Arbor Dianae

Arbor Dianae is made from an amalgam containing a rare-ish metal. It is soft and workable, rarer than gold and perhaps as common as platinum. Aged Arbor Dianae has the melting temperature of palladium, well above 700 degrees Celsius, though it can become malleable and ductile. Worked, it is inevitably like threads, roots, or hair. While it is being prepared it is called Arbor Dianae sponge.

Arbor Dianae is of interest only to mages and others in the arcane domain, who use it to make the matrices that are the foundation of crafted magical devices. Fabrication is detailed and complicated, and can follow a cloisonne model, as a three-dimensional assembly.

Matrices built for longevity are protected by enamel coatings or by full encapsulation in a vitrified block. Mercury exposure would otherwise contaminate a valuable construct (mercury rot), so recycling the palladium is complex and takes more than mercury exposure. Re-amalgamation is very slow at ambient temperatures, and the only really effective way to degrade a matrix may be mercury vapor.

It is mildly hazardous to work with, though not outright poisonous. Long-term exposure can cause health problems for the unwary.

See also: Mercury