Eeee. Should he wait, or should he just squeeze through as quick as possible? 

Right, okay, she should probably do something about this. 

"My sincere apologies, but could you please move back a little more?" She puts as much sweetness into her voice as she can.

She'd rather not repeat the incident outside. Please please please move.

The other person in the corridor shoots Allegra a bit of a longsuffering look, but obediently backs up a decent amount.

They're led into a reasonably spacious room, with a writing desk, plenty of comfortable chairs, and a chalkboard on one wall. There are no windows and only the door they came in through.

"Make yourselves at home, I'll fetch the tea - any preferences?" asks the attendant.

"Rooibos for me, or sweet chestnut if you've got it," replies Allegra.

She breathes a sigh of relief when the other person backs up, and shoots them an apologetic and thankful face.

"I don't think I've had sweet chestnut tea before. Could I have some?"

Elias will not sit, and instead will stand, as is his lot. He stands at the far corner of the room to avoid any Incidents, and will generally remain there, barely moving. He's once bitten, twice shy about the whole idea of locomoting in general.

"I'll see what we can do," replies the attendant, and pauses a moment to see if Elias is going to order something, but swiftly assumes that the suit of armour maybe doesn't talk and doesn't want to drink any tea, and heads out to see about their order.

Allegra paces nervously a bit, then realises she's pacing nervously, and makes herself sit down in one of the nice chairs. She's still not sure what to say and what not to say; she wants to start giving advice on cover stories, but she also maybe doesn't want to do that. She knows Verys is a much better judge of character than her, and doesn't have her habit of just giving everyone the benefit of the doubt; hopefully he'll know what to do.

She also sits down and waits.

Honestly, she relates to Allegra and her pacing. 

"Is Verys one of your business associates," she asks, in a tone that implies it's smalltalk.

"I've worked with him a few times when I was trying to shift - more unusual items," she replies. "We ran a jewellery forge for a while, mostly making, uh, mildly heretical charm bracelets, which is why I thought he'd be a good person to bring in who isn't going to - freak out about anything." It's even completely true, although really she doesn't have anywhere near as many 'business associates' as she's implying; she had settled down to live a nice, quiet, simple life dealing with everyday, local problems, and she misses it already.

"...mildly heretical? In what way? I understand if you don't want to dwell on it, though," she says, even though she really really wants to hear about that, because the manner in which the charms were heretical is probably relevant to their hereticalness. Or, well, not hereticalness, she remembers Allegra saying that what she's planning to do isn't exactly heresy.

"It's good that Verys is open minded."

"Oh, there's an Eternal who was briefly quite popular, particularly in Varushka, because some Varushkans got executed and they didn't think it was fair; symbol of a golden hare; so we made a load of golden hare charm bracelets so people could subtly show their allegiance. It was good business for a while, and while all Eternals are dangerous, I quite like Papa Otec - refuses to deal with anyone in official positions of power, compulsively helps the underdog, likes enabling us to rescue slaves and free the oppressed and that sort of thing. Everyone assumes one day he'll decide the Empire is oppressive and turn on us, and they're probably right, but also we'll kind of deserve it."

The attendant returns with a steaming pot of sweet chestnut tea and four cups on a tray. "Verys is just finishing up, he'll be with you in a few," he tells them, and starts heading to the desk to put the tray down - which would be a bit close to Elias, the room not being that big...

Elias shifts until he's touching the wall, and then presses himself against it. That's as much as he's willing to move. He doesn't want to say 'can' move, because he could probably wreck the wooden wall if there's no stone behind it. Not that he wants to try, but the thought comes unbidden to his mind.

Felicia grimaces at Elias's predicament, and hopes that Verys will react nicely to what they have to say.

"Interesting," she says. See, that's vaguely what Conrad does: refrains from dealing with authority and prefers to deal with individuals, prefers to help those who are early on the path to power, and often shows favor to slaves or servants seeking to better their position. Of course, He's also Chaotic Evil, whereas Papa Otec sounds Neutral or Chaotic Good. She's going to refrain from making that comment. 

"Why was He only briefly popular?"

Wow, the sweet chestnut tea smells so good.

"Oh, the Synod kind of shut it down; co-opted the golden hare as a symbol of Ambition, reminded everyone they would absolutely arrest people for idolatry if they were caught worshiping it."

Allegra sighs, stands up, and takes the tray from the attendant before they have an aura-related accident. She can't actually bring herself to let it happen on purpose, not when he's probably going to drop an entire tea tray about it. "Thank you," she tells him; he replies, "You're welcome," and departs.

