Tightening his grip, "Until it is dead the silver does not matter when I strike the beast."
Gallidren will search the temple area and the bodies for anything useful.
"Why not just shoot it until it falls over, and then cut it's head off?" Marcus says, clearly thinking Prophet and Theo were crazy. "That way there's less, you know... teeth?"
"I like his plan," Annika says dryly. "I don't relish the idea of getting back in reach of its claws."
Kilarra nods as Marcus comments on shooting the creature, drawing her bow without comment and putting several arrows into the werewolf's chest in quick succession. The werewolf roars in pain and anger, but still stands against all reason. After six arros jut out of the monster's chest without change, Kilarra sighs heavily and slings her bow away. "You can give it a shot if you want, but I'm just wasting arrows at this rate," she says, looking to the others. "Maybe it's just me, but something about this doesn't smell right. I mean, just look at the thing," she comments, gesturing to the bleeding, growling creature chained to the ceiling. The werewolf lunges towards her once but the chain holds fast, and she remains well outside its range. "Werewolf or not, it ought to be dead. It's got half a dozen arrows jutting out of its chest, and the two of you damn near skinned it already." The werewolf lunges again, this time at Marcus, but it remains chained. It growls weakly at the party, before backing away as far as it's able.
As the others muse about what to do with the werewolf, Gallidren instead picks over the bodies of Caleb and Rollin. The two men, for the most part, don't have anything of value; they carry packs with traveling supplies and trail rations, and although they carry coin purses, they contain only a few gold pieces each. Still, Caleb's sword is wrought from cold iron, and stowed away in one of the pockets of his jacket is a vial filled with bright red liquid. Rollin's body still holds three of his four pistols, the last having scattered away after the fight. While Gallidren has never really handled weapons like them, he's fairly certain they'd fetch a good price.
"There's something... distinctly unnatural about it," Annika agrees as the beast utterly fails to die. "Those shadows must be keeping it standing. Some sort of dark magic certainly, perhaps necromancy. That would explain it defying death." She turns to the elf currently scavenging the dead bodies. "Gallidren, have you ever heard anything about anything like this?"
Even though he was nowhere near the creature, when the werewolf lunged toward Marcus, he jumped back.
Then, angry, he made a yanking motion and one of the hanging bear traps lunged into the beast.
"I got two more before I start getting creative, Mangy! How about you heel?"
Marcus's second bear trap catches the werewolf by its other foreleg as it recoils after missing its attack on Marcus. It howls again in pain and frustration, yanking hard on the chains as if to pull the traps from their place in the ceiling. The crack around Marcus's piton releases some loose stones, but otherwise the piton doesn't move and the traps remained fastened tight about the werewolf's forelimbs. It yanks at them a few more times with the same results, before snarling at Marcus again.
Not even sure why I bother. Signing and moving so that he stands just out of reach of the Werewolf. Never taking his eyes off of the beast but calling out to the others, "I can hurt it despite the silver. If you do not have an answer soon I will try putting it out of its misery."
Gallidren offers up the pistols to the group. "Can anyone use these?"
He detects magic on the sword and the other recovered gear. He attempts to identify the red liquid in the vial.
He then turns his attention back to the werewolf. He ponders both the resilient nature of the wolf and the shadows surrounding it. "Yes, there is something supernatural about this beast."
"Gee, you think?" Marcus quipped.
Gallidren examines the vial with a trained eye, and quickly deduces it to be a healing potion. None of their other equipment is magic, however. He moves as close to the werewolf as he can without being within range of its maw in order to examine it. While he can't deduce what magic might be keeping the werewolf alive despite its injuries, the shadows clearly aren't natural or even attached to the Material plane. As best he can tell, they're somehow connected to the Plane of Shadow; why shadows from another plane of existence are connected to this location or the beast isn't something he can deduce, nor is he sure how or why they're sustaining the creature's life.
"You can try if you want," Kilarra says to Theo, shrugging her shoulders. "The wounds are bleeding," she says, gesturing to the small trickles of blood leaving the werewolf's body where her arrows pierced its skin, "It's not like I'm not hurting it, it just... won't die. If you think you might have a chance, give it a shot."
