"Maybe I shoulda taken that one," Mal said, musing. Might have been more useful than tracking. Well, maybe... He'd still have to find the things before he could kill them and then butcher them. "Should start looking into harvesting my own parts, though. Costs less that way." Which meant bigger profit margin.

"Pretty good, actually. More of a defensive fighter, but the dancing experience meant I picked up on the footwork pretty easily, and swords don't need a whole lotta strength behind 'em." Which was good, because he wasn't all that strong. "Could probably hold my own against some'a the less deadly beasties."

He snickered, then. "I actually told the instructor off- Anais Vallinar, a paladin- for sayin' that the kids who weren't learning so well were refusing to. She tried to punish me by makin' me her partner for defensive demos."