Robert Sawyer: Fossil Hunter

Capital City

Afsan (Sal-Afsan)—advisor to Dy-Dybo

Bogkash (Det-Bogkash)—Master of the Faith

Cadool (Pal-Cadool)—aide to Afsan

Drawtood—dockworker, Afsan’s son

Dybo (Dy-Dybo)—Emperor

Galpook (Lub-Galpook)—hunt leader, Afsan’s daughter

Gathgol (Var-Gathgol)—undertaker

Maliden (Mek-Maliden)—imperial bloodpriest

Novato (Wab-Novato)—leader of the exodus project

Geological Survey of Land

Babnol (Wab-Babnol)—team member

Biltog (Mar-Biltog)—mate aboard the Dasheter

Delplas (Bar-Delplas)—team member

Keenir (Var-Keenir)—captain of the Dasheter

Toroca (Kee-Toroca)—leader, Afsan’s son

Edz’toolar Province

Rodlox (Dy-Rodlox)—governor

Five thousand kilodays ago, God laid the eight eggs of creation. When they hatched, the world was born.

From the first egg came all the water. God let it run in a vast circular path and it became the Great River.

From the second egg came Land itself, and God set Land floating down the River.

From the third egg came the air, and God allowed it to flow everywhere that was not the River and not the Land.

From the fourth egg came the sun, source of light and heat.

From the fifth egg came the stars, planets, and moons, and God raised them high above.

From the sixth egg came all the flowers and trees and vegetables and roots and every other thing that is a plant.

From the seventh egg came those lesser beasts that eat the plants, including the shovelmouths and thunderbeasts and hornfaces and armorbacks. Also from the seventh egg came the fish and lizards and shelled creatures of the water.

And from the eighth and final egg came the greater creatures that dine on flesh, the terrorclaws and blackdeaths and runningbeasts and fangjaws and more.

But even with all eight eggs hatched, God was not pleased. She wanted something else, something that would think and pray. So, after much contemplation, She bit off Her own left arm and let it fall to Land. The blood flowing from the stump of Her arm made the soil rich. The fingers of Her hand detached, and each became one of the five original great and proud hunters: Lubal, Mekt, Katoon, Hoog, and Belbar, five females of strength and courage and acumen. And the five hunters pleased God and She watched them hunt throughout Land.

But the hunters themselves were not pleased, and so they prayed to God. “You have laid the Eggs of Creation,” they said, “but we, too, wish to lay eggs and have creations of our own.”

For the first time, the Land quaked, for God was angered by the impudence of the Original Five. But then God relented. “Only I may create on my own,” She said, “but I will give you the power to create jointly.” And God sacrificed of Herself again, biting off Her right arm. It, too, fell to Land, and blood from it made the soil even richer. Its five fingers became five more Quintaglios, and these Quintaglios were the same and yet different, for they were male. They each began a different task: Varkev was the first explorer; Dargo, the original healer; Takood, the first scholar; and Jostark, the craftsperson before all others. And, to keep the rest properly obedient to God, the fifth finger became Detoon the Righteous, first of all priests.

The ten who had been the fingers of God came together and produced five clutches of eight eggs. But God said soon all of Land would be overrun with Quintaglios if all those egglings were allowed to live. Therefore, She charged Mekt with devouring seven out of every eight hatchlings, and Mekt was thus the first bloodpriest.

But then Lubal declared that this portion of Land was hers; and Katoon said, and this portion is mine; and Mekt delineated a territory she called her own; and Hoog likewise claimed exclusive dominion over a part of Land; and Belbar asserted a territory, too. And the males, in a similar fashion, divided up the remaining parts of Land.

God was angry, for this was not what She had intended. But She had sacrificed Her arms to make five females and five males and until Her hands regenerated there was nothing that She could do.

One of them was going to die.

Toroca, leader of the Geological Survey of Land, caught sight of the confrontation purely by accident.

He was working nine-tenths of the way up the cliff face, just below the. Bookmark layer, looking for fossils.

As usual, Toroca wasn’t finding anything. He’d dug his pick countless times into the gray shale just below the chalk stratum, and each time he’d found nothing but plain rock. It was tiring work, so he decided to take a break. He braced himself firmly in a cleft in the rocks, then gulped water from the shovelmouth bladder he used as a canteen. He half turned to look out. The cliff face dropped for more than a hundred vertical paces directly below him. Still, it bowed out enough that it wasn’t a difficult climb in most places, and in those spots where the rocks themselves did not afford adequate purchase, his surveyors had set up webs of climbing ropes.

The cliff ended in a narrow expanse of sandy beach, and beyond that there were choppy gray waves leading out to the horizon. Above the waves, far, far out, he could see a large wingfinger circling, its furry, copper-colored wings bright against the purple sky, a sky that today was free of cloud. The sun was a tiny white disk about halfway up the bowl of the sky. Three pale daytime moons were visible.

Toroca’s eyes fell back on the beach.

His survey team consisted of eight Quintaglios. Two of them were visible far below and some distance up the beach. They were almost too small to identify, although their green skin stood out well against the beige sands. On the one nearest to him, he could just make out all four limbs and the tail; on the other one, he couldn’t even make out that much detail.

They were standing awfully close to each other, only five or six paces between them.

Toroca brought up a hand to shield his eyes. Something funny in the way they were moving—

Bobbing up and down—

Toroca’s claws jumped out in shock. He brought his hands to the sides of his muzzle and yelled, “No!”

They couldn’t hear him. The wind tore away his words. He began to scramble down the cliff face. Doing so meant turning his back to them so that he could see the rocks, find the footholds.

Where were the other members of the survey team? Either off exploring elsewhere, or else when they’d seen the territorial challenge display, they’d run away, lest they succumb to the sight of bobbing torsos, rhythmically moving up and down, up and down…

Toroca’s claws were chipping against the rock as he continued his rapid descent. He came to a little fissure in the rocks and turned to climb down the web of thick ropes that covered it. He was about halfway down the cliff now and could see the other two better.

The closer one was Delplas, a middle-aged female. She was still too tiny to recognize by her features, but her distinctive blue and orange sash gave her away. Her torso was tipped right over now, the tail lifted clear off the ground, her body rising and falling over and over again, pivoting at the hips.

Got to hurry. They’d be at each other’s throats any moment. Toroca paused in his descent long enough to shout “No!” again, but either the wind was still preventing them from hearing him, or else they were too deep in the madness of dagamant to listen.