The immortal wizards were the most powerful humans ever to walk the planet Tharia, but the wars between them devastated the planet and the whole world breathed a sigh of relief when the last of them was killed. In an attempt to cheat death, though...
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The woman who had been known to the crew of the Hummingbird as Connie Laz stood stiffly alert in the throne room of the Gem Lords, nervously awaiting their reaction to her report.
The seven thrones formed the arc of a circle at one end of the vast echoing chamber, each one separated by a great enough distance from its neighbour to allow the small crowds of courtiers, attendants and supplicants that, in ages past, had gathered like termites around their queen. At the other end of the chamber, on the other side of the decoratively tiled audience plaza, was space for thousands upon thousands of commoners and minor nobles, all of whom had been forced to stand throughout the interminable ceremonies that had often lasted all day and long into the night.
Things had changed a lot since those days. The Gem Lords now each had a realm of their own, rather than having to share the one. They were also centuries older, perhaps a little wiser, and for the most part could no longer be bothered by all the old pomp and tradition. Receiving the adoration of the masses and ruling over them like gods no longer held the same attraction for them, although some of the younger lordlets still went in for it to a lesser extent, to the amusement of the remaining members of the original seven.
The last time the communal throne room had been used had been five hundred years before, when Lady Jet and Lord Opal had been wedded with all the old splendour, re-creating the days of glory a thousand years gone, but even then there had been something forced about it. The sense that they were just going through the motions, that it had all been carefully managed and orchestrated rather than just happening spontaneously, as they liked to think it had been in the past. That sense of falseness had haunted all the participants, and had perhaps contributed to the acrimonious break up a mere hundred years later. No-one had wanted to repeat the experience, and so the vast, splendid chamber had lain unused ever since until Lord Ruby, mightiest of the remaining Gem Lords, had insisted that they hold their meeting there 'to add a sense of occasion to what we say and do, so that we understand the importance of the decision we must make.'
Of the original Gem Lords, only two were present and accounted for. One, Lord Sapphire, was dead, only a few scraps of his soul having been salvaged from what remained of his soul gem. Another, Lord Emerald, had disappeared, probably exploring some far distant corner of his realm and leaving behind all means to contact him so as not to be disturbed. Three others had gone mad, driven insane by the incredible length of their lives and the ever growing sense of pointlessness to their existence. They had taken to extremes of sensory experience in a futile attempt to recapture the joy of life, of which only a mocking memory remained, and when that had failed they had taken to excesses of cruelty and malice, turning their realms into hells.
For a while the other Gem Lords had tried to help them, but it had soon became evident that the only cure for their condition was an end to their existence. Lord Opal and Ladies Diamond and Pearl had closed the entrances to their realms, therefore, and now devoted every waking moment to an unending search for a way to destroy themselves, possibly by duplicating Lord Sapphire's accident, the details of which remained not fully understood.
