Bluepearl Wine

Bluepearl Wine is the traditional wine of House Mollusca. It is similar to blueberry wine, crafted during late summer currents and aged beneath the sea. Its name comes from its color (a deep indigo with a pearlescent sheen) and the luminous residue it leaves along the glass or shell-cup when poured, like moonlight sliding across a pearl.

Overview

Bluepearl Wine is fermented from Tide-berries, cultivated along reef ledges where cold currents meet warm upwellings. The berries are harvested sparingly, crushed with mineral-rich brine, and fermented in sealed nacre-lined vessels embedded into cavern walls.

The result is a wine that is cool, subtly sweet, and mineral-forward, with faint floral notes and a lingering saline finish.

Cultural Significance

Among Molluscans, Bluepearl Wine is not a drink of excess. It is served:

• At formal gatherings and treaty signings
• During remembrance ceremonies
• On the first night of the November, when the Night Monarch is sensed, after singing Kraken's Call
• In April and July during tourney feasts, poured once and shared sparingly

To overindulge in Bluepearl Wine is considered a social failing; to refuse it without cause is an insult.

Bluepearl is not meant to drown the mind. It is meant to remind it.

— Elysea Tahrin, Acolyte of the Fifth Ring

Flavor & Appearance

Color: Deep blue-violet with a pearlescent shimmer.

Aroma: Brine, crushed berries, cold stone.

Taste: Gently sweet, mineral-rich, cooling.

Finish: Long, dry, faintly luminous.

Variants

Bluepearl Reserve is aged multiple years, restricted to noble Houses.

Still Bluepearl is uncarbonated and used in rituals.

Bloom-Year Bluepearl is a rare vintage from years of exceptional jellyfish blooms, which only Lady Wynter knows where the remaining bottles are.

Rarity

Uncommon to Rare, depending on vintage.

Bluepearl Wine is not mass-produced. Its availability depends on the health of tide-berry groves and the stability of seasonal currents. Common Bluepearl are found in cellarettes throughout the Mollusca Protectorate, especially in The Zafforza Trench. Older vintages and bloom-year batches are rare. The older vintages are reserved for nobility, the Asteri, and ceremonial use, while Lady Wynter hoards the bloom-year batch. Export beyond Molluscan territory is extremely limited and often discouraged.

History

Early Molluscans discovered that certain reef-bound berries, when crushed and left to ferment in mineral brine beneath steady currents, produced a drink that did not spoil and seemed to remember.

It is said that Bluepearl Wine as a functional preservation draught, consumed sparingly to steady the mind during long migrations and periods of mourning. Over time, its use shifted from necessity to ritual, its preparation codified and guarded as the Molluscans began to associate the wine with memory, continuity, and ancestral presence.

Bluepearl Wine has become a symbol of unity as shared cups were poured at the end of wars (such as the World Wars), to celebrate the signing of treaties, and at funerary gathering. No one know when the Asteri first took interest in the wine’s production but they formalized oversight of it to prevent corruption of both method and meaning.

Several attempts were made across the centuries to increase production or export the wine beyond Molluscan territory. These efforts uniformly failed, either through environmental collapse of tide-berry groves or unexplained spoilage. Modern scholars quietly agree that Bluepearl Wine resists commodification, thriving only when produced within strict traditional bounds.

Nothing is known about the Bloom-Year vintage as Lady Wynter doesn’t talk about it.