The dimensional crack deposits her on a tall hill overlooking a river, the sea, and a low-tech walled city.

(There are also outlying farms, which aren't depicted.)

Ooh, some strange new city. That's a lovely hill with a bit of a castle on top, and it's right at the mouth of a river, as cities are wont to be.

She looks around and sniffs the air for anyone liable to have seen her arrival. Her fox form is kind of obvious; She looks like a big orange wolf from a distance. If she's not already spotted, she'll try a disguise.

The dimensional crack wasn't exactly subtle on this end of things, and it's likely that she's been spotted by one of the people on one of the hippogriffs which are flying quite quickly towards her. 

Yeah she is now: Invisible, inaudible, unsmellable, and has illusions obscuring her tracks as she bolts towards the forest.

The hippogriffs land on your vacated hill, but are unable to pick up your scent. Some of their riders dismount, but are unable to pick up your tracks. 

One of them takes a signal horn and blows into it, a simple but catchy melody.

Being invisible is draining and she was already kind of low on energy and needs to preserve option value. She cuts it out when she gets past the treeline. The illusions covering her tracks will fade in about an hour, for the same reason.

She notices that she's kinda panicking. But sheesh! Those giant flying things are scary!! Maybe she should just stay the hell away from the city??

She will sniff about for signs of what kind of forest this is, and also a rabbit or a deer or some other prey animal, to calm down.

She finds her rabbit. 

Cronch.

She shifts, to skin it and-

-No, she can't go changing back and forth willy-nilly right now. She just eats it whole, skin and all. She's long since learned that this kind of thing won't really hurt her.

Hmm. What now...

She should probably get far away from where those birdknights were looking. You know, just in case. And she hasn't seen an ocean in a while. She makes her way ocean-wards through the forest, taking at least a little bit of care not to leave too much of a trail.

It's a clear day on the Conqueror's Bay.

If there ever were a rabbit that chose take a trek across unimpressionable cobbled streets, and then if those streets were after scoured clean by four hours of rain, and also the rabbit were an Awakened rabbit, with levels in Ranger, and had taken care to hide its tracks--Marcus Endrin could Take Ten and follow that rabbit. 

Can Weiss give him a Perception check against DC 34?

With her magic-infused fox whiskers and an unknown but large number of years watching out for cryptids and cursed places in the wild?

Yeah.

There's a human holding a loaded crossbow sneaking up on her. When she notices him, he isn't near enough to have line of sight on her--but he doesn't seem to be having any trouble retracing her steps.

He thinks that he's sneaky, which might be why he came alone.

Her ears twitch in annoyance. A hunter. And she can't actively cover her tracks nearly as well as some of her sisters.

She just wanted to watch the ocean for a bit! The people around here are really paranoid! It must be pretty cursed around here or something, though she didn't really feel anything especially bad in the woods so far...

Is it a magic crossbow, she wonders, with a brief infusion of energy into her eyes?

It's an incredibly magical crossbow.

Some of the bolts he's carrying are magic too, independently of the crossbow, including the one he's loaded in it. 

He's also wearing magic armor, a magic necklace, a magic cloak, two magic rings, a magic headband, a magic circlet (which takes a different slot than the headband), a magic belt to hold his trousers up, and a pair of magic shoes. He carries a magic bag and his pockets are full of magic doodads. 

Do her powers enable her to tell what the magic does, or only that it exists?

She can tell that it exists, and roughly how strong it is (a lot, all added up), but not what exactly any of it does. Ugh. She has never seen a humanoid with that much magic. Even that wizard lizard with the fancy tower! Ugh ugh ugh.

She leaves an illusion in her lounging spot of a disembodied cartoon fox face sticking out its tongue and making 'pbbpbpbpbbt' noises, and vanishes again, trying to leap sneakily into a treetop, using illusion to cover her bulk.

If there's gonna be a fight she wants to pounce.

The hunter slips around a tree, stealthy as can be, finally getting a clear view of--

--that can't be the fox he was tailing. But it's pointed at him, and sticking out its tongue, which means his approach was noticed.

Rather than advancing, or retreating the way he came, or standing still, he darts off perpendicularly and finds the most defensible place to stand that he can in one round.

He shouts something in Taldane. Does Weiss comprehend Taldane?

Nope, not at all.

She can throw her voice down into the clearing, though.

"Yeah, hi. I didn't understand that. Here's some Notal. Elegantly, the North Tongue, Atsosi. And Kalgin I guess. Rotten language."

The hunter cycles through a few languages of his own, to no better effect.

But he takes the bolt out of his crossbow and stows the weapon, smiling. 

...You've gotta take a chance sometime. If there are cryptids about she'd want to check up on an unfamiliar fox, right? And she has little to fear from an unloaded crossbow?

So she can just go down. Any second now.

She drops to the forest floor and looks over at the guy. Ears pressed flat and painfully obviously anxious.

The hunter sits down, crosslegged, to make himself smaller, and holds his hands up to show that they're empty. He speaks in a low and soothing voice, although the words aren't any more comprehensible than they were before.

Every second that passes without a sudden assault is helping. She's not even usually this anxious, but, birdknights!! And extremely magic hunter!!

...Yeah, this isn't going to work without more illusion work. She's long since become completely natural with them, but they do still cost a bit of energy.

Image of a fox napping on a glowy blue rock with lush flora around it! Fox falls through a glowy blue hole! Fox sees birdknights and dramatically poofs up and hisses. Fox turns translucent in a puff of smoke and runs off.

Image ends.

The hunter nods his head understandingly, and then stops when he realizes that he doesn't know whether nodding one's head means the same thing to her as it does to him.

The hunter digs in a satchel for paper and a charcoal pencil, and begins sketching something that makes no sense, before scribbling it out in frustration and starting over.

This time he sketches the bay that she saw--he points in the direction of the bay, in case his drawing isn't clear--, and the river, and the city, with birdknights on the margins of the city... birdknights with big smiles on their faces... and he points at the city, says words in his language, and then draws a bident-looking thing with a short handle and long prongs. 

...Birdknights arrayed on walls against a horde of gribblies (wendigo, werewolf wearing blood and skulls, some kind of ooze, that one really horrible 40-foot armored centipede), looking very shiny and determined? 

Bident thing flying on banners above the walls? 

Birdknights letting lizardfolk and humans and elves and a kitsune with their ears and tail out and birdfolk and a warforged(?) pass? And a headtilt.

Birdknights arrayed on walls against a horde of gribblies: gets smiles and an arrested nod and thumbs up and then he stops doing the thumbs up because who knows if that's a rude gesture where she's from.

