“That doesn’t sound better” Kathlin mumbled as she eyed the awaiting runes, the pentacle and the cultists. It all came off as horribly Bad News to her, and left her with the sinking feeling that as tedious as the cell had been, she would far rather be back there with the darkness and dripping, than right here. 

She had to stall, that thought was uppermost in her mind. Liaena would come for her, hopefully with backup, and she had to hang on till then. Which meant in this case, delaying whatever horrible fate the ‘Knight Commander’ not-so-subtly had planned for her in the immediate future. 

Still forced to walk forward due to the presence of the mage behind her, Kathlin dragged her feet to move as slowly as she dared. The girl sneaked another glance at the runes before looking over at Sevarian dubiously. “…This can’t be just about what happened at the mansion, surely? Okay, so I’m a witness. But there are easier ways to deal with witnesses than you know. All of this.”

The girl waved vaguely at the at the setup, taking the opportunity to have another good peer at the runes as she did so. “…I think your Captain made a point of that, in fact.”

If she looked at the runes on the floor in [i] just[/i] the right way, Kathlin could see the dark spells twisted around them, glistening and knotted together in a way that made her feel physically ill. Holding back her nausea, she studied them for any conceivable pattern. The entire ensemble made no sense to her whatsoever, but she thought she could vaguely pick out some master spells in the setup, based on those that were linked to the most other threads and those which made her feel the most ill to look at. [i]“This probably counts as ‘an attempt at resistance’. Oh well.”[/i]

A stirring from the mage right behind her, as his suspicious glare bored a hole in the back of her neck. “Sir—“

“Oh!”

Stumbling on the paved floor, Kathlin threw out her hands as she fell to grab and twist at the spell she had zeroed in on, and felt it break as she hit the ground. Startled cries of mingled outrage and pain were emitted from the cultists around her as she went crazy on the remaining enchantments on the runes, snapping and battering at any crucial links she could see before the first spell hit her from behind.