Once inside the arena they were escorted to their seats, just slightly off center, on one end of the oval.  The seats, like those in the underground amphitheater of the Dragon Fortress were stone benches, probably the best type of seat to accommodate the tailed posterior of a lizzie but not too comfortable for a human.  The festivities had already begun.  Parading around the center of the stone floor were several hundred young reptilians.  Though each was naked of clothing or body paint, they each carried a long feather which they held up above their heads.  Some feathers were red, some were green, and a few were yellow or blue.  As they marched around in different lines, they held up the feathers to create different abstract designs.  They were still marching when the Freedonians arrived through the same portal that the Brechs had.

There were about twenty five Freedonians filing in into the arena, twice the number of Brechs, but far fewer than the number who must have crewed the five great airships.  All those present wore the uniforms of the Flottenluftkorps.  Senta could recognize Oberst Rothritter, as well as Fricis Hoff and Heyne Tourbell.  There was a third wizard with them, but it wasn’t Stern.  He was nowhere to be seen.  The black uniformed men took their seats half a dozen rows below and a little further toward the end of the arena.  This put them in close proximity to King Khassna, whose royal box was at the end, and who arrived as the reptilian feather marchers were finishing.

Next on the agenda was a sort of mock hunt.  Several large cages on wagons were brought into the arena one after another, and the creatures within were released.  There were several achillobators, deinonychus, an unenlagia which was a sort of deinonychus with longer and more colorful feathers, a whole flock of velociraptors, some dromaeosaurs, and even one unhappy utahraptor.  Soon the entire arena seemed to be one great hissing squawking aviary.  Only then did a dozen painted and feathered lizzie hunters enter.  Working in teams of two, they used their small spears propelled by spear-throwing sticks and their flint-lined wooden swords to attack and kill the animals.  The hunters were quick and efficient in their task, though the velociraptors gave them a bit of difficulty with their speed and agility.  Only the utahraptor had the opportunity to retaliate, as it caught a pair of lizzie hunters intent on a deinonychus and jumped on them from behind, disemboweling one with its sickle-like foot claw, and tearing out the other’s throat with its razor sharp teeth.  In the end though, even this feathered monster was felled by the warriors, who then paraded triumphantly in front of the audience, while servants removed the bodies of the slain.

“That was quite exciting,” said Mr. Vever.  Senta was sandwiched between him and Mr. Brown.

She made a noncommittal noise.  She was actually feeling a little bored.  You could see lizzies hunting birds at home, if you just got out of the house once in a while.  The next part of the show was slightly more interesting if only in scale.  A huge tyrannosaurus, strapped down so that it looked like a great crocodile atop a very long wagon pulled by four dozen lizzies was brought into the arena.  Just as with the smaller creatures before, it was released and a dozen hunters attacked it.  The giant whipped around the arena, catching several of the lizzies off guard, snapping them up in its great jaws and swallowing them down.  The remaining hunters, buoyed by several replacements, peppered the beast with their spears until it looked like a great black pin cushion.  It didn’t give up though, and with a tremendous burst of speed leapt into the midst of the lizardmen, snapping and kicking.  Only when a third group of hunters were sent in, did it finally falter and fall to the arena floor.  Then the lizzies were upon it slashing with their wooden and stone swords until it bled to death.

Again there was a lull as the bodies were removed.  Senta looked at Mr. Brown and noticed that he had taken on a pasty hue.

“Not feeling well?”

“It’s so much blood,” he said.  “Those swords are bloody efficient.”

“Buck up.  I have a feeling they’re building toward something.”

Another long wagon, just like the one that had carried the tyrannosaurus was pulled into the arena by just as many lizzies.  Instead of a giant dinosaur though, this wagon carried some strange device.  The base was obviously some kind of mechanism, for Senta and the others could see gears made of huge copper plates.  Upon this mechanism was a giant egg shaped stone carved to resemble an almost caricatured image of Hissussisthiss.  When the device reached the center of the arena, those reptilians who had pulled it in withdrew, and from the other end of the stadium at which Khassna sat, the city witch doctor stepped forward.  He was much younger and more vital than the ancient and shrunken creature at Suusthek, but his body paint was very similar, as was his lizard-on-a-stick talisman.  He danced around for a bit, shook his talisman, and cast spells of blessing on the stone Hissussisthiss.