In which there is a death

The Soldier's Defense is... unnaturally quiet today. Somber in the wake of the attack that took place last night. Though the floors and walls have been scrubbed clean, and the bodies carried away, nothing can steal the hush from the air that lingers. Those that talk loudly get sharp looks from those sitting nearby. Even the number of people here has died away, leaving only those essential and it seems like they might be a bit short on volunteers today the way the few that can be seen are hustling.

Zeke is among that number, busily bringing a pile of handkerchiefs to a bedside. The woman there coughs heavily and wetly. From the cough alone it's clear she has the plague that is defying every effort to cure it. He bends to offer her a new one and tucks away the little pile she's made of blackened old ones. Then kindly he leaves her a new stack to use up as she wills. She thanks him quietly and he offers her a low nod before stepping away.

One of the volunteers is a little shorter than many of the others, and the only thing that can be seen of her are her eyes and hands. Everything else is covered in the traditional white of a nurse/volunteer. Zeke soon has a little shadow and may feel a tugging at his sleeve. "Hey, good to see you're unharmed after the events of yesterday.", she says cheerfully.

Zeke startles at the sudden tug on his sleeve, jumping away from the shadow at his side and giving a frightened little hiss before he can stop himself. Green eyes narrow, and clear fear is evident in his eyes as he takes in the familiar form of Acedia in her unfamiliar clothing. "Assedia!" He almost hisses her name and then swallows, straightens, glances around a little and then looks back at her. "Thisss one wasss not here when it happened."

He sounds displeased and he carefully straightens his cloak about himself. "How did you hear of it?" The blue-scaled sith-makar begins walking again, this time a little more slowly.

The little Gobbo in white blinks and takes a step back at the hiss. "Yes, it's me.", she says matter of factly. "I am happy you are not injured. And uhm, it's all over the place now. Everyone knows about it." She holds up her wee, gloved hands. "That's why I am helping out." She tugs down her mask to show off a toothy grin.

Kruulvog walks into the hospital, oblivious to the unusual ambience, as he is utterly new to the place, but owing to his normal xenophobia, it seems that he has come from some motivation sufficiently drastic to overcome his reluctance. Trying his best to go unnoticed by most, he skulks into the place and bombs his attempt at stealth by tripping over someone's foot and falling noisily into a table from which his collision sends a collection of steel instruments flying through the air. He says, "Ow!" and "Sorry." in a sibilant voice as a green snake escapes from his pantleg.

In response to Acedia, Zeke offers a little nod. He might even have replied if not for the sudden commotion beside them. Thankfully neither of them are tripped over, but Zeke quicken's his pace seeing that he is the only one nearby save for Acedia. He stops just a handspan away from the half-ourch who fell and looks the other over quickly. "Are you okay sssir?" He leans cautiously closer.

Acedia follows Zeke to Kruulvog's side, the Gobbo smoothing her white clothing nervously. "Are you alright, then, Kruulvog? Do you need any healing?" She starts picking up the scattered instruments as quickly as possible, so that they do not get stepped on.

Kruulvog looks nervously at the two who approached him so near and so solicitously. He says, "I am not well." He is glowing, like he's been exposed to rather a dangerous amount of radioactivity. He continues, "Sticky, black, gooey. Not the sweet blackwaters of before."

Life has been... odd for Lysa of late. She's been out of Alexandria on one mission or another... and she has oddly been avoiding the temple of Daeus. At least while that weird angelic being was there. After all, in her home culture, one does not look upon the celestial servants of the gods. It just isn't done.

But her ship has just come in. Literally. Yes, she sailed into the port, grabbed her kit and headed straight to the Soldier's Defense. After all, this is a place she can still be useful, and not like.. bump into divine entities. At least she hopes she won't. That's how the blonde teen steps inside. She doesn't tend to wear her full plate armor in town, but she -does- have that fine sword on her back.

A green-scaled viper slithers toward the clumsy half-oruch and up his abdomen under his shirt as he lifts himself off the floor.

Zeke blinks twice, once with his inner eyelids and once with the outter. For a moment he's silent and then he nods. "Can you get to your feet ssir? Can you make it to a bed?" He motions to an empty one close by even as he takes in the other's odd blue glow and considers his symptoms. "Have you been coughing up black sssticky ssubsstansce?"

The Gobbo slowly pulls the mask back up over her face, and then carefully puts all the instruments back on the tray, which she places back on the small side table that Kruulvog had collided with. Acedia then spots the green viper and squeaks, suddenly clinging to Zeke's leg. "It.it.it's a s.sn.snaake!"

Glancing over at the squeak of the Gobbo, Lysa lifts a brow, "Yes. It is being a snake. Odd that one would be being in a place such as this." But yes, it's been a couple of weeks since she's been in here. She traverses the room with her eyes and inquires, "Is this being the new plague that I have been being hearing about?" She does not seem concerned that she might get sick. Stupid paladins. "How may I be being of aid?" she asks as she steps over, casually placing herself between the snake and the Gobbo.

