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msg#1365

Matsos seems shocked to a standstill somehow. Tzanrol, mostly oblivious to these exchanges while accounting for his equipment, stops at this point, and tries to shake Matsos out of his inaction. "Will you just run her through, and let's move on?"

The wizard goes back to moving his things, seemingly confident that Matsos will follow, but shaking his head in disapproval at the delay. Matsos doesn't seem to have heard him, however. "Salter Street? You know it? That's where I spent my ten years, courtesy of the nobles of this great city."

He looks deep into Lianna's eyes as if searching her soul for how it knows him so well, and after seeing certain things there simply asks, "How would you save me?"

Then looking back at the pool his head dropping a bit he says, "Perhaps I'm not worth saving."

Lianna notes without really looking away from Matsos that her mother is caught between an urge to flee the room, and another equally strong one to stay to help her daughter, apparently unable to tear herself from the unfolding interaction. Charstallo seems to be cauught, too, between urges. Tzanrol, making yet another trip with equipment sees Charstallo now, and says, "Prelate! Did not Sir Matsos indicate that this woman is to be encased in one of the Adroki!" Charstallo does looks at Marossa, and thence to Lianna, and then back at Tzanrol, but does not reply.

msg#1391

She ignores all of this. Yes, it's all important, but if she takes her attention away from Matsos now, she'll lose him.

"Of course you're worth saving!" she says indignantly. It hadn't occurred to her before, but now it seems obvious that *everyone* is worth saving. In fact, she's not sure where half these ideas are coming from, but they seem to be working, so let's go with the flow and hope they don't stop...

"I can see your soul, remember? I know what it's worth." (And I wish I didn't.) "You said yourself, you only took this path to protect your family." (Actually you didn't, but it could be misinterpreted that way, and I bet I can convince you that it's true.)

"I'll help heal you if I can, but the main thing, you'll have to do yourself. It's very simple, really - just stop killing yourself!" Then, surpised at his apparent incomprehension - "but surely you knew that much? Any time you act out of hatred, it doesn't matter what you do to the enemy, or how much they deserve it, you're killing your soul. Any time you act out of love, justified or not, effective or not, you help it grow. It really is as simple as that. So..." she almost shrugs... "stop hating. Try loving."

Not that any of that had occurred to her before, either, but it seems so obvious now. And, of course... "You do realise, that especially applies to hating yourself? You've got to believe you're worth something, worth loving. If you spend all your time trying to punish yourself for what you see as failure, there's no chance." She steps in close, takes his hands, ignoring the sword in one of them. "You did everything you could to protect your family. What happened to them was *not* your fault, and not your failure. Forgive yourself, and move on."

(And if Mum gets hurt because I'm doing this instead of helping her, how will I feel? Easy to say, isn't it?)

msg#1395 "And you know, you can start right now. Still simple, and easy. See that useless twit in the clam over there? Useless, but harmless, right? Go and get her out. Rescue her. Protect her. She'll wake up and think you're the perfect hero come to save her - and you're going to believe her, because from her point of view, she's right. Try it. It feels a lot better having people think you're wonderful than having them hate you."

msg#1403

Thiator's eyes have been glued on the woman who fell out of the clam. Still, he has been listening to the real Paladin speak. Not in response to any specific words she says, but brought on by the broader theme, Thiator finds a thought burning itself across his brain "They want to suck the soul out of the city that I love."

msg#1415

Finally he moves, taking a couple of steps towards Tzanrol. "They, they are still alive, the people, sort of?" he asks. "The clams, keep them like that?"

Tzanrol stops again for a moment from his tasks setting a bix down on the table next to Fogg with an exasperated look, "Why hasn't this one been thrown into one of the Adroki yet? He seems to want to experience the living death that the lady is."

He finds one of the robed men and says in a sarcastic tone, "You, throw him in the pool, will you?"

The robed man in question starts to make his way over to Thiator.

"What about him then?" gesturing towards the Marquis. "He's going to die soon from blood loss and poison. I know a little first aid, but just enough to know that it will take much more than that to save him. Would one of the clams keep him alive? He's a rich and powerful man, saving him, no matter how, could be to your advantage."

Tzanrol, about to pick his box back up, considers for a moment. Looking around at the chamber, and back at the pool, he's obviously loathe to abandon this location. Then hearing the pounding from above again, and now more from down the hall from which direction came the Marquis, he seems to become resigned to leaving. Then an idea comes over him.

"Yes, let's save the poor marquis," he says with an obvious fake display of concern. Grabbing yet another of the cultists, he says, "Throw the Marquis in, too. A rich reward for all he's given to us."

