The City in the Skull

It is a most peculiar object. A human skull, beautifully engraved in a curiously ragged script and with its eye sockets filled with emeralds. A perfectly circular hole has been drilled in its top.

If the skull is placed over a candle, the light shining through the jewelled eyes throws a strange vista of a fantastic cyclopean city across nearby walls. As the candle flickers, it almost seems as if there is movement.

Possibilities

1 The city glimpsed in the flickering candlelight is the ruined city of Sarkomand in the Dreamlands. The skull helps dreamers find their way to the city and from there to the rest of the dreamlands. Careful research eventually reveals that the engraved script is a simple incantation. Washing the skull and reciting the incantation activates the skull. Upon falling asleep, the character's dream self is safely transported to the dreamlands.

Unfortunately, Sarkomand is close to the Plateau of Leng, whose inhabitants are known to be hostile to casual intruders. Worse, the skull is cursed, and upon activation summons the vengeful spirit of the person who was killed to make it.

2 The image of the city is an optical illusion caused by flaws in the jewels. There is nothing magical about the skull at all; it is merely priceless.

Investigators researching the history of the skull will find that it was stolen from an Aztec treasury by unknown conquistadors. It was stolen again upon its arrival in Spain, and next appeared in 1612 in the treasury of a monastery in Alsace. The monastery was destroyed in 1650 and the skull vanished.

The skull later appears in France, among the treasures of Louis XV. During the French Revolution, it disappeared, and was believed to have been destroyed by the revolutionaries.

Unfortunately, the skull brings bad luck and disaster - as well as attracting thieves from afar. If the investigators hang on to the skull, something bad will happen - soon.

3 The city is Mu. It really does exist, and it is actually inside the skull. When mad Zhoras, the immortal God-King of Mu, realised his land was doomed, he placed it within his skull using his powerful magic. Because of its magical nature, Zhoras' skull is virtually indestructible, and Mu has survived for untold millenia.

The writing on the skull is in the language of the serpent people, added at a much later date. Once translated, it proves to be a gate-spell to the city. However, getting from the city back to the real world is much harder. Furthermore, Zhoras still rules within the skull, and exacts a fearsome toll on trespassers.

© Matthew Grossman

The Plated Skull

The high-ceilinged, oak-panelled entrance hall of The Whitstable Reserve, an exclusive Knightsbridge gentlemen's club, is lined with artefacts gathered from across the globe. The artefacts comprise various tablets of stone, a few ancient tribal weapons, some mysterious urns and jars - and in the pride of place, a hideous plated skull. In front of the skull is a faded handwritten label: "Plated skull, Thebes 1936, circa 500BC."

The artefacts have all been donated to the Whitstable Reserve by members, either in the course of their membership or as part of their will.

However, there is something strange about the hallway - it is reportedly haunted and cleaning staff refuse to clean after dark. At least, not without a full member of the Reserve present to watch over them.

Possibilities

1 The plated skull isn't human. The skull has been taken from one of the skeletal warrior-guardians of the legendary Fleece of Gold. The bronze plating is etched with celtic designs and appears to have been added to the skull much later. It is quite battered - neither the skull nor the plating is in good condition.

The original guardians of the Fleece of Gold were magical warriors, and skull still contains magical reserves. That energy sometimes leaks out, giving the hallway its haunted reputation. Should the skull somehow regain mobility, it will unthinkingly try to carry out the last orders given to it - to kill all those aboard the Argos.

2  The plated skull is a gregori, or "Witness". The creation of a gregori requires a ritual sacrifice. During the ritual the victim's soul is trapped into an object (often the victim's head or skull - sometimes some other object). The ritual is difficult and expensive, and gregori are prized items as a result.

The gregori itself has only limited consciousness, but perfect recall. With the right ritual, the gregori will reveal everything that it has witnessed since it was created. The plated skull was created in Ancient Greece, and it has 2500 years worth of memories to reveal.

3  The plated skull belongs to the club's founder, Sir Wilberforce Whitstable. Sir Wilberforce had two great loves in his life - the occult and exotic wines. He founded the Reserve in 1880 so that he could and other like-minded gentlemen could combine their interests in civilised oak-panelled surroundings.

Sir Wilberforce died in 1916 and he left his skull to the Reserve. The Reserve had it partially-plated in silver and put it on display in the Reserve's hallway. During the war, the Reserve moved its prized possessions to a country estate in Shropshire to escape the Blitz. When they returned to Knightsbridge in 1945 (the club had survived the war largely unscathed), many of the Reserve's records had been lost and the skull became labelled as an archaeological find.

The wine cellars of the Whitstable are fully stocked and extensive. Some of the wines even date back to Sir Wilberforce's era - although they are now largely undrinkable.

© Steve Hatherley