Part 2: The meeting of paths

"After everything, he doesn't even want to be fixed" Akiran's snout fixes itself into an ugly sneer as this thought pierces his brain. Thoughts fill Akiran's head of roaring about all that was lost today, of forcing the pale one to look at the ruin that was once Lilli's leg & making Ash see the brand of a monster that scars all of their arms. They'd set out today trying to become more than what they were, trying to put the bad blood behind them and become an actual unit. But as Akiran watches Katrin & Sable coddle the man that they went through hell for and came out battered, bloody, but triumphant. Only for him to throw it all away on whim. Akiran comes to the realization that they'd never be more than what they were now.  Sheathing his blade Akiran turns his back on Ash and in a cold scornful tone says  "Do what you gotta do." Retaking his seat next to Lilli, bursts of cold air flowing from his snout as his eyes remained fixed ahead on the wall in front of him. 

At that moment, Ana reenters the cathedral at a dead run. She takes only a moment to survey the tense situation before looking at Ascian with pleading eyes. She speaks quickly, her voice quavering with anxiety and what seems like a good deal of fear. "Ascian, whatever has its hands on you is dark, Darker than you know. Whatever it tells you is a lie. But right now, you need to run. Byer is coming. He'll kill you and anyone he thinks is with you." The deacon reenters the cathedral as well, his paces even but his face contorted with rage. Two armored acolytes armed with spears and shields flank him on either side. He points a finger at Ascian and says, "That one."  "All of you, run!" Ana screams, turning to face the deacon. 

Akiran's initial outburst at Ascian elicited a low-groan from Thezra. Sucking air in through her teeth sharply, she stood looking between the two as the bickering begin. Truthfully, she had felt the same. She'd only not said as much to avoid the same sort of conflict that had arisen not a day before, but it was clear the dragonborn had taken a shine to Lilliana. Couldn't blame him in the slightest for trying to stick up for her. As tensions continued to flare, she found herself silent, unable to get the words her mind was begging her to shout off the tip of her tongue in time to bring things back down. Instead, Ascian... wait what was he...? Her eyes go cold, sinking into their sockets. She mutters an orcish curse, reaching instinctively back for the cool metal of her blade's hilt .  The form of shadow billowing from the boy's pores sends a chill down her spine, the image so clear and sharp even in its brevity. There could be no mistaking what it was; the boy was truly cursed. Possessed. Demonic or otherwise, in that moment all she could see was the form of Duar'ken not a day earlier, snarling in similar ashen form; a remnant of death birthed in blood and darkness.  And he wanted to protect it . Did he though? Did he want to protect it, or did it want him to protect it? Was the boy even in control of his own body? Even with her eyes glued to the scene before her, her mind was elsewhere, wracking her brain for an easy answer and coming up short. Her instincts screamed not to trust him, not to trust  it . Trust in the group was already sparse at the best of times and now -- not a day after clashing over that -- one of them had attacked another. Her eyes flit from Akiran to Ascian and back, squinting as they pass over Katrin, who'd continued to leap to the boy's support even after what he did.  It was only the scream of the bishop that jogged her from her focus. The shaman was returning, with guards. She scowls. Even if she wanted to fight, she knew after a day like today the group was in no condition - physically or otherwise - to mount much of a defense most likely.  Turning quickly she scoops Lilliana up over her shoulder, then pivots back around to Ascian, jabbing a finger towards him and in a steely tone says,  "Ascian I don't know if you're a demon, possessed by a demon, or just letting one control you but we  will  find out and deal with it somehow."  She looks to the others and motions to the exit,  "I'm always down for a fight, but I think the goliath has the right of it. We should move. Now."

" Scheiße ," Sable curses when he sees the deacon and his men. "Alright, we can talk about this later. Everybody out the door, I'll cut them off." The last sentence is spoken louder to build anticipation amongst their pursuers in preparation for the illusory barrier that the wizard has planned.

