Fall; or, Dodge in Hell - Neal Stephenson Page 0,281

and Eve in their thousands and their millions would soon strip the whole Land bare, and make it as dead and disfigured as that place.” The angel lifted his gaze to the burning crater of the Red Web high above.

Adam knew not what to say, and thought on it for a while. “I cannot deny that I have with my own hands felled many trees of late, out of a desire to build a larger habitation for the little souls being spawned by Eve. Nor that the same actions carried out by thousands of my descendants—”

“Millions,” the angel put in.

“—would lay bare much Land that now is pleasantly forested. But to produce so many souls will take many years, and is it not possible we might change our ways in the meantime? We are not blind devourers. Already the souls of Eltown find ways to live comfortably while cutting down fewer trees.”

“That will only delay the inevitable,” said Messenger of El. “Fortunately, a simple fix, undertaken now, will prevent anything of the kind from ever occurring. It is the easiest thing in the world.” And the angel’s hand strayed to his right hip, where the pommel of a small knife gleamed as it protruded from a hidden sheath.

“What is the nature of this fix,” inquired Adam, “and in what way does it involve that knife?”

“Inborn to each of those twelve is the faculty of spawning more souls,” explained Messenger of El. “The males take after you in this respect, and the females take after Eve. The latter have their organs of reproduction deep inside, but you and the boys wear yours externally, where the mistake of Spring can be fixed by the smallest cut of a knife. No parts will be removed. It is merely the severing of an internal connection, quite nearly painless. While they are sleeping I will just see to it.” The angel turned back toward the door of the cabin, drawing the knife from its sheath. Its blade was scarcely larger than Adam’s fingernail and it gleamed white under the light of the stars.

Adam reached out and clapped a hand upon the other’s shoulder. “If it is all so quick and simple as you say,” he said, “then do you come back at some later time after Eve and I have had the opportunity to consider your proposal.”

“It is no proposal,” said the Angel, turning to face him and shrugging off his hand, “but a thing that is to be done, by order of El himself, this very night.”

“The writ of El does not run here,” said a third voice, and Adam turned to discover Walksfar approaching them across the clearing. “Camp may be small and mean to you who have come lately from the heights of the Palace, but it is old, founded in a place of wild souls by ones such as I who spawned in the age of the Old Gods and who looked upon Egdod himself with our own eyes. We did not invite El to the Land and we do not grant him the authority to send his minions into our dwellings and alter our forms with knives.”

Courage overtook Adam upon hearing these words and seeing the confident stride and proud bearing of Walksfar. He advanced toward the entrance of the cabin so as to prevent the angel from drawing any closer.

“Those are brave words from an indolent hermit who has done nothing but sulk in his cabin and drink tea for centuries,” said Messenger of El. “But while you were thus occupied, great changes came over the Land. You would be well advised to walk far again, as you did of old, and familiarize yourself with things as they are before insulting El and impeding his messenger.”

Walksfar’s face clouded and he did not seem ready with an answer, but Adam spoke: “I am well informed, as you know, and am hardly of a mind to insult El. But I will gladly impede his messenger in this case.”

It had now come about that Messenger of El was between Adam and Walksfar, for the latter had not slowed in his advance. Looking both ways and finding himself hemmed in, the angel became an angel again. Its garment brightened until it was making light of its own, and unfurled into bright wings, and it sprang into the air, a little higher than a man might jump, so that Adam and Walksfar were looking upon its winged feet. “I am sent to make matters