Picking up his box, he follows the robed man to the pool to watch him throw the Marquis, now almost insensate, into the pool. Meanwhile, Matsos talking to Lianna, all that stands between Thiator and the portal now is the advancing robed man.

msg#1416 For a bit, Matsos eyes glaze over not buying the arguments entirely, but wanting to somehow. It's at this point that Lianna realizes that the damage to Matsos' soul has made him less than completely sane. Then his eyes lighten up a bit maniacally, and he says, "And then she'll owe me, too, right?"

His shoulders unslump and he begins moving, "If I can make them owe me, then I have power over them, too, right? That's what you're getting at, isn't it? They'll love me, and do what I say because I protect them!"

Then he turns back to Lianna, hesitating, "But you'd know the truth."

He looks her deep in the eye, "If you would save me, then you can't tell them what I've done. But you have to tell them. Unless you give an oath that you won't. Of course that would mean extracting oaths from these others as well, under pain of death."

"But, swear on your goddess, Lady Luck, that we'll hide what I've done here, and allow me to stay in the order, and I'll save one and all."

msg#1419 Thiator backs away from the man with the sword, letting himself be herded towards the pools. He does his best to look defeated, a talker who is out of words. He keeps glancing over his shoulder at the Marquis, hopefully looking more worried than calculating.

Then the moment comes, he can feel it, it is like when it is time to trim a ship's sails—you just know. As the robed cultists starts hoisting the Marquis' dead weight into the pool Thiator spins and swiftly accelerates, sprinting straight towards the pool.

Maybe the cultist with the sword yells something. Maybe Tzanrol hears his footsteps. But maybe that doesn't matter.

Ten more steps.

Maybe Tzanrol is lifting his head?

Nine more steps?

Yes, Tzanrol has heard something.

Eight

Seven

Tzanrol is starting to react, his back straightening.

Six

The Marquis is falling.

Five

The Marquis hits the water, Tzanrol takes a half step back, starting to turn.

Four

Three

Thiator lowers his shoulder, aiming for the middle of the Marquis' torso.

msg#1434

Two.

Tzanrol pivots to one side, extending a leg to trip Thiator.

One.

After his dive off the balcony not so long ago, Thiator had learned something about missing tackles, so he was ready for this move and lunges sideways to hit the sorceror.

Zero!

Tzanrol flies through the air, almost missing the pool but ending up sprawled half in, half out. Thiator himself ends up on his knees, quickly pulling one hand back out of the pool.

msg#1439

"Power isn't the point," Lianna says absently. "You may well be right, it's easier to get people to do what you say if they like you, but that's not the point at the moment. Let's stick to keeping you alive and sane, that's quite hard enough."

"That oath idea - you know, I don't *have* to tell anyone anything. What I do tell them has to be true, but there's no rule that I have to volunteer anything unless I'm asked. And I don't, as a general rule, volunteer things about my friends." She grins at him, sharing a joke between just the two of them. "Just ask Giuseppe."

Then she turns serious again. "I'm not interested in what you've done in the past - punishment doesn't achieve anything, revenge doesn't achieve anything. I'm much more interested in your future. Making sure you have one, for a start. Preferably as a paladin, yes, because you'd be good at it. And it would be good for you..." She takes his hands again. "That's what matters. What's good for you. I'll help as much as I can, and getting you locked up for things that are in the past wouldn't be helping. If you'll give me your word that in future you'll try to act as a paladin should, try to do things for the right reasons, not out of hate or for pure power, I'll give you mine that I won't volunteer anything to give away your past. Not that I would, word or not. And there's no need for you to swear on your god. I'll trust just your word. Paladins don't break it, after all, and that's what you are - right?"

''msg#1492'

At the sound of Tzanrol splashing into the pool, Matsos turns his head to look over his shoulder and see what is going on - Lianna still holding onto his hands. What he sees is the shell of one of the giant clam things surging up in the pool and sucking Tzanrol into it. Matsos involuntarily pulls a bit from her at that, but feeling her hands, his frame seems to become less tense, and he turns back to Lianna. Oddly, there is a grin on his face.

"Well, that ties up that loose end. One less who can indict me in this." Matsos continues, "What about them, however?"

His head tilts back towards Thiator, Marossa and the half-elf of Lianna's suspected ancestry all standing by the pool. "Time to extract those oaths, no?"

