She is indeed not at home.

The clouds are bright overhead, and the wind calm and slightly cool. She's on a path made of wooden boards, with a sturdy wooden railing, painted mostly-clean white, on both sides. Off one side a whole lot of water can be seen. And a steep drop to the smooth rocks below. On the other side of the path is a slice of forest-garden, a mixture of tall fruiting trees, shorter bushes full of berries, and small plants that might be root vegetables or grains. All in full bloom and looking - and smelling - delicious. Voices chatter faintly from within the garden.

Wow. What an incredible prank! "Beautiful! Well done!"

She touches the railing. "It feels so real!" She strokes the wood lovingly.

The food smells amazing. But the wood... what a texture.

pet pet pet

...but sleep. It's too bright here.

She slinks under the railing toward the forest-garden.

And remembers the food! "Oooh!"

She  flops down and slides on her back deeper into the forest, grabbing berries and leaves and what's this a carrot? and stuffing them into her mouth. "Wow this is so good mmph mmph really hope you're not trying to kill me but it'd be worth it mmmmph."

Eventually she gets her head deep enough into a bush to fall asleep.

The gardeners have to come around and maintain the plants practically every day, to keep them this lush and welcoming. Anton Maxim really loves his "traditional Kelos garden". But it's really quite hard on plants to always be in full bloom and presenting fruit - there's even some bushes that make spicy berries in winter! - so it's a good, well-paying job for five groundskeepers to keep it that way. The produce they pick doesn't pay for their own wages even before you start considering the matter of supplies. Expensive, but that's Anton Maxim for you. 

The first to notice her is a woman with a thin frame and long squirrel-like tail, for balance, leaping through the high branches which have been carefully shaped into something nearly like straight paths. She pauses her inspections for mites and bark sores, and the application of a thin paste to any she finds plus the careful picking of any fruit that seems fully ripe-

-Some lady is passed out naked in the garden?

Mitra blushes, then drops to the ground below with a soft pat, and gently touches the end of her tail, feeling out with Green magic. Hmm, that's... Strange... But not injured and not sick, kind of undernourished, seems to be just slightly poisoned - heh, she recognizes this type of 'poisoning' - and tired.

Mitra purses her lips and sighs as she sees the trail of consumed plants. Well, Anton will be pleased as peaches if they rescue a hungry traveler. 'It's meant to be eaten' and all. Okay. She taps a pendant around her neck.

"Hey boss? I've found a lost traveler or something in the garden. Don't recognize her at all. Ejer type form I think, it's weird, not in acute danger but passed out exhausted. Oh, and completely naked for some reason! Think she's from a shipwreck or something? Yeah, I don't know. The guest room in the garden house is free, right? Oh, yeah, of course ask him, but you know the answer already. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah, if you could send Ves out with some clothes that'd be great, you know I'm a climber, not a hauler."

A few minutes later someone gently tries to wake Nefanie by calling out loudly. If she doesn't respond, they'll pull her gently out of the bush and dress her, then carry her to the guest house.

She starts drifting awake when they call out. Bleh, what happened? That liefling is a genius, wow. She can still almost taste the food.

And now someone is getting handsy. Not worth fighting it. (Obviously, she can't teleport away while they're touching her.)

Is that clothes? Why would someone put clothes on her? ...some kink, presumably.

She squints. Ow, it's bright. Is she still in the garden? What's up with that, anyway? There's no way this all fits in her house. Who wanted to prank her so extensively that they hired a whisshopper, and a very talented one... Not that she's complaining! She's going to remember that illusory food the rest of her life.

With sudden embarrassment, she realizes that she's sticky from gorging herself, all over her snout and hands and chest. Ew, why is that part of the illusion? And now she can't clean herself.

And now they're putting her down? Are they still there at all? She clenches her eyes open again - ow - and tries to teleport a few feet to the side, if there's a safe place to land.

The guest bed is wide, and 'a few feet to the side' is still on top of it. Ves, who looks a lot like a boark, happens to be looking away to close the curtains at that moment and yelps in surprise when he turns back towards her.

"-Are you awake? Can you understand me, miss?"

She's clean! They can put the clothes back on her if they really want, but she's not going to do it proactively.

She has no idea what the illusory boark said but doesn't let that stop her. "Well, hello. This is a fascinating prank! Did you really let me teleport just then, or was that part of the trick? You must be counting on me staying for the food. Which was amazing! Complements to the 'chef'."

She glances at him but keeps her eyes roving, looking for flaws in the illusion.

If their sudden guest wants to be naked, that's her prerogative. Ves will just do his best go be professional and only glance once. (He completely unironically appreciates the tail almost more than anything else. It's pretty impressive, more than Mitra's.)

She's in a large stone walled room painted dark blue with wooden furniture. There's some sort of art piece depicting a tree on the wall, softly glowing. Some tables and chairs. A desk. A doorway into a white painted room displays a mirror facing the bed (which she is visible in), and there's some odd square panels on the wall near the entrance. The bed is very soft, and the scent of something flowery is in the air. She can hear Ves's footsteps.

Ves indicates a small side table which has a tray of fruits and crackers, another folded robe thing. He reaches into a drawer and places down a stone disk the size of her hand with weird blue squiggles on it. "I'll leave you to your rest, feel free to call if you need anything." Then he bows and turns to leave.

Wow, what a beautiful room. Food! She gets out of bed and devours - most of it, and then stops and thinks. She takes the last two pieces of fruit, bites off a small piece of each, and puts them in her mouth at the same time. She tumbles them with her tongue several times, tucks one under her lip, and bites the other one. Yep, that's the delicious tangy-juicy-strawberry-thing she was expecting. Now, how did the whisshopper know which one she bit? She chews the other fruit - such a nice combination, she should have tried more combinations earlier... the whisshopper could be working with an undine. Scary.

But really, who would be that dedicated to pranking her.

So, she might actually be here, somehow. Which means she stole from a garden. Great. Can she teleport back to the garden to see how it's doing?

She cannot. At least not the first two spots in it she attempts.

Anton Maxim is a good, traditional Kelosian. There's a great amount of nostalgia for his homeland in him. Even if he's somewhere between a social pariah and a nobody now for having been part of the whole Declaration business, he's still technically a Baron, by the most bare of threads. He owns land, which grows crops and is worked by people in his employ, and he still has the writ from Royal White. Even if it's been appended with him giving up basically all his formal ruling power; He's the master of only the manor now, not even on the sawmill or the vineyard is his word law anymore.

But it suits him fine. He still keeps contacts back in Kelos, the only way to get really high end artificing work done, to keep his ear to the news, to maintain his place in the little merchant network. There's still a lot of excitement and activity there, if you own ships and employ the sailors to use them. The very image of the more rotund and harmless sort of old money is handy that way. An airheaded academic, friendly and a bit absent, focused only on his particular special interests. It makes people underestimate him. Though the image is real, to an extent- It's a lot more relaxing to be that way.

At any rate, all this means he's retained his original form, no snout or ears or tails or anything at all except the usual cosmetic tweaks to keep him young and handsome and wrinkle-free, and the traditional tassels and patterned shirts and fancy hat, and all the first impressions it creates with visitors. Education, artificing, merchant houses, Kelos.

His daughter he also managed to convince to at least keep it subtle. So she has the decorative eyes that belong on no natural being, the sclera and pupils a sort of golden color with a subtle sheen, and hands and forearms darkened to an opalescent green/blue with tiny soft scales, in imitation of a certain species of rock lizard she's fond of.

A complete stranger wandering into his garden and gorging herself is a little bit vexing in his heart of hearts, but he doesn't keep the garden to make money off it. You don't actually catch more flies with honey than vinegar, but the metaphorical meaning of the saying remains true, sometimes. And if she was shipwrecked or something, well, it's only decent to feed guests. Plus, the news that the stranger has an extreme and unfamiliar form is intriguing. So he'd better go say hello in person. (He is, of course, wearing several powerful wards, as he always does.)

And his daughter happened to be telling him about her day, and decided to follow along to the garden house. If she's asleep, he'll just take a nice stroll and have his letters for the day fetched over. If she's awake, they'll have a nice chat. No hurry.

