Dream Pen

"Are you interested?" 
"In helping you find a pen? Isn't there a stationary store you can go to?" 
"This isn't just any pen! This pen writes the dreams of the dead. Once made, and trust me, that process isn't easy but it's possible, you can record people's dreams." 
"So...? Someone's looking to write some smut?" 
"So, there's lots of trade secrets and tech information in dreams." 
"It's not like you can take a dream to the patent office. What would that look like, insert Cloud tab A into Lava slot B?"

— a conversation about Dream Pens 

Mechanics & Inner Workings

The workings of the quill are complex, intricate, and infused with each other to a point where a single spell can't be separated or lifted from the pen. 
Both Drawing What the Eye Sees and Dream Recording need to be cast at the same time (which requires more than one witch to be working on this quill). 
Find Me! (a spell normally cast in cases of missing people) is used here to find the person who Focused Thoughts will be cast on. This means that Focused Thoughts is cast in such a way (different movements in the spell casting) that it'll hit the person that Find Me! finds. 
Finally, the last spell of Words of Understanding is cast. 
Together, this quill, when the target is invoked, can find a dead person, record their thoughts via words and drawings with a subject focused on by the castor, and when everything is written down, any missing words or information is caught at the end.

Manufacturing process

This quill can only be manufactured by a witch (two, technically, if the person wanting the quill would like both of the spells).

History

Back in the wild days when witchcraft was still new to the people able to use it, those were the days when ideas best left alone began to gain traction; there was always someone willing to test it, or make it...but for a price. 
One day, a grieving sister came to a witches' cottage and explained what she was looking for. Her younger sister had accidentally been swept out to sea, and she was feared drowned. She'd only been sixteen years old, and the older sister wanted to know what her dreams were of so that she could do something for the shade of her sister. 
The witch listening to this request started to think of how it could be done. A pen, he believed, would be the best instrument. But the dreams would have to flow into the pen for them to be written, and then there was the factor of trying to get the correct dreams from the correct person. He tells her to come back within three months, and that he'll need something personal from her sister (hair, if possible, would be best). 
When she comes back (and brings a brush full of her sister's hair), he finishes his enchantments and presents her with a quill pen and a small bottle of ink. She doesn't recognize the feather, but she does see that the nib holder is made from bone (at the same time, she doesn't see that there are magical patterns worked into that same bone nib, carved lines forming the trappings of spells). 
Nothing happens for the next few nights, and finally, the sister brings back the quill pen with contempt. The witch points out that sometimes spells need more than one conjuring to make things happen, but he refunds her money and keeps the pen to tinker with. The next day, a bedraggled and woe begotten younger sister arrives at the gates; she had still been alive! 
The witch, still intrigued by the idea of communicating with the dead, tried his quill out on the next person who died (the older sister, actually, who died of shock when she found out pushing her younger sister into the ocean's current hadn't killed her). 
When the older sister was lowered into the ground, he tried the quill trick again, and it worked. She wrote her "dreams" into a notebook that was bound to the pen, and he could see that she hadn't wanted to share their trader father's coffers when he passed on - overflowing chests with coins and fine cloths would have netted her a better life in an area far away from the village...if she hadn't needed to share with her younger sister.   
Her thoughts were spilled onto the papers until he ran out of ink. Because they were nonsensical ("pure" thoughts that run around the brain and without assistance from understanding), he believed that the dead dreamed after death (it was from him that the "fact" came from). He wrote up the information, including a recipe for the quill and ink, and that was it. When he died, his Book of Spells (all three volumes) were spilt amongst his apprentices. 
The one that inherited his book containing the recipe for the quill, ink, and all his notes about how it worked didn't do much with the information, but when she died, her apprentices were too many to give books, and so one of them was only given this information. 
Xe took it, and was known to the magical world as The Spirit Whisperer. Xe made exactly 99 quills, 99 bottles of ink, and then tore the recipe for the quill into bits and burned them. For the rest of xyr life xe continued to sell the ink bottles to those who had bought the quill, but never mentioned what had caused xe to stop making the quills. 
Hundreds of years later, when this quills was just the hint of a whispered rumor, someone wanted it re-made to their specifications: that it would write the "dreams" of the ghosts in a format that was readable (a high spell version of autocorrect), that they could attack to a specific ghost or not (again with the use of hair), and that the quill itself could never break (high spell). 
When it was made, the creator was murdered, and it was covered up to look like a suicide. This is the murder that Xala stumbled across while she was investigating the pen that was created.

Significance

This small object has a large factor on today and the future of the world. For example, since the dead don't actually "dream" (but hold all the thoughts in their head from their life), this person is using the pen to steal ideas and technology from a high profile tech inventor that just died. These ideas, after being stolen, are then entered in the patent office, and it's bringing the holder of the pen a lot of prestige and money he normally wouldn't have. While this borders on illegal, him them using the pen to blackmail people is 100% illegal and what gets him looked at closer.

Rarity

This item is whispered about by the people who know about it, those who have heard rumors that such an item exists. It's an old, old rumor of a pen that could write the dreams of the dead, except that it's not the "dreams" since dead people don't sleep; it's their thoughts.  
Any person making this pen needs to have the recipe for both the pen and the ink.

Weight

480 g

Dimensions

23 cm long; 14 cm wide

Base Price

lost

Raw materials & Components

The breakdown of the "new" pen is this (it's unknown if the original pen was of the same materials or not, but believed to be similar even if the items were more from that region than the international items used in today's making). Dreams of the Dead (Quills) Ingredients: bones from a murdered person feather from a phoenix (colors are either red, purple, or blue) an etching tool kit to etch the spells into the bone nib Spells Required Words of Understanding - this spell functions as an "autocorrect" in case there are missing words, misspellings, etc. when putting thoughts to paper Dream Recording - not only for dreams, this spell is mostly used by writers (not only them though) for putting all their thoughts onto paper or computer before them. For writers it normally takes practice to pull ideas from the scattered, wild mess that is their thinking process. Focused Thoughts - [Warning! This spell and its use has been revoked by ICSA {International Community of Spell Assistance} under the category of Mind Control - use of this spell can result in a fine or prison sentence up to 5 years]. Focused Thoughts allows another person to focus and mind read their chosen target. Drawing What the Eye Sees - allows a person to see something (even if they don't know how it's used or how to draw it) and let's them sketch it out. (Mostly used by engineers or other people trying to convey their information via drawings/sketches.)
Dreams of the Dead (Ink) Ingredients: ash from the dead (not *needed* but seen as being easier to the "autocorrect" spell to work) powdered scales from Medusine snakes burnt pine or lamp soot animal glue (animal is left up to choice) incense (can be chosen by the person burning the incense, but there is usually a connection between a culture and "death" fragrance.) tear drops for the water Notebook Requirements: Any notebook that has been charmed to accept spells can be used for this (being charmed allows spells such as Dream Recording to be written down.) Pages need to be a certain thickness so the ink doesn't go through to the other paper, and so that the quill nib doesn't scratch through to the other side. Most notebooks used for recording dream thoughts are also spelled with Don't Notice Me and Locked Until Needed

Tools

A witch's wand is required to make this, along with all the ingredients for casting any and all spells needed. 
In addition to a wand, items used to etch bone (and the safety glasses for that) are needed. When spells are cast, since these spells are not going directly to the target, they need to follow set patterns (spirals, lines, etc.) that give the spell more energy for the distance (these help the spells maintain themselves until finding their target - they also need to continually have energy pumped into them, which is why bone is used - this supplies the potential energy).