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Text File | 1994-01-06 | 28.4 KB | 472 lines

TITLE:SUNSTONE by ZULKIR MALIGOR of THE MAGIC GUILD
PALETTE:0333 0a99 0aab 097b

                                    SUNSTONE

                      By Zulkir Maligor of The Magic Guild


                               The Black Mountain

The  sun,  high  and  hot  in a clear and almost white sky, was hitting fiercely
three human figures, climbing the steep side of a tall, black mountain.
The  mission  of  the  exhausted  company was going to be accomplished, they had
reached  finally  the  place  they  had  sought for months, crossing foreign and
mysterious  lands and dark and dangerous forests, through mountains and valleys,
at  the  other  side  of the Big Sea, where the same name of The Magic Guild was
unknown and therefore non respected.
Medwyn,  Jason  and Gan'Alv stopped in front of the mouth of a cavern, on one of
the  sides, signed in the stone, there was a round face, grinning with distorted
eyes, in a way half ironic, half maniacal.
It was the place, the entrance of The Black Mountain.

Medwyn  took from his sack a round sphere and started to sing an odd, melodious,
monotonous  song.   It  was the Call of the Guilders, able to summon the Guild's
members from every possible place on the planet.
The  Call was for Merlyn, the leader of the Magic Guild, who since the beginning
had  believed  in the enterprise and who strongly wanted to attend the discovery
of the Sunstone.  The Divine One.
The  wind  howling unnaturally and the sun shining on, Jason, Gan'Alv and Medwyn
raised their hands and shouted, finding strength in the soul and the throat:
"I want him all, I want him all, I want him now".
It  was the favourite invocation of every guilder and it gave to the members the
feeling of being part on an unique organism, made of different bodies.
It had also the power of summoning Merlyn in his integrity.

Merlyn appeared, he wasn't alone.
At  the  side  of the more or less immortal half elf a tall, black haired, black
dressed, black eyed, skinny, white man raised the surprise of the three mages.
"What's this?", asked suspiciously Jason to Merlyn.
"Zulkir Maligor, a chronicler of the deeds of the Magic Guild, my mate".
Merlyn  had  always had a preference for theatricality, the occasion was too big
to  risk  to  be  forgotten  by History, always child of few scribbled lines, he
found just necessary to have with him a witness who could transform actions into
written words.
"Can he speak?", noticed wicked Medwyn.
Zulkir Maligor moved slowly his empty and somehow dumb eyes towards him.
"Only  when  necessary", immediately replied Merlyn, used to the silences of his
story teller, who mysteriously happened also to be a distant relative of his.
"Let's  enter  then",  interrupted  Gan'Alv, tired of digressions and curious to
take the last step of his search.

Five  walking  creatures entered in the core of a mountain and ready to cross it
from  side  to  side,  up and down, following its internal labyrinths leading to
many different places without apparent logic.
Hours  passed  and  days arrived, time seemed to slow down in the biology of the
five  bodies,  the desire and the will to find the Sunstone was strong enough to
survive also to the jokes of obscurity.
For  hours  Merlyn interrogated the three mages about their voyage and the lands
visited  by  them.   He already knew that the starting team was composed of five
wizards,  his  heart  wept remembering Sharkill and The Joker, whose lives where
lost in the crusade for the stone of the sun.  He hoped that their sacrifice had
been useful for the glory of the Magic Guild.
The  discussions  seemed  unlimited,  a  common  thing  for the loquacious Guild
members,  the  three explorers related their experiences and opinions, old dirty
jokes  about princess and horses were narrated by Merlyn, whose goliardic spirit
was a novelty for Zulkir Maligor, not familiar with the new mates.
Zulkir Maligor's mouth was actually the only one which never opened and this was
seen  suspiciously  by Medwyn, Gan'Alv and Jason, who more than once wondered if
he  was  mute  and  if  he was really able to scribble few historical notes, not
being able to hold any discussion, apparently.


