She's good at killing things. She used to enjoy it, and at the time she considered this unvirtuous, an evil or at least a great temptation towards evil. Lucian didn't like killing things; he did what was necessary and grieved the necessity. 

She does not enjoy it any more, and she's pretty sure that this is not in fact because she has grown in wisdom, but because she's diminished in something else.

She is still very good at it. She lets her eyes adjust to the cave, and finds a space where she can't be ambushed, and selects her arrows and waits, intending to kill the giant frogs at range before they get anywhere near her. In fact they move very fast, and she kills them only at moderate range before they get all that close to her, but she still does kill them, and is only very lightly singed for her trouble. She spends the next while carving them up for parts. It's sort of relaxing.

Alaherren waits until the croaking dies down and then creeps forward. She watches as Spear carves up the frogs, then approaches and holds out the scroll.

"I suppose you'll want this back, then."

Well, it's not actually useful to her without allies, so she should probably start making them.

“Unless you want to follow me around and see if I need it eventually. I guess I’ll have to pay you more, if I’m asking for that.”

"Depends. I'm guessing you didn't trade for the money or scroll with a bunch of fish."

"I smuggled some things in. What are you on the lookout for?"

Dallis' keys and a berth on an outbound ship. "Nothing in particular. The magisters didn't search you when you were arrested?"

She haaaates subterfuge. “I - wanted to see what was happening at Fort Joy. I found a sympathetic magister.” Who knew he was leaving supplies on her orders but not that they were actually for her, at Matten's insistence.

"You should have stayed away."

"What makes you say that?"

"There's a cure, supposedly, for being a sourcerer. The magisters take people out of the camps here, and cure them, and send them back to the mainland. But nobody ever stops in here before leaving to say goodbye to their friends on the island and - Before you came here, had you ever once seen a cured sourcerer? Ever once seen a ship full of ex-prisoners unloaded on a dock? So the cure is a lie. But then why are we here? If their only purpose was to prevent the use of source, they'd just execute sourcerers. No collars, no prison camp out in the middle of the ocean, all the magisters standing guard here and on the transport ships could spend their time tracking people down instead. If this were an act of mercy, the guards would be less cruel, there'd be more food or shelter... not that there is any reason to expect more mercy than you show to petty thieves and killers. So. They are doing something to people and using the story of a cure to cover it up, and whatever it is they are doing is - worse than death by starvation or sun-sickness or seaprickle venom or Griff's enforcers. And they brought us all here for it, to the island of the Source King. As to what specific unholy contraption of Braccus' they plan to subject us - your guess is as good as mine."

"That was approximately my inference as well. And why I came here, because - with proof, with witnesses and details, with something more than 'come on, they're definitely up to something evil' we can get it shut down. Not - soon enough." Not in time to save any of these people, probably. "They are doing it in secret in part because it is almost certainly a great evil that will be wildly unpopular when it is public. People will be outraged to learn that these crimes were being committed in the name of the Divine. The Bishop will be outraged, unless he's in on it, and if he is then all of the ambitious people who'd like to be Bishop will be outraged." It'll be hers without even all that much bloodshed, if she can prove that Alexandar dug up some unfathomable ancient evil to which he's feeding peoples' children having told them he'd cure them. She really cannot say that.

She decides not to point out that the Bishop was here not a month past overseeing the executions of every Magister caught taking pity on the prisoners, in favor of a line of questioning that might actually be productive. "There's a flaw in your plan. You are now here, on the inside of the world's largest gaol, and the Bishop and any potential rivals are outside. And across the sea."

A reasonable inference and yet a false one! She cannot say that. 

"I will need to escape once I have proof," she agrees instead. "I think it should be doable. I have allies in Arx who will send a boat once I contact them."

This is either the opportunity she was hoping it might be or a trick to find the prisoners most likely to plot an escape so that they can be dragged off to their dreadful fate next. "Hm." she says noncommittally, and hands the scroll back.

"...give me your hand?"

It's not that she minds elves. It's just that the last time -

She offers it. It's only shaking a little.

She brings the palm to her mouth and holds it there for a moment, to give Spear a chance to pull away. When she doesn't take it, Alaherren bites down on the muscle at the base of the thumb. Not enough to be seriously impairing, not more of an injury than she could heal with a moment's effort, but the taste of blood fills her mouth and -

Guilt. Overwhelming guilt, and grief, and determination. There is little to do belowdecks on the prisoner ship but to plan for the future or reflect on the past, and she has already been over her plans dozens of times. Not that she hasn't dwelt on the past as much or more, but it is easier to fall into idly. Through force of will she turns her mind to the future again - She will look for allies or witnesses from among the other sourcerers. Hopefully someone who can help her sneak out of the prisoner area to the other areas of the fort where she might find more evidence. Then to rendezvous with the others and sail back to Arx where Alexandar - She hopes Alexandar will listen.

"Alright. What are you paying, to follow you around while you break into the fort proper, pick you up when you die, patch you up when you don't quite -" she heals the bite, by way of demonstration, "- and...make it rain when you're thirsty, I suppose?"

“I have gold, for all it’s worth in here, and a knack for fishing, which is worth a fair bit more. And I’ve got a boat out, though I think only an optimist would put any stock in it and there aren’t many of those here.”

"It's better than no boat out, if only by a little." There are boats in, to deliver new prisoners and supplies, and the magisters not being inclined to sink all of their own ships in the harbor every boat in is a boat out. "Are your allies likely to be any help in getting these damn collars off?" Alaherren thinks she might be able to break the lock by freezing water in it but isn't confident enough in her ability to do this safely to start with her own, and for some reason when she explains it like that she hasn't gotten anyone to volunteer to let her try it on theirs.

“I expect so. ….I think one should not, actually, use Source. Certainly not in inhabited areas. They say the Bishop wears a collar and it strikes me as the one reasonable thing he’s done.”

"Regardless of whether one is using Source - and I've not particularly felt the need to before being imprisoned here - it seems like it would be hard to live a life outside of Fort Joy while bearing a very obvious mark of an escaped Sourceror"

“You’d need to be very sure of how you were playing it, at least." She hasn't decided if she's going to take hers off. "I’m sure they can get it off. I think it can be done with ordinary tools. Really, if it were more difficult, there’d be no need for Fort Joy…though perhaps there isn’t.”

"I suppose the question I was asking was more 'will they' than 'can they,' though I infer that you believe they would. You have my help then. What kind of proof are you looking for and do you expect to find it in this cave?"

“I want to determine what they’re doing with the people they claim to cure. I expect they keep detailed records. I want to rescue a couple of people with horrifying sympathetic stories, presuming there are some such, but it seems likely that there are. If there are prisoners whose presence here would create a diplomatic incident I want to find them in particular.

I don’t really expect any of that is in the cave. I just came here to kill the frogs off.”

"They weren't actively causing trouble but I am sure the others will appreciate the space. What do you have against oversized fire-spitting frogs?"

"I don't want to answer that but my reasons for not wanting to answer that aren't particularly fair to you so I will answer if you press me."