A catman, slim and black-furred,
was crouched and cutting the hobble-strings of the nearest animal. I
hurled myself on him. He exploded, clawing, raking my shoulder with
talons that ripped the rough cloth like paper. I whipped out my skean
and slashed upward. The talons contracted in my shoulder and I gasped
with pain. Then the thing howled and fell away, clawing at the air. It
twitched and lay still.
Four shots in rapid succession cracked in the clearing. Kyral to the
contrary, someone must have had a pistol. I heard one of the cat-things
wail, a hoarse dying rattle. Something dark clawed my arm and I slashed
with the knife, going down as another set of talons fastened in my back,
rolling and clutching.
I managed to get the thing's forelimbs wedged under my elbow, my knee in
its spine. I heaved, bent it backward, backward till it screamed, a high
wail.
Then I felt the spine snap and the dead thing mewled once, just air
escaping from collapsing lungs, and slid limp from my thigh. Erect it
had not been over four feet tall and in the light of the dying fire it
might have been a dead lynx.
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