Showing results for "alien-clay" in Science Fiction & Fantasy

The planet of Kiln is where the tyrannical Mandate keeps its prison colony, and for inmates the journey there is always a one-way trip. One such prisoner is Professor Arton Daghdev, xeno-ecologist and political dissident. Soon after arrival he discovers that Kiln has a secret. Humanity is not the first intelligent life to set foot there. In the midst a ravenous, chaotic ecosystem are the ruins of a civilization, but who were the vanished builders and where did they go?

Studying ancient sites on a backwater planet, Archaeologist Nosuma Okande finds more of them than The Institute has on record...On her first day, she digs up an odd statuette, and after she receives death threats, the Institute sends Nosuma to another excavation site. There, she unearths a second artifact and later the same night, stumbles upon a strange ceremony in the village square. Not deterred by this, Nosuma decides to unearth the mysteries the planet holds. But as a deeper truth slowly emerges, can she untangle the enigmatic past of an edifice abandoned?