Staff of the Líkgjalland

Description

The Staff of the Líkgjalland or 'Líkgjallanda refðit', as it is called by the Skaura Orohlen is an important magical tool of the líkgjalland that is imbued with the memories of all líkgjalland who ever existed. Superficially it's a very long-shafted axe with a miniscule rounded blade made of mímiril, a very rare metal, fiery to the look yet ice-cold to the touch. The shaft is made of yew studded with brass and silver pins forming irregular spiral patterns. The tip again is covered with a mímiril spike.

History

The first shaman to be líkgjalland was Frektloik. She is credited with having discovered three new ingredients for use in alchemy and was known for using necromancy in ways actually beneficial to life. On one occasion she went on an astral journey on which she reportedly met Krókjo, the bird that picks the memories off the dead to carry them off their bodies. Krókjo showed her how to preserve her memories to pass them on to the líkgjalland after her. To do this she gave her the refðit of which the axe blade symbolises her tail and the spike her beak. The metal studding on the shaft is meant to be the shimmer on her feathers. She also told Frektloik how to use the refðit, so she and her successors could access its knowledge and also make it conserve their own knowledge so later generations could access it.

Capabilities

The refðit is a multifunctional tool, but is mainly used to harvest ingredients for alchemy, to reaccess knowledge of past líkgjalland and to note down knowledge for future líkgjalland. The refðit is eternal and never wears off, unlike all other tools made of mímiril. But the refðit is also ever changing, since the number and position of the studding changes each time it is passed on. The pins on the shaft are coding for certain places within the settlement area of the Skaura Orohlen. These places are actually sites, where a líkgjalland has left written down what she discovered in her research or on astral journeys. The text can be written on every surface: the ground, stone, the surface of a body of water and so on. The spike of the refðit is moved over the surface without leaving a visible mark but leaving what the líkgjalland notes down in an ethereal form. The líkgjalland is the only one who can write using the refðit and is also the only one who can read what was written using it by virtue of her rank.

Having all these memories spread out over the whole settlement area encourages the líkgjalland to wander around and conduct own research and make her own discoveries. Whenever she reads a new memory, it becomes bound to one of the brass or silver pins along the shaft of the refðit and the líkgjalland memorises it connected to the head of that pin. So she envisions her own travels across the land following the pin patterns and lives through all the memories she collected again by following the pins on the staff.

Item type

Tool