"David G. Hartwell - Year's Best Fantasy 5" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hartwell David G)

“But still,” Barrow told himself. “These claws and scales are enough to pay for my year. If it comes to
that.”

But it didn’t have to come to that.

Inside the fossil lay the reason for all of his suffering and boredom: behind the stone-infected heart was an
intricate organ as long as he was tall—a spongelike thing set above the peculiar dragon lungs. The organ
was composed of gold and lustrous platinum wrapped around countless voids. In an instant, Barrow had
become as wealthy as his dreams had promised he would be. He let out an enormous yell, dancing back
and forth across the back of the dead dragon. Then he collapsed beside his treasure, crying out of joy,
and when he wiped back the tears one final time, he saw something else.

Eons ago, a fine black mud had infiltrated the dead body, filling the cavities while keeping away the free
oxygen.

Without oxygen, there was almost no decay.

Floating in the old mudstone were at least three round bodies, each as large as the largest naval cannon
balls. They were not organs, but they belonged inside the dragon. Barrow had heard stories about such
things, and the educated man in town had even shown him a shard of something similar. But where the
shard was dirty gray, these three balls were white as bone. That was their color in life, he realized, and
this was their color now.

With a trembling hand, Barrow touched the nearest egg, and he held his palm against it for a very long
while, leaving it a little bit warm.

II

At one point, the whore asked, “Where did you learn all this crap?”

Manmark laughed quietly for a moment. Then he closed the big book and said, “My credentials. Is that
what you wish to have?”

“After your money, sure. Your credentials. Yes.”

“As a boy, I had tutors. As a young man, I attended several universities. I studied all the sciences and
enjoyed the brilliance of a dozen great minds. And then my father died, and I took my inheritance,
deciding to apply my wealth and genius in the pursuit of great things.”

She was the prettiest woman of her sort in this town, and she was not stupid. Manmark could tell just by
staring at her eyes that she had a good, strong mind. But she was just an aboriginal girl, tiny like all of the
members of her race, sold by her father for opium or liquor. Her history had to be impoverished and
painful. Which was why it didn’t bother him too much when she laughed at him, remarking, “With most
men, listening is easier than screwing. But with you, I think it’s the other way around.”

Manmark opened the book again, ignoring any implied insult.

Quietly, he asked the woman, “Can you read?”