So she can't sneak back now and fix the damage to the garden (or find something else that needs doing).

Well, this room is far too beautiful to be a jail cell, and - blink - she's not observed right now, so they're probably not angry, just curious. That's okay, she can be entertaining enough to pay them back!

Or they just don't have the people to keep a constant watch on her...odd, for someone rich. But the room and the food could be distractions to keep her from leaving. And the food is so, so good - could it be addictive?

Wait. They tried to put clothes on her, and the boark was surprised when she teleported, so maybe they're not familiar with kitsune? Well that's a delightful opportunity!

She paces around the room until she has been to enough places to teleport freely within it.

When she hears Anton's footsteps, she pops into the white painted room and leans against the wall... ideally she would like to be out of sight of the door, either directly or in the mirror, but it's okay if that's not possible.

The white painted room appears to be a separate bathing-and-toilet setup of some kind. There's bars of soap, soft towels, levers that make things dispense water, and the like. She'll be out of sight even in the mirror from one side.

When he arrives, Anton knocks on the door five times and waits, then calls out at moderate volume, "I know you may not understand me, but I intend to enter! Please say something if you don't wish to be disturbed."

And waits another few moments, and only then opens the door, peeks in, then opens it fully to reveal what looks like a human man. "-Wait, where did she go?" Anton frowns and walks to the nightstand.

The foreign speech doesn't sound angry, so she ignores it.

When the door opens, she waits one second* and tries to teleport to the corner by the door, still leaning relaxed against the wall (not touching any of the odd squares) with a small surprised-but-friendly smile... how about now? now?

* About 1.2 Earth seconds.

On the third now, she is behind him. Not the boark, this is a different person dressed in fancier clothes. Human-looking man, young looking, blonde hair and thin face.

He picks up the stone disk from the nightstand, then glances around and startles at seeing her. He holds a hand over his heart for a moment before recovering. "What in the- Ahem!" He blushes and shakes his head gently and nods at her with a sigh. "My apologies for intruding. I don't suppose you know what this is?" He presents the stone disk.

What a gratifying reaction. She gives him a polite nod.

She's not sure what he wants her to do with the disk, juggle it? She can't juggle.

Everyone here keeps trying to talk to her in their language... just like she was trying to talk to them. But she thought this was a prank by someone she knew, someone who probably wasn't intending harm. They might be mistaking her for an enemy of theirs.

Assume that everything she perceives, whether real or not, is aimed at producing some effect in some adversary... hm. But they're being nice (unless the food is addictive). So not an enemy, just a very confused whisshopper or some shape-changing species or something; a person who they care about, who they want to stop pretending to be a strange lost kitsune. That explains why they weren't angry about the garden, and why they put her in such a nice room.

And when this person shows up from wherever they actually ran off to, there'll be trouble.

If they don't know what she can do, she shouldn't have just demonstrated it! Just great. (It was funny, though.)

They keep trying to get her to pay attention to that disk. It's not a tool of any sort she can identify, but it's important. Maybe it's something like an elph's shrine, belonging to the missing person... if she touches it (or maybe even just looks at it too closely) and doesn't react properly, they'll know she's an imposter. (And she does not actually want to pretend to be the missing person, that would be mean.)

She smiles and bounces up and down and twirls and slips out the door and around out of the man's view, and tries to teleport to a patch of beans in a nook seventy miles tengward of her home, a place where she thinks she's the only kitsune who's ever visited.

Well, there's another woman waiting at a table in the room beyond, with a pitcher of some sort of drink. So that might be why it doesn't work. She has shimmery-scaled hands and golden eyes. She giggles and waves, then clasps her hands together briefly. At that, Nefanie suddenly knows that:

(Tone: amused) Anton needs a good scare once in a while; She approves. Also, Nefanie is considered a guest here, and she'd like to know if the garden was tasty~?

So that's what an undine looks like.

She kneels, and thinks that: the garden was 🍓 the 🥭 best 🥕 food 🥬 she's ever had and it's clear to her sober self that she has ravaged a masterpiece of devotion which she can't possibly replace, but she desperately hopes she can repay her gracious host somehow. She can teleport but she's going to stick around to see her task complete (she might want to eat only food from home though). She's willing to go into dirty places, and, with enough preparation, she can carry messages, find lost people, and watch borders.

(Tone: thoughtful) The garden is very magical; She's proud and happy that it's so impressive and delicious; They aren't too concerned about the garden but if it makes Nefanie feel better they can calculate exactly how much she ought to owe about it so it's not some looming nebulous thing; It wouldn't be ruinous. If Nefanie is really good at teleporting messages or parcels might be pretty valuable; Long-range thought relays are expensive to operate.

Anton comes from the room and looks surprised. He asks a question, and the woman responds. Anton laughs!

(Tone: amused) Nefanie really should take the language disk. It will let her understand Kelosian so she doesn't have to keep this up. The disk is not delicate but it's actually QUITE expensive, so do be careful with it, though.

Huh, okay! She takes the disk and lays it on the floor, maintaining contact with the side of her knee.

"We" people of my specialization(?) "can't" as a general weakness not a situational limitation "carry" by magic "objects" whether living or not. "Woah, that's trippy!" in a blue(??) way. "You have a fun language!" Kelosian! "Thank you for letting me use your language disk! Do you have work for me now?"

"That's very specialized. Does doing it like that let you keep it up all day or something? Oh, and welcome." Anton nods agreeably. "There was debris on the bed- So that's instant self-cleaning as a side effect, so clever!"

"We didn't expect you to pop in needing work." Katherine demurs. "Anything I come up with on the spot may well be doing you a disservice though I suppose such things are good for one's red."

"Yeah! I can keep it up all day.

I think that where I'm from, we have much less control over specialization. I'm fox-specialized, and everyone fox-specialized has exactly the same abilities, for better or for worse. You must have amazing control over magic!

I realize that I am hardly in a position to ask anything of you, but if it was possible to teach that skill, my people would be delighted to learn.

How about I go wander around and visit all your rooms and gardens? I promise no snacking. Then I'll be able to teleport to all those places if you need me to later."

Anton's eyebrows raise high. He smells some sort of massive trade potential, here. "Oh, head through town and down to the docks and the sawmill too if you're doing that!"

"Father dearest, let's give her some time to acclimate, hmm? You brought the reports from Captain Wilk, read those. And that sounds like a fine idea, I'll accompany you if you wish. Magic is quite flexible, yes- The endurance you're claiming is incredible on our side- Most people can do magic that's not just tricks-" she flicks her fingers at a cup, sending out a few small flames to warm it, "For a few minutes a day. Perhaps an hour or two if they really devote themselves to one thing. Something like teleporting? Once a day if you're lucky."

"Woah, neat! Flames and telepathy are totally different specializations where I'm from!

I would love a tour! Are there any places you don't want me to go, which I might be able to get to by walking, jumping, swimming, or climbing?"

Katherine stands. "Parts of the main house up that direction are private, you probably wouldn't be able to get in anyway. Magic, you know." She smirks. "But this is a small town, Gale Rocks named for the summer storms, recently amicably reorganized. The manor is a bit outside town, fifteen minutes' walk. I like to think we're relaxed and friendly here."

"That's magic I'm not familiar with, cool!"

She rises, picks up the disk, and clutches it to her chest. "...What's summer? A kind of oscillating storm system?"

"Right this way." Out past the door, a portion of the garden is visible. "I suppose, in a way? The days get hotter and longer when our part of Scope is tilted towards the sun more often during half its orbit, and when the oceans grow too warm they form storms. Hurricanes. Hmm... There's an orrery in one of the sitting rooms, I can show you later."

"Days? Are different from uh [cycles] how, oh... Hm. The planet Scope spins around so fast that you can see it happen?!"

She stops and sits down (in a smooth squat, keeping the disk tight). Deep breath. "Sorry, that's just a little unnerving. I know it shouldn't change anything, but the planet I'm from, which is apparently a whole different planet!, doesn't spin like that.

...I'm still not sure what you mean by 'tilt' but I suppose they orrery will make that clear.

How much of Scope is inhabited?"

