Janey was still looking when she heard the voice from behind her. “The man is one of the leading citizens of Thisrock,” the voice said, in a mellow, purring tone. “We call his kind insiders. The woman is an officer from a Promethean starship, of course; I expect that you knew that, dear. And your lesson, I’d guess, was to be that both insiders and Prometheans are to be treated with deference. They are powerful people.”

They turned. The speaker was wearing a Promethean uniform, too; but unlike the woman’s his was thin and patched. He had nothing else in common with the starship officer, or with anyone else in the crowd. Instead of being hairless, his face and hands were both completely covered by a soft gray fur. His ears were pointed, his nose was black, his eyes feline. He was, in fact, a man-cat.

“Hello, Hal,” he said, in the oddly gentle voice that mocked the stingstick swinging from his belt. Then he smiled at Janey. “Right now you’re full of questions,” he said. “I know them all. First, I don’t talk like the others because I’m not from Thisrock, and I have an education. I don’t look like the others because I was genetically altered. A game they play with the lowborn on Prometheus, you know. My alterations were not satisfactory, though, so I wound up here. Some of them work, however. I heard Hal’s last comment from quite a distance. Now, yes, that should cover it.” He smiled. His teeth were very sharp.

Hal did not smile back. “Janey Small,” he said, pointing. “Stumblecat.”

Stumblecat nodded. Janey stood frozen.

“You’re clearly a star-born,” Stumblecat said in his cultured tones. “How ever did you wind up with Hal?”

“Starlady was passing through,” Hairy Hal said sharply. “She hired the wrong bodyguard. Listened to Crawney spin, an’ wound up raped and ripped. Now she’s with Hal.”