"Okay thanks, Azuk'ai, you can put your shirt back on." Run returns to her seat and resumes writing and sketching as Duron and others head for the front door. After a bit, she rummages in her backpack some more, producing a battered but functional old abacus, then a small rack of metal-coated vials. She immediately begins calculating something on the abacus, the soft clicking of its beads either a comfort or annoyance depending on one's perspective, though with the pouring rain outside it's probably not as noticeable as it might otherwise be.
The longer they wait, the more unpacked and settled in Run is getting, losing herself in her work. Only the regrettably frequent blasts of thunder and flashes of lightning draw her attention away from what she's doing, causing her to start and then look around the room with a sort of wary apprehension. She is now kneeling on the floor, using her chair as a makeshift table, and has several vials and flasks out, a small lab set up by her knee, the abacus, a waterskin, her chapbook and pen, a magnifying glass, and a couple large old tomes -- one filled with startlingly accurate drawings of creatures' musculature and bone structure, the other loaded with arcane formulae and page-long mathematical calculations that have more letters than numbers in them.
"Hey, no problem. Always happy to undress for a girl." Azuk'ai says with a smirk that actually does reach his eyes.
"An' hey Wesh. I saw it too. Wern't no trick of the light neither. But don't worry, I'll look out for ya. Those things go down if ya hit 'em hard enough." The self-proclaimed undead hunter says boldly.
Azuk'ai's getting nervous.
"An' don't you worry none either. Just stay behind me." Azuk'ai says smirking at the nervous elf as he passes out the door after Melk.
Melk cautiously hazards a few more steps down the corridor. "Father?" he ventures hopefully at a particularly ominous creaking. In the sudden lull of quiet after a big thunder crackles the house he stops for a moment, listening and peering intently - trying to discern something out of place.
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Wesh scowls, "I ain't worried, just sensible to be cautious about things that go bump in the night." His braggadocio wanes as he thinks out loud, "Plus how de ye hit a ghost, ain't they like spectral? Your hand would go right through it, and then it would pull your soul out through your mouth and eat it."
With Melk leading the way, the house's quiet is almost deafening. Every crack of the wood sounds like faint footsteps, every creak like a whisper from the corner. Nearing the front hall, the front door stands blown open, the storm pouring into the house. The room is completely empty except for the armor suits. As the group looks around nervously, they collectively jump as a figure walks through the door.
Kendra, soaked to the bone, stands before them. She appears confused, even worried, by the group's presence in the front hallway. "Who left the door open?" She looks quite concerned for them, though not nearly as startled as they are. She shuts the door with a heavy thud and locks it. "You must remember to lock the door, otherwise it doesn't secure quite right."
Just as she says this, a small door opens in the side room. Father Harking steps out, carrying a tray of hot beverages. The steam rises off them, a welcome sight in the cold and wet night. He smiles when he sees Kendra. "I was hoping you wouldn't be far off. I prepared something to chase away this cold night."
Kendra returns the cleric's smile. "Thank you, Johin. Everyone, please, thank you for staying. If you'll assemble in my father's study, I have something to read of his."
Melk's body exudes relief as much of the tension in his muscles give way. "Ich - I was worried, came look for you. The nights are unquiet." There might be a hint of a tear in Melk's eyes.
Clearing his throat and straightening the front of his robe, Duron does his best to look undisturbed by the night's misgivings. "Ah, yes. Thank you Father. It is good to see you Madame Lorrimor. Let us take the good lady's advice and return to the study. I know from experience that anything written by the late Professor is most definitely deserving of our attentions."
Kendra gathers the group into the study, dripping all the way. Still soaked, she seems unbothered by it in her haste to speak to them. She sits in the Professor's large chair behind the massive desk. For a moment, she looks like a little girl in her father's study, the sadness of the day washing over her. She pulls herself together, though, and reaches under the desk. She puts a small chest, a simple box of oak and iron with a crest atop it that appears to be a brass scarab set with a single eye in its center.
