"What?"
Nasha looked up at Dorle. "The white stones, the great broken teeth. We
saw them, the Captain and I, from the control room." She touched Dorle's
arm gently. "That's where they fired from. I didn't think we had landed
so close."
"What is it?" Tance said, coming up to them. "I'm almost blind without
my glasses. What do you see?"
"The city. Where they fired from."
"Oh." All three of them stood together. "Well, let's go," Tance said.
"There's no telling what we'll find there." Dorle frowned at him.
"Wait. We don't know what we would be getting into. They must have
patrols. They probably have seen us already, for that matter."
"They probably have seen the ship itself," Tance said. "They probably
know right now where they can find it, where they can blow it up. So
what difference does it make whether we go closer or not?"
"That's true," Nasha said. "If they really want to get us we haven't a
chance. We have no armaments at all; you know that."
"I have a hand weapon." Dorle nodded. "Well, let's go on, then. I
suppose you're right, Tance."
"But let's stay together," Tance said nervously. "Nasha, you're going
too fast."
Nasha looked back. She laughed. "If we expect to get there by nightfall
we must go fast."
* * * * *
They reached the outskirts of the city at about the middle of the
afternoon. The sun, cold and yellow, hung above them in the colorless
sky. Dorle stopped at the top of a ridge overlooking the city.
"Well, there it is. What's left of it."
There was not much left. The huge concrete piers which they had noticed
were not piers at all, but the ruined foundations of buildings. They had
been baked by the searing heat, baked and charred almost to the ground.
Nothing else remained, only this irregular circle of white squares,
perhaps four miles in diameter.
Dorle spat in disgust. "More wasted time. A dead skeleton of a city,
that's all."
"But it was from here that the firing came," Tance murmured. "Don't
forget that."
"And by someone with a good eye and a great deal of experience," Nasha
added. "Let's go."
They walked into the city between the ruined buildings. No one spoke.
They walked in silence, listening to the echo of their footsteps.
"It's macabre," Dorle muttered. "I've seen ruined cities before but they
died of old age, old age and fatigue. This was killed, seared to death.
This city didn't die--it was murdered."
"I wonder what the city was called," Nasha said. She turned aside, going
up the remains of a stairway from one of the foundations. "Do you think
we might find a signpost? Some kind of plaque?"
She peered into the ruins.
"There's nothing there," Dorle said impatiently. "Come on."
"Wait." Nasha bent down, touching a concrete stone. "There's something
inscribed on this."
"What is it?" Tance hurried up. He squatted in the dust, running his
gloved fingers over the surface of the stone. "Letters, all right." He
took a writing stick from the pocket of his pressure suit and copied the
inscription on a bit of paper. Dorle glanced over his shoulder. The
inscription was: