The lock was a cunning blend of magic and mechanics. Slowly and deliberately, Shiara worked upon it, running her fingers over the surface to sense the mechanism within. Sometimes she operated upon it with cleverly constructed picks. Sometimes she used incantations. Finally she pushed against it gently and the door sung open. Motioning Cormac to remain outside, she entered cautiously.
The room was vast, so big the walls were lost in the gloom. The marble floor, tesselated in patterns of black and darkest green, stretched away in front of them. Shiara had the feeling that by stepping through the door she had become a piece on a gigantic game board.
The way was lit by witch-fires of pale yellow enclosed in great massively-carved lanterns, the light pouring out through the thin panels of alabaster or marble that formed their panes. The glow held an odd greenish tinge that gave an unhealthy pallor to everything it touched.
Here and there a censer smoked, emitting heavy fumes that curled and ran along the floor like snakes. The incense was pungent with hints of cinnamon and sandalwood, heady with the fumes of poppies and the sharp chemical tang of ether. It was neither pleasant nor offensive, just strange. It did not quite hide the musty odor of time long passed in a place undisturbed and the faint sweetish hint of corruption that hung in the air.
Worse than the incense to Shiara was the magic that closed around her as soon as she stepped over the threshold. It was as close and stifling as a heavy quilt on a hot summer’s day. It pressed against her flesh and blocked her nostrils until she wanted to gasp for breath. It twisted and moved around her in odd directions and peculiar angles. She felt that if she stared into the air long enough the magic would become visible. She did not want to contemplate what might follow.
Shiara took one more step forward and did gasp. There on the floor of the chamber, like a flock of crows dropped in mid-flight, lay half a score of black-robed bodies, already decomposing in the strange atmosphere of the room. Obviously the League’s sorcerers had found a trap that guarded the treasure.
In spite of the dead, Shiara’s gaze was drawn to the objects scattered around the room. Each sat on its own pedestal like exhibits in a museum—or pieces on a game board—and each of the ones Shiara could see was different. There was no obvious pattern or order to their placement, but Shiara did not doubt there was some subtle design there.
“What lies within?” Cormac asked from just over the threshold.
“Danger and magic,” Shiara told him. “Stay where you are for a moment.”
On the nearest pier of blue-white marble sat a jeweled crown. The golden band was made to curl snake-like around the wearer’s brow. Gems covered its surface so thickly the gold would be scarce visible when it was worn. Blue sapphires, blood-red rubies, sea-green emeralds, and lustrous pink pearls ran in twisted bands across the gold. Over each temple sat a smoky yellow topaz, golden as the eye of a dragon. In the center of the forehead was a blue-white gem the likes of which Shiara had never seen. Over all of it flashes of substanceless flame licked and leaped, clear as the fire of burning alcohol. Truly this was a thing designed to adorn the brow of a mighty sorcerer.
Awed, Shiara reached out to touch the crown. Reached and then drew back. Some sense warned her tht to touch it would be fatal.
“Cormac, come in,” she called, not taking her eye off the glittering prize on the podium. “Move carefully and on your life, touch nothing!”
“Fortuna!” Cormac exclaimed when he saw the remains of the League’s expedition. “What happened to them?”
“One of them touched something, I think. Help me search the room, but move carefully!”
As Shiara and Cormac passed from pedestal to pedestal the extent of the trove became apparent. Each pedestal held an item of magician’s regalia. Here a great gold thumb ring with a strangely carved sardonyx cameo stood on a drape of leaf-green velvet. There a chest of scrolls stood open, each scroll bearing the name of the spell it recorded. Against one wall an elaborately embroidered robe, set with gems and so stiff with bullion it stood upright and ready to receive its wearer. Above another pedestal floated a pair of silken slippers decorated with pink-blushed pearls. There were flashing swords and black lacquered armor, chests of gold and heaps of jewels, amulets and talismans and silver-bound spellbooks galore. Every item reeked of powerful, subtle magic and ancient, ancient evil.