The Book of Visitations of Glory

Issue Twelve | Feb 2008

These Mean Streets

by Barry Blatt

Introduction

Jakálla Foreign Quarter is tough place, not quite lawless anarchy, but the authorities care little what happens to nakomé scum, foreigners and aliens and only shift themselves to intervene in crime when riots are threatened and inducements offered.

This leaves the field free for ‘freelance’ law enforcement by the inhabitants themselves and opportunities for those down on their luck to haul themselves out of poverty by preying on those even less lucky. Tsolyánu may be a paradise to its citizens, who hymn the Emperor every day for his divinely mandated rule, but is a cruel place to the noncitizen, foreigner and outcast.

Author’s Notes

I have given stats for Tékumel: Empire of the Petal Throne, The Guardians of Order incarnation of Tékumel abbreviated as T:EPT in the text, and for the original TSR Empire of the Petal Throne game, noted as OEPT. I apologise to fans of Gardásiyal and urge the authors of the d20 Tékumel rules to get them published. This is fairly straightforward ‘dungeon bash’ at heart, but I have highlighted certain elements I think give an adventure a specifically Empire of the Petal Throne feel. I freely admit to lifting this idea from the Dying Earth RPG (published by Pelgrane Press) which uses a similar checklist to ensure scenarios have a sufficiently ‘Vancian’ feel.

Odd Customs
In the Swords and Glory sourcebooks Professor Barker lovingly describes a whole gamut of peculiar customs and folkways. Using these will help reinforce the feeling that Tékumel’s nations are old, stratified and highly ritualised and challenge the players to break out of their easy going western liberal mindset and adopt the role of someone truly different. The GM could, for example, simply make a point of the various greeting gestures and phrases used by different religions, ethnicities and social strata, describe the peculiar facial scarifications so important in the Kráa Hills, get players terminally embarrassed over Yán Koryáni sexual mores and so on.

Political Shenanigans
The Tsolyáni have a deity dedicated to lying and subterfuge, have institutionalised assassination and a tacit acceptance of peculation and bribery. In any situation at least one person is going to be following a secret agenda and/or hiding their true factional allegiance, perpetrating a scam, doing the dirty on a rival, looking for an opportunity for blackmail and so on and so forth. The Tsolyáni are a deeply honourable people, and don’t you ever forget it if you wish to avoid getting involved in a duel, but in the quest to climb the social ladder they are willing to commit any number of dubious deeds.

Punctilious Etiquette
The Tsolyáni are honourable people, they are touchy and liable to indulge in lawsuits and/or violence if they feel that this honour has been impugned and so they are always very polite and correct in their language. This correctness includes talking to lower caste people as if they were shit, and grovelling outrageously to anyone upper caste and doing your damndest never to contradict or disagree with them outright even when they are talking utter rubbish, out of fear of impalement. I suggest in each scenario there should be at least one awkward situation where players have to talk their way out of a sticky social situation with the possibility of death and mutilation for ‘rudeness’ an ever present threat.

Casual Cruelty
Tékumel is a fun place to visit, but living there would be hell. People are impaled for being rude to arrogant stuck-up pea-brained nobles, there is sexual exploitation of slaves, humans are sacrificed daily, people are born into rubbish jobs like latrine digger and expected to remain such the whole of their miserable lives, there is open racism and subtle sectarianism. At all levels of society you can encounter heartless oppression and cruelty. Make your players uncomfortable by shoving this fact in their face every so often, and if possible require them to participate.

Weird Magic and Obtuse Technology
Tékumel is magical place. People point at stuff and it explodes, they take over each others minds like puppeteers and the dead get up and walk. There are a lot of fraudsters making magical claims they cannot back up too, but once in a while you meet some magical phenomenon that will make your skin crawl and your mind reel. If the players ever start taking magic for granted remind them that it emanates from the mysterious gaps between the universes and mere mortals must be very careful with it lest they lose their very souls.

Tékumel is a scientific place. The whole planet is an artificial environment, its very gravity has been modified by technology, the staple food, dná grain, is a GM crop and there are androids and robots on the loose below most cities, zapping people with laser beams. Once in a while let the players come across a piece of familiar technology in this unfamiliar setting, a trick used by Professor Barker in his novels and in the Adventures on Tékumel series. What would medievally minded folk make of a mobile phone? A beeping flashing idol that lets you talk to god? What use would they make of an ye of Retaining All Things Forever (a holographic camera)?

Alien Vistas and Ancient Ruins
Tékumel contains animals and plants from at least 14 different planets, has 17 intelligent alien species, not counting the ones that have gone extinct, visit occasionally from other planes or pretend to be semi-intelligent at best to avoid hassle. Your chances of finding a familiar terrestrial type animal or plant on Tékumel is very slim. Remind the players of this regularly with outbreaks of strange alien wildlife and flora; paddy fields of yafa-rice guarded against pests by semi-domesticated polyps, flute-trees which use sound to attract insect pollinators rather than bright flowers, pollinators which are not insects at all but gas-filled aerial molluscs.

Tékumel is very old. The gap between the fall of Éngsvan hlá Gánga and the rise of the Empire of the Petal Throne is 10,000 years, a span of time equivalent to the whole of earthly history from the first permanently settled villages in the hills of the Fertile Crescent to the modern day. The Empire of the Petal Throne is 2300 years old; this is as if the Roman Empire never fell in earthly terms. Players should come across stupendously old buildings on a regular basis with five hundred year old clanhouses made of ever repaired and recycled mud brick a commonplace, a towns ‘new’ temple being a mere millennium old and an architectural curio decorated with bas reliefs of writhing feshénga and dancing girls in an unknown style and commemorating a king and kingdom long forgotten standing half-buried and used as káika-coop by the local peasants. Shelley's Ozymandias would feel right at home on Tékumel.