The moment that Acedia attaches herself to Zeke there's a problem. The sith-makar's eyes widen and then suddenly he's hissing a high-pitched noise. It sounds remarkably like water hitting a hot skillet. He claws at his leg to get her to let go, his breath harsh and fast. "No pleassssssse." He tries to step away from her but she's... attached. He hisses louder realizing that he's /touched/ and rushes forward /into/ Lysa. A fact which only causes him to rebound and emit a pained moan. Not that hitting her hurt him so much as that he's now creating an odd sibilant moaning noise. "Pleassse." His hands are held out before himself, his body shaking like a leaf on the breeze.

The Gobbo squeaks again after bouncing around attached to Zeke. She ends up hiding under the small end table that tripped up Kruulvog, where she watches silently, eyes darting about as if trying to spot the snake again.

Kruulvog looks at the bed indicated by Zeke, then stands weakly up and heads for. He sits on it, evidently fatigued to exhaustion, and answers the sith'makar, "No, or not yet, at least. I did find some by the sewer entrance, and having previously enjoyed a magical black water that I had encountered at a pool in the forest, then again in the sewer, I assumed this was more of the same, and bent down to slurp some up, but it was neither sweet nor as fluid like the magical waters of before, the waters that had come alive." Is he serious or delirious? Either way, he doesn't seem in possession of normal mental faculties.

Eyeing the glowing Oruch as the man goes and speaks of trying to drink black sewer water, or whatever... Lysa is bumped into. Now, it should be noted. She weighs just a bit over half as much as the Sith-Makar who slammed into her. This means... that due to this crazy thing called physics, she gets shoved back further than the Sith-Makar rebounds off of her. She ends up on her butt, having backwards-tripped over a cot, with a stack of folded towels flopping off of a counter onto her head and body.

From down there, she just... blinks a bit, unsure of what just happened. But then she turns her head to the left and sees the Gobbo hiding about six feet from her. "This is not being normal activities for this place." she explains. "Please be being accepting my apologies."

The only one that seems unphased by all of this is the half-ourch really. Zeke is free from entanglements now so he takes a deep hissing breath and then another. Then another. "Thisss one iss to blame. Thisss one is ssorry." He bows his head and then shakes it slowly. With a low noise he moves toward the half-ourch and speaks up. "Asscedia, help the woman up pleassse. Thiss one will help you." This last he offers to Kruulvog. Trying to listen to the others details though they lead to confusion.

"You drank ssome black liquidsss in the ssewer? How are you feeling?" Zeke tries to narrow down why the other man is here with simple questions.

Acedia stares at Zeke in silence for a few moments, before scurrying out to offer Lysa a hand up. "Are you okay?", she wonders, eyeing Lysa and Zeke. She blinks and stares at the Oruch. "Ewh, you drank sewer water?"

Kruulvog turns to Acedia and says, "Not just ANY sewer water, little one. I am a witch and so I hold that consuming magical substances, imports the magic into my being, thus growing my own magical power. Anyway, since I put my tongue to this gooey imitation, I've not felt well, and my spells have done nothing to alleviate my discomfort." As he finishes speaking, his body convulses into a mini-seizure which lasts about a minute then leaves him unconscious and choking as black ickiness starts bubbling from his mouth. The snake emerges again from the neck of the shirt and coils itself into a spring, then jumps off, heading for under the bed.

Accepting the Gobbo's hand, but also using her other hand on the nearby cot for support, Lysa gets to her feet. She bends and begins picking up the towels. "Can you be being telling us precisely where you were being finding this liquid that you tried to drink?" she asks. "Perhaps if we could examine it, we might be being helping you."

Zeke is paying no attention to anything around them save the half-ourch's words, and when the man starts to go into a fit he grabs one of the handkerchiefs he had been holding and uses it to start mopping up the ichor. "Do not just stand there! Get help!" He barks this order at Acedia and Lysa; having little care that they are not really his to order about. Meanwhile he tends to the sewer-drinking ourch in question as best he can, tilting the man's face off to the side so that he doesn't drown in the black liquid pouring upwards.

Acedia huffs as the Woman tugs on her, and eyes Kruulvog as he starts to convulse. She flinches as Zeke barks his orders, and she scurries out of the room. Somewhere in the distance there's a shriek, followed by shouting a few moments later. A short time later, nurses and a doctor arrive, looking a little ... harried.

The convulsions startle Lysa into motion. She rushes forward and offers, "I am being volunteering as a part time nurse here. How can I be being assisting?" Her voice is calm, like someone used to dealing with stress in a crisis. But she is already reaching to help restrain the convulsing body of the man.

"Keep him on the bed, but do not hold him down. If you plasce sstresss on hiss body it may break itsself." He motions for her to stand on the other side of him. He keeps slight pressure on the half-oruch's head, enough to keep it tilted to the side. It's to no avail however, and by the time the doctor and nurse arrive... the half-ourch is no longer with them. The ooze-caked cloth falls from Zeke's fingers and he gently lowers his head to hear if there is any further heartbeat.

The doctor backs them all away, pronouncing the half-orc dead a few seconds later and closing his eyes for the last time.

A sigh escapes Lysa's lips. She lifts a hand and grips her holy symbol, her whispered voice uttering a soft prayer for the fallen half-oruch. "We need to be being finding this.. pool of liquid. It could be being the key to solving this."