Bident thing flying on banners above of the walls: causes him to pinch his nose. He tries drawing a person in fancy regalia (he pays a lot of attention to the details of the regalia) holding the bident thing in one hand (it's small) and a sort of spirally-thing in the other.

Birdknights letting lizardfolk and humans and elves and a kitsune with their ears and tail out and birdfolk and a warforged(?) pass: discomfort and a so-so hand gesture and then Taldane and then, smiles and thumbs up and headnodding. He taps the badge on his shoulder and says something.

She nods along when he does, and fusses up an illusion of the guy with the regalia as he goes.

So, there's a king who wields the bident and something else, and he's with the cops, but they're not necessarily super racist ones. That's a lot better than the alternative. Things could even end up being Fine(TM). It's not like she has any particular reason to suspect humans who aren't immediately hostile about kitsune.

...Sheesh, learning a new language, again, is going to be such a pain.

Her tail sways thoughtfully...

She waves her tail forward, next to her head, and shakes it. A small pile of tian-looking coins on strings falls out.

He smiles broadly and says something that she can't understand.

He'll scoop up the coins and mimes pocketing them to see if that draws a protest?

...Wait what that's not what she was going for at all. She whaps her tail over the coins and they vanish into the fur again as he reaches for them.

What was she going for? She's not really sure. She seems to end up doing random things when aimless.

Uhh... Illusion of a ... Oh, fuckit.

Illusion of giant fox shifting into her base form and walking into the city and trading a Tian-y silver coin for a pie from a blankfaced stall owner and the cop standing nearby conspicuously not hassling her?

That gets big smiles and nods.

Alright then. She shifts - there's a brief moment of faint unreality-feeling - and then gives a shrug in her usual leather and linen light travelling outfit. (Barefoot.)

"Here we go, I guess?" She points towards the city.

He points at the city and smiles. He draws a signal horn... and mimes blowing into it. He taps his ears and winces.

"Pfffha. I can handle loud noises." She flicks her ears in amusement and waves negligently. "Letting the other cops know I'm not hongry for zee bluud?"

He doesn't know what she said, but must have gotten the gist, because he blows into the horn. 

He starts walking in the direction of the city.

And if she jogs ahead, faster than a walk?

He can move faster to keep up! The hunter is comfortable moving a third-again as fast as most humans; in a group, he's not used to being the one who sets the pace.

Fast jog for her (60 feet per round) it is, then. She doesn't try more talking, that's proven useless so far. 

She diverts a tad, to the beach, though.

It's a nice day.

There are birdknights come circling (and a hippogriff without a rider, although that might be difficult to tell from below if you don't know the hippogriff in question).

The hunter isn't afraid of the birdknights but does seem annoyed by them. He monitors Weiss's own response.

Sus, but she's person shaped now, and vouched for, so only ready to go invisible and bolt again if they dive.

He waves the hippogriffs off and they reluctantly fly back to the city.

He gives her an apologetic smile and says more words she can't understand.

Shrug. Cops are gonna cop. At least this guy's (presenting as) a cool cop.

In approaching the walls of the city, you must pass fields and houses. In passing fields and houses, you must acquire an entourage of curious Korvosans. 

Some of them are skittish, but for the most part they seem excited by the strange woman with fox ears. They hound your cop escort with questions.

The answers to which must not be reassuring, because they tend to send the skittish on their way, and inspire adults to drag away their children.

He does seem apologetic about it in her direction, though.

Steady on. All shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.

You're stopped on the road by an unassuming group of guardsmen who want to check the Commandant for enchantments with detect magic.

It's possible that the visible guardsmen are backed up by a number of invisible wizards and archers.

Is this really necessary?

Somebody somewhere must think so.

Well, at any rate he hasn't been enchanted. 

Happy?

Eh.

The guards want to surround Weiss and walk with her into the city.

The hunter-cop is arguing with them.

How about (a pretty real-to-life image of me) stands here very unimpressed while the real me is about ten feet away looking for the best path out of the fucking ambush.

When she creates the illusion, one of the guards shouts something and the others put their hands on weapons.

The hunter-cop shouts something very loudly, a vein bulging in his neck.

...The cops retreat to a respectable distance.

The hunter-cop looks around--not at the visible illusion--and then his eyes flicker to the ground and back up to where she is (but his eyes are unfocused; he can't see her directly).

He raises his hands unthreateningly.

Yes yes she's right here, a foot away from where it looked like she was.

Glare.

(Terrified, annoyed, and a teensy bit betrayed.)

"You don't want me? Fine, I'll fuck off into the forest."

He still can't speak her language, but he can take a big step away and speak low and slow.

The thing is, she maybe can't, actually, escape these people. They have absurd amounts of magic. Hunter guy found her trivially. Even if she retreats to the Woods, who knows if they can't find her there too? These people are SO MAGICAL. There's a dozen or more of them, invisible, enough that she can't actually keep track of them all through the vibrations! WTF.

The smart ones are always the most dangerous.

It's fucking terrifying. She can feel them all, lurking there. Menacingly. She can barely think. All she can do is puff herself up and twitch minutely at every suspicious motion or cough as if it will start the fox hunt.

The hunter-cop growls something at the other cops and they all leave, including, after more words are spoken, the invisible ones.

He runs his hand through his hair and keeps trying to apologize. 

She hugs her own tail and uses illusions to indicate that she totally knew about all the invisible people. She doesn't have an accurate count, though.

Like. Thinking about it a bit more rationally-

-They don't seem to know what kitsune are? Or have a wrong idea, maybe? It's-

-She puts up an illusion of that red-armored Captain type and a thought bubble emerging from her head, and in that thought bubble, herself, smiling and glowing softly, and standing just aside and under it, a pale vampiress cackling and with blood on her skeletal, clawed hands.

Herself in chains at an interrogation table, being yelled at and pointed at angrily. And three branches off from that- Of them letting her go with suspicious looks, of them throwing her in a barred cell, and of them drawing a sword and lunging forward to her-

And it all vanishes in a poof after a bit.

"I get it. I get it. You gotta- Check, right? But that doesn't make it any less scary!"

The hunter-cop nods sympathetically. 

It seems like the trip into the city has been delayed, even though you're so close to your destination; the hunter-cop isn't walking from where he's at.

After a (fairly) brief intermission, the red-armored captain-type comes down the road with two other people. One of them is dressed in gleaming white armor, and walks in the front of the group. He stops sixty feet away before saying something--possibly that it's safe for others to approach? 

The other is dressed like a priest, and approaches closer before offering a hand for her to take.

