"I was under the impression we were here to sneak. Which we did, very successfully I might add." 

"Oh, yes, of course, and you will be paid handsomely," the commodore assures her. "I imagine this will all be wrapped up nicely in a few hours and there will be nothing to worry about." 

"That is a lot of people getting stabbed." 

"People who attacked us first, m'dear. You're an adventurer, surely you're familiar with the concept?" 

I am not Evil and I am not gonna light this guy on fire for being a condescending dick, Laila tells herself sternly. 

Are you suuuuuuuure. It would be such fun! 

See, even if he's an asshole this does not mean he's not right, but - 

oh jeez, is Ashoc telepathic, what the unholy heck

He's just over here, whistling innocently and sitting on a barrel. 

oh, only a little, whispers his voice in her ear. I don't know your deeeeep daaaark seeeeecrets or anything. just enough to make helpful suggestions! 

Serra lands on the deck with a heavy thud and a slightly worrying creak of wood. Several sailors wince. "I see that you have succeeded in your quest, Laila!" she says brightly. 

Aw, man. She has just signed up for the most concerning adventuring party ever, hasn't she.

She could just leave, technically. Not everybody stays with the same mercenary group forever even if they make a whole career of adventuring. They've done their job, they'll get paid and she can go home and make a reasonable dinner containing no dragons whatsoever and not have to make apologetic faces at random stressed out sailors and reorganize her notes and do normal adventurer things like protect caravans from goblins and shit, and Serra can go back to her temple with her dubiously imprisoned prisoner and Laila will not have to - oh, who is she kidding. The incredibly concerning demons are delightful, she's keeping them. 

And so they return to port, and they get paid (several hundred gold pieces each, plus a bonus for killing the dragon as well as rescuing the damsel in distress). 

Lovely! 

Laila would like to know if her new friends would like to come by for dinner, meet her teacher? He's not the most exciting dude in the universe but he knows many interesting magic facts and she likes him. 

"I would be honored." 

"Although," glance at the sky, where the sun hangs in a friendly early afternoon fashion, "perhaps first I shall visit the temple, make a report, and become slightly more presentable." 

"That's very reasonable!" 

Laila gives clear directions to the small downtown apartment she shares with her teacher, and waves, and heads cheerfully off in the direction of the apothecary. She need more spell components, and to take another crack at seeing if she can figure out how to brew healing potions. 

Serra reports back to the slightly uncomfortable local head priest, tells him that the problem she was summoned to resolve has been resolved and also incidentally the wizard is very charming, and assures him that the the prisoner remains completely under control. 

(The prisoner is over here, encouraging small children to fold their choir music into pretty birds.) 

How suspiciously cute.

In any event, she will avail herself of the guest rooms the temple has available for visiting priests, and clean up moderately, and then, because she feels it would be rude to show up to a dinner invitation in worn traveling clothes, decides that perhaps some of this money is to be spent on nicer clothes. 

There's a seamstress downtown who'll do on-the-spot tailoring, one of the local priests suggests, although with an awkward warning that, he suspects, even with a sun disc on her chest to make her considerably less suspicious Serra will probably be charged extra for general, er, atypical body plan. 

Implications that this is probably actually a 'seamstress might be kinda racist' warning aside, that's honestly fair. Serra is just shy of seven feet tall and has wings and a tail, that's genuinely a lot of extra work where making clothes is concerned. 

She will pay the extremely professional middle-aged elvish seamstress, who might or might not be thinking racist thoughts, quite a few gold coins to make her a Special Occasions outfit that gracefully handles these facts, in lovely gold and purple silk. Since this is a predominantly Lathanderite city, there's already some fabrics available with delicate sun-patterned embroidery. 

And what does Ashoc want? 

He gets fancy clothes too?????

" ... yes? I'm not an expert on the social customs of cities but I am given to understand that it would be terribly rude to require you to attend a dinner invitation in the home of the local professor of magic without appropriate attire."

Ashoc is an expert on the social customs of the part of cities where appropriate attire is concerned mostly with whether you will die of exposure while sleeping in an alleyway. 

He does not say this. Instead he surreptitiously un-steals the handful of pretty needles and embroidery threads he'd swiped while Serra was talking to the seamstress and picks out a sturdy brocade coat that shimmers like it's full of little red stars. 

He can have that adjusted to his height and shoulderspan, with matching knee-length trousers since digitigrade legs don't really admit of long pants. A shirt?