You know what Woljif's favorite thing about ghouls is? They aren't resistant to any of the things demons are, so he can hang back and fling rays of frost and acid splashes while the people wearing armor get within biting range. 

"Are you okay?" Lusilla asks the survivor once the ghouls are dealt with, shifting back into human form in order to be more reassuring. 

"I--uh--"

He is not in fact okay; he just got energy-drained pretty badly by a nabasu. And watched his three companions die of same and come back as horrible twisted undead abominations of themselves. 

But he's not going to die in the next five minutes or anything. 

"The temple of Desna is currently mildly inhabited; is it okay if we escort you there? We're going to pick them up later and bring them to the Defender's Heart--the Eagle Watch is using it as a temporary headquarters, and there are refugees there that they're protecting--we can bring you there then too."

"--Alright." It is mildly convenient that he doesn't have to at this time address the question of if he's going to recover enough fast enough to qualify as a fighter and not a refugee. 

What would be really convenient would be if he had died like his friends and they didn't have to bother, but oh well. 

Well, the Desnans don't see it that way. They're very happy to provide shelter and respite to a random stranger! Desnans are just like that. 

And then they can finally make it all the way to Horgus Gwerm's house. They do have to kill some more stuff along the way, but nothing that merits additional detours. 

"So then," Lusilla explains to Lann, later, once everyone including the Desnans and the rescued nabasu-victim has reached the Defender's Heart safely, "it turned out that Camellia is secretly Horgus Gwerm's bastard daughter, except also Horgus Gwerm isn't actually Horgus Gwerm, he's some kid who got mistaken for Horgus Gwerm after the whole Gwerm family was wiped out by demons. Which apparently happens a lot," she adds, glancing over at where Daeran is talking to Nenio. Probably she should be concerned about that, given how engaged Nenio is and how amused Daeran looks, but whatever. 

"...Is the surface always like this?"

"No, of course not. ...I mean, cities might be, I don't know, but it wasn't in my village growing up." 

Shrug. "It might be something a kid would miss." Since he was a small child the last time he spent any length of time on the surface." 

"Well, ideally most people will continue to miss it! I just didn't see any reason to keep it secret from you, when you might just as well have ended up coming along and finding out with the rest of us." 

"Fair enough, I guess. Sounds like I missed out on an exciting trip." 

"Personally I feel like the vision of Elysium was more exciting than finding out about Camellia's personal drama." Not that she isn't sympathetic about the whole situation, but it still doesn't really... explain... some of the odder and more troubling things she's seen from her. 

It might explain her being rude to Ember, except that Daeran objectively outranks Camellia and he's perfectly kind to the young witch. 

"I am kinda sorry I missed that part."

"If I'd known it would happen I would have asked them to hold off on sharing the song until we got back, but oh well." Shrug. "Oh, but on a note that not coming along doesn't mean you missed out on--here." She pulls out a longbow and hands it to him. "Finnean can help out someone else, at least for the moment. Horgus Gwerm said we could help ourselves to a bunch of stuff that was still in the house, on account of better the crusaders than random looters and his not having the ability to actually keep the place secure."

He snorts. "Thanks. Though I don't think I'll ever get over how some people on the surface have so much and others so little." 

Shrug. "Rich people, and nobles, aren't really something I have a lot of experience with either. But I guess I was more used to the fact that they existed, from stories."

"Yeah, our stories...were different. If they took place on the surface at all--they generally didn't--they were always about the crusades."

"Whereas I'd never even heard of them." She shakes her head. "Oh! And one more thing." 

She bends down, then rises to her feet again with a purring orange cat in her arms. "This is Tiger." 

"...You adopted a cat?"

"She was in the Gwerm manor's kitchen, and she just started following me around! I asked some of the others for advice on a name, and Daeran said there are giant orange cats called tigers, so it fit." Scritch scritch. 

"I hope she doesn't bother Dànpiàn."