9 THE COMPLETE GRISELDA

By Oliver Dickinson

Foreword “Oliver and Me” by “Interfering Uncles Have Their Uses” by Michael O’Brien Excerpt from A Promise of Thunder by Robin D. Laws

Cover illustration by Heather Bruton Cover design by Melanie Haage

Pavis map by Mike Blum, annotated by Wesley Quadros Big Rubble map by Wesley Quadros

Acquisitions and Copy Editing by Rick Meints Layout, Supplemental Editing by Stephen Martin Runes by Issaries, Inc.

Issaries Publication ISS 4502. ISBN #1-929052-11-1

Published by Issaries, Inc. Sample900 Murmansk St, Suite 5 file Oakland, CA 94607

Griselda herself protects this book. And you don’t want to mess with her! 1 9 T HE C OMPLETE G RISELDA 9

This book made possible by the Trading Association

Issaries salutes the volunteers of the Glorantha Trading Association whose contributions made this book possible.

Are you interested in learning about the GTA? Check out the web site at:

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THE COMPLETE GRISELDA

Cover text, Oliver and Me, preview of A Promise of Thunder, advertisement on page 224, and maps are copyright ' 2001 by Issaries, Inc. Redfox is copyright by Fox, and appears by permission. Interfering Uncles Have Their Uses is copy- right ' 2001 by Michael O Brien. All other text is copyright ' 1993, 2001 by Oliver Dickinson. All rights reserved. Any similarities between characters in Glor- antha and any persons living or dead are strictly coincidental. Cover illustration is copyright ' 2001 by Heather Bruton. Portions of this book originally appeared as part of The Collected Griselda, ISBN 1-898190-00-3, published by the Reaching Moon Megacorp. The reproduction of material from this book for the purposes of personal or private profit, by photographic, electronic, or other means of storage or retrieval is strictly prohibited. First Printing August 2001.

Address questions about this publication to Issaries, Inc. SampleVisit www.HeroWars.com to learn more about Glorantha!file Dedication This book is dedicated to Philip Kemp, a most valued source of ideas and constructive criticism for many of the later stories, and also to all who have shown appreciation for the Griselda stories, especially to those who at successive Convulsions have taken the trouble to tell me that they liked them. No author could ask for more. 2 9 T HE C OMPLETE G RISELDA 9 Table of Contents

Oliver and Me, by Greg Stafford ...... 4 Introduction ...... 6 Map of the city of New Pavis ...... 10 Points of View ...... 12 Lucky Eddi ...... 17 Griselda Gets Her Men ...... 21 Shamus Gets a Case ...... 26 A Tasty Morsel...... 32 All In The Family ...... 37 The Great Chart Caper...... 44 Hanufa’s Little Sister ...... 50 Down Among The Dead Men...... 54 Good Advice ...... 59 Wolfhead’s Story ...... 61 Carving Up Carver ...... 64 Devil’s Play ...... 72 Bad Example...... 80 Holding the Baby ...... 84 This Love Business ...... 89 Serious Money...... 95 Worlds Apart...... 106 Red Hot ...... 113 Happy Anniversary ...... 124 First Class Protection ...... 130 The Hero Bit ...... 138 The Matchmaker ...... 144 Griselda the Hero??...... 154 The Trouble With Nephews ...... 155 Map of the Big Rubble ...... 165 Interfering Uncles Have Their Uses, by Michael O’Brien . . . . 170 DifferentSample Shades of Red ...... file...... 172 Respect ...... 184 The Cradlesnatchers ...... 195 Griselda: A Brief Biography ...... 214 A Griselda Songbook ...... 215 Griselda: A Brief Bibliography ...... 219 Oliver Dickinson: A Brief Biography...... 220 3 9 T HE C OMPLETE G RISELDA 9

OLIVER AND ME (edited a little and annotated by Oliver Dickinson)

