A great topic! I'd think that there is a legend that our (fill in the culture) writing is descended from the first language written on the Spike. (Course it mostly won't be, but so what?) During the Greater Darkness, I suspect that many of those who actually did know writing died protecting their flocks, so most systems have been reinvented since then.
In mostly illiterate cultures writing will be considered powerful and magical, and not for common folks. Runes, OTOH, are used commonly in Sartari culture, and there could well be a system equating various signs with particular sounds, again not necessarily widely known. Don't discount the possibility of a syllabic system, either, like the ancient Egyptian one.
Anyway, I'd suspect that your Sartari wouldn't necessarily have any clue how to recognise the sounds that the writing represents, so if you wanted to stymie them, I'd certainly accept it as a player.
Alison
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