“Are they dangerous?” Nocso zev Martois asked.

“Only if you’re a shrub,” Radnal said. “No, actually, that’s not quite true. Some eat insects, and one species, the bladetooth, hunts and kills its smaller relatives. It filled the small predator niche before carnivores proper established themselves in the Bottomlands. It’s scarce today, especially outside Trench Park, but it is still around, often in the hottest, driest places where no other meat eaters can thrive.”

A little later, the tour guide pointed to a small, nondescript plant with thin, greenish-brown leaves. “Anyone tell me what that is?”

He asked that question whenever he took a group along the trail, and had only got a right answer once, just after a rain. But now Benter vez Maprab said confidently: “It’s a Bottomlands orchid, freeman vez Krobir, and a common type at that. If you’d shown us a red-veined one, that would have been worth fussing over.”

“You’re right, freeman, it is an orchid. It doesn’t look much like the ones you see in more hospitable climates, though, does it?” Radnal said, smiling at the elderly Strongbrow — if he was an orchid fancier, that probably explained why he’d come to Trench Park.

Benter only grunted and scowled in reply — evidently he’d had his heart set on seeing a rare red — veined orchid his first day at the park. Radnal resolved to search his bags at the end of the tour: carrying specimens out of the park was against the law.

A jerboa hopped up, started nibbling on an orchid leaf. Quick as a flash, something darted out from behind the plant, seized the rodent, and ran away. The tourists bombarded Radnal with questions: “Did you see that?” “What was it?” “Where’d it go?”

“That was a koprit bird,” he answered. “Fast, wasn’t it? It’s of the butcherbird family, but mostly adapted to life on the ground. It can fly, but it usually runs. Because birds excrete urea in more or less solid form, not in urine like mammals, they’ve done well in the Bottomlands.” He pointed to the lodge, which was only a few hundred cubits ahead now. “See? There’s another koprit bird on the roof, looking around to see what it can catch.”