1 BoreaKota'na, Red Indian straight out of America's Old West -Kota'na, Keeper of the Bears watched Moreen at play with a pair of cubs each bigger than herself and shook, his head in admiration and amazement. The mother of the bears, huge Tookis, almost ten feet in height when she was upright, grunted and pawed the floor of the exercise cavern where she stood beside her master. Her mate was Morda, Kota'na's favourite among all the fighting bears, but Morda was not here. No, for he was out hunting with a pack of his brothers and their keepers, butchering food-beasts around the foot of the plateau for the larders of its tribes.But the way this girl played with these cubs -- without fear, laughing and biting their ears, and slapping their noses where they tumbled her and them retaliating with howls and clumsy bounds. like puppies, but never going to strike her! Striking each other, certainly, with mighty, resounding, bone-breaking clouts; but not the girl, never the girl. And mighty Tookis, the mother of the cubs - the way she seemed to enjoy all of this, snorting her encouragement and thumping the floor but if anyone else had dared to try it, maybe even Kota'na himself... well, good luck to him!And at last Moreen had had enough. Laughing and panting she struggled free of the boisterous mounds of snowy furwhich were Tookis' cubs, then leaned against the wall of the cavern to catch her breath. 'They're too much for me!' she panted and laughed, shaking back her shoulder-length, golden hair. 'Why, I'd bet they're even too much for their own mother! Eh, Tookis? And she flung an arm round the great bear's neck.