The Fireblades flee through the large doors of the cathedral. Sable, the last one out, can see bright lights begin to flare from the deacon's hands before he throws up his illusory barrier. Nonetheless, he can feel heat begin to radiate through his barrier as he turns to flee. The sounds of radiant explosions can be heard up to a block away as the Fireblades run. They agree to split up, but both heading for the Wayfarer's Guild. They do not see any signs of pursuit, but after a minute or so, bells can be heard tolling from the direction of the temple. Lilliana, Thezra, and Akiran arrive at the Arcane Minded, bursting through the door. Timm whirls around, looking at them in shock as they pile in. His eyes come to rest on Lilliana's injury. The rush of wind in her face as they fled has almost succeeded in waking her up again. "What is going on?" Timm asks. The tavern is quite busy at this hour as Ascian, Ember, Katrin, and Sable enter. The dwarven bartender, recognizing them for what they are, shows them to their "private table" in a back room, where they find the secret passage down to the guild hall.

Only once they're inside the passage to the guild hall does Katrin allow herself a moment to relax. Her muscles ache from the tension she'd been holding in her body as they'd fled the church. She runs a hand distractedly through her long, blond hair. "Fuck." She looks grimly at Sable and Ascian. "Things just got a lot more complicated." They walk on for a few more moments. "Fuck the church. Fuck everything. Just..." she lets out a long sigh, shaking her head. "Fuck."   

Thezra bolts in through the doorway, Lilli still in her arms. Ignoring the question for a moment, she spins and kicks the door shut behind them, the adrenaline of their sprint through the city still pulsing through her veins. "Wha-?"  When she finally registers what was asked, she turns, heaving, and rushes to place the girl down on the nearest table or couch she can find. Resting her hands on her knees, she holds up a hand as she catches her breath.  "How to... explain ..." she pants out,  "went out for mushrooms, got branded by a dragon, fought an angry rock that ripped this one's leg off, walked up a waterfall, and now a shaman wants to assassinate us. Think that's everything."  Her body finally relaxing after a bit, she slides to the floor, bringing her knees up as she reclines against the wall. "How's your day going?" 

Ascian is quiet, lagging slightly behind the others as he tries and fails to process the addition of one more grievance to the day's list with a mind so overloaded it's gone numb. The reality of the situation is stifled by Ana's words and Thezra's, hitting one after another with as much dull force as his bolts.  Dark. Demon. A lie. Possessed.  It's a litany of all the worst things he'd feared, and now put plainly on the table for all to see. He doesn't know what's worse, the looks before the accusations or the ones that had come after; if Akiran's fury had been preferable to Thezra's condemnation, or infinitely worse. Just that he can't face the weight of either again without breaking entirely, and something already a third of what it should be becomes a fourth. "I'm sorry,"  he mumbles for what feels like the hundredth time, staring at feet that don't feel like his as they make their way into the guild hall; one after another, toward a place he can't stay.  "I don't...I keep getting people hurt." He thinks of Ana, and the explosions; again of his wrists at Lilli's throat and the thought that had come then - that perhaps it was what he was good at, and perhaps that was simply a fact, not a choice.

"Nobody... ...got... ...hurt," Sable wheezes between pants. "Not in the church anyway and if anybody is at fault for Lilliana's leg, it's me. I missed the monster. None of this is your responsibility, Ash." The wizard slumps against the wall rubbing the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. "We should leave the city. Didn't you mention a job in Dragonvale? I suppose Sable is burned..." he adds sadly, removing his hat and turning it over in his hands. "That didn't take long this time."

Katrin nods. "Yes, an escort job. It doesn't leave for a few more days though. But...given what just happened, Dragonvale will be safer than the Crossroads." She suddenly feels very claustrophobic inside the metal chestpiece. "If we need to leave sooner, we can."

Timm's expression is a mix of confusion, faint amusement, and concern as he listens to Thezra. "What...a shaman  is chasing you? What shaman?" He moves to the door of the shop as he speaks and peers out the window. He cocks his head as he hears the ringing bells from the Temple of Pelor. "Oh," he says gravely. "That shaman. Next question: why?"