She unlocks the chest with a small box, but leaves it closed. Looking up at the gathered six, she lets out a slow breath. "Thank you, all of you, for coming. My father's instructions for his funeral were to hold them here, during the night, so that I might be able to see who his true friends were. You six are just that, and so he wanted me to open the chest and read his will to you. There is something that I didn't mention, though, in my letter to you. My father was fairly a wealthy man, and I attempted to resurrect him." Father Harking, as a cleric of Pharasma, looks slightly uncomfortable at that admission. "His soul did not return to his body. I attempted to commune with him in the Beyond, but received no response. I fear that his soul is without rest, and I believe that his untimely death has something to do with that. I implore you all, please, in addition to whatever he asks in his will, I need your help to set him to rest." Her eyes are filled with unspilled tears.
She opens the chest, revealing a small set of six books. She takes out a piece of parchment on top of the books and unfolds it. "This is my father's will. 'I, Petros Lorrimor, being of sound mind, do hereby commit to this parchment my last will and testament. Let it be known that, with the exception of the specific details below, I leave my home and personal belongings entirely to my daughter Kendra. Use them or sell them as you see fit, my child.'"
"Yet beyond the bequeathing of my personal effects, this document must serve other needs. I have arranged for the reading of this document to be delayed until all principals can be in attendance, for I have more than mere inheritance to apportion. I have two final favors to ask."
"To my old friends, I hate to impose upon you all, but there are obviously few others who are capable of appreciating the true significance of what it is I have to ask, as well as the will to carry it out. As some of you know, I have devoted many of my studies to all manner of evil, that I might know the enemy and inform those better positioned to stand against it, for knowledge of one's enemy is the surest path to victory over its plans."
"And so, over the course of my lifetime, I have seen fit to acquire a significant collection of valuable but dangerous tomes, any one of which in the wrong circumstances could place countless innocents in danger. While the majority of these tomes remain safe under lock and key at the Lepidstadt University, I fear that a few I have borrowed remain in this chest. While invaluable for my work in life, I would prefer not to burden my daughter with the darker side of my profession, or worse still, the danger of possessing these tomes herself. As such, I am entrusting my chest of tomes to you, posthumously. I ask that you please deliver the collection to my colleagues at the University, who will put them to good use for the betterment of the cause."
"Yet before you leave for Lepidstadt, there is the matter of another favor - please delay your journey one month and spend that period of time here in Ravengro to ensure that my daughter is safe and sound. Danger lurks in the city, especially now that I am unable to stymie its dark progress. She has no one to count on now that I am gone, and if you would aid her in setting things in order for whatever she desires over the course of this month, you would have my eternal gratitude. You will find copious notes on the dangers, especially in Harrowstone, in my journal. From my savings, I have also willed to each of you a sum of one hundred platinum coins. For safekeeping, I have left these funds with Embreath Daramid, one of my most trusted friends in Lepidstadt - she has been instructed to issue this payment upon the safe delivery of the borrowed tomes no sooner than one month after the date of the reading of this will."
She softly reads the last paragraph, the pain of her loss evident in her voice. "I, Petros Lorrimor, hereby sign this will in Ravengro on this first day of Calistril, in the year 4711."
Run's eyes widen as soon as Kendra produces the box. "...the palatine eye..." she mutters under her breath, just barely loud enough to be heard. Then, when the younger Lorrimor speaks her father's words of the value of knowledge, of its power over the enemies and forces of darkness of the world, Run stifles a sob and looks down and away, tears running down her cheeks. that's so like him...I remember that conviction...that surety... Her skinny shoulders heave once with a huge sigh and she sniffles. "I'm sorry...I...the funeral itself was so...abstract...but this, your father's words, Kendra, meant so much to me...I'm so sorry." She looks at the others. "I'm s-sorry, all of you, oh my." She buries her face in her hands, flooded with feelings of grief and embarrassment, and does her best to cry silently as Kendra finishes reading the will.
