Fossil Hunter

*14*

The year was a unit of time little used, although since Afsan’s discovery that the world was the moon of a large planet, the concept at least now had a meaningful definition. A year was the time it took for the Face of God—the planet around which the Quintaglio moon orbited—to complete one of its own orbits about the sun.

Astrologers had always been vaguely aware of the year, for that was the length of time it took for the pattern of constellations viewed at, say, the seventh daytenth, to cycle through a complete circle. But the year was such an impossibly long span that people paid little attention to it. The average Quintaglio would see only four years completed during his or her lifetime. Still, those who wished to be perceived as fashionable might now say, “It’s been years since I did thus and so,” whereas before the Afsanian revolution they would have remarked that it had been kilodays.

Not that a year and a kiloday were anywhere close to being equal in length. A kiloday was one thousand days, but a year was—opinions varied—somewhere between 18,310 and 18,335 days.

Still, there were subtle changes besides the constellations during the course of a year. The reproductive cycle of Quintaglios as well as some animals seemed to be tied to it. A female Quintaglio would normally be receptive for the first time eighteen kilodays—one year—after hatching, and become receptive again at an age of thirty-six kilodays and perhaps once more at fifty-four or fifty-five kilodays, producing, therefore, two or three clutches of eggs during her lifetime. A few females were constantly receptive, although, ironically, usually they were also barren. They tended to become hunt leaders.

Hereditary rulers were always taken from the first clutch of eggs. Dybo had been one of Len-Lends’s first clutch; she had not lived long enough to lay another. Even if she had, the second round of egglings would have been accorded little status. Dybo was male and therefore had some say in when he reproduced. He had been expected to do so when he reached the age of eighteen kilodays, but now, at twenty-eight, had still not called for a mate.

Even for females, the once-a-year mating cycle was only a loose correlation. They could be moved to estrus at different times, as, for instance, Wab-Novato had been, leading to her union with Afsan and the birth of Toroca and his siblings.

No one knew for sure how many years the world had left, but it was thought to be no more than ten or twenty. Novato decided therefore that the Geological Survey—which, after all, was only a preliminary stage in the exodus project—must be completed in a single year. That was a substantial amount of time—Toroca would be twenty kilodays old by the time the survey was finished, and Novato would be well into middle age—but the world was a big place, and there really wasn’t much time in that schedule to spare.

And because of that, Toroca hated how time-consuming this voyage would be. It was now understood that Land was an equatorial body, halfway between the world’s poles. The journey to the south pole, then, would be equivalent to sailing halfway around the world—the length of one leg of a pilgrimage voyage. And yet, to Toroca’s relief, the time passed reasonably quickly, for throughout this voyage, there were wonders to behold.

“My God!” Toroca exclaimed to himself one morning, standing on the Dasheter’s foredeck.

Keenir happened to be passing by. “What?” he said in his gravelly voice.

“My breath,” said Toroca, his eyes wide. “I can see my breath!”

Keenir clicked his teeth. “You’ve never been on a voyage to southern waters before, eh? Well, look at this.” The captain opened his mouth wide, gulped air, then moved his jaws together so that only a thin slit separated them. He exhaled, and a flat disk of whitish fog appeared around his muzzle.

“That’s incredible.” Toroca mimicked Keenir’s trick. He blinked in surprised. “What causes it?”

“The cold, lad. The air you breathe in is warmed in your lungs, so they tell me, then, when you expel it, it hits the cold air outside and condensation occurs. Just like fogging a piece of glass by breathing on it.”

“It’s amazing.”

Keenir ground his teeth in a chuckle. “You’ll get used to it.”

Toroca puffed air out again, white fog dissipating rapidly.

Some of Keenir’s crew had been with the Dasheter long enough to remember when the captain had been obsessed with having the lookout’s bucket, high atop the foremast, constantly occupied. He’d been mad to find Kal-ta-goot, the giant water reptile that had torn off his tail and scarred his face. But after Kal had been slain, Keenir had become less rigorous about having someone scanning the horizons. Now, though, with the Dasheter journeying ever southward, he insisted that the bucket always have an occupant.

His prudence paid off. Shortly after they passed the two-thirds mark in their voyage, a shout went up from old Mar-Biltog, the officer doing the watch.

Another officer scurried off to alert Keenir, running down the ramp that led to the lower decks. A moment later the captain thundered up onto the damp wooden planks. He glanced up at the lookout’s bucket to see which direction Biltog was indicating, then moved to the railing around the port leading edge of the ship’s fore hull. Keenir had his far-seer in hand, and he brought the brass tube to his eye.

“That’s a huge one,” said Keenir softly. Then, shouting: “It’ll be breaking up, this far north. Watch for fragments!”

Toroca, now wearing a light cloak—such a strange feeling for a nonpriest to have clothes on!—had come up on deck to see what all the shouting was about. He moved as close to Keenir as protocol would allow and looked out in the direction Keenir’s far-seer was pointed. There was indeed something there, brilliant in the sunlight, completely white. An island, perhaps? That would be fascinating! No islands were known this far from the mainland. “What is it?” Toroca asked.

Keenir stepped close enough to Toroca to hand him the far-seer, then moved back to a more appropriate separation. “Have a look. It’s called an iceberg.”

“An iceberg!” Toroca rotated the tube, bringing the object into focus for his younger eyes. “I’ve heard of them. Frozen water, right?”

“Right.”

“I never knew they could be so huge.”

“That’s a small one, actually.”

“It’s white,” said Toroca. “Water is clear.”

“Not when frozen. And not when there’s that much of it. It’s white, or bluish-white.”

“An iceberg. I’ve always wanted to see one of those. Captain, we must go closer!”

“No. It’s a hazard to navigation. The part you’re seeing above the waves is only a tenth of the whole thing; most of it is submerged. These icebergs drift north and melt. And they don’t just grow smaller and smaller until they disappear. Hunks drop off. If we hit one, it could rip our hull open. We’ll give it wide clearance; treat it as if it were a member of The Family—just get out of its way.”

“But I’d love to see so much ice up close.”

“You will. You’ll see more ice than you can possibly imagine. You’ll grow sick of it, I promise you.” Keenir lifted his head and shouted to his crew, “Hard to starboard!”

The night sky danced.

A curtain of diaphanous green fluttered across the firmament, now rippling, now waving. Its reflection could be seen on the water. Moments later, streamers of yellow grew upward from the horizon, twisting and intertwining as they did so, growing taller with each passing moment. Vertical bands of deeper green, pulsating as if alive, appeared across the sky, counterpointing the yellow.

Toroca thought he could hear, just below the threshold of certainty, a hissing sound, punctuated by occasional crackles, like a fire spitting its last.

The display was awe-inspiring, gorgeous—

—and fleeting. Already, it had started to fade.

Toroca shook his head in wonderment. He’d thought, perhaps, that his father had unraveled all the secrets of the skies, but it was clear that they still contained many new mysteries.