"That's for sure!" Thonolan said. "But what do you mean, make sport of the flatheads? I wouldn't invite trouble from them."

"It all started as high spirits. One would dare the other to run up and touch a flathead. They can be pretty fierce if you annoy them. Then the young men started ganging up on any flathead they found alone – circle around and tease him, try to get him to chase after them. Flatheads have a lot of wind, but they have short legs. A man can usually outrun one, but he'd better keep going. I'm not sure how it started, but next Charoli's gang were beating up on them. I suspect one of those flatheads they were teasing caught someone, and the rest jumped in to defend their friend. Anyway, they started making a practice of it, but even with several against one flathead, they didn't get away without some good bruises."

"I can believe that," Thonolan said.

"What they did next was even worse," Filonia added.

"Filonia! It's disgusting! I won't have you talking about it!" Laduni said, and his anger was real.

"What did they do?" Jondalar asked. "if we're going to be traveling through flathead territory, we ought to know."

"I suppose you're right, Jondalar. I just don't like talking about it in front of Filonia."

"I'm a grown woman," she asserted, but her tone lacked conviction.

He looked at her, considering, then seemed to come to a decision. "The males started coming out only in pairs or groups, and that was too much for Charoli's gang. So they started trying to tease the females. But flathead females don't fight. There's no sport in picking on them, they just cower and run away. So his gang decided to use them for a different kind of sport. I don't know who dared who first – probably Charoli goaded them on. It's the kind of thing he'd do."