They found Zauric in the hollow of the ledge, looming over the bound souls.
He was a grotesque sight: a towering figure that looked stitched together from shadows and decay. His "robes" were not fabric at all but ragged extensions of his own body—long tatters of blackened sinew that swayed as if caught in a phantom wind. His right arm ended in a jagged iron hook, rusted and pitted with age; his left was scaled and reptilian, greenish hide stretched taut over corded muscle. Each finger ended in claws meant for tearing.
Around him, four souls dangled by spectral threads. They screamed and writhed, but Zauric paid them no mind. With his clawed hand, he cupped the second soul as though it were an egg. His hook punctured deep, splitting light from within, and he peeled the soul's essence apart in shivering fragments. The victim's scream shredded into silence as its body collapsed into pale husk and drifted away like ash.
