Free The Myst Reader by Rand and Robyn Miller with David Wingrove Page B

striations of the rock, then pointed to his left.
    “Just there. See, Atrus? See the steps?”
    Atrus saw them, cut like the thread of a screw into the uneven sides of the great hole, but the thought of using them, of descending that vast shaft by their means, frightened him.
    Gehn looked to him. “Would you like to go first, Atrus, or shall I?”
    Atrus swallowed, then spoke, keeping the fear from his voice. “You’d better. You know the way.”
    “Yes,” Gehn said, giving his son a knowing smile. “I do, don’t I?”
    For the first hundred steps or so, the steps passed through a narrow tunnel cut into the edge of the chasm with only a thin gap low down by the floor to the right, but then, suddenly, the right-hand wall seemed to melt away and Atrus found himself out in the open, staring down into that massive well of darkness. Startled by the sight, he stumbled and his right sandal came away, toppled over the edge and into the darkness.
    He stood there a moment, gasping, his back against the wall, trying to regain his nerve. But suddenly he found himself obsessed with he idea of falling into that darkness; and not just falling, but deliberately throwing himself. The urge was so strange and overpowering it made the hairs at the back of his neck stand on end.
    Below him, almost directly opposite him across the great shaft, Gehn continued his descent, unaware, it seemed, of the immense danger, stepping lightly, almost effortlessly, down the spiral, his lamplight casting flickering shadows on the groined and striated rock, before he vanished inside another of the narrow tunnels.
    I must go on , Atrus told himself, freeing his left foot from the sandal; yet the fear he felt froze his muscles. It was like a dream, an evil dream. Even so, he forced himself to move, taking first one step and then another, each step an effort of sheer will.
    If I fall I die. If I fall…
    His father’s voice echoed across that vast open space. “Atrus?”
    He stopped, his shoulder pressed against the wall, and closed his eyes. “Y…yes, father?”
    “Do you want me to come back to you? Would you like me o hold your hand, perhaps?”
    He wanted to say yes, but something in Gehn’s voice, the faintest tone of criticism, stopped him. He opened his eyes again and, steeling himself, answered. “No…I’ll be all right.”
    “Good. But not so slow, eh? We cannot spend too much time here. Not if I am to be back in time.”
    Controlling his fear, Atrus began to descend once more.
    Imagine you’re inside a tree, he told himself. Imagine it.
    And suddenly he could see it vividly, as if it were an illustration in one of his grandmother’s books. He could picture it in the brilliant sunlight, its branches stretching from horizon to horizon, a tiny crescent moon snagged among its massive leaves. Why, even the blades of grass about its trunk were several times the height of a man!
    Halfway down, there was a depression in the side of the shaft—a kind of cave. Whether it was natural or D’ni made, Atrus couldn’t tell, but Gehn was waiting for him there, sitting on a carved stone ledge, calmly smoking his pipe.
    “Are you all right, Atrus?” he asked casually.
    “I’m fine now,” Atrus answered genuinely. “There was a moment…”
    He fell silent, seeing that his father wasn’t listening. Gehn had taken out a tiny notebook with a tanned leather cover and was studying it as he smoked. Atrus glimpsed a diagram of paths and tunnels.
    With a tiny grunt, Gehn closed the book and pocketed it again, then looked up at Atrus.
    “You go ahead. I’ll finish my pipe, then catch up with you.”
     
    §
     
    It was several hours hard walking through a labyrinth of twisting tunnels before they finally came to the eder tomahn. The D’ni way station was built into a recess of a large cave, its black, perfectly finished marble in stark contrast to the cave’s natural limestone. Atrus walked over to it and, holding up the lantern, ran his fingers