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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Medriev" data-source="post: 4893994" data-attributes="member: 21864">Chapter 23 - Lost Souls (Part 4)Telkya saw Enlishia retreat and raised her amulet, chanting a prayer to call divine light down on the elf spirit. The column of light descended and the creature shrieked as the power of Corellon Larethian burned its insubstantial body. Lavren moved to stand beside his wife, throwing down his torch as he did and raising his want. He shouted a curse and an incantation in one swift cascade of words and a bolt of black, crackling energy burst from his wand to sear through the body of the ghost. Again the elf spirit shrieked as the magic tore at her form. Then the creature turned toward Telkya and lunged forward, letting out a terrible howl as it did so. The flesh of its translucent face seemed to shrink back and a leering, skull-like visage was revealed that chilled Telkya’s heart and shocked her utterly. She fell back against the wall and Lavren reached out a comforting hand to her.“It seems we have angered the ghost,” he said softly and Telkya nodded though tears rolled down her cheeks.Erlmoor parried desperately as the skeleton came at him again, blocking one scimitar to his left and then another to his right. Then the creature raised its two upper arms and slashed both scimitars in at him, one from either side. The paladin, twisted and parried to his left but the scimitar to his right clove into his shoulder and spun him back a step into the corridor. He looked back at Enlishia and smiled before turning back to his foe and parrying again. To his right, he saw ribbons of light flash past the elf spirit and then a black bolt from Lavren’s wand tore through the ghost. As the spirit shrieked again, the dragonborn decided that his companions were holding his own. He parried another scimitar to his right and then swept his blade across toward the skeleton’s spine, a prayer of thunder on his lips. The skeleton leapt back with surprising agility leaving the paladin’s sword to sweep through nothing but air. The undead creature snarled and then came forward again.Thorn snarled and leapt at the skeleton before him though he bled from several wounds that its vicious scimitars had inflicted. He snapped his jaws at the creature’s leg but at the last it drew back and moved the limb beyond the druid’s wolf jaws. To Thorn’s right, Dulvarna slashed at the skeleton’s other leg but again it retreated and the warrior woman’s sword struck only the stone wall. The skeleton stepped forward as quickly as it hand retreated and before Thorn could react, it plunged all four of its scimitars downwards and into the wolf druid’s back. He yelped in pain and staggered back until the wall of the corridor was behind him. Knowing he could not survive for much longer, Thorn began to seek a way to retreat from the battle.Enlishia raised her bow and loosed another arrow and then another at the elf spirit, both tearing through its body and causing it to shriek in pain. The ranger reached for another shaft and nocked it to her bowstring but as she did, the second spirit, the one that had appeared around the corner to the north, burst through the wall next to its companion. It turned toward Lavren and Telkya and let out a terrible shriek unlike anything that Enlishia had ever heard. From the corridor, the ranger heard Telkya and Lavren cry out as the terrible voice pierced their minds and then, for a moment, there was silence. Trying to put the fate of her companions out of her mind, Enlishia raised her bow and took aim at the spirit before her.Dulvarna watched Thorn start forward again despite the terrible wounds he had suffered and admired the courage of the druid but before he had taken more than two steps, he collapsed unmoving on the stone floor. Behind her, the warrior woman saw Lavren and Telkya stagger back around the corner as the elf spirit’s shriek tore at them and she wondered whether there could be victory in such a terrible place. Banishing such thoughts as best she could, Dulvarna raised her blade and moved to take Thorn’s place before the fierce skeleton. Weaving her blade before her, she sought an opening and when she saw one, she lunged forward, driving her blade though one of the creature’s ribs and out through its back. The skeleton staggered back but then lashed two scimitars downward to knock Aecris aside. The other two came in from left and right in quick succession but Dulvarna was ready and brought her sword across to meet first one and then the other blade. Then the skeleton drove its other two scimitars forward together in a double thrust and Dulvarna knew she could not keep both at bay. She swept Aecris across and knocked both away from her chest but one tore into her side as it flashed past her. The warrior woman gasped and staggered back but kept her blade before her, determined to keep her undead enemy from besting her.In the doorway, Erlmoor found himself retreating step by step as the skeleton came at him with renewed fury. It lashed one blade into his arm as he tried desperately to parry and then, as he parried another blade to his left, another scimitar plunged into his hip. He roared and staggered back another step, looking back over his shoulder as he did to see where Enlishia stood. As he looked, the ranger raised her bow and loosed another arrow at the elf spirit in the corridor. Even as the ghost shrieked in pain, Enlishia drew, nocked and loosed another arrow toward her enemy. This shaft flew past the undead creature and clattered into the wall next to it, drawing a snarl of derision from the ghost. Then it lunged forward at Erlmoor and Enlishia, shrieking as the other spirit had done. The dragonborn fell back, reeling from the terrible shriek and with pain tearing through his head. When he stopped moving, Erlmoor realised that he and Enlishia stood in the north-south passage that had led them to the trapped gas room. From back down the corridor, the paladin and the ranger heard the howling of the other elf spirit and knew that their companions needed them but for the moment at least, they could not move.Lavren held his wife up with one arm as they both tried to make their numbed limbs move after the shock of the spirit’s terrible shriek. Suddenly he saw movement and as he looked over Telkya’s shoulder at the corner, he saw the ghost float into sight. It lashed out a translucent arm at the elf maid and Telkya shrank back from the creature’s chilling touch. At last he felt strength return to his limbs and raised his wand as Telkya shrank back against the wall. At least they would fall together, Lavren thought grimly. What Corellon had joined, nothing could tear apart.</blockquote>

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