Exotic Food and Overstated Costume
The Dying Earth novels are full of descriptions of the fantastic meals and outfits that are the hallmark of its self-indulgent society, and the Professor likewise made great use of outlandish costume and cuisine in creating a similar atmosphere in his Tékumel novels. We should do the same in our scenarios, making the irruption of a temple procession into the world of off-white kilts and loincloths in the back streets of Jakálla a feast for the eyes with plumed masks and embroidered banners, the shaven scalps of the priests painted with icons and hordes of acolytes throwing flowers across the path. No official is properly dressed without his official headdress, covered in symbols depicting his role in the bureaucracy (even if he is supervisor of sewers and latrine pits), and everyone must wear something communicating their clan origin and religious allegiance. Make players describe their characters everyday apparel and ornamentation.

And the food needs some attention as well—feasts are regular occurrence, so what do people eat? On a world where terrestrial-style vertebrates are a bit of a rarity and there are thousands of vegetables and spices from all round the galaxy all kinds of possibilities arise. A favourite starter in lands bordering the Gilraya Forest is wasp-nests; a certain species of wasp makes little nests 5-10cm across which have enough resin in their paper to stand being dunked into boiling water for 30 seconds or so. This poaches their grubs nicely and the nest can be served cut in two and the diner can remove the larvae with a wooden toothpick. Or aprai-melons stuffed with yakï beans? Aprai melons are toxic, yes, but the beans neutralise the toxins, you just have make sure you use enough of them. Cooking and Toxicology are closely related disciplines on Tékumel.

Not every scenario is going to use all of these elements, but adding a few of them will make a simple little job like throwing a gang of squatters out of a run-down building into a true Tékumel extravaganza.

The Situation

Jüggash Korolyágashmu is self-proclaimed ‘Lord’ of the Jakálla Salarvyáni exile community. He claims to be a scion of a cadet branch of the junior line of the Great House of Thireqúmmu, but hides whenever a real Salarvyáni noble is in town. He is pretty ‘in’ with the Flat Peak clan and has persuaded them to let him manage their property in the Foreign Quarter which consists of some rather tumbledown tenement blocks. His contract is of course dependent on providing a good return on minimal investment, and if he does well he will eventually be adopted into the clan and granted citizenship.

Unfortunately one of these blocks is home to a large group of Salarvyáni exiles calling themselves the ‘Ügremish clan’. These nakomé reprobates have been paying no rent for years and have the temerity to dispute the provenance of the title deed and contract papers waved in their filthy faces by Jüggash. They say they rent the building from the last surviving member of the Golden Crab clan, who oddly enough cannot now be found.

Jüggash wants the squatters removed, and the PCs are going to help him do it. How the GM involves the PCs in this unsavoury situation depends on their social status. If they are barbarians just ‘off the boat’ this kind of freelance thuggery is as good an offer of employment as any, and many a Very Low or Low clan member is hard up enough to consider such a job. They may even have their services offered to the Flat Peak by their clan elders as the Ügremish have been annoying some of the very low clans by undercutting their casual labour rates.

Higher clan PCs may be involved as part of the city’s bureaucracy or police force if Jüggash has a bit more money to spend and can afford a few bribes. He might even be able to get the odd legionary or temple guard involved.

Alien Vistas and Ancient Ruins: Jakálla in the Rain

Jakálla, The City Half As Old As Time, Green Princess of the Eqúnoyel River, a place whose fame and glory spreads across the known world. Many people from all over the world yearn to see its mighty palaces and glorious temples, the (allegedly) jewelled bridges and beautiful Palace of the Ever-Living Lord. Many people who have lived there for years yearn to see them as well, trapped as they are in the infamous Foreign Quarter, surrounded by high city walls surmounted with impaling stakes and rotting corpses.

Not that they could see much of the rest of the city on a day like this; it is not so much raining as the entire atmosphere has liquefied and is falling upon the steaming city in a never ending avalanche, a monsoon that lasts on and off for three months from Hasanpór to Didóm. Today one of Jakálla’s less glamorous epithets, The City on the Yellow Mud, is the most apposite. The streets of the Foreign Quarter run with murky yellow water, and, where the sewers are blocked, brownish things as well. People are still out and about though, the petty market stalls covered with leaky rush matting, the shopkeepers squatting on upturned baskets to stay out of the mud. Barefoot plebeians, clad in loincloths and wide straw hats, wade through the streets towards the docks where they hope to earn a few qirgál shifting goods, the crowd by the Gate of the Black Stair seeking access to the city proper is as thick as ever, men and women squatting on plank benches waiting their turn to dicker and argue with the gate guards. Beggars hold their usual posts on the corners, bony hands held out to all who pass, but as usual receiving little but drops of water.

Much of the yellow mud on the streets comes from the walls of the ramshackle buildings. In places veritable waterfalls flow off the roofs down the faces of the three and four storey blocks, carving gullies into the plaster and revealing the baked yellow clay bricks beneath. The top and bottom floors of such buildings are often abandoned on days like this, the water from the streets flows through the ground floor and the roofs are so leaky you might as well be outside. The ancient past of the city shows through. There are stubs of buried walls in the more rutted streets, remnants of the last ditlána where the whole city was buried and rebuilt, catching pools of water like little dams. On one corner the whole street has subsided into an alleyway built millennia before, then buried and forgotten.

