"Ok. I said before I have some friends who don't talk outloud who do some other things. I'm wondering if you might like to try anything like that? It's very alright if you don't, or if you try and then don't want to use it. And you don't have to try it right now if you do, I can just leave you some things. Shake your head if you just don't want to deal with that right now at all?"

Headshake.

"OK."

Is she looking alright, or like it would be best to ask the next question some other time?

She seems kind of shaken. 

"That's probably already a lot to take in. I can give you some space some more. Nod if you want me to stay for any kind of reason?"

 She nods, and pats the couch next to herself.

She won't look more-happy-in-reaction externally; that could convey that Denice has to do this to make her happy. But, unless Denice thinks this right now, this could be a - good thing, that she's trying this.

Heria sits down on the couch, arranging herself so she neither touches Denice, nor looks like she's trying to avoid her. (If the blanket is in the way, she'll move it to the back of the couch.)

She sits there, not looking at Heria, carefully controlling her breathing. After a minute she whines, under her breath, a barely-audible sound of distress, shudders, and scoots over to make contact - she's trembling, snuggled up as close to her as she can be.

"...would you like a hug?"

Nod nod nod nod nod.

Hug. Very hug. (Careful attention - if Denice makes to pull away she will let her go immediately. But meanwhile - hug, and the physical contact, and what comfort she can convey through it.)

She relaxes, and the trembling intensifies as she does. She tries to snuggle closer: it doesn't really work, but she ends up a little more flopped onto Heria than just snuggled up to her.

That's absolutely fine for her to do. Hug.

It seems like she's going to stay that way for a while.

That's fine. She considers singing, but she thinks sensory overload can be a risk here, and she doesn't want to barrage Denice with more questions right now. She'll hold her quietly, and say her prayers in her head in silence.

Denice stills, after a little while, and after some ten or fifteen minutes she pulls away, looking at Heria a little more assessingly than she has been.

Pulling away when she wants will be made as easy as it can be.

And does Heria react in any particular way to Denice watching her?

Keeps open and friendly and non-threatening body language. If Denice looks like she's trying to look at something that's out of view, she can move to make this more possible.

No, she's definitely looking at her.

Or, was, anyway. She looks away and curls up again: she's calm, now, just not engaging with her any more.

Well, some parts of her are also out of view.

That's also very fine.

"I have another question I wanted to ask you, but if you've still had enough of those for now that's very alright. Shake your head if I shouldn't ask right now?"

She shrugs.

"You may have seen when you first appeared, or looking at our books and things, we don't know the language you know here. I'm not a mage myself, so Shen made me a translation spell so that I can talk to you in your language, or understand it or read and write in it if I needed to.

If you didn't mind, she could make one for you too, and then you could watch some videos with talking, if you wanted, or look at some of our books and things like that. But if you can't trust us like that right now, or don't want it, that's very alright. Shake your head if you don't want her to make one right now?"

(The documentation really didn't give them anything to help figure out how Denice might feel about more active mages and magic. Hopefully she isn't just terrified of all mages to the point that this will make her terrified of Shen - the documents didn't mention doing the kinds of things that would cause that, but. But if that's the case, hiding is not a very good way to try to deal with it.

Didn't mention trying mind-affecting magic on the children, either, such that she'd more likely to be afraid to accept any spells from them. Again, not that that makes it certain.

But defaulting to depriving Denice of chances of input-that-is-not-just-them is also not right.)

At 'mage', she tenses, then intentionally relaxes. When Heria is done talking, she considers the question, obviously bewildered; after a minute, she gives a confused 'eeh?', possibly a request for more information.

Well, she knew the chance very much existed.

"I'm sorry. Shen won't do anything to hurt you, with magic or not. But you don't have to believe me, and if it would make you feel safer she can stay farther away from you as much as she can. And I'm not a mage, and my husband isn't.

Do you not know enough about translation spells to think about it, or something else? Nod if it's that one?"