"You've teleported here from a different planet?" Katherine grins and bounces a bit. "Wow! I'm not sure how that should be possible. Yes, Scope spins! The Old World is pretty dense now, but we only learned how to kill dragons*, oh, seventy years ago? Before that you couldn't cross the ocean without getting mulched. It's not easy even now. And the people living on the New World didn't densify it anywhere near as much. I guess they're the Old and New continents, not worlds, though."

*Enormous magical sky-storms

"An ocean is a really big lake? How much of Scope is ocean? Does anyone live in it?"

"Not really a lake, it's very salty. There are a lot of mangroves in Remii, and people catch fish in it all the time, that's where a good portion of our food comes from even. Looking for places to settle, are we?"

They're emerging from the guest house now. "So the garden wraps around the whole place. We have it arranged by aesthetic more than type. Off that way is the gazebo, and past that a nice lookout point. It's designed to remain in full bloom more or less constantly, for the splendorous pleasure of being able to just-" She picks a cherry-like fruit and pops it into her mouth, stem sticking out. "Mm! Commercial forest-gardens are different."

"Nah, I can't bring anyone here to settle with me. It's just - you have so much space here, and it's so nice! On my planet, Ansaf, everywhere is either packed with people, or barren rock."

"Gorgeous!" She does not join in the snacking.

She zigzags around Katherine to cover more area, ducking under bushes and behind trees where possible without damaging the plants.

"So, how does a dragon... happen? It's just magic not connected to a person at all?"

"You can make a little dragon if you know what you're doing. It's very, very dangerous, because they can escape and become big dragons. I don't know how, probably only a hundred people anywhere know how to do it in detail, but everyone is pretty sure that's where they came from. Someone tried to make a dragon that would do useful magic for them and stay under control, like animals in pens- But they escaped, and bred, or more like copied and mutated, and got bigger and bigger. We're just lucky they can't survive indefinitely over land for some reason."

"Gosh. I wonder if it would be safe to try that on Ansaf, since we don't have any oceans. Are there any public guesses about what useful magic they were supposed to do?"

The gazebo is such a delightful building. A roof that is doing nothing! Currently!

"Actually I'm not sure if any of our specializations even could make a dragon. We can do some things with objects - shaping, freezing, moving - but it's more like putting a piece of ourselves into them, not creating separate magic like a dragon or a language disk."

"Many guesses, none much better than random. I favor either something benign and everyday like food or heating, or they were supposed to be weapons. As for experiments I would advice against. Apparently you grow up hearing all sorts of horror stories if you do arcana track... I have no idea what's at the root of your magic, but admittedly we don't have much more than theories about ours. Everyone starts off generalized, then specializes themselves. Being very smart, and being very determined, both help quite a lot. Perhaps we'll try some experiments, depending on how your magic works?"

The gazebo, made of colorfully painted boards, seems to have a faint breeze around it keeping any falling leaves and petals from settling onto the shiny black roof. Katherine vaults the railing rather than walk around to the stairs.

Nefanie vaults the railing too! "Neat, another object with its own magic." She walks in a circle, then down the stairs and around the outside to check for accessible spaces underneath.

"Oh, wow, that's different. We have a specialization that can create other specializations, but then we can't change a specialization, either our own or someone else's. What's it like, getting to decide?"

There's space under the gazebo, but it's not designed to be accessed.

"A surprising amount of pressure and guesswork." She grimaces. "You have to study very hard and try a lot of different things when you're young if you want to make the most of yourself. Small children, they learn everything much faster, yes? And yet they haven't earned much magic of their own yet, so they have limited chances to practice, and they're not the most diligent and forethoughtful creatures, heh. And that kind of pressure isn't necessarily good for you."

Can she reach a hand through a gap into a space that she could fit in?

"Oh. That makes sense. I guess some of our specializations have to practice their skills, but at least they have their full power from the start. Sorry. I was thinking it sounded fun to grow and explore, but it's just another thing to worry about.

What kind of experiments do you want to try? What additional information do you need about my magic? Which, I'm getting the sense, is really quite different from yours... I wonder if there are other planets with yet different magic!"

She can reach a hand through the slats to a three-foot or so gap underneath the gazebo.

"No, my apologies for bringing down the mood. I'm a bit of a worrier." She shrugs. "I think every known persistent magical effect relies on having a stock of black... The most obvious thing I'm thinking of is giving you an artificing primer. There are mental exercises. Or having you teleport near a speckle sheet or under the gaze of an inkscope, those are both used to record and forensically analyze magic devices when our own sense for magic isn't enough. The very most basic shape in black magic can grab and hold on to other magics... A general anti-magic ward stops our teleporting, but does it stop yours? And does a simple hexagrammic circle do the same?"

Katherine peers down as Nefanie circles the gazebo.

"I'm sure a doctor would be keen to examine you, and I don't know what kinds of tools they use. After that I don't really have things I would describe as 'specific ideas'."

She pulls her hand back - she can return to explore the inside later.

"I don't know what any of that is but it sounds fascinating! I'd love to learn artificing if I can. Even if all I can make is an object that teleports, someone would probably have a use for that.

I don't think I can teleport under an inkscope if that's a tool you look through? I can't if someone is watching. A speckle sheet sounds like it has a better chance of working. Like, if I go into a small cold room, stay a while, and leave, you'll be able to tell that I was there because it's warmer now. That's okay, it doesn't block me.

Oh, the colors are kinds of magic? Blue, red, black... red blue green white black? I thought that was a philosophy thing!

What do doctors do? We have specializations for identifying sickness, making medicine, moving things in and out of people, cutting and seeing inside people, and doing small delicate tasks. Can you fix cancer of the blood?"

"Fascinating... What counts as watching? What counts as 'someone'? If you teleporting would cause a bell to fall that I would hear? The kind of inkscope that can record things for later is one we don't have. Speckle sheets it is. They are philosophy, and ways of life- Embodying a color is how you best get more of it! We have specializations for identifying sickness and injury, making medicine, for changing the shape and traits of a body both for cutting-open and moving-in-and-out reasons and cosmetic or functional ones, for dealing with poison and non-contagious diseases like cancer - it probably depends on some factors I don't know about, I think they can tell your body that the blood cancer is a disease it should fight? -I know there's a lot of small cumulative tricks to fix things people tend to get when they grow older, the heart, the blood vessels, the bones..."

"If teleporting caused the bell to fall, yeah, that would block me. If my presence caused the bell to fall, I'm not sure. My home has unsteady tiles in the floor that make noise, pretty similar, and that blocks people. But if someone tried to come in balanced on one toe on a quiet spot on the floor, they could do that even if they immediately fell over.

Animals don't count, unless they're trained to report to a person. Hm, if you can read memories from animals, they would block me...

A wobbly tile that leaves a mark to be checked later generally doesn't block us, but a friend of mine got it to work with a floor twenty feet wide covered with small levers, each of which made a separate mark. His theory was that the evidence left on that floor was more 'conclusive' of teleporting, but he died in a bizarre mountaineering accident before he could prove it.

You might have to make the speckle sheets worse before they'll work, then? Or have someone else teleport around too so it's not 'conclusive' that it was me."

"Oh my stars, dad is going to be obsessive about designing tests. And probably pay you to play along with them."

"Great, I hope I can make this whole thing worthwhile for you.

...I don't normally behave so irresponsibly, you know. I only do that much drugs a few times a year, and I wasn't expecting to end up in a stranger's very expensive garden. Only when a liefling is visiting - that's the specialization that makes medicine. Oh, I wonder if they could make something to tell a body that cancer is a disease! That's kind of obvious now that you mentioned it, though, so maybe there's a reason it's harder than it sounds. Or maybe not!

But anyway, yeah, just wanted to make that clear."

She comes down from the gazebo and heads towards the edge of the garden, where the wooden walkway is.

"I'm not judging. Well, I'm judging a little bit, you know, in the bigger temples the students are high basically all the time to specialize faster, it is not healthy. But occasionally, why not? I'm curious what sort of drugs now, and if they'd be fun~ We thought you were shipwrecked somehow at first- Mitra took a look at you with green magic and decided that you're undernourished by our standards. I think a trip to the healers' commune is much more important than the sawmill, there's probably a lot you can learn."

