EdGreenwood

LOST LORE OF THE REALMS #23

Added 2025-10-12 21:11:26 +0000 UTC

Once again life disrupts the intended schedule: it's Canadian Thanksgiving, but dark and early tomorrow I begin the drive to GameholeCon, which is NOT to be missed! That trip will likely make the NEXT instalment of Lost Lore a few days late, but never fear...it SHALL appear!

In the meantime, enjoy this one!

Wild Edibles Of Coastal Cormyr

Coastal edible wildflowers and weeds of Cormyr include Elengur (wash-weed), Mammurth, Wuthdrar, and Yamril (all detailed in Amarune’s Almanacs, from Vorpal Dice Press). They are hardy and fast-growing, so remain surprisingly plentiful despite many locals casually picking them for snacks. Farms in this area offer many “branches reaching out over the fences” sloes and quince to the wayfarer. Such accessible-to-anyone edibles are often called “fence-hedge” crops.

Wild strawberries vary in size according to how much water, sun, and soil nourishment they get, and have always been eaten as raw berries in the Heartlands and farther south.

In the Vilhon, Tethyr, and Chessenta, they’ve long been cultivated, being a “manure crop” (the bushes get farm animal manure root dressings). Strawberries are made into strawberry wine, strawberry puddings and tarts, and used as an ingredient in hearth pottages (stews).

In coastal Cormyr, wild raspberries are far more common than wild strawberries, but in boggy areas, “bog blueberries” outdo both.

And the shores and shallows of that coast (and all around the Dragonmere and the Neck) offer eels, clams, crabs, and crayfish. With squid, silverfin and skilletar (= flounders) in deeper waters.

Notes On Elminster’s Visits To Earth

Being a Weave anchor, Elminster brings a long, tenuous strand of the Weave with him when he visits other worlds (other Prime Material Planes, like our “Earth”).

He usually jaunts between Toril and Earth via existing gates (portals), and knows many ways back, so is never “stuck.”

He also knows how to access magic on Earth, thanks to many visits and much experimenting.

If an Earth person went the other way and happened to have the Gift (ability to wield the Art = arcane magic; not all do), they could experiment, and be trained, and so learn to work magic in the Realms. Safe handling comes slowly.

And what does he get up to, on such visits?

I suspect he often hides things here that he doesn’t want found, back on Toril, but when he interacts with me…well, here’s a recent overview:

El wanted a ride in a canoe on a placid northern Ontario lake, and got one. He now knows that standing up in a canoe and LEANING is a good way to get wet. Luckily for him, he knows a spell that can expel all excess water from clothing, hair, and body. Unluckily for me, the magic just hurls a wet mist out in all directions. Yuck.

El loves lightning storms, and striding over the gently manicured hills of golf courses with his staff held high, getting struck repeatedly by lightning. DON’T TRY THIS; he’s an archwizard and foolhardy to boot.

Some old camping glades survive in some of Toronto’s ravine parks (log seats in a ring, well away from the paved paths and manicured areas). Lots of teenagers discover these, and so, in COVID times, did some local fantasy and sf fans and writers, who still get together to drink and chat from afternoons until moondown in the wee hours. Far from me (I’m now a hundred-some miles east out in the countryside), but El remembered their moots, and attended. In disguise as, well, me. He assures me he behaved, and told me he loves the energy, idealism, crazy ideas and passionate discussions of them, and the youthful cynicism, too (“so CUTE,” he deemed it).

El also confessed to attending—in a different guise—a not-yet-released-TTRPG playtest in a Toronto-area basement.

“Their ideas of magic are so TWISTED,” he told me.

“Cthulhu twisted?” I asked.

“Worse,” he said darkly.

And of course the Old Mage continues his usual raids on my larder and wine cellar. No ice cream (I’m being a good diabetic; El did NOT approve), and he found some of the libations I procured for my library ladies (co-workers at the day job) bewildering (as in: “Folk DRINK this cr—stuff? WILLINGLY?”) but enjoyed others (leaving me a heap of empty bottles). He also read some of the novels I’m working on and found them HILARIOUS.

Some were even meant to be funny.

I’ll add this: having seen many folks wearing masks to guard against the coronavirus, El couldn’t understand why we don’t all seize the opportunity to wear plague doctor masks or wilder face coverings with snouts and so on.

“Folk in your world need to PLAY more,” he told me, “and not just when they’re young. Life is too short to stop having fun.” He then used a spell to conjure up pies and started a pie fight. My cat was NOT impressed.

Secrets Of Saerloon

The many small local gnome and human family firms who make various cast alloy items (collectively “pewter”) have had suspicions swirling around them for years, mainly of smuggling (small valuable items encased inside castings). Recently, word has leaked out that the Vronan gnome family sells “darkware” to select customers: cast pewter cups or goblets that poison wine

In the wake of the sudden disappearance (likely assassination) of Lord Governor Haelta “Johannes” Jauhanneszlan, not only did the Netherese influence over the city fade almost overnight (after the destruction of the city of Thultanthar [Shade]), rumors arose that she’d been assembling a local treasury for the Netherese, partly from wealth seized from the temples to other gods than Shar she’d seized and destroyed or rebuilt into arsenals, barracks, and coinvaults (banks). Various folk, both citizens and visiting adventurers, have been hunting for Haelta’s hidden wealth, thus far without any (publicly known) success.

Fire recently broke out at the Mavnurathan family shipyard and destroyed two caravels under construction. A sword was seen to rise up out of the ashes and fly away—into the heart of the city. So what was a magical blade doing aboard a half-finished hull usually a-swarm with workers? Where did it go, who has it now, and what are its powers?

