Fall; or, Dodge in Hell - Neal Stephenson Page 0,272

a place I knew from my wanderings. We trekked across the sea of grass and down into the valley, where wolves came for us in the night; we fought them off with the weapons Thingor had taught us to make and we kept going. We ascended the east side of yonder ridge. We stopped for a time, as I had lost my way in those dark days of pursuit and struggle.

“As I stood on the ridge looking west into the valley, I felt warmth on my back and saw the whole territory cast into shadow by a new light brighter than the sun. The others of my party were exclaiming. I turned around and saw in the far distance the brilliant form of El descending upon the top of the Pinnacle where it rose above the rubble of what had once been the Town and the hive. We saw flashes within that brightness as when the sun gleams on the surface of troubled water, and then saw the forms of Egdod and the Pantheon hurtling away into the sky; and they burned as they fell away from the Land that they had made, and did not leave off falling and burning until they struck the hard vault of heaven, and broke it, and set it aflame. It burns still and you can see it when the night sky is clear.”

“The Red Web!” Eve exclaimed.

“It goes by many names. That one is as good as any,” said Walksfar. His beverage had cooled sufficiently that he now took a long draught of it. “That was the Fall of the Old Gods. I turned my back upon the brightness of it, which some saw as glory, and descended into this valley with most of my party and here made Camp. But one of us, Honey by name—she had been my lover for a time—was enthralled by the glory of El, and chose to abide on the ridgetop where she could gaze across the sea of grass and adore him. She it was who built Elkirk. Many souls were drawn to it and made their way into the valley after they had forms. We of Camp showed them how to cut trees, build fires, smelt metal, bake bricks, and practice the many other crafts that had passed into our ken from Knotweave and Thingor. Thus Eltown.”

His listeners considered it. “We did not encounter Honey at the kirk,” Adam said.

Walksfar nodded. “Honey ceded Elkirk to priests whom she had raised and trained to that duty, and went into the east, crossing the sea of grass toward the Hive and the tower of El in the hopes that she could find some destiny there.”

“How long ago was the Fall?” Eve asked. “How long has Camp been here—how many winters has it known?”

Walksfar eyed a man who was staggering across Camp with a log balanced on his shoulder. “Ask him and he’ll say it was just a few years, for he is forgettish. If you wanted a precise count, you would have to venture into the west and seek out Pestle, an old soul who has written down the chronicle of all that she has seen. I made no effort to count years until many of them had passed. Then I formed the habit of cutting a mark into the wall of my cabin every year when the great tree shed its leaves. I was just getting ready to make another such mark this morning when your companion, Mab, came and interrupted me. You may come inside and count the marks if it will serve as an answer.” Walksfar drew a steel knife from his belt as he said this, and tested its edge on his thumbnail. Then he got to his feet and opened the door of his abode and left it open behind him in case Adam and Eve wished to follow him inside.

They did so, and saw little at first, for light came in only through two small openings. The walls were nothing more than the surfaces of the tree trunks that had been stacked up to make them. The logs were silver with age. As their eyes adjusted they saw many small vertical grooves cut into the wood, no farther apart than the width of a finger. Not all of the logs were so marked, but most were grooved from one end to the other. As they watched, Walksfar trailed his fingertip along one of the logs until he sensed the place where