Some people seem to enjoy the downpour though. A procession of barbarians from some far off island are dancing naked through the streets with bones through their noses and feathers in their hair howling praise to whatever crude aspect of Avánthe they call their own. They shake everyone’s hand as they pass, trying to haul them out of their torpor and join their procession. Some people smile, but many recoil and wash their hands of any demon-taint in the muddy yellow water. A few watch the savages pass through circled fingers, a deep insult if only they knew it, and a sure method of spotting any evil demons they may be bringing forth with their mispronounced prayers.

Initial Encounter: Disputation at the Tower of the Red Dome: Punctilious Etiquette

There is a sudden flurry of activity around the Gate of the Black Stair; two gents lounging on palanquins appear with a body of men bearing clubs and two pushing a handcart laden with rakes and shovels. It is the dreaded Supervisor of Labour for the Glory of the Realm and the Lord of Easy Flowings (and their entourage)! (see Haruné and Eikó).

Unsurprisingly many of the crowd by the stair slosh away through the rain as nonchalantly as possible, but an unlucky few are bellowed at by Haruné and marshalled into a line by the armed men. They are marched between the two officials who give them the once over, their names are written down and they are then handed a shovel and fall resignedly into line.

Once the retreating unemployed are round the corner they break into a run and scatter into the alleyways and other refuges including the Tower of the Red Dome, where the PCs are either living or are dragged by the tide of fleeing people. This, it turns out is a big mistake, as these two worthies always make the Tower their first port of call after rounding up the beggars at the stairs.

At this point the PCs are trapped. Haruné yells obscenities in their general direction and a loud voiced Tirrikámu informs them that they have just volunteered to Labour for the Glory of the Realm. If they are of low status they will just have to put up with it, but mid status persons might be able to answer back respectfully and wheedle their way out of a day’s hard labour in the sewers. They will of course have to explain to the City Guard Sergeant why they are in the Foreigners Quarter if they are persons of any status, and this may land them in even deeper and dirtier water…

At a key point in the argument (before they are arrested, thumped, or marched off to dig) Jüggash appears. He too needs labour, and anyone who signs up with him has a halfway decent excuse not to dig as they are in effect being sworn in as deputies of the Guard to deal with malefactors against the realm. This will of course cut no ice with Haruné, and Jüggash will eventually negotiate with Haruné (standing under his little waterfall and via the grovelling Arján) The PCs will not know the terms unless they can sneak up and overhear, but essentially Jüggash is selling the Ügremish clan to the Iron Helm clan at a knock down price as slave labourers – not that he owns them (yet).

Overstated Costume and Odd Customs: Haruné and Eikó

Tsolyáni officials love a nice hat, and these two worthies are no exception.

Haruné hiJuyukkún, a member of the Iron Helm clan and follower of Hrü’u, is Supervisor of Labour for the Glory of the Realm, a post that involves rounding up whatever labour is needed to carry out emergency repairs on the fabric of the city. He is often seen being carted around in his all-weather palanquin during the monsoon season as the sewers inevitably get blocked and sometimes sandbag defences need putting round the government offices and palaces. City dwellers are occasionally drafted to help dig out drainage ditches in the nearby fields or roofs and walls collapse and need to be made safe and cleared away and so on. Theoretically he can conscript absolutely anyone within the city walls, in practice he goes for the nakomé in the Foreigners Quarter, grabs very low clanners but does give them a couple of qirgál or so a day, negotiates with low clans for low price work gangs and borrows slaves from mid and higher clans, if that’s OK with them. Those who object to being conscripted are imprisoned and fined; in the case of members of the lowest clans and nakomé this usually means they end up enslaved anyway.

When on duty he wears a white chlén hide headpiece adorned with two curved truncheons supporting a seal of the Palace of the Realm surrounded by a golden sunburst and his wide blue and gold collar is adorned with stylised motifs of builders and labourers and has a pyramid on each shoulder. He also wears a purple and blue robe, gilded workboots with silver studs in the soles, bears an ornamental whip in one hand and a pointed swagger stick in the other, all symbolising aspects of his role. He never gets out his palanquin if he can help it, being very overweight, and summons people to talk to him where the rain running off its peaked roof falls in their faces, just to rub in his authority. He never speaks directly to nakomé or indeed anyone below high clan. He bellows loudly at one of his minions who them bellows the message onwards usually from a distance of mere inches.

Lord Eikó hiFershéna is a member of the Golden Dawn clan and a worshipper of Avánthe. He is Lord of Easy Flowings and responsible for directing the works done to prevent flooding, and to dig out sewers and latrine pits. He has to accompany Haruné to make sure he gets the right number of ‘volunteers’ and to direct them to his current work sites. He is empowered to enter any premises and inspect its drains and latrines, and actually does so, directly supervising his servants as they rod out drains and closely inspecting the impacted solids they extract from the sewers, using the semi-magical art of geomancy to analyse these substances and locate the key blockages by swinging a magnetic iron talisman over them. This has two faces, one of a constipated demon in tears and one of a relaxed demon smiling happily. He will sometimes inspect potential recruits with this device, asking the demon ‘Is this person a good shitter?’ This is unusual and eccentric but not rude—the Tsolyáni are peculiar about many things but bodily functions are not one of them.

He is a tall skinny fellow, looming over most people when he deigns to get out of his palanquin, with permanent look of distaste on his wrinkled face (brought on by smelling so much shit according to his admiring minions). His headdress consists of a blue headband with little silver shovels alternating with ovoids on sticks in bronze. He wears a jewelled amulet shaped like a muck-rake round his neck and he too carries a whip—a real one, and he will use it if he feels his workforce is not taking the blockages seriously enough. Haruné hates him as he is a ‘Lord’ and Haruné a mere Supervisor even though he is far higher social rank, and they address each other only through a long suffering flunky called Arján the Weary who must kneel every time he speaks to Haruné (as he is a noble) and clap his hands three times in the air and hold his nose when speaking to Eikó (as he is supposed to be so dedicated to supervising sewers he needs his attention grabbed and it is polite to imply that he always stinks due to his unending labours on behalf of the city).

