Saintsbridge was a nice and welcome sight when they first arrived that day. Alfyn and Cyrus stopped to ask Dohter if he wanted to review their research efforts on the way over. They had been a cheerful group when revisiting the place. They mostly managed to keep Cyrus from accidentally seducing the women in town by having Primrose follow him around. (And she only seduced one person.) Leaving town the next day was a much different story.

There was a larger abomination before the twelve gods than even Cyrus' abandoned spell experiments and that was anything that made for a depressed Alfyn. Primrose looked ready to commit murder when the group got the story out of Alfyn. It was a good thing Miguel was already dead or she and Therion might have been begging Cyrus to teach them just a small curse. Just one.

Miguel, the group decided, was possibly the worst.

Ophelia decided to take some action. It wasn't as drastic as some previous actions since Alfyn wasn't in the habit of reading heretical demonology tomes and way less likely to incur divine wrath. Ophelia had absolutely no apologetic tone in her voice when she told Therion she was sorry about the delay. She dragged Alfyn on a slight detour and into Dohter's shrine. He protested. He was embarrassed and said he wasn't worthy. They had important things to do in Noblecourt. Everyone elected to ignore his protests. Alfyn's visit was much shorter and he held a small piece of paper when he emerged from the shrine. He looked a bit surprised and more than a little awed.

Alfyn got a prescription.

It read: Travel with your friends until you feel better. - D

Therion shrugged. "Is that really the best thing a god could come up with? I guess you doesn't need my help."

"I beg to differ," said Olberic. "We would miss our drinking buddy."

"We all need to keep Alfyn company. It's divine commandment now." Primrose said.

Tressa normally loved to sleep in, but found that she was up earlier than usual. This made it more surprising that there was another person not on watch who was awake at this unholy hour of the AM. "Hey Ophelia! You are up early." Tressa said. "Did you have trouble sleeping?"

Ophelia looked like she didn't sleep at all that night. She absentmindedly stirred her tea. "Oh, it's just... It's silly, really." This dream didn't have the feel of prophecy to it, and she knew Cyrus was not about to do anything which might remotely cause a massive disaster, but she could not shake the mental image. "It's nothing."

"Want to talk about it? I bet it is not silly."

Ophelia thought about it for a while before she smiled gratefully at Tressa. "Well... it was a dream I had. I had been walking through Flamesgrace and then, suddenly, it was covered in skeletons. Just skeletons. All over town. "

"Whoa. That is a scary dream."

"It wasn't as scary as I thought the town being covered in skeletons would be. I could tell it was Cyrus' fault in the dream because the skeletons were polite..."

Tressa gave this statement due consideration. "Huh. That, uh, yeah. That would do it." Yep. If ever there was a mob of skeletons descending on a town to be polite at people, there would be no more likely culprit.

"I was pretty mad so I went to find him. I eventually found Cyrus at the inn at one of those desks they have in the rooms and you know what he said? He said 'Oh, wait, that decimal was supposed to be over there. My apologies.'"

Both women sat in silence for a moment trying to think of what to say after that. Tressa spoke up, "Uh, should we ask Cyrus what he was working on last night, just in case?"

"I suppose it can't hurt."

Olberic is a commonly accepted party dad. Even the birds think he's reliable. I'm glad other people also find the effects of Cyrus at the dinner table funny.

I was considering making Dohter a god who knows all about blood magic instead of Dreisang because, well, he's a god of doctors. He seems logically to be the god second to Galdera when it comes to knowing how to manipulate life. It kind of messed with my plans for the plot in the future so I'm going to the standard assumption that Dreisang is more of the guardian of forbidden knowledge.

At least ice magic is logical for apothecaries. Ice packs are lovely, as are reviews and follows.