories once they were told in the bazaar. There was even talk of an invention from far-off Cathay, where stories could be printed on vellum and sold throughout the kingdom. The grand vizier consoled himself with the thought that if sales were good enough, the income could pay for regilding his ceiling.

The sultan eventually learned of the arrangement, of course. Being no fool, he demanded a cut of the profits. Reluctantly, the grand vizier complied.

Scheherazade was the happiest of all. She kept telling stories to the sultan until he relented of his murderous ways, much to the joy of all Baghdad.

She thought of the storytellers' guild as her own personal creation and called it Scheherazade's Fables and Wonders Association.

That slightly ponderous name was soon abbreviated to SFWA.

 

AFTERWORD TO

“SCHEHERAZADE AND THE STORYTELLERS”

 

The story was written as my contribution to
Gateways
, a story collection honoring Frederik Pohl on his ninetieth birthday, edited by his wife, Elizabeth Anne Hull.

The storytellers are all based on fellow writers of science fiction, their names thinly disguised by pseudo-Arabic monikers.

In addition to being a masterful storyteller himself, and a good and dear friend, Fred Pohl was a Grand Master of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America—a slightly ponderous name that is usually abbreviated as SFWA.

 

INTRODUCTION TO

“DUEL IN THE SOMME”

 

The frontier in this story is a frontier of technology.
Virtual reality
is the name commonly given to an electronic method of presenting sensory inputs to a person. A VR user sees, hears, even feels a simulation of the real world. VR allows you to
experience
a scene, instead of merely reading or watching or listening to it, a scene that actually exists only in the circuitry of the virtual reality system.

Although VR technology hasn't gone as far as it is presented in “Duel in the Somme,” the day is coming when virtual reality systems will offer a complete digital hallucination; the user will not be able to tell the difference between the VR simulation he (or she) is experiencing and the real world.