"I don't know, I just ate the leaves he gave me! ...and lay around feeling cozy and hallucinating, with a slow heartbeat and a tingling in my feet and ears.

There's so much to eat here! At home, my food is spread across the mountainside. I have to teleport between each bite, pretty much; no other specialization that needs to eat normal food could survive there."

"Wow, is that the ocean? It's huge! Only fish live there, no people? You don't have any specializations to live there? I guess you have plenty of space, it just seems like a waste."

"That's the ocean, yep! The vast deep. That does sound nice. Most of ours are stimulants, not relaxants... Sometimes you just want to space out, no? There's no one really living in it, just a few on it... Not just fish though, there's amazing creatures like squid and barnacles and anemones. Whales are the elephants of the sea, they're mammals like you and I!"

They can have a pleasant chat heading down into town. There is a brief patchwork of single-story sheds and houses, then a few blocks of tall stone buildings, many shining with artificial light. It's a little crowded. Signs proclaim craftsmen and stores of various sorts, a bank, a courier office.

The streets are not that crowded, they see a few dozen strangers. Most people wear clothes, at least pants, or are pretty heavily furred if they don't. Maybe a quarter of them have an obvious nonhuman feature, and they only see two people as nonhuman as Nefanie- a hulking bull-like horned man doing masonry to a damaged wall, and a woman with weird lanky multi-jointed arms and legs, with suction cups on them, clambering up and down the side of the cliffs and the drainage tunnels along them. She gets some appreciative looks and a couple of wolf-whistles, but people on the street here are either in a hurry or keeping to themselves for the most part. One man tries to chat to Katherine about 'business opportunities' but she deflects him with the obligation of seeing to a guest, with a faint look of annoyance.

"Behold, Storm Ward! The part of town that almost never gets flooded between elevation and good foundations. If you can't carry coins, perhaps we'll get you some sort of debit arrangement at the bank. Maybe a removable tattoo to show people?"

"Oh, cool! I wish I could bring someone here to try making people from those kinds of animals!"

(Nefanie diverts into every alley they pass.)

"We can't make light like that, but we can build with stone much more easily..."

She nods solemnly to the people giving her appreciative looks.

"How much is specialization related to appearance? You mentioned changing bodies for cosmetic or functional reasons, and I think we've passed some of each - how often are either done?"

"A tattoo saying that people can trust my word about how much money I'm giving them?" She mimes holding up her palm, one of the few parts of her body that's not covered in fur. "And then they can go to the bank, who I will have told that I transferred the money? Seems complicated, but okay. What if someone steals the tattoo?"

"Oh, is that how it works? Seems dangerous, dramatic changes like that without any healers of your own. I want to note that this region, White Forest, we've sort of made peace with the Ejer tribes unlike a lot of other colonies, and they had a long history of practically every adult taking on a new form when they come of age. Someone who still looks ordinary looks like a child to the traditionalists. It's a spiritual and practical thing to them. Kelosian types do it less, and it's not as popular elsewhere. I'd say probably four out of five in town have something, and one or two in five have something extreme. Storm Ward, here, is pretty Kelosian. As for the bank, we have debit numbers- You give them money and they tell you an account number, and you can use that account number to pay for things, maybe swear or sign a receipt that you're doing so. That will work here in town and a few folk don't carry cash anymore, all ledgers and receipts instead. People elsewhere won't trust it, not least because they'd have to come here to Gale Rocks to tell the bank that you paid them."

They're going down the hill now, towards a wooden bridge. The docks are visible below, with single-masted sailing ships lined up along the low coastline. Piles of timbers are being loaded onto one by burly furry people and a little crane.

"Hm? Oh! No, sorry, they don't make animals into people, they make new babies that are sort of inspired by the animal in some way. Always the same way, with physical resemblance but no clear reason for the magic. All people-of-my-specialization teleport, but foxes don't teleport, they don't do anything remotely like teleporting.

People have theories that the magic comes from an association in the first maker's mind, or in their culture, or that it's encoded in tiny little shapes in the animal, or that it depends on the time of the first creation, or the exact positioning of the creator and the room they're in... it would be amazing to be able to predict which animals make useful kinds of people, and of course everyone says their theory is almost there and they can totally explain why their experiments haven't worked.

But we still don't have a species that makes things cold, a simple ability with tremendous benefit, so fooey to the scientists, I say.

...Can you make animals into people?"

"Those boats are so big! And pretty!"

"Quite mysterious. And I'm familiar with that phenomenon of academics, yes." She snickers. "The doctors can make animals smarter by increments, and shaped more like humans by increments. I think they could turn them into people if they really wanted, but as yet all that's been made is some especially clever dogs and hawks... Cold is really quite useful, I think it's either magic or tricks with evaporation and airflow. Though Gale Rocks is chillier than most. P'raps- Hm, no, you can't carry things. I'm starting to wonder about specialized organs, but that's a pretty touchy subject, isn't it? As for the ships, why, thank you. We own that one, Seafoam Crest, and that one, Deep Blue. Would you like a tour?"

"I would love a tour!"

"What kind of specialized organs? Can you give the colors to animals? I'll try learning artificing either way, but I'm probably an animal to you..."

"Let's head down there then. An animal in the strictly biological sense, surely, not the moral one! We've never observed an animal with freeform magic, the way we have it. Sometimes people give animals magical abilities, but they always remain static. Custom organs... Women changing into men and vice versa, of course, there's some organs involved if you want that to be complete. That's the one that's most common. Retractable claws, photophores - that can change skin's color on demand - growing in different kinds of fur for different conditions or making it grow much faster, adding a muzzle and fangs, changes to the muscles for more strength or endurance, improved noses, webbed feet, different kinds of tails, there's some sort of little organ in the gut they can change to prevent scurvy, improved eyes that see the way birds do - I have that and it makes flowers so much more beautiful! All of these are taken from some animal or another, I think? More observing what nature has wrought and using it than custom-designing our own from scratch. I'm not a doctor."

As they approach the ships, the workers recognize Katherine and welcome her. A couple of them joke about finding a lovely tail to accompany herself.

"None of that, now. Unless Nefanie is interested, and if so chat her up when I'm gone, hmm? We're here for a quick tour- She's from far away and never seen this sort of ship before."

"Suppose I can spare a hand for a few minutes," the bookish woman who seems to be in charge drawls. She waves them up a wooden gangway and on to the lightly swaying deck. "Do you know anything of the sea and sailing, Nefanie?"

"But are you 'animals in the strictly biological sense'? Those modifications are very cool. I assume that's adding retractable claws to people who only have vestigial claws, not making functional claws retractable?"

Ooh, lots of cute burly fellows, but she will exercise self-restraint. For now.

"I just found out what a sea is a few minutes ago! But I've seen boats before, much smaller ones, and I've heard of using the wind to travel. Are you the operator of this boat? I would love to see all of it, but is there a private space you would prefer I teleport to? I'm not sure if I can, but I'll try!"

("Either! And we think so, the only detectable difference is magic...")

"I'm the captain, yes. Captain Moray." She looks at Katherine.

"She claims she can teleport an unlimited number of times a day, if nobody observes her doing it."

"That's... Unheard of."

"Yes, and we're going to test it later with message-relaying games or something, but for now I'd like to be polite and welcoming, no?"

"And you'd like her to be able to-" Moray stops herself and sighs. "Very well? You're boss enough for this, I suppose. There isn't much spare room aboard. Captain's cabin might be most appropriate even though it's mine. Aye, sailing is a matter of using the wind, and importantly, the fact that the wind and the water currents below - you get some currents and strong wind over the ocean, unlike some lakes - are almost always going in different directions."

"Thank you so much! The difference between a boat and a ship is whether it's meant to go through the ocean, more or less, and boats have operators but ships have captains, leaders, since they take a larger crew to work safely."