A small pile of towels wanders into the room and remains still by the doctor. It does sniffle, though, at times.

"Send word to the temple of Vardama about the body, it needs to be burned immediately." The doctor turns to his nurse who nods and she hurries away. Meanwhile he turns to Zeke. "Keep an eye on this would you? Until the Vardaman's come by to pick it up."

Wordlessly Zeke ducks his head obediently and stands a little closer to the body. Slowly he pulls a crystal hand out from beneath his cloak and uses it to start wiping away exis ichor from his fingers. "Resst in the armss of the Dragonfather."

Nodding slowly, Lysa remarks, "I will be being watching over his remains." She has sympathy in her voice, compassion in her expression. But there is a steel there. She is wondering if this plague is just happenstance, or... engineered. If the latter, she has silently vowed to do -something- nasty about it.

Another sniffle, this time louder and at length. "Is. Is he going to be okay?", a scratchy voice wonders. That pile of towels hasn't moved, despite the doctor's leaving.

Turning to regard the pile of towels, Lysa says softly, "No little one. He is not being getting better. The poor creature is no longer being with us. He has gone to meet his god."

"He iss dead Asscedia." Zeke says this gently, picking up the top few towels so that he can see Acedia beneath them. Gently his crystalline hand moves them to the side and then disappears behind his cloak.

Acedia sniffles once more. "So what do we do now?" She buries her face in the top towel. "More people are going to die, aren't they?"

"Unfortunately, yes." says Lysa gently as she steps closer to Acedia and goes down to one knee, "But, all that we can be being doing, is helping where we can. It is good and noble of you to be being here helping. I intend to be being searching the sewers for this.. black sludge soon."

"Thiss one thanksss you." He stops and looks at Lysa. "Thiss one does not know your name, but thiss one appreciatess you looking into it. Thiss is a terrible ssicknesss, and thisss one iss bussy helping the sssick." Zeke looks around the room briefly. The black ichor still stains his fingers. He'll need water to clean them properly.

Snuffling loudly into the towel, the Gobbo snorts and looks to Lysa. "Do not go by yourself." Acedia looks to Zeke, and offers up one of the hot, wet (not yet sullied by her tears and snot) towels to the Sith. "I'm Acedia.", she says to Lysa, "And this is Zeke."

Zeke takes one of the towels and uses it on his hand gently before offering it to Lysa to clean her hands with. His tail flicks twice back and forth. "Thiss one iss not ssure if one sshould be hoping it iss natural and thuss no one is /doing/ thisss thing. Or if one sshould hope that it iss sso that they can be asssked how to cure it." He sighs heavily with a light hiss. "If thossse that find the perssson ressponssible think to asssk. Many will be angry if it isss a perssson."

Acedia offers Lysa one of the hot and wet towels, before putting the rest on the small side table. And quietly begins to sidle out of the room, sniffling sadly.

Accepting the towel, Lysa cleans her own hands. She's not in her armor today, just a simple linen tunic and a pair of trousers that fit loosely over her fit frame. "No, I will not be being going alone. Would you like to be being going with and watch my back noble Acedia?"

“...thank you, ser." The quiet, unassuming voice could come from no more an unlikely source. Chay ducks his head as he exits the side door. The Althean, a healer of heavy yet soiled robes, could look no more tired or--she's reached a point of tiredness where a person lacks expression.

It's that lack of expression that she turns to Chay. "Yeah," she says. Nods.

Then, shuts the door. Chay looks down at his hands. He's holding...something. He worries at it for a moment, and then tucks it away.

Zeke is picking up all the dirty laundry as he 'guards' the body that he's been left in charge of, and tries gently to clean up the body somewhat too though its clear he has little practice in the matter. Which is when he notices Chay and brightens immensely. "Chay." He makes the name a greeting, loud enough to be heard but definitely not actually calling out to the other sith-makar. "What are you doing here?"

The Gobbo simply stops in the doorway, perhaps making Chay's entrance a bit awkward. She doesn't answer Lysa right away, but slowly turns around, and wobbles her way to the woman's side. Where she buries her face in the woman's side and bawls noisily.

One of Lysa's hands reaches around Acedia's shoulders. She feels like a big sis here and now, and certainly has no racial prejudices she holds to. Zeke's words of ... ahem.. greeting to Chay make her blues eyes flicker up and look towards first Zeke, and then in the direction he himself is looking. But at the moment, she doesn't speak.

"...Zeke?" the word is quiet. Perhaps the place demands it. The bawling gobbo--he flinches, and stumbles backwards. Brings his hands up for a moment. HIs breathing comes fast and then slower, as he lowers his arms. Looks towards the gobber, the other sith-makar. "Hunting, ser," he says. Takes another, steadying breath.

A nod to those there. "Pease to your nests," he says. "One is...one is sorry things are as they are. I...was the passing recent, sers?" he asks, and lowers his muzzle.

Zeke moves slightly to the side so that he can see Chay better around Lysa and Acedia. His green eyes darken and stay that way as he bobs his head. "It happened jussst ssecondss ago. It wasss..." Zeke trails off with a glance toward the body as his claws wrap around the cloth he is holding. "Bad. Asscedia... you sshould go. Thisss iss a bad place for you." His voice is gentle toward the little goblin. "You can be of help elsssewhere."

