From the introduction: The city of Etherian holds many wonders. There are soaring bridges that fly out over vast, dark expanses, connecting gleaming spires of steel and marble with windows that run like long strips five to ten stories high. Floating gazebos lift gently, sighing upon the breezes while string quartets softly weave beautiful melodies under the conversations of the rich and powerful and the clink of ice in crystal. Machines, slick and powerful in design, leap skyward. It seems the entire city longs for the sky, its skyline is made of towers that reach upward. Huge portions have already slipped gravity’s fingers and float like metallic icebergs, held more or less in place by flexible bridging tubes, though these are only used by the pedestrian workers riding noisy, clanking trolleys to and from their hidden jobs. Exotic creatures of the sky, drakelings and pegasi, frequent the streets and are clear marks of station. Ingenious machines blink and hum with a buttery yellow light. Money, polished drops and folded clouds, slips from hand to hand as easily as breath into eager lungs, while nearby the hungry watch with greedy eyes and hopeful faces, dreaming of being lifted out of poverty for the life of a slave among the wispy clouds that the rich so love.