Melome

He turned and took three steps toward the shadows when he heard the woman's sharp command.

'Chang! Hold!'

One which sent the leopard hurtling from where it squatted.

Dumarest turned, jumping to one side, the package lifting, lancing toward the snarling mask. A distraction the leopard ignored, landing, springing again as Dumarest reached for his knife, feeling his foot slip on something in the sand, toppling, feeling the slamming impact of the animal as he went down. Pinned, helpless, he stared into the snarling mask.

And froze.

Reiza said, 'At least you've the sense not to move. A hunter?' As Dumarest made no reply she added, 'You're playing dead. Hoping Chang will get bored and move away. In the wild that might work if you aren't bleeding and the beast isn't starving.' She leaned over him, nostrils flared, sniffing. 'You stink but not of fear. That's good. All right, Chang, back now.' Her tone hardened. 'Back, Chang! Back!'

Dumarest sat upright as the beast left, seeing it lope toward the shadows, its caged den. He climbed to his feet as the woman turned to face him.

'A thief,' she said. 'Certainly a liar.' The lash of her whip tore at the package. 'A few things for your sister? It holds nothing but rubbish.' The lash cracked an inch from his cheek. 'Talk, damn you!'

'I came looking for someone. A girl. Melome. That's all.'

'Your sweetheart?' The whip cracked again and he felt a sting on his cheek. Touching it, he saw blood on his fingers. 'You like her?'

As she liked what she was doing, the whip, the questions, the usage of power. Dominating him. Playing with him as a cat would torment a mouse. And there was more than a little of the feline about her. In the slant of her eyes, the set of her mouth. The whip was a claw she sent to sting.

'Thief! Liar! Why are you here?'

'I told you. I'm-' Dumarest looked at the welt she put on the back of his hand. It burned like fire. 'Be careful with that whip.'

'I could take out your eyes. Have one lying on your cheek before you knew it.' Already she had proved it to be no idle boast. 'Cut off your ears. Flay you. Slice open your face. Do you think I wouldn't?'

'I think you'd enjoy doing it.'

'So?'

'Don't touch me with that whip again!'

A warning rejected. Dumarest saw the widening of her eyes, the movement of her hand and was moving before the lash could strike. A spring toward her, his right hand snatching at his boot to rise weighted with nine inches of pointed, razor edged steel. His left arm shot out, the hand gripping the lash as the blade sliced upwards to sever it inches from the stock.

'You!' Startled, she looked at the knife, the ruined whip. 'Bastard!' Anger replaced the amazement. The stock parted in her hand, became a falling sheath and a foot-long stiletto which she held like a sword in her hand. Its point lanced toward his eyes.

Dumarest parried it with a clash of metal, attacked in turn, air whining as his blade slashed in a vicious arc. One aimed at the throat, the jugular it contained, the life-blood it carried. A blow dictated by reactive instinct. One changed almost too late to send the point of the knife slashing downwards. Leather parted as it sliced through the halter to free her breasts and leave a shallow gash on the creamy skin.

Then she was his prisoner, his left arm rising beneath her right, his fingers locked in the mane of her hair. Pulling back her head and exposing her throat to the prick of his blade.

'You-'

'Shut up!' The point dug deeper, almost breaking the skin. 'You had your fun and now it's my turn. I could blind you,' he said, mimicking her threats. 'Slash your face. Cut off your nose. Do you think I wouldn't?'

She swallowed. 'What do you want?'

'Melome. Take me to her.'

'The girl? I don't know where she is.'

'Then find out.' Impatience edged his voice with the raw note of anger. 'Someone bought her. Someone must know where she is. Now move. Move!'

He shifted to stand behind her, his hand still locked in her hair, the knife still at her throat. A position maintained as he urged her over the sand of the ring toward the tiered seats.

The passage, the men who were waiting, the gas which sent him spinning into oblivion.

Zucco had given her a lamp; a thing of delicate artistry depicting a woman locked in a feline's embrace, the whole illuminated from within. By its light Reiza examined herself in a mirror.

She was nude, skin still damp from a scented bath, the thick mane of her hair framing her face and edging her shoulders. A good body, one still firm, muscles clothed by softening fat which enhanced her unabashed femininity. One untouched by claw or fang-luck and skill had seen to that; the costume she wore was for show and not concealment. But now she had been marked and her hand lifted to touch the gash on her breastbone. One about an inch long, shallow; healed it would leave no trace. But, always, within her mind she would bear the scar.

The scar and the man who had injured her.

Closing her eyes she could see him again. The face hard, cold, the mask of an animal. A creature determined to survive. One ready to kill to avoid being killed. Like Chang and Ahrda and Torin. Like all the great cats she had trained-his eyes had matched theirs. His reflexes had been as fast. Faster-never had she known a man move so quickly. Death had been very close.

And, again, she felt the thrill of it.

A moment Hayter had mentioned when, satiated, he had lain beside her in a place redolent of the cats they both loved.

'It's the power,' he'd said. 'The dominance. To rule over creatures which could kill you without hesitation if the mood took them. But over that is the thrill of danger. Each time you train or perform you risk your life. Take a gamble-your skill against their instincts. It's like a drug which, for a moment, makes you more than human. Makes you come really alive. And, always, there is the temptation to push your luck a little harder.. To tempt fate a little more. Don't do it, Reiza. When it comes to that, quit the game.'

Advice he hadn't taken-had he welcomed the claws which had ripped out his life? The attack which had saved him from decrepit old age?

She hoped it had been like that. He had been too full of life to waste and fade. Too proud to be other than the best in his field. And, when her time came, would she feel the same as when death had come so close?

The knife slashing at her throat-time had seemed to slow to extend the moment and, against her lids, she could see the glitter of steel, the edge and point. Feel again the constriction of her stomach, the anticipation. Then the burn, her breasts falling free, the sting of the knife at her throat.

And the face so close to her own.

A chime and she opened her eyes, swaying a little. The effects of the gas had been neutralized but traces lingered and she caught the edge of the mirror to steady herself.

'Reiza?' Zucco's voice and, again, the chime. As always he was impatient. 'Reiza? Are you all right?'

'A moment.' A robe lay close and she donned it, yellow silk, rich in the diffused illumination. Material which held a sensuous appeal and it clung to her body as she tied it around her waist. 'Enter!'

He walked like a cat, light on the balls of his feet, his body slender, lithe, bright with scarlet and gold. Garments modeled on those worn in the ring lacking only the cheap glitter of sequins and artificial gems. His face, thinned, held the sharp awareness of a predator. His eyes held the darting flicker of a serpent's tongue.

'My dear!' He halted before her, tall, showing an outward concern. 'Are you sure you're all right? The gas-'

'Did you have to use it?'

'There was no other way. Shot he could have killed you as he fell. Threatened-' His shrug was expressive. 'Your life was too valuable to risk.'

And so the gas kept by for use in emergencies against animals running wild, men, crowds.

'A madman,' he said. 'Deranged. He could have killed you.'

Would have done had he really wanted. Zucco, watching from the shadows, had not seen the initial lethal aim