My earliest memories are hazy. Fuzzy. Indistinct. Although I cannot remember exactly when it was that I first gained consciousness, I do remember the days I spent growing in my egg. It was warm. Cozy. Comfortable. I do not think of it as ever being cramped, confining, or crowded. It was more than my home, it was my world. I could hear things from the outside, usually the roars of my parents, and the heartbeat of my mother. I knew nothing of what these sounds meant, nor that I would one day be able to make them myself one day. When my mother finally laid my egg, I took notice. The sounds changed. Her heart was no longer a sound I could hear, the roars became less noticeable, and newer sounds filtered in through the shell. I could hear the screeching of flyers, the lowing of spiketails, even the footfalls of the great longnecks. Of course, my parents continued to be the sounds I heard the most, although I did not know it at the time. All the while, it continued to be warm, safe, quiet. Although I would go on to learn that as an egg, my existence on this world was by no means guaranteed, I could not tell that at the time. As far as I was concerned inside the shell, nothing could harm me.

Inevitably, all that had to come to an end. One day, my shell ceased to be comfortable. I had grown to the point that I was ready to hatch, and cast off the shell. Things started to change for me in ways my primitive mind could not have previously imagined. Feeling confined for the first time in my existence, I pushed against the shell, against what was previously the limits of my known world. After a time of struggling, the shell began to crack, and the voices of my parents began to pick up. A certain sense began to pick up; something I had never had to deal with before. My eyes were still closed, and my tongue was still in my mouth. I had been able to feel the warmth of the amniotic fluid since my earliest moments, and sounds was an early experience for me as well, but something new was registering, something which changed with my surroundings and when the winds shifted. I would later learn that this new sense was smell. I was smelling the air around me, and the scents from the outside world were wafting into my cracked eggshell.

Pushing my head against the shell, I finally managed to get it out, and for the first time, I could experience the world outside. I opened my eyes for the first time, and not long after smell had been taught to me, I experienced sight! I saw things! At first, it was a real shock, having only experienced the warm darkness of the amnion. Everything was blurry and indistinct. And so bright! Having experienced two new senses for the first time was a real shock to me. My sense of hearing was much clearer now that I could hear the world with only the air separating me from it, without the shell in the way. I didn't know how to handle it. Not realizing what was happening, I let out a feeble scream, a truly pathetic sound for a sharptooth, no matter his age.

"Scrrreeaaaww!"

From there, the rest of my shell quickly began to crumble, what was left of my warm little world literally disintegrated before my eyes. I had hatched, whether I liked it or not. My fate was no longer to be warm or safe, and no longer would I dwell in darkness. For the coming years, my life would be tied to that of my parents… my parents. All they were to me on that day was a pair of blurry colors. My mother was a blurry mess of light green and yellow, while my father was a blur of dark green and white. Still, I had other senses available to me. My nose was keen and my instincts compelled me to smell the air. I soon picked up the scent of my parents. I knew not which was which at first, scent being a new experience for me. Then, my mother approached. I looked up at her with eyes still not clear yet, with a face nowhere near the deadly visage it would one day become. I looked at her, and she looked back, and nuzzled me. I felt a certain kind of warmth that I had not felt in the shell, a warmth that came from inside of me. It was love. My mother loved me and I loved her back. I did not know whether it was instinct, or hormones, or something deeper… or a combination of the three. It was enough for me to know that at last, I was safe, and as long as my family was around, I would be fine in this new, vast world outside of the shell. Everything would be fine. Just fine.

At the time, I didn't know what that sound was. My parents were roaring to each other, and I couldn't understand a word of it. I later learned that they had named me "Blackclaw", that my mother was name "Auria", and my father's name was "Bladefang", although he was mostly called "Blade" for short. They were speaking to each other. Speaking… making sounds that others agreed upon that stood for certain things. With my mother still looking at me, I clearly heard the first words in the outside world, although their meaning was yet unclear to me.

"Look, Blade! It's our child!"

"I see him, Auria. Is it a boy or a girl?"

"Let me check, my love." And with that, my mother moved in close to me. Not knowing what she was looking for, her eyes saw… whatever it was that she was checking for. She also gave me a lick, the second sign of affection in my short life.

"It's a boy, Blade. I'm sure you are very happy to hear it."

