Between Kaleeth's outward concern, Rhazii's crying, and her own share of the worries, Sabine was beginning to feel closed in. She didn't respond to Kaleeth for a few moments while she realised just how anxious she had become. In a stray lucid thought, Sabine didn't want to be trapped by her anxiety any more. Even if it was just the help given to her by the ritual keeping her going, she channelled as much focus as she could into mental resilience. Even then, it was hard. She didn't make eye contact with Kaleeth as she found a response. "Ahnasha will come back if anything goes wrong. She will know what to do." Sabine's voice was straining not to stutter, "Let's just keep going."

Vera and Darahil gave looks of mild disapproval at Ahnasha still being transformed while idle, but now was not quite the time to raise such issues.

Darahil spoke first. "If there is another entrance to the inhabited parts of the ruin, we would have found it by now. The only other openings are the vents from the forge and the dining chamber, but they are vertical drops, too narrow for an attacker to fit through. The only other potential entrance would be through the unexplored parts of the ruin, and that would hold the danger of traps we have not yet disabled, let alone discovered."

"Oswall is the one who is intimately familiar with the defences of this place," Vera said to them both, buckling on some sturdy looking leather armour as she spoke. "We must admit, we may have to improvise in some regards. We will have to hold them at the gate as long as we can and wait for the warband to strike them from behind. If they get through the gate, which is the weakest point if they had the sense to bring a ram, we will have to start moving everyone out into the unexplored ruins while holding a fighting retreat. If what you said is true, we have little chance of beating them back on our own. They are likely trained to fight us and confined spaces favour them over our beast forms."

It was clear that Darahil and Vera were planning to save as many lives as they could. Either they didn't have the acumen, or they weren't willing, to take any risks to give them an edge if there were any. Darahil glanced to some warriors piling up quivers by the base of the defences and looked to Ahnasha. "While you're in that form, use your reach and pass those quivers up to the men up by the arrow windows. Unless you have anything further to add, of course." Darahil may not have been deliberately trying to sound caustic, but he didn't seem to make an effort not to.