The hunter-cop gives Weiss a thumbs up, and a hopefully reassuring smile.

Deep breath. Get over yourself. Was the fucking centipede any less scary? ...It was, actually. Yeah, the centipede was less scary.

Humu, where was she going with that... Like, what now even...

She wishes Tessa were here; Tessa would hate this even more, but she could throw the runes and get a fucking answer...

A lot of this song and dance doesn't make sense if this is... Some elaborate trick.

She doesn't usually think about the humans a whole lot. They do their thing, she does hers, she doesn't bother them. They're convenient sweets, fruit, and pie dispensers in exchange for animals she's hunted or scaring off nasties. Occasionally she warns them off cursed ground, or something. But-

-These humans force her to think of them as... Peers. It's kind of embarrassing to realize that, that at some point she stopped considering them, important, agentic. Maybe her morality is just habit.

They're scared. But trying to trust. So should she.

She grits her teeth and shuts her eyes and extends her hand.

"...and that's Share Language cast, you've got 24 hours of Taldane starting now."

"I'm sorry for the fright we've given you," are the first words out of his mouth after the spell's been cast.

"This is- Strange. Uh."

She runs it over in her head. It's distinctly not like Charm. She's not sure what it is like, though.

"-I understand that you're being careful? I could be anyone. It's just- Scary."

"I'm abashed to say that instincts like those will serve you well on this plane of existence. Speaking of which - where are you from?"

"We, kitsunes- No? That word isn't quite right? We just called the two planes we could access the Spirit Plane and the Material Plane."

"If the translation spell's worth the money I paid on it, the Material Plane is where you're currently at."

He looks to the red-armored captain-type (with some amount of petulance). "Do you know anything about... 'kitsunes'?"

(So she isn't an azata, then, nor an agathion. The Field Marshall will try her level best to keep the I-told-you-so off her face.)

(Okay, but, more importantly, neither is she a CR 20 evil demon, which is what he knew for sure she wasn't.)

(It'd be bad form to argue with that when in this case your approach worked better than mine and at any rate I doubt I could convey my nuanced position purely via facial expression so let's pick this back up at some later date.)

"Kitsune are a race of shapechangers, of Tien extraction, with two forms: a humanoid, all but indistinguishable from any other, and an anthropomorphic fox--bipedal, five fingers to a hand, but hairy with a snout." The implication is that this isn't a kitsune and the translation spell's on the fritz. "I don't know what the Spirit Plane is--possibly the Ethereal? I might be able to ID it with more details." I'd ask a wizard, but you sent my staff away.

"I can see why that's the closest available word, I guess. I can pull willing people into my little pocket of the Spirit Plane if you want to see!"

It occurs to her that volunteering information about her capabilities is probably a bad idea if these people turn out hostile again.

"-Uh, you don't trust me, right. Anyway, the rifts are a known thing for us, rare but known, so I'm definitely somewhere strange. All I really want to do is not be menaced by hippogriffs and buy pies, though?" Here's the string of gold coins again! She snatches it from midair into a hand. "Maybe kill some gribblies later if they're uncomplicatedly evil? All I really want to do today is not be menaced by hippogriffs and buy food."

"If you're willing to repeat that under a truthspell, I'll be out of your hair shortly."

"Yeah, you got people to protect, makes sense. How's that work? The truth spell."

(Cressida Kroft has heard about thirteen sentences from Weiss Faron and she is either positively enamored of the not-a-kitsune else enamored with the character that the not-a-kitsune is playing. It's probably the first one.)

"There are spells which suborn the will and compel certain behaviors, among them Abadar's Truthtelling, which compels honesty--to my sensibilities, it's the least offensive compulsion bar none. But if you've never heard of truth magic before, and have only my word that the spell is harmless and only lasts a minute, I can't ask you to let us cast it--and you would have to allow us, I don't anticipate that you'd have any difficulty resisting."

One more deep breath. The adrenaline is steadily ebbing away. She feels tired.

"...All actions seen so far make considerably less sense from the perspective of attempting to land hostile mind control, or some other elaborate conspiracy going on. It would have been much more likely to, like, try to dogpile me and apply it anyway five minutes ago if that was your goal. Anyway. Been enchanted before. It's not fun but not so scary in hindsight. Let's do it. Also, paid? You paid for the translation magic?" She asks Hunter Guy. "How much?"

He tries to wave the question off. "The taxpayer paid it, and got their money's worth. You'll pay them back a thousandfold in dead gribblies."

Fiducia Falco is having none of it. "I charged the Commandant twelve Korvosan sails. The spell you needed, had you not needed it, could have, and would have, instead granted one day's relief to a sufferer in the throes of infection or flu. It might have enabled their productive labor, and society would be richer for it. Or it might only have increased the joy they gained through living, and society would be richer for that. If you kill a 'gribbly,' collect a bounty. If twelve sails seems steep, learn Taldane."

This guy's annoyance is probably aimed at the ranger more than her, but it's still annoying in turn. Some part of her wants to cross her arms and pout: I was GOING to be all financially responsible, but now I don't want to!

Whatever. Annoyed ear-flick.

"I have at least twelve gold talents, from past gribble killing mostly," She jangles the coin string, then stuffs it back into her tail. "So... Whatever. Figure that out later. Let's get the interrogation over with, please? Also, I'm Weiss Faron."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Faron. I'm Field Marshall Cressida Kroft."

The spellcaster in robes is "Fiducia Falco," the quiet guy in the gleaming armor is "Knight-Sergeant Garundicus."

"And my friends call me Marcus."

Falco casts a spell and extends a hand for her to take.

Grab.

-Yeah, she can feel how this would be resistible. She doesn't, though.

"All you really want to do today is to not be menaced by the hippogriffs, and to buy pies?"

"-No, that's too strict and glib a phrasing. All I want to do today is peacefully and un-criminally do... City things. Shopping, finding an inn, talking to people. I don't want to hurt people. I don't want to steal things. I don't want to break the laws unless they're really stupid laws, also I don't know them."

It turns out that the red-armored captain-type can in fact smile!

"Welcome to Korvosa. You're free to come and go as you please, although I'll advise you that it'll raise fewer questions the fewer legs you choose to have--up to a point."

"Thank you, all. I'm... Really glad I didn't just keep running, actually. Anything else? -Fiducia Falco, you seem concerned about money, would you know where I could find a bank?"

Oh yes, he knows the way to the bank. He seems chuffed to have been asked.

"I work at the Bank of Abadar," he says, tapping the stylized golden X hanging from a chain about his neck. "As I intend shortly to return to it, and as you could quite easily tail me whether I willed it or no, I couldn't charge a copper pinch for the service of guiding you."

