Kevin Kaier
While shopping in an Arabic antiquities store, a curious item comes into view. It is a beautiful, but simple 8th century Arabic curved dagger. The dagger, according to its supposed history was recovered from a tomb outside of Baghdad. The owner of the store, Bazzeel Shimmir, drives a very hard bargain and will not sell to investigators unless they show significant knowledge of Arabic history. "This is an important artifact, not a trinket or a letter opener," he will say. The investigators are allowed to examine the dagger, but without a detailed inspection, its true nature is not discernable. If the investigators want to find out the daggers true nature they need to buy it, or steal it.
1 The dagger was owned by none other than Abdul Al Hazred and was taken off his body after he was torn apart by an invisible monster in the market square in Damascus, by a peddler. The dagger was created from metal from a meteor, which fell from the sky. The extraterrestrial nature of the metal makes it quite effective against mythos entities. The dagger has passed through the hands of many affluent Arabs before arriving here. Mr. Shimmir is a smuggler of stolen artifacts, as well as heroin, and will protect his investments at all costs.
2 Al Hazred’s dagger was stolen from a Cthulhu worshipping death cult from Iraq. They are hell bent on retrieving it and Mr. Shimmir is not aware of this, nor is he involved in the theft of it. If the investigators procure the dagger they can expect lots of trouble from these fellows. Them and their shoggoth.
3 The dagger is a fake and Mr. Shimmir has sold dozens like it. He specializes in forging supposedly ancient and rare esoteric artifacts and selling them to pseudo intellectuals and Middle Eastern aficionados. His reluctance to sell was just subterfuge to drive up the price. The Keeper should play it up how the dagger glimmers with energy and power (which is actually the lighting and the high polish of the blade), Mr. Shimmir will also steer the dagger's supposed history to meet the investigators expectations. If the investigators procure the dagger, hope they didn’t pay for it and hope they don’t think it is going to especially effective against Mythos entities.
Copyright (c) 2001 Kevin Kaier
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