D&D 5E 5th Edition and Cormyr: Flexing My Idea Muscle and Thinking Out Loud

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Second day of the first tenday.

Rumors of the purchase of Taertranth’s House (nigh the Trueshield Trading Priakos warehouses) have proven true. Per the latest printing of The Hunting Horn of the Forest Kingdom, the venerable playhouse now belongs to the Ladies Bareldur (Narnathra), Tantorn (Laeyalane), and Ravenhill (Cathone). The noblewomen promised to renovate and repair the aging playhouse, and to resume the regular day and night showings for which the House was once popular. The Ladies purchased an adjacent structure, which will serve as lodgings for the House’s actors and playwrights in residence.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Third day of the first tenday.

In Greatgaunt, burghers have called on the Queen’s Lord of that city to send a ride of Purple Dragons north to find a host of Tempus worshippers that are stopping travelers on The High Road and warning all to remain still while spells are cast. “Those Tempus-loving bastards slowed my journey by a day. A whole day!” This according to Marlchur Halonthar, a seller of fine books and Sword Coast broadsheets (including such popular titles as Horkle’s Gossip Cauldron and The Waterdeep Wartrumpet). One of the more prominent rumors circulating in Greatgaunt claims an enchanted mace is the subject of the host’s search, one cursed to drive to madness anyone struck by it, whether in battle or during arms practice.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Ninth day of the first tenday.

The once in a decade mating march of harp spiders in the King’s Forest has begun. From Suzail north to Immersea and Arabel, and from Eveningstar west to Tyrluk and High Horn, travelers are being warned to avoid the King’s Forest unless absolutely necessary. Folk leaving the forest have reported the sight of rangers herding aggressive male arachnids away from rest stops on the Starwater Road between Dhedluk and Immersea by means of spells and trickery. Rangers and Royal Foresters alike are warning travelers to avoid playing harp song of any kind lest they wish to invite an attack. Troupes of harp spiders have been observed on the Way of the Dragon. These are moving southwest before breaking off the road and into the forest, likely in the direction of songs played by female harp spiders deeper in the wood. Meanwhile, a ride of Purple Dragons is escorting a handful of minstrels and bards on the Ranger’s Way, a veritable horde of spiders trailing their enchanted harp song. Amongst the spiders were specimens "large as a thimdror" according to Elgur Harthmantle, a roadside peddler of edibles and trinkets.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. First day of the second tenday.

Traders arriving in Suzail from Arabel report an immense, anvil-shaped cloud has formed over Masoner’s Bridge–one that has yet to dissipate or drift away.

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In Suzail, six adventuring bands (numbering two score and 12 individuals) arrived at the Royal Court to obtain adventuring charters. Though all were dressed as one might expect, at least four poorly disguised factors of prominent noble houses were spotted amongst the motley collection of adventurers.

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The Lord Warder is reportedly furious over the disappearance of Lord Garlingar Haelbroke from the Royal Court. (Or a man who looks very much like him; the folk of Suzail remain divided as to who is the true Lord Garlingar–the one supposedly slain in Thunderstone or the man apprehended from the Dragonrider’s Club three and ten days ago.)

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News of a startling development in Marsember has made its way to Arabel and Suzail. A haunting has begun occupying doors by night and freezing them cold. Unsuspecting victims find themselves chilled to the bone when they try to open the door and remain attached and near-freezing until they answer a question put to them by an ethereal face that emerges from the door.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Third day of the second tenday.

Overnight, all of western Suzail south of the Promenade became illuminated by hundreds of floating balls of light. Stories told that night and the following morning point to no single source for the illumination. Rather, they appeared “all at once, everywhere.” Folk living in the “Darkstreets” (as that part of Suzail is referred to for its lack of illumination relative to the Docks, the Promenade and the area immediately west and north of the Royal Palace where nobles live and congregate) took the opportunity to leave their homes and observe the lights. There were no major incidents reported to Crown authorities. The floating lights faded away before the light of the sun touched Suzail’s western wall.

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Crown officials have firmly denied rumors of Sembian warships attempting a nighttime raid on Marsember. Information overheard within the Royal Court and discretely shared beyond its walls suggests a trio of competing Sembian merchant vessels attempted to outrace each other in a bid to make port in the City of Spices. The first to arrive dared make port at night, but nearly sank after striking a wreck beneath the water. Crown officials forced the other two ships to assist in keeping the damaged ship afloat, then arrested the crews and removed them to Starwater Keep for detention and questioning.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Fourth day of the second tenday.

Merchant interests in Suzail have diverted shipping caravans to the Way of the Manticore in response to traffic on the East Way being halted by snow. All of the East Way from Arabel to Masoner’s bridge, where an enormous cloud responsible for the out of season snowfall was first sighted, has been covered in snow to the height of a draft animal. The cloud drifted west as far as Arabel, buried the city, and then dissipated. Traffic on both the Way of the Manticore and the Thunder Way is expected to double until the Easy Way is cleared of snow.

