Later...

It takes something like an entire hour to reassemble the dancing scarves into cloak-form.

Fortunately, there are far stranger things which frequent the campus around the Temple of the All-Seeing Eye than a teenage girl sitting in the rear-most booth of a lesser tavern with a lap full of expensive and suspiciously-Calistrian fabric.

Dana has never actually asked her friend and research-buddy and occasional-lovebird if she's a Calistrian cultist. She kind of hopes her suspicions are true, because that's way more fun, but she has not, in fact, asked.

Dana definitely notices and smugly notes the colors on the mysterious fabric, though, as she spots the other girl in the back of the tavern where they'd agreed to meet. Under Dana's arm, she has actual notes she's eager to show off and share. She sashays on over and slides onto the seat next to Gamila.

"You'll never guess what I found."

Gamila's cloak is mostly reassembled at this point, and laying over her front like a blanket as she works on the ripcord. She's not naked under it, but only barely, clad in a minimalistic black silk loincloth and a black leather breast-harness attached to three feet of dull golden silk that draped down her belly and reached mid-thigh, like the front half of a prostitute's dress.

She greets Dana with a smile.

"The lost secrets of the Azlanti?"

"You joke, but! I dug this up in a book about a book from Aroden's mortal lifetime."

She slides a sheet of notes in front of Gamila. "Read this."

In front of Gamila are three summaries.

The first one summarizes a research project of Aroden himself, having to do with the spread of plagues. Underlined and highlighted is a section describing how one of the researched plagues seems to move from person to person if, and only if, a healthy person comes in contact with the bodily fluids of a sick person.

The second section summarizes a medical treatise on the effects of using Prestidigitation on open wounds, to prevent festering. It concludes that Prestidigitation can indeed prevent festering, under roughly the same conditions that pouring alcohol on the wound prevents festering.

The third section seems to be an entirely unrelated ecological case study written by a Druid/Wizard multiclasser. In the case, there was a forest, which got destroyed by logging. The author's attempt to re-green the area was thwarted when a weed species that hadn't previously grown in the area spread there once the forest floor was exposed to sunlight.

"I didn't see the connection at first either," Dana admits.

She scoots closer, pressing her hips up against Gamila's and leaning on her as she points at the scroll.

"But each of these three accounts cite the other two, see? They were all written at the same time, by researchers who were talking to each other. And here's the really interesting part. The book I found these in? It was missing pages," she says with relish.

That is at least a little suspicious. Gamila frowns.

What do plagues-in-bodily-fluids, cleaning wounds, and invasive weeds have in common?

(Heal: 28)

Something's right there, on the edge of perception. Gamila closes her eyes and lets her mind go still.

Plagues, wounds, weeds. Plagues, wounds, weeds. Plagues, wounds, weeds.

Gamila's eyes suddenly fly open as she bolts upright in her seat.

"It's alive! It's fucking alive."

Dana has chills and a big grin on her face as she watches her friend have a moment of revelation like something out of a mystery novel.

"What what what? What's alive? You just figured the whole thing out right tell me!"

Gamila kisses Dana, hard.

When she pulls away, she repeats, "It's alive. Just like the forest."

Gamila takes a breath and tries to put her reasoning into words.

"The female vital essence that gets injured by Prestidigitation. It's alive. It's all alive, and it's all the same thing. Plagues, wounds that fester, and the sickness. It lives in the fluids. It's like the forest. Cleaning a wound is like scorching the earth, right? You clear all the living stuff away and leave just the rock underneath. A festering wound is growth, in a place where nothing should grow, like, like if a wagon wheel suddenly sprouted leaves and couldn't turn anymore. But the female sex is like the healthy forest, not a wagon wheel. The forest is keeping the weeds out, but if you burn down the forest..."

"You let the weeds in," Dana breathes.

This is a mad theory but sometimes those are the best kind. It's disturbing, to think there's an invisible forest full of invisible life, growing on and in people. Disturbing and gross... but the missing pages.

