This palm-sized saltshaker is made of warm rosewood banded with tarnished silver. Its domed cap is pierced with seven tiny holes arranged like a pair of teardrops, and a thin blue enamel line spirals around its body before ending abruptly at a broken clasp. The remaining half of its matching clasp hangs loose, as though torn away. No matter how much salt is poured from it, the chamber inside always appears half-empty. When held by its attuned owner, it occasionally gives a faint, wistful rattle.
Endless Pinch
The shaker contains an inexhaustible supply of fine white salt. It can season any nonmagical food or drink without changing its nutritional value or otherwise contaminating it.
Flavor of the Heart
When you use the saltshaker while preparing a meal, the salt takes on the flavor of your strongest genuine emotion at that moment. The flavor cannot be imitated by mundane means, and a creature that tastes the meal can identify that emotion. A creature that knowingly eats a portion of the meal within 1 hour of its preparation gains the benefit associated with that emotion for 8 hours. A meal can affect up to six creatures, and a creature can benefit from only one meal prepared with this property at a time. The Dungeon Master determines the emotion and its associated benefit: calm grants advantage on the next saving throw against being frightened; joy grants temporary hit points equal to your proficiency bonus; sorrow grants advantage on the creature's next death saving throw; anger grants a +2 bonus to the damage roll of the creature's next weapon attack; fear grants a 10-foot bonus to the creature's walking speed during its next turn after it rolls initiative; and love grants advantage on the creature's next Charisma check made to aid, comfort, or protect another creature. The effect ends early if the creature willingly eats another meal prepared with this property.
A Taste of Truth
A creature that tastes food prepared with the saltshaker has advantage on Wisdom (Insight) checks made to determine the attuned cook's emotional state for the next 24 hours.
Longing for Its Twin
The saltshaker is one of a matched pair and constantly yearns for its missing sibling. While the sibling is on the same plane of existence, the attuned creature always knows the direction to it, provided it is within 1 mile. Once each dawn, the attuned creature can hold the saltshaker and learn whether its sibling is within 1,000 feet, within 10 miles, farther away on the same plane, or on another plane. The saltshaker provides no information if its sibling has been destroyed.
Reunited Seasoning
If the missing sibling is found and both shakers are used to prepare the same meal, the meal can affect up to twelve creatures, and each creature gains the benefits of two different emotions chosen by the Dungeon Master based on the genuine emotions of the cooks. A creature cannot gain the same benefit twice.
Lore
The shaker is said to have been made by the celebrated halfling chef Merra Brinesong, who crafted a matched pair so that two cooks could season a meal together from opposite ends of a kitchen. Merra believed that food carried the truth of its maker more faithfully than words. Her apprentices claimed that diners could taste love, spite, grief, or hope in every dish. The shakers became known as the Heart's Seasonings, but one vanished before Merra's final feast, leaving the surviving half permanently flavored with longing.
History
The Longing Saltshaker was recovered from the ruins of the Brinesong Hearth after the kitchen was destroyed in a fire. The surviving shaker was found inside a sealed oven, untouched by flame, beside a silver plate bearing a single cold meal. The missing sibling has never been conclusively located. Several adventurers have sought it in the belief that the pair was separated deliberately, perhaps by a jealous rival who wished to conceal the emotions revealed by their cooking.