Captain Moray starts explaining ship functions as they walk around the deck - the rudder, the ladder up to where the sails can be manipulated, the cargo doors - and then they drop down into a cramped and fairly dark space below, lit by windows and occasional magic light. There are hammocks strung up in open spaces, and various barrels and bottles and sacks here and there too. They pass sailors cleaning things, a carpenter replacing a beam, and two cooks counting biscuits and sausages. Ships have multiple watches, enough people to run it around the day even as others rest and sleep, so it can keep moving. An ocean journey to the Old World takes a month or two, and remains fairly dangerous- Storms, the odd dragon, the boat itself wearing out, pirates, and more can strike. The captain's cabin is at the back, after Moray unlocks it- A space fifteen feet wide with a bed, a desk facing the door, and a metal tub, somewhat more nicely appointed than the rest. The tub has a paper divider blocking the view from the rest of the cabin.

"I understand, Captain Moray. You have a very pretty ship."

"Oh, so people on Scope normally all sleep at the same time during - the dark - the night? It must be nice not getting split from your family. We don't have that problem, but once I went into the city to work on a sewer and our wolf-specialization coworkers were complaining about it."

She bounces around the captain's cabin: behind the screen, into the tub, behind the tub - "What's the big sink for?" - flop on the bed - "Ooh, soft! Not as nice as Katherine's, of course!" - roll off the edge of the bed and teleport back to behind the tub - "Okay, I can teleport in the ship with this much motion, at least..."

"Aye, the night is for sleeping. For most. And the tub is for bathing and washing. That much water and weight is a luxury afforded to me as Captain- Getting clean is a lovely feeling. Soldiers and sailors and some other sorts take night watches. I never really considered the alternative..." The Captain glances at Katherine long-sufferingly.

Katherine giggles at the bed line. "I think her planet does not rotate? So there's no day and no night, the sun is always at the same angle."

"Huh! That would be handy for navigation, at least. Sounds inconvenient in a lot of other ways."

"The real question would be if you can teleport to Seafoam Crest while it's underway. You might end up appearing in midair above the docks instead once it moves. They're having shore leave right now, and cargo loading this afternoon, likely to leave tomorrow morning..."

"I could have the ropes let out and drift ten, fifteen feet from the docks."

"I know I can't go to a cart, but I can go to a house that's been carefully moved...

Apparently I got here by imagining that my home was Katherine's garden! It's supposed to be impossible to use confusion like that, and to go someplace I've never been. So my abilities might be more flexible than I think.

How about I leave before you move your ship, Captain, and then try to return. How long will it take?"

"Shouldn't be but ten minutes, miss."

"It's really quite inexplicable. Oh, do be sure to use your lockbox, Moray."

"...I always do."

Nefanie gives the disk to Katherine, making sure she's holding it firmly before letting go.

Hm, where will make a dramatic departure? She prowls around the room... she climbs into the tub, looks down in startled horror, and mimes being pulled downward, fighting to get away from her assailant. Poof.

Time to eat those beans from home.

They taste like normal beans! They're not as good as Katherine's food, but she's perfectly capable of enjoying their flavor and crunch. Whew.

She spends the next nine minutes at home struggling to remember all the foreign language she was just hearing and speaking, getting as far as 'I' and 'you' and 'teleport'.

Now, the boat - the Frothy Wave or something - is just like a house, right? It's exactly the same structure as it was ten minutes ago. Moving shouldn't matter, just like Ansaf and the other planet move and that doesn't matter.

Any unobserved areas in the operator's house in the boat?

Katherine giggles again as she goes.

The inside of the tub is just as unobserved as before. Moray is writing something at her desk, quill scratching across the paper and finger tapping the desk.

Sneak sneak sneak headpat!

Moray is remarkably calm in her reaction. She freezes utterly for half of a second, ink pooling slightly on the page, then raises her quill and drolls in a casual voice, "Ah, welcome back miss Nefanie. I take it you were successful, then?"

Nefanie snickers and gives her another pat as she circles around to the door. Disk! Wouldn't you like to know - no she's trying to be useful and respectable, even with the 'captain'.

"Indeed! I look forward to carrying messages for you." She curtseys lavishly and strolls out looking for Katherine, or any unoccupied workers.

Katherine is: Gesturing vigorously and scolding a group of workers near a pile of timber, which appears to have fallen apart. "-not the point-" ... "-fuck around after work-" ... "-CRUSH YOUR LIMBS!" ...

The rest of the dock remains somewhat busy. There are a few workers lazily 'sorting' crates that happen to be in a good position to overhear the scolding and muttering about how Emmer and that lot need to grow up, and more working to clean up the timbers, and a group of craftsmen working on one of the other ships who just kept working, and a few gawkers from town. There's a young-looking woman with blue skin and sharp teeth resting with her arms on the stone edge of the dock, most of her body submerged, too, looking amused at the show.

Hm, probably not the best time to seduce anyone. She meanders off the boat, brushing against a fellow sorting crates and running on tiptoes over a timber ("oops" - "yeah they need to be careful" - "hey nice pattern on your fur") and over to the not-undine.

"Hello! You look interesting! Do you live in the ocean? I just arrived in Gale Rocks - I'm Nefanie - where's the best place to hang out and hear all the news?"

The watcher grins. She has a lot of teeth.

"Hello. You look interesting too. Full snout, don't see that too much. How's your sniffer? I don't know, do you think I live down here full time? News, that kind of depends on what kind of news you're into. This place is kind of boring, honestly. Oh, call me Fins, as in shark fins."

"Ah! I'm not from around here - I'm not a kaleid! My sense of smell is average for people of my specialization, which is average for specializations who can smell well. Uh, can you tell that someone spilled alcohol right about here? That she's pregnant? That him over there wants to punch his foreman?

Well, you look like you could live down here full time! If you wanted. Keep your secrets!

I want to know what it's really like here, not just at Maxim Manor, not just what I'll hear in front of Katherine."

"No, there's totally a secret underwater society. Where old Ejer traditions are still the only way. The Kelos pukes can't even conceive of it, hah! Maybe I can show ya. The booze stench is pretty obvious but not the rest. Nah, I'm specialized in underwater sniffing. Can you tell how many fish are in the harbor to within a dozen? And where each of these ships sailed from by the salt and barnacles on their hulls? Which it's also my job to clean off, eugh."

"There are fish here?!" She steps away from the edge with a wary squint. (This is a joke; she knows fish are tiny.)

"Hah, I knew it! Floating cities? Or, no, floating just under the surface so boats don't see them! Air pockets for the kids? Do you grow food, or just eat the fish and squid and barnacles - not barnacles - anemones and whales? And sharks? What's a shark - yikes! - huh actually right next to you is the safest place!

I should warn you that if I visit I will be able to teleport there again. I'm not planning to invade your private space; I just don't want to trick you."

"Lots of caves for kids. There's enough connection to the surface that the air doesn't go stale. Seaweed farming. Fish farming in net-pens, with them eating the zooplankton and phytoplankton that grow right on top. Anemone farming, or starfish or whatever, eh... Sometimes? Usually it's, like, clams. Oysters. Those are pretty low maintenance. Some of them, you can get dye or medicine out of. Whales are bigger than we need and they grow real slow, so those are a no. I gotta warn you though, the ocean is full of slimy stuff and parasites. The shallows are fuckin' teeming. The open ocean much less so, but there's still a lot. It's a constant pain to keep clean. Random fish you catch from the ocean have all sorts of worms and shit in them, which is why you cook 'em nice and thoroughly. I guess random rabbits or whatever land hunters hunt probably do too? The farms, less so, since we're spraying 'em and magicking 'em all the time. Ooh... That's a thinker, the teleporting thing."

Fins kicks off from the dock and lounges on her back, wearing a tight leathery garment of some sort; Her feet are long flipperlike things.

"Spraying?

The downside of my teleportation is that I can't carry anything, like this disk. But the upside is that I can't carry anything, like grime and parasites! I've waded into shit slurry up to my elbows and then popped home clean and dry, not even any stench grubbing up my nose.

I guess you don't come to the firm land - dry land - very much, or people would notice. But I would really like to find a local place to hang out, if you have any tips, where I can learn to really speak Kelosian, and stop letting the maker of this disk jam their concepts into my thoughts. Or other languages! Is there a commonly-used Ejer language?"

