He's in the middle of helping the strongest squad at Crusader's Fort clear a particularly problematic nest of demons when he notices the change. Bad time, Archduke.

They don't have a wand of Sending. Those are expensive, and they're supposed to be the people that receive the emergency Sendings. Their cleric has one prepared, but they definitely don't have ten minutes for her to cast it.

"Potential emergency in Westcrown," he calls out to the squad captain. A lightning-quick calculation. "No retreat advised yet."

     "Acknowledged," replies the captain, and then to the whole squad, "Move to defensive positions. Prepare for possible emergency retreat."

(There is not any response immediately apparent at Charthagnion Manor.)

Probably this is not in fact the only mob in the city. Quite possibly this was timed by some hostile power and is simultaneous with much worse problems. If they're on their own....

...if they're on their own they're going to run out of arrows before Westcrown runs out of lunatics.

Shit. The servants who'd usually be the ones called to grab a bucket of water are all in the cellar. "Dídac, go put out torches as they come in, you can go on raying from downstairs."

Dídac runs.

Protection from Fire, and he is now officially out of spells.

"I think it's permissible to fire on people outside the gate with torches. I don't know if it's wise." Because right now they're mostly staying behind the gate where they're safe, and if that stops being safe it's possible they'll flood the yard. But that's a tactical call; Narikopolus is better than him at those. The moral call is his and it's fine to shoot people throwing torches at your home full of civilians.

The lamp-oil is much harder to put out; he winds up smothering it with his leather vest. The guys with real equipment will be harder to take down and he's employed doing laundry and making sorbet - ray of frost ray of frost -

"Should we be evacuating the house? I have Protection from Fire up, I can help get people out if they'd be safer out here."

"To where." They're still surrounded. Possibly if they'd thought of it ten minutes ago they could've gotten the civilians out over the rooftops but it's too late for that now. 

"I don't know," he answers Arn, "but—the mob might spare women and children. A fire definitely won't."

The mob might conceivably have spared the women and children if they'd gone out with Marit at the very beginning but it's too late for that now and also they might even then have torn them apart on the spot.

He turns his head briefly to respond and is shot through the eye. If he were an empowered priest of Iomedae this wouldn't be lethal, but he's not and it is.

The flames are out of control. He brought a really large number of arrows, but he's running out. The smoke is getting thicker. It might be his imagination but the floor is feeling warm.

"Xavi, my sword. We're going to jump."

Xavi doesn't ask questions. He gets the sword, straps it on Aniol's waist while he's still firing.

"Good boy. Cling to my back, keep your head ducked down."

Xavi climbs aboard.

Aniol stays a few moments longer. He runs out of arrows and slings his bow over his shoulder. Draws the sword.

Leaps out of the window with Xavi on his back, and starts to slash his way through the part of the crowd that looked thinnest when he had this idea. Temple of Abadar. It's nearby. He can pay for them to let him in.

Llei drops his bow and draws his sword. He stabs, slices, lets four bodies fall at his feet, but it isn't enough, they're leaking men around the edges. An arrow hits him. He screams in fury - not at the arrow, but that by the time he has decapitated the next man, another has gotten past him.

This is not defending anything. He runs for the cellar, coughing, hacking down any man he runs across and doesn't recognize.

He also runs for the cellar.

The sparrow, whose name is Pol, has gotten inside the palace. He has tried chirping at servants and guards. He has tried flying into somebody's face and gotten swatted aside. His wizard is in terrible trouble and nobody will even ask him to land so they can get the note off his leg. His wings are so tired but the note is tied on badly and hopping is difficult and slower than it normally is when he tries it. He takes off again. Looking for somebody who isn't too stupid to recognize a familiar with a note when they see one.

Valentia is outside the cellar. She kills the first man to enter her field of view without hesitation. But the smoke is thickening, and the people inside will suffocate. She tears the cellar door open. 

"Out through the servant's entrance! Out, out, out -!"

"Go!"

She shakes him off and fires another arrow. She's going to cover the cellar until every single person she herded into it is out. She's not a coward.

Dídac is not very good at casting spells while his good arm is stabbed. He's trying, but it slows him down and fouls his aim. Someone clubs him across the head with a table leg and then someone else follows up with a real mace.

Elsewhere, Pol falls dead on somebody's desk.

He gets to the cellar at a run and immediately heads down the stairs; he returns a moment later supporting a coughing servant woman. "Get the kid out of here!" he yells at Valentia. "I'll—"

The rest of that sentence is replaced by a gurgle of blood as an arrow pierces his throat.

This wouldn't ordinarily be lethal, but he's taken enough hits already that it is.