This duo always appear with Arján, four palanquin bearers each, two workers with barrows full of tools, a scribe, a miscellaneous flunky with a rush mat on a stick to shield them from the rain should they wish to dismount, another flunky with a wooden step to assist the same, a Tirrikámu of the City Watch with a hand bell to summon assistance if needed, a Tirrikámu of the Legion of Kétl to supervise the removal and incarceration of refuseniks and four lesser ‘clerks’ of the office of Labour in light armour, helms and armed with stout staves for immediate suasion of those who dare to doubt that the Glory of the Realm needs their labour.

The Plan: Casual Cruelty and Political Shenanigans

Having been rescued from a day’s highly demeaning and unpaid labour in the sewers, the PCs will no doubt be curious as to what Jüggash has in mind. He ushers his men into the front room of a run down wine shop and explains the deal; evict the Ügremish, a bunch of no good Nakomé scum and he is willing to pay 40 hlásh, 10 up front, 30 on completion of job and bonuses for captives, 5 hlásh for a child under 14, 10 hlásh for a woman, and 12 hlásh for a man. There are 10 men, 12 women and 18 children as far Jüggash can tell.

In the wine shop waits Yuni of the Flat Peak clan, a 3rd circle clerk in the Palace of the Realm who is acting as Jüggash’s legal advisor (T:EPT Int 6, Law 1; OEPT Int 75, Class II Lawyer skill, see Appendix 1). He explains that he has obtained a writ from the Foreign Quarter Magistrate to allow the eviction, but there are conditions and limits as to what can be done, and the last thing he wants is the Ügremish to launch a counter suit for ‘shámtla’, bloodmoney and fines exacted for insults against honour and reputation.

• Any verbal assaults, threats and insults are OK – the Ügremish are Nakomé, have no honour and can be called anything you like without incurring any shámtla.
• Injuries must be limited to minor contusions. Drawing blood or causing harm liable to stop the injured party from working for one full day or more will possibly incur shámtla, even from a nakomé. If this does happen then Jüggash will cover it, but if someone is killed outright then that is your look out. Use clubs, not knives and don’t get carried away in the heat of the fight.
• The building itself must not be damaged, and the Ügremish must not be allowed to damage it. Any damage you cause will be taken off your wages, and if it looks like they are going to burn the place down hit ‘em hard if you can.
• Jüggash will not pay shámtla to anyone who is injured while in his employ, that is the nature of the job, but will pay out if someone is killed or permanently maimed. This should not happen, these are squatters not killers.
• If the Ügremish do injure you let Yuni know and he will assess the injury and put in a claim for shámtla against the Ügremish on your behalf.

The Ügremish owe some 480Kt in back rent, plus the costs of the eviction and legal fees to a total of 50Kt and Yuni, in his capacity as 3rd class surveyor of Low Clan accommodations will be inspecting the place for wear and tear to add on to this total should it need refurbishment (which of course it will). Yuni and Jüggash also hope that their impromptu bailiffs will get sufficiently knocked about for them to claim yet more shámtla on their behalf. The Ügremish will then be forced to sell some of their family members to Jüggash to cover the bill, who will sell them on at a mark-up to the Iron Helm.

The Attack

The Ügremish have been expecting this kind of assault ever since Jüggash turned up with his rent demand and fake deeds and have posted a couple of kids on the approach roads to the tenement building as sentries. These will run to the building as they spot Jüggash and his thugs coming and they will set about defending it. Four of the men, two of the women and four of the children will be out working—they clan still need to make money to eat—but a child will run round the Foreign Quarter and down to Músa Jakálla Docks looking for them to warn them what is going on. They will turn up at the building in an hour or so.

The plan is simple. The lower floor is occupied by the men who have a barricade to place over the front door. Three will hold this barricade in place while Ösh Ügremish the headman and two others make sure than no one comes through the downstairs windows by bashing anyone who tries on the head from concealed positions by the wall. Ösh will use his talent for being intimidating to promise that anyone who dares attack will be killed.

Upstairs the women and kids keep a continual barrage of bricks and buckets of slops falling on the attackers. If the lower floor is taken the defenders will run up the stairs and make a second defence on the first floor landing, Ösh in the front of the fighting while further rocks are hurled as appropriate.

If it looks like too many attackers (6+) are coming at this point then the women and children will start enlarging a hole on the third floor into the building next door. The walls are pretty weak, being much riddled with Wall-Tongues (see box Alien Vistas: Wall Tongues). This will give them access to the building next door which is inhabited by a few Ahoggyá, who will be so surprised at the intrusion that they will fail to stop any of the fleeing people running down the stairs through their living area and out into the street.

Ösh will hold out until the last moment, keeping his men at the attack using his Command skill (OEPT: Use normal Morale rules, but as long as Ösh is conscious and fighting give the Ügremish +10%). They will flee to the third floor, pushing at an exposed and weakened beam that will collapse the ceiling on their pursuers as they use the escape hole made earlier by the women.

The attackers will consist of the PCs, backed up by Jüggash, and if the GM deems it necessary two of Jüggash’s flunkies and possibly a few more thugs for hire. Use the stats for Minor Thug of p234 of the T:EPT rulebook, or use standard Lev 1 Warriors with leather armour and clubs for OEPT. If the players stop and think about it they will be able to use planning and teamwork themselves, but GMs should not remind them.

The Clanhouse

The building lies on the eastern edge of the Foreigners Quarter, very near the city wall. The main entrance lies on the south side of the building on a small street, there is another entrance on a narrow alley to the north.

