People of the Nightland(167)
Blue Wing stared in disbelief as the great wave spread like a huge ring. It raced across the narrow band of water, rushing up the southern shore, covering the tundra. As it engulfed the land, it dislodged the grounded bergs, tossing them high up on the pockmarked land. Then the water seemed to settle for a moment, filling the hollows, swirling around the hillocks and drumlins.
Behind it, the beach remained bare, reefs of rounded rock sticking up like pimples on the naked seafloor. Then the remnants of the wave began to flow back across the denuded shores, and the roar of it came thundering across the land. She felt the power of it by the trembling of the earth beneath her, and the rumble that deafened her ears.
As she watched, a series of cracks shot through the bellies of the Ice Giants, racing away in every direction, and another slab sloughed off. It crashed into the lake. Then another peeled off and fell with what seemed an agonizing slowness. The massive waves that rolled away smashed into the backwash of the first. Giant geysers of white shot high into the air; the mist rainbowed in the sunlight.
Terrified birds fluttered this way and that like disoriented bats. An arctic hare ran past her in panic.
In one gigantic grinding wail, a piece of ice bigger than all of Nightland country broke free … .
The lake exploded. A wall of water raced through the pitching waves for the shore.
It came like thunder, the sound growing louder by the instant. The great wave overwhelmed the draining waters of the first, thrusting them back into the rocks and old ice that lined the tundra.
Blue Wing watched in stunned amazement as the edge of it rushed across the land below her, churning, dashing, shooting high as it engulfed the country she had just crossed. The rumble of it shook her, shivering her very bones.
In panicked immobility, she watched wide-eyed as it rolled up almost to her feet, and slowed.
To the south, the Thunder Sea rushed through the hilly moraines, spilling out across the uneven ground in a wild torrent.
The earthquake trembled to a stop, but a new roar filled the air.
As more and more water poured through, the gap widened and sent the icy lake water crashing down what had been the narrow channel of Windigo River. The wave pushed a flood of enormous rocks and chunks of frozen earth before it, scouring the channel.
The water had overflowed the banks of the river and was flooding out like a black sea, washing toward the distant ridge where Headswift Village stood.
Blue Wing climbed uneasily to her feet as the water below her began to drain away. Every hollow was filled; rivulets were being cut into the slopes before her eyes.
Every vestige of the Nightland Caves and villages had been wiped clean. The beach below the camps stretched empty, the water far down the gentle slope. Damp mud glistened in the sunlight with an eerie sheen. Here and there, great rivers of backwash roared back toward the dancing waters of the Thunder Sea.
She had no idea how long she stared, but a distant wall of white caught her eye. It lay along the eastern horizon of the narrow Thunder Sea, a hazy thin band.
She looked at the exposed mud flats where water had once rested, thought about the waves that had washed out of the basin, and looked back at the distant band of white.
Was it bigger now?
“Water always finds its own level,” she whispered. And the Thunder Sea ran right into the ocean.
She turned and ran.
Seventy
For two days following the great quake, Silvertip led his people eastward along the ridges. Behind them, the water continued to rise, slipping up valleys, spilling into hollows.
At last he topped a final ridge, following a path between large pines. He stopped, staring, stunned to see with his eyes what his Spirit had known only in Dreams.
Ashes came to stand beside him, her war club resting on her shoulder. He heard her sudden gasp of disbelief. Lookingbill and Dipper walked up on either side, standing in silent awe.
Below them, what had been Lake River Valley had become what at first appeared to be a flat plane that extended almost without relief to the distant peaks of the Ice Giants. To the eye it seemed like flat land at first, until a decided movement became apparent, as if the great expanse of plain moved inexorably to the east.
Looking closer, the observer realized that what passed for matted earth was floating debris consisting of rafts of uprooted trees, icebergs, tangles of wood, sticks, and branches. Most, however, was duff and leaves floated from the forest floor. Occasional clear patches of water, like cracks, gleamed a gray granitic sheen.
Close to the shore Silvertip could see the bloated carcass of a mammoth, the long red hair of its hide clotted with debris. The great cow floated on her side, bobbing slightly, head turned down into the filthy brown water. He spotted other carcasses: a bison, two elk, and the dark hide of short-faced bear. All animals that had no chance to flee the great sprawling mass of water that had rolled out of the west.