Lann is pretty sure he knows where she's gone. There's a spot where Wenduag and he used to - well, anyway, that's likely where she is.

Well, yes. What's it to you, horn boy?

Nenio would like to interject that addressing people as 'boy' is her idiosyncratic speech pattern and she'd appreciate if Wenduag knocked it right off.

(Woljif is not going to mention that he has twice as many horns as Lann. He's not. He's learned his lesson about making slightly off-colour jokes in extremely tense situations. And anyway it's not even all that funny.)

Oh all right. He has to say something or he'll explode.

"Wait, the fox girl can remember names? How come crazy spider-cat lady rates it, but charming rogues and cheerful paladins don't?"

Nenio only remembers names of things she intends to dispose of shortly. If they're going to figure in her future experiments she gives them a more convenient label like "boy" or "test subject #341".

This thing? Plainly useless. She wouldn't want its pelt for cleaning supplies. She'll be pleased to forget its name in a minute or two.

(It may be relevant that Nenio's Cunning is currently in the region of 30 and she has grasped the entire situation from the context clues well before any of the others managed to formulate the hypothesis of what Wenduag has done. The act is, after all, unthinkable - unless you are very good indeed at thinking clearly.)

Wow, that's... you know what, Lann will engage with the sudden unexpected viciousness from Nenio another time. Because. He's actually pretty worried about the conspicuous lack of hostages in this cavern. But, like... Wenduag, you didn't, right? Please say you didn't.

Eh. The strong do as they will, and the weak suffer as they must.

So... Abramo would like to get this straight. Wenduag would like the mongrel tribes not to go anywhere, for whatever reasons make sense to her internally and which he's not going to bother asking for an articulation of, he's pretty sure they're not super legible even to Wenduag. So, following her ideology of strength, she kidnaps Dyra and notifies Sull that he should stay put, on pain of losing his cleric. So far, immoral but effective. But then she... eats her hostage? In what possible world is that going to conceivably work? 

*Shrug* Sull's not going anywhere if he has any excuse not to, is he? So it doesn't matter that much if Dyra is actually alive or not, what matters is what Sull believes about it and he's way too fat to actually check anything. And besides, it saved Wenduag several hunting expeditions plus keeping an eye on her hostage all the time. She had class levels, you know.

Of all the short-sighted... Abramo is lost for words again. He's used to fighting demons, who are impulsive and break commitments at the drop of a Hat of Disguise and are kept in military formations strictly by the threat of violence, but nonetheless they are able to keep track of the basic elements of a plan. Such as, for example, not killing the hostage you need to be able to threaten once someone inevitably tracks you down and tries to negotiate! Not that Abramo had any intention of letting such a threat move him, but to be unable to make it at all is just, just...

Insane, Commander. The word you're looking for is 'insane'. Or 'crazy', if you prefer the mongrels' informal language.

Well, yes. You're right. There's no point in getting angry at a madwoman, or trying to reason with her.

Bolt of Justice.

What? No! I'm stronger than you, you have to do what I say!

Savalemekh, help me!

Crickets.

...sorry boss, locusts just don't make the right sound for this situation, it's not my fault! If you wanted "locusts" to be the go-to meme for "nothing happens after someone makes a dramatic outburst" you needed to start your cultural manipulation fifty years ago!

Never mind, I don't need any help! I can take Lann any day of the week!

That... might have been true a year ago, Wenduag. Even three months ago. I've spent those three months killing demons; what have you done? Sat in a cave and killed a first-circle priest who never hurt a Giant Fly!

Additionally, it appears that the enemy commander has neglected to account for the overall correlation of forces, to wit, Lann has brought five high-level companions and Wenduag has... 

The strong don't need companions!

Everyone does, Wenduag. That's what strength is.

Still, Lann would like the others to step back, please. A man ought to kill his own crazy ex. 

Sorry it's not a fancy spell or anything. It would have been a little nicer, actually, to finish this with a "Bolt of Justice" or "Arrow of Sanity" or something. But - two in the chest, one in each eye, that's how archers say good-bye.

Full Attack.

Good-bye, Wenduag.

The repentant cultists who kidnapped and then defended Ember can go in the prison right alongside Jannah, to await trial. Trials are a great invention! They are vastly superior to military commanders making life-and-death decisions on the spot! They can sometimes even have, like, written procedures and outcomes consistent across similar cases!

Right? Pharasma cannot fathom why people are so down on Her trials. They give one of exactly nine outcomes, how's that for consistency?

Abramo will note that his god is in the legislative branch, not the judicial, and frankly he rather prefers that. He was, for a while, open to the possibility that Pharasma, who claims to be the Creator of all this world he finds himself in, might be another aspect of the Name - there's nothing in Genesis saying that the world he was born in was the only one created - but... no. They are just not the same; no such easy solution.