Board Thread:The Last Sovereign Discussion/@comment-39332473-20190808194309/@comment-27713488-20191031144828

The Crystal of Ivala looks an awful lot like a big divine shard, much bigger than the one in our Tower HQ. It can't be, though, because they're going to let people touch it - and therefore risk absorbing it, as the succubi had to consciously resist doing when they sucked lifeforce from the small one.

But wait, the promise is that touching it will cure all disease. All disease. Chronically sick people are likely going to test that out with conditions that have defied normal healers for years. And if it's just a crack team of super elite healers casting spells on supplicants from behind the wall tapestries, people will notice that. So either they're going to restrict access to this miracle very carefully, and look like stingy frauds (which they probably are in that case)... or it's really a divine shard, a crystallized source of pure vitality.

Given its colossal size, could it really be Ivala's shard, which Riala speculates someone else has taken captive even though we know Ivala isn't dead?

There's something we know about the dark shards that power Incubi: It's possible to wrap them in a magical cocoon that controls what power leaks through. Robin did this so that Simon would slowly transform the Incubus Emperor's shard while it did not transform him. Perhaps this Crystal of Ivala is a real divine shard, within a layer of protective magical barrier that only allows it to revitalize and heal those who touch, without allowing them to draw it into their bodies and become goddesses?

Surely that would justify the expense and secrecy of the new facilities in Ardford - that, and a truly godlike level of security in case anyone tries to break through to the shard itself.

As a bonus, this may answer where Hester got the power for Ivala's Wall back in 3AW.