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and, I admit without shame, they struck me as dull and lethargic. From people like this, then, was Layco Jhansi’s Sorcerer of Murcroinim, Rovard the Murvish, creating the crazed mob of fanatics who opposed us?
    Then I frowned.
    Among the citizens of Snarkter, other people crept along, wearing gray slave breechclouts, bearing burdens, getting out of the way as the citizens passed.
    If for no other reason — and there were plenty of others — this alone was cause enough for us to liberate all of Vallia.
    The Quork Nightly looked to be typical of taverns in this part of the island, being built of stone from the local quarries, slate roofed, low pitched and with a washed-out peach-colored munstal growing over the door which, however, exuded a sweetly pleasant scent. I ducked my head and went inside, carefully observing the fantamyrrh as I did so. I courted no trouble here.
    The innkeeper was apim, a member of Homo sapiens sapiens, like me, wearing a blue-striped apron, and with rounded red forearms bristling with brown hair. His nose, I recall, looked like a red cabbage.
    He was prepared to serve a lone mercenary. Over in the corner sat a couple of hefty lads, with cudgels down by their chairs. No, the innkeeper, Loban the Nose, had no good reason to refuse to serve me.
    I spread a silver stiver on the counter along with a couple of copper obs. Flashing gold here would not be prudent.
    The ale was thin watery stuff; but it was wet and it went down along with a couple of rashers of bosk, a heel of bread and, afterwards, a pottery dish of palines. I savored the yellow berries, sovereign cures for hangovers and sundry other ills. It is extremely difficult to find palines that are not good anywhere on Kregen, although I have been to some places where the palines were a disgrace. That is rare, thankfully.
    “Come far?” was the usual opening gambit.
    I chewed.
    “Nope.”
    “Going far?”
    “Yep.”
    “Hiring out to the kov, are you?”
    “Yep.”
    Wondering how long I could keep up this tight-lipped pose amused me. Overdoing it would make these local yokels hostile. So I said, “Have a drink with me, doms. Times are hard.”
    “Aye, dom, times are hard, we thank you.”
    There were no other patrons in The Quork Nightly at this time of the morning. I stood the landlord and his two bully boys a drink of their own weak ale, and we talked desultorily. I asked for a vet, and was directed to a house with a black front door over on the other side of town.
    As I took my leave I said: “Thank you, Koter Loban. Do you do a good meal here at the hour of mid?”
    “Aye, koter, that we do. Roast ponsho, ponsho pie, ponsho puddings — we do a very fine meal.”
    “Good. Remberee.”
    I took Salvation walking alongside me, the reins in my fist, as I crossed to the house with the back door. The sign read:
    MASTER URBAN THE UNGUENT
    The paint was cracked black, the lettering a wobbly attempt at the severe formal Kregish. Underneath in smaller letters was:
    ALL ANIMALS TREATED LIKE LORDS
    I went in.
    Salvation had to wait outside, tied up to a post. No doubt there would be a treatment yard round at the back of the house.
    One breath inside the house and, instantly, I was back in the house where I’d been born, long ago and far away on Earth. My father had been a horse doctor, and the house constantly witnessed a struggle between the smells of liniments and oils and those of freshly-baked bread and cabbage and furniture polish. I shook my head and went into the room where a crude picture of a human hand pointed the way.
    “Yes, koter?”
    Master Urban the Unguent was small, untidy, his hair a mop, and his clothes stained by the marks of his trade. He was in the act of dropping oils into a mixture in a brass pot upon a tiny brazier, and by his movements I saw that he knew, at least in this, what he was doing.
    I told him the problem, and he pursed up his lips and shook his head, and looked serious.
    “Since these troublous times I