The crying stops suddenly, and the Gobbo looks up at Lysa a moment, before she looks to Zeke. She snarls. "Tryin' t'chase me away again!" Acedia wiggles from Lysa's hold, and stomps out, shedding pieces of her little volunteer's uniform, leaving her in plain homespun clothing. The door is -almost- slammed, but stops just short at the last moment. Stomping footsteps can be heard all the way to the front door.

That gets a dark look from Lysa. She narrows her eyes and turns to follow the Gobbo. Where pieces of uniform are discarded, she pauses to bend and retrieve them. But ultimately, she follows Acedia, intending to speak with the Gobbo and try to talk her into continuing the noble work of a volunteer.

"Recent, sers?" the sith-makar asks. He looks towards the gobbers, the human. Inclines his head again. Not...quite a sith-makar gesture, but not entirely not, either. "..." He looks towards the bits of uniform, clothes. "...one...may one ask a question, sers?" he asks. "It may be uncomfortable sers, but...one hopes to assist."

The Gobbo might be heard through most of the hospital, but has run off by the time Lysa gets to the door, the little white mask left there.

Zeke watches Acedia leave in a huff, one claw upheld to stop her, but it falls to the side under the weight of Lysa's harsh look. He flinches away from it, and seems to shrink back a little bit. He does not offer her a goodbye nor even to Lysa who hurries a way's off after her. Instead he looks at Chay somewhat hopefully. "Thisss one might be of asssssitancse?"

Chay watches the duo a moment, as they near the door--and then looks back. He blinks once, his eyes lighter. "With appreciation, sser. One...one wondered if the blood had changed color at all, ser. And, perhaps--the name of the latest victim?"

The tail moves side to side, then lowers, slowly.

"I do not know hissss name." Zeke seems saddened by this fact, moving back toward the corpse and lifting one of the half-ourch's limbs slightly. Now that the other is dead Zeke's touch is far less cautious than it would have been in life - as in he is touching the other at all. He peers down at the wrist he lifts and then looks at Chay. "Yesss. How did you know? Hissss blood iss black!"

"...it sseemed a logical leap, ser," the sith-makar says, uneasily. He looks to the side, his look quiet. His body language quiet. "...ser, if one might. If one might, ser, perhaps we might place some of the blood in a bowl and...retreat to a quiet space, ser? One would not distrub others, ser but--" a swallow. "The People know of Blood, sser."

Zeke looks uncertainly at the body then around to see if anyone is nearby. There isn't, so after a moment's hesitation he picks up a cup from the bedside table nearby and brings it over to the body. A little of the blood is spilled down into the cup, Zeke occasionally looking around to see if anyone has any intention of stopping him but... Nobody does and with the task done he huffs out an uncomfortable breath, his lips closed tight and motions for Chay to leave so that they can go to another room. There's an empty room just a little ways away from them and Zeke knows the way well enough to lead them to it.

‘Excuse us, sers," are the quiet words. Quiet body language. Quiet...everything. If the seven foot sith-makar could shrink to five and pale, he probably would. He follows a respectful distance behind Zeke, though.

Closes the door. "...thank you for trusting me, sser. One...there is magic ser. One knows the shaman know of it, but hunter-caste--" he says, and his voice falters. "...hunter-caste studies as well. It asks the blood its history."

"Would it not be very interesting, ser," he asks, and tilts his head to the side. "If this blood was so transformed, and thickened by opposing magics, that it was /unable/ to resspond?"

The blue-scaled sith-makar looks at the cup in a sort of hopeful confusion before setting it down politely on the stand that the room holds. It's one of the private rooms here, usually reserved for those about to die so that they could speak to their families in peace. Now it's empty because the person who was here is dead. The rooms are far too transient these days. "You know thisss sspell?" Zeke watches Chay with interest, he himself slightly bent so that he takes up less space and less.... everything. He remembers the last time they shared a room this small. "It would tell uss sssomething at leasst. Now we know nothing."

"...it is limited in sscope, ser. It is not the strength of the shaman-caste. It is...it hunter's magic, sser. A quick answer on the field, sser." Chay crouches near Zeke, and looks across at him. "Were it from the sshaman caste, sser, one would not perhaps, learn the spell."

He looks away, and down. "At least not directly, kin," more quietly. Ah. Truth. A rare enough thing, from this sith-makar.

Or a direct answer about not being direct. One of the two. Chay then reaches up, and pricks his thumb with the opposing claw. Then, brushes the Blood across his muzzle, between the two nostrils.

He leans forward, and inhales over the blood--not touching it--Zeke permitting he do so.

"The hunterss have great sstrength." Is Zeke's quiet opinion, his green eyes watching Chay. He seems to realize what Chay is saying, and tucks it away inside his own mind for now. Perhaps he can be a source... but that is not for now. The sith-makar allows his kin to inhale the blood, his flicking tail the only sign of his emotions giving away that he is... uncomfortable. Something close to uncomfortable.

