Terry wanted to stab himself in the eye. That would at least give him an excuse to leave. He hadn’t recognized the fancy dinner trope until he was escorted into the room for the schmoozing before the eating. He’d seen variations on it enough times to understand that he was out of his depth. Some people could navigate these situations. People other than him. He could barely navigate a date where the only things he had to do were try not to embarrass himself too much and avoid talking too much about geeky things until he’d tested the waters. For something like this pre-meal get-together of people he didn’t know and definitely did not want to meet, survival depended on a certain kind of understanding, a way of behaving toward and interpreting others.

After poking the other-knowledge and trying to rouse some kind of response from other-Terry, regular-Terry was left with a sinking feeling. While getting his sorry ass isekai-ed to a new world had come with some kind of bizarre info dump and some new skills he really needed to try to get a handle on, he had not been blessed with an idiot’s guide to Machiavellianism. Knowing this, he had retreated both physically and metaphorically. He dropped back into a corner of the room so no one would wander up behind him. After all, just because he assumed this was generally meant to be a violence-free event, that was no assurance that someone wouldn’t try to off him. He became even more laconic, answering most questions with a shrug or a single word.

It was working, mostly because there were a limited number of people in the room. It seemed that the dinner party was meant to be an intimate affair or some other euphemism for too exclusive for poor, weak, unconnected, and boring people. Terry honestly felt like he belonged in that latter group. He didn’t understand most of what the conversations were about since they revolved around people, events, laws, and ingrained cultural attitudes he knew nothing about. Once the fifth or sixth person had gotten nowhere with him, the rest of the guests started ignoring him. That let him simply stand in the corner, blessedly alone, and count the seconds until this nightmare finally came to an end. Then, a latecomer arrived.

Terry tried not to stare at the Church official in his distinctive robes. His tension, which had been incrementally decreasing, immediately shot back up to one hundred percent. This is bad. This is very, very not good for me. I need to avoid that man. Terry looked around for something large to hide behind for a while. He would have even settled for someone large to hide behind. Beggars couldn’t be too picky, after all. The room, for all its ostentatious glory, was also a wasteland when it came to good hiding spots. Terry gave serious consideration to simply finding a door to slip out of and making a break for it. Unfortunately, his gracious hosts had planted servants at all the doors to answer questions, announce arrivals, and presumably prevent a panicked Terry from escaping quietly. The bastards. Much to his horror, the baronet and his wife almost immediately led the Church guy over to him.

The Church guy looked purely Western. It was almost a parody. He had the squarest jaw, bluest eyes, and fullest head of blonde hair Terry had ever seen in person. The man looked like he ought to be gracing the covers of trashy romance novels. He wasn’t quite on the level of the stupidly pretty people, but he was close. The baronet, a much less cover-worthy specimen, had seemingly left all of the talking duties to his wife. The Lady Silventar smiled brightly and gestured at Terry.

“Your Excellency. May I introduce Terry of the Adventurer’s Guild.”

He had flatly refused any attempt by Amaline, the Lady’s servant, to extract any additional information from him. He’d also denied her many attempts to get him to change his clothes and her one, very polite suggestion that he should disarm. Terry saw the slight crease form between Heletina’s eyebrows as she provided the Church guy with the scant information she had about him. She didn’t let it slow her smooth introductions, though. She gestured at the Church guy and continued.

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“Terry, may I introduce his excellency, Bishop Dallen Syndar.”

The bishop offered Terry a smile and extended his hand.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Terry,” said the bishop.

Terry stared at the extended hand for most of ten seconds before he muttered, “Sure.”

The bishop seemed taken aback and even looked down at his hand in puzzlement before he withdrew it. He frowned at Terry, who resolved to say nothing more to this man if he could manage it. Heletina let out a breathy little laugh that distracted the bishop.

“As you can see, Terry is a man of few words. Still, what would we do without the adventurers?”

“What, indeed?” asked the bishop, shifting a thoughtful gaze back to Terry. “Have you ever been north of here, Terry?”

“Hasn’t everyone?” asked Terry.

If he absolutely couldn’t avoid speaking, he might as well fall back on answering a question with a question. He knew it wouldn’t matter in the end. The bishop would just ask the Baronet or Heletina. They would confirm he’d said he’d come from the north. Of course, Terry wasn’t trying to run a long con on the guy. He just wanted to keep Dallen Syndar guessing for a little while. The more time he spent puzzling over Terry’s true identity and reasons for being where he was, the more time Terry would have to get away from the friendly questions turned into unfriendly questions.

“Ha,” said the bishop. “I suppose that’s true.”

Terry stared at the other man. He hadn’t laughed. He’d actually said the word ha. Who the fuck says ha like they’d say chicken or fork? If that wasn’t an absolute sign that the man was evil, Terry didn’t know what was.

“Do you enjoy being an adventurer?” asked the bishop.

“It’s work,” said Terry with what had to be his fiftieth shrug of the night.

“The Salvation does say that diligence and hard work will be rewarded,” offered the bishop as he gave Terry an expectant look.

Terry looked back at him. He kept looking back at him. He had no idea what the man was fishing for, just that he was fishing. After the silence grew long and decidedly uncomfortable, Terry generated his fifty-first shrug of the evening.

“Sure,” he said.

He did find himself puzzling over that phrase, The Salvation. He could practically hear the other man capitalizing the words. Is that what they call their god? Is it their holy book? Is this shit that everyone here knows? Terry had never been one for religion. He’d lost his faith in other people, who he could actually see with his own eyes, pretty early. That had made invisible parents with strange fixations on rules and rituals an almost impossible sell for him. Now, he wondered if not having a religious background was going to be just one more of a thousand things that were going to bite him in the ass like a coked-up crocodile on a beach full of drunk spring breakers. He noticed the bishop giving him a narrow-eyed look.

“I take it you’re not of the faith,” said the bishop.

It wasn’t a question, so Terry didn’t say anything. He did see Heletina and the baronet trading worried glances. They clearly hadn’t anticipated that inviting the local church bigwig would be problematic. It was equally clear that they weren’t sure how to deal with the obvious tension between their guests. Terry might have considered helping them out, except he didn’t know how. He also didn’t want to. This entire situation had been all but forced on him, and he was happy to make it as uncomfortable and unpleasant as he could without simply throwing silverware around.

“Don’t you find a life without faith empty?” asked Syndar with a decidedly chilly edge to his voice.

Terry tried to decide if that was a question worth answering. He also tried to decide if he had anything to say about that. He wasn’t sure that he did. They were all spared from additional social awkwardness by the door opening and one of the servants speaking in a voice that carried to every corner of the large room.

“The Honorable Kelima Silventar.”

Heletina let out an exasperated breath and muttered, “It’s high time that girl showed herself.”

Terry felt his fists and jaw clench. Whoever was coming through that door had caused all of this trouble for him. When she came through the door, he couldn’t help himself. It wasn’t a thought. It was a reaction. He lifted a hand, pointed, and a word exploded from his lips.

“You!”