"That would be Jerran, the old tongue. Hjel mef sjer klej haffajallan, yeah? I clean the ships, remember? And I'd better keep getting paid for it. They just incorrectly think I live down on the southern edge of town. If you want to power-learn Kelosian, the Oak Temples will be happy to talk and preach at you for free, teaching is White'n'Green and all, but they're stuffy and Kelosian as all get-out so I bet it'd be boring. I guess I can show you the hangout cave without giving too much away... I'm sure there's a dozen secret hangout spots, but they're secret. Friends being friends, arm in arm, not for strange eyes to see~"

"Sure, that works for you, Fins, but what about the rest of you all? Do they all have fake houses? That can't be worth the cost.

I don't need a snobby lecturer drilling me on vocabulary. Just people to talk to who might not think that, say, Ejer are um a disturbing rebuttal to moral realism but now thankfully assimilated - or something, not that phrase but that's the vibe I get. And I'm not asking for secrets! Just direction to the best" leafhouse "coffeehouse or pub or library or gamehall or what where people talk."

"Oh, you want Gjika's. Go upriver, left side, and ask folks. You'll find it. Bored now, come back some time if you wanna swim through midnight waters to a secret cave! Also, half of that was lies, 'not a kaleid'! Nice bit!"

Giving a cheery wave, Fins vanishes beneath the water with a splash.

"What? Hey! Okay, nice bit, you got me. Bye!"

How's Katherine doing?

The lecture seems to have finished. Cleanup is continuing. The mood on the docks is kind of split between amused and sullen. Katherine is handing over a pouch of coins to who seems to be the captain of the boat that was receiving timbers. Then she goes to sit on a bench in a huff.

"Nice lecture from the boss lady. Real head of steam on her."

"Could've leaped straight to fixing it instead of yelling."

"Yeah, they fucked up bad, but still..."

"Praise in public, damn in private, that's what my Pa always said."

"Maxims pay us to load the ships, not ruin cargo."

"Could've happened to anyone."

"No it fucking couldn't have, they were jumping on it and shit."

"Maxims are still just as in charge as before, if you work for 'em."

"They pay well though, and you can always just quit."

"Anton's not so bad but Katherine's too young. Doesn't quite know what she's doing yet..."

"Whatever, nobody got hurt, tempers are high, let's just fix it and get back to work."

"Yeah, yeah."

A catfolk-ish looking man stretches, then holds one arm out, palm up in a gesture that everyone else seems to recognize. "Back to work then. Anyone want a pick-me-up?"

There's a chorus of 'sure's and everyone reaches out to touch the man's arm or hand, standing straighter and looking more alert after they do.

Nobody hurt, so she's not needed, even if there were a place she could usefully deliver a single memorized phrase...

She shouldn't have taken a side earlier. She didn't mean to, really, just commiserating with a random person nearby, but she could have acknowledged his frustration without declaring an opinion, and now if she comforts Katherine she'll look like she's part of the 'Maxim loyalist faction'.

But nothing for it. She sticks by her friends! Holding the disk tight, she pokes Katherine's shoulder with her nose. "You okay?"

Katherine jumps slightly.

"I'm fine. I'm sorry you had to see that, things usually run smoothly, I swear! Bah, all that wood will have to be inspected now, the fall could have damaged some of it. Gale Timber's reputation for quality is too important not to... But enough of my woes. I think I was going to show you to the healers' commune?"

"Yeah, to the healers'! Is it common to have magic drugs like that guy used?"

As they walk, she gives Katherine a brief tail-hug. "You don't need to stifle your feelings. Gale Timber is separate from Gale Rocks?"

Tail-hugs are nice; She smiles and pats the tail in question happily.

"Oh, yes. The Maxim family used to own the entire region by fiat- That's how Kelos still does things, nobles own larger and smaller regions and pay fealty to each other. But I saw which way the wind was blowing as a little girl yea high, and I encouraged Father to speak for independence and give up the theoretical authority that never would have been truly obeyed. So now we're just a merchant house, and Gale Timber is the name of said house. Quality standards at the sawmill are high."

Nefanie can see the odd state of the construction in the area they're passing through. It's all wood, no stone at all, and most of it appears temporary. Carts, tents, scaffolding, open walls like the gazebo. The local activity is mostly peddlers and small-time tinkers; Shoe shiners, seamstresses, whittlers, a painter, three carpenters advertising, some sort of medicine maker, a scribe for hire, plus a couple of food carts. Up ahead at the end of the street is a smooth stone wall with a long ramp leading up to the top.

"Wow! Abdicating like that, no matter how much the wind was or wasn't blowing, was really good! What other merchant houses are in Gale Rocks?"

"Are the people here travelers? Do they move to follow the 'seasons'?"

"It was the only way that did not end in blood. More blood. There already was some, before my birth." Katherine shrugs. "And we're the only ones really embedded, though Three Dogs Shipping, Ruby and Lumen Distribution, and Pearapple Traders have schedules that bring them here. In Gale Rocks we don't- We endure the summer storms and winter chill alike. There are still traditional tribes out there though. Ejer. They're nomadic, as far as I know. I think the year is a bit too short to follow summer around the globe- What an image, though. Eternal summer, or eternal winter..."

"I figured. Still good of you to avoid more blood.

Do the other merchant houses want to be embedded in Gale Rocks? I'm guessing from the names that they're not as focused on timber. Do they carry timber at all? Do they have their own 'sawmills'?

And I'm guessing the Ejer travel to collect food from lots of places that are each too barren to support them? Oh, or they have to raise kids in places that kids can safely live, but then the adults travel as far as their bodies allow?

I think people who wear clothes like not having to switch between different sets all the time! At least, that's a thing that travelers complain about at home."

"Everyone carries whatever they think they can make a profit on! We're named after timber, because that's the flagship product, the thing we make the most money on and what we want to be known for- Lots of easily accessible forest that not even the Ejer care that much about upstream, cut down the trees and replant them and come back in fifteen years to more full-grown trees. Logs float down the river, nice and easy, and it's mostly good hardwood too. But Gale Rocks is still a small town- There is more industry elsewhere. Mines, smelters, cloth mills, lots of craftsmen turning materials into finished goods too. Kelos is more established at that, much busier. I don't know much about the Ejer, not the traditionalist nomads anyway. There's some truth to the food thing, I know they seed their travel routes with forgeable plants and come back to them later. It uses much more land than a farm, but farming is hard work so maybe they have the right of it if work is more limited than land. You probably do the same with the ability to teleport vast distances at a whim, no? Feeding a child- Who would be observing you- Must be a challenge."

"The Ejer object to cutting down forests? Why? I guess you just said you don't know much about them, sorry. It just caught my attention because at home there are a couple reasons people get touchy about forests, and it might just be that they want to prevent a mudslide but it also might be because they want to keep a bunch of animal species around, or because the forest is secretly full of their plant-specialized friends. I don't know if any of that matters on Scope!

Children of my specialization suckle for years, and during that time you carry them around and walk with them, so that when they're weaned they can feed themselves and start exploring areas of their own. And we try to give birth at the edge of our territory so they will have plenty to explore.

Cloth mills - machines that make cloth? Cool! How does that work? What kinds of magic do they use?"

"The food thing, and resentment for interference, I think. I'm fairly sure there aren't a lot of plants around that are secretly people, though we were concerned about that for a bit. I don't know too much about clothwork- There's a great deal of retting and sifting and threading and tamping and so on, to get cloudplant hair into suitable thread, and then big wooden frames that pull the thread taut and shuffle it back and forth. With help from a lot of blue magic to tug things into place and keep them from falling apart too soon. Also green, for growing the cloudplants. Similar principles to the mechanized sawmill, really, it's a whole specialty."

They come to the top of the wall, and see a wide, irregularly shaped plaza of smooth stone open up below them. It's busy. There's a big statue of a werewolf woman and a human man embracing in the center, with a little fountain around it. There's scattered wooden furniture and brightly colored cloth decoration, most with a few people hanging around them. A group has drawn a game field in chalk and is playing something rough with unknown rules and a hard leather ball on the hard stone. A small band is playing mediocre banjo-like music. There's a few stalls around the edges, but not as much as the area they've just passed. A big portion of the square is taken up by a large group of people working on processing some sort of small vegetable, cutting them up and laying them out on cloths to dry in the sun. A few couples are lying or sitting snuggled up with each other, talking quietly or napping or just people watching. One man is doing some sort of show with weighted cloth streamers, and a pair of women are swordfighting with wooden swords.

