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the quiet sounds of the night, gazing out the still-closed window by the bed. When he did glance down at himself, he blinked and sat up, nearly cracking his skull on the frame of the top bunk.
    There were streaks of white on his belly and sheath, and the blackness of his erection was mostly gone. Only a few patches of black remained on what looked like dirty pink skin. It didn’t take long for him to determine what had caused the coloration to lift, and he cursed softly. Fortunately, his paws were black, and as long as he kept his clothes on, nobody would notice the streaks, or his much more odd than exotic member.
    In the dresser, he found a couple cloths that were meant for towels. He used one to clean himself up, trying to minimize the area he had to wipe. He was nevertheless left with a large white patch at his groin and several white streaks down his front.
    As he put his tunic back on and lay down, yawning, a thought struck him, and he chuckled. “I wonder what is in that removal salve,” he mused as he drifted into sleep.

Chapter 3
     
    The three-day trip through the mountains was cold, but otherwise uneventful. Seir insisted that Volle wash off the coloring in a remote mountain stream where he would have no chance of being seen, and as a result he was still shivering and slightly damp when they arrived at the inn on the outskirts of town, late at night.
    Volle introduced himself to the innkeeper as “Volle of Vinton,” as though it were no big deal, and the slender, nervous-looking wolf dropped the glass he was drying. He showed Volle to a private room, ushering Seir and Reese to another, and drew a hot water bath when he saw how Volle was shivering. The bath felt wonderful, though it still didn’t clean all of the sticky residue off Volle’s fur.
    In the morning, Seir and the driver slipped off to the capital, and Volle awoke to find the governor waiting for him downstairs, a pudgy raccoon by the name of Anton. He took a liking to the raccoon after only half an hour of talking, and agreed to take a walk with him through the town. With obvious pride, Anton pointed out the progress the town had made in the last twenty years—a wall repaired, a new mill—and then stopped, flustered, as he realized he might be bragging that the town didn’t need a lord.
    Volle reassured him that he didn’t intend to stay, that the town was in very capable paws, and that he saw no need to change the arrangement the people had become used to. He would represent the town to the king, and he would rely on the governor to keep an eye on things at home. Anton was visibly relieved, and from then on he made a point of introducing Volle to all the citizens of the town. By the end of the day, Volle was more exhausted than he’d been in a long time, and he sank into his bed at the inn gratefully. He’d turned down offers from two different vixens to share the bed with him. There had been a black wolf who’d caught his eye, but he remembered the Church and didn’t dare ask.
    He spent one more day walking around the town with Anton, meeting the elders of the village, the craftsmen, and the farmers. The land’s small army assembled and presented arms for him—such arms as they had, which were largely bent or battle-damaged. He tried to remember all the names, as he would be their representative for an indeterminate period of time and would have to act accordingly. By the following morning, though, he was ruefully telling Anton that he would need reminders in the updates.
    The role absorbed him so thoroughly that for the first day of the trip to the capital, Volle pored over the papers and names and ignored Reese, who sat across from him in the hired carriage. The hare watched him with amusement at first, then boredom, and finally annoyance. As the sun was sinking, he leaned across the carriage and said quietly, “Don’t forget why you’re here.”
    Volle looked up and swiveled his ears backwards. He was sitting below the driver’s