Escape from Undermountain - Mark Anthony [45]
Artek nodded grimly. "Let's see what they found at the end of their search."
It was not much farther. After a hundred paces, the corridor ended in a pair of massive stone doors. Emblazoned on the door were letters of gold. The letters spelled out two words that they all now easily recognized: Talastria and Orannon. The group exchanged uneasy looks, and Artek pushed on the doors. They swung open easily. Beckla held out her hand, and the flickering magelight illuminated the long chamber beyond.
The sides of the chamber were littered with countless fragments of stone. Only after a moment did Artek realize that some of the fragments were shaped like clawed hands, others like leathery wings, and still others like grotesque heads-they were parts of gargoyles. Dozens of them had once lined the chamber, but now they were smashed to bits. At the far end of the room was a dais of dark stone, and on the dais rested two oblong boxes hewn of porphyry. No, not boxes, Artek realized. Sarcophagi.
"It's a tomb," Artek said softly as he sensed the truth. "Talastria and Orannon thought they would find their master at the end of the stairs, on the other side of the fiends. Instead, all they found was their own tomb-no doubt created for them by Halaster himself."
"That's a cruel joke," Corin said, aghast.
"On us as well as on them," Beckla replied glumly. "I doubt a dead apprentice is going to be able to show us a gate out of this hole."
"Don't be so hasty," Muragh replied testily. "There might be something in here that could help us."
Artek drew in a deep breath. "I suppose it's worth a try. We came all this way, so we might as well spend a few minutes poking around."
Together, they stepped into the tomb of the lost apprentices. It was an eerie place. Artek could almost imagine the two wizards, wounded and dying after their battle on the stairs, stumbling into this chamber only to find the two waiting sarcophagi. Did they laugh madly as they laid themselves within their own coffins? Artek did his best to shake the disturbing image from his mind. While Beckla and Corin began poking around in the shattered remains of the stone gargoyles, he headed for the dais at the far end of the chamber.
All at once an icy wind rushed through the tomb. With an ominous boom, the stone doors swung shut. Artek spun on a heel, staring back at Beckla and Corin in surprise. As one, the wizard and the nobleman gasped. A chill danced up Artek's back.
"What is it?" he whispered, clutching Muragh tightly.
"I think you'd better turn back around, Artek," Beckla gulped.
Dread rising in his throat, Artek did as the wizard suggested. His heart froze. Even as he watched, the heavy stone lid that covered one sarcophagus slid to the side and fell to the dais with a crash. A moment later, the lid atop the other stone coffin followed suit. A dry, musty odor drifted on the air: the scent of ancient decay. Then, with majestic and malevolent slowness, a form rose out of each sarcophagus. Tattered robes of black cloth fluttered around withered forms, parchment-like skin peeled from gaunt faces, and gold bracelets clinked coldly on shriveled arms.
"By all the blackest gods," Artek murmured in a mixture of awe and terror. "They're still alive!"
"No," Muragh countered weakly. "Not alive."
Crimson flames flared into being in the hollow pits of their eyes as Talastria and Orannon reached out their undead hands toward the defilers of their tomb.
6
Beauty Perilous
"Run…"
Artek tried to shout the word, but it escaped his lips only as a strangled whisper. Fear radiated from the far end of the tomb in thick, choking waves. He tried to back away from the dais, but his legs betrayed him. Against his will, he fell to his knees, bowing to the dread majesty rising before him. Behind him, Beckla and Corin did the same.
Icy wind shrieked through the ancient chamber. Crimson mist poured down the