Infinite Day (85 page)

“It was.” His voice bore a great sadness. “The very end of that age.”

Then they put their feet in the stream that came out of the spring and, careful to keep their feet in the water, headed down the hill.

For much of the morning, they walked on downward under bright sunlight, doing their utmost to avoid leaving a scent trail. Shortly after midday, they climbed out of the stream and began walking under an open forest of conifers and beeches. They skirted round dense undergrowth, shunning the use of bush knives. Footprints would soon be washed away, but cut branches would leave a lasting record of their passage. As the morning passed, the air grew warm and humid and they found themselves sweating freely. Fortunately, there was abundant pure water to alleviate their thirst.

For the most part, they walked in silence. Merral found himself grappling with his own thoughts; he had no idea what preoccupied Vero. They stopped briefly at lunchtime, took off their backpacks, ate some food, and rested for half an hour. Then they began walking again, going gently downward, until in the late afternoon, another storm broke out. They took shelter under some rocks and then, after it had ended, walked on for another couple of hours. As they walked, they foraged for food. They caught trout in the small brooks that they crossed and collected various wild berries and, cautiously, mushrooms.

Eventually, with the sun low in the sky, they set up camp for the night in a convenient location and made a tiny open fire using dry wood that gave very little smoke. On this they grilled their trout. Then they unrolled their sleeping bags and, taking alternate watches, slept.

The pattern set on this first day was repeated on those that followed. It was hard to be sure, but Merral felt they made twenty kilometers a day. Each day, the mountain ridge fell farther behind them and the stream they traced grew in width and depth.

Merral soon decided that it was the very strangest of expeditions. The fact that it was on an unknown world to an unknown destination was only part of it. It was also a journey of conflicting emotions. As they padded along by the stream and under the trees, Merral grappled with much that was dark. Chief of these ruminations was his continuing alienation from God and his bitterness at the loss of so many friends. He decided that he no longer doubted God's existence, but it was the nature of God that troubled him.
Does he care? Can he act?

But it was not all darkness. For much of the time, Merral experienced pleasure—at times bordering on joy—at being back among woods and trees. Although it was hard work carrying the heavy backpack, the woods were pristine and glorious. The forest canopy was rarely so thick as to entirely cut out the sunlight, and with the exception of the afternoon downpour, the unknown sun overhead shone so that much of the time they walked in dappled, golden light. After the monochrome sterility of Below-Space, the infinite shades of greens, the perfect blue of the sky, and the glorious diversity of animal and plant life were therapy.

On the third day, Merral had an experience that he could only really describe as a revelation. The afternoon rainstorm had passed away early and the moisture was evaporating around them in wreaths of vapor when they came to a small lake with crystal waters. There they stopped, gazing in silence across it. He heard the chatter of birds, the grunting of deer somewhere under the trees, the permanent insect hum of late summer woods, and the gentle lapping of the waves. Merral's heart sang at the perfect jewel-like setting.

It's a blessing. I don't deserve this.

As they walked on, he realized that he really
didn't
deserve it and that it had been a gift.
A gift—I now understand a little more what grace is all about.
But as they walked on, Merral continued to wrestle with doubt and faith, joy and despair, grace and guilt. He was relieved—and touched—that Vero made no attempt to pry into the state of his heart and offered him no counsel. Yet Merral sensed in the many careful glances that his friend both cared and prayed for him.

While Merral's conflicts were largely private, there was also fear, and that was shared. They would both find themselves looking upward into the sky, wary lest some frightful craft should appear, or scanning a soaring bird in case it might prove to be another occultic observer, such as that which had perused them at Carson's Sill. And night and day, they both listened carefully to the birdsong and rustles of the animals in case they might hear behind them the terrible eerie whistling of the Krallen.

They
will
come. It's just a matter of time. And if Lezaroth is searching, then he will let nothing stop him from finding us.

Some of Merral's questions did surface. It was at night, when he was in some way able to take refuge in the darkness, that Merral was able to broach some of the issues that deeply troubled him.

He talked of Luke. “I needed him, Vero. I needed him to tackle Delastro. He shouldn't have been taken.”

“But perhaps that's why he was taken.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Perhaps because
you
need to do the task, not Luke?”

Merral was silent. A moth fluttered against his face.

Vero spoke again. “How about this for a diagnosis? You want to be treated as an equal with God. You want God to involve you in the decision-making process. You want him to explain.”

“That's ridiculous. At least . . .” Merral heard his words die away.

“My friend, to start thinking like that is to start down the road that Delastro has taken. God becomes a being whom we try to manipulate. By our purity, by the way we live, or if that fails, by magic.”

Is that true? Perhaps.

Day by day they walked on. As they did, they encountered evidence of the newness and instability that marked all Made Worlds. In one place, the forest ended abruptly, and for some hours they crossed a tongue of freshly cooled gray lava. In another, they came to a great landslide and, walking between tilted trees, negotiated its trembling surface. One day the stream skirted the high shattered wall of what was obviously a fresh crater rim.

