[IMG]http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u79/SharpshooterJack/markerGerald_zps253683a8.png[/IMG]
[h3]Duchy of Pelgaid, secluded pond[/h3]
“Thanks,” Gerald figured was probably the polite thing to respond to the witch’s offer to teach him whatever she knew, even though he sincerely doubted that she had any practical knowledge that would actually be useful to him. He still did not approve entirely of black magic, its ease of use and its difficulty to control, and could simply not see any real advantage to using it instead of arcane magic, barring the need to blurt spells quickly and thoughtlessly, which he would not want to do anyway.
“I hope you realize that, even if you succeed in learning it, necromancy is a slow skill to obtain; it probably took me several years before I got to the point where I felt justified in calling myself a necromancer. We will also need materials... for practice.” He decided to leave the nature of those materials unsaid, as he figured she could probably guess what they were. “Without them we could practice controlling the flow of energy within yourself, but doing that alone would get you no closer to being a necromancer than a warden.”

When it came to Jillian’s family, though, Gerald was not entirely sure what to say or think. Jillian had been part of a coven plotting to change the country, after all, which would most likely cast suspicion on anyone associated with any member of the coven as well. There would be investigations, interrogations and they would most likely end up under surveillance, but other than that? If they really had no connection to the Voice of Reason aside from being related to Jillian and were not even magi, there worst that could happen [I]legally[/I] was that some bad rumors started going about, affecting their business negatively. The problem was that the one that orchestrated the destruction of the Voice of Reason – most likely Dennis – had already proven ruthless and willing to skirt the law to achieve what he wanted. The fact alone that witch-hunters had been employed to catch Jillian and Vince was a bad sign, since witch-hunters were people that walked the line of what was legal and illegal, since even practitioners of the forbidden arts generally were not subject to death penalty and could not be killed except in self-defense or if they were rendered outlaws... Even if the mastermind behind it all did not tell them to, any surviving witch-hunters from the band might decide to harass the Veldaines on their own.
“I don’t think they can do much if they really aren’t involved,” he ended up telling her, thinking that it was better not to worry her needlessly. “At worst they’ll take a hit to their reputation, I think, and maybe have some of their merchandise destroyed in a faux search for cursed items, but legally they’re safe.” Whether “they” were bold enough to do something overtly criminal just to get to Jillian, however, was a different matter entirely.