Krik Pens

In the northern reaches of the Whips Isles, there lives a group of solitary people known as the Skrig. This group of people have never been observed to utter a single sound. Not so much as a cough or a sigh, much less a word of speech. To deal with them in trade, for their much sought-after commodity of Cloven bud for smoking, a rune system of writing is used for communication purposes. The runes are etched in such a way, that each rune represents a picture of something and its meaning is found in the context of the runes around it. Both the tool for etching and the material etched into are unique products of the Northern Isles: the Krik pen and the pale leather paper known as Huke.

The Krik pen is a thin and short piece of metal, tapered at one end and more flexible than the top half providing a great level of manipulation in etching detailed runes. The pens are light weight and readily available at trading posts along the Whips' southern coasts.

The Huke leather paper is made from the skin of some subturanian creature in the north known only to the Skrig people. Huke skin is a pale off-white color in nature, but when pressed and prodded by a Krik pen, will produce lines of dark blood, unchangeable after their initial reaction and permanently etched into the skin, unless a specialized heat is applied on the back of the skin beneath an etching.

Mechanics & Inner Workings

Krik pens are a small hand-held chisle, crafted as a single short length of thin metal, flexible and taperd at the bottom end to use in etching runes into the appropriate material, Huke paper. There is no internal substance within the Krik pen to produce the runes, but rather the Huke paper itself contains a substance beneath its surface which when pressed upon will create the lines needed for etching runes.

Item type

Tool

Related Technologies

• Huke Paper

Rarity

Krik pens are originally produced by Skrig smyths, though they can be found in some other parts of the world, delivered as rare oddities to collectors and historians across Sanctuary. The metal used is a dull gray sort, unusual to all continents other than the Northern Isles.

Weight

5 grams

Dimensions

1xTH (thumb) long. 1xN (nail) wide