When it's done, Marilwenn has collected herself somewhat, though her nose and cheeks are still red and she is still sniffling. She pulls out a battered red-and-white striped hanky and blows her nose with a voluminous *HONNNNNK!*, then, in spite of herself, she speaks to Kendra. "I was going to ask if you attempted resurrection. I...I should like to see your notes, if you have any. I mean, if it's not too m-much trouble." She pauses.
"Gosh that's a lot of money."
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Wesh frowns mouthing, "A Month?" in displeasure. But the old man helped me learn what I am... And he was a friend, if I did not honor his wishes I don't suppose I could call myself much of a man. S!@% on it! Ramon's going to laugh his ass off. Well if that stupid cat thinks I'm going through this along he's got another thing coming.
"I ain't much for towns, but I suppose I could stick around for a month. I ain't going to deny a friend's last wishes, and I ain't keen on leaving you here alone near that haunted ruin. But you sure you wouldn't rather move off to the wilds away from spooks and kooks? I know this is your home and such, but I swear down I just saw a spectre peepin' at us from Harrowstone... Would not take long to set up a cozy camp. Ye could sell this ill omened place and move somewhere where your neighbors are, a hundred percent not the living dead."
Melk's grin is belied by the tears that flow down his cheeks. As Kendra reads the will he nods his head, repeatedly. "Ja natürlich - I shall stay as long as is necessary." He notes the last part of the will, almost as an afterthought: "Do you know the dangers your Vater speaks of?"
Kendra sadly shakes her head at Wesh. "My father taught me never to back down from doing what is right. This is my home, and I will not live in fear."
Turning to Melk, she picks up the journal on top of the chest. "I imagine that he left notes in here. My father was almost always buried in his writing." She offers it to the group, its pages overstuffed with additional paper between the pages.
Melk takes the journal, then suddenly overburdened by the heady writing he nervously gives the journal to Marilwenn. He looks guiltily to the floor.
Run takes the notes from Melk, nodding gratefully at the monk, but does not yet open them. "Um. I'm sorry. My interests here are mostly academic. Scientific. I very much want to look at them but if any of you..." she looks around at the other five "...want to look at them for personal reasons before I comb through for arcane lore and formulae and other possible secrets, well, I would rather you look first." She raises her eyebrows questioningly and looks around for any takers, but it is obvious from her body language that she is aching to crack the book and dive in.
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Wesh sighs, "Fair enough, I ain't going to argue the point, but I'm bringing Ramon. If I have to suffer he's going to to. He's a cougar." The young druid folds his arms and glowers at all and sundry defiantly.
"I've been training him anyway, so if I need to be stuck here for a month I'll carry on with that I suppose."
Taking up a place by the fireside Azuk'ai folds his arms with a sour expression on his face as the will is read. As Kendra finishes a single tear rolls down his cheek and he goes to Kendra's side and squeeses her shoulder. "Of course I'll stay. Anything you need Kendra, anything, you only need to ask." he says with a fervor, his eyes burning red in the dark.
"I'd like to read through it, yes, before you start disecting it" Axuk'ai says haugtily to Run, frowning as she talks of academic formula. "If there are any clues as to his demise, that journal holds them." Taking the journal gently from Run he reverantly opens it and scans a few pages before putting it away for reading in private.
Run twists her mouth ruefully, but nods as she hands the journal over to Azuk'ai, feeling as if it's the right thing. She has centuries ahead of her to study that book and its undoubtedly glorious contents, but right now they had only a month to achieve a significant goal for their late friend and that was more important by far.
She can wait.
"Perhaps you, good Father, know something as well? Are there more than just rumors about the Harrowstone?"
Father Harking takes a look at Melk, then nods gravely. "Everyone knows that the Harrowstone is haunted. It isn't rumors. I have seen the Warden myself, eternally patrolling the grounds."