"I'd be glad to tag along," says the hunter-cop, "if you wouldn't mind it."

"I don't mind. I do want those twelve sails, plus the truthy thing's cost unless the cop budget covers it, and local coin for shopping... But we probably have stuff to chat about?"

"The cop budget covers the translation spell as well, to be clear. The Fiducia here is asking you to make a donation to the city treasury."

"I mean... He's kind of got a point, though. There's only so much magic to go around. If I had naught but sticks and strings I'd probably feel different."

Everyone present is Abadaran and/or Good enough to find this delightful.

(She's feeling kind of lousy about hassling Weiss earlier. It's her job to treat powerful Good adventurers well, and to treat quadrupeds that fall out of interdimensional rifts with suspicion, and she succeeded at the latter by failing at the former. Which--she endorses, to a point. It's the more important duty. But if you fail at keeping powerful Good adventurers happy, they stop hanging around and/or cooperating with the Law, and the symptoms of that disease are as manifold as they are hard to quantify. She once tried to make the general point to Eodred by saying that the number of reefclaw attacks reported on the River Jeggare trends up or down from year to year purely as a function of whether this one monomaniacal adventurer winters in Korvosa or in Magnimar and Eodred rolled his eyes like she was Feebleminded and said, "If that one man is so important, cater to him in particular!")

"If you find yourself looking for work--especially of the 'gribbly' kind--there's no shortage of it known to me. I'm not a difficult woman to find."

"The reward for doing good work is more work?" She asks wryly. "Sure. Tomorrow, probably."

Kroft is still a cop. And so is the surprisingly soothing Marcus. But being on good terms with the cops will make her life easier.

And they set off for the bank!

The gates to Korvosa are guarded by a much larger group than one would hope necessary--but the reason for their presence is as obvious as the fact that most of them are the people Marcus told to go away the first time they stopped her on the road. They salute Weiss's group as it approaches, and burst into excited babble once it's close enough to hear. In response to their questions, the Field Marshall informs them that Weiss "isn't evil," and that she's "a heroic sort from another place or plane." 

This is objectively the most interesting thing that's happened today; does it stress Weiss if they crowd a little close and ask what sort of magic she has and if she's a druid and whether she uses weapons and goggle at her ears and tail?

Okay, these people were threatening her a while ago, at least some of them... But... It's sort of a compliment if you think of it right, isn't it? That she's enough of a threat they need a full response.

Her ears flicker briefly to each loud or startling noise. Her tail curls anxiously. She flicks it repeatedly, scattering little blue fires from the tip that form up in a circle five feet around her. They feel hot to the touch but won't actually injure people. (This time.) 

...Being openly special like this is an uncommon experience! She's usually a quadruped for it. She's usually disguised when in humanoid form. She's not sure what to say.

She wants to, and doesn't want to, at the same time, and follows a surge of some sort of emotion (embarrassed pride?) and starts dancing. Her moonlight dance, the one that she can do almost without thinking, slow and elegant and twirly. She pilots the lights in spirally orbits around her and keeps walking forward as she does.

The magic performance gets cheers and applause.

Weiss leaves behind her an impassioned argument as to whether she's a "dance sorceress" or merely a dancing sorceress (or wizard or druid!)

They'd probably follow her a distance if they didn't have posts to get back to and a Field Marshall (who's operating on the observation that Weiss is still skittish around the people who stopped her (if not around people full-stop, but there's less she can do about that)) to inform them of this.

Within its walls, Korvosa is a dingy city. It may or may not be nice by the standards of early-modern cities on Earth, which is to say, Korvosans have prestidigitation and they do use it, but... that's the reference class. There is more fecal matter on the street, both human and animal, than someone walking barefoot might strictly prefer.

The streets are bustling with humans and horses and stout bearded dwarves and and waifish elves and chickens and pigs and people with slightly pointed ears who stand three feet tall and have large furry feet and walk barefoot as a rule and a dog chasing the chickens and a person chasing the dog chasing the chickens. 

The houses are multistory and cramped together. It seems that some of them have been built even taller, and the construction rarely looks up to code.

There's a human child with wide eyes that wants to know "What are you?"

Yeah, cities are like that. There wasn't really enough magic in the other place to make them clean, either. And she just bets there's a slum and orphanages around somewhere, and a fancy district where merchants and nobles live.

She's paying attention to what people seem to think of Hunter Guy, and whether he seems uncomfortable in the city like she kind of is.

"I'm a fox. See?" Kids are cute. Sometimes. She won't let them touch her tail, though! Kids YANK.

The kid is incredibly disappointed by the fact that the fox proves to have a personal bubble.

If Hunter Guy is uncomfortable in the city, it shows in how his smile grows wider but less of it reaches his eyes. He separates the dog and the chickens, which all parties present--canine, fowl, and hominid alike--seem gladdened by; whatever else he is, he's very good with animals. Whenever someone waves and shouts at him, he waves and shouts right back.

Hunter Guy told you that his friends call him Marcus, but it seems that everyone else calls him "Commandant" or "Lord Endrin."

"Say, Marcus, I don't have a good idea what the local soldier types are capable of, and the reverse seems also true. Probably you want to keep an ace in the hole, or three, but getting more familiar with what to expect would be a good idea?"

He takes a moment to roll her words over in his head before he says, "It's hard to speak sweepingly. Most humans--the kind of thing I am--don't have any innate magic. We only have the kind that you learn the hard way, or get from a god, with fairly few exceptions. Spellcasters have tricks, too many to easily list, but most of us soldier types are just normal mortals wearing shiny shirts."

"And the rest of you 'local soldier types,'" Fiducia Falco adds, "can punch through solid stone and wrestle hippogriffs and survive ordinary forms of execution and can shoot the wings off a fly in the dark."

He nods because it's true. "People have a variety of skills and are varyingly good at them."

"Nnnno that seems like magic to me. Just, magic of the body, not the fire-flinging kind. I've got some of that too."

"Certainly I know some extraordinary people, but I wouldn't call them magic. Detect Magic can't detect someone's underlying factor of selfhood, and Dispel Magic can't dispel durability or strength unless it's granted by a spell or item, nor can Antimagic suppress it."

"Sounds like a terminology problem to me."

She suddenly leaps fifteen feet into the air, and lands light as a feather.

"See? That's unnatural. That's magic, to me."

That's was a very impressive jump. He will golf clap, sincerely.