My father's tone changed. It seemed to be higher, as if something was right about me. He wanted a son, now he had one.

"Yes! YES! We have a son! I would have loved a daughter too, but, now I have a male in my family who is just like me! I can see it in his eyes, Auria. He's going to be a great hunter! As great as I am! No, better. He will be better than us one day."

"He will be everything we've hoped for, My mate. This is the greatest thing to happen to us. If you are as good a father to him as you've been a mate to me, we have nothing to worry about."

"I wish I could say that was true, my love. I know that you shall be as good a mother as anyone could hope for, but our son will quickly learn how harsh the world is. Even we can't protect him forever."

"I know. It kills me already. Five minutes out of his egg, and we're already talking of danger. Our son… what were we going to name him if it was a boy?"

"Something based on his appearance. Let me take a closer look." With that, my father inspected me. My vision was still blurry, and I had yet to stand up, but he learned what he had to.

"He has dark skin. I think we should call him something that begins with 'black'."

"How about 'Blackclaw', my mate? Your father was named Darkclaw, and it is fitting to name a son after his father, at least in part.

"So be it. Our son is named 'Blackclaw.' His claws are white, though. Ah, well. It's still a good name, Auria. Now, maybe you could help our son get to his feet."

"Sure thing." As she had said this, my vision started to clear, and I saw my mother's head coming at me. Still lying down, I tried to get away as this big… thing approached me. In a moment, I realized that the 'thing' and my mother were one and the same. She had gently grabbed me in her teeth, working with more gentleness than I would later think was possible for a sharp tooth, and she set me on my feet. I could feel the dry ground pressing against me. Looking down, I saw that each foot had three claws on it, plus a fourth one on the side, and that my parents had the same, only many times larger. Looking up, I could see that each of them had a large snout and a mouth full of very sharp teeth, as well as a pink tongue. Placing one foot in front of the other, I attempted to walk, but fell down.

"Aww. Who fell down? Who fell down?"

"Auria, is there any need to coddle him already?"

Ignoring that comment, my mother helped me up and bade me to try again. This time, I managed to take a step, then another, and another, until I could walk on my shaky little legs. Next to the great strides taken by my parents, I couldn't walk very far or very fast, but no sooner than it was ascertained that I could walk did my father pick me up and place me on my mother's head, as she had asked him to. Not at all afraid of this, I looked out at the world around me. As far as my young eyes could see, there were plains. Occasionally, a cluster of trees or a watering hole punctuated the landscape, but on the whole, my world was flat. Flat and full of other creatures in the distance. Many of them. Creatures of all shapes and sizes. Food. All of them were food. If it walked, I could eat it.

That was the first day of my life. The egg was quickly becoming a distant memory. Everything was so new! There were flyers, longnecks, and waterfalls, and rocks, trees, the bright circle, the sky, sky-water, leaves, threehorns, was there ANY end to the things there were to see? And it was all so BIG. How could a sharptooth as small as myself gain any place in this big, big world? Would I remain small forever? Would I somehow become like my parents? Would I grow? If so, how? But these were questions which my mind was unable to answer. Then, my capacities included pointing, roaring in my feeble voice, clinging to my mother, and before long, eating. It was not until the second day of my life that I was introduced to food. My mother and father had walked a good distance on the first day, but then, the sky began to change from light to dark. Was this normal? Did it happen a lot? The bright circle fell, then disappeared. I hoped it would be back. I missed it. This new night circle was hardly a match for the one that went away. My parents stopped walking and began to roar again.

"That's far enough, Auria. The bright circle has fallen, and it is time to rest."

"Good thing too, Blade. My feet are killing me." My mother replied and she lay down. I was still on her head, but she was careful not to drop me as she lay on her stomach. My father was lying on his side not too far away.

"Goodnight, my mate."

"Goodnight, Auria. May you and Blackclaw sleep well."

Sleep. That's what my parents were doing. Closing their eyes and staying very still. For my part, I was full of energy. Sleep was not on my mind. I stayed neat my mother and looked up at the sky. It was now full of little twinkling dots. The night circle was there too, and in time, it moved. I couldn't see its motion, but after looking up there for long enough, I had come to the conclusion that it was going somewhere. Why couldn't it just stay in one place? Eventually, sleep overcame me, and the first day of my life gave way to the second.

