He had only a split second’s warning as the embarrassed young officer let out a snarl and lunged at Marcus, his jaws snapping.

Marcus had recognized the signs of brittle pride, which, it seemed, were as common and easily noted amongst ambitious young Canim as they were amongst their Aleran counterparts. Marcus was nearing sixty years of age, and would never have been fast enough to have met the Cane, had he been relying upon his senses alone to warn him—but foresight had always proven a far-more-effective defense than speed alone. Marcus had been anticipating the flash of temper and instant violence.

The Cane was eight feet of coiled steely muscle, fangs and hard bone, and weighed two or three of Marcus—but as his jaws darted forward, he was unable to twist away when Marcus seized his ear in one callused fist and hauled to one side.

The Cane twisted and rolled with the motion, letting out a snarl that rose to a high-pitched yelp of agony as he instinctively moved toward the source of the pull against his sensitive ear, to reduce the pressure on it. Marcus took advantage of the motion, breaking the Cane’s balance, building momentum, and dropped his entire weight as well as the young Cane’s full onto his furry chin, slamming him to the deck with a skull-jarring crack of impact.

The young Cane lay there stunned for a moment, his eyes glazed, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, bleeding from a small cut.

Marcus rose and straightened his tunic. “An inferior sense of smell,” Marcus said, as if absolutely nothing of significance had happened, “is distinct from being told that one smells unpleasant. It’s possible that someone sensitive might think you intended an insult. I personally am only an old centurion, too slow to be dangerous in a fight anymore, and find nothing insulting in either statement. I am not at all angry, and could do nothing about it even if I were upset. But I would hate for someone less tolerant and more capable to do you harm when, clearly, you are only trying to be friendly. Do you understand me?”

The young officer stared at Marcus with glazed eyes. He blinked a few times. Then his ears twitched in a vague little motion of acknowledgment and assent.

“Good,” Marcus said, in his rough but functional Canish, smiling with only the slightest baring of his teeth. “I am glad that you make adequate progress in your efforts to understand Alerans.”

“A good lesson,” Varg growled in agreement. “Dismissed.”

The young Cane picked himself up, bared his throat respectfully to Varg and Nasaug, then walked rather unsteadily from the ship’s cabin.

Marcus turned to face Varg. The Cane was a giant of his race, nearly nine feet tall when standing, and the Trueblood had been built to fit him. The cabin, which, to the Cane, was as cramped as any shipboard space, was cavernous to Marcus. The Cane, a great black-furred creature, his coat marred with the white streaks of many scars, crouched on his haunches, the at-rest posture of his kind, negligently holding a thick, heavy scroll in his pawlike hands, open to the middle, where he had been reading during the language lesson.