In her atrociously accented English she said:
"No, I cannot be killed. No Krak ever killed."
"Don't you ever die?"
"Oh, yess. We die."
"How?"
Shel Lur merely shrugged and repeated: "We die." And looked at him
impassively.
He liked those rare occasions when she sent him out with the laundry
to the section laundry where the humans toiled day and night with the
heavy garments. It was good to see your own kind, he thought, even if
they are slaves.
Once he tried to lose himself in the city, but an unerring Krak came
straight to his hiding spot behind an eating place, lifted him out of
his lair, and returned him to Shel Lur.
Shel Lur had not even chided him on his long absence, but had merely
looked at him impassively.
This day began differently. Shel Lur woke him by prodding him with her
big foot and when he sat up on the cold floor, she pointed, her face a
blank:
"See?" she said.
He twisted his aching neck sharply, and almost gasped:
"Marcia! What--how did you get here?"
"Woman," Shel Lur said tonelessly. "Your woman."
Tiny Marcia, her blonde hair awry, her blue eyes frightened, her tiny
hands twisting.
Her words stumbled out: "A Krak came; took me from beside Mike in the
laundry."
Sean looked from Marcia to Shel Lur.
Shel Lur nodded: "Your woman," she said again.
"No," Sean said, "my friend's woman."
"Yess?" said Shel Lur. "Your woman, I say it." She took Marcia by the
arm, pushed her against Sean. Then she walked out and shut the door.
Sean stood in the center of the room, running his hands through his
flame hair.
"I'm damned if I know what she's driving at. Oh, well," he said and
shrugged.
He looked at Marcia, commented: "You look better than you did on the
ship."
Marcia looked at him, her lips quivering, her eyes brimming with tears:
"Oh, Sean," she said. "What kind of hellish world is this?" Then she
threw herself into Sean's arms, her breasts heaving, sobs like tiny pin
cushions tearing at her throat.