"I should warn you, I coat my bolts in garlic. A trick I learned from you noodle-slurpers. That way if the bolt doesn’t finish you, poison will. You’re professionals, you understand that no matter what, I’ll splatter your boss’s brains all over this place. If he dies, the paydays dry up."
- —Brunner the Bounty Hunter to a group of mercenaries hired to protect Abdul-Qaadir.[1g]
Garlic is a common herb of the Old World grown in most gardens of the Empire and Tilea.[2a][3]
Tilean cuisine in particular makes extensive use of garlic for its dishes,[3] but it has even darker uses; for instance duellists from the city-states dip their blades in garlic to make it more difficult for the victim's blood to coagulate.[4a]
Garlic is also said to ward off Vampires and other denizens of the dark.[2a] In truth, some Vampires do seem to be driven away by this herb while others are just annoyed by its stink.[2a][3]
Another holdover from the Undead terrors that have long plagued Sylvania, commoners in the Empire and Tilea string garlic in their homes to ward off evil spirits during certain nights of the year.[1a]
Trivia[]
The Tilean use of garlic during a fight could be a reference to old Cosa Nostra methods. The Sicilian Mafia's button men used to rub their bullets with garlic so that even a flesh wound wcould prove dangerous due to the lack of blood coagulation.