[h3]Jaelnec, Freagon, Irah, Lhirin, Nabi, Yanin, Jordan and Madara – Bor Manor, Borstown[/h3]
Freagon looked and listened. He examined the archangel posturing at him and Irah. He scanned the room visually back and forth, even peeked behind the open door into the corner that would otherwise be hidden when standing in the doorway through the crack between it and the door frame. He looked as much and as hard as he could without moving from the spot or otherwise making what he was doing too obvious.
Much to his annoyance he did not see anything that might suggest where their quarry [I]actually[/I] was, or he would have simply thrown a dagger at it and been done with it. He still had three rodlin remaining in his left hand that he could throw to check, but doing so would be overt enough to potentially prompt the divine to act. It had not exactly reacted well to him throwing the first coin, after all – at least he assumed that was why it had reiterated its command for them to stop – , so he would much prefer to spend an action with a potentially hostile response confirming where the divine was, rather than where it was not. The obvious thing to do would be to throw a coin at the archangel, which was obviously an illusion; Freagon had enough experience with archangels to know that this was not one. He was confident that throwing the coin would not end well, and a strong suspicion that wherever the real divine was, it was not there, but likely as far from that spot as possible. All it would accomplish was ensure that they knew that the divine was not there, and that the divine knew that they knew, which would escalate things.
With how dangerous the divine energy in the air was, it was easy to forget that divine taint was not the only threat of thalks. All of the dense energy filling the air here was a weapon for the creature to wield, fuel for its magic and nourishment for its strength.

Instead of throwing coins, Freagon busied himself with – as casually, idly and accidentally as he could manage to make it look – hold his sword so that its blade rested within the wall of fire meant to stop them from entering. He immediately noticed that the flames were not reacting to the obstruction, but seemed to flow exactly as they had before, seemingly passing through the metal rather than flowing around it. More importantly, the blood that still stained the blade did not react to the fire; there was no smoke, no sizzling, no signs of the blood being cooked. The flames were just for show, it seemed, and could be walked through safely.
He clenched his jaw inside the helmet and refocused his attention on the archangel. He knew he [I]could[/I] advance and attack; now he just needed to know where to advance toward, and where to strike.

During all of his looking, Freagon also listened to the conversation taking place, taking in every word spoken and putting it aside for later consideration. He did not even flinch when the divine accused them of having an angel among them, nor did he react in the least when Irah – in Fermian, though that did not stop him from understanding – more-or-less confessed that she was the one who had brought it. From what she was saying, and the fact that there was no one among them that resembled an angel, a wraith or a ghoul, he guessed that Irah had let the angel possess her. He also guessed that the hostile divine had just banished that angel.
Indiscernible behind the visor of his helmet, this did make him furrow his brow a little. The first thing he wondered was how long Irah had been possessed by this angel of hers, as he was fairly confident that she had not summoned it in his presence, at least, so it must have been before they all met here. Then he wondered what kind of angel it had been, only for his thoughts to turn to how she had seemed to call upon Reina's favor to heal Jaelnec earlier. What were the chances that she was an elementalist, a summoner [I]and[/I] a Favored One of Reina? Not high, he would wager. It was much more likely that the prayer had been for show, and it was actually her angel doing the healing. If that was true, there were only several kinds of angel capable of that kind of magic, all of which were greater divines. The thalk – which he still suspected this of being – was only a lesser divine. It must have taken a significant chunk of its power to get rid of Irah's angel, which meant that doing so had been very important to it. Why? Because it was afraid of another angel being present and able to see through its illusions?
It was possible. Likely, even. But its reaction to seeing Irah and its choice of words made him hesitant to assume that was the only reason. “Angel slaves,” it had said, and it had gotten furious. It had also called them “villains,” whatever that meant.
Was all of that part of its deception? It could be.

In the next room over, Jordan and Nabi would find that hiding there and closing the door behind them did indeed mean that they were not enveloped in divine energy. They were spared the accumulation of divine taint in there and were, at least relatively speaking, quite safe in there.
The archangel seemed entirely taken aback by suddenly hearing Jordan's voice from over there, and for just an instant panic flashed across its face before it regained its composure. Freagon saw, and pondered what that meant. His first thought was that the real body of the divine might be over there, with them... but he quickly dismissed that idea just from the fact that the archangel was reacting to things that could only be seen, and all the divine energy was definitely coming from this room, not the other one. The divine was here, no doubt about it. Why then?
It was not too hard to guess, he figured: its entire strategy seemed to be based on simply distracting and delaying them with its theatrics and illusions for as long as it could while the divine taint did its cruel work on them. Someone speaking from a place not exposed to that energy meant that no amount of stalling was going to secure its victory, at least not completely. It meant that it had to change its plans... which he figured might mean that it would go on the offensive.
But curiously it did not. It simply listened, seeming surprised and confused. He also noticed that while the visual of the fire in front of him and the woman and child by the bed were still there, the woman's sobbing had gone silent, the fire was no longer crackling and he did not feel any heat coming off it anymore. [I]It's distracted. Good. That means it'll make mistakes and its illusion will crack.[/I]

Out by the entry to the hallway, Jaelnec flinched at the feeling of divine taint starting to seep into him, though he did not react with the surprise or evasive action Madara had, though he could easily sympathize as to why she would react that way. It was far from the first time he had felt divine taint, however – in fact he had felt it as recently as just moments ago, when Irah had healed him – , but one never quite got used to how it felt, let alone the grim awareness of what would happen if you accumulated too much. If anything, he was quite impressed with how swiftly Madara had reacted and how quickly she had regained her composure.
Back in the room, the archangel seemed less surprised to hear Madara speak – she was within its domain, after all – but attentive nevertheless. It actually seemed to physically shrink a little when it was asked who it expected to draw in with the sound of a sobbing woman, only for the image of the woman and child by the bed to instantly wink out of existence.
Freagon frowned. [I]Too bad. Less illusions means it can concentrate better on what is left.[/I]
He also noticed, quite concerningly, that the golden sword that had been hanging threateningly over the child did not vanish along with them. It remained suspended in mid-air where it was, though it slowly seemed to change its alignment until its tip was pointed straight at him. He resisted the impulse to throw a coin at the sword to check whether it was real. Things were happening, it seemed.

What [I]really[/I] seemed to coax a reaction out of the creature was Madara's final question: “If it is not suffering and death you yearn for, what is it that you seek in staying here?”
The archangel blinked several times rapidly, its mouth opening and closing without sound for for a second, before its shoulders slumped. “I... I...”
Freagon blinked and tightened the grip on his sword as he instantly noticed that something was odd. He – as well as Irah, Lhirin, Madara and Jaelnec – felt the sensation of divine taint accumulation suddenly diminish to a mere fraction of what it had been before; still present, but no longer an immediate threat. The wall of fire and the hovering sword both also faded away, and a faint shimmer, like a haze, seemed to hang over the entirety of the bedroom with the divine in it.
“I am supposed to do [I]something[/I],” the archangel said emphatically, a hint of desperation in its voice. “I am here for a reason. I [I]must[/I] be. But she is gone, so she cannot tell me what to do. I wanted to...” It faltered. “I do not know why I am here.”