It's not the first time someone's tried to absolve him of blame today, and that in and of itself feels damning. He doesn't mention Ana, though her fear and the explosions seem indicative that her safety is a falsehood; is still thinking of her wild eyes as the others discuss next steps that he doesn't realize he's staring at the wizard's hat until it's being flipped in the man's hands, twisting as if in slow motion. One more thing that isn't true. His eyes squeeze shut as he tries to ground himself back in the guild hall, but everything still seems to be adjacent to where it should be, as if staring at it all through unfocused eyes. When he opens them again the others are still there, and so is a face he's come to recognize, though it isn't the one he'd hoped to open his eyes to. "Can Thrandimir come back?" he asks fragilely. "Just for a little while."

Breathing heavily his already foul mood reaching new depths. Looking to Timm he growls out "Ash pissed in their holy water, after screwing us over"   looking back to Lilli he lets out a long "Fuuuck! We didn't get the artificer's name." Looking back to Timm "You got anybody that can make a prosthetic? Does the guild have any contacts?"

Sable looks up in surprise, a wry grin playing across his lips. "I thought you wanted Tim?" He asks, intrigued.

He thought he did too, until the thought came of having to face a stranger. "I want you to want Tim," he replies uncomfortably. "I don't know him. I just want to talk to Thrandimir. It doesn't have to be for long."

Sable pushes himself wearily to his feet. "Now, or after some sleep and a wash?" He asks with a chuckle, stretching his arms.

Timm nods. "There is indeed an artificer in town that specializes in prosthetics. I can take measurements now and send them to him tomorrow, if you like," he says.

Sleep.  He's never needed it as badly as he does know, and the siren call of it is immediate as soon as the word leaves the wizard's mouth. The urge to be on a rooftop watching the guild hall wipe clean is as powerful as the desire had been to run from that church; there's answers for him in sleep, and there's Casimir, and there's a world away from the misery he's wrought. It would be here in the morning, logically he knows that. But maybe Thrandimir will be too. "After is okay," he says, looking back over his shoulder, waiting for the others to appear even though in the back of his mind he knows logically it won't be through this door. He looks miserably back to Katrin. "Can you make her something? Could they in Dragonvale. For her leg."

Katrin nods. "We'll get something for her. I'm not particularly skilled in that area of crafting, but there are artificers, here and in Dragonvale. She's going to be fine." The feeling of something pressing in on her from all sides continues to grow, and even as they walk, she's unbuckling her armor.

Thezra follows Timm’s gaze to the window and as the bells toll outside, she anxiously starts to open and close one hand, the weight of her blade ever-present in the back of her mind. “How long would it take to get that made? And how likely is that shaman to break in to the guild? Don’t think we’re looking to stay much longer.”

Timm shrugs at this. "It would be no longer than a day. And while many know of the existence of the Wayfarer's Guild, few know how to get into the guildhall. Deacon Byer, I assume, is the shaman you're speaking of." Timm scoffs as he walks back toward the back room where they lift down to the guildhall is. "He has very little actual authority to do anything immediately. He would need the king's permission to search the city for you, and he's not likely to get it, given the king is away at the front lines of the war at the moment. He isn't due back for a few days."

Lilliana stirs with a soft groan as she takes stock on her body. “Do we have anymore of that really good booze?”  She just lays there, not yet opening her eyes as the weariness and pain settle over her, leaving her feeling more tired than she has ever felt in her short life. “I can still feel it, my leg… is that… is that normally?” She finally sits up slowly with a grunt as she opens her eyes and blinks in confusion. “A shop? I.. where are we?” She looks over and Akiran and Thezra and the open concern on their faces. A cold chill ripples out from her belly. “What happened? Where are the others?”

Forcing a bit of his usual cheer & swagger to his voice "Welcome back kid! That bottles run dry but as soon as this shit blows over we'll buy out the bar!"  His scaley face growing more somber "Yeah that's the way it is. Drove a buddy of mine from the Legion up a wall, said sometimes it'd itch so much he swore it grew back.  He claimed ya get used to it though."  Nodding over Timm "He's gotta contact that can build ya a new leg, but some shit went down at the Church and we'll have ta foot the bill.  He wants to get the measurements, if you're up for it?"