The thunder cracks again, causing the house to creak and moan. Something is brushing against the house, blowing in the storm, sounding like whispers and footsteps in the house.
Too spooked to notice anything amiss, Melk pushes on: "The warden? Do you know what happened? Why is the place in ruins and haunted?"
The cleric blesses himself, a complicated gesture in which he moves his hand from his heart to his head, then in three directions with his other hand. "The prison burned 50 years ago in a prison riot. The warden, two dozen guards, and every prisoner there died in the fire. The Warden guards them to this day, keeping the prisoners from escaping. The grounds, though, are dangerous. I told Petros as much, but you know him. It's where he..." He looks at Kendra and rephrases. "Where he was his final night."
Father Harking feels great shame and guilt for the Professor's death. There's something he isn't saying.
Intent on Father Harkins tale Azuk'ai shivers at the night's sounds but pushes them out of him mind.
Azuk'ai's eyes narrow in suspicion at the good fathers words. "What do you mean you told him as much? Where you with him that night?"
Before Father Harking can answer the question, an unfamiliar voice cries out, startling the assembled group with its sudden unexpectedness. "Get it! The journal is free!" Robed figures flood into the room, faces obscured by dark masks. There are at least four coming in from the front of the house. There is a terrible crash as the great window shatters, two more robed figures crashing through it. The robed figures are completely quiet as they move, saying not a single word or making a single sound beyond the sharp withdrawal of longswords from sheathes.
The robed figures fall upon the group, swinging their swords as they rush them. They draw blood from Melk, almost a deadly blow. Aydan takes just as bad a cut, but he mostly appears angry rather than badly hurt. Runyon shrieks as a cultist slashes across her arm, cutting into her. Azuk'ai has two cultists attacking him, one of whom strikes him with the sword. The other tries to grab the journal from his hands, but the young man has too strong a grip.
"Hey! What's the meaning of this?" Azuk'ai cryes out, hugging the journal to his chest. Stepping back he stuffs the journal inside his jacket and unravels the chain around his waist, a determined look on his face.
"Father! Was is this? Help us!"
Father Harking dodges the sword attack and shouts back at Melk, "I don't know!" He raises his holy symbol towards the cultist, who responds by raising his sword for another swing.
Aydan is listening intently to all of the discussion, thinking over the stay in Ravenegro when the robed figures race into the study. Outraged by this assault in the study of his dead friend Aydan draws his great sword in a sweeping action, his face contorting in rage at the insult to both Petros and Kendra, he yells a roar as he brings the sword up high and grasps ith with both hands, adrenaline pumping in his veins he brings the blade down with a ferocious growl.
Blood sprays crimson and stark in the gloomy study, illuminated in its trajectroy by the flashes of lightning from outside and the robed man in front of Aydan collapses in a heap a the feat of the roaring Pathfinder.
"Aaaagh! Ouch! What th-?! What's going ON?!" Runyon, in a near panic, dives past the two robed figures near her and executes a surprisingly nimble tuck-and-roll to a spot about 10' away. As she comes up, she pulls an odd double-vial out of its respective little leather loop on her vest and pulls a bimetallic strip out if its center with her teeth. She shakes the vial furiously and yells "Azuk'ai! Shield your eyes!" and then flings it at the cultist by the wall.
The vial breaks against the cultist's body and there is a sucking sound as air is vacuumed out of the man's immediate vicinity with astonishing rapidity, then a thudding *PHBOOOOM!* as the highly volatile mixture combines with the air and detonates! Bits of the cultist are flung about and what remains of his body collapses. Meanwhile, the flames jet out a small ways and engulf the cultist by Wesh, torching his body and burning him horridly. With a scream and a thud, he falls unconscious to the ground.
Witnessing the destruction she has wrought, Run's eyes get huge as dinner plates and she makes a wretching noise, but keeps it together for the moment. Her hands steady even as the color drains from her face, she reaches for another vial, preparing to help her new companions and Kendra and the Father however she can.