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An unusual number of adventuring parties have arrived in Suzail over the last tenday. Most journeyed to the Royal Court, where the number of on duty Purple Dragons and Wizards of War have conspicuously doubled, whilst the remainder found lodgings in the homes of nobles. Sensing an opportunity to feed, the hungry maw of gossip gorged itself on speculation and rumor over these arrivals. Suzail’s wagging tongues (broadsheets) have provided many answers but little in the way of truth, these answers ranging from the outrageous (Queen Raedra has given up on finding a suitable consort amongst the nobility and has decided instead to marry a worthy adventurer), to the scandalous (nobles have instituted a practice of “riding” adventurers to determine their "worthiness" before employing them), to the clear headed (far too many adventurers are operating in Cormyr without a charter, thus has our wise Queen ordered them rounded up and brought to Suzail to either pay their way or lay down their swords).

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A great many ships have anchored in the waters beyond Suzail’s docks. Not surprisingly, broadcryers employed by dockside shipping firms have fanned out into all of Suzail south of the Promenade. They are calling on folk in need of extra coin to report to the Docks at sunset to assist in the loading and unloading of cargo by night for wages one and a half times the day rate.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Seventh day of the second tenday.

A handful of Nurturers arrived by ship in Suzail and disappeared into the city. The followers of Chauntea were marked as such for their bare feet and the questions they put to locals. (“Might you know where the nearest public gardens may be found?”)

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Lady Alyanstelle Immerdusk’s hushed attempt to hire adventurers to kidnap Lord Staglan Wintercoats was laid bare at the Dragonrider’s Club by a masked dancer. The end of the dancer’s performance saw Traegar Wintercoats, son and heir to House Wintercoats, clothed only in gleaming oils, remove his mask and announce to the stunned crowd that he would pay 500 golden lions on top of Lady Alyanstelle’s promised fee to see his father safely detained and made to appear unharmed before the Lady in order to answer for crimes against her. Just what “crimes” Lord Wintercoats is guilty of has left noble watchers across Suzail to speculate. One entertaining rumor first overheard at Hrelto’s, a tavern popular among nobles’ servants, claims Lord Wintercoats stole Lady Immerdusk’s favorite stallion, bred him and then gelded him, and left the unfortunate horse to run wild across her private estate bordering Taverton Hall--this the latest in a string of “punishments'' meted out by the furious lord, who holds Lady Immerdusk responsible for matchmaking his son with a halfblood Scornubrian sorcerer the year prior.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. First day of the third tenday.

Merchants arriving in Suzail from Eagle Peak have shared a detailed account of a bloody skirmish that took place after a ride of Purple Dragons was ambushed by a phalanx of hobgoblins on the grasslands north of the Tunwash. The hobgoblins deployed polearms and locked shields in an attempt to break the Cormyrean’s charge after the phalanx emerged from the long grass and fired their crossbows. Spell shields cast by a pair of alert war wizards prevented the hobgoblins from taking down more than a few riders and mounts. The Purple Dragons broke the shield wall, yet still lost half their number in the furious battle that followed. The hobgoblins proved immensely strong and disciplined; they used their brute strength to pull riders from their mounts, then attacked in twos and threes to slay fallen Dragons before they could regain their footing. The war wizards evened the battle with carefully placed spells that slowed their hobgoblin foes and entangled their feet. No prisoners were taken. Notably, one of the war wizards insisted several of the polearms be destroyed as an offering to Tempus before the survivors departed with their dead.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Second day of the third tenday.

Several portraits within the Suzail home of House Illance have mysteriously transformed into a single likeness. Officially, neither family nor servants recognize the individual newly depicted, which is reported to be that of a young man with long brown hair unbound, dressed in a blue doublet over a white undershirt, with a sword on his hip. Unofficially, the elder Illance heads are furious over this blatant reminder of a foe that bedeviled their family. Upon hearing news of this event during the most recent of his nightly “informed gatherings'' in Dragonhaven, the sage Farlthast related an anecdote of a slaughter that took place some twenty one years ago at Stag Well, the summertime gathering place of the Illance family. According to the sage, a lone man avoided the watching eyes of a dozen guards, made his way inside the mansion, and put a crossbow quarrel each into the bodies of Lord Rancelair Illance and his son, Meldrauvyn. The assassin butchered his way back out, delivering up numerous servants and at least one house mage to the gods before disappearing “back to Sembia most likely, there to take payment for his bloody work.” Farlthast could offer only conjecture as to who ordered the attack; he named a handful of Sembian noble families who’ve long considered the Illances to be mortal enemies, then moved the conversation to other topics of recent interest to his audience.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Kythorn. Third day of the third tenday.

A story of “useful undead” has made its way from Irriphar’s Inn, in Arabel, to Ossper’s Warehouse nigh Eastgate, in Suzail. According to Pelapra Barcantle, a seller of expensive fabrics, her favored supplier in Arabel, hight Arenelle Saraclar, shared over dinner a tale of the terrific scare she suffered when fabric crates stacked one atop the other within Ssantusas’s Rental Warehouse (located south of Calantar’s Gate in the shadow of Arabel’s outer wall) tipped over and shattered. The topmost crate struck the warehouse wall, sheared off the wainscotting, and revealed upright corpses hidden inside. Before anyone could decide what to do, the corpses tore their way out of the wall and proceeded to extract the bolts of fabric and restack them, then removed the broken crates and wainscotting and repaired the wallboards using boards and nails stacked in another crate in the warehouse. The undead seemed to know where everything they needed could be found, did not harass or attack anyone, and returned to their spaces between the wall studs before sealing themselves back into place from the inside.