On the fifteenth day they struck a small farming community, and after that they traveled by day on a paved road between cultivated fields.
Jupiter saw many more of the green tinted Rik'gans being used like draft animals. There were also black hairy people with tails who were kept in pens and watched the caravan pass out of sad, lack-luster eyes.
The hairy men were Begans, Lete told him. The Anolyn bred them for food. Occasionally they ate the Rik'gans, but the meat was coarse and tough.
Horror sprang into Jupiter's green eyes.
"They eat them?"
Lete shrugged. "Of course. And so have you."
He went deathly pale. He could feel his stomach revolt at the thought.
"The Anolyn breed men for special purposes," Lete went on, unaware of the loathing in his eyes, "fighters, meat animals, the pink-skinned Caligans. Oh, there must be fifteen or sixteen different kinds. They're all 'Edir'," and she dismissed them with a shrug of her shapely brown shoulders.
Jupiter's cage was swaying along the plastic ribbon of a road. It was all he could do to keep from being sick, but he knew now the subtle distinction that had been troubling him.