1. Kitchen/Main Living Area. The room is smoky from the cooking fire and reeks of a mix of boiled vegetables, incense and decaying meat. The floor is damp and there are splotches of mould on the ceiling where water drips through from the rain outside. The kitchen tables are covered in clutter; wooden bowls, utensils, clay jars etc. and a pot of some root vegetable sits boiling on the kitchen fire, which is burning dried chlén-dung, driftwood and a couple of sticks of charcoal. Observant PCs will notice that the smell is worst near the small grilles in the floor.

The door to the south has been blocked by a large table held by three men, while Ösh and two others lurk between the windows on the south wall. These are 1m wide and 1.5m high and have wooden shutters which are hinged at the top to allow for ventilation. The barricade can be pushed back by main strength using a battering ram (though it will have three Ügremish behind it pushing back), or chopped through with an axe. (T:ETP 48HP, 1 Armour rating, OEPT 20HP).

2. Stairwell. A very dim area lit mainly by light coming from a hole in the ceiling two floors above. The steps are quite shallow rising 1.5m in each stretch with a small landing halfway between each floor. The back door is only 1.2 m high and opens into a cramped space under the first landing, which is blocked off from the rest of the building by a pile of dried chlén-dung – the back door will not open and anyone kicking it in is in for nasty surprise. Qigékh (see Alien Creatures) scuttle about and there a couple of harmless phosphorescent fungi on the underside of the wooden stairs.

If the men in area 1 are pushed back they will retreat to the first floor landing and defend from there, while the women in areas 6, 7 and 8 will come to the stairwell and drop their rocks at those coming up the stairs towards the first landing.

3. Workshop. This room is full of smoke. The window shutters are open and black smoke pours out into the alleyway from a smouldering conical heap of hmélu hides on the flagstone floor. There are sacks of some grey powdery substance piled against the south wall, and a low dais toward the west wall is piled with seaweed. Anyone entering the room must save vs. Con or start coughing uncontrollably.

Further investigation will reveal what is going on. The river estuary is always getting clogged with weeds and one of the ways casual labourers like the Ügremish make a living is by cutting it and selling it to the alum-makers clans, who slow burn it and extract chemicals from the ash. The Ügremish have been trying to make more money by doing this somewhat inexpertly at home. Yuni the lawyer loves this as the fire definitely breaches building regulations and he can get a magistrate to slap a fine of 200Kt at least on the perpetrators for causing a health hazard. Any fighting that takes place in this room is at serious penalties due to the smoke.

4. Bathroom. This house was originally relatively upmarket for the district as it has it own pump linked to the city aqueduct and its own bathroom/washroom. This is a sunken brick recess in the floor with a tight fitting square wooden plug over a stone grille leading to the sewer below. The pump continually drips and has some unpleasant looking slime hanging from it, but for Nakomé this is luxury. A couple of laundry pounding stones sit on the edge of the pool area and there is a pile of half done washing, small greyish tunics worn by the children of the clan.

This room is very dim, and the window is only 45cm square and blocked by a cemented in wooden grille. This could be knocked out and a Tinalíya or Pygmy Folk could get in, but a human would have to be very small and flexible to use this as access.

5. Storeroom. This room is shut off from the kitchen by a flimsy door with a wooden frame and rush matting panels. Inside it is cluttered with boxes, barrels and half empty sacks. Something scuttles in the darkness.

The boxes bear the marks of several merchant clans, the Ügremish have obviously been pilfering from the docks. Yuni the lawyer is not so pleased about this, as it means the offended clans will press for impalement of any captives and Jüggash won’t get his slaves. If any PCs realise that this is evidence of theft he tells them to hush or they won’t get paid. The barrels are mostly empty but one has two gallons of soured héngka beer. The sacks contain slightly mouldy dná grain, and some empty sacks have been nailed to a trap door by way of camouflage. Opening it will reveal a noisome hole reeking of bad meat and cheap incense, a crate at the bottom providing a step of sorts down to the passage below.

The window is small and barred with a grille as in room 4 above and will provide access only for a tiny person. The scuttling is from more qigékh, the ugly spiny vermin common in southern parts of the continent (see Alien Creatures).

6. Ösh’s room. This room, like the others on this floor, has a bamboo bead curtain hanging in the doorway. There is one large sleeping mat, much frayed around the edges, and one blanket. There is a shelf with various bits of clutter. And there is a pile of half bricks by the window.

This room will initially contain three women and three children, one of whom will be chucking bricks out of the window at any attackers, while the others rush about screaming. If the attacking group makes it past the first barricade they will move to area 2 and defend the stairs, then flee to areas 10 and 12.

This is usually the private room of Ösh and his two wives. There is little of value here; on the shelf is a bone comb and a small pot of very cheap black lip-paint, the colour preferred by Salarvyáni women, maybe worth a couple of qirgál.

7. Dormitory. This room is strewn with dirty sleeping mats and few items of bedding. Water drips through in some quantity from the ceiling into a large clay pot near the door. By the south window is a pile of bricks ready to be hurled.

This room has a further four women and six children, who will again shower rocks on anyone who tries to attacks the building as noted above. One of the women is very old, maybe 60, and will be left behind when the others flee. The PCs will find her screaming incomprehensible insults at them and trying to brain them with a brick as they pursue the main body of the clan up to the second floor.

This area is usually inhabited by the married men and women and the smallest children. There is nothing of value here, juts the detritus of the life of the urban poor, a few objects such as clay cups, wooden spoons, a spare loincloth, needle and thread for repairing clothes etc.

