Iseldis meant to flank the dark elf while Roland had her momentarily preoccupied, but a cracking burst of stone behind her drew her attention, just as the cold, scratchy grip of a draugr seized her left arm. They were starting to rise from their sarcophagi, perhaps willed back to life by the foul magic of the elf. Iseldis reacted quickly, pushing one end of her staff into the coffin before the draugr could escape and sending a blast of her magic through it. With a bright flash the undead was put to rest again, and the grip on her arm lessened until she escaped from it.

Roland hadn't fared well in the meantime, though. He'd sliced into one of the elf's legs, but it wasn't severed, and he'd received a wound to his shoulder for his trouble. Iseldis weighed their options quickly; the quarters were tight, making fighting her two on one difficult with all these coffins around, and they'd have little way of seeing draugr coming. But maybe it was worth the risk.

"My magic can hold her," she said quietly, a hint of nervousness seeping through. "Try to get around her, but watch for draugr. We need to make this fast."

A brilliant spear of light formed in her hand, and she hurled it at the dark elf, only for it to be shattered against a shield of dark magic, bursting into a thousand tiny, fading lights. Goddess, she was strong if she could do that.

Nevertheless Iseldis charged forward into close combat with a flurry of staff attacks. The elf fought barehanded, but it was as though she had eight limbs to work with, and getting through was nearly impossible. Before long the attack was turned on Iseldis, and she found herself backing up, desperately on the defense.

One of the spear-like spider legs went low, the first to slip through when it stabbed into her upper leg. She cried out, blocking aside further stabs with her staff, but she stumbled back into a sarcophagus unexpectedly, and her defense momentarily fell apart. A punch caught her across the cheek bone, dazing her, a second slammed into her midsection, driving breath from her lungs, and then a fierce pain erupted in her shoulder, as she suffered a similar stab wound to Roland's.

"What was it he said?" the elf said, smiling wickedly at her. "Not a princess, are you?" Iseldis caught the meaning quickly enough. She'd been watching them this whole time. It sent a chill through her, even as she struggled to remove the leg stabbed into her shoulder. "Scream for me, princess."

The dark elf released a surge of black, inky magic from her hands, and it hit Iseldis point-black in the chest, knocking her free of the leg and sending her tumbling over the sarcophagus to the ground. Blood ran from her wounds, but the real agony was the wicked magic that surged through her body from head to toe, inflicting constant pain. She writhed on the ground, tears springing to her eyes and blurring her vision. And she screamed.