Matsos looks at Lianna as if expecting her to take action on the subject. Presumably he wants her to swear them to secrecy as a show of good faith.

msg#1498

Lianna's parents still standing near the pool stare shocked into the pool at the thing that has swallowed Tzanrol, and do not notice what Lianna and Matsos are conversing about yet.

msg#1503

Looking around, Thiator realizes that other than the two paladins, he is the only one still standing. Of course, the sorceror could fight off the clam any moment now....

The portal! Thiator suddenly realizes that there are any number of these folk on the other side of the portal, with some number of these demonic clams that they can draw power from. Even if the sorceror is contained, the cancer will just grow anew.

At the same time, the pounding at the doors promises imminent relief. Safety might be best served right here.

In the end, Father Mulvaney tips the balance. For Thiator to clearly see where his duty lies, but to then ignore it, would make it all the harder to face the old priest again.

Thiator kicks off from the side of the fountain, and sprints back the other way, towards the portal. Is it flickering as he approaches? He drives his legs harder, and gets ready to dive if the portal starts shrinking.....

msg#1500

Terrike's yes open as the urge to cough seems to make it neccessary. Looking up from the marble floor that she lies upon, she sees the Marlin that she'd tried to help in the spirit world sitting looking at her with its stuffed eyes. Gorstam stands above her with a concerned look.

"Are you all right?" he says, with as close to a look of concern as his wizened and etherial visage can manage.

But she definitlely is not. Something is missing from inside, like when a tooth is gone and the tongue goes searching for it. The gap left seems odd.

msg#1505

Terrikke sits up against the wall. "All right," she repeats, stupefied, one eye blinking, one eyehole twitching. "What... Gorstam? Sacred spirits, I thought I was dead there for a moment! I was in –"

Her jaw drops.

"I didn't die, did I? I failed, didn't I?"

She crouches, running through her fetishes in a sudden panic. All there, all still meaningful, if (mostly) currently empty. She hasn't lost any of her spirits. All is well then, or is it? If only she could quite remember…

"It's all -her- fault!!" she shouts in a sudden rage. She leaps up - or tries to, but forgets about the stuffed Marlin above her head, which promptly slams her down again in a shower of dust and loosening gilded plaster. "Oufgh!"

"She put a curse on me, back there on the beach, don't you see Gorstam? The grandmother of – of –" A word seems to stick in the back of Terrikke's throat. She looks up at Gorstam, tries again, gets no more than a strange hiccup noise. "My great-grandmother," she says instead, miserably, raising a hand and a white, washed-out stump. "Everything I do today goes amiss. I thought it was Fogg and when I'd dealt with him that would end my streak of black luck. But it was her, all the time. And spirits intend me to go meet doom? Ha! My doom, most likely. That'll suit her."

She picks herself up and reaches for her clothes, teeth grinding audibly as she tries inadvertently to use her missing hand. "Where's that doom then, do you know? There's one in this very house that I can think of. The sorcerer of the god of glass bottles and of the lake. Him I can take."

She opens the door and looks back to Gorstam. "Coming or not?"

Almost as an afterthought she steps back and wrenches the stuffed Marlin off the wall, mounting plate and all, loosing a torrent of plaster and flaking gilt. She clamps it under her handless arm, facing forward, looking like a weirdly incomplete spirit friend.

"Remind me again, Gorstam. What did I go on that spirit-forsaken quest on for?" she says, doing her best to sound casual, however unable to meet his eyes as she asks.

msg#1508

As Gorstam follows Terrikke back into the corridor, he says, "I hold on to equanimity with the knowledge that there is a purpose behind all of this in the great cycle."

Sans an explanation, Gorstam says, "Follow me to your destiny."

As Gorstam-as-Deratia leads her by back passages in the ancient and complex mannor, dodging the manor personel who seem to be running around like ants looking for food in the hot sun. He eventually comes to a storage area and leads her through a maze of crates behind which is a step down through the wall into a somewhat rough hewn corridor. He points down the corridor to where it seems to empty into a large chamber ahead with lights that waver indicating reflection off of water.

Gorstam turns at this point to answer her question, "You went to the spirit world in order to prepare to find your father, Terrikke. Yes you failed. I don't know why. All I know is that ahead lies part of your destiny."

msg#1512

Terrikke has picked up some short lengths of packing rope and is using them to tie the marlin and its plate to her handless forearm, somewhat like a clunky shield. She freezes in the middle of pulling a complicated-looking knot tight with her teeth.

Shock, bewilderment, horror, guilt visibly race through her, followed by a pitiful attempt to grin.

"Did you know he showed me…" She trails off. "On the little black beach beyond Snake Tooth…"

Olfar. So many memories and none make sense. Not even finishing her knot seems to make sense, when it was that special knot Olfar taught her. She reaches out for comfort to Manta, her last remaining spirit - but wasn't it Olfar who first told her of Friend Manta in the Deep? No sense in going on.