I awoke with an odd feeling in my belly that day. It wasn't painful, but it was annoying. Like I should do something. It was hunger. I was hungry. Looking around, I could still see and feel my mother; she was still asleep. Father was gone, though. I could smell his scent lingering in the air, but he was not there right now. Interesting. Where had he gone? Within a few minutes, he had returned, dragging the body of what I later learned to be a female spiketail. I noticed a lot of red stuff coming from the spike tail, and there was even a bit on my father's leg. It was coming from him like it had come from what he was dragging. Was that a bad thing?

"Auria! I have breakfast! Wake up, my dear!"

Whatever my father had said, it made my mother move. She opened her eyes slowly, as if reluctant to get up, but upon smelling the food brought before her, she woke up more fully, stretching her tail and feet, and yawing with a loud roar. Slowly getting up, mother moved over to her mate and nuzzled him, and he returned the gesture. Then they began roaring again.

"Take some of it to the boy, but make sure it is the softest stuff."

"Sure, Blade. Which part do you think will be best?"

"Try the belly. It is usually the softest part."

"I'll get some of- oh! Blade, you've been hurt!"

"A little. It's just a nick. Well, maybe a bit more than that, but I'm in no serious pain. You know me. I've taken worse."

"I'll go on the next hunt. You should try to stay off that foot for-"

"Auria. Come on. You know me. Has a little injury ever slowed me down?"

"Well… no. Alright, fine. You just make sure we get enough to eat. I don't want our child to go hungry because your injury made it too hard for you to catch anything."

"It'll be fine. You should be the one concerned about these things, though. I understand that. You care about the child more than you do me."

"What? I-I… I suppose that is true, Blade. But that doesn't-"

"Good. I want that. I care about him more than you, too. We're parents. We have to do this. Our livelihoods have to come second now." It was a loving gesture on the part of my parents. Not all sharpteeth were this devoted to their offspring. Most cared about the kids until there was a food shortage; then the kids became food if the parent was hungry enough. None of this was known to me at the time, though.

Not long after that, some food was brought to me by my mother. "It's from the spiketail. Go on, don't be afraid to eat it. Go on." I smelled the weird red stuff in front of me. It smelled quite good. Eating it down in a few bites, I noticed that the feeling in my stomach began to fade. I wanted more. My mother gave me more and I ate more and more, and soon, I felt full for the first time; I couldn't eat anymore. My parents, by contrast, devoured the meal in front of them, as if they hadn't eaten in a while. After eating it all, my mother lay down again. She was resting to conserve energy, and because eating a meal of that size took some time to digest. My father stood up, watching over his resting mate and child. He wasn't going to let anything happen to either of us. That was the second day of my life. There was still so much to know. How would I ever learn it all?

By the third day of my life, I was beginning to notice some patterns. The bright circle and the night circle took turns in the sky, and the night circle began to change shape each night. Even more interesting was the wide variety of creatures I saw. Some flew in he air, others lived in the water, and still others walked on the ground like I did. It was truly amazing. But not everything was good. I would be introduced to something else on the third day of my life. Pain.

I was beginning to walk for a longer and longer time, and even at this early point in my life, I could travel alongside my parents for a time. I didn't think that anything would be painful if I put my foot on it, or that anything could hurt me, because I didn't know what pain and injury were. Without knowing what it was, I saw a little black thing in my path. A sharp little stone. Neither of my parents noticed it. When my foot pressed against it, it pressed back, as all things did, but this time, it pressed very hard onto a very small area, causing the skin on the sole of my foot to tear, and for the rock to be embedded into it!

"Screeaah!" I let out a call of as much surprise as it was pain, and I fell onto the ground. The feeling stayed with me. It hurt. It hurt a lot. Immediately, my mother ran over to me and moved her head in close, trying to see what was wrong. Father also reacted.

"Auria! What happened?"

"It looks like he stepped on a rock. I'll get it out." With that, she used her tongue to lick the little rock, and in two licks, she got it out. There was still pain, but it was much lessened. Still not knowing what that was all about, I got up to my feet, but felt a lingering pain in my right foot. Would it ever get better? It would, but not for another day or two. Luckily, my mother let me ride on her head again. That experience was interesting, to say the least. The first pain I had truly felt, but not the last. I suppose there was pain from my hatching, but I didn't really feel it. I never remembered much from these early days, but I remembered that. I also recall that the next several meals brought in were young longnecks, and that my taste for that kind of dinosaur developed as a result.

