"I don't know any history, have they always been like this or is it recent..."

Shrug. "I think they've always been kind of corrupt, but all this mind control and breeding and stuff is, uh, maybe the last ten or fifteen years? The new King and his creepy advisor are behind it." 

"Adept Kiyamsomething?"

"Kiyamvir Ma'ar, that's right. You know, they say he studied in Urtho's Tower! Can you imagine that - being betrayed that way by your own student..." 

- she can't talk to Mhalir through the earpiece while there's someone right here but she assumes he caught that. "Awful. Urtho - mentored him, taught him advanced magic - and then he went to Predain and did things that made Urtho nervous and - Tantara invaded Predain?"

"Something like that. Isn't it horrible? Figure that's part of why Urtho pushed for attacking them first - he must've felt so awful, watching someone use the things he taught them to conquer all those places." 

"Yeah. Well, Urtho's an incredibly powerful mage, right, it should work out..."

"I really hope so. Understandable that you want to stay out of it, though." She sighs a little and goes back to grinding herbs; she's trying to think of a change of topic, it's tempting to just end up gossiping about war war war with everyone she talks to but it's so grim. 

Carissa is pretty sure she knows what she needs, now, and is half-expecting Mhalir to tell her any minute to get out of here for a pickup, but she can cooperate with a subject change. "You're an apprentice here? What're you learning to do?"

Mhalir is still absorbing what he's just heard. He thinks it's enough to go on but he's taking a moment to mull on whether he has other questions to convey to Carissa. 

"Mix medicines, brew ale, we also sell herbs and spices for cooking so I help with that too. Master Baar's all right." She finishes grinding and dumps the powdered herb into a jar of grain alcohol, and then retrieves her pipe and re-lights it. "Wanna try a puff? It's some herb from way down south, makes you feel extra alert and cheerful, it's great." 

"Oooh, sure!"

(Mhalir is not at all sure that in Carissa's place he would go along with smoking random herbs handed to him by a random apothecary apprentice, but it doesn't seem worth actually interrupting about.) 

The smoke is pungent, leaving an almost sweet taste behind in her mouth, and thirty seconds later everything does in fact seem a little bit brighter and sharper. 

The girl takes her pipe back and has a long pull from it. 

It seems like most of the fun of being a boy is that you can take random drugs from people you just met and expect they're actually what is advertised. She giggles. "Oooh, I like that."

"Best perk of this job. You can have another if you like." She holds out the pipe again. "Oh, and maybe that breakfast you wanted." 

"Ready to pick you up whenever it is a good moment to step away," Mhalir says in Carissa's earpiece. He's borrowed one of the other hosts, an Earth-human woman; she's fine, mostly she daydreams while he does things with her body. 

"Thank you. Is there an outhouse?"

The girl bobs her head. "It's out back, we share it with the tailor's shop." 

So she heads out back. "Okay, ready for a pickup," she says softly when she's out of earshot.

The shuttle descends, cloaked, just outside the village, providing instructions to her. 

She goes invisible and jogs on over.

Mhalir, with relief, exits his borrowed host's ear. The woman offers him to Carissa. 

Carissa is slightly intoxicated with the pleasantly sharp thing and very pleased with herself. I guess objectively we still shouldn't be sure, but - it fits, right - Ma'ar studying under Urtho, who then betrayed him because he was scared that he was conquering places and doing something that's very taboo in Tantara...

<Yes. I was thinking exactly the same thing. But - Urtho is still alive, here - in our war, Seerow died in the first engagement...> 

He's feeling a surprisingly strong pang of - is that envy?