Three shades break from a group running on the plain and form a spinning wheel as they speak to Dante — they cannot stop, but they can slow and circle each other. They are Florentine soldiers of the previous generation: Jacopo Rusticucci (whom Ciacco had mentioned), Guido Guerra, and Tegghiaio Aldobrandi — men of virtue and reputation who ended here. They ask urgently about Florence: does courtesy and valor still dwell there, or has it been corrupted? Dante struggles with grief and respect — these are, in his civic imagination, the great men of the city's better days. He tells them the truth: a new people and sudden wealth have brought pride and excess. He cannot stop to speak further; they run on.
They reach the edge of the cliff above Circle VIII — the roar of the waterfall below is deafening. Virgil makes Dante untie a cord from around his waist — the cord Dante had thought to catch the leopard with at the beginning — and throws it into the abyss below. Something comes up from the deep in response: Geryon, the monster of fraud, his face honest and benign, his body of multicolored serpent rings, his scorpion tail. He surfaces and lands on the cliff like a boat, waiting. This is how they will descend to Malebolge.