                           The story of the Sunstone

While  walking,  crawling, climbing and hopping in the seemingly endless caverns
where  the  Sunstone  had  to  be  found,  Merlyn  thought  once  more about the
circumstances that drove him to that filthy, though exciting, place.
It  all happened a sunny day, many months before, un unknown mysterious stranger
asked  for  audience at the entrance of the Crystal Cave, the headquarter of the
Magic Guild.
Oz  was  the  guilder  charged  to  receive  guests  and he asked with the usual
formula,  what  was  the reason of his welcomed apparition (Oz's exact words had
been:  "What do you want?").
The stranger asked for Merlyn and without even waiting for any reply, he stepped
into the cave and he walked resolutely towards Merlyn's hall.
Seeing such a bold foreigner, Merlyn, while many guilders were already conveying
to  the place with not friendly intentions towards the intruder, asked:  "What's
the reason of thy visit, sire?".
Merlyn  had  the  odd  power of doing exactly the opposite of what whoever could
find sage to do in certain situations.
"I know where is the Sunstone", replied loudly the visitor.
Silence  came  down on the Cave, some guilders looked Merlyn, some others looked
astonished the guest, some started to mumble and to mutter with agitated voices.
"Introduce  yourself,  noble  sire,  and  tell  me  more  about  this remarkable
novelty", said interested Merlyn.
The  stranger  introduced  himself as The Collector, he assured Merlyn about the
truth of his declaration and he showed the relative evidences.
He  actually  did  NOT  know where the Sunstone was, but he had with him ancient
scrolls and maps whose deep study could bring to the discovery of the last piece
of divinity on the M'Yiomosa Lands.

Legends  and  myths  had  been  created about the Sunstone, there was no living,
averagely  thinking,  being who didn't know them, since they where the favourite
topics for children's fables.
The  Sunstone,  narrated  legends, was the only thing left by the Gods when they
decided to abandon the M'yiomosa Lands to their destiny.
There  was  a time when the Lands were the home of Gods.  They stood there for a
lapse of time which human or not human mind can hardly grasp.
When  they decided to leave (the legends offer many versions of their department
and  the  following  Sunstone  trouble)  one of the lesser God forgot one of his
divine objects, the Sunstone.
Interpretations about its nature were numerous and fantastic, for someone it was
a  little  shining stone, whose power is unlimited, as unlimited is Gods' power;
for others, who thought to interpret the legends and their metaphors, it was the
same  sun; for somebody it's a tool with shape never seen before; the members of
the  NoWorld  sect  even  declared that the Sunstone had already been found, but
nobody had recognized it!
Many  others,  the  majority,  simply thought that the Sunstone didn't exist and
that  such  a  precious  present  from  the  Gods was just the child of rootless
legends.
Merlyn  knew  that,  but  the  immense  possible  power  of the Sunstone and The
Collector's  seemingly  convincing  evidences  had  convinced  him  to give some
attention to the visitor and his arcane scrolls.
The search for the Sunstone started actually in quite a feeble way.
Merlyn  asked  to  Zulkir  Maligor  to  investigate  and  study  The Collector's
documents, partly written in dead languages and mysterious codes.
The  Collector's pretends were relatively light too, he wanted to join the Guild
and  to  take  part  in the quest for the divine stone, a quest he couldn't face
with his only forces.

Behind  the  most important and heroic historic deeds there is often a long work
in the dark, a work seldom done by the heroes whose name is written on the stone
of eternity.
For  months  and  months, while the Magic Guild was caring of affairs of totally
different nature (a zany quest for some strange kind of letters), Zulkir Maligor
studied the papers brought by The Collector and looked for more informations, to
complete  the fragmentary knowledge of the situation and to solve the problem of
finding  the  actual  place where the Sunstone seemed to sleep since the dawn of
times.
When  he finally came to the conclusion that he had enough hints about the right
place,  Zulkir  Maligor  asked  audience to Merlyn and related the result of his
work,  not  without  mentioning how actually The Collector had been far from the
solution when he appeared in the Crystal Cave.
The  quest  for the Sunstone started, it had been painful and long, while Zulkir
Maligor remained at the Crystal Cave, studying his scrolls and receiving reports
from  the  explorers, five members of the Guild crossed lands and oceans, facing
marvellous adventures and, in two sad cases, death.
After this human sacrifice and a powerful magical help from the Archmages of the
Guild,  Medwyn, Jason and Gan'Alv finally found the Black Mountain, house of the
Sunstone,  as Zulkir Maligor declared with presumption to Merlyn, when the three
exploring wizards called him singing the Guild Hymn and Recall.
The  Black Mountain was more or less at the opposite part of the globe, compared
with  the  place  where  Zulkir  had  thought  it  had to be, but in the general
euphoria this aspect of lesser importance was forgotten.


