The Remembering Music Box

by Frazer 👁 25 views

Charges: 7 (regains at dawn)

This palm-sized music box is made from black walnut polished to a mirror sheen, with silver hinges and a winding key shaped like a skeletal hand. Its lid bears an inlaid scene of two figures separated by a river of mother-of-pearl, while a tiny moonstone set in the clasp glows faintly whenever the linked dead person thinks of its owner. Inside, a slender brass cylinder turns beneath a comb of translucent crystal teeth. Along the underside, several interlocking brass dials display its ever-increasing tally. The box's music is delicate, intimate, and unmistakably human, as though hummed just beside the listener's ear.

The Remembered Melody When you finish attuning to the music box, you name one deceased person you personally knew. The box becomes linked to that person's soul, provided the soul still exists and is capable of thought. Whenever that deceased person thinks of you, the box plays the tune they are humming, whistling, or imagining at that moment. The music can be heard clearly by creatures within 30 feet, lasts for up to 1 minute, and requires no winding or action. If the deceased person is unable to remember you, has no thoughts, or their soul has been destroyed, the box remains silent. The box functions across any distance and even across planar boundaries.

A Door Left Ajar As an action, you can touch the box and speak the linked deceased person's name while expending 3 charges. For the next 10 minutes, you may ask the deceased person up to three questions. The box answers each question with a brief musical phrase: a rising phrase means yes, a falling phrase means no, and a discordant phrase means the soul does not know, refuses to answer, or cannot be reached. The box cannot compel the dead person to answer and cannot reveal information the soul could not reasonably know.

The Unalterable Ledger The music box magically records every use of its magic. A tiny brass dial on its underside displays the total number of magical activations, the number of times the Remembered Melody has played, the number of charges expended, and the number of questions asked through A Door Left Ajar. Opening the box without activating a property is also recorded as an opening. These counts never reset, cannot be altered by magic short of a wish, and continue to increase even if the box changes owners. By speaking the command word 'account,' you can cause the dial to display each category in sequence.

Last Refrain If the linked soul is willing and remembers you fondly, you can use a bonus action to expend 1 charge and cause the box to replay the last melody it produced within the previous 24 hours. This replay is only an echo and provides no information about the deceased person's current thoughts.

Lore

The box is said to have been created by Ilyra Venn, a mortician and clockmaker who could not accept the death of her twin brother. She built it after spending seven years collecting every tune he had ever hummed. When the box first played a melody neither sibling had known in life, Ilyra claimed it came from the thoughts of the dead. Since then, mourners, spies, monarchs, and lonely adventurers have sought the box, hoping to learn whether someone beyond death still remembers them.

History

The Remembering Music Box was buried with Ilyra Venn beneath the Bellwright Mausoleum. Centuries later, grave robbers found it inside a sealed lead coffer, its counters already displaying 12,004 openings and 3,771 melodies. The box has since passed through the hands of a grieving queen, an inquisitor who used it to identify murder victims, and a bard who spent an entire winter listening to the same three notes. No owner has ever successfully reset its ledger.

Created by Frazer 👁 25 views