For all his silver-gilded cuirass, jeweled honors and the martial-looking longsword that hung at one plump thigh, he seemed distinctly out of place at the head of a punitive company of warriors. And, indeed, with every league his troop penetrated into the dense jungles his dissatisfaction with the military life grew more profound.The bad-tempered little Daotar was hot and weary, and his buttocks and thighs ached from long hours on kroter-back. He sat slouched in the saddle, dreaming of a soft couch, cooling breezes from the gulf, nubile slave girls at his beck and call and tall, frosted goblets of spiced wine. He wondered if he would ever feel comfortable again.For seven days and nights now he and his troop of warriors had plunged ever deeper into the jungles of southern Kovia, until by now he was heartily sick of the whole business. The massive crimson boles of soaring lotifer trees rose all about him; snaky vines dangling from low branches overhead caught the plumes of his helm; stinging gnats whirled in buzzing clouds about him as he guided his plodding kroter through thick bushes of tiralons, the strange green roses of ancient Lemuria.
