Excerpt from The Enchanted Drinker: A Connoisseur’s Guide to Cocktails, 3rd Ed.

The Blue Plague

Historians and laypeople alike have the Amal Era time period 113-121 tattooed upon their consciousness because of the devastation wrought by the Blue Plague, a disease spread by an invasive species of mosquito that arrived with imported building materials during the reconstruction of Amal following the Great Quake of 113 AE.

It took nearly two hundred years and a revolving door of royal families for Amal to recover from this dark period, highlighted by the founding of the Spice Bazaar and the splashy reintroduction of The Conclave of Bards in 301 AE.

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During the month-long festivities, the city was a playground for locals and tourists alike. After the parades and feasts, the bards told their tales, and people required drinks. Lots of drinks.

The famed Ale & Marrow tavern of Pauper’s Notch claims to be the birthplace of “The Blue Plague” cocktail, with failed-Binder-turned-bartender Mattison Yurko claiming credit as its creator.

“The drink is akin to a rebirth ritual,” the mixologist proselytized in his oft-parodied memoir, Drinking Magic. “We needed to eradicate the evils — the toxins — of our past before we could honestly embrace this new era.”

Many scholars have debated Mattison as the originator of this cocktail, however. The Brigand, a dive in the Canal district, claims they created the drink that spreads like its namesake every Conclave.

There are many variations of this vile concoction, but the following is the best approximation of the Ale & Marrow’s recipe:

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Ingredients:

• 2 oz. fermented thorned kiwi juice (or sample a local vitamin C-rich kombucha)

• 1 ½ oz. white rum

• 1 oz. camel’s milk (if you can’t afford such a delicacy, try buttermilk)

• ¾ oz. fire ant honey (if you don’t live near the Sindar Mountain caverns, absinthe will do)

• ½ oz. bergamot juice (Earl Grey tea will suffice)

• ½ oz. cobalt sour plum juice (blueberry or cranberry juice can be used in a pinch)

• a sprig of paracress (alternatively, a Sichuan pepper would provide a similar numbing effect)

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Instructions:

1. Roast the fire ant honey on low heat overnight. This will activate its hallucinogenic properties.

2. Meditate on what you wish to remove from your life.

3. The next day, when ready to begin your transformation: In a mixing tumbler, combine the kiwi and bergamot juices, milk, honey, and rum with ice or an icy Binding spell. Shake well.

4. Strain into a traditional Damson glass (a pint glass will also work, swine).

5. Top with the sour plum juice to “infect” the drink with The Blue Plague.

6. Garnish with a sprig of paracress.

7. Drink the cocktail in its entirety before the blue reaches the bottom of the glass or you’re dead!

8. This will facilitate a cleansing purge of all the toxins from your body. Chew on the paracress if you’re still feeling nauseous.