                                Mysterious walls

Creeping  across  the  strict  passages  of  the Black Mountain, Merlyn breathed
satisfied at the remembrance of the past months and glanced his far relative and
recent Guilder Zulkir Maligor with paternal benevolence.
The  same  bizarre  tortuous caverns were a strong prove of the particularity of
the  Mountain,  whose  strange black stone used to sparkle softly at every light
source.
Suddenly the five adventurers heard a distinct rumour behind them.
They  looked  around  and  faced  themselves  with interrogative eyes, there was
somebody or something in those cold caverns.
Merlyn  ordered  silence  and in silence the noise of approaching steps could be
easily  heard.  The five magic users prepared themselves to meet the visitor, in
other words they revised mentally their most destructive and terrible spells.
A  light  appeared  not far away from them, followed by a figure emerging from a
blind bend.
Merlyn raised his right hand and screamed: "Who or what are you?".
The question was quite silly, indeed, but it was the right one for the occasion.
"It's me, The Collector, just me, honorable Merlyn", replied the shadow.
Merlyn breathed in relief, "We weren't expecting you here", was the cold reply.
"Yes,  I  know, but since you have left the Crystal Cave are passed so many days
that  me and the others were slightly worried, somebody had to come and see what
was happening...", replied the new guilder.
Merlyn  wasn't  totally  satisfied  by  the  answer,  maybe because he was still
shocked  for the unexpected visit, just after a good pair of seconds he realized
that those words were quite strange.
"What do you mean? We are here just since few hours!", replied astonished Joker.
"Few hours? A week has passed since your Call of The Guilders!"
"There must have been some temporal extravaganza here!"
"These black walls are so strange..."
"Somehow I don't feel at my ease among them!"
"Good  sign!   The  Sunstone  must be near!", Merlyn always knew how to find the
best side of bad news.
There  was  actually  something  strange in those caverns, something not easy to
grasp  or  to  describe,  for sure the preoccupation for some rumours had turned
into something similar to quiet panic, even for those well trained minds.
The  cavern,  or something inside them, the absence of light, the total silence,
the  cold and wet air or whatever, seemed to exaggerate feelings and sensations,
an  unnatural place with supernatural powers, it seemed, as if the same Sunstone
contained  somewhere  in  those  tunnels,  had  given  them  a ray of its divine
properties.
In a world with an its own time, the same flow of human vibes seemed to run in a
distorted way.  Strangely enough all the six guilders gathered there didn't seem
to  take  too much care of those odd and obscure phenomena, their excitement for
the mission was killing every trace of caution and prudence...

Zulkir Maligor and The Collector discussed a long about the possible location of
the Sunstone, they were the maximum experts on the matter and the whole team was
depending  on  their decisions to solve the seemingly impossible puzzle of those
galleries.
All  around the walls arcane and mysterious scribbles and signs were drawn, they
didn't  seem  to be words of any known language, they didn't seem to be words at
all, not being represented by any series of fixed signs.
They  weren't even images or pictures, they didn't seem to represent anything or
to have any kind of meaning.
In  those  signs  anyway the secret to find the passage to the Sunstone location
had  to  stay.   Zulkir Maligor studied them for long and came to the conclusion
that  they  were  signs of another world or another era, they hadn't anything of
this  world,  not  even  the  display  logic.  Just some parts of the walls were
covered by them and only some walls which didn't seem to be made of normal rock.
Time  seemed  caged  in  that absurd labyrinth and with it logic and rationality
were lost.
After  discussions  and  studies,  after theories and researches, after, most of
all,  long walks that seemed to bring always to the same place, the six Guilders
realized that they were completely lost.
Merlyn, not approving the situation and the relative feeling decided to call the
Souls  of  the  Elected  Dead Men.  Only few magicians in the world were able to
call  the  Elected  Ones and also for them this had to be a painful and terrible
effort.
It  was just at the beginning of the preparatory spell when he realized that his
powers didn't work any more!
All the magicians tried to invoke an elemental spirit or to cast a simple spell,
by  nobody succeed.  The Guilders were nude and lost, not even their magic power
seemed able to help them.
After  many attempts, exhausted and somehow worried they collapsed asleep to the
ground.


