[Stealthily enter, prepared to intervene.]
On either side the ruined chapel lie empty frames that once held stained glass windows. Their bottom sections stand only a few feet off the ground. Better to enter from an unexpected angle, you decide, and close the distance. The time to act may be soon.
Stealth Check: 5
Failure
You find a solid foothold between the stonework of the chapel side wall, boosting yourself up to the empty window frame. As you prepare to lower yourself into the chapel, the corroded iron window frame you are grasping for support crumbles into dust. Your balance shifts unexpectedly and you do not land so much as stumble into the ruined building, halfway between the entrance and the altar at the chapel’s end. You slide for cover behind a collapsed, moldy church pew, but it is too late. Sister Margrite turns in your direction, holding the swaddled, smoldering thing to her chest like a protective mother. In the dead silence of the chapel, you hear the sound of flickering flame eating through the cloth.
“Children! To the altar!” she says, her voice pained.
The children hurry in uncanny unison, slowing down as they approach the altar, and make a line in front of Father Velholme.
He looks out into the darkness, holding his lantern above the line of children, and says, “To me, Sister! The time is upon us! The child must be baptized!”
Sister Margrite backs her way to the stone altar with a swiftness and surefootedness you did not know she possessed. She draws the smoldering thing from her breast and you see that it has burned through her vestment, revealing woman’s flesh beneath.
In the light of the Father’s lantern you catch a glimpse of the smoldering thing. The fallen star. The meteorite. A newborn babe?
A mewling cry echoes through the chapel as Margrite lays the meteoric child on the altar.
“Milk of human kindness marks your covenant with man,” Sister Margrite says.
Now she and Father Velholme speak in unison. “We anoint thee in holy myrrh, promised savior of man.”
“Continue the sacrament,” Father Velholme says. “I will protect us from this intruder.”
He leaves the lantern on the altar, stepping down. The children part for him like reeds. He holds out a palm and a flame flickers into life, illuminating the chapel ruins. In his other hand he holds a heavy ceremonial scepter.
You are at the edge of the light, hidden behind a dilapidated church pew. Your presence is known but you have not yet been seen. Behind you is the entrance to the ruined chapel. Father Velholme approaches. Behind him, the line of children obscures the baby on the altar. Sister Margrite, standing over the altar, finishes reciting a prayer and draws a long, silver sewing needle.
What do you do?
A. Emerge from behind the pew and disarm them with words of faith and devotion.
B. Dash passed Father Velholme, the children, and Sister Margrite, and grab the smoldering infant.
C. Throw your dagger at Father Velholme in a surprise attack.
D. Cast a Ray of Frost at Sister Margrite.
E. Flee the chapel and run for your life.