He held her, feeling her terror. “And my planet, my home, my Hvee world, it sold me to Chthon, because I loved her. Now I return.”

“We’ll all die, Aton.”

“I have no choice, you see,” he said, and kissed her again on face and breast, and left her.

12

The Hard Trek, Aton thought, the Trek has taken us from the world of the rushing winds where we tarried so long in what we did not know was comfort. It has shown us the world of the furnace heart, where the generative gasses fling their essence into the wider system, as Earth herself flings hers, without abatement and without compassion, to flame briefly and flicker out and return at last, tired, only to be blasted forth again. And now it shows us the last of its mighty elements, the world of water.

He stood at the edge of the river, looking into it and dreaming. It had been spurned before; would it now, like a woman, show them its vengeance?

Miles below, downstream, the party had gathered and was resting while two men reconnoitered, one upstream, the other downstream. Each would leave tokens behind, marking his trail; the rest would follow the one who did not return. This was logical: what man, finding freedom, would venture again into the caverns? What man would risk the loss of a hopeful path by turning back? Only defeat would make him welcome his fellows.

Thus Aton found himself alone, tracing the source, because his urge to escape was the strongest. He was armed, and he had a pack with rich red meat, and he had a vision. Bedside had come this way, perhaps, and Bedside had escaped. Somewhere there would be a sign.

The glow was brighter, here by the water. Aton stooped to dip his fingers in the clear liquid and touch the shining fringe at his feet. The surface of the path was smooth and a trifle slimy. His passing contact left patches of darker stone, as though he had crushed the vegetable beacons eating at the rock: The green luminescence came up through the water, casting its energies into his face with surrealistic beauty.

There was a narrow channel along one side of the stream, a kind of raised pathway about eighteen inches deep that clung to the upright wall. Aton followed it, since it was uncommonly convenient. The alternative was to wade waist deep through the swift flow, trusting his naked feet to whatever lurked beneath.

He took the path, but did not trust it. Never yet had Chthon offered a gambit that was safe to accept. The walkway had to be used by something, and that thing was bound to be inimical. He moved quickly, not so much because time was short—though this might easily be the case, if the distance to the surface were far—as to confound any stalking creature behind him. Or surprise anything lurking ahead.