The Paladin's Tale by Jonathan Moeller

caught fire?
    She saw the first bones after that.
    Three skeletons lay in the dust nearby, clad in rusted armor, swords and maces lying near their bony hands. She saw the marks of violence upon their bones. Plainly a battle had been fought here, long ago, and it had been followed by a fire.
    How long had she been lying in this place of death?
    Calliande reached the archway at the far end of the nave. A skeleton lay slumped against the stairs, clad in the ragged remnants of a robe. 
    A white robe.
    She remembered the image from her dream, and reached to touch the bones.
    As she did, the blue light brightened, and a specter appeared on the stairs.
    Calliande took a step back in alarm, but the specter made no move to harm her. It looked like an old man in white robes, his head encircled by a tangled mane of gray hair, his eyes deep and heavy and sad. 
    “Forgive me, mistress,” said the specter.
    “You can see me?” said Calliande. “Who are you?”
    “Forgive me, for we have failed in our sacred charge,” said the specter. “The Tower of Vigilance is overrun. The warring sons of the old king brought their foolish quarrel here, and the Tower is taken. I wished us to remain neutral, but the others thought differently…and our Order has paid for it.”
    “Answer me!” said Calliande. “Who are you? Why am I here?”
    But the specter kept talking, and Calliande realized it wasn’t really there. Or, rather, it was not a spirit or a ghost. Rather, it was a spell, a final message to her.
    Left by the man whose bones now lay moldering at her feet. 
    “I have no doubt they would kill you simply out of spite,” said the old man, “and I have my suspicions of the darker forces behind the strife. But I have activated the defenses of the vault. Sealed it from the inside.” He took a deep breath. “Only you can open it.”
    “But that means…” said Calliande. 
    That meant the old man had sealed himself inside the vault.
    And to judge from the skeleton, he never left.
    “Do not mourn for me,” said the old man, “for my course is run. I am wounded unto death.” She saw the spreading crimson stain across his white robes, and realized that he had been wounded. “You will be safe here, until you awaken.”
    He closed his eyes and shuddered with pain.
    “Mistress, I beg, listen to me,” said the old man. “You were right. You were always right, and I should have listened to you as a young man. This war between the Pendragon princes…no, it did not occur on its own. They were manipulated into it. Mistress, beware.” His voice grew thicker, his breathing harsher. “The bearer…the bearer of the shadow. You were right about him, too. This was his doing. Everything has been his doing…and he has been laboring in the darkness for centuries before Malahan Pendragon raised the first stone of Tarlion itself. Mistress, please, beware…he will come for you…he…”
    The specter vanished into nothingness.
    And the blue glow faded. 
    With a surge of alarm Calliande realized the glow had been part of the spell. And now that the spell’s message had been delivered, the light would fade away.
    Leaving her alone in the darkness.
    “No!” she said, her voice echoing off the walls.
    The blue light faded away a moment later, leaving her in utter blackness. 
    Follow this link to continue reading  Frostborn: The Gray Knight .