Gord wakes up wounded and in pain and unable to remember what happened or where he is.

He instinctively casts cure light wounds on himself, too out of it to really consider what spell he's giving up. Sits up - why is he still swaying - oh, he's being carried on a stretcher, by men in Mendevian insignia.

Something about this situation feels oddly familiar.

"Hey, where -"

Then the wound on his chest reopens and he's hit with blinding pain and and passes out again.

"Make way! Coming through! Fetch a healer, quick!" 

"What happened to him?"

"Demon attack, probably. The wound on his chest keeps closing and reopening, it's probably some kind of curse."

"Demons, this close to the city?!"

Gord wakes up groggy and in pain and finally out of spells to convert, so he channels on instinct.

Sits up and looks around. What's he doing back in Kenabres?

"You're a cleric? Praise the Inheritor that we got to you in time! You must have not woken up properly the last few times so you couldn't channel. Are you feeling well now?"

"I can stand," Gord says, and demonstrates this by standing and then collapsing with a reopened wound.

"Someone get Terendelev!"

Heal.

"I am afraid even that hasn't healed you fully. Your wound will probably reopen again. But it should give you time enough to find out what's wrong, and a cure. If you're not a strong enough cleric yourself, you can ask for my help."

"Thank you," Gord says as he (very carefully) stands up again, for what is hopefully the last time.

He has seen Terendelev in human form before, but never face to face, which is probably the only thing saving him right now.

Another man he has carefully managed to avoid until today strides up. "You were attacked by demons, close to the city? Tell me all about it. Who are you, who is your god, and what is your business in Kenabres? I have an excellent memory for faces, and I don't recall seeing yours before."

He certainly hopes not, he's been careful not to wear his real face at the gates to Kenabres for several years now!

"I don't remember what happened," he says, less because it's true and more because he doesn't want to try an unprepared bluff on a powerful inquisitor. "Or how I got here, because I don't have any business in Kenabres." He'd rather leave the city than argue about being allowed to visit without a particular purpose in mind.

"My name is Thrush," he offers pretty much at random. "I'm a cleric of Gorum."

Conveniently missing memory is a staple adventurer excuse which he, Hulrun, will not abide in his orderly and lawful city.

"Will you repeat that under Zone of Truth?"

"I absolutely will, if those are the only questions you ask!"

"Come, Prelate, this is no time for an interrogation. Let the poor man enjoy the festival."

What, really?

What, really?

...but he stalks off, reluctantly, to interrogate the men who brought Gord in.

To be honest, he expected Hulrun to attack him on the spot for having a Chaotic Evil aura! Something here is odd, on top of all the rest.

After thanking Terendelev again and making his escape, Gord pats himself down and discreetly goes through his bag of holding to discover that -

Most of his equipment is there! His sword is in the bag and so are most of his potions and emergency scrolls and money. He's wearing his chainpants and his belt and a wholly unnecessary shirt. 

He's also wearing an unfamiliar magical amulet.

Um?

He tries taking it off; nothing visible happens. He stuffs it in the bag.

The wound on his chest hurts when he pokes it. He has no idea what it is but tomorrow he can try remove curse and neutralize poison and if he has to restoration and hopefully even if those fail he'll be able to sense if there is a curse or poison or whatnot involved.

He deliberates whether to get a room at an inn (and risk being caught by the Inquisition) or leave the city (and risk being caught out in the open with no spells) and settles on going to the festival square first, to hear the local news and get some free liquor and punch the straw dummy into a heap of straw (was he not meant to do that? they should really make a better festival-punching-target - fine, fine, here's a couple of mendings).

This is when the sky darkens and a giant voice buzzes over the city like a plague of locusts and Deskari makes a personal appearance to cut the head clean off Terendelev!

Aaaah run away?

Some of the people in the square shed their disguises to reveal themselves as demons who attack the nearest targets, although none of them bother Gord for the moment, perhaps because he has a big sword.

Some other people shed their disguises are paladins and inquisitors and so on, who attack the demons. A couple of the probably-paladins rush at Gord with a clear intent to smite first and ask questions later.

Why now?! He was doing so well blending in!!

He sets himself in a defensive stance and shouts "I'm not with the demons!" even though he knows they won't believe him.

A nearby halfling, who must be either Gorumite or Caydenite, tries to shoot fucking Deskari with a crossbow. It's not even a magical crossbow!

Whether due to a ridiculous morale bonus from the festival ale or an equally ridiculous amount of halfling luck, Deskari actually notices the bolt.

A gnat snaps its jaws at the Lord of Locusts, he rumbles, and swings down his scythe, bigger than houses, faster than the mortal eye can see -

He's not aiming at the halfling. 

An enormous fissure opens up as the ground around them shudders, shaking the gnat-sized people clinging to it off its shoulders and down, deep deep down into the abyss.

You know, metaphorically speaking.

Ugh, that really hurt! He probably lost most of that Heal's worth, just falling down. At least the mysterious wound hasn't reopened.

Gord eyes the uneven wall. He could probably climb it, but Deskari is apparently up there (seriously, Deskari is apparently out and about in Kenabres?!) and so the better part of valour consists of finding an out-of-the-way corner to cower in until tomorrow morning when he has his spells back.

This fissure is fairly linear and doesn't afford much in the way of quiet corners. Also, he can hear voices up ahead.

Some cautious creeping reveals two more people who fell down (or are pretending that), one of them pinned under a rock.

Ugh. The smart thing to do would be to hide from them and hope not to be bothered, but whether these are fellow survivors from Kenabres or demons in disguise, there really isn't much room to hide in! 

There might be room deeper into the fissure, but he'll need to get past them first.

"Hello," he says, stepping out into the light where they can see him, "do you need help?"

"A fellow survivor? Yes, help me lift this rock off her!"

With Gord and Seelah working together, the rock is easy to remove.

"I don't have any spells or channels left. If we wait until tomorrow morning I'll be able to heal your leg."

It's very reasonable of him to have used up all his spells and channels fighting off the demons before falling down! If Seelah had any channels she probably also would have used them before falling down!

"I'm Seelah, a paladin of Iomedae, and this is Anevia."

"We can't climb back up, especially with Anevia's leg. Let's move forward; there may be another exit back to the surface, or more survivors who might need our help."

Anevia is much less trusting of mysterious strangers than Seelah, and is prevented from bringing this up by the fact that her audience consists of Seelah and the mysterious stranger himself.

"I can walk, with help, and I can still shoot things. While standing still."

He'd take point, except that he doesn't trust a paladin not to sword him in the back the moment she remembers to check whether he's evil.

"I'm also injured from the fall. I'll help Anevia walk, and if we get into a fight I'll come up front to help you."

He also has a potion of cure light wounds in his bag, but he's not going to give it to a stranger when he's likely to need it himself before the day is out; that fall did, in fact, take a lot out of him.

A little further down the fissure they come upon another pair of people who fell down from the city, except that this time one of them is dead and the other is standing over him in a... suggestive pose. What exactly it suggests may be up to one's priors, though.

When she notices them she brings up her rapier threateningly. "Who's there?!" 

"Relax, friend! I'm a paladin." (Seelah firmly believes that this should only ever make people less wary of her, at least if they're the right kind of people.)

The girl relaxes. "I'm Camellia. I fell down when that... that..." Her voice falters for a moment. "When the demons attacked - how could that happen? And I found this poor man and tried to help him, but I fear I was too late..."

"What happened to him? He's mutilated. The fall couldn't have done that." But a rapier and a clever pair of hands could.

"Some monster probably found him, and ran off when I arrived. I think I saw a giant centipede earlier."

There's a familiar-looking locket around her neck.

"Did you by any chance arrive in the city this morning with a mysterious wound and missing some memories?"

"What? Certainly not! I've lived here for years." She glares at him.

"She has," Anevia confirms.

"We're looking for a way out. Would you like to join us? It's safer to stick together."

Camellia agrees, and if she trusts some members of the impromptu party less than others she's better trained than to let that show on her face.

Gord keeps supporting Anevia. When they're accosted by the aforementioned giant centipedes, though, it rapidly becomes clear he's much stronger than the rest of the group (unless they're sandbagging) and he reluctantly takes point.

Camellia turns out to be another divine caster (though she also claims not to have any healing), which means he doesn't know what she can do, and so Gord isn't very happy about having these people at his back, but not to the point where he'd risk one of them being killed by a lucky bite from a centipede or a spider. Hopefully they'll keep each other from stabbing him in the back.

Either they don't trust each other or they don't actually want to murder him, because they make it through the centipedes (not really a threat to Gord) and to the next pair of strangers.

(Why do they keep meeting people in pairs, Gord wonders idly.)

The fissure has since merged into a mix of haphazardly dug tunnels and what seem to be natural caverns, but when they hear voices and divert towards them they find a room built of well-shaped stone surrounded by columns and plinths. It's rather the worse for wear due to the recent earthquake, but otherwise it's clearly more - civilized than what one might expect to find deep under Kenabres.

(Camellia is duly surprised. Anevia is surprised, in the way that one is surprised by the sudden yet inevitable and long-foreseen betrayal of one's faithful friend, the official maps and histories of Kenabres. Seelah is too new to Kenabres to know she should be surprised. Gord is too experienced of an adventurer to be surprised by finding a secret dungeon deep under a city.)

"...to be somewhere around here! I'll turn over every heap of rubble if I have to until I find it."

"And what then? You can't touch it, none of us can!" The second voice is full of sibilants and anger and a burning drive to survive, in the face of the world and despite it, to live no matter what it takes.

Not that Gord can understand all that from a tone of voice. But something about it - speaks to him. He's heard a lot of voices like that, over the past five years.

"I'll wrap it in my shirt if I have to!"

"What will that prove? Bring it to the tribe when you cannot wield it? It is a useless symbol of Heaven rejecting us, not a reason to go on a suicide mission!"

Seelah decides that is the right moment to fail to be stealthy instead of listening to the potentially illuminating conversation. (Her armor may have played a role in making that decision.)

(Gord might be slightly biased against paladins and/or unnecessarily heavy armor.)

"There's someone here - Wenduag!"

"Peace, friends! I'm a paladin of Iomedae. We're looking for a way back up to the city."

Oh good, maybe they can foist off the bloody sword on the actual paladin and send her through the Maze.