She does obviously glance for the back wall - given how these things are built, that's probably a corridor behind there, and she can't recall whether a wooden partition is going to block the aura or not - but doesn't say anything about it.

"Oh, I see," she says, her tone sorrowful.

She drinks some of the tea, and it tastes just as good as it smells. She's going to kind of ignore everything and focus on savoring the tea now, at least until Verys arrives.

A few minutes later, Verys Eternal bustles into the room; a tall gentleman with a salt and pepper beard, and big rams' horns threaded neatly through his hooded green robe.

"Hello, hello! So sorry to have kept you waiting. I hear you have something interesting for me?"

He heads to the desk to pour himself some tea, absolutely does get clipped by the aura, but does just a small double-take. "Ah, yes, something especially interesting, I see," he says.

"Verys, this is Felicia and Elias. They have some excitingly foreign gold coins to sell you, and we could do with some... general advice," Allegra introduces them.

She stands to greet him, then sits back down when he does. "Very nice to meet you, Mr. Eternal. Yes, we would like to sell some of our gold coins for...local currency. I have ten of them to sell."

She places all ten of the gold coins on the table. They're pure gold, each one third of an ounce in weight. They have Mendevian markings on them, but she doesn't expect that to be relevant.

"And yes, advice would be good."

Elias is surprised that Verys didn't react terribly to the aura. Unpleasantly surprised because it means he's dangerous and might be able to put up a fight, but pleasantly because it means that he doesn't need to be so paranoid. He relaxes and stops leaning against the wall.

He'll let Felicia do the talking unless it requires his input.

"Just Verys, please! These look like they come with a story to tell - a story will always fetch a higher price when it comes to foreign currency, people like to know what fantastic adventures they can feel - nearby - when they hold it. And as I'm sure Allegra will tell you, it's almost impossible to stop me giving advice, no worries on that account."

Verys takes out a little magnifying glass from a pouch on his belt and starts inspecting the coins. He's clearly not exactly comfortable in the aura, but he is exerting Advanced Stubbornness to not let this actually affect his actions.

The coins have the heraldic achievement of Mendev on them, as well as Taldane numerals saying the date of minting: 4717 AR. On the opposite side is Queen Galfrey's face, although she's no longer the queen now.

"Oh, well, it might not exactly be wise to say where the coins came from. They are pure gold, though, so they are suitable to be melted for use in jewelry and the like. Can we be assured of your discretion, Verys? Also, I can ask Elias," she gestures to him, "to move, if it will make you more comfortable. I am impervious to his...influence. I think if we rearrange ourselves correctly, it would work."

"You'll get an awful lot more for whole coins than for the gold content," Verys warns them. "Is it a secret story in that the markings are secret themselves, or can we weave a good tale for them out of what you can tell me?"

Verys glances at Allegra, who is mostly looking like she would like to sink into the chair and become invisible and generally not be here any more. "I can certainly deal in secrets to your exacting specifications, if that's what you'd like, and I wouldn't be a very good trader if I couldn't keep the negotiation quiet, even if we don't come to an agreement," he answers.

"And, uh, can I ask what that even is? I haven't come across an aura that's - centered on a person, rather than just on them or on a place or an item? That doesn't need to go anywhere, it's just for my own curiosity."

She sighs and runs a hand through her hair.

"Okay. Allegra trusts you, and you seem trustworthy, so I'll tell you the whole story. The two of us came here from an entirely different world through a magical accident, and now we have no idea how to get back. These coins are from a country called Mendev, which is near where we live. We often sell magic items to them, which is where we got them. I'm not sure how safe it is to tell people we're from another world, though." She's willing to accept a lower price – she does have more than two hundred of them.

"The other part of the story is that we're...ordained – chosen to advance Their interests – by two of the gods of our world, and one of Their boons expresses itself as that aura. I was told you don't have gods here: I suppose you can think of Them as some of weird Eternal-like entity. He, Elias, is an 'antipaladin', a form of divine warrior. Allegra has told us that his particular aura is likely to attract suspicion, so we've been trying to keep him away from people.

We would like to get back to our world, and, if possible, having perhaps bought some of the magic items in this world for our...group...to study, as well as other potentially useful items. Alternatively, if it proves impossible to return, then we'd like to figure out how to settle here in a way that would...not upset everyone. I've been told that the Empire cracks down hard on people of other faiths."