The muzzle twitches. Had Zeke been among the People, he might recognize the look. A look of past-ages, of not-quite-there. Of being too far inside yourself, and edged with a draconic fervor.

A draconic fervor that, lazily, sniffs around at the world around it.

"Ssserrr...it is blood, sser. It is still blood," he says, and seems to need to organize his thoughts.

Zeke takes a small step away from Chay, not wanting to interfere with the spell or Chay's senses right now. He considers speaking, his mouth opening twice before he considers that it may not be wise to offer anything just yet and then because of Chay's words he finally speaks anyways. "Whossse blood hunter?" It's a quiet question just loud enough to be heard.

"...he called himself Kruulvog, sser. This is his form, sser--he was of oruch blood. The ...the cursse has not changed his look, sser. It has not hidden it, sser. He passed today and...curses ssomething...ssomething he ingested, sser. There is a foulness around his mouth. He curses at a feeling in hiss sstomach." The tail flickers once, in a controlled way before having no gesture at all. He looks up to Zeke. "Does...this match with what you know, ser?"

The blue-scaled sith-makar nods his head. His tail sways from back to forth and back again, clearly pleased. "Yesss!" It's an excited little hiss. "He ssaid he drank... ssewer water." There's a flash of disgust. "And sssweet black water he sssaid." Now though the sith-makar grows still and thoughtful. "I thought he wass fever-talking."

""The others ser, they worked in professions which would ...which they would become thirsty, ser. Most of the others. ...except the tailor, ser. They led active lives. If there is blood left, or rags left..." he looks towards Zeke hopefully, but...one could guess what the answer may be. He does not expect hope.

This... is a request that Zeke is uncertain of. He tilts his head in a raptor-like way, a quick movement into thought and stands there. "I think... That you will have to hurry Chay. They mean to burn the bodiesss of the dead after what happened yesssterday. But they are all here under guard until then."

"I...then one may move quickly, sser. If...if it is permissible, sser. Please tell them a hunter wishes to--wishes to examine the bodies. A hunter of Gilead, sser. They may understand, then," Chay says. "If--one may ask," he adds. He leans forward, and rubs at his eyes with thumb and forefinger.

Zeke has a fire lit in his eyes now. The possibility of answers! His tail wags back and forth. "I know jussst who to assk." He motions for Chay to follow him, picking up the cup of blood and carrying it out the door into the hospital proper. Now he walks with certain steps, his head held high for what seems like the first time.

"Kin," Chay says. He looks down at the earth as he stands. He stands more swiftly though. More easily. By the time he gets to the door though, he's back to his quiet stoop--a seven foot lizard, trying to vanish into the crowds. He tugs his collar around him.

The first sign that a new patient has come into the Defense is the sort of wet, vibrating coughing noise attainable only by those who have decided that if lungs have to be cleared, *effort will be put in.* The second sign is a spitting sound, like one has just hacked up half a lung and doesn't like the taste.

The third sign, of something thick and moist splattering on the ground... doesn't come.

Instead, a *supremely* annoyed Alba drifts around a corner, her mask discarded.... And replaced by some sort of sausage-casing, hurriedly affixed to leather straps and tied about the dark Witch's face and chin, allowing her nose to breathe freely.

The sausage casing is tied off at the far end, and half-full of a black, tarry globby substance.

Oh god.

"...witch?" comes the words from beyond the sausage casing. "...kin, one knows of this witch. She has helped..."

"Me, sser. She has helped me," he says, pushing the words past. Directness does not come easily to Chay. More loudly, "Witch! It is Chay, sserivce to the Hunter Dragon. Are you able to speak?"

Stena, of course, is already here. She was exposed to horribleness earlier and oh god what there's horribleness here now?! Black tarry horribleness.

"Oh," she says with a sigh.

Zeke changes direction smoothly, following Chay. He says nothing to this strange person, but watches the end of her... sausage swing with vivid attention to its detail. "Sshe hass the plague too." He says this quietly as though Chay and perhaps Alba does not already know this.

"One hears, ser," Chay says, voice hoarse. "...then, one may not know how long she has her voice, ser. ...one will move quickly, ss-sser."

He looks back to Alba and steps forward. He stops short of her--short for Chay, meaning a meter's distance. A healthy distance, for anyone else. For him--remarkable. "Alba, sser. ...What was the last thing you ate or drank, sser, before this came on to you?" asks the reptile.

"And--and where were you, ser? If one may ask, ser." He lowers his hands to his sides. He doesn't know what to do with them.

"It tastes of festering rat entrails and direwolf gall and *I want it gone,*" Alba seethes in answer to Zeke, her voice hoarse and crackling. But as Chay approaches, the legendarily prickly Witch forces more calm upon herself, and... she even deigns to let her feet touch the ground. Mostly.

"It was a creature, Hunter," she says after a moment. "A mage-born thing, it looked exactly as what you see--" she waves negligently at the sausage casing "--within. The Noble Quarter, it and two like it were menacing, and great effort was needed to take them down."

A sigh becomes another wet, hacking cough, and another gob added to the sausage. No one should ever have to see a sausage get made. "But this sickness it left, when it made to engulf me and was repelled. For a week, I have sought to uncover its makeup, its weakness. For a week, I have failed."

