Under the quartermaster's directions, a pair of wagons start filling up with the requested relief supplies. There's food, of course, with large sacks of flour followed by salt and barrels of dried meat, butter, and cheese; they're joined by arrows by the barrel and box, containers of chain links, bandages and thread, bowstrings, and even spare clothing. The largest individual contribution, however, comes in the form of fuel - the ability to sustain fires is of critical importance in the field, and heating for food and warmth and repairs can go through a supply at breakneck speeds. For all that they have the money to afford it, it's clear that this is one of the things it pains Wilcer Garms most to part with.

(A handful of scrolls and potions are set aside as well, but those are for her to carry on her person; they're not as valuable as the entire wagon, but by volume or weight there's nothing they'd prefer more to keep out of the hands of the demons if this turns into an ambush or any other trick).

She tucks the scrolls and potions in her pockets, which acquire little bubble-wrap linings around the glass bottles, and heads over to the wagon. She did a bit of thinking, while the supplies were being gathered, about the best way to pick up a wagon that was never designed to be lifted off the ground. She lies down next to the wagon, scoots underneath it like a car mechanic, and bench-presses it with two hands on an axle, the other two on the sturdy wooden floorboards, and Alpina flopped on her face so she can read the scroll. It's not exactly dignified, but if anyone decides to complain she reads the scroll off before they can get to it.

And then she exits the wagon as a cloud of glitter at the other end before coalescing back into a human with pockets, because why not.

And comes face to face with a number of people in very evil-looking armor, leveling their spears at her.

"Identify yourself!"

Godsfuckingdangit did she just teleport into a demon cultist ambush. Is there a mole in her staff or something. "I'm Knight-Commander Brenda. Who are you?" (She tells Alpina everything is probably under control but if she got another teleport scroll ready to go that would be super helpful of her.)

"You are in the camp of - and under arrest by - the Order of the Godclaw. Do not attempt to cast spells, retrieve items, or flee; we will respond with lethal force. You will be held until such a time as we can confirm your identity, as authorized under Article 2, section 5 of the Worldwound Treaty, with the accompanying conditions."

Aha. They have misinterpreted each other's aesthetics in similar ways. "I have no interest in harming anyone who isn't working with the demons. What's your plan for verifying my identity? I spoke to Captain Munir of the Sunrise Sword by Sending earlier today, these supplies are for them and you. If you Sending Sarjukheh Aamir he can confirm that I rescued him from the demons this morning and found out about your situation from him. I can also answer questions under a truth spell if you've got one. Whatever your preferred method is, we ought to proceed with it quickly, so I can get this wagon unloaded and go back for the second one."

A sending to someone held prisoner by the demons means exactly nothing. Even if they haven't broken what passes for his discipline yet, nothing prevents a succubi from dominating him and forcing him to reply as they choose. And rushing a verification process by creating a sense of urgency is almost literally the oldest trick in the infiltrator's handbook, right up there with asking what the verification procedure they have to fake is.

"You aren't cleared to know that."

The guards holding her at spearpoint are shortly joined by another group in the same ominous plate; as soon as they arrive the ones she'd already seen seem to somehow stand even straighter, but they don't take their focus off her for even a moment. One of the new group is significantly shorter than the others, and it's he who first speaks up.

"Report."

"Sir! The entity claims to be the Knight Commander, and appeared alongside what seems to be a cart of unknown provenance and contents that they described as 'supplies' intended for the Sunrise Sword. They have demonstrated teleportation or a convincing facsimile thereof and a shape-changing transmutation of unknown character."

"If you manage to verify my identity without my finding out what the procedure for verifying my identity is . . . actually that would be pretty clever and impressive of you. I have several more suggestions for options but I worry you'll want to avoid anything I've already mentioned and I'd hate to rule out whatever you're planning on doing so I'll only tell you them if you actually want them."

"The verification procedure will not change based on your words. Escort her to zone three."

