The conjuror frowned with impatience and repeated his summons, holding out his hand. "Aeron, the others have gone ahead to the temple. Come on."
"The temple?" Aeron asked, puzzled. He took two steps toward Oriseus, the cold, hard ground crunching beneath his boots. He looked past the red-robed master, and his heart stopped. Behind Oriseus, the Broken Pyramid stood intact, looking as it must have centuries ago. No other building of the college, or even the city, was mirrored within the shadow, but the pyramid stood, a stark and inescapable monolith beneath the eternal dark. His jaw fell open. "It stands again!"
"It never fell here. That is the way of the shadow. It remembers things lost to the daylight, places long gone, people long dead. In some places, it even holds the memory of what might have been. The city below is ephemeral, a vanity of no importance. But the pyramid is quite real here, Aeron." Oriseus stepped forward and took Aeron's arm in a firm hand, steering him into line. "This is the least of the wonders I have to show you today, lad. Now follow me."
Nodding mutely, Aeron fell behind the others, trudging to a dark and narrow door in the pyramid's flank while his mind reeled numbly. Oriseus moved on to shepherd them all within, watching vigilantly. Aeron spared one more look for the sere hilltop, stretching out with his senses, searching for something more than the empty cold that surrounded him. His unease was growing by the moment, a hopeless panic that frightened him all the more because he could not pinpoint its source. Something was terribly wrong here.
The Weave, he realized. It's gone. The stony earth was cold and dead, the air still and lifeless. The spark, the flame of the living world was missing here. No magic, no life, existed for him to perceive. Yet as he adjusted to his surroundings, he sensed the barest trickle of magic. The shadow held the merest whisper of the Weave, but it was not entirely desiccated.
As Aeron turned his attention to the pyramid, he became aware of a dark, hot energy suffusing the structure, a tangible emanation of potency that he could sense as surely as if he turned his face to the sun during the day. It streamed and coiled away from the obelisk like a leaping flame, invisible and silent, yet fraught with unearthly power. The thick, ancient stones could barely contain the raging conflagration within. The sensation terrified Aeron, yet he hungered to feel the black warmth on his face, to stand unharmed in the dark pyre and tame the power.
Aeron scrabbled forward after the others, eagerly moving to view with his own eyes the wonder hidden within the stone tomb. He didn't even spare Oriseus a glance as he passed between the blank door and felt himself pulled down the long, silent corridor of worked stone that led within. He trailed Dalrioc Corynian as the circle of sorcerers wound through the lightless labyrinth of the pyramid's innards, spiraling downward through winding stairs and echoing chambers until they reached a chamber set beneath the center of the structure. Midnight power thrummed in the stones under his feet.
Oriseus pushed the door open, leading the way into a wide, low vault of dark stone and squat columns. Arched galleries circled the room, and intricate bas-reliefs defaced the walls, but Aeron had no eye for these. The stone in the center of the room seized his attention.
It was a simple thing, an uneven shard of smooth, glossy black rock about the size and shape of a horse's skull. A weird lambent light danced in its ebon depths. It was bound in rune-carved iron bands, suspended in a rude circular stand of black metal. The mages surrounded it in an even circle five paces wide. For a long moment they gazed on it in silence, unable or unwilling to speak. Finally Master Sarim wrenched his gaze away. "Oriseus? What is it?"
The High Conjuror did not reply immediately. He stepped close and laid a hand on the cool rock, his face absent. Finally he answered. "Thousands of years ago, the Imaskari arose, first of all men to walk in this world. Unfettered by the powers and restrictions of gods, they had nothing to defy their understanding, their comprehension. The glories of Netheril and fallen Raumanthar were mere reflections of the first mages, the sorcerer lords who mastered magic in that forgotten age.
"And so the Imaskari ruled vast lands thousands of years before the rise of Mulhorand, of Unther, of Netheril and the other ancient kingdoms of man. They roamed the planes, building portals to a thousand times and worlds. And so they aroused the ire of the petty gods who rule over this sphere. These powers sought to bring down the Imaskari by withholding the Weave from them. The lords of the Imaskari thus turned to a source of magic from beyond this world, a source of magic that they could wield without answering to the rude demipowers of this sphere. They brought the Shadow Stone into this world, establishing a link or conduit through which they could draw on an energy that exists outside all time and space."
Oriseus circled the stone, studying the mages one by one. "This stone represents that which existed before anything else existed. It is a symbol, a link to the blind and voiceless power that was displaced from our sphere in the very beginning of things. It did not save the Imaskari, but with this they slew gods when the world was young."
Oriseus looked up at them, his eyes glinting. "Here, my fellows, is the strength that even gods fear. Set your hand on it and it is yours. You need only ask."
Aeron closed his eyes, his face flushed with the energy that danced before him. Oriseus had once told him that the Weave was the spirit, the soul of the world. The stone was something else, a void or vacuum that injured the world by its very existence. It was potential without purpose, eager for the hand and mind to guide it. With nothing more than his intuition, Aeron understood that once he touched the stone with his will and sight, he would be able to call upon its power anywhere, anytime, joined by an ethereal link to something that defied distance and hesitation. He shuffled closer a half-step, drawn by the power.
Ahead of him, Dalrioc Corynian broke the ranks of their circle and boldly stepped forward, an arrogant sneer on his face. "Very well, Oriseus. I ask." He moved to stand beside the stone, studying it without a hint of hesitation. Dalrioc reached out and set his hand on the glossy rock and stood petrified, enraptured, his face twisted in a rictus of astonishment as the black energy coursed over him, freezing him in his grasp.
Aeron paused, waiting and watching while, one by one, the other students and masters stepped forward to join Dalrioc beside the stone. As each touched the gleaming black surface, he ceased to move, straining to contain and master the power that exceeded him.
Oriseus's face contorted with unholy glee. His eyes flashed living darkness. With the light touch of his hand on the stone, he directed the fearsome black energy as it coiled and smothered each mage who approached. His expression appalled Aeron, and for the first time, he allowed himself to sense what he'd known from the moment he felt the stone's influence.
It reeked of evil.
It was powerful and majestic, a conflagration of energy that defied his senses. But it stained him to stand so close to it. There was a conscious malevolence behind its splendor, an ancient, aching hunger that shrieked for Aeron's willing soul. He knew that if he set his hand on the dark stone, he would be lost forever, consumed and filled with something older than time and unspeakably, irredeemably evil.
As if waking from a dream, Aeron gasped and threw a panicked glance around the cold stone chamber. Cold and hateful light seared his eyes, leaving painful afterimages that blinded him. Across the room, Master Sarim-the last who had not touched the stone besides Aeron himself- staggered forward, his teeth bared and eyes staring vacantly, fighting with every ounce of his dying will to resist the stone's greedy pull. It was not enough. Marching like a broken doll, he was jerked to his knees and thrown prostrate before the black talisman, betrayed by his own muscle and bone. He whimpered in terror as the energy surged forward to devour him.