Jadzia’s (Apothecary Shop/Swords of Kos Fantasy Campaign Setting)
"Jadzia's" appears in Skirmisher Publishing's Swords of Kos Fantasy Campaign Setting as a rules-free description of an apothecary shop. It is intended to stand by itself or within the Kos milieu and includes an adventure hook that suggests one way it might be used.
"Jadzia's" is a rules-free description of a place that might be found in many different sorts of communities and cultures and was written as a specific example of an apothecary shop, and is one of the more than 70 places described in the Skirmisher Publishing book City Builder: A Guide to Designing Communities, and appears in its Swords of Kos Fantasy Campaign Setting as a location in Kos City. It is intended to stand by itself or within the Kos milieu and includes an adventure hook that suggests one way it might be used.
This tiny shop is located in the basement of a run-down townhouse at the lower end of the mercantile district of Kos and can be entered by a set of stairs that descend from an alley behind it (the building is owned by a cloth dealer who uses its upper floors as a retail area and warehouse). A mosaic of intermingling smells hints at the many different herbs, plants, and other substances the shop contains. What strikes most people when they enter it are the shocking dimensions of its proprietor, who looks like an oversized caricature of a classic witch: Jadzia, who is hunchbacked, snaggle-toothed, has a wandering eye, and is swathed in black cloth, is also nearly seven feet tall, and somewhat menacingly spills out of the little space behind the counter of her dimly-lit shop.
Jadzia greets visitors to her shop with a series of cackles, refers to almost everyone as “deary” or something similar, and will stretch out her huge, taloned hand to offer them pieces of candy (often yellow anise candy and red-and-white striped peppermints). Sweets are, in fact, one of her specialties, and she compounds many standard herbal medications and remedies into hard candies in a wide variety of shapes and colors that can be viewed in dozens of jars on the shelves behind her.
Beyond her herbal confections, Jadzia’s apothecary shop is well-known as both a good general source of herbs and the like and as a likely place to obtain obscure substances that cannot easily be found elsewhere. In addition to dried plants of all sorts, the hag also specializes in animal byproducts like bones, bottled blood, and organs, and is skilled at extracting toxins from poisonous monsters of all sorts. She has, in fact, been a member in good standing of the Guild of Beggars, Guides, Locksmiths, and Exterminators for several years and, as a registered exterminator, is licensed to keep on hand all sorts of poisons (although no one can recall her ever having accepted a commission to eradicate troublesome vermin of any kind). Jadzia also presents herself as a midwife and frequently dispenses fertility-related medications to women from all walks of life, but generally engages in the sorts of “family planning” that result in smaller families.
Most of Jadzia’s equipment, storage containers, and furnishings are old or well-worn and much of it is nicked, chipped, or otherwise damaged. Her largest mortar, however, is actually an enchanted helmet, and the mace she uses to crush things within it is similarly magical. It is unclear how she ended up with these martial accoutrements or why she has reduced them to such humble service.
Jadzia is not a native to Kos and is at least partially Sarmatian and originally from the shores of the Black Sea. How, why, or when she ended up in the city is a matter of uncertainty and speculation. She sometimes talks about an unnamed sister from her homeland who, she says, is “bigger” — presumably, she means “greater” — than her in almost every way.
Adventure Hook
