Talisman Vendors of the Renewed Glandive

In his January Rolling Stone profile of Pope Francis I, writer Mark Binelli supplies a classic bit of color reportage:

Outside St. Peter’s Square, hawkers are selling everything from Sistine Chapel tours to airbrushed paintings of Tupac, Bob Marley and the pope. I ask one of the vendors, a tall Belizean with a shaved head, if the increased crowds under Francis have been good for business. He scowls and shakes his head, then answers in perfect, New York-inflected English, “Naw, this guy, all he does is talk about the poor, and so he’s bringing in these poorer tourists from places like Argentina. They ain’t got no money, these people! When Ratzinger was pope, Germans would pull up on a bus. They’re organized, they spend! Now everyone wants a discount.”

The reminder that vendors of religious souvenirs might be motivated by less than the utmost spiritual concerns put me in mind of The Dying Earth. It just so happens that the area around Shin’s Stadium near the Marketplace of Kaiin now teems with pilgrims. These hopeful believers have erected a tent city in hopes of getting near to the Glandive. This earthly representative of a once-moribund—one might frankly say obscure—creed has energized a new generation of worshipers. Her previous earthly incarnation, that of a doddering, querulous old woman, attracted an ever-dwindling core of adherents. With her passing, the matriarchs of Glandive pronounced that the unceasing spirit of the Glandive has rooted in the pleasing form of a young woman with silken gold hair. The newly charismatic and outgoing Glandive inspires travelers from all over Ascolais and Almery. None doubt the purity of her vision, encouraging charity and empathy toward all—none, at least, who do not desire a good kicking from intemperate followers. With her rising popularity has risen a brisk trade in memorabilia, from small ceramic portraits of the new Glandive, to locks of golden hair. (Warning: hair samples not guaranteed to originate on the head of the Glandive herself.) All of these items are considered to be powerful amulets conferring luck and protection from swindle and robbery upon their owners.

The head of the cartel selling these amulets, Imgo the Gaunt, surprisingly does not answer to the Glandive or her matriarchs. An independent operator, he fiercely defends his trade against unauthorized talisman hawkers. He doesn’t pursue relic sellers elsewhere in the city, but around the tent zone and the still-modest Glandive temple, his mighty-thewed enforcers ensure that only his merchandise winds up around the necks of the pious.

Your PCs might be engaged by the matriarchs to drive Imgo and his gang off, or by Imgo to prevent competitors from horning in on his action.