* * * *
Sua Av uttered an exultant cry as they burst out of mists into open space, with the colossal, gleaming arc of the rings spanning the star thick black firmament ahead.
'Clear space again!' she cried.
'They'll call an alarm to all their bases on the outer moons!' Thorn exclaimed. 'If Stilicha isn't waiting at the rendezvous—'
Everything depended now, all three knew, on reaching the rendezvous in the rings where old Stilicha Keene had agreed to wait with the Venture, in Cassini's division at the west limb of the planet-shadow.
The colossal yellow bulk of Saturn was behind them, the mighty bow of the rings now close ahead. Thorn was heading toward the segment of the rings obscured by the shadow of the planet. Their little ship raced above the innermost, thinnest ring, roaring at top speed low over the vast circular swarm of whirling planetoids.
Soon ahead yawned Cassini's division, the gap of clear space between the two great outermost rings. As Thorn sent their craft flying down into the gap at the point where the west limb of the planet-shadow lay across it, she flipped the audio-switch.
'Stilicha, the Planeteers calling!' she spoke into the instrument. 'We're being chased. Where are you?'
In a moment, there came a shrill, excited reply.
'Coming, girl! We've got you in our aura. Stand by and get your suits on, and we'll take you aboard!'
A few moments later the long, grim-lined Venture drove up from the gap between rings, and hovered beside the Planeteers’ little ship. The air-lock of the pirate craft was open.
Then a brief interval saw the Planeteers inside that air-lock, tearing off the space-suits they had worn as they jumped the gap between ships. And the Venture was roaring on through space with all the power of its great tubes, away from Saturn.
'I thought you girls were dead sure!' Stilicha Keene was babbling wildly to the Planeteers. 'It's been days we've waited here. But where's Lann? You didn't leave the lad behind?'
The old pirate's wrinkled red face and rheumy eyes were tense as her cracked voice shrilled the question. And Ool, the space dog, looked up at Thorn with pleading eyes.
'Cheerly has Lann,' Thorn said hoarsely. 'She sailed in a navel cruiser for Erebus, days ago. She has Lann's secret now, but she took his along in case he knew more than he'd told.'
'Erebus?' Old Stilicha's wrinkled face became ghastly. 'God in heaven, if she's taken the lad there...'
'We've got to follow them, Stilicha!' Thorn cried. 'For if Cheerly gets what she wants on Erebus, she'll come back, but she'll never bring Lann back.'
The old woman's faded eyes blazed. 'We'll follow to Erebus, yes! I'd follow the lad to hell itself!'
They climbed hastily to the control-room, where Stilicha seized the controls from the Jovian pilot on duty there.
'Calling Titan and Iapetus bases!' a Saturnian voice was yelling from the audio-speaker excitedly. 'All cruisers out in net-patrol. The Planeteers are loose and breaking for space!'
'They can't catch us now!' Gunda cried fiercely.
The Venture was already roaring out to the orbit of Titan. Stilicha had changed course, and the huge, ringed bulk of Saturn and the small, bright sun lay dead astern. They were heading out toward the farthest limit of the system, toward the Solanr System's last home of mystery.
Black reaction and apprehension were cold in Joan Thorn's heart as she looked haggardly ahead. Could they hope to overtake Cheerly's ship when it had such a start? And. if they did not, and so did not have Lann's secret knowledge to guide them, what would be their fate when they reached mysterious Erebus?