"It's just to the rear, between the engineering space and here. I'll make sure it's labeled. Do they need food? Anything to take care of before we set off? We leave within the hour."

"Not much, and slops will do. I'm ready to leave at your convenience."

The preparations for flight are straightforward. Crew bustle about, inspecting the exterior and moving things around. Dinner is some sort of stew with purple vegetables and unfamiliar meat, with optional cheap booze. The Captain gives a short speech about how this ought to be a straightforward trip to Pan, and they'll get shore leave at Pan!

And then they're off. The engine floats through the sky mysteriously, driven forward by the power of coal and steam. A steady chugging noise and the groans and cracks of pipes expanding. The frost invades her porthole, but the radiator keeps it at bay. It'll be a few days. She's welcome to play cards and gossip with the crew, though they treat her all deferentially.

She'll drink lightly, and play cards - she loses on purpose to try to put them at ease, especially if they're making bets, though she bets conservatively (even by their standards, after the first couple hands - she's not going to be wealthy here and should get used to it). When it comes up, she asks about superstitions and stories - she suspects she's short a lot of common knowledge, and she's never met a traveler who didn't like tall tales.

When in her cabin, she dredges up long-unused training for sensing the flow of mana. It may take a lot of trying, and she's not sure how stingy she'll have to be.

They're betting pennies, tiny fractions of a Sovereign. And chores and favors when those aren't sufficient. They gossip about old friends and lovers, and places they've seen, and gawk at her a bit, treating her deferentially due to the nice clothes and probably-having-mysterious-powers. There's a lot of sky-lore to share, she's clearly getting bits and pieces only. 

They gripe about cleaning the pipes in the narrow spaces, and talk in hushed tones about star-madness symptoms and how rest, comfort, and home alleviate them. They speak of Hours, 'crystallized time'. Valuable and often-used in Albion, it seems, but rare as hen's teeth out here. Of Devils who can only be trusted for cheap coal, scrive-spinsters lashing out at everyone, Douser engines who seek to bring darkness and anarchy, the semi-anarchy of Pan's many competing factions, the Crossroads that dot Eleutheria and have fey-like rules about debt and politeness. Judgements and the Correspondence mentioned only in hushed whispers- Not to be messed with lightly.

One of them makes regular sacrifices to the Waste-Waif, throwing some of his food out the hatch, to the consternation of others at the chill this allows in. But they don't say anything, or stop him.

"Devils with coal, huh? What do they look like? Ravnica's devils are... short, big horns, scaly, stupid, leave a trail of murder, fire, and property crimes anywhere they go."

"No, devils're dapper things. Polite, civilized, will absolutely knife you in the back if you trust them. Really concerned with souls. They can taste altruism and cruelty in the heart and stuff."

"Golden eyes and the smell of sulfur. That's how you tell a Devil. They buy them. Souls, I mean. For a desperate sort, it can seem worth it. I'm rather fond of mine."

"Hell only knows - heh - what they do with 'em, but they insist they don't actually eat souls. You see them on display in their offices and stuff."

"I heard they have engines that burn souls. They can make yours better, make you a better person. Carillon."

"That always sounded like something stupid rich folks do for a fad, like aquapressure or whatever stupid thing it was-"

"Well it's a real place. If the Devils can bilk rich folks, more power to 'em."

"You wouldn't believe the things ours go for. Daily ooze-bandages that are supposed to make you "attuned to the universe", ordering an angel-golem with the looks of a woman two centuries dead, made to order from pieces of a hundred corpses and animated by five mind-mages trying to pick up what you expect her to do, buy a whole mountain and strip everything down to the ruins to 'experience nature'..."

"Christ."

"I was a guard for this guy once, long story, and he met with an admiral or something who talked about how all his cabinets were made of genuine Senior Scrivener wood. Imagine wanting your fucking cabinets made of a thinking being."

"Yeah. It reminds me of the Bazaar buying love stories, all kinds, every-"

"Bad luck to talk about the Bazaar up here."

"Shit, sorry."

"Or the Mausoleum."

"Yeah, that place is ridiculous. Traitor Empress kills her husband in the first fucking place, then turns a whole mountain into one titanic tomb. What the fuck?"