"It's interesting that your language doesn't disambiguate. To me, magic is... magic and the supernatural are the things which aren't on the same continuum as animals are. Some things in nature can leap further than others, some are stronger or faster or better swimmers, but none can fly without wings or conjure summoned outsiders. That's what I regard as magic."

"Seems like a case of unclear boundaries and definitions, yes. I'll have to use the local terms lest I confuse everyone I talk to. C'es la vie. You have-" A ridiculous stack of magic items, she was about to say, but stops herself short. "-Hm, no, nevermind, nonsense thought."

Your path takes you to the foot of a steep marble stair which leads to the bronze doors of a towering temple made of gleaming marble and bronze.

The fiducia gestures with a hand. "The Bank of Abadar."

"-Thank you, sir. I think it likely I'll want to buy Share Language tomorrow."

The Fiducia thought it likely as well.

As they ascend the steps, he describes her options: as Share Language has an arcane and a divine version, she could have it cast by a wizard - who learned the spell through study - or by a cleric, who was granted it by a god. Korvosa has many prominent wizards, and so divine spells are scarcer and more expensive than arcane spells. The Fiducia will charge you a modest amount more than a wizard would for this spell, and what you'd be paying for is the knowledge that no fiducia of Abadar's will accept payment for one spell but cast another, not in Korvosa and not anywhere else on Golarion - or Abadar would revoke their magic. It's a useful service to travelers, who know that no matter where they find themselves, so long as there is a Church of Abadar, they can safely transact.

The fiducia could also connect you with a wizard known to him to have the spell and do good work. It'd be cheaper--8 sails to 12--, which is good for Weiss Faron and good for society. If Weiss expects that her time is worth too much to want to set that up, Faron will do the legwork for a finder's fee.

First she has to figure out how much all this gold she has from two decades of adventuring is in sails. This kind is alloyed with about an eighth copper, this kind with tin and nickel she thinks, and this kind she doesn't recall the purity of.

The rewards posted for merking really nasty gribblies few others can, about once a year, are... Substantial. There's some miscellaneous gems in there too.

An appraiser is found, and the value of the coins discerned. The spells involved are of the sort that Paizo never bothered to print, because in their version of the world all nations and peoples use gold coins worth ten silver which are worth ten copper.

Exactly how substantial the plunder of posted rewards are in Korvosan currency will depend as much or more on the relative rarity of metals as it does how much value she provided her old planet in terms of an average Korvosan's daily wage and wait a minute.

Can you say more about these "miscellaneous gems"?

You know, miscellaneous bracelets tiaras crumbly old statues and murals and thrones of the dishonored long-dead in ancient cursed ruins and barrows, really don't need all those emeralds and rubies and sapphires and diamonds and opals and garnets and amethysts and-

in your world does no one know they can use rubies sapphires and diamonds as material components for powerful spells?

First instinct, act unsurprised and confident, no we totally knew that, buuuut she kinda sucks at lying actually.

"--No? I mean, they get used as the base for major enchantments but the expensive part is the magic, not the diamond dust you pour into the ward circle. Regular old magic lights are made of, like, quartz."

"I can give you 25,000 sails for the stone in this ring," indicates it, "and 6,000 sails for all the rest of this combined."

"Uh, I think I might want a second opinion."

"The diamond is probably worth more than one copper pinch," Marcus volunteers.

"It's not that I think this is bullshit, but more that twenty five thousand anything is a lot and you do diligence about it."

Okay, fair enough. The bank can find more Abadarans and solicit opinions from them. 

(The idea that you might want to do diligence by consulting non-Abadarans doesn't occur to them.)

And Marcus thinks Abadarans are mostly trustworthy? Like the Flying Bird's priests? Hm.

She prays. Briefly. No answer, of course, but it points her thoughts in the right direction: What are the risks here? What can she do to mitigate them? Is it worth taking said steps?

How about she adds a buyback clause, she sells it for 24,950 or whatever and can buy it back for 25,000 for a month if it turns out this isn't a usual price?

That works for them!

Okay. Deal?

She's kind of discombobulated now.

The solution: Pie, and nomfing said pie.

And if Marcus is still around, asking him what kinds of nasties tend to be around and telling the story of the Wendigo, who grew stronger from eating bodies and needed a special ritual to put down for good instead of a month.

The Wendigo reminds him of a barghest, although fortunately barghests die for good when killed.

Did the Wendigo heal from positive energy or from negative?

"Uh... The sun burned it, so it moved at night? Megi did not try healing it. She was in mortal danger just being in the same county."

"If the sun burned it, the smart money says it would have healed from negative."

The nasties which "tend to be around" according to Marcus Endrin if "limited to things which have killed someone, seriously hurt them, or have eaten someone's animals since the turn of century," "in no particular order" include "wolves, wargs, ankhegs, brown bears, black bears, owlbears, bugbears - those aren't really bears, just big hairy people -, goblins, squid goblins, aforementioned barghests, allips, will o' wisps, humans, stirges, goblin skeeters, dog-eating camel spiders - those ones are new, here's to hoping that they don't go endemic -, otyughs, blackboil gators, imps, hellhounds, derro, dire rats, boggards, shingle spiders, forest spiders - forest spiders are worse than foxes - in that they eat chickens, I don't mean to cause offense -, shrew flies, chokers, shingle fishers, mimics, pigtails - the centipedes, I mean, not the thing that sticks off of a pig. Dream spiders, shocker lizards, behirs, zombies and skeletons, jellies and oozes - ochre jellies and gray oozes, I mean -, black pudding, yellow musk creepers, violet fungus, assassin vines, evil trees of every stripe, dragonleaf plants - aka cowbiters aka giant flytraps -, shambling mounds, reefclaws, bunyips, jellyfish, giant snappers, swamp barracuda, ogres, ettins, hill giants, swamp giants, stone giants, snakes, basilisks, cockatrices, phase spiders, manticores, chimeras, wyverns, forest wyverns, fireball wyverns, river drakes, mist drakes, hydras, harpies, hags, witchwolves, wererats, demons and devils - this year was a bad one for devils, ask me about that later -, demonspawn and hellspawn, mad constructs, feral hippogriff, porcupines - porcupines aren't very aggressive but people lose their minds when they see a big one -, kobolds, gremlins, ghouls, wights, gray renders, red dragons, cats, skunks and weasels... and half-again as many beasties which are presently slipping my mind."

