Explore "The Game of Rat and Dragon" by Cordwainer Smith on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Underhill spun the combination lock on the Lady May's cage. He woke her gently and took her into his arms. She humped her back luxuriously, stretched her claws, started to purr, thought better of it, and licked him on the wrist instead. He did not have the pin-set on, so their minds were closed to each other, but in the angle of her mustache and in the movement of her ears, he caught some sense of gratification she experienced in finding him as her Partner.
He talked to her in human speech, even though speech meant nothing to a cat when the pin-set was not on.