“It’s not like that,” Kai said.

“What’s it like, then?”

“The whole island’s sacred space. This is where human beings came from, after all.”

“Oh,” Teo said. “Right.”

“Oh right what?”

“I forgot. You’re one of those cultures. ’And so the gods shaped men out of clay.’ That sort of thing.”

“What do you have against creation myths?”

Teo shifted in her seat. “Outside of the fact that they’re wrong?”

“Creation stories are key to mythology. They show us who people think they are. And they’re so interesting. Some Old World cultures say people are made from earth and spit. Orthodox Apophitans claim one of their sun gods, you know. Jacked off onto some sand, and then shaped the sand.” Jamie squinched up her face like she’d smelled something foul, which confirmed Kai’s theory she was pretending to sleep.

“And yet you believe human beings were created here. On this island.”

“What do you believe?”

“The fossil record. Old bones in caves. Evolution. A friend of mine, his mother studies rural cultures. Find a hundred fifty people who scrape a living together in the deep desert cutting cacti open for water and trapping rats for food, and they’ll have a story about how the great cactus god shaped them out of rat dung and hung the sun in the sky to dry them. Or this masturbating sun god. Creation myths are embarrassing.”

“There are gargoyles in Alt Coulumb,” Kai said. “Seril’s children. The goddess made them. Zurish gods made the sentient ice that walks Koschei’s empire—or the ice made the gods. Some dragons claim they made themselves, but you never really know with dragons.”

“Those are exceptions and you know it. You went to college?”

“Of course.”

“A real one, I mean. Not just shaman academy.”

“Shaman academy has as rigorous a mathematics and applied theology course load as any in the Old World,” she said. “But, yes, I did undergrad at Seven Islands.”

“So you know about evolution.”

“I do.”

“And you believe it.”

“I’m no student of the mystic arts, but sure.” Kai shrugged. The cable car rolled on; the cable’s slope increased and the car tilted back and Jamie’s face slid forward on the glass until her temple and cheekbone pressed against the window’s edge.

“And yet,” Teo said, “you claim the human race started here. On this island. Doesn’t the contradiction bother you?”