One of the best parts of being in roleplaying is the people I meet. Often someone who was, at first, just another player turns out to be a fasci- nating person, and perhaps (if we are lucky) even a friend. Oliver Dick- inson is one of those people. Oliver and I have never sat down and played a game together. Our friendship has been more slow and refined, in a genteel sort of way, at first. Over a long distance, the game began when Oliver somehow got a copy of RuneQuest and was intrigued enough to generate some char- acters. After reading about Pavis and the Big Rubble he liked the set- ting enough that he began to play the characters, albeit in solo play. Sometime about then he began writing about the characters’ adventures which he had created. Well, I have seen lots of game write-ups which have never had another eye cast upon them since then. This one had two things more: entertainment and luck. There is a great difference between writing prose fiction and narrating game adventures. A whole lot of bad “game fiction” is out there pol- luting the market because it is not well written fiction. Oliver did not fall into that trap, and instead adopted a narrative form which is, in case you did not recognize it, a Damon Runyon pastiche. It is well writ- ten and entertaining to read. And he was lucky. I cannot list the places where Oliver’s material was published, but who can ever truly describe the circumstances which allowed White magazine to publish RuneQuest fiction? Oliver began by correctly writing to me to ask about using Glorantha as the setting for his fiction. He also said something about mythology. I made some flippant remarks about Mycenaean mythology. Oliver replied with some statement of fact or other, and I quarreled my position for some time 1. Eventually, I discovered that Oliver really was a scholar who actually knew what he was talking about. But I didn’t hold it againstSample him. file Oliver’s day job is, in fact, Reader in the Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Durham. He is a senior staff member, and has chaired his department. His magnum opus is a book on the Aegean Bronze Age (that is, “mainland, islands, and Crete”), published in 1994 2. Its title is entirely and appropriately academic: The Aegean Bronze Age. He once mentioned that he might have preferred “Sex and

4 9 O LIVER A ND M E 9

Violence in the Bronze Age,” or even “Matriarchy and Militarism”, per- haps to attract the New Age market. Or maybe the gamers. I always liked the way that Oliver picked up on small clues and used them in his stories. That was how I got the chance to manipulate Griselda, and use long-distance gamemastering. For instance, from an early issue of Wyrm’s Footnotes he picked out that Pikat Yaraboom had a weakness for red-headed women. Griselda then got a reputation for being the big brute’s friend, as published in “Gris- elda Gets her Men.” I was pleased, and entertained. And prompted to tweak a player character, in a gamemaster way. I was working on Troll- pak, and entered the same information about Pikat Yaraboom as had appeared in Wyrm’s Footnotes, but added that he liked red-headed women “to eat.” I never said anything to Oliver, and wondered if he would even see the note. The response was “A Tasty Morsel,” in which this touchy problem is politely addressed. It made me laugh. I think that one of the appeals of these Griselda stories is that we all recognize our own RuneQuest characters in Griselda and Wolfhead, and their colorful opponents, and ourselves in Olaf Dickin’s-son, the narrator. After all, where would you and I really be in that dingy cor- ner of glorious Glorantha? I have enjoyed the Griselda stories, and endorse them as presenting a legitimate view of Glorantha. I am glad to honor the author in this publication. Greg Stafford November 6, 1992

Sample file 1. Actually, Greg hasn’t got the sequence of events quite right; no doubt he would say that this is the way it should have happened. For a closer approximation to the reality, see his comments in Gloran- than Visions, pg. 4. 2. Corrected reprints 1997, 1999.

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INTRODUCTION

It is something of a shock to realize that I have been writing Griselda stories for nearly twenty years (the first was published in 1982). Every time I think that I have run out of ideas, something, maybe just a potential title, gives me inspiration. They are harder to write than they used to be, but I still get a bang out of it, so as long as people will listen to and read them I suspect I will keep producing them. As many readers will realize, they are in the style of Damon Runyon’s marvellous Broadway stories, which I had always wanted to try my hand at imitating. One day I got the idea of using the style for a tale set in Pavis, which from what I knew of it in 1981 could provide the kind of rough, semi-criminal background suitable for Runyon-style stories. As they say, the rest is history, and I am proud to have con- tributed some notable characters and locales to Pavis. Though a major aim has been to entertain, I have also aimed to show how I thought things could work in Pavis at this level, and how adventurers might behave, and to point a moral here and there. I have used as much of the Runyon language as is appropriate to the set- ting, but have incorporated American expressions from other sources that I liked, and sometimes tried my hand at other styles; I drew on George V. Higgins’ early novels to produce the monologue “Good Ad- vice,” while “Griselda the Hero??” and “Devil’s Play” are more ‘old West’ style. The Irishisms of “Shamus Gets a Case” got in because I was enjoying very much The Best of Myles, by Myles na Gopaleen (Flann O’Brien), when I wrote it. The texts originally published have been revised somewhat here, to fit known Pavis facts, improve the language, or make the meaning somewhat clearer, and the order of the later stories has been rearranged slightly from that of The Col- lected Griselda to fit their intended chronological sequence. There are two points that I should emphasize: Griselda began as a fic- tional character, whom I provided with statistics. and used in scenar- ios at a later stage — she is not the cover identity for someone more famous in Pass history. I have it on good authority that some people have speculated that she is Kallyr Starbrow, but tough as she is, she is not in that league, and if anyone joins Constable Jorjar (see “PointsSample of View”) in wondering what such a smart doll is filedoing in Pavis, all I can say is that if she has some purpose beyond being where the action is, she has managed to hide it remarkably well up to now. Some of the other characters in the stories did begin as NPC’s [non- player characters, ed.], and I now have RuneQuest 3 statistics for all who participated in the Cradle scenario (see “The Cradlesnatchers;” those published in Pavis sources are for RuneQuest 2), while Trea- sure Trove Hurbi’s statistics are presented in Shadows on the Bor- 6 9 I NTRODUCTION 9 derlands (but my version is slightly different). Maybe I will find myself working up statistics for the Hero Wars game for all of them some day (statistics for Griselda and Wolfhead are both available on Issaries’ web site: www.HeroWars.com), although I am not certain that such guys and dolls really have a place in the Hero Wars vision.