"The missing pages! Do you think people from Aroden's time already knew this? And," Dana lowers her voice ominously. "Someone, or someOne, didn't want us to know."

"...it feels true."

Gamila's skin prickles, suddenly feeling paranoid. She glances around the tavern but nothing's different than it was a moment ago.

"But, whoever doesn't want us to know, they failed. We have the answer now. We know what kind of targeting the cantrip needs. We're almost there."

"This is so awesome. So we need to look at spells that affect one kind of life but not other kinds of life? Are there spells like that? What am I saying, there are lots of spells like that. What do you think? Charm spells? There's like six of those for different target categories. Do you know a Druid? There are at least two Speak With spells that we might glean something useful from..."

Gamila nods as she turns their new theory over in her mind.

"All of those. And I want to see if I can get a look at a Slay Living, too. It's a fifth-circle divine spell, but I think that's only because it needs to be strong enough to kill an entire adventurer. What we need to kill is less than what can already be killed with a Prestidigitation, and the base mechanism for directly targeting life might be something we can use."

"Do you know any fifth-circle Clerics? 'cause I don't."

"I don't know any Druids either. But for this..."

Gamila bumps Dana's shoulder and leans her head over for a moment.

"Tell you what. We'll see how far we get with just the Charm targeting mechanism. If that's not enough, I'll start posting personal ads in the newspaper, for a Druid with at least two Speak With spells and a fifth-circle Cleric. Or, uh, I'll give you the money for it and you can post the ads."

"I love how you're living, like, a quadruple life," Dana comments with a fond eyeroll. "Either way, good idea."

Dana bites her lip and squirms in her seat a bit, then turns and gives Gamila a sultry smirk.

"You're working tonight, right? Are you ever going to tell me what your mysterious job is?"

"Are you ever going to ask?" Gamila teases back. "Also, I think your math off by a factor of two, there."

Gamila is living a double-life at most, if you don't count her assassin persona, and she really doesn't. Her involvement with the Beachhead is a secret, but only because the Beachhead itself is secretive, and Clerics of Calistria are under heavy suspicion by default. But it's not like she has a separate, public identity for being a Cleric. She just doesn't advertise that Gamila Saei is a Cleric.

(It's annoying and frustrating, that she can't sell her Channels without revealing herself as a Calistrian, but those are the rules of magic.)

"You're so mysterious. But okay then, I'm asking~"

She breathes the last word into Gamila's ear.

Gamila smiles, turns, kisses her, and gives her waist a light caress.

"Come with me, then. I'll show you where I work."

"Awesome. Let's get some wine first, though. I'm thirsty~"

"Sure."

Gamila sets her reassembled cloak on the seat next to her, and gets up to go with Dana to the bar. She drinks in the scathing glares of ill-concealed lust that follow her ass on the way there.

One gold piece for a serving of mind-enhancing wine. What once seemed like an insane amount of money to her now barely feels like it's worth keeping track of.

Dana isn't the only one who's thoughts go in the direction of 'Calistrian cultist'. Who dresses like that?! Fortunately for Gamila, accusing someone of looking Calistrian is rather fraught with the risk of the accuser getting funny looks and questions about how they know what a Calistrian looks like. So, though the thought is had, it is not spoken or shared.

Among the patrons of the small tavern, this young man over here with a handsome, noble face and expensive clothing at the table directly behind Gamila, is going to slam his fists on the tabletop and stand up angrily.

"Damn it! I am fed up with this whore waving her used goods in our faces while we're trying to take a load off! Have you no decency?!"

(Sense Motive: 25)

Gamila glances back at the loudmouth...

She smirks at where his eyes are slipping, gives her hips a little wiggle, and gives her own ass a nice loud smack.

"You wouldn't be upset if my 'used goods' didn't get you hard. You're only mad because you want this ass but don't want to admit it."

The handsome young man flushes angrily.

"I. Would. Never! I'll have my pick of proper women; good, well-behaved wives from fine families! You're nothing but some low-life animal's chamber pot. What kind of man would ever want to touch you."