Quiverberry Quest (LONG)

From: Guy Hoyle <ghoyle1_at_...>
Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2001 10:45:37 -0500


I woke up early this morning with a ridiculous idea for an adventure, for which I'd like some feedback. I have not written it up in scenario format yet, but I'd appreciate some advice in converting it. If you notice something that doesn't work for you, please let me know.

Guy Hoyle

Short summary: To avoid a disaster for their clan at this year's sacred cooking contest, the player characters must go on a quest for the fabled quiverberries. After overcoming many obstacles, they must return with the fabled berries in time for the contest, which their clan's best baker must win.

There is a certain Earth Season festival in the players' tribe that includes a baking contest. Every year for the last five years, the Ruddyfurrow clan (or the players' clan, if that has been determined) has been narrowly beaten by the Dogleaf clan's mouth-watering delicacies. The clan ancestors predict a disastrous famine if they don't win this year. Barbeena Whitefingers, the Ruddyfurrows' best baker, has recently rediscovered the lost recipe for the legendary Quiverberry Pie for which the clan was once famous.

Quiverberries were renowned in Ruddyfurrow lore as one of the gifts Orlanth brought to Ernalda when he was wooing her. Rare even in legend, the iridescent purple berries quiver slightly even after they are picked, and eating them (or something made from them) provides a pleasant tickling sensation in the belly, and a gentle though not intoxicating euphoria. They are powerfully addictive, however. Old scraps of legend warn of the seductive wiles of Old Man Quiverberry's daughter, and of Orlanth's victory over the angry god's quarrelsome son. Finally, when Orlanth sends Minlister to brew some Quiverberry Beer, and teaches Old Man Quiverberry how to do it, then the two gods make their peace.

The biggest problem is that quiverberries seem to have become extinct. However, some careful and clever divination will reveal that Gornalda Gornasdotter, who lives a long way away, knows the location of the bogs where the last quiverberries are to be found. The characters must travel there and convince her to give them the location of the quiverberry bogs, which she will not be happy to do; if they will recover the special platter her sister Grelda Greatbelly "stole" from her on her wedding night, then she'll divulge the location.

Grelda lives nearby, but she has been feuding with Gornalda about her right to the dish (a platter which belonged to their mother). She absolutely refuses to part with the dish, which leaves the characters with little choice but to steal it or find another way to obtain it. They can do this by stealing it, by finding some kind of obscure legal precedent in tribal law which grants the platter to Gornalda, etc. If the characters tell Grelda why they need the platter, she tells them that the quiverberry bogs are guarded by quiverberry daimones, which will visit misfortune on anyone who takes the berries without the proper ceremony. However, she doesn't know what the proper ceremony is.

Assuming that the characters are successful in obtaining the platter, they can return it to Gornalda. However, a merchant from the Dogleaf clan has visited her, telling lies about them and sullying their reputation. If she can be convinced (a trial by combat, fast-talking, etc.), then she will direct the players to the location of the quiverberry bog. She doesn't know anything about the guardians of the bog; however, if anybody does know, it's her cousin Gullbag, who supposedly made some quiverberry wine that came from the berries of this bog.

If the characters decide to look up Gullbag, they will find that he's been driven mad by his taste of the wine, his lips stained iridescent purple by the taste which lingers forever in his mouth and his heart. When asked about the quiverberry bogs, he hems and haws for awhile (he is afraid of the quiverberry guardians, who visited his dreams when he stole the berries, and scared him out of his wits the next time he visited the bogs). However, when they mention anything about appeasing the quiverberry guardians, he makes up a complicated, ridiculous dance that, he claims, needs to be performed all night in front of the cairn of large rocks where the Quiverberry Guardians reside. Of course, the ritual works better if you don't wear any clothes, and paint the appropriate portions of yourself with "berry patterns", so that you can pass for "berry spirits".

The ritual is just a bluff, so that the characters will distract the quiverberry guardians while Gullbag gorges himself on quiverberries (almost all of them, in fact). This is all part of his nefarious plot for vengeance upon the tribe that cast him out when he fell prey to the madness of his quiverberry wine. He plans to sneak back to the stead of the clan's king and throw up on the mother alynx, cursing her offspring with ridiculous purple blotches and bringing scorn upon the king. (The curse won't work, though; Gullbag has forgotten which tribe he used to belong to so he will sneak into the wrong hall, and the only thing that happens when Gullbag throws up on the alynx is that he suffers retribution from a sticky, angry alynx.) If the characters can prevent Gullbag's plot from succeeding, their dance will have amused the quiverberry guardian so much that they can pick as many quiverberries as they need. If they are found to be part of Gullbag's plot, even unwillingly, or attempt to bypass the guardians, the stones of the cairn grumble menacingly and move to grind the characters beneath them. However, the stones are dreadfully slow, and cannot go past the bounds of the bog, so escape is not only possible but likely. Anyone suffering the wrath of the quiverberry guardians will have dreadful nightmares where "berries" are picked off their naked bodies all night long, only on the night after they escaped the bog. If they taste any of the purloined quiverberries, their lips will be stained iridescent purple and they'll remember the indescribably but unbearably delicious flavor of the berries for the rest of their lives, which is what drove Gullbag mad with longing. If the berries were obtained with the consent of the quiverberry guardians, the characters will remember the flavor pleasantly whenever they want to, but they will not be stained. Someone with the knowledge of brewing or winemaking, who offers to stay and make a batch of quiverberry wine or beer, will be welcomed by the guardians, but that person will have to stay behind and miss the competition.

Bringing the quiverberries out of the bog sets some minor magical events into motion, however. The Quiverberry Boys are mute warriors, with leaves instead of hair, their unclad bodies painted in purple berry patterns, who fight only with leafy whips and slingsful of small, berrylike stones. The Barefoot Beseecher is an old, old man with iridescent purple eyes and purple teeth, who speaks longingly of bringing quiverberries back to Dragon Pass if the characters will only part with the ones they have, "so that all our children's smiles will be sticky and purple with quiverberry juice". He offers no violence to them, but if they abuse him flocks of birds from all over Dragon Pass, Tarsh, and the Holy Country will show up in ever-increasing numbers, trying to gorge upon the sweet fruit. Finally, the Berry Berry Maidens will visit any man who has tasted the berries; these delicate girls, purple of hair and eye and lip, tempt those men who find themselves alone, seducing them with berry-sweet kisses and the promise of their purple-tipped breasts. Those who succumb to their temptations are swiftly drawn back to the quiverberry bogs, usually dallying for the rest of their short lives in a fatal bliss. The purple bones of those who have suffered this fate are found beneath the cairn of the Quiverberry Guardians.

Even if the characters manage to overcome these challenges, the ever-present temptation of the berries threatens to make them betray their task and consume the berries utterly; even if they resist, anyone they meet on the road is tempted as well. In addition, the Dogleaf clan has sent some warriors to ambush them, stealing the berries or delaying the characters until it's too late to make the pie.

Assuming that the characters have successfully returned with enough berries to make a quiverberry pie, the adventure is not over yet. The Dogleafs try and sneak something unpleasant into the pie; once the pie is baked and cooling, they try to steal it; anyone who stole the berries must appease the ancestors for tainting the ceremonies with theft; Gullbag tracks the characters down, accusing them of tricking him, of being unfaithful to their spouses with the Berry Berry Maidens or the Quiverberry Boys, vomiting on alynxes, and whatever will cause a stir. Once these obstacles are overcome, however, the contest takes place, the judges render their verdict, Barbeena Whitefingers puts the Dogleaf's best baker to shame, and, amazingly enough, there's a piece of Quiverberry Pie with some fresh cream for everybody.

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