Lann relaxes minutely; someone saying they're a paladin doesn't exactly prove it. He at least has the experience to tell that the markings on her armor are authentic.

"What's happening up there? There was a strong earthquake..."

"A horde of demons attacked Kenabres, and Deskari personally punched a hole in the earth, and we all fell through it and ended up here."

This is true and also unbelievable and he's curious what these people will make of it.

He's also curious what kind of people they are. They look - not demonic, exactly, and not tieflings, but - like blends of humans with animals, or vermin. Wenduag's robe hides most of her body, but his instincts are that this is less of a normal kind of creature, and more like something - misshapen. A curse, perhaps?  

Camellia is less circumspect. "What are you?"

"Deskari attacked Kenabres?" Lann exclaims.

It feels so validating to have picked approximately the winning side.

"We're neathers. Descendants of some of the first crusaders cursed by demons - supposedly - we've lived below Kenabres ever since."

"Mongrelfolk," Lann insists.

"I've heard of you... I wasn't sure if you were real or not."

"Mongrels is the name upsiders gave us when they cast us out. What did you hear of us?" Wenduag asks pointedly.

"...That you were some kind of tieflings." Anevia tries to look a little embarrassed.

Yes fine Wenduag you win let's get on with the important thing here.

"The way to the surface - the shortest one we know of - is through a dungeon called the Shield Maze. Only the strongest hunters survive it; most who go in don't come out again. Some of our younglings foolishly decided to brave it, to try to get to the surface." 

"We're looking for a sword left by an angel who fought with the first crusaders. It was kept in this room, with other artifacts, because we couldn't use it ourselves, but it can still serve as a symbol to rally the tribe to action and go rescue them before it's too late."

A roomful of First Crusade artifacts, you say? Gord's magic sense is tingling!

Unfortunately, only one actually magical artifact seems to have been kept in this room, but that just means he immediately zeroes in on the right pile of rocks. Carefully moving them out of the way reveals the dusty hilt of a longsword.

If these 'mongrels' can't bear to touch it, Gord doesn't care to try it himself. He already has a magic sword that likes him fine, anyway. He gestures the resident paladin forward.

Seelah grasps the sword's hilt. And - stands there, swaying a bit.

"Are you all right?" When that fails to elicit a response, he pokes her cautiously with the pommel of his sword.

As if released by his touch, a flash of warm light sweeps through the chamber. It leaves everyone feeling just a little bit more vibrant and alive. It doesn't dazzle your eyes, but it might dazzle your mind a little, if you're unused to the touch of Heaven.

In its wake, Seelah looks metaphorically as well as literally radiant.

"I saw a vision", she says reverently. "Lariel, an angel from Heaven, who fought in the First Crusade, was killed here. By a monster who looked like Deskari, though he wasn't really Deskari. And he left his sword, here in the stone, for someone to find, and to - pick up his struggle, his war to protect the innocent."

"I can't serve in the place of an angel. But I can carry this sword, until I find someone who will."

Lann has almost literal stars in his eyes.

"Will you help us rescue our younglings? If you bring the sword to our village and show it to Chief Sull, I'm sure he'll agree."

Then he remembers the surface was just attacked by Literally Deskari. This probably-important paladin's duty is presumably back in Kenabres. "The quickest way we know of to the surface is through the Maze, for those strong enough to make it and clever enough to navigate it, and our village is almost on the way there. We'll help guide you if you help us in return; Wenduag is the best of us at navigating the Maze."

"I am completely out of spells and intend to wait until tomorrow morning before trying this maze. Of course you don't have to wait for me, if you think you can save these younglings and the delay is too dangerous." It sounds like a fine and noble mission, but Gord isn't going to risk his life for strangers and in the company of strangers while he's weak and disoriented.

Anevia has very much noticed that Gord is, in fact, the strongest of their party; if he wants to rely on his spells more than his sword, then she definitely wants him at full power.

"I don't think my returning to the city a day sooner is important enough to risk dying on the way there," she comments. "We would all be better off with some rest."

"I hate to say this, but Chief Sull definitely won't get the tribe into the Maze before tomorrow morning, no matter what we do. The younglings are in great danger, but we wouldn't be here looking for the sword if we thought we could go after them alone."

Seelah really hates sitting around not doing anything while there are people waiting to be rescued. She's also the only one of them who isn't out of spells (by virtue of not having any to begin with), other than Anevia who has a broken leg. But if even the kids' relatives think it's too risky, she's not likely to persuade them otherwise, and she's not going to try it alone against everyone's advice.

...she still hates it, though. How can she be worthy of carrying Lariel's sword to its rightful wielder if she won't even risk herself to save some children?

On the way to the mongrelfolk village, Wenduag taps Seelah's shoulder and gestures for her to drop back for a bit so they can speak in private.

"Lann's idea is madness. He wants the whole tribe to go through the Maze and to the surface, because he lived on the surface as a child and he dreams of going back. He thinks a magic sword will solve everything, and he is going to get everyone killed. The maze is dangerous, and no place for any but the strongest hunters. Leading more children and old folk into it would be sacrificing them, as prey."

"When I was young and foolish, and Lann was playing with dolls up on the surface" - she hisses the last word - "I and my friends tried the Maze. We died, one by one, to traps and monsters and things we couldn't even see in the dark, and in the end I was the only one who made it back out alive. I had to step over my friends' bodies and leave them behind to survive, and I'm not going to do that again."

"When we get to the village, don't show them the angel's sword. Tell them you fell down, and are going back, and will rescue the younglings on your way if you can" - Wenduag does have some idea of how to appeal to a paladin - "don't tell them to follow you. I will guide you through the Maze, and without any weaklings to slow us down we might even make it through alive."

Seelah can totally appreciate the idea of not asking noncombatants and the young and old to follow her into a dungeon!! She's not very clear on why Lann wants to do that.

When they arrive at the village, it's not immediately clear that it deserves the name. It's a collection of tents and ramshackle lean-tos, built on an island in a small lake. Because it's only lit by torches, it takes a few minutes for them to realize that's all there is to it.

That's supposed to be a self-sufficient settlement? Do they have a druid or something, or do they eat only fish and flesh and fungi?

Maybe it's just a hunters' camp away from the main village.

Lann leads them up a small knoll and towards an elderly-looking mongrelperson.

"Chief Sull! We found the angel's sword! And we found a paladin who can wield it!" He points at Seelah. "Gather the tribe, anyone who can hold a weapon! The young ones are still alive, we can still save them!"

"Uplandersh... The end timesh are upon ush, indeed..."

No two mongrelfolk they've seen in the village look the same. Chief Sull looks like a were-rat deformed by old age at least as much as by curse, one eye blind and the other tearing, a few tufts of white hair hanging onto his bare head and his breath rattling in his lungs. He makes Gord think of the Pharasmin dioramas (or, The End Times Are Upon Us, figuratively speaking) - the end of a progression starting with brash youngling and mature adult and continuing past wise elder into sad decrepitude.

"Ah... Lann, you're always chashing your dreams, too hashty for your own good", Chief Sull declares. "Uplandersh can be paladinsh and wield the Light of Heaven... But such thingsh don't happen to ush."

"This paladin didn't just - happen to wander by to collect the sword and be on her way! She's here to help us! Even if we can't wield the Light of Heaven, we can still follow it, so we should! Seelah, please, show him the sword's light!" He looks at her imploringly.

The sword is clearly something more to these people than merely a powerful weapon. Or even a sign of Heaven's favor: it's the sword they care about, not her being a paladin.

But while she's not sure what showing them the sword means, she can't possibly hide it from them, not after Lann and Wenduag already saw it and indeed told her about it in the first place and led her here because she has it.

When she takes the sword out and concentrates on it, like she does every morning in her prayers, it glows again. Not as brightly as before, a soothing and comforting light rather than a blinding one. A touch of Heaven upon every soul that does not know how to seek it out themselves, everyone who lives in this dark and forgotten corner of the world where it is never morning.

Indeed, the sight of the sword's light is enough to move Chief Sull to tears.

"Sho it'sh true... The angel did not forshake ush, no... Back, back from the dead he came, to shave our children..." He goes on in this vein for a while, but Gord's looking to see how the others are taking it. 

Lann looks righteously happy; he must be feeling vindicated. Wenduag is angry (but she always seems angry) and trying to hide it, her eyes darting about, looking for allies and potential foes. Seelah seems troubled; Camellia seems uncaring. Anevia is... probably the only one here who's actually any good at hiding their thoughts.

Chief Sull shakes his head. "All the tribesh will gather for thish. I will shend out the meshengers. Wait with ush, uplandersh. Rest in our hutsh. Our home ish your home."

"If the tribe follows you into the Maze, their blood will be on your hands!" Wenduag hisses furiously into Seelah's ear.

Seelah is honestly mostly confused. "Chief Sull... Why do all the tribes need to go with us? I don't know what the light of Heaven means to you, but shouldn't I and the strongest warriors clear the Maze first, and do it as quickly as possible to save your children?"

"We are the deshendants of the firsht crushadersh. The underground crushadersh, we are, and we... our anshestorsh did not give up. We have alwaysh remembered that some day we would be called on to crushade again. It'sh how we can live like thish... remembering our pasht, keeping who we are. Telling our children they are not beashts or half-beashts, they are not worshe than the uplandersh. They musht live well and rightly, for themshelvesh and for their tribe, and be ready to follow the Light of Heaven. The Light would call ush again."

"And - now it hash." He seems to need no further proof or explanation to follow Seelah straight into battle with demons, bad eye and age-spots and all, him and all the rest of his tribe.

Seelah doesn't feel qualified to judge that theologically, but on a practical basis, she's pretty sure leading a mixed civilian population into battle isn't what the Light of Heaven wants her to do!

"The city might be very dangerous for you just now, as well as the Maze," she offers uncertainly. "There was a big demon attack, and an earthquake, which is why we fell down here in the first place! I - obviously welcome any allies in the fight against the demons, but we should really clear the Maze first, and make sure you'll have lodgings and food in the city and so on." She looks at Anevia pleadingly.

Anevia is much more practised in delivering inconvenient truths.

"Any warriors who help us fight the demons would be very welcome. Anyone who is not a warrior, or an experienced healer or smith or something like that, would frankly be a liability until the fight is over and the city stabilizes. You seem safe from the demons down here, so you should send only the warriors you can spare, with everyone else to follow later."

