His head hurt. Agitated and bemused, he stumbled back to the enclosure’s entrance. A pair of very large two-legged males were waiting for him there. They bore weapons and grim expressions. Standing behind them, the female with whom he had recently consorted appeared in a state of extreme agitation, pointing and jabbering in his direction. The looks on the faces of the two armed males grew ominous.
If there was one thing he was in no mood to tolerate at that moment, it was the absurd verbalizations and oral circumlocutions of a brace of irritable bipeds. To let them know how he was feeling, he voiced a warning roar. The effect was salutary. The fur stood up on their heads, their eyes grew as big as emu eggs, and they turned and bolted in the opposite direction as fast as their hind legs would carry them, flinging their weapons aside while screaming at the top of their lungs. From other enclosures, startled faces peered out in search of the source of the sound. Feeling much better about things, he strode out of the bordello. Though he had neglected to pay, no one dared to confront him.
Lying well away from the campfire, Ahlitah smacked his lips as he rolled over onto his back.
* * * *
Simna frowned as he entered the city. The golden towers, the marble archways, the teeming crowds of barkers and bazaaris, the fragrant smells of fine cooking—all were absent. In their place were simple houses of stone and wood and thatch. In lieu of richly garbed horses and moas, dogs and rodent-hunting cats roamed the streets. Where he normally would have expected to see paving stones of granite there was only packed earth.