The Ark loomed before her now, a green monolith in a sea of white, like a land mass all its own that by its sheer size was able to alter the course of the storm. Martha watched the snow sweep up onto the wide plane of its sprawling roof, slide in wide swaths along the incline until it crested over the peak in swirls and eddies, sifted down the far side to cascade gently over the edge, settle along the wall in a long line white.
Standing there was a little like the Grand Canyon, or Niagara Falls or the Rocky Mountains. The sudden comprehension of scale. Of what it meant to feel small. She moved toward the near wall, out of the wind now, and stepped up onto the snow bank, sharp-edged and hardened, through the veil of snow drifting down off the roof and into the hollow, sheltered space, a few feet wide, between the green wall of the Ark and the snow. Flakes showered down from the roof in crystal hisses, cascaded over her like a white and powdery falls as she walked along until she reached the corner of the building and stepped around it, back into the wind. Stayed close to the wall until she came to the same small door she remembered from her last visit, tried the latch and when it offered no resistance, pushed it open far enough to step inside.
The world changed instantly from blinding white to blinding black. Light poured in through the open door like an invasion, a violation of what must have been, until a moment ago, total darkness. Martha waited for her eyes to adjust, her breath visible in smoky clouds that vanished beyond the sharp straight lines of the light’s boundaries. It was very cold inside, much colder than outdoors. There was a heaviness to the cold in here. A weight of something sucking heat out of her body. A dampness. In the hollow quiet, the yawning dark, an eagerness to swallow up everything - light, heat, sound. Martha took a few steps in, listened. The only sound the snow sweeping across the long slope of the roof, washing over her like the glassy whisper of sand on a wide ocean beach.
The darkness beyond the edge of the light from the doorway seemed liquid, to be flowing away from her as she strained to push the boundaries of her vision deeper into it. Snow was streaming in through the open door now, fanning out over the dirt floor like a white luminescent bridal veil, and as it grew, reflected more and more light into the chamber, up into the rafters, until Martha could make out a faint skeleton of trusses and beams overhead, like the ribcage of some oceanic leviathan that had swallowed her whole.
She walked through the widening pool of light until she reached the edge, stopped, a little unsteady on her feet, swayed from side to side as though she might have descended below the decks of a massive wooden vessel at sea in a storm. Now and then a creak came down out of the rafters as the Ark shifted and groaned in the wind. A tall oak timber, stripped of its bark, rose up before her like the mast of a ship and disappeared into the rafters above. She ran her fingers along its surface, slapped at the smooth wood with a satisfying smack, like a hand on naked flesh that echoed into the vast chamber. A ladder leaned against the far side of the timber, climbed along it to where the light hardly reached. Next to it hung a set of ropes that led up into the rafters. A dark mass on the ground, not far from the base of the ladder. The vague shape of a figure crouched low. The indistinct shadow of someone crumpled into a kneeling position.
Martha drew closer and saw that it was a human shape, perched on its haunches, utterly still. And then she could make out the long black coat, the wide-brimmed hat, brought her hand to her mouth, leaned in closer to examine her brother, touch a finger to his hands, translucent and pale as snow, clasped before him, fingers entwined, as though praying, follow the faint pattern of frost over his face, lifeless eyes turned up, as though in a moment of exquisite, frozen rapture.
She straightened and put one hand on the ladder to steady herself, followed his gaze up into the rafters to try and see what it was her brother had been so fixated on but the darkness there was impossible to penetrate. She stepped onto the first rung, pulled herself up onto the second, turned to look up but still the dark would not yield. There was something up there. She thought of climbing back down but then she remembered the box of wooden matches she’d picked up on her way out, knowing she was coming here, fumbled through her pockets and brought them out. With one arm locked around the wrung of the ladder she slid open the box and took out three matches, bunched them together, scraped them along the side of the box. An orange light burst forth and she climbed, head down, watching her footfalls as she ascended the ladder, held up the burning matches and found herself at eye level with a pair of naked blue feet, one resting over the other, a spike driven through both, turned her wide eyes up long enough to see Clarence, head resting on his chest, arms spread eagle, staring back down at her. The matches burned her fingers now and she cried out, launched herself backward through the air, arms wide, like a diver.
Bring home Into the D/Ark by David Elias, published by Radiant Press, 2025.
About Into the D/Ark:
Rose Martens struggles with the aftermath of a terrible fire that has left her sons, Jake and Isaac, horribly disfigured. The boys have gone to live in an abandoned house they’ve named Bachelor’s Paradise, where they spend all their time watching American network television. Their father Clarence works day and night in his blacksmith shop, producing bizarre metallic creations no one can make any sense of. Martha Wiebe returns to the stifling conformity of the valley to discover that her brother Abe, a preacher, has abandoned his congregation to devote himself to the construction of “The Ark”, a massive and mysterious edifice whose purpose he will not divulge. When the first major snowstorm of the year roars into the valley, it unleashes a chain of bizarre events that the valley may never recover from.
Praise for David Elias:
“Winnipeg writer David Elias fashions scenes that are literally breathtaking: sometimes because of the sheer beauty and insight of the passage; sometimes because of the bone-chilling tenor of the description. Both aspects demonstrate the potency and reach of Elias’s writing.”
— Winnipeg Free Press, October 12, 2008, Marjorie Anderson, (Review of Waiting for Elvis)
About David Elias:
David Elias is the author of seven books, most recently The Truth about the Barn: A Voyage of Discovery and Contemplation, published by Great Plains Publications. It was featured in the Winnipeg Free Press as one of the top titles for 2020. His most recent work of fiction is an historical novel, Elizabeth of Bohemia: A Novel about Elizabeth Stuart, the Winter Queen. It was published in 2019 by ECW Press, and was a finalist for The Margaret Lawrence Award for Fiction at The Manitoba Book Awards. His previous works have been up for numerous awards including the McNally Robinson Book of the Year, the Amazon First Novel Award, and The Journey Prize. His short stories, novel excerpts, and poetry have appeared in literary magazines and anthologies across the country, and in addition to writing he spends time as a mentor, creative writing instructor, and editor. He lives in Winnipeg, Canada.