Melk nearly doubles up from the pain the treacherous attack inflicted. Staring at the blood as it seeps through his hands he barely manages to put up a semblance of offense - two weak punches fly towards the assailant, but one falls short. The other evaporates power to the point that Melk's hand merely touches the hooded figure, sliding off to leave a blood-colored and smudged imprint of his hand on the cloth. Wide-eyed Melk steps back, horror tinging his voice - if not his face - "Was? Who are you? Help!"
Father Harking stumbles backwards, shakingly pushing his holy symbol up to ward off the cultist from attacking him again. "Get back!" he shouts. The cultist nearest him simply looks at him, not saying a word, his face covered by the dark mask.
Kendra shrieks in fear. "Who are you? Get out of my house!" She raises her hands in fear, nothing to defend herself with.
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Wesh steps forward pulling free his scimitar and with a feral snarl slashing it across the closest cultist's face! Gore flies, but the man manages to lower his chin just in time to prevent the young druid's blow being truly fatal.
"I don't know who you weirdo are, but it ain't polite to just barge in at a wake. But seems like you intend to be among the mourned rather than the mourning!"
Ha, who is missing out now Ramon? I get to fight murderous nutters. Ha.
As the assault begins, Duron staggers backwards in surprise, bumping into a bookcase on the north wall and causing a number of heavy tomes to fall to the floor with a thud. His eyes widen as the cultists bloody his companions and he nearly faints as Runyon's well-placed bomb sends two of the attackers to the ground and showers of gore flying across the study.
As his face turns pale and he considers an escape, a voice echos through his mind, 'Hold it together old man.'
Blinking away his fear, Duron spots two cultists bunched together by the table. Reaching his fingers into his spell component pouch, he draws forth a tiny ball of butter. Proceeding to rub the greasy substance into his hands, he holds his palms forward and speaks the arcane words to complete his spell, causing a layer of slippery grease to manifest beneath the boots of two of the cultists. Almost immediately the attackers' feet give out below them and they collapse to the floor.
One of the cultists takes his sword in both hands and swings at Melk. He dodges out of the way with a bizarre "Waaauhh!" It cuts through the air, its dangerous edge promising death if it strikes.
The cultist with a direct hit from Runyon's bomb and the cultist nearly cleaved in half by Aydan still cling to life, their bodies slightly twitching on the floor. The smell of burned flesh begins to cover the room, a grim testament to the elf girl's alchemical skill.
With his last breath, the second cultist splashed by Runyon's blast reaches out in a desperate attempt to grab the journal from Azuk'ai. He swings his spiked chain around, catching the cultist in the face. The man's hood falls back as the chain shatters his mask. The face revealed underneath looks as if it has not seen sunlight in many years, gaunt and hollow as death itself. His mouth is stitched shut with thick black string, likely the cause of their eerie quiet.
One of the robed cultists afflicted by Duron's grease spell crawls out of it, grasping upwards with his hands for Azuk'ai.
The other cultist in the grease stands carefully and moves out of it, lunging towards Kendra. He snatches her in his arm, holding his sword against her neck.
Thunder strikes again, lighting up a figure in the ruined remains of the window. Like the others, he is masked and hooded, but he radiates an unholy magnetism that is impossible to ignore. Impossibly thin, he points at Kendra. "Hand over the journal or I will order her killed!" His voice is raspy and ancient, like dried out parchment. The robe hangs over his body like a hanger, his skeletal frame barely sufficient to keep it up. He points towards the burned cultist with a bony finger and speaks some ancient tongue. "Takar ith dizuma!"
The burned cultist begins to shake. His burned skin sloughs off, leaving only a bloody skeleton reaching from the robes. The mask falls to the floor, splashing in its bloody discarded flesh. A dark flame lights up its eye sockets, with the remains of its eyes oozing out in a dark liquid. It rises like a figure from some nightmare, reaching its blood-covered skeletal hands towards Azuk'ai.
