Dustfall, Book One - Shadows of a Lost Age

by J. Thorn

  As she headed down the slope, following the same dirt path that had led her up to the black bush clearing, she passed the ruins of the mansion. The place was sometimes used as an outpost for hunters and gatherers, and Seren hoped that there would be people there now, and she could stay there for the night instead of heading all the way down the slope to the village. If she stayed there, no one would know she had messed up and been caught out in the dark. The hunters that used the lodge wouldn’t tell anyone, she knew that. All that would be considered was the catch of the deer, and that would earn her much respect.

  But there was no one there. The building, which had been a ruin for centuries, was quiet. No fires lit the great driveway, with its crumbling black entranceway, and no lanterns lit the huge courtyard with the large empty pit in the middle of the open ground.

  Seren had always wondered about the pit and what it had once been used for. There had been speculations. Her father swore that people from the long ago used the pits to trap animals, but this had never made sense to her. The pits were always close to the buildings and behind the outer walls, so animals wouldn’t have even gotten into the inner grounds. And there was the way that the rain gathered in them, filling them inches or sometimes even feet deep with fresh water that would slowly drain away. The outside walls of each of the pits—a feature that could be found on the grounds of many of the old world buildings wherever you went—were lined with of some kind of solid square rock plates that no one knew how to make anymore, and even though many were broken, the pits would still hold a lot of rainwater.

  Disappointed at the empty building, Seren started down the path once more, not relishing the extra hour of travel that she would have to endure, in the dark, to get back to the town.

  * * *

  The glow of the lamps that lit the main street acted as a guide as she followed the slope down by the edge of the water. The reservoir was calm, as was the wind. As she climbed the steps down to the flat patch of ground that the village used as its collection area for forestry, she heard a twig snap in the bushes to the side of the path. A figure stepped out, and for a moment Seren’s heart leapt. She hadn’t been expecting anyone to be up at the flat ground at this time of night; no one should be. There were strict rules about where the younger members of the clan were to be at this time of night, and it wasn’t up there. She was caught.

  “Seren!” a familiar voice called, just as she was about to lower the log and her catch and wait for the sharp telling off that was to come. After the few seconds that it took her mind to process and catch up, she felt a surge of relief.

  “Keana?” she asked. “What are you doing up here?”

  Keana stepped into the light of the first lamp at the bottom of the steps, and Seren could see that she been crying.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, hurrying down the steps.

  “I screwed up,” said Keana. “I was out at the lake, supposed to be fishing.”

  Seren grinned, knowing what was coming next. “And you fell asleep.”

  “Yes!” Keana said, shaking her head. “It was warm, and sunny, and I keep telling them I can’t sit still for that long. I just... I’ve nothing to take back.”

  Seren looked down at the deer, still tied to the branch, and sighed. This catch would have earned her a lot of favor tonight, especially with the news of the migrations starting. It was the first signs of the cold weather heading toward them, and a hint at the approach of the day that their own migration would begin.

  At fifteen years old, Seren had walked the great migration distance a dozen times already. On the first few, when she was tiny, she sat up in the wagon-sled reserved for the youngest children, but as soon as she had been able to walk, they made her do so. The few weeks leading up to the migration would mean storing and curing food in preparation, and a large buck like the one she had caught would go a long way to preparing for the journey. And she hadn’t caught a lot in the last few weeks.

  “Take this to your father,” Seren said, pointing at the buck as it lay on the path.

  Keana’s eyes opened wide. “But...”

  “No,” said Seren. “I caught a squirrel as well, and I have bags of nuts and berries. Not a good haul, but enough not to get a ticking off. If you go back with nothing, your father will be furious. You could end up cleaning out the cesspit for a week.”

  Keana was about to reply, to refuse the offer of help, but Seren could tell she was thinking of the cesspit—a task reserved only for those currently being punished for minor misdemeanors—made her hesitate.

  “Are you sure?” Keana asked.

  Seren nodded. “But you owe me big,” she said, with a grin.

  “Of course,” said Keana. “Thank you. I don’t know what to say.”

  “And,” continued Seren. “You’ll have to tell them that you weren’t finding any catch in the lake but you saw the deer at the edge of the woods.”

  Keana nodded, looking down at the deer with puzzled amazement. She’d never taken one down herself, so not only would the deer be a surprise to her father, he’d be proud of her as well. Her stomach churned at the lie.

  “And if I don’t get at least a slice of it when it’s cooked, I’ll be seriously upset.”

  They laughed at this, though Seren was feeling less pleased on the inside. Afterward, as she slumped down at the edge of water and watched her friend haul away the deer—which she could see now was a large one, even for its age—she reached down to grab the squirrel from her belt and felt her heart sink even further as she lifted the broken string it had been attached to.

  “Dammit,” she cursed.

