"A fiend on every step," Beckla echoed with a shudder. "It must have taken the apprentices years to get past these stairs. The silvery marks on the walls must be scars left from the spells they cast to destroy the creatures."

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, parchmentlike 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.

"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 steps of the dark dais, filling the air with a bloody miasma. Trailing tattered funereal garb and yellowed wisps of dried flesh, the long-dead wizards climbed from their sarcophagi. They stood before the stone coffins, orbless eyes blazing, pointing accusing fingers at the humans. Two keening voices rose in shrill chorus.

Defilers! Trespassers! Foolishly have ye dared to transgress upon our domain!

The words pierced Artek's skull, flaying his mind. He clutched his hands to his ears, but he could not shut out the deafening shrieks.

Accursed breathing ones! Our guardians may be no more, but still ye shall not profane our tomb. Ye shall pay for this violation with your throbbing hearts!

The undead apprentices stretched out their leathery hands, and scarlet energy crackled on the tips of their clawlike fingers. Artek grunted in fear as he felt a tugging deep in his chest. With stiff, terrible slowness, the mummified wizards took a lurching step forward. They reached their ragged arms out still further, hands blazing with fell magic.

Artek screamed in pain. He threw his head back, arching his spine. His heart leapt wildly, straining against the inside of his rib cage, as if at any moment it would burst from his chest and hurtle through the air to the waiting hand of Talastria or Orannon. A moment later, Beckla and Corin echoed his cry, writhing as their own beating hearts were called by the dread wizards.

The undead horrors continued to hobble forward, until they stood upon the very edge of the dais. The nearer they came, the more the pressure in Artek's chest increased. He gnashed his teeth in agony as a trickle of dark blood oozed from his nose. He could not breathe. So this is how it ends, he thought dimly. Dying at the hands of the dead. He might have laughed at the irony of it, but when he opened his mouth, he could only scream.

The wizards grinned evilly, empty eye sockets blazing. A little closer, and their dire magic would be strong enough to rip the beating hearts from the chests of their defilers. Together, Talastria and Orannon took one more stiff step forward.

Numb and dried as they were, their feet did not sense the stone step beneath them. The two undead wizards lurched forward at the unexpected drop. Their brittle feet crumbled upon striking the top step of the dais. Withered arms shot out as the apprentices fought to preserve their precarious balance. The sudden motion caused ancient sinews to snap like old bowstrings. Talastria and Orannon let out a terrible, soul-rending shriek, and then, like grisly puppets with their strings slashed, they pitched forward. Their desiccated bodies struck the sharp stone steps and burst asunder. Disarticulated bones rolled down the steps, crumbling as they went.

By the time the remains of the two wizards reached the floor before the dais, all that was left were shards and scraps. For a moment, scarlet sparks of magic sizzled around the crumbled remnants of the gruesome mummies, but these, too, were soon extinguished. Yellow dust settled to the floor. After ten centuries, Talastria and Orannon were truly dead.

Artek slumped forward as the near-fatal magic released his heart. He clutched his chest, drawing in deep, ragged gulps of air. Gradually the wild throbbing of his heart slowed to a more steady pace. Turning his head, he saw Beckla and Corin pull themselves to their knees. The wizard wiped the blood from her lips with the back of her hand. Corin was hunched over, retching, but then he managed to straighten himself, his blue eyes wide in his pale face.

Muragh had rolled a short distance away. "Well, I guess that will teach you to respect the dead," the skull said in a slightly smug tone.