"Yeaj go ahead sorry." Yawn again. "No big deal." She's still in her flight suit, having slept in it. Her hair is rather messy.

The girl swaps out the chamber pot deftly and scurries out. The smell of freshly cooking bacon, along with a hint of cinnamon and cardamom, wafts in from the hallway.

She briefly walls out in the hall on autopilot and turns left. Where her bathroom would be at the Academy. Then pauses and goes back in the room and takes out a mirror and comb and makes her hair at least a bit less messy. Then on to explore.

As she starts to wander around the corridors, a young man catches up with her and asks, "Um, Lenora? Breakfast with the dhomiro is being served out in the courtyard, if you'd like to join them?"

A great spread of breakfast items is laid out on the open wagon's table, and Yasmina has been joined by half a dozen other Freeborn adults, all richly dressed in brightly coloured silks, mostly heavily embroidered and bejewelled. There is a decent array of fried mushrooms and variously flavoured hummus as well as the bacon, sliced eggs, spiced yoghurts and flatbreads.

"Sure, thanks, where's that?" She offers cheerily.

-And then remembers what happened yesterday and suppresses a wince and a sigh, still smiling.

"Out on the guest wagon, follow me if you're not sure?"

Lenora is conducted to the open wagon where there is some space left on the end of one bench. There are several unfamiliar faces at this breakfast but she may also recognise the dhomiro that Yasmina was arguing with back on the road.

She waves broadly as she approaches. "Hello, Yasmina and all!"

"Good to finally meet you, Lenora! Please, pull up a bench, help yourself to our hospitality; it's going on Yasmina's extensive tab if nothing particularly economic comes out of this," the dhomiro greets her effusively. He is a rather large gentleman in a rather dazzling jewelled golden robe, a belt of various brightly coloured silk scarves tied to each other, and a red silken head-wrap with flame-coloured embroidery.

Yasmina looks somewhat embarrassed and smiles apologetically at Lenora.

She snaps to a more neutral/respectful position automatically. "Hello, sir. I'm not sure I remember if we were properly introduced... Well, I could make a pretty good courier if that'd help, as a favor. Not entirely sure what to do next, I admit."

She shakes her head and moves to sit down and examine the breakfast looking a bit more subdued, now.

Yasmina is looking somewhat worried, like she'd like to take Lenora aside and tell her that the dhomiro is just an idiot, but is rather constrained by the fact of having breakfast with him.

"We're not Leaguers, we're not really in the business of favours, but if you'd like to pay your way with courier services - what kind of cargo can you carry, or are you more in the reliably delivered letters business? Winged Messenger is excellent but the potential for a three month delivery time is a downer, you know."

There is a wide variety of excellent breakfast available.

Yum! She relaxes at Yasmina's demeanor and starts eating. This is an exasperated aide and forgetful boss situation, yep.

"Is winged messenger a... Magic spell? I could do a couple hundred pounds if it's nice and secure. Or lightning fast letters, I can hit Mach one, even if it's a workout. That's something like six hundred miles an hour. Slower with cargo. I can't vanish lots of stuff, it's complicated."

"Winged Messenger is Autumn magic, one of the things I keep Yasmina here around for! It's an excellent ritual, but a little pricy and it just isn't good enough to beat sending a runner anywhere in a couple of weeks travel. Much harder to intercept though, that's the real use case. Anyway, I'd declare us square on a proof of concept run to Siroc with a letter bundle, and if you'd be interested in a longer term contract I'm sure I can get one drawn up by lunchtime," declaims the dhomiro.

"That includes the letter of introduction to the Siroc shipbuilders," Yasmina adds, as a minor conversational nudge.

"Yes, well, your branch of the family are all quite eager types, they are family so we're very happy to commend you to them," the dhomiro blusters on.

"Not sure I'm interested in anything long-term. It is nice to do productive things instead of destructive ones, though. I can definitely carry a letter packet somewhere I was thinking of heading anyway, though a good look at a map will be helpful too."

"Certainly, certainly. Marilla, have we got the big map unrolled anywhere at the moment?"

