Paladins: Divine Necessities

"You go ahead," said Raven. "Ask your goddess for guidance, if that's what you need."

"What about you?"

"There's a tub," Raven said evenly. "I'll take the first bath."

"I... As you wish." Laina still didn't know what to make of the smaller girl. She'd known Raven for nearly three months now, long enough to realize that the girl actually was a cleric, but Raven never dropped her guard. Her expression was always blank, her words dolorous and her observations gloomy at best. Why she'd chosen to come with Laina...

"I'll knock before I come back in," said Raven, and walked out of the small bedroom -- once a room for children, Laina thought -- where the family had put them up for the night. 

Laina sighed, and knelt beside the bed, placing her hands on the sheets and letting her attention drift. She had no altar here to help her get in touch with the divine, her prayers -- as always -- felt uncomfortable and unpracticed. She let her thoughts clear, tried to open her mind, and then said, "Well, Boss? What's the play, here? What am I supposed to do with this?"

There was a long silence, and then a faint stirring as a sense of presence spilled into the room. Laina waited, listening. 

Evil waxes. Good wanes. Dark powers rise. You must restore some small part of that balance in this place.

You want me to kill the vampire, Laina thought. Right, Boss? 

Right.

You should have just said so, then.

I said exactly what I meant to say. Now quit moping and get on with it, Child. Despite the words, the tone was gentle, humorous, and Laina found herself smiling. She'd never wanted to become a paladin, but she was slowly coming to believe that there were worse ways she could spend her life. Still...

Vampires. Why did it have to be vampires? She hated vampires. And she'd seen what they could do; if it came down to a fight, she and Raven were both going to die.

She could send word back to the Temple of Amun. Tarric or Werendril or Anica or Aesa might come to help them. Hell, all of them might come together; even if they didn't seem to regard her as some sort of baby sister, they might consider it a matter of honor since she'd fought with them before. And the batch of them together stood a pretty good chance against a single vampire. Did she want to do that?

No. No, she did not. However safe the farm seemed now, Laina thought the situation was more urgent than that. More importantly, though... Her goddess had told her to kill the vampire. Herself. With Raven's help, very likely, but still. She hadn't said, I brought you here to gather aid. She'd said, You must restore some small part of that balance in this place. 

So that was that. But if she and Raven ended up fighting the vampire, they were both going to die. 

So Laina would just have to make sure that they didn't end up fighting the vampire.Which meant finding its lair in the daylight, and making damned sure that it was dead before it had a chance to fight back. Well... Sarha had a pretty solid theory about where her ex-husband would make his lair. They'd have to try it.

We can do this, She decided. We can, and we will. And then we will come back here and make tea. Or aletheis, and then tea.