the temple had some gorgeous stained-glass windows and somehow most of them were still intact
but inside the temple we saw a lot of ruined portraiture and other smashed fixtures and also a bunch of bandits shooting arrows at us
and they'd set up false walls they could hide behind with slits to shoot those arrows through at us from all around us
that was disorienting
so between that and the earlier combat i was a little rattled
i hunkered down behind what cover i could manage and kept a couple archers too busy to fire
but i thought i'd run out of the throwable spell tokens i usually have prepared and i can't cast renew from a distance
so when bell got seriously injured i wanted to run in and help but i was so afraid of being in the middle of arrows going everywhere that i froze in place for a few seconds
and those seconds could have been real bad for her
i came to my senses and found my last renew token and bell came through it fine but i still felt like an unreliable teammate and a bad friend
we talked it out later and she wasn't upset with me at all and everyone else was sympathetic so i'll try not to dwell on it
the most important thing is that we got through the rest of the fight using teamwork
and also the lantern of jaila valeau which was much brighter than the bandits were ready for
when attempts at negotiation fail we end up fighting but i do my best to remind our opponents that they can stop fighting at any time and we'll do the same
that hasn't worked often but it did this time – one of the bandits surrendered and after the fight they promised to share all the info about the gang with the watch in exchange for protection while they were in jail
redeker was waiting outside so we made the case and she'll to do what she can
i asked the bandit what we could do to stop the gang from returning and they said reopening it would keep them away along with the "lords of dust" who oversee the whole operation?
redeker said she'd discuss it with "queen aurala" so it just might happen despite tensions between aundair and the church of the silver flame because thrane is governed by some part of the church and aundair and thrane don't get along
anyhow here's hoping this works
with the lantern of jaila valeau available to us meledri is confident that we stand a good chance of defeating palor
but we have less than three days to find people we trust to help because the seven of us total still may not be enough
she said to "find sources of hope and justice to carry us in a fight against despair"
i have ideas but that means i have more work to do