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bread and I was showing the men how to make bows and arrows.
    Chron and his fellow teenagers became quite adept at snaring fowl in nets made from vines. We used the birds' feathers for our arrows after feasting on their flesh.
    One night, as Anya and I lay together in a cave apart from the others, I praised her for her domestic skills. She laughed. "I learned them a few lifetimes ago, just before the flood at Ararat. Don't you remember?"
    A vague recollection flitted through my mind. A hunting tribe much like this one. A flood caused by a darkly dangerous enemy. I felt the agony of drowning in the lava-hot floodwaters.
    "Ahriman," I said, more to myself than Anya.
    "You remember more and more!"
    The cave was dark; we had no fire. Yet even with nothing but starlight I saw that Anya was suddenly filled with a new hope.
    Propping herself up on one elbow, she asked urgently, "Orion, have you tried to make contact with the Creators?"
    "No. If you can't, then how can I?"
    "Your powers have grown since you were first created," she said, her words coming fast, excited. "Set is blocking me, but perhaps you can get through!"
    "I don't see how—"
    "Try! I'll work with you. Together we might be able to overcome whatever force he's using to block me."
    I nodded and rolled onto my back. The stone floor of the cave was still warm from the day's sunlight. Just like the rest of the tribe, we had constructed a bed of boughs and moss in a corner of the cave. I had covered it with the skin of a deer I had killed, the largest animal we had caught in this abundant forest. There were wolves out there, I knew; we had heard their howling in the night. But they had not come anywhere near our caves, high up the steep rock face and protected by fire.
    "Will you try?" Anya pleaded.
    "Yes. Of course." But something within me was hesitant. I liked this place, this time, this life with Anya. I felt a real aversion to reestablishing contact with the Creators. They would force us to resume the tasks they wanted us to carry out, their endless schemes to control the continuum, their petty arguments among themselves that resulted in slaughters such as Troy and Jericho. Our pleasant existence in Paradise would end the moment we reached them.
    Then I remembered the implacable evil of Set. I saw his devil's face and burning eyes. I heard his seething words: I will destroy you all, including the woman you love, the self-styled goddess. She will die the most painful death of all.
    I grasped Anya's hand and closed my eyes. Side by side, we concentrated together and strained to touch the minds of the Creators.
    I saw a glow, and for an instant thought we had broken through. But instead of the golden aura of the Creators' distant spacetime, this radiance was sullen red like the dark flames of hell, like the unblinking baleful eye of the blood red star that hung above us each night.
    The glow contracted, pulled itself together like an image in a telescope coming into focus. Set's remorseless hateful face glowered at me.
    "Soon, Orion. Very soon now. I know where you are. I will send you the punishment I promised. Your doom will be slow and painful, wretched ape."
    I bolted up to a sitting position.
    "What is it?" Anya asked, startled, sitting up beside me. "What did you see?"
    "Set. He knows where we are. I think we revealed ourselves to him by trying to make mental contact with the Creators. We've stepped into his trap."

CHAPTER 5

    All that night Anya and I discussed what we should do. Our options were pitifully few. We could stay where we were, even though Set knew our location now. We could try to escape deeper into the forest and hope that he could not find us. If we tried to contact the Creators, the mental energy we expended would signal Set like the bright beam of a laser cutting through the dark. If we could not contact the Creators, we were practically helpless against this reptilian demon and the enormous powers he possessed.
    We came to no conclusion, no