                              A woman from nowhere

A day, a week or a month later, one after one, slowly, confusingly, each Guilder
reopened his eyes, giving a new glance at the world of consciousness.
They  had  mysteriously  fallen  asleep  for  a reason that no one of them could
understand, not even Merlyn, whose commanding abilities seemed to vacillate.
There  was  something with them, anyway.  In the dark chamber at the cross among
three  corridors  there  was  a new yellow light blinking from the dead end of a
short blind passage.
All  at  once the Guilders looked at the approaching light and all together they
saw a woman behind it.
She  wasn't extraordinary beautiful, as every woman seems to be in certain silly
fantastic  stories,  nevertheless she was far from being bad looking and somehow
her eyes had conquered all the awakening wizards.

In an unnatural silence of astonishment, The Collector, who was discovered later
to be a remarkable viveur, found the spirit of finding the first words.
"Am I allowed to interrogate a beautiful woman like you?".
All  the  others  looked at him with surprise, for sure that was one of the most
original way to begin a discussion in that circumstance.
The  woman  seemed  to  appreciate  (Zulkir  took note of the new technique) and
smiled:  "My name is Phoenix, no relations with the bird".

Merlyn  grasped  the  situation  willing  to start a deep interrogation, without
wondering  that  it wasn't exactly normal to meet in that place a woman speaking
his own language.
"Do  you  know  where's  the  Sunstone",  asked  the  founder  of the Guild with
impatience.
"The Sunstone? I don't know what you're talking about".
At this moment Zulkir Maligor noticed that some logic passage had been forgotten
in that surreal discussion.  He explained to Phoenix the basic facts about their
quest.
Having  listened  with  curiosity the woman, smiling at The Collector, said:  "I
have  been here for much time and I'm sure there's nothing similar to your stone
in  this  mountain,  I know every corridor and every passage, I'm here to find a
sort of scent, of which there seem to be trace only in the Black Mountain.  I'll
sell it in my home lands, when I've collected enough of it".
"A  new  scent?   Has  it  some  magical  power?   A life potion?", asked Medwyn
interested.
"Oh  no,  surely not...  It's something with totally different use!  Just smell,
I've it on my body", Phoenix smiled mischievously.
That  was  enough  to  light the heart, and something else, of the six guilders.
They looked one another suspiciously wondering who had better chances to conquer
the woman and how they could win in this new kind of love battle.
None of them remembered that the quest for the Sunstone seemed failed.

The  mysterious  powers  of the Black Mountain, which seemed to magnify feelings
and  desires, seemed to have boosted what were just normal sexual tendencies but
they  couldn't  imagine or conceive that, facing what the thought to be the most
wonderful woman ever appeared in the universe.
Phoenix  smiled  with coquetry noticing the effect of her scent on those men and
realized that she could pretend even more than what she thought for its trade.
Merlyn,  old  but  not immune to a certain kind of fascination, asked from where
such  beautiful  women  might  come.   Phoenix  smiled again and answered:  "Oh,
thanks  you  noble  sir,  I  come  from  the Misdeeds Lands, at the south of the
continent".
"I  am  from the Misdeeds Lands too!", almost shouted Zulkir Maligor, rising the
surprise  and the irritation of the other Guilders and unable to control himself
and his desires.
"Nice to hear that", replied cold Phoenix smiling to The Collector.
Zulkir Maligor started to hate his comrade.

For  some  hours the Guilders continued to interrogate and to chat with Phoenix,
trying  to  be  brilliant  and to rise her conquering smile in any way.  She was
polite  with everybody but her interest seemed to run towards The Collector, who
was skilled enough to be able to control the favorable situation.
The  real  reason  of  their  presence there had been totally forgotten, for the
first  time  in  its history, the Guild, a remarkable part of it, was completely
paralyzed and unable to decide and to act.  The charm of an averagely attractive
woman, in an utterly unusual place, had been enough.

