air.

"--if we don't hit it by nightfall--But we can't be that far away!
I'll stay out and try tomorrow." That was Hobart. And since he was
captain what he said was probably what they would do. Raf shied away
from the thought of spending the night in this haunted land. Though,
on the other hand, he would be utterly opposed to lifting the flitter
over those mountains again except in broad daylight.

But the problem did not arise, for they found their city in the
midafternoon, the road bringing them straight to an amazing collection
of buildings, which appeared doubly alien to their eyes since it did
not include any of the low domes they had seen heretofore.

Here were towers of needle slimness, solid blocks of almost windowless
masonry looking twice as bulky beside those same towers, archways
stringing at dizzy heights above the ground from one skyscraper to the
next. And here time and nature had been at work. Some of the towers
were broken off, a causeway displayed a gap--Once it had been a
breathtaking feat of engineering, far more impressive than the
highway, now it was a slowly collapsing ruin.

But before they had time to take it all in Soriki gave an exclamation.
"Something coming through on our wave band, sir!" He leaned forward to
dig fingers into Hobart's shoulder. "Message of some kind--I'd swear
to it!"

Hobart snapped into action. "Kurbi--set down--there!"

His choice of a landing place was the flat top of a near-by building,