Have a chat with Talvas Fathryon and he’ll mention that he’s created an Ash Guardian that he can no longer control. So your job is to kill it and then return back to him.

Ash Guardians are fairly persistent creatures, just don’t get too close unless you’re a melee-combat specalist class as they’ll let off a fire explosion and do a fair bit of damage.

Once it’s dead, speak with Talvas again and you can now either summon an Ash Guardian or you can get a staff from Talvas and have him become a companion and join you.