Thinking that anything else she said would only aggravate things further, Ysbel opened a link to the flitter and turned and began to walk away. Most of the arbiter’s crew trailed after her, and pups and striplings danced along on either side, shouting at her, starting to trot and run as she lengthened her stride. Women and small pups had come out of the shacks to watch, standing in doorways, in vegetable patches. Neither they nor any of the crew intervened when a stripling danced up and leered in Ysbel’s face, or when another threw a stone. Other striplings, emboldened, joined in, gleeful that this stranger, this hateful other, was at their mercy. Ysbel lifted an arm to ward off the small rain of missiles. A clod of mud burst on her elbow and a stone smacked her forehead and her sight flashed black for a moment and she stumbled, suddenly afraid that if she fell the mob might close on her. She wanted to run, but the thought of a pack of natives pulling her down like wolves swarming a moose restrained her. They were half her height or less, but she was badly outnumbered and she had never before seen natives behave like this. She brought down a couple of bots, had them flash like bright stars in the faces of those closest to her. It won her a few moments’ grace, but then a stripling danced in and hit her across the hip with a branch, hit her again so hard the branch broke. She staggered and recovered and walked faster, shielding her face as best she could, stones clattering on the hull of the flitter as she heaved up its hatch and tumbled through.