The Setting Not all readers of these stories may know of the fantasy universe of Glorantha in which they are set, which was the original setting for the fantasy game RuneQuest, and is now the exclusive setting for Hero Wars. This universe has an extremely rich and complex mythology and history, of which only the most relevant points are mentioned here; read Glorantha, Introduction to the Hero Wars to learn more! Dragon Pass, the part of Glorantha that provides the setting for these stories, has a predominantly “ancient world” rather than mediaeval feel, and Pavis is a medium city by ancient standards, with a population of several thousands, many of whom are transient adventurers who contribute greatly to its rough, frontier town atmosphere. These are drawn by tales of treasure in the Rubble, the name generally given to the massive ruins of the ancient city of Pavis, against one wall of which the modern city was founded as recently as 1550 S.T. (this and all other dates represent years since the start of Time). The mainly Sartarite population came from the settled lands to the north-west (Griselda’s home country, Sartar), which were conquered in 1602 S.T. by the Lunar Empire. The Rubble is infested with dangerous creatures and outlaw groups, but several portions are occupied by various races, of whom the trolls are most notable (see further below), and a remnant of the ancient city, known as the Real City, survives within it. The original city took its name from its founder, who is still worshipped as the city god by the surviving descendants of the ancient inhabitants and by many of the new citizens, but his power is purely local. It is the only major set- tlement in the plains of Prax, an otherwise desolate region that pro- vides just enough pasture for the livestock of the nomadic tribes of the area, who take their names from the animals they herd and ride (Sables and High Llamas are mentioned in the stories, but there are several others of varying importance). Caravans cross the northern parts of these plains to reach Pavis, which is also situated on a north- southSample river along which a thin population is strung file out in several minor settlements. The city’s new rulers are from the Lunar Empire, founded by the Red Goddess (who is now visible as the Red Moon). However, the con- quest of Pavis only took place in 1610 S.T. (the date of most of the stories is 1616-1617), and is very much resented by many sections of the community, especially those who originate from Sartar. The

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Lunar government is attempting to enforce law and order, with some success, and to control the activities of adventurers; but it has no effective control over the Rubble, although movement in and out of it is monitored and patrols are sent in fairly regularly. The Peoples Apart from the various races of human beings, there are many non- human intelligent races in Glorantha; several are mentioned in the stories and have representative populations in Pavis or the Rubble, including the Mostali (craftworkers resembling fantasy dwarves, but obsessively machine-minded) and Aldryami (like fantasy , but really humanoid plants). The most important are the trolls, a rather gross race tied to the element of Darkness, who completed the ruin of ancient Pavis after the nomad tribes had done a lot of damage, and are to be found in many parts of Dragon Pass. An ancient curse on them means that the majority of their offspring are the stunted and inferior trollkin, whom they treat as a slave race. They have the capa- city to eat virtually anything, and generally do; their habit of treating every other form of sentient life as food makes it hard to sympathize with them as their tragic history deserves. Gods of theirs who are mentioned are Zorak Zoran, the war and death god, and Xiola Umbar, a goddess of healing and compassion; their society is dominated by the females, but like many other features of their complex culture this is not well known among humans. Also important among the races of the Rubble are the broos, gener- ally humanoid in form with animal heads (often goat, deer, or similar), who are tied to Chaos, as are the rarely mentioned scorpion-men, ogres (human in appearance but cannibalistic), dragonsnails, and gorp (lumps of acidic protoplasm). Chaos can also produce all kinds of monstrosi- ties (see “Wolfhead’s Story”). Broos are the most common form of Chaos in the Rubble; they are immune to all diseases (though often carrying them) and poisons, treat all creatures, including each other, appallingly, and are generally bad news.

