The Tongue of the Murmbel

This entry was recovered from a frost-ruined camp on the outer edges of The Dreadwood Basin. The ink was scorched into the page, but the script remained legible—despite the claw marks.

  Field Notes, Day... 17? 18?   I found it.   Not the beast—no. I heard it, though. My name, over and over, in my father’s voice. I followed. Gods forgive me, I followed. I didn’t see it move, only shift, like fog becoming bone.   I didn’t kill it. I think it wanted me to have it. Just a slice, coiled and still warm. Like it had bitten itself off for me. Like it knew I was starving.   It tasted like my brother’s birthday cake. The one with the honey jam in the middle. I haven’t eaten since. I haven’t had to. But I remember everything. My own name won’t stop whispering inside my mouth. I can hear old arguments, hear my first lie,   hear—
“Murm murm Murmbel waits,
In the root and under slates.
If it hears your crying song,
It will give you tongue so long.
Eat it hot and eat it clean—
Then remember all you’ve seen.”   Children used to sing that in the outer provinces. I thought it was a game.   I think I see one now. A child. Standing by the fire. She’s humming.   Please gods I want to forget again.

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“The SAFE Way to Eat a Murmbel (If You're Gonna Be Stupid, Be Smart About It)” —Notes scrawled in charcoal on the side of a hunting horn, attributed to ‘Feral Gann’ of Deadtooth Hollow  

• DO NOT eat the tongue raw. Unless you hate your soul.
• Slice only the tip—never more than a hand’s length. The rest is venomous with memory.
• Wrap in pine moss and singe the tip until it twitches once. No more, no less.
• Boil in SILENT water. If it hears your voice, it’ll speak back later.
• Bury the bones of something you love nearby. It helps. I don’t know why.
• Eat with honey if you want it to taste like happiness. Eat with salt if you want the truth.
  “Eat twice and you’ll start remembering things you never did. Eat thrice and you'll start doing things you never remember.”

 

“I remain unconvinced that the so-called Murmbel is anything more than a folkloric composite—born from famine, madness, and the northern provinces’ tendency to romanticize their own tragedies. No verifiable remains have ever been collected. No reliable witness has survived encounter. And the only ‘recipe’ we have is written on the side of a hunting horn by a man named Feral Gann. Let us be serious.” —Professor Tillic Vandros, Royal Institute of Beastlogy, Adrea

  —Archived by the Academy of Echoing Silence, Yvendar Outpost (defunct)