By Jon. Pio
Every aristocrat, from the lowest pickling house sub-scion to the Prime Meridian House Stewards themselves, has at least one hazy memory from a House Impertabo soiree. Those memories are painted from a wide palette: the spreads of luxurious foods and exotic drink, the meticulously manicured gardens and arboretums, the silver platters spread not with multi-hued gems but a selection of the House's designer drugs, the loud and boisterous lesser House fuori, and the lingering presence of the silent, masked House elders watching from balconies above the ballroom floor.
From the
outside, House Impertabo appears to be two houses. First, there are the fuori:
the younger scions of the House known for raucous behavior, unabashed revelry,
and jovial brawling. To the lay person, these are the only members of the House
they see or interact with. The second house, the precisi, are the
elders: enrobed, unnaturally silent, masked figures rarely seen in public. They
haunt the corridors of aristocracy, chambers of high finance, and back rooms of
trading houses.
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Like all
Meridian Houses, House Impertabo has its fingers in many a Tarrasque meat pie.
Its strongest sphere of public influence is business consultation and
diplomatic affairs. The precisi are valued throughout the city as
impeccable advisors on mercantile deals and financial trades. The words they
whisper to their fuori heralds can swing a raw deal into a profitable
venture that could elevate a smaller house overnight. Being party to these lucrative
dealings has allowed House Impertabo to fill their own coffers. In fact, a
whole subset of Blood Merchants reaps enormous profit by mimicking the monetary
movements of House Impertabo
After their role
as advisors and majordomos, House Impertabo is known for producing a variety of
medical and vanity drugs. Many a regretful reveler has picked up a pack of
Fancyfree to ease the symptoms of the previous night's drunken tryst with a
citizen of negotiable affection. From their processing of the Tarrasque
hindquarters and decades of scrupulous experimentation, House chemists distill
and process chemicals and components into medicines and remedies. House
Impertabo avoids producing any magical or alchemical reagents, preferring to
trade or sell them wholesale to their alchemist allies. The density of
phosphorescence in the Tenth Meridian and its high demand for ghoul upkeep by
House 5 has linked those two houses in an alliance of meat and money.
Below the banal
gaze of the lay public, House Impertabo is a narcotic maker of the highest
regard. In laboratories deep underground, bubbling chemical vats and eldritch
machinery churn out the city's supply of Shine, Slip, Butcher's Bliss, Marrocaine, Salty
Nan, Jut, Tet, Hornblow, Black Annie, GORE!, Drover, and Ambergris Tobacco . Most citizens do not associate the name House Impertabo with the
narcotics they use to excite their lives or deaden their pain, but the higher
the social echelon, the more likely someone knows that if you want to party, an
Impertabo fuori is the person you need.
Even more secret
than the narcotics production is House Impertabo's prized creation: a drug
called Veri. Distilled from a mixture of yet unidentified fluids extracted from
deep within the Tarrasque hindquarters, Veri is the drug upon which the entire
House is built. The purest form of Veri is a viscous blood red wine consumed
via injection to the throat. A Veri user is gifted with a supernatural ability
to determine the Truth of a statement. It allows a precisi to cut through
layers of context, self-denial, and outright deception to firmly grasp what is
True. It is because of this drug that the House is so valued as advisors and
consultants. While on Veri, the user cannot speak untruth themselves without suffering
intense pain and even bodily damage. This side effect explains the necessity of
having both the fuori and the precisi.
To minimize pain
from speaking untruth, the precisi
whisper their words to their retinue who then transmit them to clients. The
lesser, younger members of House Impertabo, the fuori, exist to interact with the public at large; to be the liars,
the faces, and the voice of their precisi
masters. All fuori aspire to join the ranks of the precisi in time which is why most of the fuori are loud and boisterous bon vivants. These assistants know
that their destiny eventually will travel into a life of opulent silence so
they seek to make as much noise as possible until that glorious reward is
bestowed. The exorbitant parties House
Impertabo often throws are as much nostalgia on louder times for the precisi as well as an outlet for the fuori.
There is
another, darker, side effect of Veri usage. After mere weeks of consistent Veri
usage, physical deformity starts to manifest from the injection point at the
throat and spreads outwards to the face and chest. The disfiguring caused
by this long-term use is why the precisi
wear masks. The House’s vain and arrogant top clientele would most likely
recoil at the true visage of a precisi
elder. As per tradition, the more beautiful and intricate the mask, the more
horrid and vile the disfigurement hidden beneath.
With Veri as
their tool, the Impertabo earn additional revenue through blackmail and
interrogation. Analyzing the small talk of aristocrats for Truth at one of their
many banquets and balls is profitable on its own without forcing secrets out of
any guest. Uncovering information and prying thoughts out of prisoners is quite
easy when dosed with a small amount of Veri. There is no need for red hot
pokers or rusty pliers when your own body tears itself apart should you speak
untruth.
