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mistaken, and
       I the Ubars of the Wagon Peoples know well each wagon and
       the number of branded beasts in the various herds; each herd
       is, incidentally, composed of several smaller herds, each
    |   watched over by its own riders. The bellowing seemed now to
       come from the sky itself, like thunder, or from-the horizon,
       like the breaking of an ocean into surf on the rocks of the
       shore. It was like a sea or a vast natural phenomenon slowly
        approaching. Such indeed, I suppose, it was. Now, also, for
       the first time, I could clearly smell the herd, a rich, vast,
       fresh, musky, pervasive odor, compounded of trampled grass
       and torn earth, of the dung, urine and sweat of perhaps more
       than a minion beasts. The magnificent vitality of that smell,
       so offensive to some, astonished and thrilled me; it spoke to
       me of the insurgence and the swell of life itself, ebullient,
       raw, overflowing, unconquerable, primitive, shuffling, smell-
       ing, basic, animal, stamping, snorting, moving, an avalanche
       of tissue and blood and splendor, a glorious, insistent, invinci-
       ble cataract of breathing and walking and seeing and feeling
       on the sweet, flowing, windswept mothering earth. And it was
       in that instant that I sensed what the bask might mean to the
       Wagon Peoples.
       "Ho!" I heard, and spun to see the black lance fall and
        scarcely had it moved but it was seized in the fist of the
        scarred Tuchuk warrior.
          The Tuchuk warrior lifted the lance in triumph, in the
       same instant slipping his fist into the retention knot and
       kicking the roweled heels of his boots into the silken flanks of
       his mount, the animal springing towards me and the rider in
       the same movement, as if one with the beast, leaning down
       from the saddle, lance slightly lowered, charging.
          The slender, flexible wand of the lance tore at the seven-
       layered Gorean shield, striking a spark from the brass rim
       binding it, as the man had lunged at my head.
       I had not cast the spear.
       I had no wish to kill the Tuchuk.
          The charge of the Tuchuk, in spite of its rapidity and
      momentum, carried him no more than four paces beyond
      me. It seemed scarcely had he passed than the kaiila had
      wheeled and charged again, this time given free rein, that it
      might tear at me with its fangs.
      I thrust with the spear, trying to force back the snapping
      jaws of the screaming animal. The kaiila struck, and then
      withdrew, and then struck again. All the time the Tuchuk
      thrust at me with his lance. Four times the point struck me
      drawing blood, but he did not have the weight of the leaping
      animal behind his thrust; he thrust at arm's length, the point
      scarcely reaching me. Then the animal seized my shield in its
      teeth and reared lifting it and myself, by the shield straps,
      from the ground. I fell from some dozen feet to the grass
      and saw the animal snarling and biting on the shield, then it
      shook it and hurled it far and away behind it.
      I shook myself.
      The helmet which I had slung over my shoulder was gone.
      I retained my sword. I grasped the Gorean spear.
      I stood at bay on the grass, breathing hard, bloody.
      The Tuchuk laughed, throwing his head back.
      I readied the spear for its cast.
          Warily now the animal began to circle, in an almost
      human fashion, watching the spear. It shifted delicately,
      feinting, and then withdrawing, trying to draw the cast.
          I was later to learn that kaiita are trained to avoid the
      thrown spear. It is a training which begins with blunt staves
      and progresses through headed weapons. Until the kaiila is
      suitably proficient in this art it is not allowed to breed. Those
      who cannot learn it die under the spear. Yet, at a close
      range, I had no doubt that I could slay