But he doesn't want Weiss to get the false impression that if she's ready for everything which tends to be around, she's ready for anything. Every week there's a new monster which had never been a problem before, or at least in a long while, or which no one knew even lived in Varisia or existed. So far just this year he's seen giant acid-spitting beetles, a tooth-pulling fairy, this one minotaur escapee from a Varisian bigtop, satyrs, this fey who was going around buying people's shadows off them to turn into magic items - she went robber when business dried up -, a morgh, a zelekhut - that's a long stupid story -, a Belkzen warcat, an Antarean red bogg, an electric mouse, this one evil wig that'd control whoever wore it, and the wig must have been alive because it healed from positive -, skulks, skum, a doppleganger, soul eaters, invisible stalkers, a skeleton baby that stole both breaths and voices, this revenant who hid in the bay by day and emerged at night with a rusty hook and a list of names, a skeleton thing crawled out of some Shoanti crypt and could teleport people against their will and without touching them, this whole nest of rust monsters, a matched set of masked murderers who turned out to be a medusa and eighty thousand graveworms in a long coat respectively, some tougher souped-up strain of wight that you could only see out of the corner of your eye - but without the deadly touch, thank the gods, it had to use its claws to spread the plague -, and there was this plant-based pod-person a mad botanist was growing in his basement, and a breeding pair of smuggled dracolisks, and a - he forgets what Cressida called it but it looked like a human being if humans kept their eyes in their hands instead of their heads and liked to slurp people's liquefied bones out of their living bodies -, this one troll and its troggles, a gargoyle, elementals, this purple worm, Numerian kasatha, a landshark, and this whole mess of floating zombie heads - one and only one of those could breathe fire, and Marcus will be damned if he has the slightest idea why.

Mind you, this isn't a complete list of gribblies as have menaced Korvosa and its territories in 4707; Marcus is given to understand that there were a great many things in this general class of inexplicableness which he didn't happen to be present for and which were never escalated to him - it's his job to deal with people, more than it is to handle monsters - "and humans are the nastiest gribblies on the whole list of woe, with wolves a distant second."

"I mean, I eat chickens," she murmurs at one point.

...That is.

A lot.

Hrm.

"...I'm going to go on assuming that whatever I face might have completely unprecedented horrible unpleasant powers. It's true of Cryptids- There's four broad categories of monsters where I'm from, undead, magic beasts, curses, and Cryptids, Cryptids are all intelligent and terrifying and powerful. Rule of thumb is that each has at least two obvious powers, at least two subtle ones, and at least two aces up their sleeve. The Wendigo was one. So was the corpse puppeteer and the giant centipede. It sounds like you have a lot more cases of things trying to kill people than we do? A big city like this would be... Worn down to nothing at that kind of pace of threats, back home, unless there was something obscenely valuable in the area. And the big cities in the imperial cores are, uh, mostly safe if you don't count maybe getting drafted or mugged or poisoned in court intrigue."

Well, if you go by the random encounter tables in the back of The Guide to Korvosa, any given person wandering the city has ~3% chance to encounter something hostile with a CR on any given day even if they stick to the safe streets. Venturing into Korvosa's slums carries a 45% chance of the same, and in the Shingles it's 64%. Assume a simplistic model where all humans are CR 1/3rd, anyone who encounters something with a CR higher than they have dies of it, and there's a 10% chance of random encounter per person per day: if no one is born or immigrates in, 90% of the city will have died on you by the evening of the twenty-second day.

This version of Korvosa is less lethal than all that - encounters with monsters are rarer than the encounter tables report, and less likely to end in a death than in the simplistic model above; there's a reason that Marcus complained about giant spiders from the forest eating people's chickens - easier prey than humans exist, which is why he doesn't know anyone to have been killed by a Varisian forest spider in over a decade. (Shingle spiders kill people more often, because they share an environment with the most defenseless humans Korvosa has to offer - even so, they'd prefer to eat your cat.)

That said, yes, Golarion is a death world. Don't wander alone in the shingles, you'll be eaten by a grue. 

"Assuming that whatever you face might have completely unprecedented horrible unpleasant powers is absolutely a good assumption, especially while you're new to the plane. You do eventually get some feel for the general rhythm of things - and you aren't starting from nothing, we have undead and curses and magic beasts - but it'd make sense to team with experienced hunters, and lean on them while you're learning the local ropes."

"I guess you or Captain Croft would probably be able to point me in the right direction? Sheesh... I probably should get to work pretty quick if things are that bad. And optimize my power recovery. After confirming that, you know, the monsters really are unrelentingly evil. I don't want to be someone's unwitting butcher."

Mm. Marcus Endrin is the wrong person to ask, if she wants that confirmation.

The defining characteristic of a monster, in his eyes, is that it interacts destructively with humanoid society. Pseudodragons do no one any harm, so they aren't monsters even if they're shaped a bit like some things which are. Some things which are monsters by this definition, Marcus would prefer humanoid society learn to get along with or tolerate - there was a little house spider living above his bed for a week, but it didn't become a monster until his wife noticed and humanoid society interacted with the monster destructively - but for the most part Marcus doesn't think it makes sense to assign blame either to the monsters or to the people. Oil isn't in the wrong, and neither is water.

The flourishing of wolves is pretty much diametrically opposed to the flourishing of sapient beings. Wolves eat sheep and cattle, and they're dangerous, and they're much smarter than they're often given credit for, and they're very pretty and love their cubs and if he were the world's only human he'd get along fine with the wolves. 

In a world with only Marcus Endrin in it, there wouldn't be many monsters at all.

That has her pensive and thoughtful. She munches restaurant pie.

"So- I do assign higher moral importance to more intelligent individuals. To an extent. This stuff about society is why I never went to nobles or kings in the past. I more meant that, curses and undead and cryptids especially, not so much magic beasts, are all fundamentally - cruel, and destructive, and selfish. I like hunting those. It's unambiguous. They're trying to ruin everything, no matter how many times I tried talking instead, and I'm trying to kill them. If a fire-infused badger is minding its own badgery business, more power to it, yeah. So I really meant more that a specific monster has no redeeming value. It's not that I'll refuse to fight beings that are a current, active danger- It's that I'd strongly prefer not to proactively track and hunt ones that aren't, just, made of malice."

Monsters can be divided into slavering beasts like wolves, antisocial sapients which are often "made of malice," like demons and undead and chromatic dragons, and sociable sapients who are nonetheless doing evil - think goblins and human pirates and Shoanti raiders.

...In truth, Marcus has more sympathy for the slavering beasts than he does for human pirates. Beasts of the forest don't understand that they're doing anything wrong and can't be any other way than how they are. And he doesn't feel remotely conflicted about killing evil priests and wizards, who are rarely hurting for options to do other than they did. But if Weiss doesn't want to get involved in fights between people he doesn't think that's wrong of her; there's no shortage of slavering beasts and antisocial sapients.