Which is, of course, the moment when you do go on. Because that's what life with the Sea means: not giving up when there's no safe coast in sight, not giving up when the mast breaks and the rudder breaks and the waves start coming in. Just going on regardless. Which also is something she learnt--- "Well, it wasn't Innis who taught me all that," she says to Gorstam angrily. "And _she_," she goes on, remembering her great-grandmother "She would laugh to see me back down now, wouldn't she. On the threshold to my destiny. Well, we will see. We will see who laughs at the end…"

msg#1519

A story is told up and down the coasts of Bodleia, about how Not-A-Man and his sorcerers captured the Spirit of the Red Cliffs and dragged it all the way into the mountains and bound it to the bottom of their all-greedy god's lake with ropes made of black lake weed, to enslave it to their god eventually.

Another, smaller story is also whispered around the fires of the village of Grets when the doors are firmly closed in winter, of how one particularly cursed ancestor (rumoured to have more than a drop of Not-A-Man's blood in her) pulled a shred of black weed from the river that had splinters of red in it, and listened to the red rock's rotten whispers that promised power but sowed only corruption.

And there's that third story about How Waje Split the Red Rock With a Scream and saved the village from the cloying influence of the cursed ancestors' whispers, dying in the act.

So it comes like a flash of lightning to Terrikke why she is here, once she leans around the corner and smells the muddy smell of lake water and sees the lengths of black tubing leading from the dark pool to the few remaining bits of arcane equipment:

Those black tubes are the ropes binding the Red Cliff spirit. This pool is where the evil sorcerer is holding the monster the divine messenger spoke of. This pool is from where death and destruction will be unleashed on Kaitaine. It is all so obvious; and so right that she, Terrikke, should be here to step in its path if she can.

As her ancestors' lives and spirits were blighted by the red splinter of rock that had got corrupted, she will now blight the monster that doubtlessly is waiting in that pool.

Nothing happens without a reason, she reflects as she turns and goes back a few steps to look for a specific sort of barrel. Coincidence that Gorstam turned up here today and led her right here? Ha! That he was available to open the Otherworld for her to… to... Well, to be reminded of her evil ancestry, of course!

She tries being angry with her father for giving her that cursed blood, but that doesn't work. He's truly and really gone. A hole. Where there shouldn't be one… No. There should be one. Because…

Because that's what needed to happen, she tells herself sternly. Because it's like Waje, who slit her own children's throats before she went to confront the Red Rock. Because there's times you can't afford to have ties that bind you.

The thought doesn't taste right. There's still a place in her heart that should twitch and bleed and hurt like the place where her eye used to be, but doesn't; and failure is associated with it in a most uncomfortable way...

But here are the barrels she remembers, as if placed specifically to relieve her from thinking further about Olfar right now. Stocky southern barrels, wrapped in extra oilcloth and well-tarred. There's red writing on them that no doubt means "Salt". Because that's how it all has to be, hasn't it? She tears the wrapping off so the barrel will come apart when smashed.

She's grinning almost genuinely by the time she passes Gorstam again. She loosens an axe in her sash, then realises she doesn't have hands enough and shifts the barrel back to her good arm.

Barefoot to make less of a sound and thankful for her Manta's presence, she lopes on into the chamber and straight towards the pool.

Vaguely she notices the two noble looking people standing opposite the pool looking nervous, and over there the two corrupted paladins are there, standing close enough to kiss in another moment - of course. The messenger who uncovered the plot is just now making a run for a strangely lit doorway standing in the middle of nowhere, triggering a brief regret in Terrikke that she hasn't managed to get Siburlion away before (doubtless) disaster begins. But nothing more matters and Terrikke starts running, straight towards the pool.

Terrikke's meaning to crash the barrel on the side of the pool and let the salt run into the water. If the spirit bound in there is all rotten and bled out, the salt should weaken it. If on the other hand any of its original nature remains, who knows but the salt may reawaken it to its own life and purpose. And then…

Like a true raider, she's relying on the next moment to inspire her. The shortest plans are the best plans, is another Bodleian saying. Less likely to run across a reef.

msg#1523

Just before she smashes the barrel down, she notes the loud boy who had denounced the sorcerer in the room above earlier dashing for an oval gash of purple energy and a guard trying to interpose himself between the two.

