Chapter 16: The Wraith’s Tomb

Almost as soon as the word “wraith” left Luella’s lips, Lexi noticed that there was one shape towards the back of the chamber which differed from the tree-like columns that gave the room it’s arboreal atmosphere. Nestled between a pair of stone pillars whose mighty girths dwarfed the whole of their peers, there lay a rectangular stone platform, which Lexi at first struggled to identify. However, as soon as she looked closely and saw that the large stone lid set atop the edifice was slightly askew, the proper name of the thing came flooding into her mind.

That’s a fucking sarcophagus.

From out of the hollow void exposed by the slightly open lid, a faintly glowing mist began to pour. Thick as soup, the mist clung to the ground, and rolled out to quickly fill the entirety of the chamber within which the four adventurers had found themselves. Before any of the girls even had a chance to do a double-take at the unearthly mist’s sudden appearance, they were already knee deep in the impenetrably thick haze of condensed vapor.

A sudden crashing sound from behind the quartet caused all four girls to nearly jump out of their skin. Whirling around, sword drawn and ready to strike, Lexi saw that the passageway through which they had just entered the mist-laden chamber was now barred. An immensely thick black iron portcullis had been cleverly concealed within the archway itself, and had fallen down to completely cut off any retreat from whatever was being borne out of the sarcophagus on this fell mist.

“Shit!” Luella cursed, slamming all four of her palms against the portcullis’ cold iron. “Wraiths have no scent, so I had no forewarning that anything like this was waiting for us here... fuck!”

“Just how bad is this?” Lexi asked, hoping that the mothkin would assuage the mounting feeling of dread creeping over the paladin. The hairs on her arms and the back of her neck were practically standing up straight, so palpable was the sensation of raw and unabashed malignancy coming from the sarcophagus.

“Let’s just say that, compared to a wraith,” Luella rattled off frantically, the edge of her frayed nerves bleeding into her speech. “That sphinx we just tangled with might as well have been nothing more that a warm up exercise.”

“I am unfamiliar with this type of being,” Samantha said, her stoic facade as of yet unbroken, her sheer solidity lending Lexi more than a bit of strength by proxy. “Are there any special tactics of their that we should be aware of, or any stratagems we ought employ specifically against them?”

“Yeah!” Danica piped in, poking her head out from behind Samantha’s hulking bronze thigh. Whatever dread Lexi felt, the elf was apparently immune to it. Her entire demeanor was so clearly suffused with excitement at the novelty of the situation, her eyes wide and long pointed ears bobbing up and down with interest. “What even is a wraith anyway? I’ve never even heard of something with that name before, and—”

As usual, Danica found herself cut off mid-sentence. Although, this time it was not from an interjection from one of her comrades, or one of their hands being clasped over her mouth. Rather, it was the piercing shriek which suddenly echoed forth from within the sarcophagus, rebounding off the stone walls and ceiling, filling the entire chamber with an unholy cacophony of high-pitched wails. All four of the girls buried their ears in their palms, trying in vain to blot out at least some of the ear-shattering dissonance of the wordless shriek.

When Lexi finally regained enough presence of mind to look back up, she saw that the two huge pillars on either side of the sarcophagus now each had a thin line of glowing blue light etched upon the surface, taking the shape of a doorway. The illuminated lines suddenly flared brightly and then faded into cool, faintly glowing outlines now drawn deep into the stone itself. The carved lines were, in fact, so deep that Lexi could have sworn that they were doors, and not merely images of such — a supposition which was proven wholly accurate when they swung open in unison.

“OK, now what the fuck are those supposed to be!?” Lexi shouted at Luella, her voice thick with terror, her upraised arm pointing frantically at one of the dark alcoves revealed to be inset into the massive columns behind the previously hidden stone doors.

Within each shadowed recess stood an upright human skeleton, dressed in matching suits of blackened plate and chain mail, and clutching two-handed long swords, held with the pommels below their chins and the blades pointed down. When they first came into view, they looked to be nothing more than the skeletal remains of long dead warriors. However, as soon as the unwholesome mist coiled about their shins, the black sockets of each skull began to glow with fiery sparks of red light, yielding an impression of sheer malevolence. When the figures moved to step forth out of the darky shadowed alcoves and into the starlit — at least in Lexi’s perception — chamber, the paladin noticed that there was an almost shimmering transparency to the pair of skeletons, as if they were only partially really there.

“Fucking hell!” Luella yelled, her antennae trembling so wildly that they appeared a blur in Lexi’s starlight vision. “You know how I said a wraith was bad? Well this wraith is apparently high up enough on the undead food chain that we’re not only facing him, but also this pair of spectral knights that he’s using as his lackeys.”

“So these creatures fight on the wraith’s behalf as proxies?” Samantha asked pointedly, her clipped tones carrying a clear sense of urgency.

“Right,” the mothkin said with a stiff nod. “There’s no getting out of here without somehow subduing the wraith, and we won’t be able to get to him with these things in the way.”

“But ... they look so slow!” Danica giggled, unshouldering her long bow.