Spoiler: Rosalind
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With no one questioning your statement, you make your way to the Gleaming Rose. As might be expected, the hospice is bustling with patients being treated with methodical professionalism by Marglean and your other nurses and physicians. Pran is not immediately in sight, but you can guess where he might be.

On your arrival, Marglean signals for your attention - and points to a figure standing in the shadows, plainly very uncomfortable.

It feels like a long time since you last saw the High Priest of Kaithrax, but you recognise the long, torn robes the pale green of infection; the bedraggled, filthy mane of strawlike brown hair and matching beard; and the milky-white eyes. He eyes the healers with a mix of wariness and pity, then gives a shallow bow of the head when he sees you.


Spoiler: Gunn
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Lydia gives you a knowing smile. "That would be a clear violation of protocol, trespassing on a temple without a clear and present crime to justify our doing so. Obviously the record will show we have done no such thing.

"But if a third party should stumble across a potion of invisibility and a scroll of alarm, perhaps clearly labelled in the supply room through that door,"
she points, "then that would be a happy chance. I think we will go and have a break now - I'm sure you can see yourself out?"

Some time later, you make sure you are at your office for the agreed hour. Fifteen minutes late, Natalia arrives.

She is wearing a long, flattering red dress, strapless and cut to leave her back and a scandalous amount of her bosom bare. Her only jewellery is a solid silver symbol of her god, sitting in the exposed triangle of flesh beneath her throat. She has coloured her hair golden - blonde and styled it to cascade artfully over her shoulders, back and chest.

Natalia moves like someone well accustomed to attracting every eye, with confidence and raw appeal. But for a moment, when she spots you, there is a crack in that facade: a slight glance down, a misstep, and her hand moves to her hair for a second before she brings it back down, clasping her hands together.

Walking up to you, she offers her hand and smiles at you - though you think there is a degree of uncertainty, perhaps even nervousness, in that smile as she waits for you to speak first.