And if she does go after the more ambiguous targets she should be careful to get both sides of the story and not to murder anyone. Probably Weiss of all people doesn't need to hear this, but he'd rather say it to too many people than to too few: a policy of siding automatically with humans or humanoids against non-humans or non-humanoids is both chaotic and evil. If it can talk, discourse is the first recourse.

If Korvosan adventurers killed a river drake, and the drake's friend or relation approached the city on foot and sued for wrongful death, the drake would see its day in court. That's never happened in Korvosa - and he doesn't know how a river drake would ever learn that they have the option, they aren't like goblins who live in the city('s sewers, for the most part) or might know people who are, and who have a long tradition of being hired for dirty and violent jobs[1], even if river drakes were the sort to keep track of friends and relations. (Which he doesn't think they are; wyverns mostly aren't, and river drakes are a race of wyvern.) But it theoretically could happen and that's important.

Korvosa is a human state in the sense that it was founded by humans, is majority human, and only humans of Chellish descent can hold certain offices. But the laws of Korvosa do not distinguish between sapients, except in the case of specific priveleged or penalized races. Korvosa is a place where the captain of the guard[2] must be confirmed by an Abadaran Archbanker; you can and will be prosecuted for murdering the wrong imp, hellhound, or boggard. Those aren't hypothetical examples, either; there's a boggard who works for the Korvosan Guard and there are any number of imps and hellhounds who live and work in the city - and devils are made of malice, they're native to Hell. (Which is why they eg can't work in law enforcement unless it's through the Hellknights, who aren't public servants.)

If the Lamashtu Herself took up residence in Korvosa, the law would wait for Her to break it before moving against Her.

-

1. Goblins served as mercenaries in the Cousin's War, according to the Guide to Korvosa pg. 50.

2. lit. "Field Marshall."

...Honestly, today has been too much. Too complicated, too many new things, too much stress. She might try to go home through the Spirit World, even, but it seems a shame to do that before even getting to know the place.

Cities. Legalities. Bleh. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

"Say..." She says quietly, changing the subject. "I have noticed that you're absolutely covered in magic stuff. I have some items of my own, but they must be different styles because they're not the sort of thing you just wear constantly, more the sort you pull out when you need."

Perhaps they don't refine spellsilver where she's from? Oh, this will be fun.

With a big grin on his face he takes his bag and, plunging his arm in up to his shoulder, says, "The bag's bigger on the inside than the outside."

...And then he realizes that her tail already does that and maybe she won't be so impressed.

"Nice! My tail of holding is pretty rare even among my kind of kitsune."

"Most of what I'm carrying doesn't do anything so interesting or demonstrable as the Handy Haversack, but it's just as useful. This cloak might not look like much, but after Endrin Manor it's the most expensive thing I own: it wards me against everything but cuts and punctures. The magic armor is for cuts and punctures. These gloves let me see through walls, this ring of mine can counterspell the spell cast into it, this ring does mind-shielding - I can't have my mind read while I'm wearing it, and you also can't use magic to tell whether I'm a good or bad person. It's illegal for someone with my security clearance to be out and about without a Ring of Mind-Shielding, which is definitely so we can't have our minds read and I'd never ever imply that the secret purpose of the rule is to price anyone out of high office or allow those who detect as evil to inconspicuously hide it. The Hand of Glory on a chain around my neck is so I can wear a third ring - you can't wear more than two ordinarily, they interfere - and it's wearing another Ring of Counterspells - under my jacket because mummified hands aren't really my aesthetic. This is a lesser Headband of Alluring Charisma, and this is a Circlet of Persuasion - they help me not put my foot in my mouth, and I need all the help I can get. This belt does grace and endurance - though neither as good as the actual spells -, the boots mean that I'm not badly hurt by long falls and that I always land on my feet - there's a ring that's the same thing but better, but I have to wear mind-shielding instead... although in practice I'd probably wear another Ring of Counterspells. In my pockets... this horseshoe is lucky, and this is a Bead of Newt Prevention - it keeps me from being polymorphed against my will -, this doorknocker makes doors where none exist, and this is a healing wand I forgot to put back in the Handy Haversack. Oh, and speaking of wands!"

He digs in the Handy Haversack and grabs something near the top. "I've been learning wandmaking. This is a first-circle wand of Resist Fire, which I made myself." He seems very proud of this. "It's better than a wizard could do," he adds, so that she knows why.

Weiss can tell that there are more magic items than he's mentioned (and whenever the haversack is open, many more), but other than the crossbow (which he wouldn't say he's wearing per se) he's mentioned the most powerful ones.

Her eyes may flicker around to unmentioned magic items.

"If I could have one of any of those it would be the cloak. I think I could wear it as a fox too, and I fight much better on four legs. Maybe counterspell instead. Or something for mind-whammies particularly, those are the worst sort of Cryptids to fight, the ones who try to make you wonder where you even are or blind you or incapacitate you with psychic pain or make you unable to recognize friend from foe or make you wonder why you're trying to hurt such a beautiful harmless friend you should give him your blood. I have a bunch of wands stored away, never could pick up the trick of making them. And potions. And a few scrolls, but those are trickier to use."

She's pretty sure she could throw off a polymorph because Kitsune bodies are only half real to begin with but it might be a good idea to, like, check, at some point. Later.

He nods commiseratingly. "I'm terrible with scrolls, unless they're spells I can cast."

Taps his cheek. "If any of the spells are new to Korvosa's wizards, you could almost certainly sell one of them a scroll for more than it'd cost to buy back a scroll of the same spell once it's been copied into a book. In terms of magic items you'd benefit from - Cloaks of Resistance are great if you can afford them, and you can. A Mind-Sentinel Medallion is cheaper than a cloak of the same power and helps against enchantments, but it's less general than the cloak. A Wisdom headband will enhance your will, and more - I know people who swear by them. When I think about other items you'd benefit from, what comes to my mind is an Amulet of Mighty Fists - my hippogriff wears one. Or you could commission custom barding for your fox-form. Headbands and belts are very useful, and they might be able to meld with your body when you shapeshift - it'll depends on how your power works, I think. Otherwise you might need them fitted to either the fox form or the humanoid one."

"I'll probably see about the scrolls later. I have a few. Sinnah's Fly, and blizzard, and solar beam- That's divine- And mind purge and sterilize and iron footing. Those are the strongest ones I can cast most of the time and aren't redundant with something else I can do. Sinnah makes them. She, uh, would have yelled at the hippogriffs to not pester her and given them a rude gesture and I'm really not sure how it would go from there, though." She snickers. "Sounds like I have a lot of shopping to do. Barding- I'm not sure armor would help? I'm already pretty tough and it might slow me down. And it sounds kind of stuffy and miserable? This amulet sounds interesting."