  Chapter 4

  The fire hissed and sizzled with the aroma of cooking venison coming from the spit. Jonah sat between his children, Keana on the left and Gideon on the right. His daughter grinned with a hunter’s pride, eyes glistening like the stars in the Orion constellation. She kept her dark hair tied back, like her mother. Like most children in the clan, she was lean and dark-skinned, except where her vest protected her from the harsh stare of the sun. Gideon was two years her junior but appeared to be much more so than that. He fought through a fever in his first moon, which left him weak and scrawny, a medical complication far beyond what knowledge still existed. Sasha, Jonah’s wife, feared he would not survive The Walk at the end of his first year, but against all odds, he had. But it seemed to Jonah as though the sickness gave his son a different outlook. Fate would determine whether or not it would save his life, someday.

  “Eat up, Gideon,” said Sasha.

  Jonah nodded in agreement as Sasha handed their son another hunk of steaming meat. Her green eyes danced in the flames and her smile melted Jonah’s heart, as it had the first time all those years ago. He thought back, remembering how they had met at the gathering in Eliz, Sasha’s clan coming from another region altogether. Sasha’s father had known his clan would be unlikely to survive the return home, after suffering great losses to sickness on The Walk, and so he had approached Judas and asked if they could merge by marriage. It was the last thing any proud clan chief wanted, and always the last resort. It was years before Jonah even considered the day the man had come into the camp and knelt before Judas. Now, years later, he was proud of the man who had been Sasha’s father. Proud of him for being brave enough to admit when all was lost.

  Back then, Jonah had been too young to care about a mate, but as Sasha developed curves and her chest began to push out her vest, Jonah found her hard to resist. The elders spoke of the old days, stories passed down through the generations of “love at first sight.” Jonah was not sure what that could have meant prior to The Event, but he knew Sasha was his, and he was hers.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “He won’t make it,” said Keana.

  “Keana,” Sasha said, delivering her fear and disgust on an icy glare. “Do not say such things.”

  “Well he won’t, if he don’t eat.”

  “Listen to your mother,” said Jonah. “You need to eat, Gideo
n. You’ll need to build your strength. The tips of the leaves are beginning to turn, and the wind is shifting down from the north.”

  “Why must we leave, Father?” Gideon asked with a lilting melody. “Why can’t we stay?”

  Sasha put her head down, allowing Jonah to answer.

  “That is not what we do. We cannot forsake everything our ancestors have done to keep us alive. To do so would be careless with not only our lives, but their legacy as well. The winter would kill us all, you know that. I shouldn’t even have to remind you, boy.”

  Jonah hoped his son would not press him further. It was the question he had been asking his father for years, in slightly different words.

  “Okay,” Gideon said. He took a hunk of meat from the tip of a sharpened stick and tore into it like a wild bear.

  Jonah glanced at Sasha, and he saw the relief wash over her face. He nodded and she nodded back. Keana groaned and patted her stomach with a satisfied smile, when noises came from another fire in the village. Jonah stood and looked as shadows morphed into men. They walked with purpose and Jonah knew before they opened their mouths that something was wrong.

  Very wrong.

  “Jonah.”

  “Yes?”

  “Come,” said the man hidden in shadows. “It is your father.”

  Jonah felt the meat churn in his stomach, as if it was crawling back up his throat. Sasha stood up next to her husband and put an arm around his waist.

  “What is wrong?” she asked.

  “It’s your father, Judas. He is sick.”

  Jonah started to ask a question, but he saw the look in the man’s eyes. If the sickness was something common, they would not be coming for him during the evening meal.

  “And he calls for you.”

  Jonah shivered, despite the heat coming off the fire in waves.

  Chapter 5

  Judas sat facing the hearth, a fire raging inside the crumbling brick and light flashing across his gaunt face. Although it had only been a few hours since Jonah last spoke to his father, it appeared as though the chief had aged many years. Judas sat in a reclining chair, an old blanket tucked beneath his chin, leaving only his head exposed. He shivered as beads of sweat ran down his face.

  “What is this?” Jonah asked.

  Judas began to answer his son until the wet, ragged cough overtook him. He turned his head and spat before looking back at Jonah. “I’m not well.”

  “You are. You were. We spoke just—”

  “Be still. I need you to listen to me.”

  Jonah looked around the room and fished through the shadows until he found a stool. The rest of the living room inside the old house remained hidden, its age cloaked by the night. He heard the shuffling of feet upstairs. Jonah looked up at the ceiling and then back to his father.

  “They’re cleaning, making room for your family,” said Judas. “You will inherit the chief’s house, as I did from my father.”

  “You’re not dying.”

  “Shut up, Jonah. Shut the hell up and listen, for once.”

  The words slapped Jonah across the face. Judas continued.

  “I have been ill for days but have been able to go about my daily duties. But this morning, my lungs hurt in a way they never have before. And now…”

  Jonah waited for his father to continue, feeling the gravity of the situation in the same way he could detect schools of fish by the way the currents wrapped around the rocks.

  “I ate something or caught something, and I’m feeling worse. Even if this does not bury me, you need to know what has been passed down since The Event.”

  “You know of The Event?” Jonah asked, confused. His father had always avoided talk of the long past and always denied knowledge of it.

  “I do not. That might be lost forever, unless we someday discover a journal from that time. And with each passing season, that becomes less and less likely.”

