SOURCE: Star Born (1957) by Andre Norton

DESCRIPTION: "In contrast to Dalgard's smooth skin, Sssuri was covered with a fluffy pelt of rainbow-tipped gray fur. In place of the human's steel blade, he wore one of bone, barbed and ugly, as menacing as the spear now resting in the bottom of the outrigger. And his round eyes watched the sea with the familiarity of one whose natural home was beneath those same waters... On the end of his spear twisted a fish. His fur, slicked flat to his strongly muscled body, began to dry in the air and fluff out while the sun awoke prismatic lights on the scales which covered his hands and feet. He dispatched the fish and cleaned it neatly, tossing the offal back into the water, where some shadowy things arose to tear at the unusual bounty." (Star Born by Andre Norton)

NOTES: The Seal People were once the slaves of the human-like 'Those Others' but escaped their grasp in a bloody war that drove the seal folk into the deepest part of the oceans. Those Others dwindled as a race while the 'Free Folk" as they now called themselves thrived. Upon returning to the surface of the oceans the Free Folk inhabited islands that kept them near the ocean. The Free Folk can be found on both the northern and the eastern continents. Those others continue to kill them (largely for sport) whenever they could find them in their one remaining aircraft. The Free Folk ambush Those Others in the semi-deserted city in which they remain. Those Others wished to find forgotten technology with which they could destroy or enslave the Free Folk once more. The Free Folk possess a psychic ability far beyond that of the humans of Homeport. They use this ability to talk with other animals as a warning and communication system. They have yellow eyes.

HISTORY: The free Folk caught alive are sentenced to death in the arena. Norton writes a very Burroughsian arena scene, worthy of her old master, Edgar Rice Burroughs. See cover above, you can always imagine the Ray Harryhausen-style spear jab.