The Apothecary ยท Chapter 7
Natural Poisons and Venoms
What grows, crawls, and swims. Every culture in every period has these, and most people in the countryside can name the local ones.
Venoms are Injury poisons with an Interval of a round. They are fight poisons: fast, visible, and over in half a minute.
Plant and mineral poisons are mostly Ingested, with Intervals of an hour or a day. They are murder poisons: slow, quiet, and judged by their Subtle rating.
Gathering. Chapter 15 has the rules for milking a snake and picking the right mushroom.
Period: all entries in this chapter are Old World and stay available in every later period.
Blade Venom
Hunting paste, arrow gum, the generic coating
2 1 round Round 5
Injury 50 Restricted Old World None
Effect 2 Wounds
Special Ends on the first successful resist check, not the second
Antidote Any general antidote
The ordinary preparation sold to hunters and to people who say they are hunters. It is the weapon quality Poison 2 in a jar: a weapon listed with Poison X delivers this poison, with X Wounds as its Effect.
Viper Venom
Adder, rattlesnake, fer-de-lance, asp
2 1 round Round 4
Injury 40 Common Old World None
Effect 2 Wounds, and Disoriented until the next resist check
Antidote Antivenom
Venom that destroys tissue around the bite. It hurts at once and it swells. Milked from a live snake, it keeps for a week in a stoppered horn.
Cobra Venom
Cobra, krait, mamba, sea snake, coral snake
3 1 round Round 5
Injury 150 Rare Old World Lethal
Effect 2 Wounds and 2 Strain
Antidote Antivenom
Venom that works on the nerves. The bite barely hurts. The eyelids droop first, then speech slurs, then breathing becomes work.
Spider Venom
Widow spider, wandering spider, scorpion sting
2 1 minute Minute 5
Injury 30 Common Old World None
Effect 2 Strain, and Disoriented until the poison ends
Antidote Antivenom
Cramp, sweat, and a racing heart. It rarely kills an adult. It does make the next hour useless.
Arrow Poison
Curare, wourali, upas, ipoh
3 1 round Round 4
Injury 120 Rare Old World None
Effect 2 Strain and Immobilized. A victim already Immobilized by this poison is Paralysed instead
After Immobilized or Paralysed lasts 10 minutes after the poison ends
Antidote None before the Modern period; an Average Medicine check each minute keeps a Paralysed victim breathing
A black gum boiled from forest vines, made to drop a monkey out of a tree. It relaxes every muscle and leaves the mind awake. It does nothing if swallowed, which is why the game it kills is safe to eat.
Dart Frog Toxin
Kokoi, golden frog, feather-bird toxin
4 1 round Round 4
Injury, Contact 300 Rare Old World Lethal
Effect 3 Wounds
Antidote None; treat and support
Wiped from the skin of a small bright frog onto a dart. A dart stays dangerous for a year. Handling the frog, or the dart, without gloves is an exposure.
Monster Venom
Wyvern sting, giant spider, basilisk fang, great serpent
4 1 round Round 5
Injury 250 Rare Old World Lethal
Effect 3 Wounds, and Disoriented until the next resist check
Antidote Antivenom made from the same creature
The venom of something larger than a person, taken from the gland of a dead one. A Universe's bestiary may give its creatures their own numbers; use this entry when it does not.
Wolfsbane
Aconite, monkshood, leopard's bane
3 10 minutes 10 minutes 6
Ingested, Injury 80 Restricted Old World Lethal, Subtle 1
Effect 3 Wounds. The mouth and hands go numb at the first failed check
Antidote None; purge, treat, and support
A blue-flowered mountain plant. The root is the strong part. It was smeared on arrowheads for wolves and stirred into the food of rivals.
Hemlock
Poison hemlock, water hemlock, the state poison
3 30 minutes Hour 6
Ingested 40 Common Old World Lethal
Effect 3 Wounds. On the second failed check the victim is Immobilized, and on the fourth Paralysed, until the poison ends
Antidote None; purge, treat, and support
Numbness that starts in the feet and climbs. The victim stays clear-headed and can talk until near the end. It grows in every ditch.