This process apparently involves the men marching her at spear-point away from the wagons and any sort of cover, where their archers have clear lines of fire; a trio of less heavily armored people who still visibly match the same aesthetic scheme join them there.

She continues to have no interest in harming them, causing a diplomatic issue with them, or making them so worried the supplies are a trap that they never unload them, so sure, she'll go stand in zone three. And contemplate whether putting a hand in a pocket to Sending the Quartermaster that she might be late back is too much of a threatening gesture. It's not worth trying yet, anyhow, maybe they'll actually be quick about it and she'll be back right when she's expected.

Then they're going to cast a number of spells, on her and on themselves, while having her go over her story multiple times under entirely different phrasings. Partway through she's told not to resist a spell that ends up making her 10 feet tall before it's dismissed while one of the other people watch her with glowing eyes.

Eventually they do bring out a wand of Abadar's truth, at which they want her to both confirm she hasn't lied to them and also repeat her claims in yet another phrasing that they devised for her; they've got a script.

She says things! They're all true! Being unexpectedly ten feet tall is pretty neat and the whole thing is admirably thorough. She memorizes as much of the procedure as she can deduce, in case she needs to check whether someone is a spy at some point, because she very well might. She should ask for their manuals once they're sure she's legit, she muses. 

Excellent. They've narrowed down her infiltration possibilities to either a non-divinely-empowered humanoid who is very good at disguise and has a trick for beating truth spells, or a master spellcaster with magic they've never heard of. According to procedure further checks in this situation are not worth the resources expended in expectation.

And more importantly, they've had people going over the alleged supplies with a fine toothed comb while she was hopefully too busy to interfere. It's come up empty on poison, magic, or hidden goods, though they'll need to do a more thorough check later on individual packages. 

He still doesn't trust that she is who she claims to be, but the treaty is clear on what the grounds of reasonable suspicion are for holding allied units prisoner and this no longer qualifies. 

"Release her."

"Yes, sir!"

And then they can carefully disengage. They're clearly still ready for combat, but they no longer look like they're a second away from stabbing her. 

Cool! This qualifies them for various Pocket Goodies! Here, have a bunch of scrolls and potions which you'll probably also want to inspect. Are they going to arrest her again if she teleports out and then back with another wagon, or can they give her a passphrase or something she can use to confirm it's still her?

They can give her a passphrase that they will be only mildly suspicious of her if she says it when she returns, yes.

Awesome! She will help get the wagon unloaded so she can bring it back at the same time as getting the second one. Also, while she's here, do they have a manual with whatever subset of that procedure isn't itself secret? She'd like to improve her Crusade's operational security. If the whole process is classified that's reasonable and she'll approach the problem independently.

Their exact implementation details are still classified even now that she passed the test, but she can have the same broad-strokes summary they give to preemptively unreliable allies like the Mendevian army or other Hellknight orders. If she's done any research into the Mendevian inquisition, she'll see the main differences are that the godclaw focuses more on preemptively preventing people from being potential targets so they can afford to spend more on verifying individual cases; there's heavy emphasis on ensuring all patrols go out in trios (or pairs, in emergencies), that guard shifts have redundancy, and that under absolutely no circumstances do you allow someone to bypass checks even if it seems like a really good idea, with the penalties for violations starting at "incredibly brutal" and working up from there.

It's hard to tell with the helmet, but her interest seems to have resulted in the Paralictor looking at her with slightly less disapproval than before.

"Before you implement any changes, you'll need to ensure it will be followed. Never give an order that you know won't be obeyed, and that goes double for anything that just gives you a false sense of security where the demons are concerned."

She nods thoughtfully. "Yes, better to have a slightly worse procedure that actually gets followed than a nominally better one that's onerous enough people skip parts of it." 

(She will not be importing the brutal penalties. Not only is she deeply skeptical that they're necessary, even if she had cold hard proof that that they'd save enough people to be worth it she's not putting that tool in her toolbox.)