Rivers of Fire (Atherton, Book 2) (29 page)

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"Just one more minute," said Isabel, those piercing dark eyes locked on Edgar.

"All right, a little longer."

The three friends sat close, laughing and talking quietly, their legs swinging happily over the edge of the world as they talked of all that had happened and all that was to come on the world of Atherton.

Edgar turned quiet and thought about how he'd been
made,
not born like his friends. He didn't really understand this, but he thought of it often. Edgar and Atherton had both been made by the same creator. He felt more than ever that Atherton really was made for him alone, at least at the beginning, and that Dr. Harding had loved him enough to build a world for him, to shield him from life on the Dark Planet. He had made the place, then the boy, but in Dr. Harding's mind Edgar had always been first and foremost.

Edgar's thoughts turned to a place he didn't often let himself go. Had the making of Atherton driven Dr. Harding mad, or was it something else, something more painful? It didn't seem to Edgar that making a place could cause such trauma, but that making a person might. It was sad for a boy to think such thoughts, but Edgar couldn't help it. He felt more and more certain that what had driven Dr. Harding crazy wasn't losing Atherton but losing the son he'd made to inhabit Atherton.

"We'd better go," said Samuel, stirring Edgar from his thoughts. "It's a long walk."

Isabel looked at Edgar and saw that he was feeling a little

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sad, so she did the kind of thing she always did, the kind of thing that made Edgar like her so much.

"I bet I can sling a fig farther out into space than you can."

Edgar gazed out into the stars. "No, you can't. I'm stronger than you."

The two crawled away from the edge with Samuel, who was given the task of determining the winner. Slings were produced along with one black fig each, and the empty space of the Flatlands filled with a whirling sound made by two children of Atherton.

And then they let the figs go--
snap! snap!
--and they watched as the black figs flew straight and true. When the figs were a little way out over the edge, they turned down sharply, pulled toward the Dark Planet by the force of gravity.

"It's a tie," said Samuel. He began walking toward the villages, knowing his judgment would not stand.

"That was no tie," said Isabel. "Mine went farther."

"Mine's on its way to the Dark Planet," said Edgar. "It was definitely the faster of the two."

The three children argued as they went, and Isabel was pleased that she'd turned Edgar's mind away from the quiet thoughts he wouldn't tell her about. She wondered if Edgar would ever share what had really happened to him during his time alone with Dr. Harding. Isabel could only say for sure that the spirit of the boy who held her hand was deeper than all the rest. She somehow felt, as all the other children born on Atherton did, that without Edgar, Atherton itself would grow lonely and die.

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These were strange thoughts, but walking together with her friends and feeling the calm of Atherton all around her, Isabel was at peace. They walked on, staring up into a sky that used to hold their home and the homes of others, and the three of them were happy.

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