Huh, sounds like some kind of fucked-up ancient Osiriani. ... weird-ass thing to know, thanks, brain, we'll circle back to th-- 

The door opens.

Behind it, there are several ghouls, tensed for the possibility that there are enemies on the other side. Ghouls are usually depicted in textbooks wearing the tattered remains of whatever they might have been buried in (which, in fairness to Samora's recognizing-types-of-things-with-evil-auras class, is usually correct), but these ones are wearing long, pale-blue robes, like the acolytes of some peculiar church. 

The suit of armor doesn't smell like food? But it has food with it? Suspicious squinting ensues. 

".......Good evening," hazards Marshall, doing his best to engage hello_fellow_undead_with_skateboardlance.gif. Necril comes as naturally to him as though it is his mother tongue, an unsettling sensation he will also be circling back to later and not right now. "We come in peace to your, uh..." he glances around now that, from his vantage point, he can see through the door. 

Hundreds of stone shelves are carved into the walls of this fifteen-foot-wide hallway. While there are many gaps in the collection, a staggering number of books, scrolls, and folios remain. Signs hang above several doors off of this hall. A faint, blue glow flickers beneath a sign to the south.

"...your lovely library," he manages to say without ending that sentence with a question mark. Why the fuck is there a ghoul library under the evil lighth okay that question kind of answers itself actually nevermind. 

Huh. "Good evening, friend knight! On behalf of our lady Nhakazarin, we welcome you to the library of our queen Belcorra! You may of course peruse the stacks at your leisure, as soon as we take your," gesture vaguely at Samora and Tris, "donations of flesh for the Canker?" This does have a question mark because those guys do not look very, like, tied up, but they cannot think of any other reason an undead knight would bring fleshy live humans with him to visit the ghoul library. 

There is a very brief pause, while Marshall would have been sighing deeply if he had lungs. "Ah. Well. Those are my friends and we will not be doing that." 

In that case, roll for initiative! 

This seems like a time for positive energy!

And making the ghouls unable to conceive of violence without getting magically stabbed in the brain!

Why the fuck is anything touching their brains! That is illegal! The positive energy also stings a little but it is not so INCREDIBLY ILLEGAL and they don't need ALL of them to engage the sword guy, he only has two hands-- 

(Marshall takes a swipe at one of them on their way past him, and this hits solidly but doesn't slow them down. Damn. He's getting a bad grade in battlefield control and needs to get better at that. Sucks to be level 1.) 

It turns out that it is possible for things to conceive of violence hard enough to power right through their Thoughts being Forbidden. Paralytic claws for the squishy psychic. 

Oh no now she can't do any somatic components 

Oh no she should have gotten between Tris and the ghouls! She'll try to do that now. And channel again and just barely miss Marshall with it.

Paralytic claws for this asshole who keeps making his fort save or something? 

Marshall is too dead for paralysis! He has no muscles, you see.

Well, fine, but the claws are still sharp. 

Ow gotta keep their attention on him. Sword, sword, planting himself in the middle of the narrow room where he's hard to run past and engaging as many of them as he can. Ow. Look how threatening he is. Pay no attention to the healer over there chipping steadily away at the strength of anything she can get into range of.

(Her positioning is quite good for a first-circle, he thinks. Usually it takes them longer than this to get the hang of 'exactly how far is thirty feet' under live fire conditions. She had great sword form, too. Maybe he's forgotten the schools being better than he expects?) 

(That's because her teachers were awesome! Also when you have to drill every maneuver an extra several hundred times to reliably get enough power behind it you end up getting lots of practice at everything else.)

Stab stab slash six channels is objectively a lot but it really doesn't feel like a lot right now!

Tris is going to help her friends even if she can't move! What can she still do. She can Message them. Here, have a second perspective on the battle so you know exactly where everyone is and can decide where to step that much faster.

He sure is threatening! That sword hurts! The consequence of trying to corral everyone's attention is that now you have everyone's attention! Which means you are surrounded by horrific undead screeching! And claws! Can't forget the claws. There are really quite a lot of claws. 

Ow these things might be dead but they are made of flesh and bone and he has a sword in hand and a shield in front of him and casters behind him and if there is anything he is for it is for putting things that should be dead back in the gods-damned ground. 

Speak for yourself! We're dead on purpose!