Once again, more hesitation. But Ellia seems to decide something in that moment — or rather, she seems to remember the reason she sought Andy out in the first place.

"The heirloom you seek... it is wicked." Carefully, she says her piece, knowing time is not on their side. "The reason for a war that ravaged my home, of course I wanted nothing to do with it. But Dweyre insisted. He was so convinced returning it would be the right thing to do... He was the only reason I ever bothered to keep searching for it."

She pauses then, making space with her silence for a soul who is no longer with her, but remains present in everything she does all the same.

"There were four of us in that cavern, the day we finally found it. That close, I could sense something about it was off. Wrong. I wanted to leave it, I told Jun we should—"

She cuts off suddenly, looking at Andy again with a sudden intensity that had the orb on her staff flaring like a roar, though her voice never raises above an earnest utterance.

"Whatever you've heard, whatever they've told you... I didn't do it."

On a breath, her shoulders sag, and in that moment all her anger and desperation dissipates into something quieter. Something pleading.

The glow from her orb dims as she lowers her staff, casting shadows over their faces, sinking into fine lines of sorrow and grief.

"I didn't hurt anybody."