Hope. Hope is a dangerous thing. As its scattered entrails settle over the floor, Chay looks towards the earth and guards his expression. Man Sitting, that is. At this time, he could be a painting by the Gustavi. "--what we know ser, is it acts more akin to a curse, ser, than any disease. What--what preparations have you run through, s--Alba?" he asks her. For, if anyone is an expert on the twists of the arcane--

Zeke takes a step back from Alba, and then another, hiding somewhat behind Chay who at the moment seems far braver. He swallows a little lump in his throat but doesn't quite work up the courage to talk to her. Instead he leaves the questioning to Chay.

"The whole of my stock of alchemicals," Alba mutters sullenly. While that may sound impressive to anyone else, Chay might be able to guess that such a procedure probably consisted of throwing some noxious ingredients into a pot, hacking into it, and lighting a fire. One hopes she managed not to confuse her alchemical cauldron with her stewpot, if this is true.

"That it would be closer to curse, did not occur. Ideas I may have... And ears I may bend."

The sausage-casing is batted a bit, like a cat with a squishy toy on a string. "Samples I have saved, if experimentation is needed."

...Oh god she's making a drop-off.

"...one knows where, sser. ...have you the ability now, to dispel a curse?" Chay asks. He looks directly to Alba. Subconsciously, steps in front of Zeke in a way that says, whispers, this is who this _could_ be.

But not yet.

He looks to Alba. "Ser...one has learned to...tug at magic's tendrils. One might...lend strength, sser. Or healing, sser. Tell this one what you need."

Zeke seems somewhat grateful for Chay's cover, watching Alba from around it. He still doesn't say anything, but he looks far more comfortable now than he had a moment ago. "Thisss one isss a... sservant of Daeus. If that helpsss." He offers suddenly and to the complete surprise of himself.

"....This is a thing I may do," Alba muses, pursing her lips. "...Another room, I shall wish, for us to work in. If it is a thing that works..." Her eyes dart up to Chay, then to Zeke, one eyebrow rising. "...Remedies I may make of the magics. Remedies that may need the will of branch and fang, the warmth of the sun. Hnnn, yesss--" And her inward, satisfied hiss at the possibility of another puzzle defeated, turns into another racking cough.

"Rrrrrrrackgh," she spits, then her eyes alight onto Chay's scaled face. "One would be foolish to spurn the offer of aid. Doubly foolish, should the gods wish to lend their power to my benefit. Many things I may be... But no fool am I. Is this so, Friend Chay?"

"The witch sheltered this one from slavers, kin of mine," Chay says to Zeke. He looks down, perhaps. Thinking of other kin, of--

His family is small. But important. He looks back to Alba. "And the witch knows of curses, sser. And bravery. Witch, this is ...this is one's newest kin. He is scarred, too." The tail dares not move, for fear of giving something away. Anything away. "He knows of this place. It is him you must ask for a room."

Zeke's tail flicks at the mention of himself, and again at the mention of his being... scarred. It makes him shift his weight to better hide in shadows his left side. "If she isss one who aided you, ssshe iss friend of mine." He nods to her, but doesn't really seem less cautious. He does however make a motion for her to follow him. "I can take you to the room we were in before. It will be empty for ssome time."

Zeke leads the way to a small unoccupied room, settling the cup of blood down once more nervously and making himself as small as he can in this small place. It doesn't work very well.

A blink. An almost-flinch. "Thank you, kin," he says to Zeke. He watches as Zeke makes himself small, and sees perhaps himself in those actions, too. Unconsciously, Chay stands straighter, and looks back towards Alba.

"My thanks," Alba mutters to Zeke as the three find their room. Her eyes fall on the less-familiar Sith as Chay names him 'scarred,' and linger a moment... but it's not long before her interest is diverted to the cup of blood. "Whose blood is thiss, then?"

"One of oruch and human descent, Alba," Chay says. The hunter's features go bland again, before twitching, struggling...and sympathy shows there, shining through the cracks. Perhaps not a question Alba wishes to ask. At least the rest of it.

"Hiss name was Kruulvog, and he died to the plague today not long before you arrived." Zeke's soft but deep voice carries easily through the small room.

"Already claimed its first victims, eh?" says Stena, tiredly. She is sad to hear that, it would appear.

She rubs her face.

"...true, ser," Chay says suddenly, surprised at the--surprised at the voice. He hadn't seen Stena there, and the sith-makar mentally curses himself. He seems to shrink back, or starts to.

Except his heart, his breath is moving too fast. He looks to Alba directly, orange eyes wide and... he straightens his back. A little. "When," he asks roughly, "When should be begin, sser?"

"...Ah," Alba says after a long pause. "Then let us hope that it takes no more, for already I know of others who are likely to need its cure."

Not herself, though... Either the Witch is supremely confident, or slightly respectful. Either way, she strips the sausage-casing from her mouth, revealing lips stained a mottled black, and looses a long, burbling breath. "So. Soonest begun."

Settling down in the center of the room, seated in the easy cross-legged style of one used to life in a tent, she looks up at each of the three in turn. "If there are no objections, I wish to keep this mass within me not one heartbeat longer than I must. Observers I mind not, but concentration all who aid shall require."