"Allegra's a priest, so I'm sure she told you there are no gods," replies Verys, "but that's not actually a - universal opinion. Of course, it's very illegal to have any other opinion too loudly, which by your approach I'm assuming she also told you."

He picks up a coin and squeezes it gently, feeling how it responds to the heat of his hands; mostly as a grounding exercise, rather than a serious investigation. The aura is rather distracting, but he has no inclination to let anyone else know that.

"Telling people you're from another world would normally be, very safe? Attention-grabbing, yes - people would be falling over themselves to help you find a way back, hear whatever you had to say about it, see if there's any exciting magic they can buy or learn. No-one's going to lock you up or hinder you for just being from another world - I mean, not here, there are places in the Empire I'd be less sure that someone wouldn't try to grab you for their own ends. It's the 'gods' bit that's the sticking point, I'm afraid.

These coins certainly don't have anything incriminating on them, though - maybe they look a little bit Suranni, that's our neighbour to the south-west, but it's not illegal to trade with them or anything.

Do you have any leads that you're following, on how to get back to your world? I can certainly do you an interesting range of magic items or the spending money to get them, for this fine set of coins, although our magic items do expire in a year - if you want one that doesn't, that's rather more of an endeavour, I could maybe track you down a very minor example for these and some goodwill towards learning about your own magic - you'd normally be looking at ten times this much."

How...does she explain...that in her world, Chaotic Evil clerics of Chaotic Evil demon lords often get killed on sight?

"Yes, I am attached to my god and would not like to give Him up, and so I'd prefer to operate discreetly. It's not exactly that I want to keep it secret, but it's not something I'm keen to just advertise, and because Elias's god is allied with mine, and I don't want to abandon him, despite the fact that many people would be upset over his aura.

Especially since He has recently given me an additional boon that permits me to revivify people who have died within nine days, and that's, er, conflicting with Imperial theology. We haven't actually tested it out, though, and it requires a diamond to work, plus diamond dust if you want to restore the person to full health – the spell revives the person in a weakened state, and additional spells which require the diamond dust as a material component are necessary in order to get them fully to how they originally were.

I have also been granted a boon which lets me travel between worlds, which you would think would have already solved my problems, but the spell requires that I hold a tuning fork – a magic item that is attuned to a particular plane of existence – as a guiding mechanism to tell the spell where to transport us. Given that I do not have a tuning fork for my world, I cannot use the spell to get back as of now. I'm looking to see if there might be a related item we could use that could guide the spell correctly.

The other lead we have is to examine the Sentinel Gate in Anvil, which Allegra suggested. I don't know much about it, but it seems as though that's our best option so far.

Our magical items are permanent once constructed, but it does seem as though they're much more expensive than your worlds' temporary magic items, which makes sense. What magic items do you think might be useful to us? I do have some more of the coins I could exchange," she isn't going to specify how many she has, "which could go towards said items – I think I'd like to exchange these ten coins for standard currency just so that we can pay for...inn stays and food and such. Oh, and to reimburse Allegra for her mana crystals. A magic item which operates for a year would be very useful to us still, since, if things go over well, we don't expect to stay very long."

"Nine days, probably still in the Labyrinth, not too much of a stretch to drag them out? People get upset about anything that looks like it messes with the soul, but this sounds perfectly explicable.

Diamonds, we don't do much with here; I could special order them, the League and Dawn do use them, I'd have to check what kind of price I'd expect to get. I think the League uses diamond dust in manufacturing?

You'd want research mages for the tuning fork - I recommend the Lyceum, I know Allegra is going to make a face at me about it, but the Halls of Knowledge are in ruins and the Urizen are doing their research distributed, which does not at all seem like a good fit for something you're secretive about.

The Gate might help you; you're certainly interesting, it likes interesting things; but it's fickle and it's right in the middle of absolutely the worst place on the continent to march in and accidentally let slip you are followers of a god. I'd call that plan C.

Hmm, magic items. Your friend there looks like he's fond of armour, there are a lot of excellent heavy armours. If you want to study things that you can take back with you, I'd look at the cheaper items which don't require magical materials - it's possible you have a lot of magical materials just lying around and don't know what they are, but also it's possible you just don't have them at all - most of the Realms have a shortage of one or another, it's very helpful because the Eternals like trading for the ones they don't have."

Verys thinks he likes these people, bizarre unvirtuous auras notwithstanding; they have interesting things to trade and pretty straightforward desires, really. But he'd like to engage Elias in conversation to be more certain.

"So, Elias, are there any particular properties in magical arms and armour you might be interested in?"