  Jonah moved his stool closer to his father and leaned in.

  “I want to tell you what I do know, and why it matters to you.”

  Jonah nodded.

  “They used to call this area by a name I can’t remember, can’t pronounce. But some say that the name meant ‘Penn’s Woods.’ I do not know who Penn was, or how he came to own this place, but that is what they say. After The Event, the survivors huddled here, in this forest. They scavenged and hunted, gathering what they could to form a clan and begin to rebuild. But, of course, you know about The Walk. I need you to understand it, the reason behind it.”

  “We cannot survive the winter.”

  Judas coughed and shook his head. He spat again, and Jonah heard the wad of phlegm smack against the bare floor.

  “No. That is not the only reason.”

  The chief’s arm came out from beneath the blanket, holding a battered and torn journal. Even in the low light, Jonah could see the dog-eared pages and smell the years on the paper.

  “There is this,” said Judas.

  “The book,” Jonah said. “Will I read it one day?”

  “Of course. You know, no one knows when this was written or who wrote it. But I know it came after The Event, and each chief has protected it with his life. If we cannot hold on to our civilization’s beliefs, we have no hope of ever bringing civilization back.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t.”

  “Shut your goddamn mouth. Don’t you ever say that, son. This,” Judas said, waving the book around the room for emphasis, “is not how we survive. This is not civilization.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Jonah. “This is our life. There is no other.”

  “The book warns of temptation. It insists we look for the signs.”

  “What signs?” asked Jonah. “You never spoke of this before.”

  “I did,” said Judas. “But maybe I didn’t make it clear. The job of the chief is to protect, and to do so with a guise of calm, even in the face of the most dangerous threats. But that is not all he is supposed to do.”

  Jonah reared back on the stool, rocking from his toes to his heels. “C’mon, Father. Say what you mean.”

  “There is more to The Walk than surviving the snows. The Walk provides hope, a chance at finding a new future, whether that is a discovery on the road or another group at the refuge. Either way, we do it to survive. Without hope, we might as well be walking into a graveyard.”

  Jonah saw his wife’s teenage smile from all those years ago, and he remembered the sense of optimism in the clan when his merged with hers.

  “The book warns of the folly of the old ways. Of settling too long and making roots. There is danger to staying in one place. And yet, even though we always return to the forest, to this place, we must move on, and then return.”

  “You sound more like a prophet than a chief,” said Jonah.

  Judas laughed, then coughed, then spat a glob of gunk tinged with red.

  Jonas sighed and shook his head at his father.

  “After The Event,” Judas continued, “and before we settled into clans, it was common for groups to roam the ruins, searching for a safe haven. The elders told many stories of men and their search for the Garden of Eden, a place truly never found.

  “As time wore on, and the reality of those safe havens faded, men turned violent. They took to the road and pillaged what they could. The search for the garden was forgotten. Small groups gathered into larger groups and found places to call home. But when your enemy knows where you are, you are easy to find, and when many travel together, they leave signs that are easy to follow.”

  “The Walk. It is not safe to do in small groups.”

  “Correct, Jonah. It is why each season we must go as a clan. It is also why we must travel from one place to another. Don’t seek to make roots. The Garden of Eden is a cursed legend, waiting to destroy the foolish.”

  Jonah waited as another round of coughing shook his father beneath the blanket. The old man gripped the book as his body convulsed, his fingers tight around the spine.

  “
We know what awaits us at the end of The Walk. We know what will be here when we return. It is why our clan has survived while others have not. It is why you must understand how important it is for you to lead the village there. And back. You cannot waiver, Jonah. Not even for a moment. To stay over the winter is to make roots.”

  “You’ll get better, and you will lead—”

  “You can see my face, son. You know it will not stand before the clan ever again. Whether I pass before The Walk or after you depart, I will not be here when you return. The clan, The Walk, our fate. It is all yours, now.”

  Jonah shook his head. He stood and kicked the stool into the darkness, where it struck the wall with a sharp crack.

  “No. I am not ready. I know nothing of leadership or tracking beyond the paths encircling the village. I cannot lead. Who will take care of Sasha and the children?”

  Judas coughed, this time unable to turn his head. A fiery, crimson line shot down the front of the blanket. “When I am gone, you must read this. It is the rite of each new chief. But, above all, you must keep its pages only for your eyes. Thus is the way.”

  Jonah turned as someone knocked on the door. “Yes?” he asked.

  “Judas needs to rest.”

  Jonah nodded, agreeing with the muffled voice from the other side of the door. He turned to look at his father. The old man sat still, his eyes closed and his mouth agape. Jonah shook and reached forward, placing his hand on his father’s chest, which rose and fell with the sound of crushed glass. He pulled the blanket back up to his father’s chin and peeled his fingers from the journal. Jonah squeezed it, feeling the smooth and ancient leather cover. He opened it but then immediately slammed it shut. Jonah shoved the journal into his back pocket, placed a hand on Judas’s clammy forehead, and then walked to the door. He stopped and looked back at his father by the fire, the thoughts and snippets of conversation running through his head.