Two of the quietest “old coin” merchant families of Saerloon are the houses of Harandreth (who have holdings all over the Dragon Coast and Vilhon Reach ports) and Ponszcelam [“PAWN-sell-amm”] (known as jewelers and dealers in luxury furniture, hangings, and furnishings of all kinds). Although both were rumored to have been working closely with the Netherese, both are now believed to have sponsored the removal of the Lord Governor, and to be covertly seeking to choose who sits on the new Sarcrescent of Saerloon (ruling merchant council, which now has six members and is planned to have nine as soon as possible, and eventually a dozen). They may or may not have had something to do with the murder of two Crescent Councillors, one of whom is rumored to have been secretly either a Thayan or a Zhentarim, depending on which rumors one believes).

Keeping Asmodeus At Bay

To keep Asmodeus from approaching, grappling, or physically attacking you, carry a “snarlshard.” A what? Well, picture a spindle-shaped, razor-sharp piece of black gemstone, resembling obsidian. When “given blood” (handling it bare-handed will do; it will slice you somewhere!), willed to drink, and hurled at or touched to someone, it will instantly start to drain magic (memorized spells) and/or life energy (hp) from a living being (NOT scrolls or magic items). It will bond to flesh, though it can easily be plucked off. Note that a snarlshard must penetrate/cut/scrape/do damage directly for draining to occur.

So Asmodeus would pause to go around a floating shard, or dodge one, or even flee to circumvent it and come at its source by another way.

Needless to say, anyone openly striding around the Nine Hells with a snarlshard is going to get BURIED in lesser devils, sent to rend them limb from limb. No unguarded, unhidden, unguarded snarlshards are to be found in the Hells, but there are quite a few of them all over Toril. They were a favourite “secret weapon” among the Netherese and (still are, among) certain hin and gnome families.

Weapons can be tipped with snarlshards, and unlike obsidian or glass, snarlshards don’t easily shatter...but they do chip and flake, so are short-use “tips and edges.”

And yes, there are other means, both artifacts and entities, but they’re far rarer and more secret or secretive, for obvious reasons.

Getting Into Candlekeep

For initial entry, the Avowed require visitors to present a “worthy” (their judgement only) book that isn’t yet in their library (or a complete and “better” copy of one already in their library). An accepted donation grants that visitor access for life.

To prevent someone else claiming to be a previously-admitted visitor, and perhaps using a magical disguise, the monk at the gate tells them their old room is waiting for them. If they don’t then head in the right direction, a senior monk secretly works a little thought-reading magic on them. (Monks who worked with them before may converse with them about past studies, too.) And some of the Avowed have some surprising, hidden abilities (not all of them are human).

The monks do study the offered work on the spot, largely to make sure it’s not an exact or inferior duplicate of an already-possessed work. During this examination, they determine its worth: anything old, even business ledgers, tends to be valued because of what sages and the monks can deduce from combining it with what they've learned from other old books. Fictional works are always valuable if they record folk tales, song lyrics, and the like unless all have been previously duplicated in the Candlekeep collection. Brand-new, self-penned works receive the harshest scrutiny, but if they tell a story, however banal, they're almost always accepted. Candlekeep wants all written stuff, and there's no such thing as “political correctness” or budget constraints or even space limitations on their collection.

The River Lapendrar (In Thay)

Many barges and ferries ply the River Lapendrar, and captains warn passengers that many dangers lurk in the waters.

These include giant gar, giant snapping turtles, giant clams, morkoths, swarms of eels, water drakes, and octopuses. All freshwater.

And if you bathe in the river for long periods, plentiful leeches (normal, not giant, though in this cae “normal” can grow up to seven inches long).

After Szass Tam consolidated his rule, he introduced water weirds to the river, in an unsuccessful attempt to “control” all the other living menaces.

And at the mouth of the Lapendrar, where it meets the sea, dwell a small colony of merrow who actively prowl and patrol; their depredations have eliminated small open boat fishing in the area.

Summer In Waterdeep

Usually the cooling shore breezes (winds blowing from the sea) make life bearable (70s in Fahrenheit) at the height of the summer, but when those winds die the city can turn into a sauna in the sunlight (hot damp; high 80s).

Guards who usually wear plate armor would go down to “back-and-breast” (plates, held on with leather straps), plus gorget (throat) and cup (groin) plates, with white-hued surcoats to avoid absorbing heat. No gauntlets. Light helms are usually worn.

The cooling breezes are offset by warm ocean currents, that keep the harbor open (free of more than rime ice) longer than other places at the same latitude).

Bananas On The Sword Coast

Bananas can be purchased all along the Sword Coast, in ports only, except when the harbors ice in during the depths of winter. Bananas (many varieties) are a popular crop from the Tashalar southwards. The small green ones, if shielded from the sun, take forever to ripen and so are ideal for bulk shipping (a vendor in a port city exposes just what they want to sell the next day to the sun). Rare outside the ports, uncommon but not hard to find within them, priced about the same as good melons (so, affordable). The small green bananas, known as “knuth” (NUT-hh), have a caramel-like, semi-sweet taste.

And the "wouldn't fit" tags this time around are:

#Haelta “Johannes” Jauhanneszlan

#manure crop

#Mavnurathan (family)

#merrow

#moondown

#morkoths

#(the) Neck

#Netherese

#Nine Hells

#octopuses

#Old Mage