"Well, damn, you've mentioned it and made me curious. Is it safe to ask about the - marketplace - in port?"

"It's old history. Most people - Er, most humans up here came from the Neath, and it was there. It's not the serious kind of bad luck. But it's old history and kind of a lot to explain and you don't want to get stuck on heavy topics in flight, as a general precaution."

"Same for the 'Neath' in general? I'll just have to be patient, then. What makes an Empress a Traitor?"

There's a round of chuckles. "That's history. Again. She sold the city of London to the Bazaar, which brought it to the Neath."

"Shut up about the Bazaar already. And deal. C'mon."

The dealer deals. "Maybe you oughta buy a book in Eagle's Empyrean about it. We can chat about the Neath, I suppose... It wasn't quite as bad as the High Wilderness, I think. A vast sea, formless and dark, rather than a great sky."

"I'm sure I will, but I like learning from people better. Hear what's important to them, not just what some dusty writer thinks."

But in any case, she antes up.

The game moves on. Later, one of the crew, Annie (because the names thing is stupid in her opinion and they can't all have cute titles for each other), tries to spook Teysa by repeating gruesome stories from the Neath and the Sky. Eye-eating sorrow-spiders. Cannibals. Brain-eating Snuffers. Flukes that make your eyes bleed just from looking at them. And more.

She retorts with moroii who sap decades of youth from your flesh in seconds, Rakdos blood witches who call the vagrants down into their theater-altars to sacrifice themselves willingly, Simic graft-doctors who are equal parts squid, elf, deer, and virus, and Izzet 'inspiration' that sends whole city blocks speaking in each other's voices and seeing strange colors.

(She doesn't expect to win, but it's fun to try.)

Parabola, the nightmare realm where dreams are reality. The Work-Worlds, London's solution to debtors: Time accelerated prison labor. Old Tom's Well, a permanent hurricane that draws people to it in fascination. Piranesi... Well, she knows that one doesn't she?

Annie thinks this is great fun but they should probably stop before she gets to the things it's dangerous even to know about.

"I didn't actually go inside Piranesi, they wouldn't tell me the rules. And I'm pretty much out of spooky stories, you win anyway," she says with a grin.

"Could you do me a favor, though? Explain the thing with names and titles. I'd rather fit in, where I can, and 'the Dire Lady' is just what one of the Chaplains called me on the spur of the moment. I don't know how people choose better ones, or why."

"First rule, don't look back. Second rule, don't give names to the nameless. As for 'nyms... Well, it's just a thing, isn't it? From the inside anyway. You can use peoples' names, but it's a lot more fun and mysterious - Not boring old George Miller, the Blue-Eyed Gossip. Mostly important or notable people get proper 'nyms, though. Or it's a friend group's in-joke. It's kind of trashy to call yourself something grand without someone else starting it. You can shift it or reject one but... You kind of have to see it in action? You have poise and obviously nice clothes in foreign make - with bone. Dire Lady fits just so."

"Ivory," she says absently, "technically different. Ivory for Orzhov, bones for... well, it doesn't matter. Honestly, I'll probably sell the ornamentation off in port, it's meant to advertise whose protection I'm under, and I'm not."

She catches herself, and her train of thought, and turns back to Annie with a carefully-chosen smile, one that shows "Good work" and "Thank you" and a little bit of "Aren't you a lovely thing?" that tends to fluster anyone into not paying much attention to what came just before it.

"Thanks, that's very helpful. I suppose I'll keep it for a bit, probably change names when I've found my feet a bit better and know who I want to be here. Probably not still a solicitor."

Annie raises an eyebrow and nods. "Isn't ivory just bones from some great beastie or another? Also, surprising level of demand for law people in Pan, I think... I've got my course and you yours."

"More teeth than bone, that's what makes it rare. I guess I'll see what Pan's like when we get there."

"Guess so. Back to work with me." Sigh. "Boring is the best kind of trip, though."

Nothing else of particular note happens on the trip, save a slight detour to avoid something that's too far to get a clear look at.

"That's the truth. Thanks again."