If most of the tribe's hunters (they don't really have warriors per se) could go into the maze right now to rescue the missing kids, that would obviously be better than having all of the hunters with them but also having to guard everyone else. It would be very convenient if Chief Sull could be convinced of a reasonable plan like that, but -

"Wait. Wait for all the huntersh from all the tribesh to gather. Tomorrow we will go into the Maze."

- but Chief Sull is more concerned with leading the tribe, and merging all the tribes into one people, than he is with rescuing the missing kids; and Lann doesn't know how to convince him otherwise, because their duty is to the whole tribe, it's just that the kids are part of it and one he hasn't given up on.

Well at least they didn't have the whole tribe charge off into the Maze right away like Lann apparently wanted!

If all the tribes went into the Maze together... they'd still die. These newcomers might be strong enough to change that. Her job is to figure out if they're stronger than Savamelekh in time to be on the right side. This is made much harder by her not having any idea of how strong Savamelekh actually is, beyond 'very much stronger than Wenduag', not to mention whether he's actually in the Maze right now or if it's just Hosilla. She's pretty sure all the tribes' hunters together can beat Hosilla, but half of them might die in the attempt.

To start with, she needs to decide by morning whether to stick with this paladin's party or slip away.

"If you want me to guide you through the Maze," she tells Seelah, "only your party can come. Lann and I are the strongest hunters in this tribe, and the other tribes will take too long to get here. After we clear a route through the Maze and reach the city and come back, then you can tell the tribes to go ahead."

Seelah is on board with this strategy!

So is Gord! (As long as his mysterious wound doesn't start acting up again.) He'd much rather be part of a fighting party than a guard caravan. And he doesn't have to go back down with them afterwards.

Anevia will join them if Gord fully heals her leg in the morning.

Camellia isn't going to stick with these mongrels while the only humans head off to the surface, possibly never to come back for her!

Actually there's another surfacer human down here! Sorry, did we forget to mention him? He also fell down and was found by another hunter and helped here.

"I am Horgus Gwerm," he declares. He then looks rather pointedly at Camellia. Or rather, he's very pointedly not looking at Camellia, which has much the same effect if you're used to tracking people's gazes like Gord is.

"So you are," Camellia agrees, her lip twitching. "A well-known rich merchant in Kenabres, who helped sponsor the... tragically truncated festival today."

"A man of undoubted Abadaran piety," Anevia agrees.

"I have no doubt you have all heard of me if you've spent any time in the city. And I have a business proposition for you." 

This seems to be directed at Seelah, who looks a bit uncomfortable. "I am afraid I'm new to the city, Mr Gwerm, and have not heard of you before today."

Oh good, he didn't want to be the one to say it.

"You really are new to the city, then... I'll have you know that I am one of the richest and most distinguished men in Kenabres! The Gwerm trading house is a pillar of the city! Did you see the festival bunting, or try the wine? I paid for that. Did you notice the streets cleaned on Sundays, the Molthuni spices sold at a fair price? You have Horgus Gwerm to thank for that!"

This Abadaran merchant makes himself sound like an actually nice person!

"I too fell down here. Unlike you, I'm not strong enough to make it back up by myself. Lead me safely back to the city, and I will pay you a thousand crowns."

"We'd be doing that regardless," Seelah says. "We're going to clear a safe passage through to the city tomorrow, and then it sounds like many of the mongrelfolk will go through, with all of their guards, and you can join them. I might also help guard them, but it depends on the situation in the city, I might be needed more elsewhere."

"The mongrelfolk may go or stay, they may go tomorrow or later, they may let Horgus Gwerm come with them or charge him money. I want all of you to guarantee my safe passage, tomorrow if possible, for which Horgus Gwerm will pay you a thousand crowns."

Gord would happily take the job for that price, if it's still on offer after they've already cleared the route, but something could happen on the way up that would make him change his mind.

"After we clear the route, if it looks safe, I'll come back for you," he offers.

"I'll be coming back to guide the tribe anyway and I'll also promise to guard you specifically for a share of the payment." Lann has lived on the surface long enough to know that a thousand crowns is rather a lot of money for one man to be offering for a one-day job, but the other surfacers vouched for this Horgus Gwerm, so he trusts him to pay up. And the tribe will need the money if they move to the city.

(Lann's surfacer days did not include any interactions with the adventuring economy.)

Horgus Gwerm harrumphs and frowns but ultimately has to be satisfied with these conditional promises; raising his offer won't make Seelah change her mind about her duty, or Gord's about his own safety. And he is a good Abadaran, so he indeed won't pay them for anything they would be doing anyway.

With Horgus Gwerm safely away chatting with Anevia and the rest of the impromptu party spread around the mongrelfolk village, Gord approaches Camellia.

"I couldn't help but notice," he says quietly, "the magic locket around your neck. Would you mind telling me what it does?" It looks the same as the one he found, or rather was found with, and has the same divine Abjuration aura (to the limits of his admittedly nonexpert perception), but he doesn't recognize the spell.

If it's a common enough item to be duplicated, it might have some unremarkable function that Camellia won't mind sharing. And if it's not a standard item, then perhaps she holds a clue to his recently-mysterious past.

Camellia stiffens. "It's none of your business," she says frostily, followed a moment later by a reluctant - "why do you ask?"

If she won't share the information, Gord doesn't have any obvious levers to pull, so he'll try asking nicely first. 

"I have recently... come into possession of a similar amulet, and I would like to know what it does." He takes his own amulet from his bag and shows it to her briefly.

He's walking around Seelah without wearing the amulet; he took that amulet off someone who had reason to have one. The conclusion is rather obvious.

But if he wanted to tell the paladin she's an Evil mage and hiding it, he wouldn't need her confession. There's a change he really doesn't know what it does, and is just fishing, in which case...

"I am a shaman; I cast spells by calling spirits to my aid. My familiar spirit, Mireya, lives in the amulet. The one you have may have belonged to a shaman too; if you give it to me I can try to commune with the spirit inside it, if there is one."

Translation: there is a soul, imprisoned in the amulet by Abjuration magic, from which Camellia extracts power.

Gord has never been privy to the shamanic lore of old Sarkoris, but he has long resigned himself that learning more about how the world works usually means learning something terrible. And so it doesn't come as a terrible shock to learn that at least some of the spirit-callers of the old country didn't ask or bargain for the spirits' aid so much as enslave them. Mages have fancy words they like to hide behind, binding and calling and warding, but in the end it always comes down to slavery.

He still has no idea how or why he ended up with one, but at least now he knows what to do with it: find a wizard (preferably Desnan) with sufficient spellcraft and pay them enough money to figure out the appropriate ritual to set the spirit free.

He'll need to get Camellia's amulet too. That will nicely solve two problems; she looks to be rich enough to pay for the wizard. But he won't make a move until they're back in the city; there are too many people in the camp who'd object or at least demand a better explanation than "I killed her for her amulet, which contains an enslaved spirit, whom I intend to free but don't know how yet."

"I see," he says evenly. "It is useless to me, then, but I will try to find a buyer for it. Thank you for the information."

This underground village is tiny. It is cut off from almost all contact with the world, has no industry to speak of, no tools or materials for smithying or cloth or even leather, barely any agriculture. Nothing a surfacer would call technology, or civilization.

From another point of view, it is a shining light in the literal darkness around it, because the far too easy alternative is not this, it is every man for himself, no safe places to sleep, no children playing, nothing but the feral growling in the dark. And yet these people, forever teetering on the very brink of losing everything that makes them people, have managed miraculously to preserve a slice of sanity - language, tools, buildings, leaders who are not wardlords, laws - for ten too-short generations.

It takes someone special, in such a world, to keep going and to strive to make things better. And when the light of Heaven that you venerate contemptuously rejects your very touch, that someone is -

Dyra, cleric of Abadar.

Even this tiny village can't escape the grasping tentacles of Abadar! These people have been abandoned by the gods and they deserve better. Maybe there's not enough travel here for Desna and not enough sun for Sarenrae and not enough fighting for Gorum, but even Pharasma would be an improvement!

Oh, come on! You came all this way down from the surface, you must have so much to trade! I've waited and waited for so long and now you've finally come!!

Please please pleeease trade with me?

Damn it, she's looking at him like Sull looked at the shiny sword. ...he can't say no to those pleading eyes, can he.

Gord makes a through inventory of the contents of his bag for the first time since he woke up. Nothing seems to be missing, except that the cheese he bought yesterday morning has gone moldy terribly quickly; he chucks it in the lake.

He'll buy some of the local food! Lizard meat in mushroom sauce, with weird-looking purple eyes floating in; he gives it a 3 out of 10 on the Gord Weird Worldwound Food Scale (and a purify). 

And he'll sell her - this shirt. That someone dressed him in for some reason. It's not his shirt, he has other clothes in his bag for disguise days, he doesn't need it.

Having eaten dinner and freed himself of the inexplicable shirt, Gord checks in with Seelah to plan for tomorrow.

"I thought your shirt was some kind of magic armor! Why... are you wearing... only chainmail leggings?" Seelah is honestly baffled by this one.

"You know how some people wear chainmail, but some only buy chainshirts? What did you think happened to all the spare chainpants?"

That can't be how it works... can it? Admittedly, magic armor is made by wizards and they're never the sanest bunch, but still!

"He's joking," Anevia sighs, taking pity on Seelah.

"You seem very sure of yourself."

"We'd notice. Do you think the Crown wouldn't field a chainpants regiment if it could save them money?" She looks at Gord with complete sincerity.

He tries holding her gaze for a few seconds, but is the first one to break down laughing. (Damn, that woman has an admirable poker face.)

"You got me," he admits. "It's a custom job. As good armor as a chainshirt, 'cause they both cover half the body, but it's lighter and looks better, too!" And more than twice as expensive for being custom, but that's really not the point.

Anevia looks at him consideringly, but elects not to challenge this amended statement.

"Wenduag wants us to get an early start tomorrow morning," Seelah says. "Not to wait for the other tribes and their warriors. Go in, save the kids, clear a route if we can, report back if we can't. It sounds like a good plan to me."

Gord, Lann and Anevia would also rather be part of a small adventuring party than guards for a big, slow-moving host that would benefit from scouting ahead anyway.