"If your fly spell is better than ours in some dimension - lower circle, or faster, or longer duration - it'll be a big hit. I've never heard of Blizzard, what's it do? And Solar Beam isn't translating as something that I know, but we have one we call Searing Light which might be the same thing."

"-Circle? Sinnah's Fly is distinct from other wizards' fly by being faster, harder to control (it won't stop you from plowing yourself into a wall), not needing concentration, and shorter duration at just ten minutes. She also managed to squeeze in a feather fall at the end. Blizzard creates a huge cone of extremely frigid snow and sleet. Blasts things away, puts out fires, knocks things over and freezes them to the ground. Solar beam is a massive beam of sunlight, with the magical properties of sunlight, it's really good against certain specific things."

"Circle" is a measure of how much magic went into a spell, and is used as a roundabout measure of how powerful a spell is - but if you can get the same spell at a lower circle, that's obviously better. Wizards are always trying to reduce the circles of their spells, sometimes by cutting corners.

Sinnah's Fly sounds like it'd be useful in many applications! Blizzard seems similar to the less excitingly named "Cone of Cold" - Solar Beam might be a new spell to them, although you'd have to ask someone with more Spellcraft to learn for sure, and it's a shame that it's divine and probably can't be learned.

Barding - might be uncomfortably stuffy if she's not used to it, yeah. Marcus Endrin's never worn clothing over fur, but animals seem to dislike it. Barding would make her more durable, though, even if she's already very durable and even if it's light enough as not to slow her down - enchanted cloth or leather can be stronger than steel. 

"I don't think we have that as a formal thing? I'm not a wizard or a witch though. Or a sorcerer for that matter... I'm imagining running around in armor and I'm imagining that it's awful. I heal really fast as long as I have extra energy stored up already. A cloak would be fine. I've worn them in fox form before and even a saddle a few times. I kind of hate to do that unless it's important though. And armor, I might need less. Mind protection, mobility, maybe something to enhance teeth and claws, though..."

He doesn't think that spell circles are extremely rarefied knowledge in Korvosa but they might be out in the country or in other nations; Korvosa is a city of wizards and he's never specifically interrogated people about it. He's thinking that it'd be beyond weird if Weiss's world had things which translate to "wizard" and "witch" and "sorcerer," and if it had arcane and divine magic, and yet was so different as not to have spell circles as a formal thing... but then again, Weiss's type of fox creature translated as "kitsune" so maybe he shouldn't make assumptions just from the language.

Fast healing is amazing and he's glad that she has it, and it doesn't make armor less useful, and also she could relatively-cheaply test how uncomfortable armor is before making the decision to pay for its enchantment - if she doesn't want to, though, and she's been doing fine without, he won't push her.

She doesn't strictly need to Enhance her teeth and claws, because Amulets of Mighty Fists are cool like that - she could jump right to making them Merciful or Bane or - if she heals quickly - maybe Vicious? Or maybe she wants a Vicious bow... if she knows how or wants to learn to use one. Or maybe, since she can't cast Greater Magic Fang, she would be better off with a simple Enhancement bonus? There's a temptation to spend people's money for them which he's trying to resist.

"So, I don't need a bow, I have fire. There's gonna be a hundred cool things I want and I can have - quite a few of them with this much money, but not all of them. I might try armor after all, but enh. Merciful sounds promising, what's a Merciful?"

"Merciful weapons are more incapacitating than unenchanted ones, and at the same time it's much harder to kill someone by accident with a Merciful weapon - but it's still possible, so if you're trying hard to avoid it you shouldn't attack at full power or shoot arrows at their eyes."

"...I want merciful fists!"

Marcus Endrin can't not smile, at that. "They do make it much harder to hurt undead, and constructs," he warns. "The enchantment doesn't work right on things without biology."

"I can always take it off." She shrugs.

"Some undead are hard to hurt with non-magic weapons, or impossible to - but then, you do also have fire."

She holds up one index finger.

An inch-long claw is on the tip, glowing faintly with angry blue light.

"And also have innately magic claws." He's all smiles - it makes him happy when people choose to carry merciful weapons.

"I'm probably the best kitsune I know for fighting and taking a hit. I know one who has more raw skill and about the same toughness and attack, but less utility- No illusions, no invisibility, no tail of holding, and no ability to escape to the Woods Between."

"I'm the best human I know for fighting and taking a hit - if you pretend that wizards don't exist. I wonder which of us would win in a fight."

"That sounds fun to try... Some other time, when I'm fresh."

"Hmm... Do you know anywhere to stay aside from 'outside the walls' that would have a clear and ideally private view of the moon? Shit, wait, is there a moon? It might not work the same here..."

Golarion might have fewer moons than back in the day, but it does at least have one.

As far as a clear and private view of the moon goes... out-of-doors privacy is hard to come by inside the walls of the city, unless you own a manor. (Even then, there's the occasional hippogriff overhead in the air.) Although, he does own a manor, if she needs to borrow its grounds for magic purposes?

"Iiiit's probably best if I go out of the city instead. Unless that's an abysmally dangerous idea. Or make do without moonlight."

His best guess is, "Do you intend to sacrifice an animal, and if so, how sure are you that you're not sacrificing it to the benefit of some dark power?"

"Wh- No! It's just- It's embarrassing," she hisses quietly, ears folded down. "There's some things I really like about my species and some I don't, okay?"

...He doesn't have the slightest idea what she means by that and doesn't intend to pry. 

"I'd be a hypocrite if I said not to walk alone in the woods at night, but... is whatever you need the moon for something you can do while invisible, or at sea?" 

"Invisible, no. With illusions surrounding me on all sides, I've done that sometimes. At sea, I've never tried... I need a fairly large space. Ten by ten at least."

Whatever this is, Marcus is gathering that she needs it to - renew her magic, or fight at full capacity? That seems important to find a solution for which works every night she's in the city.

If she can't sail... well, what if a marine sailed out with her, flew away on a hippogriff, and came back later to sail her back? Does that work? He doesn't have a clear idea of where the constraints are, and doesn't want to pester her for details if she finds it embarrassing. 

...Oh, does she get seasick?

This line of conversation is getting frustrating.

"I feel like that would work but it seems like an awful lot of fuss. It might be easier to obscure a yard with illusions up to roof height and hope no hippogriff riders are paying much attention. I don't get seasick. And this isn't strictly necessary, it's just a lot faster."