almost every one in the city fell
asleep. The physical desire for sleep was, I learned, much stronger with
the Mercutians than with us; and only by the drinking of a certain
medicinal beverage could they ward it off.

It was after the evening meal, at a time which might have corresponded to
an hour or so before midnight, that the selected eighteen girls began to
arrive. Miela brought them into the living room with us until they were
all together.

It was a curious gathering--this bevy of Mercutian maidens. They all
seemed between the ages of sixteen and twenty-three--fragile, dainty
little wisps of femininity, yet having a strength in their highly
developed wing muscles that was truly surprising.

They were dressed in the characteristic costume I have described, with
only a slight divergence of color or ornamentation. They were of only two
types--jet black tresses, black eyes, and red-feathered wings like Miela;
or the less vivid, more ethereal Anina--blue-eyed, golden-haired, with
wing feathers of light blue.

When they had all arrived we went into the garden behind the house. In a
moment more Mercer and I were seated side by side on the little bamboo
platform. Miela and Anina took the center positions so that they would be
near us. The other girls ranged themselves along the sides, each grasping
one of the handles.

In another moment we were in the air. My first sensation was one of a
sudden rushing forward and upward. The frail little craft swayed under me
alarmingly, but I soon grew used to that. The flapping of those many pairs
of huge wings so close was very loud; the wind of our swift forward flight
whistled past my ears. Looking down over the side of the platform, between
the bodies of two of the girls, I could see the city silently dropping
away beneath us. Above there was nothing but the same dead gray sky, black
in front, with occasional vivid lightning flashes and the rumble of
distant thunder.

Underneath the storm cloud, far ahead, the jagged tops of a range of
mountains projected above the horizon. As I watched they seemed slowly
creeping up and forward as the horizon rolled back to meet them.

For half an hour or so we sped onward through the air. We were over the
mountains now. Great jagged, naked peaks of shining metal towered above
us, with that broken, utterly desolate country beneath. We swept
continually upward, for the mountains rose steadily in broad serrated
ranks before us.

Occasiona