Gord heads off to pay Dyra to wake him before dawn - his personal clock is messed up and she's probably the only one here who reliably knows when dawn is.

Then he sets up his collapsible tent, with its built-in alarm tripwires. (He's an adventurer with a bag; he doesn't need to take over someone's hut and his blanket is frankly better than what these people have to offer.) Sets his back against the cliff face, sword close to hand. And works on convincing himself that sleep is more important than fruitless worries and speculation.

Whether thanks to the highly customized tent or his own demonstrated prowess in disemboweling centipedes, Gord wakes up with the wires untripped and himself unmurdered.

He feels a lot better after praying for spells and taking a dip in the lake. Almost cheerful, in fact, and ready to take on the world once more.

First order of the day: fix Anevia's leg. Having a third archer is nice; having a rogue, as well as someone who can vouch for them to the Eagle's Watch if they make it that far, is invaluable.

Having slept on it, Camellia has reluctantly decided that delving filthy dungeons is no place for a well-mannered young lady. She will stay with the tribes for now (and Horgus Gwerm).

Good. They don't need a slaver in their party.

"Stop wasting time and go already. We have to make it to the city and back before the other tribes arrive and some idiot decides to try the Maze without us."

Wenduag takes them in a rickety boat (where do these people get the wood?) to the opposite side of the lake, and from there it's a short walk to a stone-and-mortal wall with a big door standing half-open.

"We don't have a way to track the kids, and this place is a maze. We need to find a safe path to the city, and then double back and look for survivors."

"I hate that you're right. Do you know how to get to the city?"

"I never made it all the way but I can take us a few floors up."

The first room is a kind of antechamber, with just one door in ohe opposite side. It's lavishly built, with a smooth stone floor with geometric patterns and a red-colored strip in the middle simulating a carpet. There are outright chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and one of them is lit, and so are the candle-holders stationed around the sides of the room. 

Completing the picture are clumps of lit candles placed on the floor around two sacrificial bowls that stand before hanging images of Baphomet, Lord of Goats and Minotaurs.

"This place is clearly not abandoned. There must be full-time Baphomet cultists keeping it clean and lit!" He looks accusingly at Wenduag.

She thinks quickly.

"So that's Baphomet? There are humans here sometimes but they're afraid of the worse things in the dark. Not all the Maze is well lit."

"The last time I went in was three months ago. This room has been cleaned since then." That's really obvious, so she might as well get credit for pointing it out.

"You should have told me it was like this! We could have taken all the candles in this room for the tribe!"

"That's why I didn't tell you! You would anger the Maze-dwellers and lead them to the tribe! You should be thankful nothing ever comes out of it, and only stupid children go in!"

"Quiet," Anevia orders. (Quietly.) "Whoever or what-ever lives here might be close. We need to move unnoticed if we can, whether to ambush or avoid them. Ideally we'd capture and interrogate a cultist."

She isn't really surprised by finding signs of a cult of Baphomet below the city; they're a dime a dozen in Kenabres, and calling the place a maze rather gave the game away. The big question is what this cult has been getting up to besides high-quality masonry.

Gord isn't very enthusiastic about attacking someone just because of their faith, and he has no misconceptions about what an interrogation of a demon cultist looks like, paladin in the party or no.

"We'll offer and honor surrender," he says firmly.

"Of course we will!"

Seelah is painfully conscious of being the main impediment to any sneaking-around this party might need to do.

Of course she'll only interrogate them after the cultists predictably refuse to surrender to a paladin! (She does not say this.)

These people might be very strong (at least Gord is) but they have weird surfacer ideas Wenduag doesn't really understand.

They're willing to fight people and kill them, but not to interrogate them after? It's in the captives' interests to cooperate to survive!

The next room is indeed much darker, and also much larger; a hall long enough they can't see the far wall. There are torches in wall-scones whose small pools of light only make the spaces in between seem black as night.

Seelah takes a torch. Gord casts light on a pebble; it's quicker and safer to put it away than to douse a torch quickly.

There are statues along the walls, but most of them lie broken. Walking forward reveals a bigger pile of rubble blocking the room.

"This must be from the earthquake. We have to take the longer way around it, through that side door."

Lann has been carefully looking away from any sources of light and into the darkest patches of shadow and so he is the first to spot, in the corner near the rubble -

"Someone's there!" he calls, drawing his bow.

Shit, they noticed him! And they have a paladin! Is this how he dies?!

He snaps off a crossbow bolt at Lann while his fellow starts casting magic missile.

Faced with a wizard who's willing to fight in close quarters, Gord instinctively runs towards the danger: if they think they can survive in melee, they're definitely too dangerous to fight at range.

Then the first swing of his greatsword takes the caster's head clean off and he just barely manages to turn his blade so the instinctive follow-up only knocks the other one unconscious.

What the hell were these couple of greenhorn wizards thinking, attacking a party of five?!

Wenduag is impressed.

With Gord, not the two cultists. If Lann hadn't noticed them, she was willing to let them stick around in case she ended up siding with Hosilla after all, but idiots who don't even try to surrender when outnumbered and so clearly out-matched don't deserve to live.

They carry the unconscious captive back to the more-defensible antechamber and tie him up. Because Lann and Seelah are still at the baby-adventurer stage where every bolt and missile wound counts, Gord heals them with a channel, which serves to wake up the cultist at the same time.

The first thing he sees is Gord's face looming over him. "Surrender, by Gorum's rule of battle," he intones.

Nodnodnod he surrenders!!!

...does that mean they won't kill him like Iomedae's inquisitors or put his hand in the fire like Iomedae's inquisitors or torture him before killing him anyway like (he heard) Iomedae's inquisitors or just torture him for fun anyway like the even-scarier Baphomet's inquisitor or...

Oh, this poor kid who never had a real chance in his life because he lives in fucking Kenabres.

Gord is too damn well practised at not letting this show on his face (and whose fault is that?!) but somewhere inside him, the fire never goes out completely.

"We're going to ask you some questions. We won't torture you. If you cooperate we'll set you free, somewhere you won't die of it, just not where you can let your friends know we're coming. And if you don't cooperate we'll keep you tied up, and afterwards set you free unless someone accuses you personally of something we feel justifies killing you."

Anevia approves of not torturing captives but she very strongly disapproves of letting them know she won't torture them, because that in fact takes away her best way of interrogating them without torturing them!!

Obviously she's too professional of letting this show on her face. And showing dissent would be counterproductive during this interrogation. Afterwards, they should probably talk about who leads the party and what rules they're operating under; it's honestly her oversight for not doing it earlier.

Seelah obviously wouldn't torture a prisoner or let anyone else do it, but isn't it... the law, in Kenabres... to execute cultists of Baphomet?

Technically she's not in Kenabres right now but only under it. And in any case she's not obligated to execute the laws of the city, even though she thinks this one is probably just and is definitely justified. So this isn't a problem for her Law. 

What really troubles her is that, if this goes well, they are likely to shortly end up with even more surrendered cultists, and a capture-and-release program is probably going to create some problem down the road, and especially so down the road that the mongrelfolk tribes are planning on travelling in the near future.

But what choice have they got? Operate an underground prison for cultists while demons assault the city above?

Inheritor, help this person, she prays. Help him see the light as I did, help him see that it's the right thing and also actually the best thing in his circumstances, to be our ally and not our foe.

Actually...

She can help him literally see the Light... can't she?

Seelah reverently takes out the angel's sword (she's not using it to fight with, just carrying it around like the holy relic that it is) and sort of - pulls it into her ongoing state of prayerful-meditation and just - asks it to do its best, which is definitely better than her own.

Shiiiiine.

The terrified cultist was in the middle of frantically spilling out all his secrets (not particularly in order) when suddenly AAAAAAH?!

There's an overpowering light that dazzles and blinds, physically and metaphorically both. That makes him suddenly unsure of every conviction he ever held in life, while paradoxically making him more sure of himself. A light that offers a hand up when he's at rock bottom, that makes him feel brave for the first time when he's only ever hurt people out of terror.

It can't be Baphomet; he proved himself an unworthy servant today. It can't be Iomedae; Her light burns and scours away Her foes.

Is this... Gorum?

Oh come on, he had such a good rapport going! Why do paladins have to drag their Heaven into everything?

"Let me serve you! Please let me serve you! I swear I'll never betray you, just let me live and follow you and prove myself worthy! All I've ever wanted is a master who'll use me well and I can see now you're that master!!!"

(The ex-cultist is not very clear on Gorumite and/or Gordian theology, apart from not torturing surrendered prisoners.)

It seems he's not such an idiot after all! Truly, there is hope even for the meanest who grovel.

Yesyesyes thank you thank you thank you she's never doubting the miraculous light of Heaven ever again!!!

...wait, is the cultist swearing to follow Heaven (yes!!) or to follow her (he really oughtn't...) or - Gord? Swearing yourself is serious business!

...

"Don't grovel."

"Everyone is born free. Follow a leader, defend your friends; never accept a master."

"I can tell you how to follow Gorum. I don't want you to follow me, because you're not strong enough yet to survive the kinds of fights I get into. And I don't trust you with my back yet. But we'll get you somewhere safe, like I promised, and I'll try to help you find a way forward, after this. You'll have your chance, if you're willing to fight for it."

Wenduag swears privately to prove herself strong enough to follow Gord.

Assuming he can beat Savamelekh. But - Savamelekh would never tell her not to accept him as her master.

...is this what the 'love' Lann keeps nattering on about feels like?

Seelah is very relieved that Gord told the cultist not to follow him and by implication not to swear any oaths for now! That means she'll get to tell him all about Heaven first, maybe get him a place working for some paladin order! A wizard is always useful, they won't turn away one who can swear repentance under zone of truth and if they get him out of the city (and maybe the country) they won't be sheltering him from the law.

...wait, he's still talking. She missed out on the first half of his confession, on account of praying for his immortal soul.

What's his name, anyway?

Rovaldo! His name is Rovaldo!

...and past the bunk room and the refectory they'll be back at the far end of the hall where he attacked them he's very very sorry and there's a fountain of blood he doesn't know what it does he never heard of vampires here maybe it just looks cool and then there are stairs down to the other dungeons and he last saw the Left Hand going there but that was hours ago and the other way is a big room they're told not to go but he thinks that's where he came through when they brought him down from the city only he was blindfolded and he smelled something horrible there and there are earth elementals fixing things after the earthquake and a crazy water elemental trying to drown them all and...

