Forged in the dread pyramid of Khemri by Nagash himself, the Crown of Sorcery is a circlet of cold black iron set with wards that no living hand should touch. Into it the first and greatest of necromancers poured a measure of his own titanic will, so that the crown might command the dead, bind the minds of the weak, and channel the dark magic of undeath. It is less an ornament than a fragment of Nagash's very ambition, given form and edge.
When Nagash was cast down, the crown did not die with him. It passed through the ages like a plague carried on the wind, and each who wore it felt the cold voice of the Great Necromancer coiling through their thoughts, whispering of dominion and of death made eternal. To place it upon one's brow is to invite Nagash to make of the wearer a puppet, a vessel through which his hunger might work anew.
Among the Vampire Counts the crown is a thing of terror and desire in equal measure, for it is a relic of their founder's master and a key to powers no vampire lord could master unaided. The Tomb Kings of Khemri remember it only as an omen of the tyrant who damned their realm to unending unlife. Wherever it surfaces, kingdoms wither, and the dead do not rest.
The reliquary continues