R e l i g i o n s Chaos entered Glorantha because of the disputes between its many groups of gods (most of which are tied to the elements of Darkness, Earth, Water, Light, and Air). Although it was eventually defeated it has not been eradicated; its influence shows up in many ways, espe- ciallySample mutated races and individuals and the cults of vilefile entities like Cacodemon which survived the defeat. The old gods of Glorantha all agreed on a compromise to defeat Chaos, but the Red Goddess, being ‘born’ inside Time, has been able to ignore this, and her links with Chaos are the chief reason for the suspicion and downright hostility felt for the Lunars by the followers of other gods. Most hostile are Or- lanth, a wind and storm god who is chief of the pantheon worshipped in Sartar and many other ‘barbarian’ regions, and who is a favorite

8 9 I NTRODUCTION 9 god of adventurers in his aspect of Orlanth Adventurous; and Storm Bull, a local wind god of Prax whose small cult is made up of Chaos- hating berserkers. Other important gods mentioned in the stories are Humakt, god of war, honor, and death; Vinga, Orlanth’s daughter, whose cult is favored by Sartarite warrior women; Uleria, the goddess of love in all its forms; and Lhankor Mhy, the god of scholars, whose followers, generally referred to as Sages, maintain a kind of research in- stitute in Pavis, and divide into factions reflecting their origins. Yelm- alio is a light god, the son of the Sun and patron of one of the groups making up the population of the modern city of Pavis. Those who rise high in the service of their gods are called Rune Lords (whose duties particularly involve fighting for the cult) and Rune Priests; these can acquire many special powers of magic, but simpler forms of magic, less trustworthy because casting the spells depends on the user’s native power, are widely available (hence there is no separate class of magic-user, as in many fantasy worlds, but most cults can only teach their followers certain spells). Knowledge of spells can be stored in items (matrices) and extra magic power in crystals; Griselda has two of the former and one of the latter.

The Currency Ten copper clacks make one silver (usually called a Lunar in these sto- ries, but also known as a guilder in Pavis); twenty silver Lunars make one gold Wheel.

Other Notes The game of mumblety-peg, first referred to in “Shamus Gets a Case,” may be unfamiliar to many (if anyone has seen Roman Polanski’s film Knife in the Water they will recognize it). Basically, it is as Shamus describes it, but he does not explain that you start from the space be- tween thumb and first finger and jump from there to the space be- tween each pair of fingers in turn and then back again, so going fur- ther each time, and then coming back again, trying to do it faster and faster without cutting yourself. The context should make most slang terms clear, but just in case, I will state that a dip is a pickpocket, and that tops are loaded dice. “ WSampleo r l d s A p a r t ” file “Worlds Apart” is the equivalent of a cross-over story in comic books. Redfox was the heroine of a 20-issue British comic of the same name, produced 1985-1989, of which I was a fan. It was originated and drawn by Fox and written with various collaborators, last and best Chris Bell, and the story was begun for a projected anthology concerning Redfox which never, in the end, appeared. The story appears here by kind permission of Fox.

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A Pavis Panorama Pavis is a city of contrasts. It is small, yet garrisoned by more soldiers per citizen than any other Lunar frontier town. The ruins of the Big Rubble are immense, still showing vestiges of the magnificent work of the master- builderSample Pavis, while much of New Pavis consists of adobe andfile wattle shacks. Adventurers are both more regulated and vigorously encouraged here than any other locale with so abundant a collection of ancient ruins close at hand. The people of Pavis are as polyglot as the setting. These streets have seen prancing centaurs, Heortland knights, and demon-horse riders from Muse Roost. Troll envoys from the Stronglands saunter the same walkways as Yelmalio hoplites — all under the eyes of the Lunar watch. 10