"We've been hoping all day to find someone who might be able to steal and break a large number of elemental amulets, but that's seeming less and less likely," says Earth.

"Why doesn't your local version do it?"

"Breaking elemental amulets usually leads to the newly freed elemental doing a lot of destructive magic to anyone and anything nearby and then running away. I believe that's because no one breaks them on purpose and breaking them by accident tends to happen during stressful moments. But it's a discouraging statistic if you're a human who wants to free some elementals."

"I," remarks Cam amiably, "an am immortal indestructible demon."

"Do you think you could break an elemental amulet? As far as I know they're not susceptible to physical force, that's the tricky part."

"No idea. I'm also not sure if I'm invulnerable to magical harm. There isn't any on offer in my world."

"And we can't test that here under relatively safe conditions because Lightning and I are still bound to our amulets and can't harm anyone. I suppose you could go find Maurabel and talk to her about cooperating somehow on a large-scale elemental theft... I don't know where she is at the moment, though, besides not at school. And you would stand out very obviously at home, with the wings. People would probably try to classify you as a new hybrid elemental. Someone might even try to capture you, and I have no idea what would happen then."

"I could cut the wings off."

"That sounds uncomfortable."

"Nah, I made 'em without any nerves at the base joints. It'd be messy, but it won't feel like anything. But if you don't know where to find Maurabel..."

"She's probably not that far, but my element doesn't scry well and neither does his," with a gesture at Lightning. "So 'not at school' is the best I can do. You could come through and wait for her to come back to school, but apparently you'd be risking never finding your way here again."

"That... would be displeasing but not catastrophic, if it turns out that I'm not going to be magically attacked in ways I can't handle. And if anybody in your world writes books."

"I can guarantee the books. I can't guarantee the other part."

"Anyone else likely to help, you mean? Well, I could find one of the other university elementals and ask them to scry for Maurabel... there are a few who might. Humans I'd trust to be helpful, though - no, none of those."

"Any obvious drawbacks to getting a university elemental to scry for Maurabel?"

"It involves an amount of time spent holding open a door and hoping no one wanders by and investigates. I can't think of specific negative consequences for somebody from the university finding this place, but I have the general feeling it wouldn't be a positive contribution."

"Can any of them do a safe little test on how magically vulnerable I am?"

"No. The university's very strict about what restrictions need to be in place at all times."

"Damn. I mean, I could theoretically threaten the humans, but I'm not really about that..."

The door opens again.

"I look like a five foot tall fairy when I'm a girl?"

"No, the other ones of comparable apparent age were taller and didn't have wings," says Earth. "Although one of them was some kind of plant creature visually indistinguishable from an ordinary human. Hello," he adds in the newcomer's direction. "This is a weird magic place called Milliways and that is an alternate universe version of you and we're discussing how to rescue some people in my world from magically enforced servitude."