"Perhaps some holocaust...?" Volval began weakly.
"Or a war?" Drog hinted gravely.
"Impossible!" said Gwann, leaning against one of the legs of the gigantic ship. "There is a conspicuous absence of anything that might be construed as a weapon of war. There are no bodies in the buildings or in the streets. No wreckage anywhere."
"Perhaps they have been frightened by our appearance and have gone into hiding?" asked Klendro, fingering the edge of his now futile scroll where it protruded from his belt-sack.
"Nonsense," said their leader. "From all we've learned of the Earthmen, fright would only make them aggressive. They would not have hidden from us; they'd have tried to shoot us down when we emerged from the ship."
"There was one thing...." said Jorik slowly. "I almost did not see it, but its shadow passed close by me on the side of one of the buildings, and I looked up barely in time to get a glimpse of it before it vanished."
"What was it like?" asked Gwann quickly.
"Some sort of animal, probably carnivorous," said Jorik. "I cannot be certain, of course, but I saw a mouth with teeth bespeaking flesh-eating. Quite a—" he repressed a shudder—"quite a large mouth."
"Strange," said Gwann. "Exceedingly strange. You saw only the one?"
Jorik nodded.