Shaman's Sneakthief Gloves of Mercy

Shaman's Sneakthief Gloves of Mercy wrap tight around the wrist, a whisper of worn leather that molds to skin as if it’s learned your heartbeat. The back is a tapestry of muted earth tones, stitched with bone-white thread that catches the light in a way that makes the gloves seem half sentient, half remembered. A shallow ridge runs along the knuckles, like the seam of a small seashell, giving grip without bulk. The palm bears a tiny sigil—spiral and sinewy—that pulses faintly when the air grows tense, a mercy-blue glimmer that hints at a pact between spirit and street. The lining is a soft, almost damp felt, the scent of rain-soaked earth and old stories rising with every movement. They feel both ancient and practical, as if the wearer learned mercy from a long-forgotten ancestor and learned stealth from a grizzled thief who never made a sound. Lore people tell of shamans who walked the river’s edge, trading whispers with spirits for the right to move unseen when mercy was needed most. These gloves, they say, were forged in that crossroads—where healing hands meet quick feet. Their mercy is not merely benevolence; it’s a careful balance, a choice to give an enemy a chance to retreat or a companion a fighting chance to live. In time, the gloves found their way into the hands of scouts, couriers, and healers who refused to compromise between mercy and method. They became a quiet rumor that the right pair could turn a dangerous night into a chance to shield a friend, to slip past a patrol, to swap a fate with the softest of hands. In practice, the gloves feel like they are made for thresholds—the moment when a path forks between pursuit and sanctuary. When you lean into mercy, the gloves respond with a subtle stir, and a brief veil of shadow slips over your hands, enough to melt into the crowd or cross a moonlit courtyard without a sound. They don’t shout their presence; they coax you to listen to the world’s small betrayals—the creak of a guard’s boot, the echo of a distant chant, the tremor of a doorway that isn’t meant to be opened. It’s a tool of careful mercy: heal a wounded ally and you may gain a fleeting, almost polite invisibility to prying eyes; revive a comrade and a faint hush traces your steps as you pull back into the shadows, leaving only the glow of the sigil as a memory. The gloves also have a place in the market's more secretive corners. I’ve watched them move from hands to hands in the bustling halls where merchants bargain and barter for glimmering wares. On Saddlebag Exchange, a vendor once priced a pristine pair at around two gold and seventy-five silver, the number sketched into chalk on a vellum tag as if it were a whispered map. Battered versions, nicked at the cuff and softened by travel, drift down to about one gold or a touch more with hopeful bargaining. Prices bend with stories—the ones who’ve used them to guard a caravan, the ones who’ve used them to slip through a siege’s last gate—and in the end, the gloves carry more than leather and thread: they carry mercy that can be earned, borrowed, or earned back in bloodied dawns and quiet, shadowed nights.