Much to Hector's satisfaction, everyone seemed to be pulling their weight in the fight. Behind him, he could hear the roaring Nord pirate lay waste to a draugr foe, and on all sides of him the party members were scoring kills of their own. Even Balen, who Hector had been worried about -- and the one who triggered the trap in the first place -- killed a draugr and incapacitated another. The Dunmer's movements were almost amusing. Clearly he [i]knew[/i] how to fight, but Hector wondered how often the scholar had actually done so. 

The Bosmer was just a whirlwind of motion and sharp edges. Hector had expected no less from the woodsman archer, but the conjured spectral wolf was a nice surprise. Fire lit up the chamber twice, first when Merci summoned an atronach and soon after when Elayne cast a raging firestorm that consumed several draugr. Hector made a mental note to stick with the two Breton sorcerers. They knew what they were doing. 

Hector prepared to defend himself against a charging draugr, but suddenly found himself staring at the back of Baladas Venym. The Telvanni destroyed the draugr's sword and, with the aid of Ungimros's spectral wolf, put the ancient Nord down. Hector shot a grateful nod in his direction and looked around. 

There were still plenty of draugr left, but Hector felt optimistic about their chances. Really optimistic. Hell, these draugr weren't even a challenge, were they? Feeling like his limbs were pulsing with power, Hector bellowed an incoherent battlecry and charged into the draugr. With great strength, the Imperial rammed his shield into one of the draugr, impaling it on the shield's spike, and struck down another draugr with a scything cut. Most of the Fire poison had been spent in Hector's initial thrust, but residual poison ate away at the edges of the draugr's gaping wound, sizzling and smoking. Shaking his left arm, the draugr impaled on his shield slithered, lifeless, to the ground, its spine shattered. 

That was when something highly unusual happened. 

[i]"Daal wah thuri, zeymah. Wunduniikke kos zol mul. Dii suleyk fen viik wunduniikke,"[/i] spoke an unearthly voice. It seemed to be coming from all around them, deep and ancient and terrifying. The strength that Hector had felt suffusing him ebbed away instantly, and he backpedaled to the group quickly, closing ranks with the rest of the party. The draugr that surrounded them stood motionless, their eyes fixed on the party, before they silently disappeared into the gloom. 

Hector was breathing hard, his eyes wide open, staring into the darkness. He opened his mouth to say something, paused, and closed it again. The draugr had left their dead behind, and the only movement in the room was the mindless twitching of one of the corpses. Hector had no idea where the draugr went; the stone door behind them was still closed, and the walls of the chamber were outside the reach of the glow cast by Merci's atronach.

"What was that?" Hector asked, breaking the silence. "Did anyone understand what that voice said?"