The barrel labeled "lye," ubeknownst to Terrikke, comes down, splintering into millions of bits, and the contents splash into the water quickly dissolving. In moments something in the pool is bubbling like mad. '' msg#1524''

As Thiator lunges for the portal, the guard smashes into him, sending Thiator crashing instead into the stone wall. Thiator reels back, shaking his head to try and clear it.

msg#1527

As Thiator's vision clears, the portal finishes closing with a sharp crack like a tiny bolt of lightning. The guard, also a bit disoriented by the collision stumbles onto the floor of the chamber.

msg#1530

Despite herself Terrikke's shout of triumph wavers a bit and she staggers back as the fumes rising from the water make her eye water and her throat and nose sting.

There's something horribly familiar in the stench rising from the pool, almost like the fumes that will hang in the soap makers' dingy street down by the docks on a foggy morning, but that can't be, can it…

Remembering practicalities and pushing aside horrible suspicions, she draws her axe, the first of the two, and glares around; ready to hurl it at the first threat that presents itself whether from the boiling pool or from any of the humans standing around it.

"Where is the sorcerer?" she shouts to the messenger boy who's staggering against the wall. "Is he still here? Quick, tell me! There is his monster and doom is at hand!"

msg#1534

"Gods above, the Marquis is in there!" Thiator starts sprinting back towards the pool, totally ignoring the remaining guard. As he proceeds he finally processes what Terrike said, and shouts out "The sorceror is in there too, and he can stay there!"

msg#1535

"Watch out!" Before she's even aware of what she's doing, Terrikke is moving towards where Thiator is headed, ready to defend him and herself.

Of all the people in the room he is the only one who looks like a potential ally... But that's about a sea or two further away than she has time to think. It's a compelling instinct to protect that drives her, not so different from looking out from Siburlion when he so obviously can't fend for himself. And it's something in Thiator's tone of… anguish? that draws her irresistibly. Something she's starved for or yearning for or--

And again thankfully there's no time to think further because she needs her head clear. Because it has just occurred to her that this young lad who so deftly unmasked evil Tzanrol earlier may well know what to do to this pool to further weaken it. He's Ikaiti, isn't he? He will know about these things.

"What do we do to stop the monster?" she shouts as she comes running, ready to defer to Thiator's judgement for the moment.

msg#1536

Lianna spins round at the entrance and the crash, momentarily disoriented. She had been concentrating so hard on the purely empathic business of reaching out to Matsos, the physical noise comes as a shock. And as a relief. Action. No choices to be made - delayed.

"Come on!" Not that she has the slightest idea what to do, but she runs towards the mess, pulling Matsos with her. "We've got to get him out of there - what *is* that stuff?" It smells like some of the really foul areas of the city - the places she'd never had to live in, and had never studied, because they had nothing worth stealing.

Is Matsos following her lead? She's still holding one of his hands, she hopes he'll be carried along by her sense of urgency, because rescuing people in danger is so obviously what a paladin should do.

msg#1537

"No one goes near the sorcerer!!!" Terrikke shouts, brandishing her axe and raising her Marlin shield. Of course the paladins can only be on side of evil - why else would they tarry making sweet eyes at each other when in the pool the monster gets ready to rise? They must be stopped from reaching the pool, or interfering with the messenger boy for their own nefarious purposes.

But who of the two to target first? Quickly she reaches out with her Spirit Face hoping to see whether either of the two paladins may betray themselves as the worse evil.

The double vision seems to be gone, thanks to seeing with only one eye, but the hammering in her head is starting again. And she's tired...

msg#1543

Terrikke can't see much other than that neither paladin has a tremendous spirit or anything. Which is not to say that they have none at all (Terrikke can't see Matsos missing his, for instance), just that they aren't shamans or somesuch.

msg#1544

Thiator notes that as the paladins and Terrikke face off that nobody is paying him much attention. He gets to the side of the pool, and sees the lye bubbling in reaction to what's inside.

msg#1560

"Stop where you are! I will not let you aid the monster!" Terrikke shouts and her voice catches, sounding almost as if she hasn't spoken in a looong while; but surely that is just an effect of the fumes rising from the monstrous pool.

You might almost suspect she's afraid (falsely, surely...?) as her eyes flick rapidly between those far too many threats: the pool she expects to spew forth its monster any moment, the remaining few of Tzanrol's contraptions, the two hostile paladins. There's an instant when she intensely wishes for a crew of Talath around her, although this in itself is a terrifying notion. To have failed not only at having found your father, but having lost him from your heart!

With a great battle cry, she hacks through the one thing she can reach without giving up her position between the paladins and the messenger lad: a tube coming from the pool and still connected to one of the stinking sorceror's stinking contraptions. With a snaking hiss the severed tube ends coil...

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