Nightshade
Belladonna, henbane, thornapple, mandrake
2 30 minutes Hour 4
Ingested 20 Common Old World Subtle 1
Effect 3 Strain, and Disoriented until the poison ends. The victim sees and speaks to things that are not there
Special A victim incapacitated by this Strain is not asleep: the victim wanders and raves for the rest of the Course
Antidote None; purge and watch
Sweet black berries, a dry mouth, wide pupils, and then a waking dream. A small dose was used as a medicine and as a cosmetic. Two doses at once are Lethal.
Foxglove
Oleander, yew, lily of the valley, heart poisons
3 1 hour Hour 4
Ingested 30 Common Old World Lethal, Subtle 2
Effect 3 Wounds and 1 Strain
Special Without a successful check to notice it, the death is taken for a heart giving out
Antidote None before the Modern period; purge, treat, and support
Garden plants that slow and then stop the heart. The same leaf in a careful dose is a heart medicine, which is why a physician's bag is the first place a magistrate looks.
Death Cap
Destroying angel, the fool's mushroom
4 12 hours Day 4
Ingested 30 Common Old World Lethal, Subtle 3
Effect 4 Wounds, and these Wounds cannot be recovered by rest while the poison runs
Special After the first failed check the victim feels well for a day; skip the second check and continue from the third
Antidote None; purge during the Onset, then treat and support
It looks like a good mushroom and tastes like one. Nothing happens for half a day. Then a day of sickness, a day of false recovery, and the liver fails.
Ergot
Cursed rye, holy fire, blighted grain
2 1 hour Day 3
Ingested 10 Common Old World Subtle 2
Effect 2 Wounds, and Disoriented with visions until the next check
Antidote None; stop eating the bread
A black fungus on rye. A whole village eating from one bad harvest burns, twitches, and sees devils. As a deliberate poison it is slow and looks like a curse.
Inheritance Powder
White arsenic, succession powder, the poisoner's water
3 1 hour Day 5
Ingested 150 Restricted Old World Lethal, Subtle 3
Effect 3 Wounds, and these Wounds cannot be recovered by rest while the poison runs
Special A fresh dose given while the poison runs resets the Course and does not raise the Potency. Given daily, it looks like a wasting sickness
Antidote None before the Industrial period; stop the doses, treat, and support
A white powder with no taste, sold for killing rats. The symptoms are those of a bad stomach. It was the usual way to hurry a will until chemists learned to find it in a body in the 1830s; from the Industrial period on it is Subtle 1 to anyone who tests for it.
Deathfeign
Pufferfish liver, the grave powder
4 10 minutes 10 minutes 4
Ingested, Contact 400 Rare Old World None
Effect 2 Strain and Immobilized. A victim already Immobilized by this poison is Paralysed for one day and appears dead
Special Finding life in the victim takes a Hard Medicine check. The victim hears everything
Antidote None; it wears off
Dried fish liver ground with other things. A measured dose stops the pulse a finger can find and the breath a mirror can catch. People have been buried on it. People have also been carried out of prisons in coffins on it.
Blinding Sap
Manchineel, spurge milk, spitting cobra venom
2 None Round 3
Contact (eyes) 25 Common Old World None
Effect 1 Wound and Blinded until the next resist check
Antidote Washing with water, an action, ends it
A white sap or a jet of venom that burns the eyes. Thrown from a cup or a bladder as a Light Ranged attack at Engaged range that does no damage of its own.
Sleeping Draught
Dwale, poppy and mandrake, drowsy syrup
2 10 minutes Minute 5
Ingested 60 Restricted Old World Subtle 1
Effect 4 Strain
Sleep 4 hours
Antidote None needed; Smelling Salts wake the sleeper
A surgeon's draught for setting bones, and an innkeeper's for emptying purses. It is bitter and is given in wine. Minions who fail one check are asleep.