"...I'm not sure exactly what kinds of conversations you're envisioning having that you need to pay for. I do expect to be able to sell spells to anyone who'll do business with me at all. Towns are probably low-monster but might be generally aware of what's cropping up in the general neighborhood and be able to send you on hunts for whatever's bothering their farmers."

"If I wanted to talk to someone for a few hours just to learn the language, I imagine they might want payment or some favor just for their time? Maybe I can find someone old and retired who doesn't mind talking to strangers, although I can't tell them any interesting news or stories. I don't know that I'd be much good at hunting down monsters unless they're detectably magical or easy to spot from the air like that bulette was at the time, I can't do much if they're in a forest or even just sleep in a burrow and come out at night, but it's worth asking about and trying. ...I can fly letters or small packages to towns a hundred miles away, if someone happens to urgently need that, but it might be best to keep a low profile and not reveal too many of my abilities until I'm better oriented, and visiting all the towns around delivering air mail is the opposite of that."

"I guess I was imagining a smattering of short conversations and not sitting down with one person for hours, you might indeed have to pay someone to sit down for hours. I do speak Taldane, to be clear, I just have an accent. I'm probably better at Taldane than at any other surfacer language because when new halflings come through they speak it and we can get updates on how it's used."

"I'll use available time to talk to you, if you don't mind being my language tutor, but you might be busy some of the time," or she might not like it. "It's not very important. ...do any of the neighboring countries speak Taldane?"

"I think it's popular throughout their former empire, which is most of everything to the west of here."

"Good, that's useful."

And after a short rest they can try out horizontal flying. It turns out Tanya can fly and carry her at a hundred fifty miles an hour (any more and the air resistance is prohibitive) for ten to fifteen minutes every hour for eight hours a day without tiring too much. It helps for Belmarniss to be tightly wrapped in a blanket so she doesn't have to feel and hear the wind. And Tanya isn't sure the hammock or the rod it hangs from can keep taking those forces, so ninety miles an hour is safer until they get Belmarniss a rigid lightweight container to lie in, or forty if she doesn't like the blanket option.

"Do you know what transportation technology is available on the surface? All I've seen so far is horse-drawn carts, but this is a remote and rural area."

"I'm not sure what else you were expecting, I think horses are standard if you can't teleport and aren't going somewhere accessible by boat."

"Teleports are very rare and expensive, right?" Otherwise the world would run on them and they'd have teleported to the surface and also everything she knows about logistics and transport economics would be wrong because price would no longer be a function of distance or route. "Are there no known ways to move carts - or anything on wheels, or ships for that matter - faster or cheaper than horses do it, whether mechanically or magically? We invented at least two ways to do it mechanically on Earth, as long as you have something to burn as fuel." Railroads need building out, so maybe steamships are an easier first step? Tanya is going to be SO RICH if she can only remember how to build a modern efficient steam engine and not just a toy demonstration of Watt's design. Internal combustion engines are simpler in principle, but they require an oil supply and possibly better machining or something? Definitely something to try reconstructing once she has short-term funding. She only needs enough to convince a real engineer the venture is worthwhile, but she has no credentials and her story might be laughed off..

"They are fifth circle. Everyone who can learn it does, I believe it to be the single least obscure fifth circle spell, the occasional cleric can also get it - but yes, it's rare and expensive. I do not know a lot about carts but don't know of a way to move them without some kind of creature hauling them."

"Long-distance bulk transportation is enormously valuable and benefits the whole economy. I'll have some reading to do, once we find a good library."

"I continue to think maybe you will like Abadarans."

Hmm. Well, it's possible to like Abadarans without liking Abadar, in theory. "What are they like?"

"I've never met one! But you keep reminding me of how they come off in books. Very big on trade and the economy and stuff. I believe they're one of the kinds of clerics that can get Teleport."

Tanya isn't sure she likes the sound of that. "Do you mean there just happens to be a lot of overlap between Abadarans and economists, or that it's part of the actual religion?"

"I expect it's some combination of Abadar choosing economists, economists worshiping Abadar, and people who wind up interested in Abadar even by sheer coincidence being inculcated into economism."

Well, at least it's not nearly as bad as having dogma about economics. If you can't change your mind and create new theories you end up like the Marxists. And even if you get your economic dogma right, your schismatics will change it just to show they're different.

There's probably still some amount of chilling effect from the faithful of other faiths deemphasizing economics or refusing to accept Abadaran theories because religions can't just agree on things, it makes them look silly, but hopefully it's not very bad and sensible governments will adopt good trade policies even if their population doesn't worship Abadar.

"I hope they're good at it, then." The world isn't actually as simple as 'economism', because many people aren't rational, but economics are a crucial part of the picture.

"You can stop in at a temple sometime. Their symbol's the key."

Tanya really hopes she won't have to deal with a temple to participate in trade and the economy!

Are they stopping at the nearer village to ask questions or pushing on?

Belmarniss is pro-stopping! They might decide to take her money and sell them food! Plant food!

Tanya is also in favor! The main downside, after all, was that they might be hostile to drow. Does this mean they're going into the village together? And should they fly all the way in or should she let Belmarniss disembark sufficiently out of sight and then walk the last mile or two?

Definitely together. Walking the last mile seems good, gives Tanya a little recovery time if there's some kind of overzealous guard situation.

Tanya is careful not to get noticeably tired, she's not flying Belmarniss nearly as much as she could if she wasn't keeping herself ready to fight. She was thinking more about what it might look like for her to fly in carrying Belmarniss in an improvised hammock, she has no idea what impression that might give and Belmarniss is the cultural attache. Anyway, they can walk in. Does this place even have guards? Or any magic signatures anywhere nearby?

It's a little slip of a farm village but there is a guy walking around with a spear and a set of leather armor who does look like he's not thrilled to see Belmarniss. "Hey, we're just adventurers passing through, where should I go pay twice the going rate for a loaf of bread?" she offers in Taldane.

The spear guy looks at Tanya.

Is that an agreement to standing discriminatory pricing or merely the starting offer of a negotiation where 'twice the going rate' is merely the bottom? ...no, she's being sarcastic, obviously she's not negotiating the price of bread with the guard.

What does he want from her, does she look like she's Belmarniss's minder even if she's not flying the locals might want to talk to the token human as if she was Belmarniss's patron/owner/license/guard/spokeswoman the way people talked to Belmarniss about Tanya back in Noctimar. Bleh.

"We're passing through and want to buy bread and possibly other food and supplies. Could you please direct us to the bakery?"

"You trust this drow, miss?" he asks.