"Here we have old stone market- The healers' commune is out in the forest a bit and this is the quickest way, but the plaza here is a big social spot!"

"The Ejer harvest food from the trees? Does making the trees grow more wood mean they make less food?

Mreh, blue magic to 'tug things into place and keep them from falling apart' - we don't have that at home."

"Lovely!" She dashes all over the plaza, bouncing in time with the music: splashing through the fountain to get a close look at the two statues, running on tip-toes along the boundary line of the game field, circling the sword fight, and ending abruptly to stare at the man with the streamers. "Oohh!"

- and reluctantly back. Via the vegetable group. "That smells great! What are you making?"

She leaves a trail of looks and chattering in her wake. The man with the ribbons winks at her and twists his rainbow-colored ribbons in a move where they catch on each other and the weights at the end twirl together, ribbon trailing like a spinning comet.

Most of the vegetable group keep to their work, with just a wave or a smile. They're cutting them all in half and laying them out in these spiral patterns.

"Ho there, stranger! It's mizzem- When you dry 'em and dust a bit of spices on them, it concentrates all the good flavors right down. This is mostly Ilonse's crop, theirs did really well this year, I think it's the eggshell fertilizer- Harvested early, and wouldn't you know it the plaza's the most convenient large open space for drying, yeah? I don't think I've seen you before? I'm Lisha." The human-looking woman holds out her hand with a friendly smile.

(She winks back!)

"I'm Nefanie." Handshake. She flops onto the warm stone. "Mmm, it's so nice here." She does not steal a snack. "Why the spiral patterns? Who's Ilonse? You combine the crops to process them - how does that get organized?"

"Ilonse!" A man with bright white hair looks up. Lisha waves. Ilonse waves back, confused.

"Best time of the year right now. We get the warmth and the sun, and the storms haven't quite hit yet! Well- It's just more neighborly to do it all at once, right? The more you put in the more you get back out, sure, but we all know each other, whole lot of small farms out past the wetlands. The spirals make it so each mizzem-half is slightly tilted, see? It takes up a bit less space but doesn't actually dry much slower. It also doubles as advertising~ Looks tasty, doesn't it? Smells good too!"

She gives Ilonse as big of a friendly wave as she can while flopped on the ground holding the disk. "Good to meet you, sir!" What's he wearing? How human-like does he look compared to the others? "It's nice that you're so friendly and cooperate so well. If you got this many people-of-my-specialization together, well they wouldn't be working since they wouldn't have materials or tools, but if you tried, half would get bored and leave and half would end up paired off in nooks."

Ilonse looks a liiiitle bit like a cross between a human and a drake with silvery scales instead of blueish ones! He is not especially clothed; Sandals, baggy shorts, and a sleeveless vest-thing that's not even closed at the front, the latter of which seems to be a fairly common article of clothing around here, on both genders. He smiles. "Welcome to Gale Rocks!"

(It looks like the people who are laying the mizzem out are snacking occasionally, for what it's worth.)

"What's this 'specialization', then?" Lisha asks.

Katherine catches up at this point. "Her magic appears to work entirely differently, it's quite fascinating and we'll probably do some tests about it later."

"Oh," Lisha sounds less cheerful now that Katherine is here. "Well, glad you've got that sorted then. I'm guessing you all live out in the country and are used to your space more than townsfolk are, then." She waggles a finger and smirks at Nefanie. "Not that pairing off in nooks, occasionally not in pairs, doesn't happen, of course~ Especially between younger folk."

Ilonse is pretty! Not really her type, but so pretty. He didn't respond to her calling him 'sir', but maybe that was too subtle. She should have said, uh - she rummages through her borrowed vocabulary - 'my lord'?, but it's too late now. Similar clothing, not fancy, and he looks less human than the others, which at least is evidence against the active working of the simplest Kelosian-Ejer system of oppression, at least here in this part of Gale Rocks and this social group. And Lisha didn't hint at any hidden strife among the farmers.

"Yeah, I'm from a desolate mountain. It's different in the cities! On the planet I'm from people have abilities from birth that they can't change, but can use without limit. The specializations come from animals. I'm fox-specialized - 'kitsune' - and we can teleport to places we've been before as long as no one is watching. We can't carry things, which is why we don't bother wearing clothes except to sleep. I need to go now; it was nice to meet you, Lisha, Ilonse, everyone!"

Onward to the healers'!

"Lisha seemed a bit - subdued around you. Why is that? Anything I can help with?" Nefanie can think of several good and bad answers Katherine might give. 'Technically I could have anyone in the town killed but I won't of course' is concerning, but is a better sign for Katherine than the oblivious 'she hates me for no reason'.

The fruit-drying group is happy enough to let her move on, chatting with each other.

Katherine shrugs. "The burden of implied authority. I'm never not going to be the Baron's daughter, and we gave up official power but not all our money, and that generates mixed feelings. And a lot of people really don't like Father, and I can't really blame them either- That's a bit of a story, I'd rather tell it in private. But don't I sound vain, complaining about it?"

One of the couples lounging by the fountain gets up and follows them as Katherine heads towards the forest.

"Hello, miss Katherine! We need to head out to the commune too, mind if we walk with you?"

Katherine shrugs. "Well, I don't. I'm sorry, I can't quite recall your names."

"Mart, Jula," says Mart, pointing to himself (human except for a pair of big fox-ish ears) and his girlfriend (entirely human). "It's been a week, so we'll see doctor Sky about how my new form is coming in and trigger the next step!"

"I'm curious, and of course happy to listen to your complaints. Yeah, later."

"Hi Mart and Jula! Are the ears new?" She darts closer to peer at them. "What's next? How did you decide what you wanted?"

"Yeah, the ears are new! Next is nothing visible, deep bone and muscle work- I'm going to be gaining over a foot in height and a lot of muscle too, it takes a while. I have a prescribed diet."

"Gonna be my lovely big hunk." Jula kisses Mart's cheek and he scratches it, blushing.

"Eheh. So, what animal you choose is supposed to say things about your personality, right? To an extent, at least. And then obviously some animals are a lot more popular than others because they're correlated with things we think are good virtues... But I'm doing this more for the actual physical features. I'm gonna be a mutt- Not one specific other animal, just taking a bunch of things I like and mashing them together. Fox-type ears to hear well, a snout to smell well, bird eyes to see above-violet and snake receptors to see below-red, a prehensile tail, digitigrade legs and hooves for running on rough ground, fur that grows and sheds with the seasons to protect my skin and regulate temperature. Some reflexes and vestibular stuff inspired by cats, and some skull and joint work too. And probably more when I can afford even more work! I don't have the knack for Green work myself, but there's a sort of sub-community for taking it to extremes, you know."

"And I'm just going to pick up standard cleanups, myself," Jula adds at the end of Mart's excited ramble. "Maybe a tail? Seems like they get in the way as much as they are soft and cuddly, though. Mostly I like how I look just fine."

"Ooh yeah you're gonna be such a - good at hearing with those! So just for fun, then? Cool.

What personalities are associated with, hm, cats, wolves, eagles, and frogs?"

Jula shakes her head. "Cats are loners and a bit lazy, very blue, but fair and just. Wolves are all about their families, for better or worse. Also prefer straightforward solutions. Super red. Eagles? I don't think I've seen eagles per se, usually you go with feathers taken from a robin or a woodpecker or a jay instead, but birds in general are supposed to be carefree, wanderers. White. And can't commit to anything, stereotypically at least. Frogs are associated with contentment and sedentary life. Also wisdom, maybe? Common sense? Is it different where you're from?"

"Yeah, kinda. Cats are fair and just, I guess, but usually you'd say that they like following rules and arguing about what's fair; they work together fine but value being smart more than working hard. More white, I think? Wolves are all about their families, and friends, and distant acquaintances... Red, yeah. Eagle-specialized people live in flocks! The stereotype is that frogs all hate each other and never say an honest word, but I think that's made up, to oversimplify it... they probably have about the same amount of conflict and posturing as anyone else.

It's a pity. I was hoping your knowledge of animals might help us guess at untried specializations.

