The Younger Gods (The Dreamers 4)

And then, for some reason neither of them understood, they both said, "Now."

And time began as the tiny light stopped being tiny and suddenly flared out to enormity, engulfing the darkness as it went.

Then Omago seized Ara's new form and carried her away, and she suddenly realized that they were moving even faster than the light.

In time—now that time existed—the light slowed, and the vast light began to break into smaller pieces Omago called "suns," but Ara called them "the children of the light." That seemed nicer than "suns" to Ara, but she chose not to make an issue of it with Omago. Then, in the endless eons that plodded along in time, the various suns also bore children that Omago called "worlds." Eventually, of course, the worlds also had children. Trees and grass came first, but then other living things began to appear, primarily in the oceans of the various worlds. Life, as Ara understood it to be, began in worlds uncountable in the vastness of the universe.

The universe continued to expand, but Ara and Omago concentrated their attention on a specific world and on what appeared to be a subcontinent that Ara named "Dhrall." It was a nice-sounding name that didn't really mean anything. "I think that might be a perfect place for a bit of experimentation, dear heart," she said to Omago. "This form you've given us seems to be most practical. Creatures that resemble us would probably be able to do many things that other creatures would find quite impossible." She held up one of her hands. "This alone would give our creatures an enormous advantage over creatures that only have feet. How were you able to invent hands when the time came for us to have bodies as well as awareness?"

Omago smiled. "Think back, dear heart," he told her. "We were in a very dangerous place, and we needed to leave—in a hurry. I wanted something that I could use to grab hold of you and pull you off to safety. If you'd like, we could call them 'Ara-grabbers,' I suppose."

"Not if you want me to say anything to you for the next million years, you won't," Ara replied tartly.

"I was only teasing, dear," Omago replied. He looked down at the land they called Dhrall. "I think it might be quite a long time before we'll be able to experiment, though. That land below is still at a very primitive level of development. I don't think any life-forms will appear on this world until the fire-mountains go to sleep."

"You're probably right, dear heart," Ara agreed. "This might be a good time for some exploration. This particular part of the world might be very nice after it cools down, but I think it might be a good time for us to find out what the rest of this world looks like, don't you?"

"That might take a long time, my love," Omago replied a bit dubiously.

"Not if I fly, it won't."

"You're going to sprout wings?"

"Why would I want to bother doing that? I'll just set my body aside and go exploring with my awareness."

Omago blinked. "I never thought of that," he admitted. "Are you sure that you can separate yourself from your body, though?"

"We'll find out in just a moment or two. I won't be long, dear heart. I don't think I'll really need to count pebbles or anything like that. All we need right now is a general idea of the shape of the various other bits and pieces of land here on this world. Take a nap or something. I'll be back in a day or so."

Ara felt a tremendous sense of freedom when she separated her awareness from her body. It was a nice enough body, but the limitations it imposed on her mind had been almost intolerable. Now she was free again, and she soared off into the sky.

The sea that lay to the west of the Land of Dhrall was extensive, but Ara's awareness found no signs of life there. "Ah, well," she sighed. "It looks as if we'll have to start from the beginning."

That took some of the joy away. It appeared that this particular world was barren, totally devoid of any form of life.

When she reached the land mass on the western side of the empty sea, she saw no signs of plants of any kind. There were mountains, however, but many of them were spouting fire miles and miles into the air.

"Oh, stop that," she told the mountains irritably.

And they did.

That startled Ara more than a little. "Good babies," she told them and then turned toward the south. If she could stop these eruptions with just a word, this plan she and Omago had devised might not be as difficult as it had previously seemed.

The land to the south was far less rugged than the land to the west had been, and Ara saw no telltale columns of smoke rising into the air. Evidently there were no fire-mountains down here—or if there were, they had exhausted their supply of molten rock.

"That's more like it," Ara said with a certain satisfaction.

She roamed about in the sky for several days and found even more regions with no fire-mountains. After another few days, she turned north to return to the Land of Dhrall. Omago was probably starting to worry, so it was time to go home.

Chapter Two

"Where have you been?" Omago demanded when Ara's awareness returned to the Land of Dhrall and rejoined her body. "I was starting to think that I'd lost you forever."

"You're not going to get away from me that easy, dear heart," she replied. "Actually, you'll never get away from me at all, so don't even think about it. We'll still be locked together when the universe is old and grey. I more or less found out what we needed to know. There are fire-mountains in other parts of this world, but not as many, and they aren't spitting fire nearly as far up into the air as the ones here in the Land of Dhrall are. I'd say that this is the newest part of this world."

"Did you encounter any life-forms at all?"

"Not on dry land. I sensed a few very primitive forms of life in the seas, but they've got a long way to go before they'll start coming up on dry land."

Omago looked out across the rolling sea. "We seem to have come here at the right time, then. We might want to experiment just a bit. We've seen many forms of life on other worlds, and they have characteristics that might be very useful. If we really want to, I'm sure that we could create a creature with wings and a level of intelligence that no bird-thing will ever have. Then we could also create an intelligent creature with gills, and that one could live out its life in the sea."

Ara shook her head. "No, dear heart," she said. "We know exactly what kind of creature we want here, and wings or gills wouldn't fit, and they could cause problems later on. Our creatures should resemble us. Our body-forms will prove to be the best, I think, so let's not start tampering."