At  a  certain  moment,  suddenly, Phoenix stopped herself and screamed excited:
"Hei!  I remember now that Sunstone!  I know where it is!".
In  a  first  moment the mages looked at her with surprise, when they remembered
who, what and why, they asked for explanations and Phoenix explained.
"It's  a  strange  object,  I'd forgot it, It must be not far from this gallery,
Follow me!".
They  followed  her,  the  enthusiasm  for the Quest had grabbed their attention
back,  maybe  for  the  fact  five  of  them seemed to have lost many hopes with
Phoenix, maybe because light was shining back into their minds.
With  increasing excitement the Guilders reached the room where the Sunstone had
to be.
Quite  a  normal cave, a sort of enlargement of dead end tunnel.  On the ground,
in the dust, an object of unknown nature was laying.
Merlyn took it carefully, as if he were handling the most precious object in the
world,  as  indeed  it had to be.  It was a sort of blue square, smaller than an
hand,  and  quite  thin,  made  with  a strange glossy substance.  It was partly
covered  by  a little shiftable and holed slab of metal, covering both the sides
of  the  square.  In one of the sides there was a circle of metal inserted right
in the center of the square object.
Its  weight  was irrelevant and on a face it had a strange writing and a bizarre
drawing  of  a  maniacal  grinning  round  face.  Zulkir Maligor, expert of dead
languages  and  disciple of the Peto himself, the One Who Knew All The Languages
Of The World, tried to decrypt the arcane word.
"It  seem  to  be  in  Illis!  One of the oldest language we know...  to say the
truth we don't even know if it was really a language.  We have hardly discovered
the  number  of its letters, which seems to oscillate in a odd way, depending on
dialects, maybe, or on simple historical mistakes.  I should consult my books in
order to decrypt this very mysterious word."
Phoenix  interrupted  Zulkir Maligor and declared:  "There's nothing to consult,
those  letters  mean  "Sunstone",  I'd interpreted it in my previous trips here.
You  have  found  what you were looking for, but now, if that doesn't annoy you,
I'd  like  to  sleep,  I  am  very  tired".  She looked at The Collector with an
eloquent inviting smile.  Zulkir Maligor, once again humiliated, started to hate
both The Collector and Phoenix.

There was something unusual in all the matter, the same Phoenix was a mysterious
and disquieting woman.  Nobody remembered that in a first moment she seemed sure
of  not  knowing  anything  about the Sunstone, nobody wondered how possibly she
could know the meaning of that writing.
She invited again everybody to have a rest.
Merlyn  wasn't  particularly  interested  in having a rest, he started to wonder
what the mysterious object might have been.
"It must be a magic object, I've never seen something similar"
"Maybe its a new kind of coin!"
"Oh, and what do you think to buy with it? You idiot!"
"It could be some kind of weird machine"
Discussions  continued  for  some  hours,  the mages tried to examine the arcane
tool,  the  stone  of  the  Gods, which hadn't that much of the stone, till when
Gan'Alv  suggested that in the world of the Gods stones could be right like that
one, they were different from their own mortal ones.
He was covered by insults and somehow the discussion ended.
The  mages  stood  silently  staring  one  another  without noticing that in the
meantime Phoenix and The Collector were disappeared.
"I  think  I'm  going  to sleep, I'm tired", suggested Medwyn and in few minutes
they were all sleeping hardly, on the same ground were the mythical Sunstone was
laying, forgotten and half covered by dust.


                                The misdeed hour

While the others were sleeping Zulkir Maligor woke up.
He  checked  if  his mates were really in the lands of oblivion and he picked up
the Sunstone.
He  examined  it  carefully,  it was surely something from a weird and different
intelligent living form, it could be something from a incredibly far past, where
the eyes of History cannot look.  He realized that the Sunstone had to have some
unvaluable  power,  if  not  a  present  of the Gods, it could be a relic of the
farthest  past.   Being  interested  in  history  and prehistory Zulkir couldn't
prevent himself from desiring the Sunstone for some deep and complete study.
It was an unique occasion, he looked at the others, he breathed thoughtfully and
he decided to steal the Sunstone and escape, in order to study it in a forgotten
angle of the continents for the rest of his life.
The  Guild  was important, even for a man like him who hadn't any natural talent
towards  Magik,  but  it wasn't all.  He realized in those seconds that his life
was  justified  by  knowledge, only knowledge, and he was sure that the Sunstone
was the most powerful mean to gain it.
He  looked  again  at  it,  the  square  and  neat  angles,  the  strange glossy
substance...    such   an  object  couldn't  not  contain  the  most  incredible
revelations!
He  heard  some steps, he looked around with panic in the eyes, two figures were
coming towards him from the dark corridor at the entrance of the hall.  He threw
the Sunstone and himself to the ground, pretending to sleep.