Gord stops him when he starts repeating things for the third time and Anevia can't think of any more questions.

The first mongrelfolk have begun gathering outside, so they leave Rovaldo with them (sans spellbook and crossbow) with strict instructions to both parties, and press on. The other cultists probably haven't discovered the bloodstains (Lann has been watching the hall), so they go back to being sneaky.

Unfortunately, the barracks and refectory are full of cultists, and they can't really go around them.

"We're here to clear a path, not just sneak around," Lann points out.

Then Gord will acquire a mix of dead bodies and more captured prisoners!

(He's sorry, but these guys just aren't on his level, alright? With suppressive fire from three archers and Seelah helping tie them down, he can take on their strongest fighters one by one and they're not, really, a threat.)

Questioning the new captives is more difficult because there are several of them and they will glare at the first one who tries to betray the rest.

"It will take time to move everyone to the mongrelfolk's custody and not be attacked by their friends on the way. Do we even have enough rope to tie them all up?"

Well they're not killing prisoners!!

She tries to shine the Light of Heaven on them, but it doesn't seem to work as well on groups of captives who haven't been given any promises or threats or really explanations. And they don't, really, have even ten minutes to spend on each prisoner, especially if they keep getting more of them.

"We can break their fingers so they can't fight us if their friends free them," Wenduag suggests.

"Their friends would have to heal them anyway before they could fight again. So if we give them wounds that heal cleanly, it won't help, and if we give them nasty crippling wounds then why did we even take them prisoner? I'd do it if we had no better choice, but so far I'm not impressed by the strength of these cultists so I think we do have a choice."

They end up disarming them as best they can, tying all their hands together in a way Anevia claims will stop them from freeing each other very quickly, and locking them all in a little room that opens off the dormitory. Along with their friends' dead bodies, to hopefully scare them out of staging a break-out very quickly. Gord pushes one of the two-tiered bunk beds in front of the door in case that helps.

"If you break out and I see you again doing anything other than running away, I will kill you," he warns them before shutting the door.

Then they're finally back at the other end of the hall, which has the promised pool of unexplained blood below another bas-relief of Baphomet's goat-head.

And past that, a large square room with a ritual circle drawn on the floor in blood, a few human bodies lying around, and two dretches.

Oh, these poor wretches. Made from leftover bits of souls, barely smarter than animals. Perhaps they were animals in the first place, or feral Boneyard babies.

They're not even any stronger than some of the guys he killed already, and they still attack the party on sight.

There's no real way to take dretches prisoner. They don't even understand the concept of surrender properly, beyond the moment when someone stops threatening them with a sword. A few dretches evolve something like human-level intelligence, but for the most part they're just walking bags of suffering. 

Of all the demons he's met, it was always easiest to convince himself that destroying a dretch is a mercy killing. Gord doesn't know of anything he can do to make life any better for them, not really.

He aligns his sword with Good, and tries to make it quick.

"What happened here? Did the demons turn on the cultists?"

Anevia inspects the ritual circle. "I think this was a summoning circle," she says. "So yes."

"I wish all evil cultists were stupid enough to summon demons to devour themselves," Lann jokes. Judging by his expression, it falls a little flat even with himself.

"Well, at least that explains what the blood fountain is for. Though not where it came from..."

"I never made it past this room but I think the next door leads upwards. That matches what the prisoner said."

The next door has two keyholes and they don't have even one key.

Anevia tries lockpicking but quickly finds out there are no tumblers or other visible mechanisms. "It might be magic."

Detect magic. "Yeah, it's magic all right."

"Should we try to find Lusilla or her hands? Or interrogate the prisoners after all?" Either option will take time, while the kids are presumably in danger.

Stone shape. The door with its hinges falls out neatly out of the remains of the archway.

"My spells aren't just for healing, you know?"

That is pretty cool! Seelah smiles in relief.

Beyond the doorway, a staircase winds upwards.

"We don't know what's past here. I'll scout ahead. Seelah, your armor is too loud."

Well she's sorry but if the alternative is not having any armor over her chest like mister chainpants over there then she's not actually sorry at all!

Does he trust any one of them without his supervision? Not entirely. But he does trust them to keep each other in check.

"I'll go. If I'm not back in ten minutes, I'm unable to return."

Invisibility. He pads quietly up the stairs. There are lit torches on the walls here too, so he doesn't need Wenduag for her darkvision, which is inconveniently unavailable to clerics.

The top of the stairs opens onto a sort of balcony overlooking a small round room. 

In the room are five young mongrelfolk, an aasimar, and a human woman with one of Baphomet's signature glaives.

And a four-armed demon of a kind Gord devoutly hoped never to see again, or at least not until he had quite a few more spell circles.

Calm down. Deep breath. Deep - no, quiet breath. Easy. It hasn't seen you yet. It has its back to you and the invisibility won't let anyone else see you, so you can still get away.

Gord deliberates whether casting silence with its damnable verbal component will attract more attention than the ensuing silence would solve, decides against it, and very carefully tiptoes back down the staircase.

...where he dismisses the invisibility so he can frantically shush everyone and lead them (quietly) back into the main hall.

"It's a vrolikai."

Out of everyone present, only Anevia knows enough to understand why this might lead to panic, but she also controls her face better than to let any panic show.

Wenduag also knows why seeing Savamelekh might lead to panic! Which means, by Gord's reaction, that the demon is out of their league after all.

...pity.

"How bad is a vrolikai?"

"A little bit" - he holds thumb and index finger half an inch apart - "weaker than a balor. This might well be Deskari's direct lieutenant in the city, if Khorramzadeh hasn't come back."

...oh.

He turns to Lann. "Your kids were in the room with it. Well, I assume it was them. I'm sorry. I don't see how we can save them."

"Damn it. You're sure we can't do anything?" It's agonizing to be told your tribe's children are in the next room with a demon and that you shouldn't go in to help them.

"Yes, I'm sure! Vrolikai are - look. We only ever saw, like, ten of them, in the whole war. I mean the Fourth Crusade," he adds for Anevia's benefit. "They don't leave the Abyss much."

"One of them took the Tenth Infrantry apart. Couple of hundred men, clerics, the lot. Just waded through them like tissue paper. Nobody on the field could do anything until it got bored and went away. The only way to survive was to hide in a deep enough hole."

"Any spells slide right off them, their gaze drives men mad. A hit from it would kill any of us on the spot. I can't sneak past it because it has truesight and even if I could there's no way I could get the kids out."

"It could be an illusion or a polymorph?" Seelah offers, aware she's grasping at straws.

"It could. Do you want to be the one to find out?"

Best to nip that in the bud. "He's right, we can't fight a vrolikai head on. We have to tell the mongrelfolk not to go into the maze yet, and find another route into the city - to warn them. There might be someone in Kenabres strong enough to fight a vrolikai, but with Terendelev dead we'd need everyone powerful on one page before we even think of trying."

"Wenduag, could there be another way into the city from the maze?"

"...wait, where's Wenduag?"

Shit.

In retrospect Gord blames himself, for not making them start running right away. If he calls a retreat now, he'd be leaving a comrade behind. But if the monster's already picking them off one by one from the shadows... then they're all dead men walking, so he'll just choose to assume that it isn't.

In which case: where's Wenduag?

"Did she run off to try to save the children?"

"I don't think she would. I mean, she'd at least ask me to come along."

"She didn't go past me, so she must have stepped back into the room with the stairs."

Lann goes back into the other room to look for Wenduag, and Seelah follows him.

She isn't there.

Oh for - locate object Wenduag's bow.

Yeah it's up those stairs. Moving a bit.

He's going to have to go back there, isn't he. And pull her out somehow. Except he has no idea how to convince Wenduag of anything without being overheard and he doesn't even have his invisibility left.

Gord is saved from his indecision when a woman appears in the doorway.

It's not Wenduag.

"You little rats are going to pay for breaking down my door."

Shit. (Again.)

"Everyone back to the hall and start running already!" Maybe the demon isn't right behind her and they can still escape.

"Oh, you think you little rats can run?" Hosilla taunts. "Have some quasits to play with, they seem about your speed." While she closes in with the only one in the group Wenduag said might be a problem.

He can't afford a fight of attrition, because he'd probably win it but he doesn't have the time. Gods damn it, he didn't even have the foresight to buff everyone!

A holy smite (*) at least gets rid of her summons, even if it probably doesn't affect her all that much. Now if only he can get every back through the door, he can block it with a spiritual ally and that should delay her just enough he won't die wishing he'd prepared a second stone shape today.

(*) Not really a smite, but the name's popular for obvious reasons.

Unfortunately for Gord, this party contains someone else who enthusiastically runs towards danger rather than away from it!

Gaah. Alright, how many turns can he afford to take buffing himself before Seelah commits suicide-by-cultist?

Probably... one or more? Seelah can lay on hands herself but Hosilla can deal damage faster than she can heal it, so she might not even last until she runs out. The two archers aren't making much of an impression, either, possibly because Gord didn't get around to giving them magic weapon or align weapon or something.

One it is, then. Prayer, as a compromise because he doesn't have time to debate himself while Seelah's fighting.

If he goes into melee she'll keep attacking Seelah to take the weaker enemy down first. Can he force her hand first? Searing light, and then he closes in.

Yeah, she still thinks she can win this but she also doesn't see a good reason to risk her life fighting to the bitter end when the maze is full of her people. She'll let the rats run before her for a minute while she calls her two Hands.

Hosilla tries to step back into the stairwell, so they can't both attack her at once.

"Seelah! Fall back, now!" 

Spiritual ally to box presumably-Hosilla into the stairwell, and hope like hell she doesn't have a dispel ready.

A copy of Gord made out of pure force appears, complete with greatsword. It might not have his spells and it doesn't last even a minute, but it hits even harder than he does and she'll have a hard time getting past it no matter how she buffed her glaive.

Now can they finally run away?

There's a pop of air behind his back. "Why is this taking you so long", an inhuman voice complains.

Gord turns around already knowing what he's about to see, even as Lann and Seelah shout at him from opposite directions.

This is it, then.

A feeling of resignation washes over him. He takes a step back and it's so slow, crawling like molasses through the air as Lann fires another pointless arrow and Seelah charges in to die by his side and the monster watches the ridiculously futile resistance with idle curiosity, like ants it can't begin to understand but will step on all the same.

