I, Ad Dakhla, scribe and chronicler to the court of the Sultan of the City of Bronze, do here set down the story of the Filigreed, also called the Stiletto of Plenty or the Hospitable Blade. Any who owns the blade as the sun rises, having received it fairly and without trickery, is said to be rewarded with a sumptuous repast. Its story is tied up with that of its last owner, Xe Viang, who was gifted it by a favored uncle on his deathbed. Upon finding its legend to be true, and enjoying delicious food every morn, Viang is said to have become greedy and begun selling the meal, contenting herself with simpler fare of milk-sweetened rice. She found willing enough buyers, but the meal was only ever enough for one.

So Viang had a scholar from Korton draw up a contract granting ownership of the dagger jointly to every member of her clan, with the hope that a meal would appear before each of them every morning that could then be traded upon. The following dawn, something did appear of each of the blade’s new owners, but it was a hollow mockery of the prior feasts, dewormed, moldy, and inedible. That same morning, it is said, the blade wormed its way out of Viang’s grasp and into the waters of the great Seasonal River, carried downstream to be found by a more honest bearer.

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