Holier Than Thou

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad lay down next to her with his head propped up on his palm. "To be fair, there wasn't a great deal of opportunity to tell you. You were wounded, and then we were at war, and then we were being married. The timing was...inconvenient." He lowered his gaze slightly. "However, there is more I have not told you, and I've known it far longer than a single night. Your father's story matches some other...information I've learned. It causes me to suspect that there's truth to his words."

[Emora Deen]

Tenele frowned, sitting up next to him with her back against the mass of pillows. "What other information?" Tenele didn't like the way he lowered his eyes.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad frowned at the sheets. "You're not going to like it," he said. "Your father said he struck a deal with Shea in order to throw off a fatal illness." His eyes flicked up to hers, weighing whether he should actually go on.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele narrowed her eyes on him. "Yes," she agreed. "He mentioned that... but, what does that have to do with the information you have?" Tenele felt an uneasiness sweep through her. Something didn't feel right. "Please, today has been too much and I don't think I can handle suspense."

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad mentally braced himself. "It would seem the disease is heritable. It's genetic." He wasn't sure how to look at her, but he did anyway. The words felt cold and stale on his tongue. "Your brother... he's sworn me to keep it from you. He's already fighting it."

[Emora Deen]

Tenele stared at him, her face void of any expression. She blinked at his words, shaking her head. "Fighting it?" she muttered, her green eyes flashing back to him. "You mean he's dying."

Tenele looked away, eyes wide as quarters as she stared at the back wall. She opened her mouth to speak, tilting her face back to him. The words left her. Tenele put a up a hand, slipping back out of the bed until she stood next to it.

"He's dying," she started. "He swore you to secrecy... He's dying and you agreed to keep that from me? That's why he was acting so strangely when we left... Vlad, why didn't you tell me? We've gone so far from Lowight and he's sick, dying... what if he's dead?!"

Tenele stooped for the cloak, pulling it over her shoulders. She quickly sat and began tugging on her boots.

"We're going back," she growled at him, her eyes welling with tears. "I can't believe you'd keep this from me, no matter what you swore..."

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad watched her with alert red eyes while she took in his words and expressed her inevitable fury with him. "Tenele, you won't see anything in Lowight that will make you feel any better. Talon's already given up." He hesitated, the human part of him knowing his bluntness could get her even more upset. "If you want to help him, focus on curing him."

[Emora Deen]

Tenele laced her boots, her shoulders stiffening at his words. "Finding a cure? How can I find a cure to a disease I don't even know about?" she asked him harshly. "If he's already given up you should have told me, Vlad. We could have been searching for a cure." Tenele turned to him, her green eyes wild, a blurred mixture of anger and worry.

Her jaw set tight as she watched him lie on the bed. "I can't sit here in this room relaxing with you knowing Talon is dying."

The wind blew outside, and the snow picked up. The howl filtered down through the chimney in a cold rustle. Tenele went to the window, and the ones calm snow whirled in harsh spinning wisps. A blizzard.

Tenele felt the chill of it, just looking out the window. She swallowed hard. If they travelled in that she'd freeze to death.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad stood up and followed her toward the window. He kept a little distance from her and remembered to try to repress his antisocial tendencies. This was her brother. "We have been searching," he said, summoning his pack from its place on the floor to his hand. He pulled out a heavy book with leather binding. "What's the point in spending the night in a library if we don't borrow any books?"

[Emora Deen]

Tenele narrowed her eyes on him, and then they lowered to the book. She thought about the church, the library he'd slept in, the walls and walls of books. He'd been looking for a cure secretly the whole time.

Tenele went to him, grabbed his face with her hands, and kissed him fiercely. She drew away, her green eyes meeting his. "I'm still angry with you," she informed him, her hands lowering to the book. "But, thank you..."

She took the book from him gently, cupping it in her arm and flipping through the thick parchment papers. "I have no idea what I'm looking for. I don't know what's wrong with him. I can't believe he'd keep this from me..."

Tenele went to the chair that hugged the end of the bed, getting herself closer to the fading hot coals of a dying fire.

[Soran Nightblade]

Vlad privately reveled in her renewed affection. Just a few hours after their wedding, and already the sense of being distanced from her could cause this kind of tension to build up in just a few dark minutes. Thar help me, he muttered inwardly, dismayed by his own easy relief.

"Well, we do know some things. We know it's not a normal illness, to pass down this way. Given the way Talon talked about it, it could only be a curse. And if it is, it's in there." He gestured at the book in her hands with a short nod.

"Unfortunately, his symptoms weren't all that interesting. A fever, general weakness. Not exactly a unique curse.

[Emora Deen]

Tenele frowned as she flipped through the book. "A curse?" she listened to him as he explained the symptoms. "Well, let's think of something other than the symptoms... Maybe connecting factors? It affected my father, now my brother. It killed my grandfather. Maybe it only affects the men in our family? I am not sick, after all."

"Talon knows magic so well, I would think that he would have found the curse if that is what it is." Tenele lifted her green eyes to him. "How bad was he? He seemed so strange, I just didn't look past it... I should have known."

[Soran Nightblade]

"He was only just beginning to show it. I only noticed because of his heartrate..." Vlad remembered. "It was uneven, almost like a rhythm. There was something extremely distracting about it. A state like that could eventually kill a man, I suppose."

[Emora Deen]

Tenele frowned, exhaling slowly. "I don't know anything of my family, our history would tell us who could have cursed us. I don tknow anything about either side of my family..."

She frowned, staring down at the book when reminded of her goddess mother who she had only just found out existed.

"Talon and I are so screwed," she whispered. "We have bad luck on both sides. Talon is cursed and I will have a demonic bounty on my head soon."

[Soran Nightblade]

"Well," Vlad pondered, "With so little to go on from the curse's perspective, we have two real options. We can pull up your family archives in Ighten and learn what we can - but Talon already informed me he'd researched everything there was. If we trust his insights there, that leaves the other option. Learn more about the other side of your family." He looked at her pointedly. "I no longer think your healing skills are just a happy accident. Perhaps they have the potential to be more?"