8. Dormitory. Another room strewn with bedmats. The walls are painted with crude graffiti and scratched symbols. There is a fireplace on the west wall, but no signs any fire has been lit in it for years.

This room is used by the unmarried men and older boys, and will initially contain eight boys and girls between 8 and 14 who will chuck bricks down on any attackers before running to the upper floor.

There is again little of any value to be found in the room, a cheap knife, the odd qirgál (copper coin). PCs with reasonable knowledge of the theology of Sárku or Durritlámish (T:EPT Theology of Sárku skill roll at -2 for difficulty, OEPT Priest of Sárku Lev 2 or above) might recognise one of the symbols painted on the wall as being a symbol of Black Qárqa, a black skull with three eye sockets. Those with similar knowledge of Avánthe or Dlamélish and their cohorts will recognise among the rude pictures a few signs alluding to Shiringgáyi. None of the boys who use the room is literate and no further meaning can be gleaned from the marks. Yuni will add another 30Kt to his running total of fines for the vandalism.

Those who look up the very sooty and dirty chimney will find a hidden bundle. This is made up of what was quite reasonable quality green tunic before it got covered in soot and slashed with some sort of weapon and bled over. It is wrapped round a child-sized chlén hide armlet inlaid with silver wire and lacquered in white and green. This has a sigil of the Green Opal clan amongst the design, and if taken to them will be recognised by tearful clansmen as belonging to a young girl of high lineage who disappeared some months ago. If the players show it to Yuni or Jüggash they will again want it hidden—the Green Opal will want shámtla from the Ügremish at the very least, if not impalement of a few of the captives.

9. Dormitory. Another room with bedmats, slightly cleaner and less chaotic than the others.

This room is used by the younger women and girls of the clan and will not be occupied at the time of the initial attacks by the eviction squad as the Ügremish are not really expecting anyone to use the back alley. Anyone who climbs up who make sufficient noise will attract the attention of the people in room 7 and they will charge in accompanied by the occupants of rooms 6 and 8 to prevent them getting in if possible, or to hurl rocks at close range and raise a general alarm.

The only item of value is a small statue of one of Shiringgáyi’s aspects done in green soapstone and placed in a niche in the west wall created by digging out a couple of bricks. This is worth 10Kt, and depicts Shiringgáyi as a pregnant female figure with a head shaped like a squid, the long tentacles curling down around her belly. Jüggash, who is a Shiringgáyi adherent himself, will tell the party it is Hüggi the Mother of Squid, an aspect worshipped in the fishing villages near Tsatsayágga. If kept and prayed to regularly by virgin females it will bring more squid into your fishing nets.

10. The Booby Trap. There is a large rent in the ceiling at the top of the last flight of stairs and rain pours through onto the floor boards, which are covered in slimy algae. The plaster from round the door frames and joists has been chipped away and some of the bricks removed. A rope has been tied round the door frames and wooden beams in the walls.

As the Ügremish retreat to area 12 and escape the men and some of the women of the clan will haul on the ropes hoping to cause the roof to collapse on any attackers. (T:EPT: Roll STR saves for each person pulling, add success numbers together—when it reaches a total of twenty the joists break and the roof comes down. OEPT: Roll % dice for each person. If it is below their STR then they have had some effect, five successful saves will bring the house down.) The roof collapse will bring tiles and brickwork down over areas 10, 12 and 14 and the floor will give way in area 10 and the top two flights of stairs will collapse in area 2 crashing through into the lower floor. PCs caught in this will take T:EPT 1d10 x 5 damage, x2 if they save vs. Dex, OEPT 2d6 damage, half if save vs. Eyes.

Give the players a reasonable chance of spotting the danger and an opportunity to disrupt the Ügremish’s efforts before they all get crushed.

Jüggash will be pretty irate if this area gets damaged and will threaten to withhold pay; he says it will cost thousands to rebuild. Yuni will be more sanguine; the whole structure is unsafe and Jüggash’s contract makes him and not the Flat Peak clan liable to pay for any repairs. This damage will effectively seal the fate of the Ügremish, they will all end up enslaved to defray the rebuilding costs.

11. Roofless Room. This room has no roof at all and the floor is covered in rubble and rubbish, thoroughly soaked by the rain. The wooden beams are mostly rotten with fungus and the walls are infested with Wall-Tongues (lusátimun) (see Alien Vistas). The interior wall between this area and room 14 has been demolished to provide ammunition to resist the eviction.

If the players look around they will find a good bit of timber amongst the rubble about four meters long, a long beam with planks nailed to it to make a kind of bridge or gangplank. There are also bricks removed from the east wall to make handholds, and dislodged tiles on the next door roof show where the Ügremish have clambered across it.

The reason for this will become clear if the players find the body in room 13—the Ügremish have been crossing next door’s roof, and using the bridge to gain access to the Foreign Quarter walls where the impaled bodies of criminals are displayed and stealing them.

12. Escape Hole. The plaster has been chipped away from the wall and the mortar dug out from between the exposed bricks. A stout piece of wood and a hand axe lay in the corridor ready for any fleeing Ügremish to finish the hole and get through into the next building.

This is the final retreat of the Ügremish, and they will attack the wall in order to break through and escape. (T:EPT: Make a STR save for each person on the battering ram at +2 and add the totals together, a total of 16 means the breach has been made and people can flee. OEPT: Roll % dice for each person. If it is below their STR then they have had some effect, four successful saves will make a hole large enough to get through).

If the Ügremish managed to collapse area 10 they will almost certainly get out of the building. Anyone investigating the hole after they have fled will meet an annoyed Ahoggyá, who will ask what is going on in very crude and severely accented Tsolyáni, though he will not attack unless met with hostility.