Zeke moves enough to grant Alba the necessary space and then with heistation moves a little closer. Waffles back and forth, his clawed hand flexing inward and outward. "May..." His voice is husky and his eyes narrow as he looks everywhere but where Alba is actually sitting. "May thisss one.. touch you. To offer a gift of Daeus." This last is rushed out a bit; an explanation for why this might be necessary.

"One will--" hope, ser. But one does not say 'hope.' One from the Charneth does not say hope. Chay stands there hopelessly, instead--no one used to offering comfort, or giving it. Not without such things given back in claws, and black soot.

He looks to Zeke then, and his breath eases as the other steps forward. Eases in the way of the People, when roles are taken and given, when Places are found. Such things settle the mind.

He breathes more easily, and settles to a crouch. "One...one will lend one's own strength, ssers." And avoid the touching thing, yes.

Zeke's bravery went up two sizes that day, in Chay's mind.

GAME: Alba casts Remove Curse. Caster Level: 11 DC: 18

Zeke's hurried rush to not have his words misinterpereted is answered with a quiet cackle... that almost immediately turns into another foul, hacking spate of coughing. A lock of her hair stirs to life, reaches into a pouch for a stained-to-worthlessness bit of rag to hold against her mouth. When she holds out a hand, palm up, in Zeke's reach, the reason is clear... if creepy. The cloth is tucked away, and the magic begins.

The words that lift from Alba's throat are almost as hard to hear as they are to say; twisting syllables and a syntax like the tunnel of a drunken purple worm, they don't so much resonate as *throb* in some unnamable point between the ears. To those who have eyes to see the arcane world, Alba opens up along strange dimensions, raking insides from without with a searing bloody light, burnished with the golden radiation of the sun, and buoyed by an alpine summer breeze.

With the sheer amount of arcane and divine force battering the 'plague,' it should work.

It should have worked.

But Alba's chanting falls into wracking coughs.

Hope, ser. One does not say hope. The sith-makar Chay lowers his muzzle and dares not say a word. Does not say a word--but takes a breath, and begins weaving his own prayer--his own words to Gilead, before Alba can focus on too much else.

Green magic tracks around his scales, around his claws--and drifts outwards. Then shoots, swiftly, towards the witch.

GAME: Chay rolls 1d20+7: (9)+7: 16

Zeke watches as first one spell then the other goes off. The first one is a failure in the wracking coughs of the witch despite his prayer and his offer. The second sinks into the woman and it too... falls to more black ichor as it spills from her lips. Zeke hovers near her, wanting to help, but unwilling to touch her unless the need grows more dire. "Thiss one iss sssorry, it doesss not sseem to help."

Chay lowers his hand as the second spell absorbs into the oobleck. Hope. Hope. His breath goes in and out, deep and upset. "One--one is new to this, ser. One fears..." he says, but his mouth is dry, and his throat eats the words.

"*No.*"

Alba has never had time for hope. Alba has never *desired* hope. The half-feral Witch, once, made a deal with a small creature, and the creature came through on its end. That is where Alba resides comfortably; compacts made with the world, and with her, regarding her place in it. If she wants more from the world, she offers more in return. Simple. Easy. No rancor to either side.

• And now the world looks to renege on its deal.*

This. Shall. Not. Stand.

And thus it's not with hope or bravery or desperation that Alba claws at the Weave, twisting it with word and gesture into a cats-cradle of energies that *will obey her wish.*

It's pure, bloody-minded, singular obstinacy.

It has been muttered, well away from her hearing, that Alba could occasionally be called the Black Witch of Nope. Mostly because of the spiders.

Perhaps they should be glad they're not here to witness this.

GAME: Alba casts Dispel Magic. Caster Level: 11 DC: 18
GAME: Alba rolls 1d20+11: (15)+11: 26

Chay dares not breathe when the witch gathers magics. Some part of him recognizes the pull--that prickling on the scales that signals at once shaman, at once, danger--the history of the Charneth.

The history of capture.

The itch grows to a BURN and he raises his claws, to scratch. Scratch. Chest tight and barely breathing.

That one word has power to it and Zeke freezes in place. Feels like the world freezes in place while she works her magics. He can not breathe in it. His green eyes are wide with it. He feels pulled toward her, but he does not move. In other words all eyes are on Alba, and the world waits on the edge of a pin to see if her magic will work its will.

And when the last of the magics are hauled into place, and when the red fire that scorches her lungs, nose and throat dies back, Alba opens her eyes... And the fury is already leaving.

Alba is not, by her reckoning, a gentle creature. She has her soft spots, but she does not understand, and only occasionally respects, the sort of gentleness that comes naturally to the gifted healers, the soothers of fever and fear.

But she knows trauma. She has *surrounded* herself with creatures who have hurt, who grieve, and who hang on to life by the barest of threads. Signs, she knows.

And so she sits, rigid, until the last of the fury leaves, and she lets loose a long, slow sigh.

And it's not nearly as crackly as it was.

The sickness is still with her, no doubt.

But it *has* been beaten back.

