Foreigner

*14*

An endless beach of sand, spreading to every horizon. No waves were visible, but their pounding against the shore formed a constant background, a steady, rhythmic pulse like the beating of many hearts.

Lying on the sand were several large broken eggshells. Each egg had opened and was cracked roughly in half. The halves were all sitting in the sand, rounded ends down, like beige bowls. Afsan walked over to the nearest shell half and looked inside. The edge was clearly visible, with a fringe of shell fragments still adhering to a tough white membrane. He couldn’t quite make out what was inside, though. He tipped forward from the waist, his tail lifting from the ground, and picked up the egg, cradling it in both hands. It was surprisingly heavy.

He tipped back, letting his weight rest on his tail, and looked down into the egg.

It was full of thick, dark liquid, bowing upward slightly into a meniscus. He rocked the egg gently back and forth, watching the liquid move inside the shell.

And then it hit him.

Blood.

The liquid was blood.

Afsan’s claws leapt out in alarm, piercing the eggshell in ten places.

Blood flowed onto Afsan’s hands.

He should have thrown the shell aside, but somehow he couldn’t, not until the dark red liquid had completely drained through the holes. He felt it begin to crust along the edges of his fingers, along the backs of his hands.

At last the egg was empty. He put the fragment back down on the sand.

He knew he shouldn’t look, but he had to. He moved a few paces over, found the next egg half, prodded it with his middle toeclaw. The egg tipped over, blood pouring out onto the ground.

Afsan’s heart was racing. He hurried over to another bowl-shaped egg half. It, too, was filled with crimson blood. He ran across the sands to a fourth egg-bowl. This one was so full that the vibrations caused by Afsan’s movement made blood slosh over the ragged edges.

Afsan spun around, terrified, and in so doing, his tail swept through a large arc, knocking over a trio of blood-filled eggshells, the dark fluid soaking the sands.

Everywhere he looked there were eggshells filled with blood sticking out of the sand, balanced precariously on their rounded ends. Afsan spun around again, his tail knocking over more of the shells, more blood pouring out.

The beach beneath him was saturated now. As he moved, his toeclaws sucked out of the wet sand, sounding like a dying gasp or like meat sliding down a gullet. Another step, another gasp.

Blood was pouring in from everywhere now. The upended eggshells had become bottomless cups, an endless torrent of red liquid flowing out of them onto the sands, sands that were rapidly turning into a bloody quicksand. Afsan tried to run, tried to get away, but with each step his body sank deeper and deeper into the sodden ground. Soon only his head and neck were above the surface, and then just his head, his long green jaw resting briefly on the sand.

Overhead, a giant wingfinger circled, its vast purple wings swirling about its body.

As he slipped below the surface, his last sight, brought to eye level as he continued to descend, was the broken eggshells, now empty, lying on their sides, scattered across the surface of the bloodied sands.

Afsan was growing progressively more annoyed with Mokleb. “Why don’t you say something?” he snapped.

“What would you like me to say?” said MokJeb her voice calm, reasonable.

“Anything. That you’re happy with my progress. That you’re unhappy with my progress. Anything at all.”

“I don’t pass judgments,” said Mokleb gently.

“Oh, yes you do,” Afsan said with a sneer. “You sit there day in and day out, and you judge me. You hear the intimate details of my life, and you judge them. I used to like you, Mokleb but I m getting sick of you. Sick to death.”

Silence.

“No response, Mokleb? Surely that merits a reply.”

“Why is it important that I reply to you?”

Afsan’s tone was quarrelsome. “It’s just good manners that’s all.”

“I see.”

“ ‘I see,’ ” said Afsan, mocking. “ ‘I see.’ God, I’m getting tired of these sessions.”

“I’ve never heard you so angry before, Afsan.” “Yeah? Well, things are changing, Mokleb. I’ve been going easy on you, but from now on, you’re going to hear exactly what I think.”

Mokleb reached for a fresh pot of ink.

Fra’toolar’s sky was leaden. It had been threatening to storm all day, but so far the clouds hadn’t given up their burden. When the sky was overcast like this, the material of the tower looked more gray than blue, the ladders like a column of vertebrae, the backbone of some giant creature that had come and gone before the Quintaglio race was born.

“I’m going to go up the tower,” said Novato. “I’m going to get in one of those lifeboats and ride up.”

Garios’s tail swished. “That could be dangerous,” he said. It’s—you know the old children’s story from Mar’toolar? Rewdan and the Vine. It’s just like that. The little boy, Rewdan, gets some magic seeds and plants them in the ground. A vine grows from them, and it keeps growing and growing and growing, up and un into the sky.”

“A child’s story,” said Novato. She waved her hand dismissively.

Garios pressed on. “And do you remember what happens? Rewdan climbs the vine, up into the clouds. And there he’s confronted by the most gigantic blackdeath anyone has ever seen all fangs and rotten-smelling breath.”

Novato clicked her teeth. “He also finds the wingfinger that lays eggs of gold, no? Maybe there is a giant beast up at the top, but if we’re to save our people we need the golden eggs—the knowledge that perhaps is waiting for us up there.”

“I—I worry about you,” said Garios.

“Thank you. But, as you know, we’ve tried putting cages containing lizards in the lifeboats, and they came back safe. Now we need to send somebody up who can come back down and describe what’s at the top.”

“Very well,” said Garios, his close-together eyes seeking out Novato’s. “I will concede territory on the necessity of the trip. But should you be the one to go? You’re very important to the exodus.”

“I am, in fact, in charge of the exodus, Garios. And that gives me no choice. I can’t order someone to do something I would not do myself.”

Garios considered. Then: “I want to go with you.” Novato shook her head. “You can’t. No one can. We’d kill each other in there.”

“But maybe with the see-though hull, maybe the territorial instinct wouldn’t kick in. If we kept our backs to each other…”

“I’d still know you were there, Garios. I’d be able to smell your pheromones, just as you could smell mine.”

“But we’ve seen how air is somehow recirculated through the lifeboat—the gentle breeze that comes through the vents in its walls. Maybe our pheromones would be washed away.”

“I doubt it, and even if they were, it’s just too small a space. The round trip takes twenty days, Garios. Oh, the things you mention might let us survive together for a few days, but not for twenty. Long before then just the sound of your breathing would be enough to put me in dagamant—and vice versa, of course.”

Garios looked like he was going to make another objection, but apparently thought better of it. “Very well,” he said at last. “But—”

“Yes?” said Novato.

Garios dipped his long muzzle, looking at the ground. “Come back, Novato,” he said. “Be safe, and come back to us.” A pause, then he lifted his muzzle. “To me.”

Novato turned away. “Help me start gathering supplies,” she said.