And beneath the resignation, slowly building rage. I am not done yet! How dare you make me give up! I refuse to die! How dare you call yourself Gord and resign yourself to death! Get out my head, IMPOSTER! I will KILL this wretched monster that DARES make me despair!

The wound on his chest reopens and weeps blood, and he watches it as the moment stretches to taffy. Is he even in control of his body anymore? What's happening to him?

Fight the rage, whispers another voice. You don't need it to win. Take the Light of Heaven into your soul. Smite the demon with holy power. Join us in the fight against Evil.

And that one, somehow, snaps him out of it.

How dare any of these voices get into his head and tell him what to do.

How dare Heaven bid him sell his soul for power, on this day and after his entire life. He'll die first.

But he'll die as he lived: on his feet, and fighting.

Shut up. Both of you.

I am Gord. And I will DIE FREE.

Gord's and Seelah's swords (and Anevia's arrow) hit Savamelekh at the same time, with about the effect you would predict.

Also, a giant bolt of holy energy smites him literally to the ground.

...he gets back up again.

What the abyss? That one stung! It wasn't anywhere close to lethal, but demons don't get to be a hundred years old by sticking around to find out if they can take a paladin whose weird smite can literally knock you off your feet.

"Hosilla! Destroy this vermin!" And he's gone in a pop of air.

She's still stuck behind this blasted spiritual ally (luckily Gord's been too distracted to make it move to chase her) and, also, that paladin just knocked Savamelekh off his feet!

She'll make a quiet tactical withdrawal, how about that, and totally carry out her orders later.

"What. Just happened."

"Praise the Inheritor!" Seelah says fervently, and then "praise be to the Light of Heaven!"

Light? You did that, didn't you?

Shiiiine.

"Is the demon going to come back, or can we chase down that cultist and help Wenduag and the younglings?"

"I have no idea. Seelah, can you make your Light do that again?"

"I don't think I did it in the first place! I heard it sort of speak in my head but it didn't exactly ask me for permission! I've said I'm only carrying this holy sword until I find it a deserving wielder!"

"So you didn't sell it your soul?"

"I... what? What are you talking about? Heaven doesn't buy souls!"

"It offered me power for mine," Gord says darkly, but he can't really muster up the necessary emotion because he's still feeling weak in the knees from sheer relief. "We will give you the power to smite demons if you make us a part of your very soul and agree to smite all of Evil with us, all that crap."

Seelah stares at him speechless.

Gord stares right back.

"Guys? Can we go rescue Wenduag?"

Did the demon try to dominate Gord or something? She flickers detect evil at him just to be sure.

Strongly Evil!

Oh no -

If he's dominated they probably can't take him in a straight fight (and she doesn't want to ask the Light to smite him), so she'll try not to let him immediately realise she noticed.

She'll... nonchalantly walk past him and down the hall a bit to check up on Anevia, how about that.

As the only person in the party besides Gord who is sane appreciates the threat level of a vrolikai, Anevia is also feeling a bit weak in the knees, although she's very practiced at not letting it show.

She's also enormously curious about what just happened, but since Seelah just said she doesn't know for sure Anevia won't pry, in case Seelah has a good reason not to say anything more; she doesn't want to force an inexperienced paladin to dance around the truth.

"Are you feeling well?"

"I - yeah. I wasn't hurt, just - very surprised I guess, and not sure what happened?" And clearly distracted by something.

Now, how to actually do this... She does have some practice passing secret messages, but she doubts Anevia knows Kushite thieves' cant and anyway she's rusty, so.

Seelah takes out a piece of paper and a bit of charcoal (meant for leaving messages in emergency if they ever got separated), glances back to make sure Gord is still in the other room, and writes: GRD DETEC EVL.

"Did anything like that ever happen to you before?", Anevia asks in a completely unremarkable tone.

"No! I mean - I never tried before, because I... didn't have a reason to think... it would work?" Seelah offers. Damn it, the cover conversation is mixing up with her secret messaging. She's a paladin, not a wizard!

"So... maybe you could always do that, or at least since you found the angel's sword, but you only noticed when you were desperate enough to actually try?"

"I, um. I guess I don't know that that's wrong. But it seems - very unlikely? Because it - never felt like a possibility before? You can sort of feel what powers you have, right. Like I feel that I can smite evil the normal way." Wait, no, she's getting sidetracked. "I mean, it doesn't match anything else that I've seen happen before, so it seems unlikely because of that?" Seelah has help me written all over her face by now.

"There are more experienced and powerful paladins and clerics of Iomedae in the city. I'm sure they'll be able to help you figure it out, so let's focus on getting there."

Seelah nods gratefully. This is a very reasonable justification for having the terrible decision taken out of her hands.

Gord has by now, if not quite snapped out of his shock, at least put himself enough together that he feels he can keep going. (It's sort of like the way you fight on through a long and bloody battle without really letting yourself process what's happening.)

"If we're going after them, I'm buffing us all first. Hit them fast, hit them hard. This was probably Hosilla, because she was working directly for the demon, so let's hope there are no even more powerful enemies past her. If the vrolikai comes back my spells wouldn't help anyway."

Bless, Magic Weapon for Anevia and Lann's bows, Bull's Strength for himself, and he'll save his other Prayer for when the fighting starts. And a channel to top everyone up.

Light of Heaven. If Gord is enchanted, please, please help him snap out of it. I am sure he is a really Good person underneath it. I - I don't know how to convince you to do anything you don't decide to do yourself, but - if it means anything, I really believe he's Good, and if he isn't I really believe he would be, given the chance. I don't know how much you can see down here, so I'm praying to tell you this. And she tries to focus as much as she can on who she thinks Gord is -

Gord, sternly insisting that we offer and honor surrender -

Gord, taking the time to try to get a cultist who surrendered somewhere safe, when most people in the city would slit his throat without a second thought -

Gord, telling that same ex-cultist not to follow him, because it'd be dangerous -

Gord, running forward while yelling for them to run away -

Shiiiiine.

Every buff helps!

With the buffs cast they're on a clock, and Seelah's armor continues to be non-sneaky, so they run up the staircase without scouting ahead.

There is in fact no other way down into the Maze from here, so she's still in the next room!

But she drank some healing potions and got her backup scrolls and now she is going to make them regret everything.

Even when two archers pepper her with magic arrows while Gord and Seelah block the stairways up to the balcony?

Yeah, alright, she's not a ranged fighter and most of her spells were buffs anyway. She leaves the probably-scary paladin alone, and attacks Gord.

Finally something is going his way.

One on one with melee weapons and a couple of occasional cure wounds spells, he can take her. Seelah attacking her from behind and Lann and Anevia from above just make it that much quicker.

"Wenduag!"

Wenduag steps in through the other door. And shoots Hosilla in the head.

"Where were you?!"

"I found the missing kids," she says, avoiding that question. "They're through this door. I think this leads to the Kenabres sewers - tunnels they built to drain rain." She doesn't really know what rain is, any more than what sewers are, but it's what the man with the golden skin said.

Gord is maybe still not processing quite well enough to ask how she got past the vrolikai and Hosilla in the first place, or why Hosilla seemed to know her name.

Anevia totally noticed that (and noticed Gord not questioning it) but it might not be a good idea to bring it up while she's not sure about Gord either!

The missing kids are finally rescued! Lann is very relieved.

And very, very, very upset with them for having gone into Maze!!!

Also rescued is an Aasimar who was kidnapped from Kenabres to be used in some sort of... demonic blood sacrifice ritual? He's not really sure, since it never took place. But it seemed to involve the mongrelfolk children, too.

"So the cultists were kidnapping mongrels to sacrifice? How long has this been going on?!"

"I knew cultists came to the Maze sometimes, the statues were always there. They were not the biggest threats before. I told you, I didn't go in for months. But I have never seen human cultists outside the Maze. None of our hunters have."

"We came straight here, but if the rest of it is a maze, there might be other monsters we missed. And other cultists, like Hosilla's two lieutenants."

"I know where we are. These are the storm sewers below the Gray Garrison." The aasimar's story helped Anevia figure out that much. "Let's go on up and make contact with our people."

"There were cultists right under the garrison?!"

"You really are new to Kenabres, aren't you?"

Unfortunately, Gord isn't wrong.

A short walk later, they find that a portion of the wall has collapsed - presumably in the recent earthquake. Climbing the pile of rubble leads into a storage room. Stairs lead upwards, and they can hear the sounds of fighting ahead.

Oh what now? Gord was really looking forward to finding some friendlies (even city guards would do at a pinch) and finally relaxing for a few minutes!

...Is he just stressed after a near-death fight? Or did those weird voices affect him in other ways?

The ever-mysterious wound has closed again on its own, but he casts the lesser restoration he had prepared for it anyway. Just in case. 

"I think we're in the Garrison," Anevia says grimly as she pushes past Seelah to carefully pry open the door and peek into -

Pandemonium (*).

At least fifteen assorted demons are fighting as many humans (and half-elves and half-orcs and human-sized enlarged dwarves), all mixed up in a crazy melee without any apparent battle order.

(*) Not really; this is oligodemonium at best, but they're making a spirited go at sounding like a lot more than that!

She signals them to be quiet. "Take them by surprise. Gord, Seelah, we'll fire when you charge."

Wonderful.

He is so not up to explaining how and why he doesn't rush into battle without checking who is fighting whom and why, and this does not - usually - change just because one side is composed of demons.

That said... Demons who attacked Kenabres under Deskari, and made it to the garrison... It's clear enough they're the attackers, and if half of them aren't there of their own free will, that probably goes for the guards too. He can't just make them stop fighting, or even run away from this one little room inside a big building.

This battle won't end until one side is entirely dead, and if he has to choose in a fight for the survival of everyone in Kenabres, he - doesn't choose the demons.

And he has to start killing them now, before they waste another round, or things will get strictly worse.

Gord charges in, with a mighty cry of "surrender to Gorum's might!"

He hesitated. For a moment she was genuinely unsure which side he'd fight on. But then he started killing demons with great dispatch, so she'll help him finish that before having the martial might side of the family help with the intrigue.

He, uh, was probably waiting for the best moment to attack them or something? Seelah is aware Gord being much stronger than her means he's that much more experienced. 

...she hopes that's what it is, anyway.

