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[I]Unbelievable,[/I] Gerald thought to himself as he heard the two other outsider volunteers for the defense of the Anaxim Forest state their current goals, trying to decide whether he wanted to laugh or cry. [I]Jillian really does only want magic for magic's sake, and the other one, Salas... he doesn't even have that much. Does he have no mind of his own? Hopefully he can at least follow orders, or he might prove completely useless.[/I]
Externally he showed little of his disdain for his companions' cluelessness beyond donning a small frown and rolling his eyes at each of their replies. Crone did not seem all that appalled at their lack of purpose though, merely listening to each of them in silence, although she did raise a wrinkly eyebrow at the end of Jillian's statement.
"I do not even know your name, yet you see fit to beseech my mastery of forbidden magic?" she remarked, sounding half amused and half surprised. She shook her head with a smile. "You must truly yearn magic if you are willing to go so far. I am willing to share with you some of my knowledge as you ask, but I will only teach you about black magic itself; you will obtain no new spells from me, for knowledge of those is better left unspoken until it dies with me. I will show you the path of mastery to walk yourself, but no more."

Having dealt with that bit of business Crone turned to Gerald, her ancient eyes betraying an infuriating pity for him.
"And you, Gerald the Thrice Named?" she asked, addressing him by a weird title that he did not even know how to interpret himself, one which he was pretty sure he had never been known by. [I]Thrice Named? Does she mean how I originally had no last name, then was Remdal and now am Glass?[/I] "I know that you require an imminent end to the Withering, and if you insist that this is still your primary purpose we will keep our promise and share with you the location of one who has delved further into the darkness within souls than anyone, and who may very well have possess the clues as to cure the soul disease of which you have revealed so much to us..."
"I expect no less," the necromancer snapped, growing increasingly impatient with Crone and this entire business. "Then tell me and I'll be on my way. The Withering has to be stopped." He pulled the chain over his head and off his neck, holding it for the age-old woman to take. "At any cost."
"I beg you to reconsider," she said, actually sounding genuinely desperate. She did not take the Demon Prison from him, but let it dangle from his hand, emitting its ominous glow. "I understand your haste, but upon purging the plague from yourself the power of soul-stealing will almost certainly be lost. Hazzergash is vulnerable now more than ever, but even if he restored himself to the peak of his strength, sealing him back in his prison is much more likely to succeed with the aid of your unique ability."
Gerald sneered, but did not immediately respond to Crone's request. Crone, being as old and knowledgeable as she was, must have realized how much she was asking of him... he had explained his discoveries concerning the Withering to her, after all, and told her of just what dying to it entailed for its victims. Never mind the fact that he was quite likely to die a horrible and violent death at the hands of Hazzergash or his minions if he went along and helped trying to reseal the demon lord, but it would take valuable time to do so... time he was unsure just how much of which he had. He had used the Withering to move energy between entities far too many times today, and although the external symptoms actually seemed to have receded a little, he could feel it pull on the remainder of his soul even more ravenously than before. He had to end the Withering before it ended him, or everything would have been for naught... none of his goals would ever come to fruition. He had to focus on the bigger picture, and the Withering was ultimately a greater threat than even a rampant demon lord... was it not?

Then, for reasons he did not even completely understand himself, Gerald turned to Jillian. "What do you think?" he asked, surprising himself by sounding very tired just then, and somehow much older than he actually was. "Should I go?"