"Mister!" A woman called to him, her body moving with sinuous grace. "A lecture hall can be a dull place-why not take a little pleasure while you can? Come with me and taste the realities of life. For ten corlms I will teach you a new art. For twenty I will stun your senses. For fifty I will give you paradise."

She shrugged as he moved on, knowing better than to scream insults, knowing such actions could bring an ugly return. And why waste time on one when others were available?

Dumarest heard her make a fresh offer as he slipped between two booths and into the open area. His ship was on the field, his passage booked, but for reasons of his own he delayed boarding. Instead he walked to where a throng had gathered around an area bright with unexpected light. The crowd had formed a circle, faces turned like sun-loving flowers toward the illumination, eyes intent on what they saw.

A cage stood beneath suspended lights, a thing of stout bars and braces, wheeled for ease of transport, ringed with a handful of guards. In it paced a beast.

It was half again as tall as a man, twice as broad, the hands like spades, the fingers tipped with claws as were the toes of the splayed feet. The body was dark with thickly matted hair grown so close that it seemed the texture of horn. The face was a nightmare of jutting jaw, fangs, burning eyes and pointed ears. The plated skull bore two stubby horns, their tips glistening with metallic sharpness. The neck was as thick as the thighs, which were as thick as the waist of a woman.

"Look at it!" A man sucked in his breath as he spoke to the woman at his side. "How would you like to meet that in a dark alley?"

"I wouldn't." The sight which entranced him nauseated her. "Come away, Lou."

"You don't like it?"

"I think it's vile." She gave her reason. "It's too much like a man. An animal is one thing but this is disgusting." An association others had made and which added to its attraction. The head guard, sweating despite the cold, walked past, a padded cap held suggestively in his hand. In it rested the gleam of coins.