And then the fight leaves no more room for thought.

With the unexpected help, the fight is soon over. Nobody died in this room, which is really the best outcome she could have hoped for.

Then she sees Anevia, and realizes she should have adjusted her hopes up ten or twenty notches.

"Beth! You're alright!"

The two don't collide in the middle of the room in a frantic hug. Irabeth would be embarassed and maybe ashamed and probably even manage somehow to find herself at fault for showing undue affection to a woman she has, in this context, a work relationship with and not just a personal one. And Anevia is far too sensitive to what Irabeth is thinking to do something she wouldn't appreciate.

But, well. It's the thought that counts, right?

After a brief but heartfelt embrace and even briefer introductions, Anevia leads Seelah aside for a quiet debrief, which includes a verbal report and some paperwork she found on Hosilla and the other cultists.

The other men in the room are very grateful! They might be looking askance at Lann and Wenduag a little, because because they're Kenabrites wary of anything that smacks of demonic taint.

They're also looking very warily at Gord; this one might be because at least half of them are paladins.

They must be seeing what she saw: he's Evil, and since he's Gorum's probably Chaotic Evil at that, and so they don't trust him (even though he just helped save them) and that's. Not exactly wrong, but - they don't know he might be enchanted! (Yet.) He helped them fight the demons, and he has a paladin in his party. How can she make them see him as a potential ally and not a potential threat?

Wait, she has a new tool for this sort of situation, doesn't she? Seelah takes out the angel's sword and prays.

Light of Heaven, help us trust those who deserve it. Help us find allies in a common cause. Help us see the Good in each other, and overcome demonic spells and corruption.

Shiiiiine.

They're quite impressed! Unfortunately, it isn't Gord they're impressed with.

"Kinsby, tell the rearguard we've cleared the first floor. Ask them if we can still add people to the party escorting the wounded," Irabeth directs briskly. Another probably-paladin salutes and walks out of the room.

"Seelah. Gord. Wenduag, Lann. I thank you for your help, both here and to Anevia."

"And I welcome the descendants of the first crusaders. I confess I thought you a myth; I am glad I was wrong. But this is an ill time for any but warriors to come to this city." 

"We are short on time. This building is the Grey Garrison. It's used by the city watch and some of the paladin orders, and so contains weapon stores and is highly defensible. The demons and cultist hold the upper floors of the building, and we must dislodge them before they receive reinforcements."

"But even more importantly, when Deskari attacked he managed to throw the Wardstone out of its fortress and into the upper floor of the garrison. We must recapture and repair it; this will neutralize or drive away most of the demons and make it much easier to retake the city."

She can tell them this much because if Gord is being dominated by a high-ranking demon they'll know this already. Vrolikai aren't known for enchantments, but one never wants to rely on a powerful demon's known strengths and weaknesses.

"What are your intentions now? Do you want to escort the children you rescued back down, and how many of you would that require?

Seelah really wants to help fight the demons! She promised to rescue the kids and she won't shirk her fair share of the duty, but she hopes Lann and Wenduag will judge it safe enough to escort them back on their own.

Teaming up with paladins to fight demons isn't one of Gord's favourite activities. There are parts of the Maze that still need to be cleared, Hosilla's two 'hands' are still out there, and he's perilously close to being out of spells. He could go back down and take it easy for the rest of the day.

He imagines guiding the mongrel tribes back up, Horgus Gwerm who he promised safe passage, Rovaldo who he promised to find a refuge.

Imagines them emerging into a charred ruin of a building, Savamelekh standing cackling on top of a blackened Wardstone.

...He really hates this thing where, every time you choose to help people, you end up having to help them even more. Especially when those people are paladins.

Wait. Stop. He's not normally like this. Why is he so gloomy? They won against a vrolikai! Why can't he stop feeling depressed ever since it happened? Sure, there were weird voices in his head, but the Gord of yesterday would have thrown it off and kept going.

Gord steps back into the stairwell they came from, bends down at the waist, creates as much cold water as he can over his head, and shakes himself rather like a big dog.

...yeah, all right, that actually helped!

"Do you need my help to take this place?" he asks Irabeth.

Kinsby steps back into the room and looks around. "They left already," he tells Irabeth. "The square outside seems clear for now, but I couldn't see past the smoke from the cathedral."

That's code saying neither enchantment sight nor detect magic see anything on Gord, so he's either clear (and has no long-lasting buffs) or under nondetection. But that's not a cleric spell, and requires the vrolikai or one of its servants to have come back invisibly to cast it on a dominated Gord; the balance of probabilities is against.

If he's an enemy, better to fight him now than have him turn on them at the worst possible moment. If he's an ally, better to remove the suspicion between them. And she can't, actually, think of a way to tell him they don't want his help without saying they don't trust him. She signals her people unobtrusively to move away from him, which in the rather tight confinements of the room inevitably means they come to surround him in a loose half-circle, with Wenduag and Lann behind him near the door to the stairwell.

Gord's years of battle-instincts immediately make this the most salient feature of the room. He shifts his sword to a ready stance.

"What's going on?"

"You have an aura of Evil. We're afraid the demon may have enchanted you before it left, or returned to do it later under invisibility."

They're paladins, of course they care about his aura more than anything he says or does to help them. The idea of Savamelekh returning invisibly is honestly scary, but -

"I've detected Evil for years. Ever since the end of the war! Tell them, Seelah!"

"I didn't check you, until after we fought Savamelekh."

"You didn't - what kind of a paladin are you?! I thought you people detect Evil all the time!"

"It takes concentration!! And I don't like to always see the worst about people!"

Gord considers this. "So when we were in the Maze," he says slowly, "and I was relying on you to detect any demons on the other side of doors that we opened -"

"You never told me I was supposed to be doing that!!!" Seelah is blushing furiously, in an equal combination of mortification and anger.

"I thought I only had to tell you if I wanted you to stop!"

Shit. She wants to follow Seelah, who might not be stronger than Gord but clearly serves a stronger god, but she hasn't had an opportunity to talk to her at all yet. If Seelah and Gord fight now she can prove her loyalty, but if they just split up she'll have to convince Seelah to take her on quickly. Or should she target Irabeth, who (apparently?) serves the same god and who Seelah seems to defer to?

"Stop!"

Irabeth uses just the right tone of voice to make them actually stop and listen without redirecting their emotions onto her; this is part of a social skillset she has practised religiously for two decades.

"It's neither rare nor terrible to make mistakes of communication like that when working with strangers for the first time, and you should figure out where you went wrong - later."

"Right now we need to establish as best we can that Gord isn't enchanted or possessed. Kinsby will cast magic circle against evil; we need it to renew it anyway. And I'd like him to cast dispel magic on you, if you don't have any ongoing spells you need terribly." If he does they must be under nondetection, which would - complicate things.

"I don't. Hit me with dispel evil if it makes you feel better, but it won't make the aura won't go away." The one good thing about paladins is that they won't try to mislead you with precise wording and so he doesn't need to ask her oath that only those spells will be cast before allowing it. Hopefully.

She'd rather not spend an expensive fifth-circle scroll if she doesn't have to; they might need it later.

Irabeth nods to Kinsby, who steps forward to cast the promised two spells. "No reaction," he reports. Meaning: the dispel failed in the way that suggests (but does not prove) that there was nothing to dispel. 

This clears the threshold she set herself when she heard Anevia's report. They must be suspicious, but sparingly; not just to avoid driving away potential allies, but because they frankly can't afford the spell slots to check everyone who ever met a strong demon more thoroughly than that and have enough left over for actually fighting the demons. And an Evil cleric of Gorum who claims he went Evil during the crusade but still tries to help people is not, in fact, very surprising.

"I trust you," she tells Gord. "Will you help us?"

Gord can, in fact, acknowledge someone is being merely reasonably suspicious. It leaves a sour taste, but he knows it's an instinct that's harming him, and how to push past it.

"I will. What's our opposition?"

"Schirs and babaus. More cultists than demons, some of them first or second-circle clerics. We're afraid there are vrocks or a succubus behind them. At least twenty-five total, probably fewer than sixty, hopefully not all together, not well organized and prone to fleeing - we always leave them a way to retreat. If we reach the Wardstone we can turtle up there and send for reinforcements."

"I sent our weakest back with the wounded, because we can't evacuate that many people if things go badly, so we're low on archer cover, but we have strong clerics and paladins with us."

"Anevia will stay with the rearguard; it's safer than leaving alone. Lann, Wenduag, Seelah, what will you do? The children and the aasimar can stay with the rearguard if they want, but there's more chance of being attacked that way."

Lann wishes he could go be a real crusader, but right now his first duty is to guard the children.

Seelah would like to go with the crusaders, but she'll stay and help guard the children if Lann and Wenduag ask her to, because she did promise.

"What? No, you need to come with us and smite more demons with the Light of Heaven!"

...oh, that. 

He's right, isn't he? She needs to use her new gift - the one she's carrying only until she finds a worthy keeper - responsibly, which means maximally efficiently, giving it the opportunity to do the most good - and she's in fact out of regular smites for the day -

Waaaait a moment there.

Irabeth! Irabeth is the strongest and most senior paladin in the room! (Except for Staunton Vhane, whose seniority probably doesn't count at this point.) She's, like, really really famous in Kenabres! The only reason Seelah didn't apply to join the Eagle Watch is that she's obviously more suited to fighting demons head-on than making sure the other crusaders keep the law, but here they all are fighting demons together anyway!

Many artifacts grow more powerful with the power of their wielder. Seelah is, frankly, not very strong, and also she takes a lot of risks and it might be bad for the Light if its wielder gets killed, whereas Irabeth has a twenty-plus-years proven record of not dying (or not permanently, anyway.)

Seelah takes out the Light of Heaven. It's shaped like a longsword, but it isn't really a sword; she holds it like one but never really considered trying to hit anyone with it - it just doesn't feel like the thing it's meant to do. She hit Savamelekh with her regular sword, which isn't even magical, when the Light channeled itself through her. But it's not a good plan for the weakest paladin to keep hitting the strongest demons.

"I don't know if there's a right way to do this, exactly. But, um, I think you're much more suited to bearing the Light of Heaven than me. I'm just a new paladin who fell down a hole, and then someone else told me where it was, I didn't even find it. So, uh - I want to give this to you. Or someone else you think is better." And she offers up the Light, reverently, to Irabeth.