Watching as the horrid skeleton-thing comes lurching to life, Run lets out a terrified little squeak even as the scientific part of her mind is analyzing the chymical reagents that must be required to accomplish such a thing in a living creature -- maybe they are stuffed with it such that the necrotic field activiation charge occurring on the release of spirit energy into the astral plane bursts it -- or "bursts" it -- like a cyanide capsule for a spy, only so much more effective!
Backpedaling furiously to the corner of the study, she gasps as she realizes she is between door and window, both sources of danger. "think fast think fast think fast...FAST! OF COURSE!" With a confident tug she pulls free the only vial of mutagen she currently possesses, the one she is most skilled at brewing; a quickness enhancer. She yanks the cork and throws the terrible, snot-like fluid down her gullet without a second's hesitation. It is then that the reason for her oddly baggy mode of dress becomes apparent; with horrid beastly snarls and growls Run's body begins rapidly to expand, muscle and sinew and joint and bone rapidly amplifying and filling out her once-roomy clothes with astonishing quickness, bizarre and disgusting ripplings plainly visible underneath the cloth of her shirt and pants as her physique transforms into that of a world-class athlete or martial master. Something feral and wild comes into her eyes, but those eyes lose none of their spark of intelligence.
Surveying the battle from her new position, she considers her next move.
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Wesh steps forward and stabs at the cultist before him, effortlessly downing the man with a slash to the stomach, and bellowing to Kendra, "Get you butt behind me woman!"
Before squaring off to the leader, "You ain't orderin' nothin' here dung for brains. Jabber on in gobbledegook all you like."
F@$~ing undead wrong, wrong, wrong, its against nature that's what it is! How dare they, how dare it! I'll send them all back to the grave or die trying! Grr, need Ramon here!
"F*!$!" is the best Azuk'ai can manage when he sees the dead cultist rise. Looking from the gaunt leader back to the newly risen undead he hesitates as he can't decide wich way to go. "F!!@! You let her go! he says pointing at the leader but stepping to the undead and swinging his chain at it, , . The chain whizes past the zombies head, promising to take it off if it connects.
A shiver rolls down Duron's spine as he hears the cultist leader speak the ancient tongue and he feels his feet frozen in place by the sense of dread it invokes in him.
'Move.' The voice inside his head echos again. The pitch and tone of the voice identifies it as clearly being his own, but the inflection and character of the words are completely alien to him.
On the strange voice's command, his body springs into motion and he draws his shortbow from his back, steps up next to Father Harking, and fires off a shot at the burned cultist that had risen from his greasy trap. The arrow catches in the wounded man's back and carries him to the floor.
ROUND 2, INITIATIVE 21
Lost in his anger Aydan barely catches his breath before flowing forwards his sword arcing wildly, a spray of blood following its lethat trajectory through the air. His blade bites deeply into the ribcage of the hooded figure. He wrenches his sword back out with a sickening squelch and turns to face the room. His eyes fix on the newcomer and a grim, dangerous expression clouds his face.
Near blind with panic at seeing one of these figures rise up again from what should have been certain death, Melk pummels the fallen man before him; hoping against hope that it is enough to end the threat permanently.
With all the cultists dead or dying, only their leader and his ghoulish skeletal champion remain. The masked man points at Azuk'ai with his bony finger, holding a small straight piece of iron in the other. "You will not resist me. Azzaan kinuxit!"
With a start, the young half-elf stops moving. Utterly frozen, his eyes dart from place to place. No words escape his lips as he stands paralyzed. His body refuses every order, his fear building into a near-panic.
The robed figure slips the metal bar back into his clothing. "Take the journal. Leave him alive."