"Maybe fire?" Marcus shrugged.
Still feeling that tingle in his hand and the need for that beast to be gone from this world. Lifting his blade to what should be heart level and thrusting in.
Theo's scimitar plunges into the werewolf's chest, and he feels his blade puncture organs and scrape against bone; the werewolf thrashes and growls at Theo, trying to bite and tear into his flesh, but the chains make it difficult to reach him and the werewolf is weak from its wounds. Theo withdraws his blade, drenched in blood, but the lycanthrope still thrashes and roars despite the newest wound. It bleeds profusely for some time, but the shadows the cling to its body warp and twist around the werewolf's fur until they reach the newest wound. Once there, they cover the wound and the bleeding stops; while it's impossible to tell what must have happened beneath the creature's hide, it seems likely they've somehow stopped the damage to its internal organs as well.
"It seems we need to find a way to dispel the shadows before it can die. Perhaps if we restored the holiness of this place..." She ponders the idea, considering what they might need to quickly perform such an act. Or if it would even help.
Thinking back on her religious teachings, Annika recalls that consecrating a holy site is beyond her own magical capabilities at the moment; they would need a more powerful priest to call forth the magics that would cleanse such an area of an evil taint like this. As she continues down this line of thought, she remembers the words of the Stag in the forest, "The disease may seep from beneath his helm, but its heart lies beneath our gaze. You are the light in the dark." While the cryptic statement still eludes complete understanding, it seems whatever profane magic is attached to this place is at least tangentially related to the Stag Lord as well. Her head hurts for a moment as she hears the booming voice of the Stag within her head again, but it fades quickly as she ponders what it might mean for their quest in the here and now.
Gallidren will walk around the wider area of the temple outside of the cave to see if he can find any clues.
"The disease may seep from beneath his helm, but its heart lies beneath our gaze. You are the light in the dark..." Annika mechanically repeats the old stag's words, a pensive look on her face. "Beneath our gaze... underground perhaps? A basement or cellar that may hold some connection to whatever shadow magic infects this beast."
As Annika muses on the meaning of her words, Gallidren scopes out the outside of the temple. Remembering the words as Annika repeats them, he glances up to the massive stone stag's head that overlooks the small temple. The edifice's eyes overlook the clearing below, staring into the pool of water from which the ghouls that once attacked Gallidren and Creon, and later the party as well, which now lie dead on the overgrown cobblestones that once denoted the temple's clearing. He peers over the stones that line the pool's edge, and the water still sits placid. Still, the small pond seems to be almost impossibly deep, and moving the light on the tip of his bow closer does nothing to reveal its bottom. After a few moments, he begins to feel uneasy staring into the darkness at the bottom of the pond; he almost feels as if the water stares back at him before feeling compelled to look away.
"Or... there is one other option. A skilled cleric could possibly consecrate the land and forcibly dispel any evil here. But I'm barely more than an acolyte and of a different god as well. Perhaps Jhod knows what to do. It was his vision first after all. Or the priest in the village if Jhod is still reluctant to come here."
"We could chain it to a stone and toss it int he water?" Marcus said, continuing to brainstorm.
"I still say we cut off its head. If we can hurt the thing, seems like we'd be able to do that. And I doubt even magic shadows can keep it alive." Prophet kneels down and begins cleaning his sword by wiping it with Caleb's clothing. "Of course," he muses, "if it does survive, then we've got a werewolf head running around separate from the body. Be good for a laugh, but not in the long run."
Scowling at the Werewolf as the shadows seem to repair the damage done. She is not wrong. We need someone more powerful than us."
"If removing the head does not work than it would be dangerous to carry an infectious head around."