On the fourth day, I was getting used to a few things. Father did most of the hunting, mother kept me safe, my parents would roar at each other a lot, and the world was flat. This illusion was shattered on the fifth day of my life when I saw-

"Mountains, Auria. The herds have migrated beyond the mountains."

"You mean, they are leaving these plains to go to whatever is on the other side?"

"Yes. I don't know why these plains are drying up. There hasn't been any skywater since before our son hatched!"

"Bladeclaw, our son is only five days old."

"Be that as it may" my father continued, sounding embarrassed "This area isn't going to be good for much in a few months. If the herds are going through the mountains to the other side, we shall have to go there too."

"But… what about little Blackclaw? He can't be expected to go through the mountains at his age!"

"Normally, I would not think about risking it. Still, we don't have much of a choice, Auria. I will not stand by and let him starve out here. The food will only last a few more weeks on this side of the mountains. Then what?"

"Then we go find more food. Okay, fine. We cross the mountains. But we do it tomorrow, Blade. I want us all to be rested and ready to go. Surely there is enough food for us here for one more day?"

"There is indeed. You know the drill, my mate. Rest here and-"

"-and you'll hunt for us." She was already lying down. "It's fine, Blade. I do need to ask you one thing, though."

"Anything, my love."

"How long do you think a trip through those mountains will be?"

My father had paused for a minute, then gave an honest answer.

"I don't really know. We shall have to find a pass through them. If the two of us can pick up the scent of a herd, we can follow it, and hope that they made it through a pass."

"And if they haven't made it?"

"We shall have to find one ourselves."

"Terrific."

"It isn't the best plan, but it's all I have. Do you have anything to suggest?"

"Not really."

"Then we shall go with my plan. It'll be fine, my dear. Just fine."

The next day, just how fine it would be was determined. I survived of course, but my parents would eat very little for the next three days. That's how long it took. Three days of wandering through the mountains, looking for a way though. Three days of following scent trails and footmarks, only to learn that footmarks were rare on the hard rock floor we walked over, or rather, what my parents walked over, as I was carried on my mother's head almost all of the time. The other side of the mountains was like a whole other world. Everything was so green! Instead of plains stretching on as far as the eye could see, there were plants! And the herds, so numerous. So many. Far more than I had seen before. I had to adjust my standards as to what constituted "many." Before, I had seen and smelled hundreds. Before my eyes, I beheld thousands of dinosaurs from up in the mountains. Truly an amazing sight. All that food. Wow.

My parents had the same idea. Dinosaurs meant food. Lots of it. To a pair of hungry sharpteeth, there could be no greater sight.

"Blade, have I ever told you how much I loved you?"

"Many times, dear, many times."

"I'm telling you again. I love you very much."

"Is it your love for me that makes you say this, or the fact that I just led us to enough food to keep us and our child alive for many years?"

"Both, really. I would still love you anyway."

"Enough talk, female. Let's go eat." He meant her no disrespect, and she interpreted it as meaning none. He was just so hungry…

"Yes, let's. Those swimmers look fat and good."

It has not too hard to guess what we that night. I had never seen a dinosaur quite like that before. One with a bill and webbed feet. Who knew that a creature that size could swim? My kind couldn't swim with our scrawny arms. No, but then again, how could that possibly be a worry for me? I couldn't affect me. Nah. No way. I had seen a lot in my first few days out of the egg. A lot more than some of these creatures that we ate. All they did was eat, sleep, and lay eggs, my father would say. Why, given enough food, that's all the leaf eaters would ever do. Eat and eat and eat. And take a long time to finish eating. I never quite understood that. Then again, they never understood us sharpteeth either. Our kind was very fond of sleeping, as well as performing certain actions which I would learn were good for the species as well as the ones who did it, but there was no way for one so young as I to wrap my mind around that. Oh no! That wouldn't be understood for a long, long time.