13. The Unfortunate. This room smells bad. The source of the odour is immediately obvious, a day old corpse lying under the roofed portion of the half ruined room. Wall tongues hang from all sides, and the floor is covered in whitish mould and is very wet and slippery.

The heat of Jakálla in the summer means bodies decay very quickly and the number of insects means they quickly acquire a thriving community of maggots and burrowers. Those able to hold their gorge long enough to examine the body will realise that it has a pole inserted in the anus and projecting from the right side of his neck and the face is in a rictus of extreme agony. This person was impaled and left on the wall of the Foreign Quarter as an example to other foreigners and nakomé, only to have the Ügremish chop through the stake with an axe and steal the body during the night.

They intended to move it downstairs to room 15 in the next couple of weeks, once a good part of the flesh had rotted away.

14. Collapsed Room. The interior and exterior walls of this room have been partially demolished to provide ammunition, the roof is full of holes and there is a sodden sleeping mat lying amongst the filth. Smoke comes up out of the ruined and partially blocked fireplace.

There is nothing of interest in this room bar the odd Wall-Tongue and scuttling Qigékh.

15. Temple of Black Qárqa. The passage stinks of incense and rotting meat and is utterly dark, the walls covered in streaks of black mould which trace out peculiar designs incised into the brick. The ceiling is only 1.5m high at the eastern end and streamers of slime hang down from the ceiling. The floor slopes down to a chamber 2m high; the smell here is even worse and there is curious sound, like very soft and slow heavy breathing.

As the PCs venture further into the tunnel they will hear the sound of something moving. Torchlight will show little at first then shapes, horrible twitching shambling shapes, will emerge from the darkness and attack.

Once the undead and their horrendous master are dealt with the PCs can make a proper search of the room. Against the west wall is a jumbled pile of black stained bones of all kinds, including a couple of fragments from non-humans, from amongst which the M’rúr emerge. There is the odd qigékh scuttling amongst them, making those of a nervous disposition think that yet more skeletons might be about to animate and attack.

In front of this is a low altar, a simple made up of three stone slabs. Beneath the top panel lie the temple treasures, four leather flasks with pewter fittings, a chlén hide box with incense sticks and cones, two scrolls, both rather stained and wormeaten, a book of some hundred or so black dyed pages with white writing, and a small pouch.

The flasks contain a very pungent smelling oil, those with knowledge of the rites of Sárku and Belkhánu will recognise it as Thún oil, an embalming agent. Each flask is worth some 30Kt. The incense is of the kind commonly used at funerals and in shrines of Sárku and is of low quality, a mere 5Kt the lot.

The scrolls are more interesting. The longer is in modern Salarvyáni and is a spell scroll with T:EPT Perception of the Energies Inc. Area of Effect 1, Inc. Duration 2, Ward or OEPT I Locate Objects. The second scroll has no title and appears to be a page torn from a book. It is in Classical Tsolyáni and appears to relate to a protective magical diagram, the Sign of Repelling Chitinous Foes. It is worth 200Kt to a temple library even in its damaged state. This same sign is inscribed on the floor in white chalk – Aqqa has been using it to keep the Qigékh at bay as they have a nasty habit of chewing on his necrotic toes when he is meditating.

The book is the prize find. It is called the Book of Eternal Gratitude and is in Bednálljan. It describes along series of rituals, meditations and sacrifices that will, bit by bit, turn the user into a Shédra. The process is long and arduous, involving much time spent sitting in the darkness fasting, drinking ever increasing quantities of embalming fluid and numerous human sacrifices. He must trepan his own skull, cutting a hole in the forehead through to the brain without digging too deep and lobotomising yourself. Eventually at the climactic ritual the user wills his own heartbeat to cease and becomes one of the undead. It could take years to complete the whole procedure and unless one is skilled in Ritual Magic, Energy Management, the Theology and Ritual of Black Qárqa or a similar deity and knows the spell of Necrofacture it is highly likely to fail. Those not following the procedure but merely reading it may gain some knowledge of Black Qárqa and his lore. (T:EPT Roll vs. Theology of Sárku skill, gain success number in skill points to be spent on Theology, Ritual, Scholar: Undead and/or Artisan: Embalming, OEPT Gain 250XP if a good priest or magic user, 500 XP if an evil priest or magic user and 2000XP if a priest or magic user of Sárku or Durritlámish). This is worth at least 1000Kt to any temple, and those of Sárku and Durritlámish will be very keen indeed to take it off your hands, or take off your hands if you don’t let them have it.

The pouch contains 27Kt in loose change and a medallion in the form of a thin copper disc incised with four slots. This is a key to the secret door on the north wall, and fits into a very hard to see keyhole near the floor.

Jüggash and Yuni will of course claim the goods in this room are part and parcel of the furnishings of the house and therefore their property. This is bullshit and they know it, and any reasonable argument from the PCs will make them back down and accept a mere 50% share in any proceeds. Jüggash will offer to fence the stuff for them – in which case they will be lucky to see 10% of the true value, but won’t realise how badly they have been bilked. Jüggash will give the book to the temple of Sárku for free to curry favour.

The cage on the east end of the room contains two boys about seven or eight years old. Both have been horribly mutilated, with eyelids, ears, nose and lips cut off. One is very near death; the removal of his left eyelid has left an infected wound and is crusted with dried pus. Both are completely traumatised and unable to communicate except in terrified whimpers.

