Sparkshrooms
Dolgi curiously lifts a small bit of the wool with the stone tongs, dips it into the dye-filled barrel (a small one, but still) that the Brana had clunked down on his desk, twirls it in the dye for a brief moment, pulls it up--and grimaces as charge, energy, pours out, arcing through his clothing, his hands, his fingers, all around the spartan office, a secondary one attached to a secondary workshop (And supposed to be secret, which makes the fact this mere apprentice can find it with simple scrying something of a hair raiser though he pushes that aside for a moment) meant for unpleasant (not dangerous, never dangerous) work, things like leathermaking. The quantity of dye and wool aren't enough to do more than lightly annoy a man of his age, and by the mercy of the Ancestors his beard doesn't stick out in fifty-thousand directions, but he still none too gingerly tosses the wool back into the barrel, before that can change. "Now where did you say you found this, plaitling?"
"Mushrooms." The young Stormcaller, Lightninglung, gormlessly continues to stare over his shoulder in the most dismaying fashion, his skin crawling--she's one of the rare Brana more focused on the higher, more mystical side of the Wind she has chosen to study, and her thought are as distant and ephemeral as the very skies she covets. Unfiltered access to elf texts is apparently more of a threat than he had expected. He tries not to groan at the answer. Her appearance is appropriate at least, being small by Brana standards, her head and feathers the shade of a cloud while her leonine body is the color of a bright blue day, her eyes much the same.
"A bit more specific if you don't mind?"
"Twenty miles that way," she points north with a claw, again right over his shoulder, "it should be on the...I didn't give you the map yet, did I?"
"No Plaitling, I'm sorry to say you didn't."
A moment later some poor apprentice races in with the said map, huffing and puffing, "I told you you need to--" And then the apprentice's eyes widen and she starts blurting out apologies to Dolgi, who gives her a second to get it out of her system before raising a hand to quiet her. "Thank you lass, now give it here then get on with your day."
--
Well. They are mushrooms alright. Standing in the freezing Norscan cold, huddled in enough coats, cloaks, furs, and gloves to feel more like a caterpillar in its cocoon than a dwarf, might be sabotaging his sense of aesthetic but he can't say he's fond of how they look: a pale, putrescent, white stem, capped with a baby blue tip that closer examination after he pulls one from the earth, he can confirm there are gills loaded with spores the twinkling white of stars in the night sky. All along the flesh of the thing white streaks the shade of lightning go around in zig-zagging manner. The size itself varies in the patch he's been guided to, from as small an eye to as big as his forearm. There's an unpleasant smell, rather like too much perfume spray in too small a room, not the worst thing he's ever smelled but a decent sign that it's poisonous, "dashing any half-considered, lunatic plans of experimenting with feeding them to Brana to try and supercharge their magic" to paraphrase what Lightninglung had said and, perhaps, explain why she would share such a find with him rather than keep it for herself.
Also, lightning arcs off of the flesh, even more of a deterrent. The size varies depending on, well, size, but even the smallest would be painful to try and stick into your throat and the largest would almost certainly kill, which does actually leave him with rather a question of harvesting the stuff. He could just employ some dwarfs with inexpensive grounding and spare himself the trouble...or he could use it as an excuse to finally forge a really, really nice suit of armor and talisman to obviate the issue.
That's quite a find he has for his troubles. It isn't quite Master Snorri's stumbling onto a vein of Gromril...or the azrilwutroth...or the hearthstones--look, Master Snorri has stumbled onto quite a few reagants in his time, obviously, but finding even one will do great wonders for his vault, particularly considering his clientele.
There is, admittedly, a question of use. Not what the usage of the things would be: lightning spewing, sky-related mushrooms fairly-full of magic have some pretty obvious applications in lightning and sky-related Runes (and for that matter half-remembered lessons of electricity making things twitch leaves him idly-curious whether it might not be a potential replacement for a Troll Heart in Awakening) for all he'll need to test, and extensively at that, to be sure but, well, he can't exactly make armor out of the stuff, can he? Grinding it and trying to pour it directly into the metal or other materials he's working on risks shocking himself, given any kind of notable quantity, for any Master Rune and probably some of the chancier "just" Runes for that matter, but on the other hand there is something to be said for the direct route and it gives him even more of an excuse to go all out on making himself that armor--or even better, he can use the harvesting as an excuse to make some gronti and use the actual production as an excuse to make the armor. Klora can hardly side-eye him for that expense, now can she? The wisdom expected of a longbeard. Truly, he has earned his wrinkles.
On the other hand, as the plaitlings demonstrated, he could just make a dye, stain, and lacquer out of the stuff and use it that way, for all he thinks the colors won't be the prettiest.
Either way, he giggles at the amount of money he's about to make.
--
