Grim notices the signal but doesn't really know what's going on in the front building, so she hesitates a few seconds... she knows that she will lose a good position for defending the others from any threat coming from the street, but then it must be important if they summon her. She carefully leaves the shadowy doorway and makes for the other side of the street while keeping her eyes open for anyone else approaching, as soon as she reaches the door she will seek for the best spot for still covering for the others. "Do plans ever last more than one minute in this wretched place?" she sighs, as she also gives up on the idea of following the pink orb's trajectory above the roofs... she wondered for a second whether it might still be this Judex being overseeing their actions.
The street remained quiet through Grim's crossing. Nothing emerged from the adjoining alleys or followed her from the far side. Just inside the entrance, a broken section of masonry offered a useful compromise between shelter and visibility: someone positioned there could retain a view of the street while also seeing into the passage behind the others.
Whatever course the pale pink sphere took after Grim abandoned her watch of it was no longer visible from here.
Mara listened to Sky's terms without interrupting. The mention of the Plague Doctor brought a tightening around her eyes.
"I've seen your doctor."
"I'll go with you. I'll speak with him, answer what I know in good faith, and I won't make an attempt against any of you while we're together."
She paused.
"But I'm not swearing myself into anyone's service. If that's what you mean by assisting you, the answer is no."
The stone Orris had worked loose came free with a gritty scrape. With it gone, considerably more of the main timber was exposed. What remained around it was no longer loose debris that could simply be cleared away; the weight pinning Mara would have to be shifted.
Orris's question about Severin drew her attention toward the armored Mercykiller.
"The crossbow bolts aren't what made him interesting."
Severin remained silent.
"We'd heard about him before the attack. He'd been around the sick. Around places where others had been exposed."
Mara raised two fingers toward the side of her face.
"There should have been something. The marks. Black around the eyes. Weakness. Anything."
Her hand dropped.
"There wasn't."
Severin regarded her for a moment.
"So someone decided to correct the oversight."
"Someone wanted a cleaner exposure."
"An important scientific distinction."
"I don't know why you're different. Neither did they. That's why they wanted you alive afterward."
Then came Orris's question about the halfling.
Recognition took a moment.
"A halfling asking about the plague? Yes. Several days ago."
"He wanted to know about the earliest cases. When they appeared. Where they'd been found. Who might still remember the beginning."
Mara gave a small shake of her head.
"We didn't have much to give him. He wasn't the first person to ask where this started."
As to where the plague had actually originated, her answer came more quickly.
"If I knew that, we wouldn't have needed this laboratory."
She glanced toward the wreckage surrounding her.
"By the time we began tracing cases, every street had its own story about who died first. We'd find an older case, then hear about an earlier one somewhere else. We never found a beginning we could prove."
"Your halfling wasn't satisfied with that answer either."
The bell sounded again.
Its heavy note rolled through the ruined streets and sent a faint vibration through the damaged timbers overhead. After a long interval came another, carrying from somewhere deeper toward the center of Plague-Mort.
Mara's eyes shifted briefly toward the sound.
"The Keep."
Another toll.
"For what reason do they ring?"
"I don't know."
The answer came without embellishment.
"Something inside. Something outside. Orders from the Keep. Pick one."
The loose rubble around the main support was now sufficiently cleared. Mara remained pinned, but the timber itself was accessible. Moving it would take considerably more effort than clearing the stones had.
For now, the bell continued at its measured interval, the way toward the inner quarter was apparently being closed, and Mara remained beneath the beam with more answers still potentially available.
Grim spotted no new threat approaching during her crossing. There is a covered position just inside the entrance with a view of both the street and the passage if she wants it. The pink sphere's subsequent movement is unknown now that she has given up watching it.
The beam is ready to be moved. You can try it now, provide further healing/stabilization first, continue questioning Mara while she's pinned, or come up with another method.
Sky's Guidance is noted and active; @doghead, just specify the recipient if/when it becomes relevant to a check.
"I made the promise to lead you to the palace and will give honour to that is still your direction. Otherwise, I will work to free the Mara so to escort her to the Doctor.
"Please let me know your obligation. I will check upstairs while you consider."
With that, Sky proceeds cautiously upstairs to see what is there. A small flame cradled in his hand provides Sky some illumination.
Cast Produce Flame (Cantrip) Duration 10 minutes. Bright Light 10ft, Dim light +10ft.
