Vern is more of a watcher and listener, and he's been through cities and markets before (people may notice he's good at haggling and avoiding getting his pocket picked, if nothing else). He'll likely try to arrange doing errands for coin to try and get established with the people in the marketplace, for starters.

If anyone wants company to browse said marketplace (books!!!), or to gently explore through the various areas and eavesdrop for information, Vern would be down with that -- he likely won't try to get into the palace itself for the moment, but the rest of the city is fairly interesting.