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You leap high against the cave wall, grab a handhold, dig the toe of your right foot into a tiny niche, and begin to climb. The bear is close behind you---breathing and snorting. You’re able to climb a couple of feet higher, but the wall becomes even steeper above you. You desperately feel for a higher handhold. Suddenly your wrist is seized in a viselike grip, and you feel yourself rising, then being hauled onto a ledge. Only then does the powerful grip release your wrist. Aching and sore you look into the smiling eyes of laark---then back at the paws of the bear raking the lip of the ledge, still trying to get at you. “Aug,” says laark. He starts crawling into a dark tunnel. You follow, hoping it will lead you out into the open. Instead, it leads you into an abyss. And you’re falling, clutching laark’s arms, tumbling through the Cave of Time. . . . Turn to page 93\