It was so useless! Loto flung the globe from him, loathing it for having killed that woman and her little girls. He drew Azeela back with him into the cabin. The king's palace in Orleen stood near the waterfront, in the midst of broad, magnificent gardens. A mob of Noths surged around it, into the lower doors, on the balconies and roof top. As the plane passed overhead, its occupants caught a fleeting glimpse of the queen and her children, the girl wives of the king and the king himself--in the face of death with petty barriers at last broken down--all huddled together in a corner of the roof. The Noths rushed at them, broad, heavy swords flashing. The plane swept past. The twin peaks of Orleen stood six hundred feet apart, just behind the city. The one that housed the cavern had a broad, circular base, with a ragged, volcanic looking cone above. The other peak was considerably higher; it looked down upon its fellow. Fahn had directed Rogers to fly the plane to the higher of the peaks. The Scientist had hardly spoken. He was pale, grim as ever, but his gaze, when he looked upon his daughters held a curious softness. What were his plans. What were they going to do? George asked the questions, but Fahn ignored them. The little aerial army approaching from Anglese City was now in sight. Fahn radioed them to move back, descend, and stop the Bas army and its dogs. All of them were to return to the capital. The plane landed on a small level rock near the summit of the higher peak. On top of the cavern, six hundred feet away, a solitary male figure stood. The blood light of the sunrise fell full upon it. _Toroh!_ He was standing there, regarding the city. Fahn leaped to the projector, but Toroh had disappeared. "Hurry!" exclaimed the Scientist. He still would not let them question him. He unlashed the projector and they helped him lower it to the ground. He leaped down after it, adjusting it, swinging it to bear down upon the lower peak. "We must hurry," he repeated. He was back on the cabin platform. "They will be out of the cavern, firing upon us." The Noths down there were gazing up at the plane; others were now pouring out of the cavern entrance. Fahn's projector was trained on the crater of the lower mountain. From this greater height its depths were visible. In the cabin of the plane the Scientist's arms went around his daughters. "Good-by, my girls--for a little time," he whispered in their own tongue. They were frightened; suddenly Dee was crying. But he pushed them from him. He would attack the cavern; they must all stay in the plane--rise high--very high. Something in the man's look, the command in his voice, struck them all silent. They obeyed. He climbed down to the rock. The plane mounted swiftly into the air.