What do you do to make money, you two?"

"No, that doesn't sound quite right? I'd definitely say cats are distinctly blue, not white. White's - diplomatic, blue is clever and curious- And the animals aren't literally animals, more reflections upon the human soul of what we see in them- There wouldn't be a book of this since it's a tradition thing-"

"Untried specializations?"

"Miss Nefanie is from a different planet!" Katherine explains excitedly. "With interestingly unique magic! That, or running a pretty good practical joke and demonstrating high fidelity teleporting."

"A different planet?!"

"Yep! A different planet, that doesn't spin, and doesn't have days or seasons! I live on a mountain where it rains all the time and I've never seen the sun - our sun, I mean. And we don't have the five colors, and no dragons, at least as far as I know, but maybe that's just because we have no oceans. And no magical objects like this disk, but we can use our magic constantly without using it up!

What's low fidelity teleporting? Sounds unpleasant!"

Mart snorts. "It's inefficient. Koshay, uh, he's basically the town's police, he can teleport around town, and is understandably quiet about whether he can do it once, twice, or more each day. But it's probably once. It's completely impractical for regular travel, you can walk anywhere you could teleport in fifteen minutes and it burns up a huge amount of magic that you probably want to use for other stuff. Maybe if you had a secret underground house or something?"

"I think we've got the better deal," Jula muses, making a face. "Limited but flexible. No dragons are a blessing at least. They're pretty terrifying, let me tell you, they hit the coasts sometimes. Katherine, do you know the one in sixty-eight? The one that rained caustic metal?"

"The Hateful Tears. It went back out to sea after passing over us. Was over land for maybe a day at most."

"Yeah. Honestly I'm surprised the oceans aren't completely fucked up given how many dragons still haven't been killed- I guess it'd be even harder than usual with that one, since it's constantly raining explosive poison-"

But what does fidelity mean? She doesn't want to bother these people with pedantry; she'll ask someone else later.

"Huh, you believe me! How did Koshay get his job?"

"Council appointed him. One council seat is up for election every five years, there's three."

"Mm."

walk walk walk wave her big fluffy tail around in front of Jula walk walk

"So, Katherine, what exactly are you hoping to get from the visit to the healers' commune?"

"Confirmation that you're definitely not human! And joy at seeing all the excited stupefaction that results from that. Also, maybe they'll have ideas for how we can better pay you. Some doctors can get pretty creative when they're given license to, isn't always a descriptor most people," she gestures, and Mart laughs, "Want in their medical care, but still."

"How can you be sure that I'm not kaleid? Are there changes that green can't do?

I'm happy with my body! ...but, hm... green tufts of fur on my ears would be cool! And would help me convince people at home, even if they didn't meet me before, since people-of-my-specialization's fur is always a uniform color."

If she wants Scope to benefit from more than one kitsune, she should get pregnant and give birth here. Maybe green magic can accomplish that? But she's not going to strand a child here until she knows more.

"Yes! You can check the inheritance of things with Pale Green* magic if you're really good at it. You'll have recognizably kaleid inheritance under your form if you're actually a kaleid. We can do green with actual dye, no magic necessary, if that's still cool? Or would it have to grow in that way?"

"I think the council is pretty stupid," Mart comments. "They're always so fussed with things like trade and money and talking to White Forest's representative. They're supposed to be just like regular folk, not always eating fancy gifts or talking about arcane tax stuff."

Katherine purses her lips and does not comment.

*This is a grammatical construction that just means 'Green and White'. 'Pale' for white, 'Dark' for black, 'Grey' for white/black, and then yellow, cyan, and magenta for red/green, green/blue, and blue/red respectively.

"Gifts are usually edible here? I thought that was just a [kitsune] thing - people-of-my-specialization - since it's hardly a gift, for us, to make someone carry around an object. Ohh, wait, it's to hide the evidence?"

"Yeah, even if the dye stayed, we have dye too. But we can't make fur grow a different color."

"Exactly, it's easier to point at a new shirt or potion or jewelry than claim officials are having excessively fancy food."

"I think they could probably manage it," Katherine shrugs. "They'll be very enthusiastic about studying another thinking species! Maybe even pay you about it! I'm certain I'll pay you for the bothersome experiments Father's no doubt devising right now."

They can see a clearing and a cluster of buildings coming into view ahead.

"A potion is an object with magic of its own, like the language disk, but you have to drink it to get a single-use effect? Why can't an official drink it in private? Do potions always have effects that can't be hidden and can't be claimed to have some other source? For that matter, are permanent modifications used as bribes, say, better hearing, which is even more useful if you keep it secret?"

"I'm happy to help! ...I'm also happy to be sure of my ability to pay you back.

Are you wondering if I think differently from you? Huh, I suppose I might not notice if the language disk is having trouble adapting to my mind.

On Ansaf, all our specializations have equal ability for poetry and math and memorization and social perception, on average, unless their magic specifically interacts with a mental skill, or they've put a lot of effort into breeding. Fundamentally, we all want status and companionship and interesting work, but those things feel different to people with different bodies and magic. Like, all mammal-derived specializations cuddle - and birds I think? - but the others don't. The ones who mentally influence people don't have a lot of friends, while the ones who read minds have lots of friends. Well, okay, I should say that it's my opinion that there are no fundamental differences in how we think; not everyone agrees. I wonder if the mind-reading ones know for sure? They're new and still rare.

Do the scientists of Scope know exactly how much a person's mind depends on their body? Is it impossible to modify children, or just prohibitively expensive to keep adjusting them as they grow?"

As they approach the clearing, she calls out. "Hiii healers! I'm Nefanie! I'm an alien and I'm really excited to meet you all!"

"Yeah, I dunno, I'm just griping about the potions. They can, I guess, but mostly you save 'em for a bad day. People who have power will go corrupt unless everyone else coordinates to stop it, but we're really bad at that."

Katherine says, "You'd think differently even if you have a 100 percent Kaleid brain in there, because you grew up different! And the temple types love learning about that kind of thing, enough that they'll pay people to answer questions, sometimes. Old nobility has been sort of trying to breed intelligence like that... Or, some would say, inadvertently trying to breed mania and derangements for more magical power. Oh, and different body-shapes can find different sorts of things comfortable even with no mental changes, Joocha works in the tunnels- We saw her, she has octopi arms- And she loves rain now, and can't stand being cold."

Jula shakes her head. "It's a bad idea to modify children because there's a lot of developmental changes that we don't fully understand and experiments on children tend to get people really really worked up when they inevitably hurt them. So they're mostly just... Not done, and perhaps for the best."

The healers' commune is a cluster of wooden buildings with a fair amount of activity. The nearest one looks a lot like a catfolk, except he also has a human head of hair, and he has furless hands with six fingers. He zips right up and nods to Katherine. "Hello, Mr. Mart. Your next set is today, isn't it? We're a bit busier than usual but nothing too bad, good luck with Doctor Kingfisher. As for Miss Nefanie, oho! An alien, you say? Do tell me more."

(Oh right, putting objects away to use later: normal behavior for non-kitsune.)

Seems like an expansive definition of '100% kaleid brain'... "Yeah, I'm not really sure if breeding for 'intelligence' actually works; our cat-specialized people, who try it, maybe mostly breed for obsession with math and poetry. Although if that causes more actual skill later why shouldn't that count as intelligence?"

"Hi! I'm from another planet with different kinds of people. I have innate teleportation and no other magic. I'm not supposed to be able to go places I haven't been before, but I was at a trippy party and somehow managed it while delirious! Hopefully there's a way to do it again that makes it easier to aim. I mean, I can go back and forth between here and my home now, but I want to get other people-of-my-specialization to be able to do it too!

I want to get a physical change that couldn't be done with our magic, to prove my story! Maybe make some of my fur grow a different color? If that's easy. I can't carry things when I teleport, that's why it has to be something with my body.

One of our specializations can make medicine for people. For individuals, although general-purpose medicine usually works for a lot more people than just the target. They don't need to physically contact a person to target medicine for them, so maybe, just maybe, they might be able to target people on Scope! Of course, the medicine they make is  stuck on my planet, but we can tell you what it's like, and so there might be research or even diagnostic use for it?"