In the first year, things went well. My parents and I lived in the forest, and we ate freely of the herds, and drank abundantly from the plentiful waters. With no other large sharpteeth around, no one dared to challenge us. The few smaller sharp teeth who dared to live near us quaked in fear as my parents approached. We were safe from competition. In the days, we would eat and rest in the shining of the bright circle, and bathe in its rays while basking on rocks. At night, we would rest together in a group. All during this time, I would grow fairly quickly. I couldn't tell from day to day, but after a few months, my size had increased noticeably. No egg could possibly hold me now! I was going to be a large sharptooth, maybe the largest ever! I was certainly growing enough. My parents were pleased at the way things were going.

"Well, Auria, it's been six months since he hatched. What do you think of our boy now?"

"I think he's better than I dared dream! We're the best parents in the world!"

"Now, let's not get ahead of ourselves, my love. We've only been on the job for six months, so to speak."

"That's right, Blade. I guess I got a bit ahead of myself. Heh."

"Whatever. It's fine. There's nothing more that I could ask out of life."

"Well… Blade. There is something I want."

"Hmm. What could it be? We have our child, plenty of food, we have each other, there's no shortage of water, illness and injury have spared us, and I think we are comfortable most of the time."

"Blackclaw is a gift, Blade. However, I would like to be… gifted a second time."

"You want a second child?"

"And a third. Maybe more, my mate."

"Well, it is about the time of year when we are most… active in that regard."

"I can handle another egg, Blade. Just come with me and…"

Another few months had passed, and my mother had laid another egg. By now, It had been ten months since I had hatched. By all accounts, I was a good young sharp tooth. Now, there was another egg. Fascinating. That's what it looked like on the outside. A newly-laid egg was a rare sight to see, indeed. There was another sharp tooth in there, another one like me, maybe. Was it a boy in that egg, or a girl? I would never know. I would learn, however, that dinosaurs were not of just two kinds, as I had previously thought. There were flatteeth who ate the leaves, and sharpteeth who ate the flatteeth. This was the natural order of things, I had thought. As it turned out, there was at least one other group. A third group. An unnatural one, as far as my young mind knew in those days. These dinosaurs ate eggs. Not meat, not leaves, eggs. What kind of creature would eat such a rare food? How could it hope to survive? I didn't know. All I knew was that after my parents had gone to sleep, one of those creatures stole the egg in the middle of the night, and ate it. My parents saw its footprints and caught its scent, but they never did catch the coward. He stole my mother's egg. He ATE what was to have been my sibling. He KILLED a member of my family. It was a deep loss, especially to my mother, who never forgot it. After that incident, my parents became more protective of me. This was especially stifling to a sharptooth was eager to explore and learn new things, and was just starting to speak.

My first word was spoken at around eight months. It was "meat." That came as quite the surprise to my parents, who thought it would be something like "momma" or "daddy." It was no surprise to me. The word "meat" had come up almost every day for the past nine months of my life, usually in reference to the food that kept me alive. The last two months of my first year were dominated by two events. First, a flock of flyers arrived. They were unlike the usual kind we saw in that they had soft parts on them called "feathers." Not what I thought of when I thought of a flyer.

The real surprise though was the second event; more sharpteeth of my kind. Another family, with a male, female, and child showed up. I wanted to go meet them, but my mother wouldn't hear of it until it could be determined whether or not they were a threat or not. After my father returned from a visit to them with several gashes and an expression of sheer anger, it was determined that they were a threat. My parents worked out a hasty agreement; they would hunt in one area, we would hunt in another. I was not to go out of our place in the forest. Not for a second. This was repeated to me over and over on my first hatchday. By then, I could speak well enough to answer my parents.

"But why can't I go?"

"Because, my son… it isn't safe."

"Mom, why isn't it safe?"

"Because… just… because. You'll understand when you're older."

Indeed I would. How was I to know of competition for limited resources? What was competition? Wasn't there enough of everything for everyone? Couldn't we share what we had? Why did there have to be this fighting? It was a lesson I would only learn in the fullness of time. For now, I had my own concerns, my own life, and now, I was living in "my" territory. A place for my parents and I to call our own, and there was now another place which we could not enter without consequences. Why did it have to be this way? What would happen if the food left one territory and entered the other one? It could happen. What were we to do? And why were we all fighting? Too many questions and no way to answer them. I didn't know much, and I would later learn more than I would like to know, but on my first hatchday, I was determined to get to the bottom of it all.