Evelynn Galloway, An Archaeologist researching the Marker

All of her colleagues had entered the nameless tomb in pursuit of mummified remains, calcified remnants of ancient days and inscriptions detailing the days of a so far unseen empire of the past. Evelynn however had her eyes on the real prize from the day she had first found certainty of its existence. Where others saw only the great and impossible deeds of legend as fictional tales, she still dared to perceive them as embellished half-truths. What would have amounted to nothing short of insanity among the universities she regularly perused, was quickly becoming a path to a vindicating thread of consistency. Withered records of an instrument of power that stood the test of time. It came in many forms, to people both grand and insignificant. Only its purpose seemed to remain stalwart and reliable: An unbroken temptation.

Sometimes it was a quill, a piece of charcoal or an artist's pen. That particular attribute might have caused everyone but her to overlook this incomparable prize. The others no doubt thought little of it, something a colleague had perhaps dropped upon opening the burial chamber. Standing out like a sore thumb upon the old sandstone foundations was a modern-styled marker, simple synthetic casing, black of color. As the ecstatic academic storm of the others descended into the tomb, Evelynn stayed behind, her fingers closing around the unusually cold material, like it was drawing warmth from her reaching digits.

She had lost track of time since then, pondering the odd artifact. She could feel its lull, the quiet hooks of its allure digging into her synapses. She could feel it long before she first laid eyes upon it, and she felt it still, back in her office in the rural english town of Blackale. The rain was beating against the glass of the secluded room, the window offering a faint hint of her reflection. Shoulder-length unkempt waves of black intercut with strands of purple. Angular features, worn too soon by the ravages of sun and time, wrinkles showing far too early for someone barely approaching their thirties. Eyes of hazel looked back at her, almost pleading. Some part of her wanted to be done with this obsession, to return to the mundanity of her old life.

But curiosity always beats caution into submission. A cancerous idea had infected her as of late, since she returned: All her tests since finding the relic had been on parchment; Inanimate. Not to mention that she had only drawn incoherent lines and practiced individual letters. For some strange reason she had not considered spelling something out in entirety. It was the mention of an old roman general that opened her eyes to the true potential of this myth made manifest: The man, one Tiberius of many, supposedly carved a promise to his young wife into his flesh, using a primitive quill: "Your Eternal Protector." Supposedly Tiberius died a few days after, with his wife living for a couple decades beyond that tragic point. Many sought to claim her, to harm her. Lust, Cruelty, disease - All reached for her, and all were repelled by an apparition, a memory of a man devoted beyond causality and belief. Tiberius' specter was said to haunt her life as a guardian spirit, only dissipating when her life left her aging body.

Evelynn did not believe in such ghost stories. Staring down at the marker she was not even sure whether social isolation had worn her down to seek fantasy in something so trivial as a writing implement, or if she had actually convinced herself that this was somehow an artifact of occult power. Either way, she had spent this much of her work and free time on it already, answering a voiceless call to action, she might as well see it through - At least that's what she told herself.

There was only one question she needed to ask herself, before she could proceed...