Child of Fortune by Norman Spinrad Read Free Book Online Page A

example of the planetmolder's art. This much, naturellement, was common lore, which is to say that even as indifferent a scholar as I knew Edoku as a Xanadu among the worlds of men, but upon delving deeper, I soon enough became quite entranced.
     
    In the middle of the First Starfaring Age, a terminally damaged arkology had managed to transfer its citizens to the surface of a fairly large satellite of a gas giant. Rich in mineral resources but devoid of atmosphere or biosphere, this moon was a tabula rasa upon which generations of planetmolders, landscape architects, genetic designers, und so weiter, had created a totally ersatz geography, ecosphere, and cityscape, a planetary metropolis and garden, in which every hill and stream, every plant and creature, indeed clime, gravity, and the quality of light itself, was a conscious work of human craft, and Edoku entire, so some said, our species' highest work of art.
     
    Naturellement, over the centuries, such a celestial city became one of the cultural, artistic, scientific, and commercial centers of the worlds of men -- an El Dorado of riches and extravagance, a Rome to which all roads led.
     
    Including, I determined, my own, for it is not in the nature of the naive and inexperienced to wish to begin their adventures in a venue any less exalted than the brightest jewel to catch their eye, and if I was to be limited to the choice of free passage to a single world, where better to go than such a world of wonder and opportunity, where certain streets, it was said, were quite literally paved with gold, and where, therefore, a girl of spirit, resource, and wit might best and most easily win a fortune with which to travel on.
     
    ***
     
    While my parents were openly cheered at the transformation in my spirit when at breakfast I informed them of my decision to accept the terms for my wanderjahr that they had laid down and commence to make my preparations for departure at once, my choice of worlds was greeted with something less than unbridled joy.
     
    "Edoku?" my mother fairly moaned. "Could you not choose some less exalted world to conquer?"
     
    "With ease," I drawled. "For is it not the general lore that Edoku is a jewel among the worlds of men, a planet rich in knowledge, beauty, wisdom, and art, and dripping, moreover, with wealth?"
     
    "All that and more, or so I have heard," Leonardo agreed sourly. "And as such, a magnet for Children of Fortune seeking a portion of same, as well as merchants, mountebanks, and thieves from all the worlds of men far better equipped than my kleine Moussa to survive, let alone prosper, in such a realm."
     
    "I think it best you choose a more modest venue in which to begin your journey far from home," my mother said. "Some world where a young girl on her own would have a better chance to earn credits toward --"
     
    "Where better to accumulate gelt than on a world where it is as common as dirt on Glade?" I demanded. "Is it not yourselves, dear parents, who have limited your largesse to passage to a single world? And passage to any world I choose, by your own words! Have you not commended to me the true vie of the Child of Fortune, with, as I remember the quote, 'all its dangers, hardships, and fairly-won delights'?"
     
    I could scarcely contain my glee as they glanced at each other in bemused and discomforted silence, for now, at last, it was I who had turned their words back on them, it was my turn to rest easy on the very philosophic ground upon which they had so adamantly stood, and their turn to be reduced to impotent silence in a logical cul-de-sac.
     
    "Perusing the Void Ship schedules, I have learned that the Bird of Night departs Glade ten days from now on a course which will eventually take it to Edoku," I informed them. "It is my intention to be on it, unless ..."
     
    "Unless?" they said in unison, grasping at the straw I could not forbear from offering in a teasing spirit.
     
    "Unless, of course, you choose instead to modify