Cool evenings and warm mornings followed upon each other. Rayôn and Qeyrah settled in the vale where Áronyeh had created and awoken them, and ruled over the land as their Creator had instructed them. The man and his wife watched the sun and the moon rise on one side of the land, and set on the other side. They named the place where it rose “East,” and the place where it set “West.” They named the North and the South as well. To the North, the land in the valley rose toward a ridge of high hills, and from the North the river flowed down, passing their dwelling and running south.
“Let us go up to those hills,” said Rayôn to his wife. “From there we may see all the valley.” So on Wednesday morning, he took Qeyrah’s hand, and they followed the river upstream, past the waterfall at the edge of their dwelling. Up they went, through field and under wood, until they came to the edge of the hills. There, a giant rock protruded south from the ridge, the height of five men and the breadth of fifty; the river came cascading down from it in a rushing torrent. And there were other waterfalls, and other rivers, which sprung from that rock: three fell and flowed to the east, and three more to the west: seven rivers in all. Rayôn and Qeyrah climbed to the top of the rock, and beheld a great pool there. In its center there rose a pinnacle of diamond, and out of the pinnacle a great fountain shot into the air. Its waters plunged down into the surrounding pool with a roar, and bows of colored light floated in the surrounding mist. This was the first source of the seven great rivers of old, which watered the great southland of the ancient world, the seven great rivers which are still remembered in the songs and lore of men.
The man and his wife lingered there a while, beholding the beauty of the place. “What shall we name it?” Qeyrah asked her husband. Rayôn thought and said, “Let us not name it yet, Qeyrah; we must climb the hills above and look over it all to see where the rivers go. Then, when we return this way, we will name it.” And so they continued climbing. At noon, they came to the top, and looked back to the South. They saw the great pool and the seven rivers, and the valley in which they lived; they also saw that there was not one valley, but seven: to the east were three, and to the west were three, and through each one flowed one of the seven rivers. They looked beyond the valleys as well, and saw that the rivers continued flowing across the land until the earth touched the sky.
“Áronyeh must love seven,” said Qeyrah, “For not only has he made all there is in seven days, but he has also made our home in seven parts: seven valleys, and seven rivers.”
The man and his wife then turned, and looked to the north. And there they beheld the land descending, farther down than the valleys to the South. At the bottom the land stretched out a little, and then met a vast expanse of water, which extended to the edge of the earth. They beheld the sea. Qeyrah gasped in astonishment, but Rayôn’s heart arose within him. “We must go see this thing – waters that have no end to them!” He and Qeyrah went down, and as the evening was approaching they came to the shore. They felt the sand under their feet and the breeze that flowed down from the hills out to the ocean. The water rolled its waves onto the beach; there were birds they had not seen before, and other creatures that scuttled across the sand and amidst the waves.
The sun set, and Rayôn and Qeyrah lay gazing at the heavens. The moon rose in the east; it had been a crescent when they had first beheld it, but it was now nearly full in shape. “One more day,” said Qeyrah. “Then it will be a full circle. And what after that?”
“After that, I think it will wane again,” said Rayôn.
“Why do you think that?” asked Qeyrah.
“I think that the moon does not have a light of its own,” said Rayôn. “The sun is a ball of light, and the moon is also a ball, but not of light. I think it is a ball of something like water, because it reflects the sun’s light, just as the waters in the sea reflect the lights of the heavens.” He pointed to the moonbeam in the ocean, and noted how the moon had moved farther away from the sun in the sky over the last few nights. Qeyrah listened in fascination as he described how the heavens must be working, from what they could see of it.
The man and his wife explored the shore and the sea for another day and night, and then returned to the valley. When they came again to the great fountain and the seven rivers, Rayôn said to Qeyrah, “What would you name this place?”
Qeyrah thought and said, “Shêvannah, for here the seven rivers find their source.”
“That is good,” said Rayôn. “I would name this place Shêvannah as well.” And hand in hand, Rayôn and Qeyrah went down the hill and followed the South River back to their home in the vale.