My name is Button and I’m a storyteller. Well, Button is actually a nickname but very few know that, including myself until I was nearly in my tweens. The story is told that Pansy Goodbarrel was the first to exclaim that I was “cute as a button!” when Mama first brought me out in swaddling clothes to show the neighbors. Folks thought it natural that I’d be named after a mushroom given our family’s reputation, so the name stuck.
You see, for my family mushrooms are more than just a favorite food, they've become a way of life. It started when my great grandfather, Eldon, (still a bit wet behind the ears) took a risky but well-paying job as food taster for one of the prominent Houses of Arrabar. The bitter rivalries and assassination attempts in the Houses put the Lord of House Rohdan ill at ease. It was common knowledge that he had fondness for wild mushrooms, and reasoning that it would be a fairly easy way to poison him, the Lord decided to employ a Halfling food taster. Who better than a Halfling who also has a weakness for wild mushrooms?
Fortunately Eldon had extraordinarily keen eyes and a knack for spotting anything out of the ordinary. He began making extensive notes with very detailed drawings of every kind of mushroom he ran across and managed to keep the Lord healthy. The journal became a labor of love and was one of the few things Eldon managed to escape with when the keep was overrun by a rival house. He slipped away from the chaos that ensued and traveled northeast with what he could carry on his pony.
He settled in Shamph taking up gardening and, in time, he took the lovely maid, Britta, to himself as wife. Their only child, my grandmother, Rosie, was mesmerized by Eldon’s tales of his life in Arrabar and what he knew of the older days in Elbulder and the legends of Luiren, the home of our ancestors. Luckily, she committed them all to memory before pneumonia sadly took him before his time. Rosie loved to tell the stories to anyone who would lend an ear, but alas, there was little love in Shamph for Halfling tales so she learned to master the art of cooking. The mastery of her mushroom pies was the talk of folk throughout the region for many years and the recipes became a closely held family secret.
Rosie’s skill at storytelling was not lost on her youngest son, Otho, however. The tales inspired my father so much that he determined to learn all he could about Hin history and it became his life’s work. In his early years as a scholar of Halfling lore, he recorded a compilation of all her tales into a book which he presented to her on her 50th birthday. It was her pride and joy. I could see sheer delight in her eyes when she’d spot me reading from it. Sometimes, she’d ask me which tale I was reading. Then she’d smile and go on to tell me what Papa didn't include in his writing. She brought the sometimes rather dry historical accounts that Papa recorded to life with songs and sounds and information about what the people were like and what lessons a prudent Halfling might learn through hearing their stories. I never tired of hearing them and in time I took pride in the telling of them myself.
On the occasion of my birth, Grandma Rosie presented my parents with the family collection of mushroom recipes and formulas, including Eldon’s weathered journal. Now it’s my mother’s mushroom pies that have won the baking competition at the harvest festival in Shamph for the past 32 years, which is a rather prestigious distinction among good-folk considering our great love for mushrooms and pies! The recipes have been kept in our family for four generations now, but not all of the formulas are intended for the dinner table. My mother’s interest in the versatility and variety of mushrooms led her to experiment with the family formulas and add some of her own. She took to making potions and remedies and now she runs an apothecary shop with Papa’s help when he isn't otherwise engaged in his research.
As a young Hin, I eagerly anticipated accompanying my mother on her mushroom hunting trips to Chondalwood. To me, it was like a treasure hunt… never knowing exactly what I would find and often not knowing exactly what it was that I found when I did find one! I couldn’t wait to get back to Great grandpa Eldon’s drawings and see if I could figure out which variety of mushroom would claim kinship to my treasure. I proved to be a quick study on the art of finding their secret hiding places and predicting where I might find a peculiar variety for which my mother had a specific need. The forest is a constant yet ever changing habitat and the mushrooms are like nomads popping up in different new places with each visit – always seeking the ideal environment in which to prosper. I feel a bit like a mushroom nomad at times, my gifts are the same, yet always I’m seeking the ideal place to bloom which might change with a change in the weather.
I studied herbalism (and the family art of mushroom pies and soup) under my mother’s tutelage assuming that I would follow in her footsteps taking over the apothecary one day, but I found it tiresome and unfulfilling. Sometimes I would help out in the shop, but somehow I’d always end up distracting the patrons with one of Grandma Rosie’s tales rather than selling our wares. I know a story relevant to almost every situation and making people smile with a story, well…that’s all that really matters. Besides, despite my best efforts to control myself, I simply talk too much. It wasn't long before my folks stopped asking me to help because it was bad for business. I could see a sense of relief in both of them when I announced my intention to become an apprentice to Norkas the Bard.
That was the autumn I saw Norkas for the first time. He came to the harvest festival in Shamph as bards are wont to do seeking audience, coin and bits of knowledge from local tales and songs. About halfway through my telling of a somewhat scary tale of the Hin Ghostwars, I noticed him listening intently and watching me with the most curious facial expression that I sought him out after the story. We spent most of the rest of the festival together and I found myself in awe of his storytelling skills. He was different than the other traveling minstrels I had met. He was a true bard, a storyteller! He could hold the attention of an audience so completely with just his words and a flute that he could make them laugh, cry or gasp, right on cue! I knew at once what I wanted – to learn all that I could from him. He said he saw something in me and would take me on as an apprentice if was willing to travel with him and truly be willing to learn. We left before the next full moon.
My send-off was a small family gathering and a few neighbors that didn't want to miss the opportunity for another slice of one of Mama’s pies. Mama gave me a kit of special items from the shop, several remedies, ointments and potions along with a mortar and pestle of my own perfectly sized and compact for traveling. Papa’s gifts were a little more practical: a shovel, and iron pot and a dagger that he hoped I would use only for chopping up mushrooms. Grandma Rosie was the last to present her gift and did so with bittersweet tears. You can’t believe my surprise when she presented me with the book of tales Papa made for her so long ago. Now the book is my pride and joy and I never tire of telling the tales within them, including the parts Papa didn't record.
My apprenticeship seemed to last an eternity. We traveled all over Faerun, seeing and learning much in the twelve years before Norkas finally deemed me ready to be called a true bard and took his leave. As I watched him ride off, I began to wonder how I would manage on my own, we’d been together for so long. And now, even after being on my own for two years, I still feel a bit lost without him; but the feeling fades as soon as I find an audience.
