"… Right. But other than that, yes, I really do want to help."

That gets a small but genuine smile. "I'm happy to hear that you're neither ill-intentioned nor stupid. If you each tell a deliberate lie, the spell will break and we can discuss ways you can help."

"Ummmm… I'm an only child."

Oh, that's a good one.

"And I'm not!"

"You mentioned that you do not know of our troubles, that you are here only because something is here you can help with. I have my own theory as to what that might be. But I should introduce myself first, and explain the context. I am Lady Aribeth de Tylmarande, paladin of Tyr and Seneschal to Lord Nasher, who governs the city-state of Neverwinter. Due to some ancient enchantment, the city's climate remains temperate even when the sea for miles around freezes; thus, under normal circumstances, we are the only year-round warm-water port for leagues north or south, leaving us in a position to be not just a trading hub but the trading hub for the region."

"But the circumstances are not normal. A plague struck, five weeks ago, now called the Wailing Death. Victims take on sores and a persistent cough; then, they become almost catatonically weak; then, they die. Through the process, they suffer full-body wracking pains, escalating from a bone-deep ache to an agony so terrible that I have seen grown men beg to be killed.

"The Wailing does not behave like a normal disease. It jumps from victim to victim in the normal fashion, but it also strikes those who have had no contact with the outside world in weeks. It seems sometimes as if the fear of the plague alone can spread it, but if that were the case even more would be dead than already are. When the death toll rose from terrible to alarming, there was an effort among the holy orders of the city to cleanse as many victims of their illness as possible by magic. This caused their symptoms to recede entirely, and then return within the week. Subsequent attempts halved the length of this reprieve. That was when alarm turned to blind panic.

"Paladins and monks who have attained the blessing of purity are immune. No one else is safe - not even those who have contrived an enchantment to make them immune to disease. Our suspicion is that the gods can protect their own through the channels already available to them, but mortal magic, even god-granted, cannot.

"Most alarming of all, the plague is... centered. Within the city. It is only within city limits that men fall ill from nowhere. Visitors to the city are just as vulnerable to infection, but do not suffer the same consequences. And anyone who leaves city limits falls ill immediately - at first it was one in ten, then one in five, and now everyone. We have closed the gates and harbor, of course, but cannot tell the people why. It would finally make it obvious that this is enemy action, and many would suspect a traitor within our walls. There would be lynch mobs and worse."

Haley whistles.

"Sheesh, that is pretty bad."

And she wonders: why us? The Relic will help, obviously, although if resurrecting Elan functions the same way as casting Remove Disease then she might have to leave him dead until they figure out how to fix it. Unless he's… okay with dying in horrible pain on the regular. Still, she doesn't think she's okay with that.

But the thought remains: why, of all the possible places, is this the best place to dump them? Her first assumption is that there is a traitor within the walls and they have to root them out through intrigue. Or maybe somebody wants to conquer Neverwinter and decided the easiest way to do that was to use disease to kill off 99% of the people who could oppose them.

Well, it was probably never the case that she'd figure out the solution within an hour of arriving.

"Has anyone who's died so far been able to afford to get raised?"

"A body dead to the plague cannot be raised with the simplest resurrection spells. Oleff can manage, with the Resurrection spell proper, but as you can imagine, that's not a long-term solution... and his test subject re-contracted the plague suspiciously soon."

She sighs. "The thing that makes me... anxious... is that you look like adventurers. And we do not currently have problems best solved by adventurers. Unless something suddenly goes wrong."

Uh-oh.

Yeah, that's not the best news they could have gotten. On the bright side, Elan won't have to be a guinea pig.

Also, Aribeth said basically what Haley was thinking, slightly to the left.

"Yeah, I was thinking that. I'm a rogue and he's a bard, and our Constitution is… well, we're not wizards, at least."

Ha ha.

"Is there anything you think we could do, off the top of your head? Besides wait until we know more, anyway."

     A halfling in a white robe runs up. "Milady Aribeth! There's –"

"Trouble at the Academy," she says, her voice fast but deceptively calm. "Yes?"

     "Y... yes?" he says, now sounding almost uncertain. "Goblins and masked magic-users teleported in – we just got a Sending from Instructor Jaroo –"

Aribeth turns to Haley and Elan. "You want to help? Good." She grabs their respective wrists and clicks her Boots of Teleportation together, and suddenly, they're standing in a grand entry-hall for what was presumably an Academy of some sort before somebody set it on fire and killed a bunch of people.

Ugh, talk about tempting fate.

She's surprised by how quickly Aribeth acts, but she knows how to get her bearings when surprised. Once they land, she readies her bow and arrows.

And Elan draws his sword!

"Go to the stables on the opposite end of the building," Aribeth orders, in the same rapid-fire tone. "There are four creatures there: a dryad, a y – a serpent-woman, a cockatrice, and a brain with legs. They must not come to harm, or be allowed to escape. Do not distract yourselves rescuing the injured or the dying. They would all die willingly for this. Go."

Haley goes where directed, although while running:

"Gotta say it itches to help keep people imprisoned."

"Yeah," says Elan as he follows. "Maybe when everything calms down we can talk to them? Also I think it feels better that she doesn't want them to be hurt."

There are, in fact, a large number of injured and dying along their route. Also, goblins – though they're Small, for some reason – and a handful of skeletons.

There's also this little mouse-man, approximately one and one-third Belkars in height, who doesn't seem to be either of those, and is instead running in the same direction they are but getting more distracted by the injured and dying than they have been instructed to do. Mostly he's just pouring healing potions on them while he passes by, but that still takes a move action or so.

Oh no Elan just remembered that he could totally help with a Mass Cure Light Wounds or something but that counts as getting distracted. Why does he have to do hard things like "not getting distracted;" that doesn't seem very fair. Especially when it's "don't get distracted helping people!"

… Maybe he can switch his sword for his lute and play an encouraging song, since they're not running flat-out.

Haley keeps running, though she does smile when she hears Elan start singing.

She's obviously going to defend him (and herself) if anyone attacks them, of course.

The encouraging song should help people not die!

It also makes the mouse-person startle and look back at them, then as they don't slow down, start chasing after them.

"Are you going to the stables?" he asks a bit squeakily.

"Yeah, that's where Aribeth sent us."

"There's a wizard at the entrance! I don't know how powerful he is but he's killed a lot of my friends! I would like to help kill him!"

(He sounds sort of breathless, but less in an out-of-breath way and more like that's just how he talks.)

Yeah, it sounds mousefolky.

"Thanks for the heads-up."

Ugh, she wishes that she'd been able to steal take with permission more enchanted arrows from Pete. Hopefully the Wailing Death hasn't wrecked Neverwinter's economy to the point that all the magic shops are closed.

They near the aforementioned entrance to the stables, but the architecture of the antechamber shields them from wizardly view.

Then the mouseperson puts on a burst of speed and comes into the wizardly line-of-effect.

The wizard promptly flings a Lightning Bolt at his face.

Hopefully he's distracting the wizard on purpose!