That night Brown complained of a splitting headache. They camped near a stream, and Garth accompanied the Captain down to the bank, with canvas pails. Jupiter was invisible—they had not seen the sky for a week—but the red light was fading.
"Not too close," Garth cautioned. "Let me test it first."
Brown stared at him. "What now? I'm getting to expect anything here." The man's expressionless face showed signs of strain and exhaustion. He had no nerves, apparently, but the gruelling journey had told on him nevertheless.
Garth used his knife to cut down a sapling. He impaled a leaf on its point and extended it gingerly over the dark water. After a moment he felt a shock like a striking fish, and the pole was nearly wrenched from his hands. And he wrestled with it, Brown's hands gripped the sapling.
"What the devil! Garth—"
"Let it go. I was only testing, anyway." The pole was dragged into the water, where it thrashed about violently for a few moments.
"What is it?"
Garth was searching through the underbrush for something. "Water-snakes. Big ones—perfectly transparent. They wait for some animal to come along and take a drink. Then—bang!" He nodded. "Here we are. We'll find a lot of the Noctoli flowers from now on."
He brought out a bloom nearly a foot in diameter, with leaves of pulpy, glossy black, a thick powdering of silver in its cup. "This is Noctoli, Captain. Looks harmless, doesn't it?"