Some of the towers of the city were more than a quarter of a mile high, offering a magnificent view over the plain. The lake would provide water, some of the bushes bore fruit and berries, and the neighborhood seemed rich in game for the people and grass for the horses. They could sit almost in the lap of luxury and wait for the Looters to appear.

That optimistic plan left out a few things, of course. Blade mentioned some of them to Anyara.

«If they use one of the superbombs that make the flat topped clouds, they can wipe out all of us. The only way we could avoid that is to disperse so far that we could not attack effectively.»

«What about their rockets?»

«I am less afraid of those. They are powerful, I admit, and they will do a great deal of damage if we let them. But I doubt if the Looters bring very many of them from their homeland. They probably cannot afford to fire them off the way we fire arrows. If we do not give them a tempting target, I doubt that we will have much to fear from them. I have even been thinking of ways of attacking the big machines, the ones that carry the rockets and the red rays.»

«That is something you did not speak of before.»

«I did not expect that we would have any more of the smaller war machines to use against the Looters. But we do.»

Blade had discovered that the legs of the captured machines could be retracted manually by someone cranking a wheel inside the cabin. After that, all four of the captured machines could move and fly almost as well as before. Blade, however, was the only one who could fly a Looter machine.

«Their weapons do not work, Mazda, and I do not see how we are going to repair them.»

«We are not. But I do not think we will need the weapons if my plans work.»

The next day Blade spent several hours maneuvering one of the captured machines around the streets of Miros. After that, he spent the rest of the day and all of the next working with twelve particularly good fighters from the expedition. When he finished that, he told Anyara that he had plans ready for meeting any of the big Looter machines.

«But I do not know how much chance I have of coming out of that battle alive,» he added.

«When will you know that, Mazda?» said Anyara, her face pale. «It is not good to think of the death of Mazda, even in victory.»

Blade smiled grimly. «It may happen, Anyara, whether you find it pleasant to think about or not. Accept that fact. As for when we shall know if I am going to live or not-we shall know that the next time the Looters come.»

The Looters did not come during the rest of that week. The roof of the highest building in Miros was manned day and night by particularly keen-sighted fighters. They kept an endless watch over the plain, waiting for the flash and flicker of metal to break the even line of the distant horizon.

It never did.

Blade used the unexpected gift of time to start training several volunteers in the basics of piloting a Looter war machine. It was easy enough to learn, provided you weren't paralyzed by fear of the power and weapons you had at your command.

This was hard for the younger people to do. They had never controlled anything more powerful than a team of plow-horses. But some of them controlled their fear well enough to learn faster than Blade expected.

Chara turned out to be the best of these new pilots. Blade gave her the job of rescuing the watchers from the top of the tower when the fighting started. After that she would ride with him as a spare pilot for his own machine.

The days ran on into the second week. Many of the people were openly wondering if the Looters had lost their courage. Even Anyara could not help thinking out loud.

«They sent six machines against Miros, and it must seem as though they have all sailed away to another world in the sky. Those six are gone. This is not something that has ever happened to them before. Are they brave enough to try again?»

«I don't think their courage has that much to do with it,» was all Blade would say. In his own mind, he was far less certain. The empty horizon perhaps did mean that the Looters were stunned by the disappearance of the six machines, stunned and paralyzed.

It could also mean that they had finally realized a deadly enemy was lurking somewhere out there, an enemy with new skills. They might be busily making plans to send a stronger force against this enemy. Perhaps they were even making plans to come forth themselves, instead of relying on their rugged but fatally inflexible machines.

Yet Blade was sure of one thing. Sooner or later, in one way or another, the Looters would return.

Chapter 18

Dawn in Miros. The coolness was not yet out of the air and the dew not yet dried from the dust in the empty streets. Blade sat with Chara on the platform of a war machine, in a corner that still lay deep in shadow. Suddenly he heard her suck in breath with a sharp hiss.

«Look-on the tower! The signal!»

Blade raised his eyes to the top of the watchtower. The thick black smoke of burning teksin oil was streaming up into the windless sky.

The Looters had come again.

Chara was already diving for the hatch of the machine. Blade leaped through behind her and took the controls. They rose swiftly, climbing up into the sunlight, up to the top of the tower.

The chief of the sentries met Blade as he sprang out of the machine. «They are half a day's march toward the horizon, Mazda. They are low, and if they move, they move so slowly that we cannot see it.»

«How many?»

«We count only six, Mazda. Three of the small war machines, and three of the big ones that are shaped like boxes.»

«Nothing else?»

«We have seen nothing else, Mazda. If it had been there, we would have seen it.»

«Very good. You've given your signal. Get your people into the machine. We'll drop you off by the horses when we pick up my attack team.»

The sentries piled into the cabin of the machine. Blade was the last in. He was keeping a rigidly calm face, but he was not entirely calm inside. Six machines-that was not nearly as strong a force as he had expected. But they were fighting machines only. There were none of the other kinds that would have been part of any force intended to simply move into Miros and start to loot and smash it. The Looters were also standing off at a distance rather than heading straight in.

It looked like a fighting force, sent by someone who expected trouble, and under command of human brains. No, not «human.» Call them «live» brains. The Looters were humanoid. But human? That remained to be seen.

Blade suspected that with luck they might see the answer to that question today. Then he put the Looters temporarily out of his mind and concentrated on getting the machine off the roof.

They plunged down to the street and leveled out so low that their passing kicked up dust. In minutes they were at the north camp, where Blade had stationed the twelve specially trained fighters.

Blade dropped the machine on its belly with a crunch of rubble underneath and opened the hatch. «Get to your horses and ride out of the city as fast as you can. If you do not hear true word from me or my people by nightfall, we will be dead. Then ride for the lands of the people as fast as you can. Ignore any message that doesn't contain the word 'Zulekia.' «

«Zulekia? The name of your Beloved?»

«Yes.»

«Why?»

«I think that there may be some living Looters with those machines out on the plain. They may use a false message from me to lay a trap for all of you. But they will not know my Beloved's name.»

It was obvious that the people did not quite understand. But he was Mazda, and they would obey him.

Now Blade signaled to his attack team. «I want six of you to climb into the machine and ride with us. The other six will ride out of the city with the rest. If I die today, you will return to the lands of the people and help teach others what I have taught you.»