One of the other breakfast attendees, presumably Marilla, replies: "Yes, we've put it up on the wall in one of the rooms we've got here, I can take our friend here to see it after breakfast if she likes, while we get the letters together."

"Sure! I'm probably going to head up north at some point, though. The slaver orcs sound like a real problem."

She winces and sighs and suddenly looks a lot more dour and upset. Munch, munch. Yay, breakfast.

"No shortage of slaver orcs, I'm afraid; I suppose you can at least do something about the ones in Kahraman, the politicians haven't told us we have to play nice with those. I suppose if you're off to deal with them that really is more urgent, they're getting mighty close to Ezmara family holdings up there and they're sitting on the river and the good road." The dhomiro has either not noticed or is politely not commenting on her emotional reaction.

"Kahraman is being invaded by the Jotun," explains Yasmina, "who aren't quite as determined to enslave everyone as the Grendel - but they do offer people they conquer either to flee, fight for them or farm for them, and the last of those is, pretty similar to slavery although they wouldn't tell it like that - especially the ones in Kahraman, they're mostly ex-Lasambrians. And ex-Marchers, I think?"

"Eh, they're all big red-cloaked bullies who need to stop harassing our mines, even if some of them are still in orange turbans or haven't washed the mud off," replies the dhomiro dismissively.

"All the history and diverse cultural identity is going right over my head for what it's worth. I know it's insensitive and problematic, but I'm new here and not really built for diplomacy anyway. But when you have a big gun, you're involved in politics like it or not. Where you go or don't go, what you do even if it's just 'try to help people'..."

"Well, a big gun would certainly be welcome in Kahraman! I recommend you introduce yourself to the General of the Red Wind Corsairs, I think it's a Sol-Devorador at the moment, they're an honourable family; we can draft you a letter of introduction while you're looking at the map, if you might be interested. I'm certain they can use you in a very significant capacity."

"Kahmaran is the northern border?"

"Kahraman is the northernmost territory of the Brass Coast," explains Yasmina, "so a bit north from here. You'll be able to see it clearly on the map if you decide to head there; it's the opposite direction to Siroc; Anvil is a lot further away to the east. The Jotun are invading from the west. I still think better technology in Siroc is likely to be more helpful in the long run, although obviously Kahraman is quite urgent - now the Jotun have been driven back in Sermersuaq, that's all the way to the north, I'm expecting more armies down to help out with that in the conventional way, though."

"...I'm continuing to update downwards on how much I model the Empire as a centralized federal state. I meant the north of the Empire, I heard there were entirely different groups of problem orcs there. -Though maybe I'm being unfair, if someone said 'east coast', I would imagine Washington D.C., not Shanghai. Thinking locally is natural. Sorry."

"Well, yes, we didn't insist on the egregores for nothing! The Thule aren't bothering us at the moment, in fact they just helped us push the Jotun out of Sermersuaq, I hear. Not that they're exactly pleasant chaps, but every hand that isn't against us is for us, what with the Grendel and the Jotun, and I hear the Navarr are poking the Vallorn again!"

"And the Druj," adds Yasmina.

"Oh, they're a long way away from here, but yes, the Urizen aren't having a great time, I gather."

"It's funny, I think the UNEDC is a lot more universal than that... I mean, there's still religious movements, cultural movements, a couple petty dictatorships or old privileges carried over, and China doing its best to spy on everyone even themselves, but a lot of nations have more or less - evaporated. Become cultures and local civilian administrations that don't do anything of importance, compared to global command..."

"Yes, that's what us Freeborn said would happen, if we didn't insist on the egregores. It's good to hear we were right! Means all that effort wasn't wasted. Obviously a lot of people attempt to talk a lot of hot air about 'the good of the Empire' anyway, but at least we can keep our Loyalties intact when it really comes down to it." The dhomiro seems to be largely oblivious that he isn't necessarily talking to an audience that agrees with him on this subject.

"Well, in our case, the reason America doesn't really - exist anymore except in the minds of its people - is that about thirty percent of it is radioactive hellscape and the rest is overrun by murderous aliens. So there's that." Sigh.