In the kitchen, Mary met the part-time cook. She was a early thirties woman with a very warm personality. Though she was human, she admitted to trying the snake vial the day before. "Worst mistake of my life!" she chuckled. "Didn't suit me at all. I was terrified of myself!"
The cook, Betty, pointed Mary to the barn. There she found the centaur Mr. Fields mentioned before. He was an impressive creature, powerful and sleek black stallion from the waist down and a finely-toned musculature on his human portion. He wasn't wearing any clothes, though Mary wasn't about to complain. His thick black hair waved about his shoulders.
"You must be Mary," he greeted, trotting up to her. "I'm Sherwood. I tend to the horses and cattle...and I hope to be tending to you." He smiled pleasantly, and Mary blushed.
"It's good to meet you," she said as they shook hands. He was a couple of heads taller than her, thanks to his impressive build. "Mr. Fields says you can help me adjust to working here."
"I've been working here for a few months," Sherwood explained. "Mr. Fields has...connections...to people from a rather strange line of work. You must have met one of them yourself if you got that brand."
"Yes, an old woman outside a grocer," Mary smirked. She noticed the centaur had a brand on the left side, near his horse hindquarters.
"He's been using all sorts of magical trinkets around the farm. The brands are relatively new. He said he'd fire me if I didn't get one."
"Is he a strict man?" she asked.
"No, just uses common sense more often than his heard, which I can't blame him for. After all, would you want to let a valuable worker slip away during the night?"
"I suppose not," Mary shrugged. "Anyway, getting back to the matter at hand...I don't suppose you have any sort of way for me to...well..."
"Produce milk?" Sherwood guessed. "Of course. Follow me."
They walked to the far side of the barn, past the stables and inner hog pen. They reached a padlocked door, to which Sherwood had the key. Inside were numerous wooden shelves with strange objects and dusty books. A work table was set up in the middle, very cluttered. Sherwood pulled on a string hanging from the ceiling and a few light bulbs turned on.
"This will just take a moment," he said as he searched through a drawer. "Ah," he pulled out a syringe and attached a tube of pink liquid to it. "Now listen carefully," he instructed. "This is going to allow your udder to produce a good amount of milk steadily without children to feed. Every month you'll need a new shot. You'll probably notice some other transformations besides, weight gain, more cow features, so on. Those can easily be reversed by the vials, but getting your udder to go away, even by using the human vial, will not be easy. Are you sure you want this?"
"Go for it," she said. Sherwood removed the cap on the needle and plunged it into the tough pink skin of her udder. Mary felt only a light pinch. Once the entire serum was injected, Sherwood removed the needle.
"This time tomorrow you'll be filling a bucket, guaranteed. It varies from cow to cow...or cow-woman in this case," he smiled sheepishly. "But at most you'll have to be milked at the start and end of each day.
Mary still thought it bizarre for her to be thinking these things. "Her udder," pig girl sisters, a buff centaur with miracle potions. Two days ago she'd think she was going insane, but here she was with barely a single complaint or misgiving.
"If you want to cover up," Sherwood said "I can have someone sew up some pants or overalls to fit you."
"That'd be great," Mary said. "Even with fur, I feel a bit naked."
"Tell me about it," he said. "But they don't make pants for horses."
She left the barn, ready to tour the farmhouse and start her new job on the High Field Farm. From the people she met so far, she had very attractive hopes for the future.