The Accursed Skull

At the height of the Battle of Calthor, during the Reconquest, Conrad I slew one of the three Accursed Ones - mages who had forced their way into the Creator's Realm unworthily - poisoning themselves, and becoming creatures of pure magical hate. When dealing with the Empty, the unnumbered foot-soldiers of the Accursed Ones, it was the practice to burn all the bodies they came across, to lessen the corruption of the land. However, Conrad's Lance, gifted to Conrad by the Creator, usually combusted the Empty it slew on contact. Driving the lance into the belly of the Accursed One, however, caused only the flesh to burn away - leaving a more-or-less complete skeleton.
Unsure how to proceed, the Sanctors advised destruction, but some among the Allied Armies - seeing that the battle had been as much a religious purification as a battle - convinced Conrad to keep the skull, as the trophy of the battle. Thus, the skull was taken, and stored in the new royal treasure house - built around the tomb of Morgene. Conrad - filled with grief and rage at the death of Morgene - campaigned onward for almost two years. Even after the Reconquest ended, he was not a frequent visitor to Calthor. Thus, the skull lay almost undisturbed in one of the chambers beyond the tomb, reserved for the highest-status gifts and treasure.
Later kings did not care for the skull, and it never became a key treasure in court festivities - until the time of Markus V 'The Bad', the great-grandson of Conrad. He, seeking to revive the spirit of the Reconquest, placed the skull within the audience chamber itself, next to his throne. Markus turned, slowly, into a war-monger, and a despot. He was killed fifteen years later, at Farhad's Fist on campaign against the Jellnev. The skull had been brought with him ("To remind them how Welds bled for their freedom, and what Weldic kings do to their enemies"), but the Sanctors at the Fist would not have it in the complex - believing it cursed. This opinion grew, as the Weldic nobility sought to explain the evil and tyranny of Markus. On return to Jelbridge, the skull was removed from the golden case it was carried in, to a leaden one, then that placed inside a steel box, and the box covered in heavy black cloth. 
Upon its return to Calthor, the Grand Sanctor made an examination of the skull, and agreed that the diabolical power likely still resided in the bone, so thoroughly corrupted were the Accursed Ones. Thus, it was not returned to the royal treasury, but locked in the Sanctorum vaults where an unknown quantity of dark material was already stored. Little now is known of the skull - only that six knights of the Milites Sanctorum guard the great door to the vault, and that none speak of what is beyond it.

Item type

Unique Artifact

Rarity

Unique