"That's assuming the damned thing's head even comes off," Kilarra says, wary of the magic keeping the werewolf alive. "I think Annika's right, we need someone to cleanse this place of... whatever this is. Then again, I've never studied magic or religion in my life, so maybe my opinion doesn't mean much." She shrugs at Marcus's suggestion of chaining it to a rock. "I mean, if you wanna let the thing loose from your bear traps and drag it to the pond, be my guest. I'll just be, y'know, waiting over here away from the immortal werewolf."
"Theo? Annika? You two are religious types? What do you think?"
"I think that Jhod wouldn't have been sent a vision to come here if he didn't have the means to cleanse the corruption. Better to try that than free the beast and find that it doesn't work."
Gallidren speaks up. "The answer could be ... in the water. I feel something is down there. Perhaps the means to destroy the wolf can be found in the pool. The Stag was telling us the disease seeped from these waters. We must be the light in the darkness. We must go down there."
He will detect magic on the water.
"I am inclined to agree with Annika. But I am not sure leaving the beast alone is wise." He will withhold any other comments until Gallidren has his results from the pond.
"One of us, or a small group, could run back to the trading post and escort Jhod back here while the rest of us camp here for the night and keep an eye on the beast so it doesn't escape."
"How long would it be to go back and get this guy?" Marcus said, a little concerned at where the conversation was going and what he was considering doing.
"That depends on the route you'd take back to the trading post," Kilarra says, shrugging. "If you head east, you can follow the Thorn River through the forest for a while. That'd take you longer, probably about a three-or-four day round trip. If you head north from here, you'd be able to make it two... maybe three days? Problem is, that's uncharted territory; the Stolen Lands aren't exactly mapped out, and none of us have been through that way. I couldn't tell you what you might find, but the Stolen Lands can be... unpredictable, at best. I'm not sure it's worth the risk, myself." She examines the chained werewolf, narrowing her eyes as she does so. "That said, it doesn't seem like our friend is going anywhere. Whatever you did to get that piton lodged in the rocks, it's holding fast, so you could probably manage that kind of a trip."
"I was thinking I'd stay here to make sure there's no escape attempts. I don't know this Jhod fellow anyway. If one of you stays with me to trade watch shifts with, the rest can go bring back your pal."
"I can stay here," Prophet offers. He seems momentarily at a loss as to where to put his sword, but decides to plant it in Caleb's corpse and fold his arms. "If the thing does get loose, I can help contain it, and it'll give me a chance to get to know our new recruit here." He gives Marcus a lopsided grin. "And to be frank, the old man rubbed me the wrong way. I don't exactly feel like spending days on end traveling with him."
"If you two want to stay and watch the werewolf, be my guest. Unless any of the rest of you are planning to stay as well, we should probably get moving; we have a few hours yet until we'd need to make camp, might as well get as far as we can tonight before stopping." She readjusts her pack on her shoulders, before double-checking her bow and sword. She looks out the entrance to the cavern, eyeing the forests. "Still, which path do you want to take? As I said, heading straight north will probably take less time, but I don't know what we might find; I don't relish heading through uncharted territory without everyone along for the ride. Still, if we want to be rid of this as soon as possible, it might be worth the risk rather than following the Thorn River."
Marcus nodded and started setting up camp on the landing at the entrance to the cave. "Godspeed, folks. Prophet, keep an eye on our fuzzy friend and let me know if she starts messing with the traps. Once I have a fire and dinner going I'll take over."
Gallidren takes one last look at the pool and then departs with Theo and Annika. "I would just assume take the most direct path in order to get there as quickly as possible. This will take us over some new territory, but I think it's an acceptable risk."
"The less time it takes, the better," Annika agrees. "We really don't want to be away if the wolf breaks free."
"Then let us be off. The quicker we leave the quicker we can get back." Looking over at Marcus and Prophet, "Is there anything you two need before we leave?"
"Not me. I'm good." Marcus said as he started the fire.
"Let's get going, then," Kilarra says, finishing up her once over of her equipment. She grimaces a bit when she stretches her wound from the fight, but seems well enough for the moment. "You two stay safe, we'll be back in a few days time. Just... watch out, I guess. I just... I've got a bad feeling about this place." She heads out of the temple and into the clearing, waving the others forward to follow her. "Good luck!" she calls, just before the skulking shadows swallow them up as they break the treeline. Soon enough, even the sounds of their passing fade, leaving Marcus and Prophet alone with their chained monstrosity.
