Eternity Road Read Online Free PDF

one seldom found in younger men. He was occasionally dull, but that was not necessarily a bad thing in a man. She wore his bracelet on her ankle.
    “How did it go?” he asked as she rode up.
    The Mark Twain was secured in her saddlebag. Raney didn’t seem to have noticed it. “You wouldn’t believe it,” she said, accepting his kiss and returning an embrace that surprised him and almost knocked him off his horse.
    Raney was a garment maker. He was skilled, well paid, and enjoyed the affection and respect of his customers and the owner of the shop in which he worked. The shop was prosperous, the owner feeble, and, as nature took its course, Raney could expect to have few concerns about his future.
    He nodded toward the pillar of smoke rising into the sky. “I was surprised that you’d go.”
    “Why?”
    “The man’s responsible for Arin’s death.”
    “That’s nonsense,” she said. “Arin took his chances when he went. There aren’t any guarantees upcountry. You should know that.”
    It was a fine sunny day, unseasonably warm. They rode slowly toward River Road, where they would turn north. “He came back,” said Raney. “The man in charge of the expedition is the only survivor.” He shook his head. “If it were me, I’d have stayed out there.”
    She shrugged. “Maybe. But what would be the point?”
    The river sparkled below them. They talked about trivialities and after a while turned off the road and cantered upslope to Chaka’s villa, which stood atop the ridge. Her grandfather had built it, and it had passed to her remaining brother, Sauk, who’d granted it to her in exchange for her agreement to rear her two sisters. Now, Lyra was grown and gone, and Carin expected to marry in the spring.
    Raney was staring at her. “You okay?” he asked. “You look kind of funny.”
    “I’m fine.” She smiled as they rode through a hedge onto the grounds. “I have something to show you.”
    He carried the bag into the house and she opened it. When he saw the book, he frowned. “What is it?”
    “Mark Twain. One of the lost books.”
    “He’s a Roadmaker writer.”
    “Yes.”
    “Where’d it come from?”
    “It’s an inheritance, Raney. Karik left it to me.”
    “Funny thing to do for a stranger. Why?”
    She thought she caught a suspicious note in his voice. “I don’t know.”
    “How much do you think it’s worth?”
    “A lot. But it doesn’t matter.”
    “Why not?”
    “I’m not going to sell it.”
    “You’re not?” He gazed at an open page. “What do you want with it?”
    What was that supposed to mean? “Raney, this is Mark Twain .”
    He shook his head. “It’s your book, love. But I’d unload it at the first opportunity.”

2
    The Illyrians knew the world was round, though some among the lower classes were skeptical. They knew that infections were caused by tiny creatures they could not see, that the pattern of days and nights resulted from the movement of the world and not of the sun, that the Mississippi rose in a land of gigantic ruins and emptied into a gulf whose waters ran untroubled to the horizon. They were aware that thunderstorms were caused by natural processes and not by supernatural beings, although, since no one could explain how this was so, that view was becoming progressively tenuous with each generation.
    They knew that a civilization of major dimensions had occupied the land before them. How extensive those dimensions had been was a matter for speculation: The Illyrians and their fellow dwellers in the Mississippi Valley did not travel far beyond League outposts. They were still few in number; population pressures would not, for many years, drive them into a dangerous and hard wilderness. Furthermore, river navigation was limited: They could not move upstream easily without powered vessels; and travel downstream was hampered in some places and blocked altogether in others by collapsed bridges and other debris.
    A metropolis had once existed at the