Chapter eightThe things — Clikroits, as Schanake had named them — scuttled over the sand towards us. They clicked. Their six legs clickety-clacked against their armored shells, banded in orange and brown. Their wedge-shaped heads bobbed up and down. They brandished weapons and as they neared it was possible to make out they were blessed with an opposing claw to form a grip with the other six. Each stood in that right-angled bent up posture about the Shank’s height, and he was by a couple of finger-breadths shorter than me.
It looked as though it was going to prove an interesting afternoon.
Schanake gave me a look, and I found I could read his expressions with growing surety. That lowering glare meant that he intended to fight to the death and that he intended I should do the same.
Well,