She's going to be fine. It's an assertion Ascian's hands are too slick with guilt to handle and he watches it slip between his fingers, nevertheless unable to disagree aloud.  "Where are they. They should be here."

Katrin casts a faint frown down the hall. "Yes, they should've made it to the Arcane Minded by now. Maybe they're talking to Timm."

Sable stretches again and yawns loudly. "Do we need to go and check?"

A fresh flare of nausea hits Ascian at the thought of having to face Akiran and Thezra again, at odds with the similarly intense desire of knowing they were safe. "I don't...I don't think I can." He swallows, his focus falling to Ember beside him and focusing intently on the sensation of fur knotting beneath his fingers. "Is there another way. A spell."

Sable sighs, but in truth he understands. "Yes, but I haven't learned it yet. You go ahead and I'll check in on them. See you tomorrow?"

He glances to Katrin and back, hesitating - Akiran’s inevitable distaste no matter if he stayed or went a double-edged blade in his mind. “Is that alright.”

Katrin nods, a deep look of concern creasing her face. Ash was becoming increasingly restless, she'd been noticing it since they'd arrived at the church. And loath as she was to let him go alone, she also wasn't going to force him into anything. "Yes, it's alright. I don't know what it is that you need to do, but clearly, it's not something that either of us can help you with right now." She crosses over to him, scratching Ember behind the ear. "Just be careful. And come back. We'll leave this city behind very soon."

A different, duller guilt rises up in him that he swallows back down, nodding slowly. He knows he should tell them, but to do so after the events of the day feels more monumental than even staring down Thezra again; a different kind of disappointment to add to an ongoing slew. He takes a step away from the path, toward the rooftop he knew he could access. "Okay." She sounds sure, and he wants to believe her, but doesn't know how to reconcile the events of the church with them all traveling again. He wants to say more, should  say more, but the words die on his tongue, and with another baleful look between them he backs a step away, and then another, before he's running into the cavern and through the buildings, Ember at his side.

Katrin watches him go, slowly at first, then faster until he and Ember disappear around a corner. She sighs heavily, her chest feeling very tight and heavy with worry. "How do we help him? How do we even work together anymore? They all think he's cursed. He's a being of two worlds. That doesn't make him evil."

"So is Lilliana," Sable notes, still leaning heavily on his staff, grey eyes fixed on the dwarf like cold embers, "and I, if you take the concept less literally. Thezra too for that matter and Akiran doesn't strike me as a pure mercenary. We're all caught between two worlds - even you, Katrin. We help Ash by being there for him when he needs us and right now he needs us to let him have some space while we find the others. If any of them is in the mood to declare him evil, then perhaps I can provide them with a better baseline to compare to."

Katrin holds his gaze, contemplating his words. "I know. Doesn't make it any easier. Though..." she frowns slightly, lingering on his last words. "I certainly hope it doesn't come to anything like that." 

"Nobody said it was easy," Sable reminds her with a laugh, pulling himself back up to his full height. "I will do what I must. Which way is Timm's?"

Katrin smiles wearily. "That way, I believe. Good luck. I'll probably be passed out on a bed by the time everyone gets back." She looks back in the direction Ash had disappeared. "He'll come back. I have to believe he will." With that, she turns, making her way back to their quarters, and the soft bed she knew was waiting for her. 

Sable nods and goes in search of the rest of their companions.

The fact that Akiran didn't elaborate on what the specifics were, she felt it best not to push the issue, but instead focus on the thing that she could control. "As long as the others are safe, I'm okay to do that. Do we know how much we will have to pay? I'll work on paying anyone back if I don't have enough to cover it..."  She says softly. 

