Item from The Realm of the Elderlings by Robin Hobb
A bitter herb that suppresses the Skill — used medicinally for pain and depression, but strategically as a weapon to cripple Skill-users.
Elfbark is a double-edged herb. Medicinally, it dulls pain and lifts depression — genuine therapeutic uses. But it also suppresses the Skill, making it invaluable to anyone who wants to neutralize a Skill-user without violence. Regal's faction dosed Fitz with elfbark to prevent him from using the Skill, and the damage compounded the blocks Galen had already implanted. The herb is a perfect metaphor for the saga's ambivalence about magic: the same substance that heals is also the weapon that hobbles the protagonist. Nothing in the Realm of the Elderlings is purely good or purely bad.
A dried bark preparation, dark and bitter-smelling, brewed into tea or ground into powder. It looks unremarkable — the kind of thing that sits in any healer's cupboard. The taste is memorably terrible, acrid and lingering, as if the body knows it shouldn't be ingesting it.
Also known as: Elfbark, Bark of the Elf Tree