The skeleton leaves a bloody handprint as it jerkily reaches into Azuk'ai's jacket. The blood runs down his shirt, dripping down his pants, but he cannot move to resist. Withdrawing the tome, the bloody skeleton shambles over and leaps out the window into the storm. Loose pieces of paper in Professor Lorrimor's journal flutter out as the undead abomination exits the study. The glass shatters into a million pieces, letting the fierce storm into that side of the study. The papers are quickly soaked, the heavy rain smudging the ink of Lorrimor's careful handwriting.
The robed cultist steps backwards, Kendra cowering in fear as he drops out of the window. His voice echoes through the house. "You will serve Tar-Baphon in un-death, willingly or otherwise. Your precious Professor refused, and thus his soul is enslaved for eternity. I pray that you each will make the proper choice when we choose to present it."
As the horrid skeleton rattles and hisses its way past, Runyon stands petrified in fear. It is only after it shatters the window and climbs out that her left brain and superior reasoning override her animal instinct. Or perhaps her animal instinct final decides between fight or flight. It's something she'll reflect upon over the coming days.
Whatever the reason, Run tugs another bomb free from her vest. "I'll see the book BURNED before I see it in the hands of the likes of YOU! I killed you once and I'll do it a-GAIN!" She hurls the bomb out through the broken window, the tiny vial making a ft-t-t-t-t-t sound as it spirals end over end into the rain. There is a muffled *WHUOOOM* of an explosion as she connects with the creature, blowing it to pieces. Hissing spattering sounds can be heard as raindrops dissolve on impact when hitting the brief fireball and then the superheated bones of the undead beast's remains.
With a determined cry Run leaps out the window, looking to see if she can retrieve the book before the masked cult leader has a chance to move. Even better, maybe some of the others will be able to take him down. She'll show him unlife then.
[ooc]Perception to see if she blew the journal to kingdom come, or if she can spot it. Even bits of it. :-(
Bits of burned paper curl in the rain amidst the pieces of bone, the combined forces of the rain and fire turning it into nothing. All the years of the Professor's most intimate research are destroyed, though it is better than having their dangerous knowledge in the hands of the mysterious hooded figure. All they have left are the loose pages on the floor of the study behind her, and those are quickly being turned into hardly more than illegible smudges.
As she turns back into the room, she notices smoke coming from several of the cultists' bodies. With hardly a sound, the bodies ignite in a white-hot flame. Only a moment passes before the fire goes out, but it completely incinerates the bodies and clothes. Only their swords and masks remain, leaving them and the wounds they inflicted on the group and on the house as the only evidence of their ambush.
Run unleashes an animal howl of frustration as the tattered remnants of the professor's journal flutter damply about. She falls to her knees, shaking in anger and grief as water drips off her nose and the ends of her hair. After a moment she sighs then looks up, and looks at the rest of the group. Seeing the terribly hurt Melk, she stands again, her still-enhanced form lending her greater grace and power than she would normally have. As she walks across the study she drinks another extract from the assorted vials on her vest -- this one actually has a more healthy color to it, deep cranberry hues. She walks up to the monk and rests her hand on his strong shoulder, imbuing him with alchemical healing power.
As she listlessly gathers as many legible fragments of the journal as she can, clearly depressed, she glances over to the group. "I can make another healing extract if anyone else is badly hurt, it'll just take me a minute."
"Scheiße! Das tut weh!" Melk mumbles in his dialect, but he points to the robed cultist: "Can anybody stop him!?"
Dropping his bow to the ground, Duron rushes to the loose papers on the floor, scooping them up as quickly as possible and doing his best to protect them from the elements. "Quickly, shut the curtains! We need to protect whatever remains of the Professor's work!" he yells as he rushes towards the fire, laying the documents out on the floor in front to dry them off.
Looking to Azuk'ai as an afterthought, his voice takes on a more comforting tone, "Do not worry lad, the holding spell's effects will subside soon. There will be no permanent damage."
"Danke, ...Run...?" Melk's tense body relaxes slightly as the healing magic repairs spurned flesh.