'Glintstone staff styled as a scepter. A gift once given to the demi-humans to foster peace, it can be wielded even by those of low intelligence. Sneered at by fools in the academy.' The Demi-Humans are small fur-covered folk with their own queens and their own makeshift settlements at the margins of the Lands Between. Someone, the record never says who, once gifted the demi-human queens glintstone scepters as a peace-keeping gesture. The fools in the academy then sneered at the resulting magic as fit only for those of low intelligence.

'Twisted clay sculpt in the shape of a demi-human head. Emits a voice that says "You're beautiful." A wistful fetish that imparts voices and words on an eternal journey. Unconditional love. Unrestrained assurance. It must have been a mother speaking.' The Prattling Pates are the canon's quietest evidence of demi-human inner life. They are clay heads, twisted, recognisable. They speak short sentences in voices the Tarnished can almost place. The pate that says you're beautiful is made in the shape of a demi-human head, and the canon tells the reader, in the sole declarative sentence permitted, that the voice giving the assurance must have been a mother speaking. The academies' ridicule and the mother's voice belong to the same demography. What the fools in the academy sneered at was the scepter; what a demi-human mother put into a piece of clay was love.