Perception +6 (p)
Stealth +2
At the mention of the palace, Mara gave no objection. Whatever reservations she had about the Plague Doctor, Orris could not read outright hostility in her reaction to the name. Recognition, certainly, and caution. Nothing more definite than that.
The crossbow skittered across the floor and disappeared beneath the edge of a broken cabinet.
Severin looked from Orris to the timber.
"I'll take the weight. Get her clear once it moves."
He removed his sword and set it within reach against the wall, then examined the exposed support without yet disturbing it.
"When you're ready."
Above them, the stairway climbed narrowly between cracked plaster walls before turning sharply onto the next floor.
The light of Sky's flame revealed what the collapse had left behind.
The upper chamber had once been considerably larger. Part of its outer wall and floor had fallen into the street, leaving the surviving half exposed to cold air through a jagged opening. Two long tables remained against the interior wall. Most of the glassware upon them had broken, but iron clamps, stained cloth, shallow metal trays, and several intact stoppered bottles remained among the debris.
The black residue seen from the street was more extensive here.
It had dried in thin streaks across one tabletop and down the side of a cabinet. Elsewhere, dark stains marked the floor around the legs of a heavy chair fitted with leather restraints. The chair itself had been pulled partly away from the table before the collapse.
A small shrine occupied a recessed niche in the far wall. Purple cloth hung there beneath three amber drops fashioned from glass. Whatever offerings had once rested beneath them had been hastily disturbed; one bowl lay overturned and several darkened candles had fallen onto their sides.
Nearer the collapsed portion of the room, several sheets of parchment had been trapped beneath a fallen wooden case. Others had escaped it entirely and now lay scattered among broken glass and splintered boards.
Nothing in the visible portion of the chamber moved.
The bell from the Keep sounded again beyond the broken wall.
Downstairs, Severin remained beside the timber, waiting for Orris to begin.
Upstairs, the surviving laboratory offered several places Sky could investigate more closely: the restrained chair and black staining, the bottles and equipment, the shrine, or the scattered papers. The damaged floor near the open wall could also be examined, though approaching that portion of the room would mean trusting what remained of the structure.
Orris's Insight 13: Mara's reaction to the Plague Doctor reads as recognition and caution, but not clearly as fear or hostility. Orris doesn't get anything more specific from that roll.
Severin is willing to help with the beam. If Orris proceeds, we can resolve freeing Mara next.
Sky sees no immediate creature/threat upstairs with his current passive observation. Since he's actively scouting, doghead can choose what he wants to inspect more closely and roll Perception if desired. Produce Flame provides the stated 10 ft. bright + 10 ft. dim light.
Dust sifted from the fractured ceiling as the weight shifted. At first it moved barely at all, then rose just enough for the crushed fabric beneath it to pull away from Mara's leg.
Something black gleamed underneath.
It wasn't bruising.
Thin, irregular lines ran beneath the skin of her calf, branching upward beneath torn cloth. Between them, thicker patches of black had gathered beneath the skin, while a narrow smear of the same oily fluid they had seen elsewhere in Plague-Mort wet the fabric where the beam had pinned her.
Severin stopped increasing the pressure.
His eyes settled on Mara's leg.
"Hold."
Mara looked down.
For the first time since they had found her, the composure left her face.
"What?"
Her eyes followed Severin's.
Silence.
"No."
The word came quietly.
The black tracery disappeared beneath the remaining fabric above her calf. How much farther it extended could not be seen while she remained pinned.
Severin did not release the timber.
"Can you feel your leg?"
Mara stared at it.
"I thought it was the beam."
A beat passed.
"I can't feel anything below it."
The timber remained partially raised. There was enough room now to see what had been hidden, but not yet enough to pull Mara safely clear.
The lift has exposed something that wasn't visible while Mara was pinned: black ichor/tracery is present along at least one leg, and Mara says she has no sensation below the beam.
You haven't completed the lift yet. Orris can continue, stop and lower the beam, question Mara, or change approach. If you continue, give me a Strength (Athletics) check; Severin's assistance gives advantage.
Sky's Guidance is still noted, but its target wasn't specified, so I won't assign it to Orris unless doghead confirms that was the target.
Orris moves to where the lab was, absent-mindedly looking through the various viles and experiments as he speaks to the dragonborn,
"So, have you found anything of interest? It appears our friend downstairs is having a terribly unlucky day: she's been infected. Do you have any suggestions? I feel our time is running short."
