"And what of us?" Carabella said. "Will it reach this far, Sleet?"

"The gromwark thinks so, my lady. It seeks to wait things out underground." To Valentine Sleet said,

"Shall I advise you, my lord?"

"If you will."

"We should cross the river now, while we still can. If the storm comes over us, it may destroy the floaters, or so badly disable them that they will be unable to travel on water."

"More than half my people are still in Gihorna!"

"If they still live, yes."

"Deliamber—Tisana—Shanamir—!"

"I know, my lord. But we can do nothing for them now. If we are to continue this expedition at all, we must cross the river, and later that may be impossible. On the far side we can hide in the jungle, and camp there until the others rejoin us, if ever they do. But if we stay here we may be pinned down forever, unable to go forward, unable to retreat."

A grim prospect, Valentine thought; and a plausible one. But nevertheless he hesitated, still reluctant to go on into Piurifayne while so many of his closest and dearest ones faced an uncertain fate under the lash of the wind-driven Gihorna sands. For an instant he felt the wild urge to order the floaters back toward the east, in order to search for the rest of the royal party. A moment's reflection told him of the folly of that.

There was nothing he could achieve by going back at this moment except to put even more lives in jeopardy. The storm might yet not reach this far west; in that case it would be best to wait until its rage was spent, and then reenter Gihorna to pick up the survivors.

He stood still and silent, bleakly looking eastward into that realm of darkness now so strangely illuminated by the frightening glow of the sandstorm's destructive energies.

The wind continued to gain in force. The storm will reach us, Valentine realized. It will sweep over us and perhaps plunge on deep into the Piurifayne jungles as well, before its power is dissipated.

Then he narrowed his eyes and blinked in surprise and pointed. "Do you see lights approaching? Floater lights?"

"By the Lady!" Sleet muttered hoarsely.

"Are they here?" Carabella asked. "Do you think they've escaped the storm?"

"Only one floater, my lord," said Sleet quietly. "And not one from the royal caravan, I think."

Valentine had arrived at that conclusion at the same moment. The royal floaters were huge vehicles, capable of holding many people and much equipment. What was coming toward them now out of Gihorna appeared to be more like a small private floater, a two- or four-passenger model: it had only two lights in front, casting no very powerful beam, where the larger ones had three, of great brilliance.

The floater pulled to a halt no more than thirty feet from the Coronal. At once Lord Valentine's guards rushed forward to surround it, holding their energy-throwers at the ready. The doors of the floater swung open and two men, haggard, exhausted, came stumbling out.