Jack McDevitt - Eternity Road

They continued along the slope on foot and emerged at last into the esplanade, where the inkala had come to rest.

The shelf was flat and grassy. The soil was worn away in spots and they could see concrete. They could look down at the river, blue and cool in the westering sun. Their campsite of the previous night was visible. There was the hilltop on which they’d crouched, watching the inkala come in, and there the trail over to the bridge.

A trench several feet wide and a couple of feet deep ran the length of the esplanade, dividing the concrete.

“What do you think?” asked Chaka.

“It’s a scenic location,” said Flojian. “It would have been a place for people to come in good weather. If you poked around, you’d probably find some tables and chairs.”

Quait looked at the sky. “Not good,” he said. “It’s getting late. I don’t think we want to be here after dark.”

Everyone agreed with the sentiment, and they spread out, looking for Shay’s markers. Avila found something else.

Twenty yards into the forest on the far side, a green strip rose out of the ground to a height of about two feet. It was on a line with the trench, and it quickly acquired an outside rail and curved off north by northwest, following the corridor of the inkala. It looked like the green strip that had run parallel with the walkway across the bridge.

They found a similar construction on the eastern side of the shelf, also aimed directly down the middle of the trench.

“I suspect if we followed it back to the bridge,” said Quait, ‘it’d turn out to be a continuous piece.”

“But what is it?” asked Flojian.

They were still puzzling over it when Shannon showed them a sassafras tree on the edge of the esplanade. A cross was cut into it.

“What’s it mean?” asked Flojian.

“Don’t know,” said Shannon. “But I think it’s one of Shay’s marks.”

“You don’t know?” Flojian looked incredulous. “Isn’t there some sort of code of the woods in effect here? Don’t you people all speak the same language?”

Shannon sighed and turned to Avila. “It’s supposed to tell us something, but I’m not sure what.”

Chaka pointed across the trench. “Another one,” she said. The same mark, cut on a red oak near the too of the ridge.

Shannon took off his hat, looked first one way and then another. There were two more, at the eastern and western ends of the shelf. “I’ll tell you what it suggests to me, but it makes no sense. It’s a box. Under different circumstances, I’d think it’s telling us this is journey’s end.”

They glanced uneasily at one another.

“So what do we do now?” asked Quait.

The question was directed more or less at Avila, as if she had replaced Silas. She looked up and down the platform. The sun was on the horizon, and the sky was turning red. “Jon,” she said, “are you sure those are the same signs we’ve been following?”

He shook his head. “It looks like the same knife. And all the marks we’ve seen have been made by a little guy. I’d guess Shay was about five-five.”

“That’s about right,” said Flojian.

“How did you know?” asked Avila.

“The marks are usually centered at just over five feet. Eye level.”

“Maybe,” Flojian said, “we should debate this later. Right now, I think we ought to get away from here. No matter what our little buddy says. It’s getting dark.”

Shannon and Quait looked at Avila.

“We don’t really have anyplace else to go, so I don’t see much sense in leaving.”

“But the place is haunted,” said Chaka.

Avila had been wearing an old fabric cap over her hair. She removed it, wiped her brow, and looked out over the river. “We don’t know what’s going on here,” she said. “And I guess we have to find out. I’m going to stay and see if anything happens. Anybody who wants to stay with me is welcome. Anybody who doesn’t want to hang around, I don’t blame.” Her voice sounded strained.

Only Flojian had the courage to leave. “You’re going to get yourselves killed,” he said. “I hope you know that.” He took one of the packhorses, added some grain to its supplies, and without another word marched off down the trail toward the bridge.

A hall-hour later, he was hack, explaining that he could not abandon his friends. Maybe. Chaka thought he had found being alone even more frightening than the potential reappearancc of the apparition.

They led the horses onto the far side of the ridge. Then they made dinner, hut they all just picked at their food.

It was dark when they finished. They put out the fire, checked their weapons, returned to the top of the ridge, and took up positions along an area that overlooked the esplanade. Hod they been expecting a human enemy, they would have spread out. But they stayed together, hidden in a cluster of rocks and bushes.

Flojian sat down next to Avila. “I’ve heard,” he said, “that demons won’t accost a priest. Is there a chance that people traveling with a priest are also safe?”

“By all means,” she said quietly. “Have no fear.”

Chaka was not comfortable at the sight of Flojian stumbling around in the dark with a loaded rifle, but there was no help for it. Avila, whom Chaka knew to be a competent marksman, didn’t bother with a weapon. “Whatever it is,” she told Chaka, “I don’t think a rifle will be useful. If we need weapons against it. I doubt that we have the right ones.”

They no longer enjoyed the panoramic view to the northwest that they’d had from the opposite side of the river. Now, iheir view restricted by trees, their warning that an unearthly visitor was approaching would be very short. “This is a scary business,” Chaka admitted to Quait.

“I know.” He stayed close to her. “We’ve got plenty of fire power up here. If we need it.” His own breathing was uneven. “Boo,” he added.

They both tried to laugh, but the sound died on the wind.

“Best keep it down,” warned Shannon.

“You okay?” That was Flojian, on Chaka’s other side. His hands were trembling. Somehow that was more reassuring than Quait’s false bravado.

“Yes,” she said. “I’m line.”

“I’m sorry about Silas.”

As is usually the case with the death of someone close, Chaka had not yet come to terms with the loss. She kept expecting him to appear, to walk out of the woods with his journal in his hand. She was surprised that Flojian had noticed she’d been hit hard. “Thanks,” she said.

“He’d have been proud of us. Staying, I mean. It’s not what I wanted to do, but it’s what he would have done.”

She listened to the forest noises. Quait got up and walked along the top of the ridge, trying to see.

Shannon moved past her, knelt down beside Avila. “Do you believe demons exist?” he asked.

She made a sound deep in her throat. Then: “I don’t know, Jon. Before yesterday, I’d have said no. Now I just don’t know.”

Quait came back. “Nothing yet,” he said. He looked at the stars. “It was about this time last night.”

They fell silent. Chaka wondered if there wasn’t a charm that might help. If there was, Avila would certainly know about it. Might even have it. Probably she did, but wasn’t saying anything because she didn’t want to encourage people thinking about spooks. It had been, after all, her suggestion that they stay, and she surely would not put them all at risk if she had no defense.

“If we don’t attract its attention,” Flojian was saying to no one in particular, “we might be okay.”

Chaka aimed her weapon at the platform. She had a clear shot, if need be. “What’s the doctrinal position on demons?” she asked Avila.

“According to the Temple,” Avila said, “they do exist. But they act indirectly. They’re responsible for all kinds of evils. Illness. Flood. Sometimes they fire human emotions and drive us to oppose the will of the gods.”