The stream itself—now in reality a small river—was plainly far from stable. They saw many places where it had recently overflowed its banks, cutting away greedily into the new soil. During the afternoon storms they saw the waters rise so dramatically that they were very careful not to camp anywhere near it lest a flood wash them away. Merral, gazing at a scene of uprooted tree trunks littering a muddy riverbank, reminded himself of the oldest rule:
A made world is not a tame world.

The subject of the making of worlds came up frequently between them. It was a harmless topic and one that didn't provoke Merral's troubled psyche.

“This is a good world,” Merral said one sticky afternoon as they strode beneath some Mjada firs, their slender trunks tall and straight, watching as a chipmunk bounded up a branch.

A light laugh came in response. “My friend, I don't need your expertise to tell me that. I may not know what the trees are called, but I can recognize a good forest.”

“It's what the Assembly does well.”

“But then it should be. It has been our chief task for well over ten thousand years.”

“And now it is no longer.” Merral looked up and saw above the crowns of the trees the clouds gathering. “Defense, perhaps even survival, takes priority now.”

Merral wondered what was happening out beyond this deserted and forgotten world.
Where is the
Sacrifice
now? Where are Anya and Jorgio? Have they perhaps made it to Earth without me? Have new worlds fallen to the Dominion?
He wondered if he would ever find out.

After some time Vero spoke. “I wonder—only
wonder,
mind you—if by calling these places ‘Made Worlds' we have not been guilty of pride.”

“‘We' as in the Assembly?”

“Yes. We don't really make them. God makes them. We act as—what?—the transmitters of life? All we do is spread what the Lord of All has made.”

“I've heard similar arguments, but not in such a way.” Merral considered the thought. “I suppose it's possible we have taken more pride in these worlds than is right and proper.”

“And if that is true, then is it possible that the present crisis might be a judgment on the Assembly? A rebuke, perhaps.”

Merral sighed and put his backpack down. “I need some water. So not only do you have an explanation of all that happens to me; you have one for what has befallen the Assembly.
Bravo!
”

Vero looked embarrassed. “These are suggestions, no more. But if we win against the Dominion, I think there will be much evaluation about how we proceed in the future.”

“
If
we win. I admire your boldness there, too. I was unaware that winning was a serious option. And surely we must bear in mind the possibility that this is the prelude to the end of all things.”

Vero rubbed his face in a gesture of weariness. “Yes, it's easy to see Nezhuala as the Antichrist, unveiled at the end of time to triumph for a brief season over the Lord's anointed and then to be slain by the coming King. But there are two very different problems with that view.”

Merral sipped at his water. “Go on.”

“The first problem is that we've been here before. During the War of the Rebellion, many people considered Jannafy to be the Antichrist. With very good reason. But of course, he was killed.”

“And the lesson was learned.”

“Quite. Those who recognized the signs of the end were proved wrong. The second problem is that if you do identify Nezhuala as the Antichrist and this conflict as marking the last days of our age, it's very tempting not to fight.”

“There were some in the past who did that, weren't there? Something else I learned from college theology.”

“Yes. The neo-Millerites. They were so certain that the end had come that they refused to fight at all.” Vero flicked away a fly. “Moral nonsense, of course. That would be like some follower of Jesus in the Sanhedrin voting for his crucifixion on the grounds that it was part of the divine plan.”

“True. So you think there might be life after Nezhuala?”

Vero looked upward at the sky. “Yes, I do. I would even go so far as to say that I am considering the possibility of a new, invigorated, and purged Assembly. It is even possible that with the aid of
some
of technology that the Dominion has, we might be able to make worlds better and quicker.”

“Yes, Below-Space is unpleasant, but in the shallow zones we seem able to survive.”

“Perhaps we can put aside that dreadfully slow business of seeder ships and their centuries-long voyages and move out faster.” Merral heard the ring of excitement in Vero's voice. “Perhaps the Assembly has become too slow. We have failed in our mandate.”

Merral wiped the sweat off his forehead. “I don't know. For my part, I'll be content to somehow get off this world.” He sighed. “Vero, I can't even work out what is happening in my own life, let alone in that of the Assembly.”

“I understand.”

They began walking again under the trees, over soft emerald green moss, its texture like velvet.

After a few dozen meters, Vero turned to Merral. “My friend, I find this world profoundly beautiful. Do you?”

“Yes. Who wouldn't?”

“The lord-emperor, for one. But a question: do you understand it?”

“Do I
understand
it?” Merral echoed. “Well, I know a lot about how it works. I could lecture you on how the trees and the food chains work.”

“But
fully
?”

He thought about it. “I suppose, ultimately, I really don't understand why it's all the way it is. But does it matter?”

“No, I wouldn't have thought it does. But let me be provocative. Your objection to God seems to be that you don't understand him. Why do you accept the reality of this extraordinary creation without a full understanding and yet protest that you will only accept the Most High if you can understand him?”