Skill-pillar

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Skill-pillars by John Howe

A Skill-pillar is astanding stone made of the black memory stone with runes marked on its sides indicating the different destinations a Skill-user can travel to through it. The Elderlings did not use them much, fearing the effects they could have. Prilkop described them as taking something out of you whenever one used them. A map of the world with the locations of the pillars was found in the tower buried in ice and snow on Aslevjal.

Recovered Skill-scrolls suggested that accidents had happened to novice Skill users and this was why the knowledge of their use was so severely restricted, and why the direction markings on many of the pillars were later removed.

Indeed, Fitz nearly gets lost in one until someone, probably Tintaglia or Icefyre, pushes him back out several months later.

Known Skill-pillars in the Realm of the Elderlings

  • Beyond the Mountain Kingdom in the ancient plaza where Fitz and the Fool share a vision. One of the runes in it is for the stone quarry and another for Kelsingra
  • Some at the West end of the Great Chasm Bridge in the Mountain Kingdom
  • In the stone quarry
  • The Witness Stones of Buckkeep
  • There are more Witness Stones at Kevdor - presumably Skill Pillars?
  • Standing stones in Buck north(?) from Galeton, one of the markings is for the Treasure Beach
  • At least one, possibly several in the coastal waters of the Treasure Beach on Others Island; one side leads to an Elderling city, maybe Kelsingra, and the other to the stones in Buck
  • One in the tower buried in ice and snow on Aslevjal. One rune is for the Witness Stones of Buckkeep and one to the plaza beyond the Mountain Kingdom?

this list is still very incomplete

Images of Skill-pillars