Irabeth considers the artifact before her. She can feel out its shape, but at the same time she can feel something inside it that tells her the shape it seems to take depends more on the needs and expectations of its bearer than on its own true nature. It's not a sword that shines with light; it is a light, which happens to illuminate the shape a sword.

"I do not wish to claim this light forever," she says and also thinks as clearly as she can. "I do not know if it is wisest for me to carry it, or let it be passed to another, or returned to Heaven whence it came. But if I am asked, I will carry it gladly, to the best of my ability, and yield it up again in time."

"Light of Heaven, do you wish to pass to me?" And she opens her mind to the faint wisp of energy, perhaps of - entity, that she feels inside it, the candle that in Seelah's hand briefly illuminated the entire room, as she attempts to gently tug it out of her hand.

Shiiiiine.

The light wavers a little, as if unsure; but it stays in Seelah's hand, and does not leave her.

It might not have enough agency to make decisions like that. It feels - weak, or weakened. With her hand on it, she finds she cannot imagine it righteously smiting down a demon.

Perhaps it merely needs to rest, to recharge. More likely its true nature escapes her insight.

"It does not go with me willingly. I have no right to command it, and I will not try to force it. I cannot tell you what to do with it; if you do not feel called to carry it, you should probably speak to a cleric of Iomedae." Whose cathedral lies a smoking ruin, and they have not even recovered Nestrin Alodae's body. "My advice is to come with us and try to use it, while keeping in mind that the number of times you can use it is almost certainly limited. Don't place yourself in excessive risk or sacrifice your life for a price that would usually be worth it, although I will do my best to see you raised if you die, in the hope that recovering the Light is worth it."

Seelah feels embarrassed and anxious and, well, frankly bad, at the idea that she might be raised instead of someone more useful or worthy because she failed to pass on the Light in time.

She tells herself sternly that she's not allowed to feel bad about it, because it's her duty and not an unfair one at that, it's just that - she really, really hasn't earned any of it. Instead of saving people when Deskari attacked she stumbled and fell down a hole! She wasn't needed in the Maze because Gord could handle it by himself! She didn't need to do anything, only to be present, for the Light to smite Savamelekh! She didn't, herself, actually contribute anything in the past two days, she just tromped around in her non-sneaky armor fighting people without actually changing any outcomes, and the only reason she even has the Light is because Gord didn't know what it was and didn't want to risk a little zap to find out.

She'll keep trying her best, of course she will, it's just that her best is sometimes, well, a muddle. But the Goddess saw something in her, someone worth spending Her power on instead of giving it to someone else, and she might fail but she'll never betray that trust if she can see any way to avoid it.

She nods, and thanks Irabeth, and goes to stand in the corner and pray to the Light until they're ready to go.

"I want to follow you. Lann, can you guard the kids yourself?"

"Uh, clearly not? We know there are more cultists in the Maze. Even both of us might not be enough if all of them attack at once, or those worse monsters you keep telling me about! Do you think I don't want to go with the crusaders too? We don't have a choice here, Wenduag!"

"I will leave another paladin with you in exchange for Seelah, if you will set her free of her promise so she can go with us."

Obviously she's not going to refuse, that would just make Seelah mad at her. But she's upset that she won't get to show her worth to either Seelah or Gord.

"I have no objections."

Seelah has a super-smite, is is really fair to trade her for a regular paladin? ...he won't object, though. Seelah herself clearly wants this and he doesn't want to force her to hold to her promise when they never even gave her anything of value in exchange for her help.

Then they can at long last assault the next floor!

The next floor contains a long balcony going around the main hall before they can go up the next set of stairs. (Defensible design, unlike accessible design, makes you go round and round instead of all the way up in one convenient stairwell.)

The cultists have used the extra time to prepare as best they could! They have blocked the balcony on both sides, and all the doors around it, and put up makeshift barricades for their archers and casters to shelter behind while the melee fighters try to stop them at the stairhead.

The cultists quickly discover they can't push them down the stairs without losing their own ranged support, and also that they don't really want to gloriously die in the service of Baphomet going toe to toe with a paladin. There is a brief lull as they fall back slightly and the two groups size each other up.

"Hey, I know you!" calls out one of the cultist archers in the back row to his counterpart behind the paladins. "How's it going? Want to join the winning side? You lot will be dead soon, but we'll be alive!"

Ah, a proper Gorumite greeting! "Challenge accepted," Gord shouts back happily before the addressed archer can respond. A muttered grace, and he's running past the cultists' front line and towards the archers and mages in the rear.

They're still behind a barricade. It'll take him at least a turn or two to clear it, and meanwhile they'll shoot him full of holes. He knows that, right?

Deeper darkness, on a small pebble he rolls towards them.

He bets they didn't prepare any light spells. Have fun climbing over your barricade to dispel my pebble.

Fuck it, they'll just shoot blind, then, in the general direction of the crusaders.

The cultists' former front line is NOT HAPPY about being suddenly shot in the back!!

What with being pinned between Gord and the paladins and only having half of their ranged support, the fighting in melee is quickly over, at which point the wizards and archers on the opposite balcony decide that discretion is the better part of valor.

Gord takes out a roll of old cloth, which he uses to cover up bits of the floor until he finds his pebble. He loves this little trick and it's reusable for the next hour and a half, although next time they'll see it coming.

It is impressive! But the Light of Heaven can beat any darkness spell.

On the third floor they face a new group of demons, as well as some of the cultists who fled. The rest lie butchered on the floor (this is the normal demon approach to rallying troops).

There is also a woman with a tail and no eyes.

"Minagho. You wretch," hisses a dwarf probably-paladin. (Gord has heard of Staunton Vhane, but he has never actually met him before. All dwarves tend to look the same to him once they're in heavy plate and have a bearded helmet for a head.)

Gord has never met a lilitu before, either, but the name Minagho is well known among veteran crusaders.

It ought to be easier not to panic when this kind of thing happens the second time in a day. Right?

Also, he's surrounded by powerful paladins and there is no reason for her to target him although she is definitely powerful enough to target all of them in a few rounds.

"Irabeth, tactics?" he tries to whisper, ignoring the interplay between the lilitu and the dwarf. Enemies should be allowed to gloat for as long as possible.

It could be an illusion or a polymorph, although Kinsby would have pointed out any obvious spell aura along those lines; but she can't count on that and dismiss the threat.

They can't win a direct fight with a lilitu. She's tough enough to take their hits for a few rounds until she succeeds in dominating or at least charming some of them, and from there it will all be downhill: they can't counter her when their dispels are spells and her enchantments are at-will. And that's before she calls up any more reinforcements she might have.

Also, if she's monologuing about corrupting the Wardstone or something, that probably means she's trying to enchant them right now and so Irabeth must react immediately. Fight or flight?

The only flight available is out through the window, but half of them might die from the fall and a lilitu can just teleport after them. Fight it is then: if all the paladins smite her they can force her to retreat, even though they're unlikely to kill her since she can teleport.

"Full attack!" she shouts. "Don't give her a way into your heads!" And she really hopes Seelah will take the hint and that everyone else will help clear a path for her, because she doesn't dare say it out loud. Minagho might have spied on their conversations, or even have heard directly about Savamelekh's defeat, since Anevia found correspondence between them on Hosilla's body.

Confusion on the abrikandilus and cultist around her, to clear the way. And he charges forward himself: he has instincts for fighting succubi, at least, and a lilitu is probably the same except for how they can't actually win without a miracle.

Seelah, you're up!

Since when is that a cleric spell, wonders the only person in the room with actual Spellcraft to his name.

The cultists were already having morale issues; they start stabbing each other, themselves, and the demons with abandon.

Most of the demons bite them back; one goes for Minagho instead.

Ugh, those wretches! Too weak to be useful slaves, she should have killed them herself before they could embarrass her when she's in the middle of a good gloat!

Minagho is temporarily distracted by putting them down with extreme prejudice. She was going to use them as shields to get a few more rounds of seductive monologue in, but now they're worse then useless: they are an offense to her delicate sensibilities.

Light of Heaven, please smite this demon, Seelah prays to the tiny presence in her head. I don't know how you decide when to smite someone but this is probably the strongest demon here and we really need to get past her to the Wardstone to save the city. And to not die.

And then, the moment Irabeth calls for a charge, Seelah runs straight at the lilitu. Her job is very simple and she is going to do it and definitely not die trying because she is surrounded by allies she can trust at her back.

The cultists and lesser demons are milling about in confusion and the lilitu is attacking someone else and Seelah can hit her with her sword. She's all out of her own, regular smites, so she really hopes the Light hadn't taken her smiting Savamelekh as its cue.

In the surrounding confusion, she can hit her! There is a satisfying meaty thwack.

Unfortunately, there is no accompanying smite. There is only -

Shiiiiine.

At least the Light is aware enough of its surroundings to avoid affecting the demons and cultists as well.

Minagho is not satisfied.

How would you like a brand on your face, little paladin? She doesn't have room for more husks but it still makes the woman in front of her a little more presentable.

Actually, that works fine for corpses too. Have your stupid little paladin corpse back, crusaders. If you're all this weak I'm going to die of boredom - wait, no, her dear Staunton is here! 

Damn it. Irabeth indicated Seelah was potentially very important, and they don't know for sure what happens to the Light of Heaven if she dies and is resurrected. 

He darts forward to drag her limp body back from the front of the combat, and uses their only emergency reserve scroll of breath of life.

Coming back to life leaves her woozy, even though she wasn't technically dead yet.

Did they win? ...no, there's Minagho, looking furious but not smitten-by-Heaven levels of furious. 

...oh no.

When Seelah's body lands at his feet, Gord discovers he is also feeling pretty furious right now.

The world isn't fair. People die pretty much at random, even when they're strong and the odds favor them. Surviving a life or death encounter is not a reason not to have another one an hour later.

None of that is news to him, not in the least. If you'd asked him how he expected to die, his first answer would be "fighting", but the second would probably be something like "unexpectedly".

But for some reason, this time is different than when he was facing Savamelekh. The feeling that rises in him at the prospect of death isn't fear or dismay or sadness. It is hot, visceral anger. There are no voices in his head, just an intense desire to see the enemy in front of him die die die die and he will batter her into submission.

A bunch of paladins are also smiting her and wishing she would die!!