"It's been five days," Corlethin muttered as she drug her clawed feet through the sandy shore, "Where is that bastard?"
Not that it was unheard of for the men of Bosque-kel to be gone for weeks on end during their fishing expeditions, but her husband swore no more than three days at sea. Corlethin cursed the gods that had allowed her husband's egg to hatch as she kicked a sandcastle, left behind by some children, decorated with shells and seaweed and half eroded by the rising tide.
The village of Bosque-kel situated itself on a lonely island in the midst of the Great Sea which filled the lower levels of Yliakum. It was a simple fishing village, inhabited by Klyros and Nolthrir alike, which lent to a basic, uneventful lifestyle. Corlethin could only imagine her husband and his fellows drinking their boredom into a stuper on their small fishing vessel, or perhaps galavanting away with soft bellied floozies on the distant shore. The very thought only irritated her more, and she struggled to find any other sandcastles to kick.
The quaintness of the island wasn't without it's proper share of mystery, for built in the heart of the island was the citadel of Threndghaugh, home to a dedicated order of mages and a wealth of ancient texts and artifacts. Sometimes, late at night, the villagers could hear the frightening sounds of sacred incantations echoing from without the labyrinthian halls. Tales were told, with the purpose of terrifying the children, of visitors to the island, who were seen entering the citadel to never be seen again.
Corlethin had not her mind on such stories, her anger focused now on her lousy husband. Her reptilian eyes searched the far horizon for his vessel, but there was nothing on the endless expanse except for... wait, what was that?
She narrowed her eyes and peered into the distance. There was assuredly an object on the water, but too small to be a fishing craft. It drifted aimlessly on the water too, without direction and the guidance of a steersman. Whatever it may be, it had no living thing aboard.
The Klyros woman sighed and continued to watch the far off object, and when her curiosity and frustration got the better of her, decided to take a closer look. Spreading her leathery wings wide, Corlethin caught a coastal updraft and was borne aloft. Like a Nolthrir child's kite, she sailed on the sea breeze. Gaining altitude, she sailed out towards the object, as far out over the waters as she dared. Soon enough, she gained a better view and was shocked to realize just what the object was.
Floating on a small raft of giant fungiwood was a stone sarcophagus, elegantly engraved out of the finest granite. Corlethin could make out three arrows sticking out from the wooden logs, burn marks scorching the area around them. From the make and size of the coffin, Corlethin could surmise this was a dwarven burial at sea gone awry. She smirked a toothy grin as she imagined the short smelly creatures firing upon the raft, each arrow failing to ignite the logs completely until the whole thing drifted out of range of their archers.
"Fools should have used magic."
As if taken up her own advice, the klyros invoked the Azure Way and summoned up a breeze strong enough to guide herself and the funeral raft back to shore. There she was able to get a look at the details of the engravings. They depicted heroic feats and grand undertakings, but also great ruin and misfortune. Her interest growing, Corlethin heaved the stone lid off the sarcophagus with the help of a strength spell to take a look inside. Within, she found the skeletal remains of the ill fated dwarf, female judging by the form of her body armor, and of heroic class too if the wealth of ornamentation were taken into account. Curious, the klyros thought to herself, but curiouser still was the stone tablet resting atop the steel and gold breastplate.
The tablet was carved out of a stone both dark and dense and depicted strange sigils and diagrams of obscure arcane rites. It's very nature was so alien that Corlethin felt her stomach turn with tightness. To look upon it made her feel so nauseous that she was both relieved and startled when a voice addressed her from behind.
"Corlethin Tasaph, please step away from the dwarf as ye've found her."
Corlethin did so, taking one step back, and then, quickly outstretching her wings, she spun with a hiss to face the speaker. He was an Ylian, but wore the horns of some foul beast upon his head. He had a long and thin, grey-streaked beard on his chin and was dressed in raggedy black robes. He carried a staff with a crystal talisman at the end, and this he stuck in her face.
"I said get away ye. What ye have found is beyond all yer comprehension. The High Magus Palmol has claimed it as his own, and has sent me forth to retrieve it."
Corlethin hissed again and dodged out of the way of the crystal staff, "The High Magus? Wait.... how do you know my name?"
"We of the order know all there is to know of the inhabitants of this island, m'dear. It is our privilege and our duty, as neighbors."
Her eyes shifted toward the interior of the isle and the citadel tower which lay buried in dense jungle. "Neighbors, pah! You occultists have never committed a single neighborly act. You've hidden behind your walls while we've suffered mealstroms and famine, disease and strife. Now you appear out thin air and lay claim to this corpse? This pile of bones belongs to no one as far as I'm concerned, I don't care what your duty is."
The mage grunted and frowned, "I do not care for the dead, m'dame, but the tablet she carries. Think on it... ye know not the weight of its power. Think of the suffering yer people may endure if a child were to happen upon it and unleash its potential. Could ye control it? I am merely offering to take it off of yer hands... to keep it, safely."
Corlethin looked upon the tablet once again and felt the tightening in her stomach. There was an awful resonance emanating from the stone, that was for sure, and it reverberated with discord down through the center of her hollow bones. The nausea she suffered was enough for her to relent. "Alright, you wicked man, take the stone... I only hope it brings you nothing but plague and ruin."
The mage bowed his head in thanks, and with a flash of light both he and the tablet vanished, leaving Corlethin alone with the dwarven corpse on the otherwise empty beach. With a shudder she sat in the sand next to the washed up raft and turned her forlorn gaze back to the endless horizon of the sea.