These were to be used as part of one the sacrifices mentioned in the Book of Eternal Gratitude. If the muck is washed off them they will be found to have Livyáni tattoos of the Uyzváz clan, another gang of nakomé refugees living at the Tower of the Red Dome. The family will not be entirely grateful to have them back. They sold the boys as slaves as they could not afford to feed them and needed the money to keep the rest of the family going. They will offer them to the PCs as slaves for the knockdown price of 20Kt each, going down to 5Kt, and then simply refusing to take custody of them and telling the PCs to take them away. The children are too badly mutilated and psychologically damaged to be worth anything as slaves, no slave dealer will take them and they will be nothing but a burden on their impoverished families. If approached directly the Temple of Dlamélish will express some interest, but only offer 50Kt.

This whole room will put Yuni in rapture. Running an unlicensed temple or shrine merits a whopping fine from the Palace of the Priesthoods of the Gods and having unregistered undead on your premises is also a serious religious offence (all undead outside the precincts of a Sárku or Durritlámish temple must have proper identity papers, a death certificate from the Temple of Belkhánu, an undeath certificate from the Temple of Sárku and be registered on the proper census along with a living ‘guardian’ who will take responsibility for any brains eaten, blood sucked etc.).

16. The Sewer. This is a typical Jakállan sewer, an old alleyway roofed over in the last ditlána, paved with brick and with the ghostly facades of rubble filled buildings on either side. Here and there names and signs painted on the crumbling mould-stained plaster tell of ancient businesses and lost clans. The secret entryway opens through an old window a mere meter high and wide, large lumps of masonry serving as steps down to floor level.

There are any number of reasons a semi-undead priest of Black Qárqa might want a secret entrance to a sewer that will connect up to the Tsuru’úm at some point, and any number of nasty things that might inhabit it – the GM will no doubt have his own ideas as to what these are.

The Aftermath

What happens after the Ügremish are dealt with depends on how many and who escaped. If Ösh got away the PCs are likely to find themselves ambushed some dark night by a gang of Salarvyáni thugs out for revenge. If he was caught or killed then the rest of the clan will fade away into the Jakállan underworld, never to be seen or heard of again.

If the party did not find the underground temple then they are in for bigger trouble. Grandpa Aqqá will be able to complete his transformation into a Shédra and will then set about taking revenge on Jüggash, the PCs and finally the Flat Peak. The party may hear of rumours of something very very unpleasant happening to Jüggash, building workers refusing to go near the clanhouse to carry out renovations. If the party have been daft enough to rent the clanhouse from Jüggash at a knockdown rate in return for clearing out the Ügremish then they will find that the place is ‘haunted’, with regular incursions by the undead until the temple can be deconsecrated.

PCs may hear some time later that Yuni and the Flat Peak clan have claimed a 2000Kt reward from the Palace of the Priesthoods of the Gods for drawing their attention to the illegal temple and that an ecumenical deconsecration committee has been to the site to expunge any religious influence.

If all goes well then the PCs will have made some useful friends. Jüggash is a bit low rent as a patron, but he does have connections with all sorts of unsavoury people in the Foreign Quarter who will be handy to know if you need someone roughing up or discreetly unload stolen goods. If the party are canny enough to go round Jüggash and offer their captives direct to Haruné hiJuyukkún of the Iron Helm as slaves then they will acquire a much more useful contact. Haruné is a proper noble and is engaged in climbing the ranks within the Palace of the Realm, he will have all sorts of dirty jobs to be done and lots of money.

Disposing of the Book of Eternal Gratitude could also earn the PCs some status and favours. The best route will be to give it voluntarily to the Temple of Sárku or Durritlámish. This will leave them owing a major favour to the party, and if one of them is a priest of these gods he can expect an immediate promotion of at least one circle. Gifting it to other temples will be regarded as a minor favour, but if the Temple of Sárku finds out you had such an item and gave it to someone else they will not be best pleased.

Appendix 1: Legal skills in OEPT

Tsolyánu and the ability to draw up contracts, handle sales of property, assess probable shámtla and other everyday legal activities.

Magistrate/Advocate is a Group III skill; it enables a person to act on behalf of a client in court, to draw up pleas, apply for writs and handle other advanced legal documents and if the person is promoted to a suitable position in one of the Palaces to sit in judgement either alone or as part of a panel of jurists in legal cases. All of these functions are much enhanced if the person also has the skills of Orator, Scholar: Law, Ancient Language: Classical Tsolyáni.

Alien Vistas: Wall-Tongues and Qigékh

Qigékh occupy the same ecological niche in Jakálla and southern Tsolyánu as the rat and urban fox do in terrestrial ecology. They are shaped more or less like woodlice about six inches long and two wide, have a multitude of short sharp spines on their carapace and long antennae. Unlike a woodlouse they have pairs of legs specialised for different functions; at the back two pairs are thick and paddle shaped and are used for digging and at the front one long pair is viciously spined and kept folded up under the head until deployed to grab prey. The other seven pairs of legs are short and tough with spines and claws. They will eat anything, thriving in rubbish dumps and sewers and burrowing into granaries where they can. They are most fond of other, smaller vermin, and a certain low level presence is tolerated by storehouse managers. Their poisoned spines discourage terrestrial cats from attacking them, but Kurukú and Aschaunë-birds will kill and eat them, picking the flesh from inside their toxic carapaces.

Wall-tongues, or lusátimun, are harmless but unpleasant beasts that colonise run down buildings in hot and damp cities like Jakálla and Penóm. They are a peculiar form of worm which burrows into soft rock or brick using acid, cementing themselves in place with exuded resin. They then evert their intestines which hang down the face of the wall resembling small pink human tongues with tiny red hairs. These hairs are covered in glue and any insect which lands on them is trapped, the tongue withdraws and the food digested. They spread quickly and in a matter of a few weeks a whole building can be fatally weakened by their burrowing. In most districts of Jakálla building inspectors are continually on the look out for them and will fine house-holders who do not take prompt action to remove them.

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