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Ceolfric briefly let his eyes wander to the commotion across the cemetary, confident the diminutive woman before him was less of a threat than the newly arrived interlopers. It seemed he guessed wrong, once he got a look at them. Local gravetenders, performing their consecrations over the dead in the name of whatever woeful deity that bade them wear those garish robes. The Tainted clearly wanted nothing to do with them, and while Ceolfric might've been inclined to ask these locals whether the marks in the ground were a common occurance, his options were limited if the halflings believed him one of the perpetrators. If this were Dranir, he'd have made hacksilver out of their sacred icons and drinking goblets out of their skulls for such an accusation, but this wasn't Dranir, and he'd win no friends butting heads with the local priesthood.

[color=aa4a44]"As you wish,"[/color] The man responded quietly as he returned his sword to its scabbard. If they had the decency - or naivete - to turn their backs to him so easily, he doubted they had any plans of turning on him in the near future. He followed dutifully, always positioned behind the other two to watch for foul play on their parts. Once they were well out of earshot of the priests, he spoke up again.

[color=aa4a44]"So what [i]were[/i] you doing, sleeping in that graveyard?"[/color] It seemed an odd place to find refuge, and their skittishness in the face of being witnessed suggested that they weren't there in any sort of official investigatory capacity. Plus, Freckles didn't seem the type to offer to sleep where monsters were known to roam. Which meant they likely weren't lying about being just as clueless as Ceolfric was. He really did make an unlucky pick.

[color=aa4a44]"There's quite a few highly aetheric-"[/color] He paused for want of a word, [color=aa4a44]"[i]entities[/i] in the woods around Soft Haven today. If it's not related to our mystery monster, I hope there's a different reason beyond simple entanglement in the gnarled skeins of fate."[/color] If that was even what he could call it; perhaps aether simply called to aether. Such a principle sounded ripe for catastrophe, if his last encounter with an aetherborn was anything to go off of, but in that mage's defense, he was attacked unprovoked.

Perhaps his approach with the probable-siblings was a bit gruff in retrospect, if the people of the southern lands truly were as soft as he'd been led to believe. It was literally in the name, after all.

[hr][@McMolly][@Obscene Symphony]