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[h3]Duchy of Pelgaid, secluded pond[/h3]
When Jillian spoke it was her manners that alerted Gerald to her less-than-optimal condition first, even before his mind had the time to fully comprehend the words that had been directed at him. “Gerald”? “Be a dear”? Hearing Jillian speak to him like that, particularly after the way last night had ended, felt so out of place that his instincts immediately registered that something was wrong. Even Crone seemed to notice her fellow witch’s distress as she looked up from what she was doing, her expression one of annoyance in contrast to the warlock’s own of concern.
[I]Water,[/I] he thought, looking around only for a couple of seconds before he realized that the most suitable container at hand to hold liquid was his own tea-mug, which he swiftly produced from his robe as he turned to the pond, only to pause once more. The pond... not only had it just last night both served as their visual medium to channel a demon lord [I]and[/I] as Jillian’s bath-water, but it was also host to a number of plants and animals and was given an unappetizing greenish tint by algae; he was pretty sure that it would be far from a perfect source of drinking water. As he stood there staring at the pond it felt as though every detail of it grew sharper and more vivid to his eyes, his focus shifting from a late swarm of mosquitoes dancing over the surface in preparation of laying the last eggs of the year – eggs that would soon add to the doubtlessly already present population of larvae – , to a toad hiding among a patch of reeds, to some nondescript piece of floating object resting virtually motionlessly in the water near the opposite shore. What was beneath the surface? Gerald’s stomach churned in protest to the very thought of drinking anything that came out of there.
Yet he had to draw water from there if he was to grant Jillian’s request; there was no longer time to sleep and recuperate, no more room to waste energy conjuring water through magic. So with a disgusted grimace and the taste of bile in his throat, Gerald went and quickly dipped his mug in the water, trying his very hardest not to imagine what else he was collecting along with it.

“Renold,” he called with a significantly greater amount of desperation in his voice than the situation realistically called for, “please start a fire, quickly, so I can boil this.”
It took a moment before the dragon stirred, yawned so deeply that it beached the floating object Gerald had noticed earlier, and then [I]infuriatingly[/I] appeared to almost fall back asleep before the necromancer went up to the giant reptile and delivered a feeble but earnest kick to one of his haunches.
“Renold! Fire! Now!”
“Ugh,” the Elder Green groaned as his brilliant eyes opened with all the hardship of heavy gates that had remained shut and untouched for decades, to the point of Gerald almost imagined hearing an actual creaking sound with the action. “What?”
“Start a fire! I need to boil this water and I can’t spare the energy to do it with magic!”
“Huh... Little one, did you actually wake me up to serve the role as tinderbox? No respect for the elderly these days.” He produced a sound not unlike a cough, spewing a quick a gout of flame from his jaws that managed to reignite the remains of their campfire from the night. “You know,  breathing fire is not something we can do indefinitely either... We get hungry faster the more we do it. I remember one time...”
“Whatever,” Gerald grumbled, having already moved to the fire and set the mug atop a stone amidst the flames.

While all of that happened, however, Crone had retrieved her inventory from the ground and gone to Jillian’s side, looking at her with her ancient gaze as she knelt beside her.
“Have you succumbed to illness?” she asked with a remarkable lack of concern in her voice. “Has fever taken you? You appear to perspire.”