The Collector and Phoenix stepped in silently, Zulkir heard them whispering.
"They are sleeping"
"Take the Sunstone, Be silent!"
"Are you sure we have got to do it?"
"Yes! Sure! The Sunstone must have some incredible power! It's so strange..."
"But  with  this  I'll  be  banned  from the Guild.  They will never forgive me,
they'll chase me everywhere"
"Is  it important?  The Magic Guild is a bunch of kids compared to the power the
Sunstone may give us!".
The  situation  for  Zulkir  Maligor  was  completely changed, The Collector and
Phoenix wanted to steal the Sunstone, he couldn't permit that, in few seconds he
decided what to do.
He went up, he raised his voice and screamed menacing: "What are you doing?".
Surprised  they turned towards him, without sensible words in the mouth, some of
the  other  guilders,  awaken  by  Zulkir's shouts, moved lazily in their couch.
Zulkir  continued, theatrically:  "You were trying to steal the divine Sunstone!
Blame  on  you!   Blame  on  you!".   His  last  words were an almost paroxystic
liberatory  howl.   There  was much more than indignation and anger.  There were
also the frustration for his own failed theft and the rancour towards the duo.
After  some  frantic  and  confused  discussions,  excuses  and  accuses  Merlyn
authoritatively  raised  his voice.  He asked what was happening, Zulkir Maligor
answered and The Collector negated.
The  matter  was  serious,  someone  had  tried to cheat The Magic Guild and the
honour of all the Guilders, this was an outrageous and horrible idea for Merlyn,
he  tried to investigate, his interrogation with The Collector had been deep and
painful but at the end truth was established.
In normal conditions such a crime was punished with the immediate expulsion from
the  Magic Guild, this was what Merlyn actually had decided at the first moment,
but  Phoenix,  in  the  attempt of defending herself and his loved The Collector
(true  loved  seemed to be born in the nasty couple!), reminded that the strange
and  supernatural  effect  of the Black Mountain had made them act in a way they
didn't actually wanted to.
The problem was complex, Merlyn understood her points and thought for days about
the sagest solution.


                               Where ends, begins

For  days  the  seven  beings  remained  in  the  caverns  of  the mountain, the
atmosphere  was  always silent and strained, Merlyn was deciding what to do with
the  guilty  couple  (always  guarded carefully by the others) and with the same
Sunstone.
The  opinions  were  different  in the party, Zulkir Maligor wanted to bring the
arcane objects with them, in order to study and discover its properties, he also
wanted  The  Collector's  banishment  from  the  Guild and the death penalty for
Phoenix.   Gan'Alv  suggested  that the couple had to be left to its destiny and
the  stone  destroyed.   Jason  preferred  to  let Phoenix join the Magic Guild,
without caring of the destiny of the God's stone.  Medwyn, finally, pretended to
forgive  both  The  Collector  and  Phoenix  and  bring  to the Crystal Cave the
Sunstone.
The  decision  was hard, Merlyn mumbled for long hours and finally he announced,
in the total silence of expectation.
"This  adventure,  my dear mates, has taught us something.  There are powers and
forces  we  can't  pretend  to  control,  there  are places were our presence is
forbidden  and dangerous.  We shall leave here the Sunstone, where it has rested
for  millenia  and  where  it  has  to  remain.  I forgive The Collector for his
attempt  of  betrayal,  as he couldn't control himself properly in the bowels of
this  magic  mountain.  Nevertheless he has to train himself better and more and
for  this reason he is allowed to stay in the Magic Guild under the condition of
a long, hard training.
Phoenix  is  a  woman  and  women  too often are dangerous for men, but we can't
decide  about  her  and  her life, even if she has not been fair with us.  We'll
leave  her  to  her way, out of this mountain, which has to be hindered from the
view and the attention of mortal eyes.
This is what I have decided, this is what has to happen".

While  leaving  the  mountain,  the  seven  heroes  remained in their individual
silence,  with  different nuances and shadows, while the influence of that magic
world was fading slowly.
They  were  all thinking about their own experience and they all knew that there
was something absurd and pointless in that whole adventure, something unbearable
and overwhelming, upon which there couldn't be control.
Silently, without stopping or saluting, Phoenix departed from the group, walking
away with her own mysteries and some tears in the heart.
A huge rock was placed on the entrance of Black Mountain, hindered from the arms
of the world.  Inside, lost in the dust, a grinning face smiled on the Sunstone,
its  secret  had  survived  also to this intrusion and more time could pass, the
safer it was.


From: "The Unofficial Chronicles Of The Magic Guild"