""Aww, thank you! I will go check out some more of the crafts, but -" she glances at Iomedae - "come get me if you need anything?"

"We'll take care of her!" Katherine promises, perhaps just a bit too chipper. "Iomedae, here, these are things we didn't sell previously so we're making them cheaper."

She's peeling $10 stickers off tunics and replacing them with $6 stickers. Six dollars for a tunic is a ridiculous bargain, but then, ten dollars was a ridiculous bargain in the first place. They're mostly things that haven't sold for some reason or other; unpopular style, very large or very small, strange fabrics, missing lacings or buttons, or needing to be layered and nobody wanting to make or acquire the appropriate other layers. 

"If this one fits you, you can have it for free," she offers, pointing to a blue Viking apron-dress which hasn't sold because it is sized for a bodybuilder or possibly a sumo wrestler. 

Raoulin sets to studiously gazing at some handwritten accounts and diligently reorganising the cash box while he waits for Jenny to leave. And for Iomedae to drink her damned water. None of these young people drink enough water.

Iomedae knows her numbers in this numeral system and is happy to re-price tunics. "I wear men clothes," she tells Katherine, seriously, after looking at the dress.

"Fair enough. Well, if you find anything you like, you're welcome to it, as a volunteer and all."

Katherine hangs the Viking apron-dress up on a rail, and after a few seconds' thought, puts a $4 sticker on it. 

(Is Jenny out of earshot?) 

Long gone! (Though nervously looking over at the table every once in a while.)

He maintains a very easy demeanour, as though he's casually discussing the weather, just in case Jenny - or anyone else mundane - happens to look over. And he makes eye contact with Ludmila across the field and gives her a small wave; she has instructions to head off anyone mundane who approaches the table by engaging them in chitchat and offering them free food. Free food is a foolproof strategy and he employs it frequently. 

"Iomedae, we also asked you to volunteer so we could talk to you about - well. Can you keep secrets, if you need to?"

There's an uncanny disjoint to how serious his tone is, while his posture suggests that he finds something mildly amusing about the change in the cash box. 

"I don't know secrets, sir," says Iomedae, in an equally serious tone though she kind of just talks like that in general.

"Well, there's things we know that it is very important your foster parents don't know. If we tell you, you can't tell them. I think - hope - you also know some things you're not telling them, but you might be happy to tell me."

"Oh! Jenny says anyone who is saying to me not to say things to her and Robert thinks I am a bad woman."

"I do not think you are a bad woman." He is... not definitely sure if he catches her drift but he's old enough and Southern enough to have grown up with people talking badly about women in that way. Regardless, there's no version of that sentence where he wants to tell her that she's bad.

"But there's things holy warriors know that people can't know if they're not holy warriors, right? Like passwords?" 

"I don't know 'passwords'? I have not studied as a holy warrior. I was going to study as a holy warrior when I goed to America. I have been - thinking what a holy warrior do, and God still here, but I do not know things holy warriors know." 

That definitely lines up with several of Raoulin's suspicions. She's from somewhere else, and this is probably going to be easier if he uses the terms and the framework that she's figured out for herself. He picks one thread from the several options he's been rehearsing in his head all day. 

"I think - you are telling people you are a holy warrior, and they do not react the way you expect, right? And I want to help. But in America holy warriors are secret. The real holy warriors don't tell anybody they are holy warriors, because it's dangerous. So, when you tell people, they think you must not be a real holy warrior. They think real holy warriors don't exist. You follow?"

"Why is it dangerous telling people they are holy warriors?"

"All the holy warriors agreed it's better if people think there's no such thing as holy warriors. So if you're the only one who tells people, all the other holy warriors might be very upset, and the bad things like monsters might focus more on you because you're the most obvious target."

Those things are true. Better to focus on saying true things that fit within the framework she's got, rather than trying to explain artefacts and demons and medieval virtue magic to a non-English-speaker who is only hopefully human.

He closes up the cash box. It is getting to the point where it's implausible he could be taking this long to count change. Instead he'll rummage around under the table and pull out... another water, why not. And he can help himself to one of Reynhard's blueberry muffins. 

This conversation seems extremely important and is answering questions that Iomedae is desperately curious to have answered. And also, these people are mostly Evil and in service of an Evil queen, and the thing he is telling her is that paladins are systematically misleading everybody about whether they even exist, which - she hasn't quite straightened it out in her head, but she thinks that defeats the entire purpose of paladins -

Okay. This is the part where the priest did argue with the petty King. She's not going to succeed at lying and pretending and avoiding coming to their notice. She should not try. "I think...it is good there are holy warriors, or God not make them. It is good monsters focus more on me. It is bad other holy warriors angry, but - but I do not think it's better if people think there's no such thing as holy warriors. I think it's maybe lying, and God hates holy warriors lying."

Raoulin has no idea that Iomedae thinks his queen is evil, but he's also very much not evil, not even a little bit. Unfortunately, Iomedae didn't cast Detect Good.

"It's not good for monsters to focus more on you if you haven't learned to kill them yet. You're a quick study with that sword, but you're not a good holy warrior yet, are you? You said you hadn't started training yet. Does God want holy warriors to die because they fight before they learned to fight well?" 

"It is better not to die unless dying you can save lots of people from Hell, like God," she says very earnestly. 

"You know, I think we have - very different ideas of how the world works. I don't think there is a Hell, but maybe I'm wrong. Lots of people think there's no holy warriors and they are wrong, because the holy warriors all agreed not to tell anyone."

Raoulin scratches his nose thoughtfully. It is so much easier to just have a conversation with Iomedae from within her own framework, even if he's only half certain he understands half of what is being said. Where did he put his damn coffee cup? (Why are squires never in line of sight when you need coffee?) 

"Maybe people thought Hell would be too scary so they all agreed not to tell me. Is that what's going on, with your Hell?"

"If not knowing of Hell made people not go to Hell then that a good reason to not tell them. But God says it in the holy books. I think people go to Hell even if they do not know it. I think Satan wants people to think there is not Hell? So that people will be bad, and go to Hell. God does not want that."

"So, um, maybe you can help me. How do I... not go to hell? I just want to check we're on the same page about all that."

It's hard to remember that she's almost certainly not Christian. But Raoulin thinks Cináed was probably right on that point. Worth checking. Heck, maybe she's right about the world and they're all wrong, and if that's the case then he'd like to stay out of hell.

Coffee cup located. It's in the cup holder of the empty unused folding chair next to his, and it's empty. Maybe he'll go to hell if there's coffee there. 

Iomedae has finished her labeling task and it hasn't occurred to her that she's supposed to look busy so she's just settled back down to do her favorite thing, talk about theology. "When we die we go to God the maker of all things. All of the next lives can come and say, we want this person. If you are honorable and good, then you not go to Hell. If you do lots of bad things, then maybe you go to Hell, or another bad next life."

"All of the next lives?"

(Jean used to drill him on picking up on small details. When he just wanted to get stuck into the wilderness and not talk to anyone except birds and horses, Jean would make him practice asking things. A scout ought to be humble enough to have questions, and perceptive enough to notice when the answer isn't what you expect. Nicole picked it up faster than he ever did, but he's not a slacker.)

"How many next lives are there? There's other bad ones that aren't hell?"

This definitely does not sound Christian.