Inside the office, Chris could see the evidence of Lin and Ishani's earlier visit. The sacrificial knife was still wet, looked like a chicken given the feathers around the altar. He sighed again, it was definitely one of those mornings. Blood was splattered all up the side of his hand press espresso machine. Shaking his shaggy head he turned back to his putative team. As he did so his gaze took in most of the office.

The wall to the left of the door was nearly all taken up with an altar made of marble with veins of turquoise and gold running through it. The block of marble was nearly a metre and a half long and about the same high. Its depth appeared to be only a few centimetres at first glance, but a second look would show it as apparently deeper than the room it was in was wide. A third look made it seem to be a fresco on the wall. Tucked into the corner near it was a formica table with an electric kettle, an antique hand press espresso machine and a caddy with the word "TEA" written on it. Under the table was a cheap plastic coated wire rack with some battered mugs with faded prints on. Opposite the door there was a desk which appeared to be wood, but it had somehow melted at the back and become part of the wall, it had the detritus of a data scientist from the mid twenty-first century on it. Papers were scattered haphazardly with titles like Generalization of back-propagation to recurrent neural networks and Graph-theoretical concepts and physicochemical data. The corner of the desk was taken up by a frankly ancient terminal which was clearly intended as little more than an entry point for a super computer somewhere else. The right-hand side of the room just managed to squeeze in a dry-erase board and a bean-bag.

"Could you not have cleaned up after you finished?" Chris asked, looking askance at the pair. Lit's rocky face went an interesting shade of puce, as close as she could get to blushing while still being mostly silicate.

"We were about to when you started shouting in the corridor. Anyway, there's no cleaning stuff in here, how are we meant to clean it?"

Ishani chipped in here for the first time, "Where do you get water for the kettle from too?". Her voice was surprisingly bold and confident, belying the nervousness her physical posture showed.

"I am the avatar of the god of Magic. I am not the avatar of the god of plumbing. Aquae et ventī, mundā!"

The spell pulled the ambient mana from the air and a gentle dew settled on every surface in the room, including the living inhabitants. Then from nowhere a warm breeze came up and quickly lifted the water away, taking with it any dirt, dust or other contaminants.

"Ta-da, magic."

Ishani frowned, her earlier reticence forgotten in a wave of questions about what she'd just seen. "You literally just said 'water and wind, clean', that's nothing like a proper spell. I don't even think you got the conjugation of the verb right. How did you do that? The air was warm too, and the water vanished, that's not physically possible. How did you do that?"

Chris smiled for the first time since he'd gotten off the train that morning. While being the avatar of a god could sometimes be an arduous and thankless task, it had its perks. Perks like this. "I'm the avatar of the god of magic. I'm literally the personification of magic in this realm. I can do anything I want."

His boasting was cut short by a presence suddenly appearing in the room. Lin and Ishani fell to their knees as the altar shone with a light that was simultaneously all colours and none. A mellifluous voice, which was somehow without pitch or tone, yet expressive and warm for all of that, rang out.

"You cannot do anything you want, you can do what I, as your god command and permit. You also need to sacrifice more to me. These children aren't even my followers, yet they were good mannered enough to offer me a sacrifice at my primary altar." The voice managed to sound quite petulant by the end.

"Oh great and mighty Ngaboux, would you like a coffee too?" Chris asked, knowing full well that his god had little need for coffee, but for hundreds of years had been hounding him to offer it.

"Yes, make it the Yirgacheffe, mid-roast."

Lin had taken her feet again and moved to the bean bag to sit down, while Ishani remained on her knees, face pressed to the floor in obeisance.

"Oh, do get up child. This is my inner sanctum, we can dispense with protocol here." Ngaboux's voice had changed as suddenly the overwhelming presence receded. Next to the altar stood an androgynous human form, wearing what appeared to be a chiton.