And this realization puts a slow, hungry smile on the Witch's black-stained lips.

"Hehhhhh. It is a curse that *bleeds.* And if it bleeds, it may be killed."

Breathe. The air comes more easily, the /scent/ beaten back. The sith-makar hunter stands there, his muzzle working rapidly as his brain catches up, and forces itself to re-engage.

"Bleeds, witch?" he asks her. "...it is a disease that may be hunted, then?" Chay looks up at the witch, from where she floats.

At least the air--the air is /cleaner/.

Zeke tilts his head suddenly, pulling back away from her but hearing the sound of her voice easier now. Zeke's teeth flash suddenly in a sith-deadly grin. "May be /killed/ kin." There's a flash of hunter in those green eyes, a hint of something close to vengeful. Zeke might not show it, but this sickness has struck a chord in him. Dealing with those that it afflicts day in and day out, and it does him some joy to see it hurt in return.

"So, and just so," the Witch answers, slowly lowering herself back to the ground. Placing herself at eye level to the Sith, or a bit below. Body language often means more to the unconscious mind of the scarred, after all, than mere words. "It may be hunted. It may be killed. And it *deserves* to be brought down."

Chay looks over to Zeke, and then to Alba. For a moment, the hunter-dragon dares reach his eyes. The breath smooths outwards.

"...perhaps the magic of the shaman-caste may work now, ser. Now that the skin has been peeled back."

The blue-scaled sith-makar nods to Alba's words, finding them to his liking. As to Chay's... "We can but try. If you will allow... witch?" He says this cautiously, not having been given her actual name to call her by. "Thisss one doess not have thisss magic, but many here do. You only need give permisssion and I will go get one for you."

"And so you have it, Shaman," Alba says gravely. Still a touch giddy from her triumph, and it shows in the way she rocks from side to side, humming a tuneless song under her breath. "Enough of the healing arts do I know to make simples and potions and medicines. To cleanse a sickness like this, experts I shall trust easily."

The hunter-caste looks towards Alba for some time, and then to Zeke. Chay seems frozen, between. Eventually, though: "One shall wait here, kin. And, we shall ssee."

Zeke ducks his head to kin and to the woman alike, rushing out the door to see to getting a healer. It seems to take only a few minutes for him to arrive with a senior priest in tow. Or rather with him following along with dogged steps as if to make sure that the priest does not wander away in the wrong direction. The priest nods politely to everyone.

"I've heard you've some limited success with the plague. If you don't mind I'll try to cure it from your body entirely." He waits a moment for permission before reciting his prayer.

Zeke watches the other priest raptly, as if he might memorize what the other man is doing. Certainly this other has a confidence that he lacks; and clearly seniority in the Soldier's Defense.

GAME: Alba rolls perception: (3)+13: 16

So many.

Chay inches closer to Alba, so much as one might. His look is sharply on the priest, on Zeke. On the walls around them.

In and out goes the breath.

Permission is given with a nod, and Alba waits patiently as the prayers begin. And waits.

And waits.

And waits.

Long after the prayers have finished, Alba cracks one eye open. "...Is it done?"

Zeke looks concerned now, shifting off to the side to allow the priest his space. In truth he's mostly in the hall now because the room is small and he doesn't want to crowd in there.

The priest looks a little embarrassed. "Yes." He looks at Alba with concentration. "Though you don't seem any better..."

GAME: Chay rolls perception: (10)+10: 20

"...she smells better, ssers. The old smell one understands, now, sers. The old smell was of layers."

"There is still sickness, sers. However, part of that sickness is gone. It is...less complex, sers, though one still...I do not have that experience, sers, to identify what it is. This one apologizes," Chay says, and lowers his muzzle. He sits, crouched, not too far from Alba, though far enough. A meter's length, if he might manage it.

"Layers," Alba mutters, her rocking going still. Looking down at her hands for a moment, she sucks thoughtfully at a tooth. A red-banded viper slithers out from beneath her hair, and for a time her eyes turn its way, the two sharing some wordless communion. Finally, the Witch nods. "It is well, then. More research, I must needs make. My own coin I shall spend, I ask nothing from this house that would not be given its regular patient. ...Save room in which to work."

Oh good, Alba seems to have decided to install herself close to treatment.

OH GOD ALBA HAS DECIDED TO INSTALL HER WORK HERE. Chay glances towards Alba. Then looks to Zeke, where the other hides outside the door. "One knows, sers. This one may travel swiftly, and fetch the samples. ...and then. ..." ...then he will spend some time in the Temple of Gilead. Cleansing, breathing.

Then coming here, and...speaking, as best he may.

"Ahhhh." The priest in question pales. "Don't you think... you'd be more comfortable at home?"

Zeke, bravely again speaks up, lifting his clawed hand. "I will attend her. Sssee that ssshe doess not dissturb the other patience. Besssides, we offer roomss to the other."

The priest seems unsettled by this, but with Chay's offer finally nods. "So be it, but cause a ruckus here and you'll all be out on your ears!"

"Home I cannot be, for home is the edge of the Felwood," Alba says matter-of-factly. "Also, worry not. All my workrooms are kept well ventilated."

-End