Sablestone & Pitchstone

Found more of the bloody stone today. If I had known how much grief it'd be, I'd have never started building this damned cellar in the first place, or at least would've hired some lads from town to do it for me. Erwyn says that the rock is actually worth some coin on account of it's color or some nonsense, but I know better than to trust Erwyn's financial advice. No, I'm just going to keep digging around it and try to get this project done by autumn. That is, so long as I don't blunt all my tools on this slagging invisible rock first.

A page from a personal journal, found in a field nearby a Rojelen pitchstone mine.

Properties

Material Characteristics

Pitchstone and Sablestone are two of the most valuable building materials in Morova due in large part to their unique appearances. Both look the same in normal light, hence why they are always listed and classified together. They appear as a dull black, similar to onyx if it were matte, and are durable as granite. However, it is only darkness that can reveal what differentiates the two materials. Sablestone, when exposed to moonlight, glows a brilliant blue as if it were reflecting and magnifying the light from the moons. Pitchstone does the exact opposite: it absorbs all light and looks like a void, making it impossible to spot in moonlight and incredibly ominous by torchlight. No one knows entirely why these substances' special properties seem to activate only in moonlight, but it has led to some people classifying them both as simply "moonstone".

Geology & Geography

Were these materials more common, they might not be quite as valuable. However, they have only been found in abundance on two islands: Roje and Tansiva. They appear in veins, often mingled together, and it takes a professional eye to not only distinguish the two, but to even notice their presence in the first place. In the darkness of a mine, there is often little chance for moonlight to hit the stone and reveal its hidden beauty.

Note: the Kingdom of Fharyn currently controls all of the known sources of pitchstone and sablestone, meaning that the price of these materials has been forced up in other kingdoms.