In the corner, Chris was already trying to wrap his massive paws around a tiny Hario hand grinder. He struggled for a few seconds then growling he put it down and concentrated. The transition back to human was just as painful as its counterpart, but good coffee was worth the sacrifice. Now with appropriately sized thumbs and fingers, Chris picked the grinder back up, reached into nothing and pulled out a scoop of beans that immediately filled the small, and now rather crowded room, with the aroma of freshly roasted coffee.

Ishani was struggling to not throw herself back down on the ground as she tried to move to the corner of the room furthest from the manifest god. Lin grabbed her arm and pulled her to the beanbag to sit beside her. By the press, Chris was conjuring boiling water from thin air, without so much as a gesture or spell. Ngaboux smiled and sat down on a chair which hadn't been there a moment ago and rested their arm on a table that similarly wasn't there until it was. The table couldn't actually fit in the room, but apparently that kind of thing wasn't a problem when you were a god. "Ishani, I thank you for your offering. You want to know how my chosen one can perform magic without the structure that you've seen is needed. Let me explain, because that oaf definitely won't."

"I heard that, which am I a chosen one or an oaf?" Chris interjected

Ignoring him, Ngaboux continued "This temple is close to my home realm, close enough that those of us who are divine, or our chosen representatives in this realm, can manipulate the magic at will. The chant he did wasn't necessary at al. I personally think he just enjoys the melodrama. You should hear him when he's drunk, he's always 'Why do I have to live like this!' and 'If only I'd gone home on time that day!'" Ngaboux smiled and accepted the offering of espresso from Chris. "Of course, then you get times like today where he can show off to a pretty young thing. He doesn't seem to bemoan his lot so much on those days."

"She's a child, hell, everyone's a child to me now. You need to bring some of the longer lived races to visit. I've not dared to start a relationship since my fifth wife, and that was what, a hundred and fifty or so years ago?" Chris paused as he emptied out the grounds from his espresso press and readied another shot. "They say that on the other side there's people who live as long as me and never seem to worry about being lonely."

Ishani looked at Chris in a confused manner, "Well the main bridgepoint is in an elven city, the moment you go there you're surrounded by people thousands of years old. Why don't you just spend some time there?"

"I'm not allowed to cross the bridge, never been over there. I'm only allowed on this side, if I crossed over, everyone here would have a very bad time."

Ngaboux picked up the thread then, "Chris, my avatar, is the anchorpoint for the system of magic in your realm. If he leaves it, so to would the system that guides and trammels your expression of magic. But now you need to go, Arun will be here shortly to take you to gear up." They turned to their avatar and smiled, regret and love warring on their face. "I think this dive will not be easy on you. Take heart, I'm always with you and trust in this young one. She has potential that I think you'll enjoy."

"Are you match making? I mean if she gets picked to be an avatar, will she be immortal too?"

"Firstly, I wouldn't inflict you on another person, you're nearly three hundred and I've seen the state of your flat, you are a lost cause. Secondly, most avatars are not undying like you. Remember that you're not immortal. You have my protection, and you can extend it to others, but you are not immortal. You'll have to remember that today. I can't say any more, guild rules you know."

"Guild rules my foot. Thanks for the heads-up though."

"Thank you for the coffee" with that Ngaboux stood up and discorpoated, the table and chair vanishing as they did. The empty coffee cup fell to the floor, bouncing on the carpet and disgorging the dregs.

"I really wish she wouldn't do that. Do you guys want coffee too?" Chris waved his hand and the coffee vanished, the espresso cup cleaned itself and moved to the shelf by the espresso press.

Lin stood and stretched. "There's something about meeting a god, it never gets old. I feel energised and enervated at the same time. C'mon junior, we've got to get some kit. No time for coffee. Kitty boy, time to cat up."

Ishani followed in Lin's wake, like a small boat trapped behind a destroyer. Chris swigged back his coffee and hurried after them, muttering under his breath about the fact that this was meant to be his team.