Timm shakes his head, his hands outstretch in a placating gesture.  "Should only be 40 to 50 gold pieces. Nothing that will break the bank."  He spends a few long minutes measuring Lilliana's other leg and foot -- from the width of her calf to the length of her phalanges. A clunk from the back of the shop causes him to turn, and Sable steps into the shop, looking somewhat frazzled.  "Well, I'm finished with the measurements."  His fingers trace a complicated arcane sign in the air and he stares off into space for a few moments.  "There. The artificer has the measurements. I can go pick it up from him tomorrow." That moment of stasis between wakefulness and sleep takes Ascian back to that familiar greyscale reflection of the world. Ember rests next to him, both there and not there. Casimir pulls himself up onto the roof and bends over, seemingly winded. The mundanity of the display in this place is almost bewildering to see. Ascian's brother smiles at him as he stands from his bent-double position. "I felt you come back," he says. His eyes take in Ascian's vacant expression and he frowns. "What happened?"

There's a sort of unspooling within Ascian when he opens his eyes to the world he's felt half-in all evening; a deluge of relief that surges past the fragile half-walls he'd attempted to put up to separate himself from Thezra's assertions or Akiran's ire or his own raw, brutal guilt. It barrels through him as soon as he sees his brother, familiar in a hundred ways he can't be considering they've only just met – and resolutely stills in its tracks at the question. The dragon. The drugs. The cave. The mushrooms. The favor. The leg. The brand. The church. The dark. All avoidable, all painful; all his fault. "I hurt them," he says hoarsely, slowly sitting up. Strangely, disconcertingly, it feels realer here than it had back in that cathedral when his vision had been swimming and he'd been half there and half here and half somewhere else entirely.  "All of them. I got them hurt today. Trying to find answers for us."

Casimir sits on the roof next to Ascian. "I'm sorry," he says. He leaves the commiseration hanging in the air for a moment, then says, "Was it actually your fault? What happened?"

"A cleric said she had a ritual that could help us. I told her I'd get her mushrooms in exchange. I took them with me to get them; the others. And a girl lost her leg." He stares miserably at his brother, slowly rolling up his sleeve to bare the dragon's brutal glyph with numb fingers. "We ran into a dragon on the way. It wanted something we wouldn't give up. I could have given it the drugs that let me come here. But I didn't. So it marked us. All of us."

"Everyone alive?" Sable asks the others dryly, still leaning heavily on his staff.

Akiran trying to muster up all the cheer he can "50 gold! They're practically giving it away." Forcing his snout into an approximation of a human smile "Shit for that price we'll have em deck it out, get that rune smith Thezra found to put some protection on it. Hell we can even plate the thing in silver. Ya probably can't see it now but Lilliana the Silver Sorceress, has a good ring to it. A name ya can build a rep off of." In a more sincere voice he adds "Don't worry 'bout the price, you've paid enough. The crew'll bite this arrow." Looking up as Sable speaks Akiran tenses and peers into the corridor behind the man, relaxing after a moment. "We made it, did you & Katrin run into any trouble?

Sable shakes his head. "Just came to make sure that you all made it back safe. If anybody needs me, I'll be sleeping this nightmare off."

sansasnark said: "A cleric said she had a ritual that could help us. I told her I'd get her mushrooms in exchange. I took them with me to get them; the others. And a girl lost her leg." He stares miserably at his brother, slowly rolling up his sleeve to bare the dragon's brutal glyph with numb fingers. "We ran into a dragon on the way. It wanted something we wouldn't give up. I could have given it the drugs that let me come here. But I didn't. So it marked us. All of us." Casimir listens quietly, his green eyes intent on Ascian as he speaks. As he finishes, Casimir meets his gaze, his face a mixture of resignation and compassion. "I'm sorry," he says again. AFter a moment, he looks Ascian up and down. "You were marked by a dragon?"

There’s some strange comfort in not being told it isn’t his fault when he knows otherwise, though it flees as his sleeve pushed past his forearm and the glyph comes into sight. “Yes,” he grimaces. “I owe her a favor. I don’t know what kind. But the others said it won’t be good.”

Casimir's eyes trace the lines of the glyph for a few long moments, his face locked in a frown. "Faerus will want to see that," he says, his voice carrying just enough to reach Ascian's ears.

“Why.”  Ascian’s face creases to match his brother’s, scanning it for answers. “Can he remove it? Do you have dragons, here.”

Casimir shrugs. "I haven't seen one," he says. "It's just the mark of a powerful creature, and it's here now. That's why I assume he'll want to see it."