nt, it had trailed. Without
any need for faithfulness and loyalty, it had been loyal and faithful.
But loyal to what, Duncan wondered, to him, the outlander and
intruder? Loyal to itself? Or perhaps, although that seemed
impossible, faithful to the Cytha?

What does Sipar think of me, he asked himself, and maybe more to the
point, what do I think of Sipar? Is there a common meeting ground? Or
are we, despite our humanoid forms, condemned forever to be alien and
apart?

He held the rifle across his knees and stroked it, polishing it,
petting it, making it even more closely a part of him, an instrument
of his deadliness, an expression of his determination to track and
kill the Cytha.

Just another chance, he begged. Just one second, or even less, to draw
a steady bead. That is all I want, all I need, all I'll ask.

Then he could go back across the days that he had left behind him,
back to the farm and field, back into that misty other life from which
he had been so mysteriously divorced, but which in time undoubtedly
would become real and meaningful again.

Sipar came back. "I found the trail."

Duncan heaved himself to his feet. "Good."

They left the river and plunged into the forest and there the heat
closed in more mercilessly than ever--humid, stifling heat that felt
like a soggy blanket wrapped tightly round the body.

The trail lay plain and clear. The Cytha now, it seemed, was intent
upon piling up a lead without recourse to evasive tactics. Perhaps it
had reasoned that its pursuers would lose some time at the river and
it may have been trying to stretch out that margin even further.
Perhaps it needed that extra time, he speculated, to set up the
necessary machinery for another dirty trick.

Sipar stopped and waited for Duncan to catch up. "Your knife, mister?"

Duncan hesitated. "What for?"

"I have a thorn in my foot," the native said. "I have to get it out."

Duncan pulled the knife from his belt and tossed it. Sipar caught it
deftly.

Looking straight at Duncan, with the flicker of a smile upon its lips,
the native cut its throat.

V

He should go back, he knew. Without the tracker, he didn't have a
chance. The odds were now with the Cytha--if, indeed, they had not
been with it from the very start.

Unkillable? Unkillable because it grew in intelligence to meet
emergencies? Unkillable because, pressed, it could fashion a bow and
arrow, however crude? Unkillable because it had a sense of