Sure enough, within a few hours the weather turns for the worse, and what begins as a drizzle becomes a steady rainstorm. The inside of the temple is dry from the rain, and the heat of the fire keeps it from being uncomfortable cold. You still get the sense of uneasiness from the temple grounds, as if someone or something is watching you, but after a while it retreats to the back of your mind.
Annika looks up at the sky and nods. "A good idea I believe." She pulls the small tent out of her bag and set it up on a reasonably flat piece of ground, hopefully without rocks or roots. She tosses her bedroll out to make a reasonably comfortable bed before tramping off in to the woods to grab some firewood while Kilarra is setting up the shelter. "Yes, allow me." She channels her faith in to her hands and lays it on Kilarra's injury.
More than willing to help out though, "Not something I have ever done before. Though I can follow directions rather well."
Once they have all gotten situated, "If it still aches I can help as. You should have said something earlier."
"I would prefer the last watch."
Gallidren offers to take the first watch.
"Hey, kid," he says after some time, looking up at Marcus. There's a curious look in his eye, not so predatory as during the fight--more inquisitive, like an animal staring at its reflection. "Things must have been pretty bad for you to leave the Stag Lord, right? I mean, we've seen some of your old buddies around, but just how bad did it get?" He pauses for a moment, licks his lips, and shrugs. "I mean, it was pretty rough when I left. That wasn't too long ago, now. But still, things change pretty quick around here. What made you decide to get out?"
Marcus thought for a few moments, poking at the fire and keeping one eye on the trapped monster in the distance. "Didn't like who I'd become." he said with a shrug.
"I used to be a hunter. It was a good way to keep away from people and still manage to stay fed. Later, I became a tracker. Then I got hired by the Stag Lord's folks to help 'em find people who tried to leave the band."
"What's that called? Irony?"
He gestured to the werewolf. "Those traps used to be for wolves an' bears. They work wonders on people though. But, people can just pull 'em open."
"A tool's a tool. It ain't good or bad. It's the choices we make that make 'em so. That said, tools are built for purpose, you know? You can make tools that make it a whole lot easier to do real bad stuff."
"Those traps ain't what they started out as. I put ratchet locks on the jaws. When they snap shut, they can only be opened again by me. They're for people now."
"It was one thing when I was being sent after run away bandits. Didn't stay that way though. When you're good at something, people start coming to you for more. All of a sudden I was being included in robberies. Then kidnappings. That was the last straw for me. One of my traps ended up catching a nine year old girl who was trying to run. The boys thought is was hilarious. They took her prisoner to see if they could get a ransom out of her. Even if she survives, I doubt she'll ever walk again."
"After that I packed up my gear and took off. Did a lot of soul searching, and a lot of drinking, and eventually heard about you folks. Thought maybe you could help get rid of the Stag Lord and everyone like him. I'm hoping that's my amends, you know?"
"I dunno about amends, kid. Hell, I dunno if I even think we need 'em. Sure, sounds like you've done some bad things. I know I have. But that's the way things are, out here. Sometimes you can't afford to think about right and wrong, let alone good and evil." Prophet takes another swig from his skin and looks at his sword, resting against the wall next to him. "It's about do or die, kill or be killed. You have what you hold. And it's still nicer than what went on back in Belkzen."
"Yeah, I know that's the way things are. I'm hoping someday they won't be that way anymore. Morality tends to take a seat in the face of desperation. That don't mean desperation is a better way to live, or even a good excuse."
"I lived that life, which is how I know I don't want to live it anymore. The stuff we've been through? Ain't nobody that should have to go through that. Not when there's any kind of other option."
Marcus spun a coin across his knuckles like a carnival showman, not really paying attention to what he was doing. "Predator and Prey aren't the only sides of the coin. With a lot of luck or a little cheating, you can get it to land on it's edge."