With what loyalty these girls already were banded against me! Little Dolores clutched me.
“Don’t do that, Leonard! Sonya, you misunderstand him.”
I tried to explain myself. “It’s only because I thought the other course would be better for the prince,” I finished. “How long will this take us, Sonya?”
Sudden tears were in her eyes. “I believe you! But you must know that I . . . least of all, would delay to help him I love! Mine is the better way, and we won’t be long—a few hours at most.”
I yielded, “All right, Sonya. You know best.”
We entered the building, a large room divided by the metal screening into huge cages. A great commotion, the flapping of wings, greeted our entrance. Travel in this realm indeed was primitive. We were to go by air, on a gliding platform drawn by giant birds trained to harness.
Sonya pulled down a swinging tube of light from the ceiling and held it toward one of the cages. Eight giant birds were there, soft, gray-white feathered bodies, heads small, round and bald with black top-knots like plumes.
They stood upon short legs, yet were as tall as myself. They seemed very gentle; they regarded us timorously, but curiously. They knew Sonya; as she entered the cage, they nuzzled with their beaks against her smock.
“Ah, Nana! They want sweets,” she laughed. One, more bold, pecked at her pocket. She leaned, and with her shoulder heaved it away. Then she produced small pieces of sweetmeat and made them each take a piece decorously.
“They are well trained, you see?” She rested an arm against the great curving side of one of them. I could well imagine that on its soft back she could have ridden into the air. One had lazily opened its wings; a feathered spread of fifteen feet at least, graceful wings, gray-white, with tips that were solid black.