Pilgrim’s hackles prickled. He remembered that Grandfather Bearbane had told him about the songs bears sang to make themselves known to other bears, and wondered what the doomed bear’s song might mean, what thoughts were swimming in the unknowable darkness inside its skull.

There was a general flurry of movement and chatter in the audience around the pit. People were laying bets, according to Gentle.

‘Surely the outcome is inevitable,’ Pilgrim said. His excitement was quite gone and he felt faintly sick.

‘Laying odds on how long the curs will last with it, which will draw blood first, which will come out of it best, so on.’

‘Did you hear the bear’s song? It seems to me that it might be pleading for its life.’

Gentle shrugged inside his big fur coat. ‘They sometimes imitate speech when they are at bay. Try to distract the hunters.’

‘They used to be like us,’ Pilgrim said, but Gentle didn’t seem to hear him.

The cornet brayed again. The cur handler and his charges were walking down a cleated ramp into the pit. The curs strained at their leashes and their handler was having a hard time holding them back. The bear had been watching the two pikemen; now it bent towards the curs and opened its mouth wide, showing a red tongue lolling between broken yellow fangs.

The crowd quietened, everyone watching the handler as he hauled the curs to heel and unclipped their leashes and stepped back. The curs stood foursquare, fixed on the bear, trembling, and the man clicked his tongue and they moved forward, one circling left, the other right. The bear took two ponderous steps, looking left and right, took two more. Its ankle chain lifted and snapped tight and there was a blur of motion as the curs attacked. One was thrown aside and the other backed away as the bear reared to its full height. There was blood on its forelegs and the patch of white pelt on its chest; blood sprayed when it shook its head. The curs attacked again, and again one was thrown sideways. It was slower to get to its feet this time, its flank raked with bloody gouges where one of the bear’s swipes had connected.

The handler conferred with the man with the cornet, then whistled to the curs. They slunk to him with slanting gaits, their gazes fixed on the bear, and allowed themselves to be leashed and hauled up the ramp.

The bear shook another spray of blood from its muzzle and groaned and grunted, looking up at the crowd as people made good on their bets and called to attendants for more beer and food. Teal Leadwood was a still, solitary figure seated above the rest of the women. She saw Pilgrim looking at her and looked away, and a ripple ran through the crowd as the next pair of curs was brought in.