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talent Chthon had taught him.
    Arlo stepped out of the shower. The water wrenched at him again, and his feet slipped out from under. He sat down hard on the rock, his legs going out over the edge, his gaze fashioning a precipitous plunge through the glowing vapors of the middle space of the garden... and again Verthandi’s hand caught his and held him steady.
    “You have saved me. You have also answered my questions,” Arlo told her. “I will remember that. But now I must hurry.”
    She only nodded. She surely knew whether he would ever return to her, and was willing to wait. Zombies had extraordinary patience.
    He left the cave of the Norns, impelled by his new urgency. He made his way down through the labyrinth of passages, again reminded how formidable they would have been for anyone who did not know their idiosyncrasies and dangers. His father could not pass here—at least not with any speed or security. But Arlo had had years to explore them, with Chthon’s protection and help.
    This particular region had only one safe exit: a corkscrew tunnel barely large enough to let a man pass. All other routes led past potwhales, caterpillars, and other predators. Arlo could traverse them when Chthon was with them, but not alone.
    As he approached the corkscrew—the term derived from an artifact mentioned in LOE, a metal-wire spiral used to remove the ancient stoppers from bottles—he stopped. A salamander was there.
    The best way to deal with a salamander was to avoid it. Normally they did not stray from the hottest wind-tunnels.
    Which suggested that this one’s presence in this key location was not coincidence. Chthon could have summoned it to bar the way.
    Why?
    Arlo froze, a prickle of dread traveling up his spine. Ex was alone; only his determination had spared her from Chthon’s siege, before. She was imminently threatened by something vicious. A wolf thing. Now—
    He had to get past the salamander! But the creature was aware of him, alert—and the very touch of its tiny tooth meant death.
    “Chthon!” he called automatically, knowing that was useless. One lesson this experience with Ex had already taught him: he could no longer rely on his friend the god. Not completely. And what was untrustworthy part of the time was uncertain all of the time. He had depended on Chthon to protect him from cavern predators, until he had come to think of the caverns as safe. That had been a dangerous complacency!
    Now he had to handle the salamander himself—and quickly, for the menace to Ex was growing. Chthon, balked from direct attack, was now using an indirect approach, sending a monster to kill Ex while the salamander blocked off Arlo. Had he remained longer with the Norns, the deed would have been accomplished before he could return. The Norns, governed by another aspect of Chthon, had not informed him. They had sought to distract him longer..
    Arlo scowled. One day, when he had nothing better to do, he just might see about making them regret that.
    Suddenly a new, ugly connection formed in his mind. The hvee, too, had worked Chthon’s will. It had sent him to the Norns, rendering Ex vulnerable. The hvee was able to grow in the caverns only because of Chthon’s ambience. Chthon could make anything happen. Chthon had wanted Arlo to be happy, so the cavern god had provided him, through Doc Bedside, with the ultimate in contentment: successful hvee. But by that token, the hvee was but another zombie, or at least a partial zombie, like Verthandi and Bedside. It seemed independent, but at the root it was not.
    Arlo realized that he had complicated his life phenomenally when he had set his will against that of his god.
    But the salamander: let the theoretical implications go, in the face of the specific. He did not dare put his hands on it. The thing was less than the span of his spread hand from thumb to little finger, but its virulent poison could kill within minutes. He could not risk hurdling it, for the thing could jump