Couple's Counselling

Ingredients:

200ml of Swamp Water
5 Rose Petals
3 Rose Thorns
3 Sprigs of Fenugreek
1 Maca Root
2 Oysters

Instructions:

First, grate your Maca Root. If you do not have any implement capable of grating at hand, very finely chop the Maca Root instead.
Then, place your Oysters onto a plate and sprinkle the grated or chopped Maca Root over them, ensuring that the oysters are coated evenly in Maca Root, then leave them out in the sun to dry. This should take 12 hours for them to dry completely and the oysters will need to be flipped after the first 6 hours.*
Meanwhile, pour your Swamp Water into a medium-sized pot and bring it to a boil. As the water boils, chop the sprigs of Fenugreek.
Once boiling, add the Rose Petals and Rose Thorns to the water, stirring occasionally to ensure that the Rose Petals don’t stick to the bottom or sides of the pot.
After an hour of boiling, the thorns will begin to float to the surface. Once the last of them have done so, add your chopped Fenugreek, cover your pot with a lid and leave to simmer.
When your Oysters have finished drying, chop them into quarters and toss them with any of the Maca Root still on the plate to ensure that the Oysters are fully coated. Remove the lid from your pot and add the Oysters to the mixture. Stir thoroughly, adding more Swamp Water as needed and cook for 30 minutes.
Once finished, strain your potion through a cloth to ensure that none of the petals, thorns or oysters end up in the bottle. Make sure to cast a small illusionary spell on the bottle so that whoever takes the potion will believe that it smells like the thing that arouses them most.
*If the weather does not permit natural drying, magic can be used to dry the oysters instead.

Background:

Couple’s Counselling is a famous potion amongst the common folk who can often be found travelling to the local Witch Coven’s camp to receive the potion. By heightening the user's libido and arousal, the potion can lead to a very full night of fun. Designed to last for 5 hours, there’s little wonder why they are highly sought after and are one of the biggest sources of income for any Witch.
While publicly taking a stance against the use of anything from the Witches, especially something as lewd as Couple’s Counselling, the nobles also make regular use of it behind closed doors. The Witches that I spoke to all mentioned a variety of tales about finely dressed servants wearing thick cloaks in an attempt to disguise themselves coming to pick up an order for their masters.
Nobles can often be found decrying the shameless acts of the commonfolk in court, demanding that laws and restrictions be put in place to bring the peasants in line. However, those same nobles will also attend the secret masquerade parties that are so popular at the moment in high society. I myself was fortunate enough to be brought along to one such event as a plus one for the lady with whom I was staying for a while, however, to write about the actions of those present would also serve to incriminate me and as such I will refrain from discussing the topic further for the time being.
To hear the Witches tell it, the origins of the potion are not of great interest, however, it would seem that the creation of Couple’s Counselling may have had a bigger impact than they realise. Coming from a time when the tensions between the Covens and the rest of the Three Great Powers were at there highest. Witch Hunts were commonplace, with an open bounty on witches providing commoners with a steady source of income and nobles enjoying the sport of hunting a Witch who had strayed too far from their Coven.
The Witches, meanwhile, had taken to retaliating by cursing whole villages and slaughtering anyone who wandered too close to their homes. With actions on both sides causing further escalations, it didn’t seem as though it would be too long before the conflict blew up into an open war between the two peoples. That is until a Witch who had fallen behind their Coven came across a young man who looked forlorn and lost. Debating on whether to kill the villager now before he noticed them or just trying to sneak by, the Witch’s curiosity eventually got the better of them and they decided that they needed to know what was wrong with the man.
Slowly approaching him and making sure to call out so that he wouldn’t think that they were trying to sneak up on him, the Witch asked the man what brought him out this far into the forest. Surprised and scared at first, the man finally sighed and decided to share his plight with the Witch. It seemed the young man was in love and wanted to make his partner happy, however, whenever he came to take his partner to bed his body would always betray him. Feeling like a failure and less of a man for not being able to satisfy his partner, he ran away rather than face everyone.
The Witch couldn’t help but laugh at the man’s situation, but upon seeing him bristle at the Witch’s reaction, they quickly defused the now-growing tension. Explaining that what he was experiencing was completely natural and nothing to be ashamed of, the Witch talked the man through methods that he could use to satisfy their partner even if their body proved to be lacking. This quickly cheered the young man up and his eyes lit up upon hearing all of the new things that he could try in the bedroom, however, he still didn’t seem satisfied.
Turning to the Witch and their expertise in alchemy, the man explained that they were grateful for all of their help but they were still determined to please their partner the conventional way. Rolling their eyes, the Witch told the man to give them a moment as they set about preparing something that would at least get the young man to leave them alone.
Fortunately, the Witches had already done a great deal of research into aphrodisiacs and it is rare to find a Witch without any in their pack. The Witch took out their ingredients and began to throw a selection of the most powerful aphrodisiacs into a pot. Not wanting to waste any of the fresh water from their waterskin, the Witch waited until the young man wasn’t looking to collect some Swamp Water and added it to the mixture, laughing to themselves over their little prank. When finished, the Witch cast a subtle spell on the bottle to try to mask the musty scents coming from the potion and then handed it to the young man, wishing him a good night with a wink.
Quickly grabbing the bottle and running off in the direction of the nearby village, the young man shouted a thank you back to the Witch, who was now free to catch back up to their Coven. Little did the Witch know that this wouldn’t be their last interaction with the young man who would come to visit them almost daily over the next few weeks. It would seem that the potion had worked so well that the man had been receiving noise complaints from his neighbours.
In disbelief that the potion that they had absentmindedly thrown together had actually worked, the Witch provided them with more and happily took the offered purse of gold from the man for their services. In time, the young man would bring their partner along with them and pay for enough of the potion for both of them. Then the man would bring along their friends, who would eventually bring their friend until the entire village was coming and going from the Coven to purchase their potions. By this point, the Witch had already told their brothers and sisters about the situation and they all agreed that this seemed like the greatest con they had ever heard and they were all brought on board to help with the increased demand.
During the annual gathering of the Covens, the Witch would share these events with all of the Covens of Atoom and soon they would all begin similar operations across the continent. Eventually, the Witch Hunts would slow until they stopped altogether as the common people enjoyed the benefits of having Witches close to their villages and the nobles started their private parties. Meanwhile, the Witches stopped cursing and killing outsiders as they decided that they served better as clients than they did as prey.

The name Couple’s Counselling stems from the common folk’s tongue-in-cheek sense of humour. It was originally simply called a love potion by the Witches who made it, many peasants found that the potion served as a perfect device to help soothe their partners following an argument. As such, the name was coined by villagers as they gossiped amongst themselves.
“Seti, I heard you and the husband had been arguing all through the night, is everything ok?”
“Oh yes, Menes and I are fine, but just to make sure we’ll be going for some Couple’s Counselling later”