Armed with
riches, black ledgers full of compromising information, and a tireless pursuit
of Truth, House Impertabo under the leadership of Binder-Lord Baldomero
Impertabo is a major player in the intrigue of the City of Salt in Wounds yet
they make no overt moves to gain more power or control. With what they know and
what they could reveal, their unseen, deformed hands could already be clutching
innumerable puppet strings attached to the powerful across the city.
Primi Precisi Baldomero
Impertabo, Binder-Lord of the 10th Meridian
The current Binder-Lord for House Impertabo is Baldomero
Impertabo, a direct descendant of the original hero which helped bind the Tarrasque,
Piorvani Impertabo. Much like the first of his line, Baldomero was a rake in
his younger days; from duels in the street to the Saint Jacopo’s Eve Orgy (now
immortalized in the painting of the same name; House Impertabo Galleria, West
Mezzanine). Rakishness and skill with a rapier led to an ever-rising position
in the House Militia. Under his leadership as Consgli of the Militia, House
Impertabo’s control of street level narcotics dealing expanded through a
targeted acquisition of the city’s water dens and other havens of inequity. Additionally,
his decision to focus militia fuori
as bodyguards for the young aristocrats of the city ensured House Impertabo was
in a good position to advise them with the precisi
later in life.
Today, few lay their eyes upon Baldomero and not just
because of the severe amount of Veri-based disfigurement he has suffered. The
Binder-Lord spends most of his time within the house tower in Beast’s Crown. Known
for their somber subtlety, most citizens would casually ignore the unassuming
tower which belongs to the 10th Meridian house, their gaze distracted
by the encircling taverns, water dens, and flesh pits. Baldomero serves as
advisor to the precisi below him,
shaping the way they exert their influence in the various financial and
diplomatic dealings into which they have inserted themselves. Unbeknownst to all but the closest family
members, Baldomero has gotten more and more obsessed with his physical decline
and advancing age. It is because of this fear of the end that he has drawn his
House closer and closer to House Five; offering secrets, wealth, and choice Tarrasque
cuts in exchange for more and more arcane forms of life extension. His thoughts
turn to ghoulification at times, but he worries that if he became immune to
Veri usage s a ghoul, his place as head of House would be made invalid.
Altopar Menzogna-Impertabo, Keeper of the Black
Ledgers
The Library of Black Ledgers is a near-mythical warehouse of
information and secrets guarded zealously by the Impertabo family. From details
of the most banal meeting between a God-Butcher and a Marrowminer eighteen
years ago, to a meticulously collected list of possible command words of all
Thirteen Meridian anchors, the Library contains data on an unimaginable scale. Most
House members who have been blessed with access have never even lain eyes on
the shelves and shelves of books, racks of scrolls, and drawers of tablature;
opting instead for a comfortable salon where a fuori and precisi Weaverscribe
pair analyze the information request and bring forth the relevant materials. Of
course, the request for the information is itself logged and added to one of
the Black Ledgers for future analysis.
Altopar Menzogna-Impertabo, great nephew of Baldomero
Impertabo, serves the family as chief librarian and keeper of the Black
Ledgers. He has chosen to remain a fuori
and go without Veri his entire life as a sacrifice for his specialized role. His
memory is unparalleled and his ability to weave together flimsy and tenuous
threads of information into a tapestry from which the House may act has proven
priceless again and again. His role
places him as one of the most important viziers of the Binder-Lord, yet his own
secret ambition and zealotry may ultimately mean the downfall of the House or
the city itself.
The Mondus Veri
The Impertabo dedication to the truth manifests zealously in
some individuals. They find its pursuit
and adherence a near religious mandate, sometimes even punishing dishonesty at
the expense of the House’s holdings. This crusade resulted in the creation of
the Mondus Veri cult within the ranks of House Impertabo. The Mondus Veri
believe that a state of pure Truth can be attained within the City of Salt in
Wounds: the elimination of secrets, the end of intrigue, the expulsion of
dishonesty, and the dispelling of all illusion. How they plan to accomplish
this goal is unknown but some mass exposure of Veri or public access to the
Black Ledgers must be involved, with House Impertabo ascending to the ultimate
keepers of veracity. The House tends to crack down on proven members of Mondus
Veri, considering their actions in direct conflict with the advancement of the
House and its agenda. Despite the persecution, membership continues to increase,
including the recent addition of Altopar Menzogna-Impertabo himself. Suspicious
of the head spymaster, he proved his dedication to the cause by informing the
cult leaders of his evidence-backed hypothesis concerning the true nature of
the unknown chemicals extracted from the Tarrasque’s abdomen; the same
chemicals from which Veri is distilled.
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