Connects to: 04.06, 17.03, 17.06, 17.07, 20.08, 21.06, 21.06.01, 25.04 and the Kingswood.
Not far west from the Sundial Inn (25.04) are the ruined walls of the Shattered Citadel, destroyed by elven siege more than a hundred and fifty years ago. The Verlime were a noble-blooded clan who acted as the protectors of thriving community, eventually claiming for their leader the title of Duke, and willfully provoked the Count of Kingswood with hunting and timbering expeditions into the forest. The elves were slow to respond, but when the inevitable attack came it was overwhelming. The wards the Verlime had arranged were torn like paper, and the stone walls of the Citadel dismantled soon thereafter by a horde of summoned elementals.
The Citadel was razed and the Verlimes punished harshly, hunted down to near extinction. It is said that the last few grandmothers of the Verlime purchased life for their family by agreeing to a generational geas – the family must ever more give up their firstborn infants to the Court of the Kingswood.
The Citadel itself is haunted by the bitter phantoms of the old Verlime generals, and a few elementals left behind to guard the ruins and ensure that no one ever rebuilds. Stories say the cold-iron enchanted elfslayer swords of the old Verlime were not all captured by the Court, and treasure seekers occasionally visit the ruins in hope of gathering some hint from the phantom generals as to the resting places of the Verlime’s lost treasure.
Regulus Verlime of the Sundial is long since tired of treasure-seekers trying to pummel him for information about the treasure, and so easily suggests any inquirer visit the Citadel, where he expects the elementals and angry wraiths will deal with the curious.
The wizard who set up the wards that she promised would keep the elves at bay fled when the elven host arrived rather than stand and fight them with the Verlimes. She and her followers kept on running west away from the forest until they ran into the western mountains, where she established the village of Cragsend (04.06) and ruled as the Witch Queen.
Subhex:
- 18.07 (The Body of the Child): a fetus conceived by the moon and the earth lies sleeping under the ruins of the citadel.
Connections:
- After destroyed the Citadel, the elves burned the town of Treebrush (20.08).
- The Verlimes built a beacon tower at the edge of the Kingswood (21.06), it is now abandoned.
- Some Verlime soldiers know haunt the site of the Last Skirmish (17.03).
- A remnant of the Verlime clan lives at Newhill (17.07).
- A nearby well-lit road helps keep the elementals and other things of the citadel at bay (17.06).
- Although the Verlimes were citizens of the City of Shuttered Windows their last Duke (Gavriel Verlime) was denied entry to the City when persued by the Elven Hunt following the destruction of the Citadel.
- One of the last of the old Verlimes was Ota Verlime, the Iron Count (21.06.01).
Hooks:
- Elves of Kingswood still want human infants. Why?
- Is the treasure of Verlime, including the elfslayer swords, a real thing? Where is it?
- Though the elves have let the Freehold be for well over a century, the reason for their restraint is a mystery. Is it one of the terms of their treaty with the Prince of Men?
The Body of the Child
Hex 18.07.01
Connects to: 18.10.01, 18.26.01, 29.14.13 and the Kingswood.
In primordial times, before the war of the gods tore the earth asunder, there was a pure love between the earth and the moon. The seed of the lunar deity fell to the earth as stars, fertilizing the warm earth, the lakes, the winds and the fires. From this union the first elementals were born - crude creatures, with bodies of base matter and a star inside each one to give them the spark of life.
Then came a time when the moon loved too much. A huge fragment of his body broke off and fell into the earth, forming the crater whose outline can still be traced around the old Verlime citadel (18.26.01). Never again after that would the moon and the earth hold congress as they had, but the earth bore her lover’s last child faithfully. It would be enormous, a mountain with a star for a heart. But alas - the age of men was already fast approaching. The humans and their new gods beat back the elementals, cut down the trees of the great northern forest, and carved up the earth to build their City of Many Windows.
Fearing the might of humanity, the earth-child chose to remain slumbering in the womb. Within its body, passages formed, and the essences of earth and moon mingled to create lesser elementals. These grandchildren of the moon make their way through a secret tunnel that connects them to the Sunless Sea, and from there they spread out across the Shrouded Lands. They have no intelligence as humans can understand it, yet they seem to have purposes beyond mortal reckoning. Perhaps the elves, who have mastered the art of summoning such creatures, know more, but they will not tell.
As for the Body of the Child, it remained safe for thousands, perhaps millions of years (the records, such as exist, are unclear). The Verlimes built a citadel on top of it, but that was of no consequence, for citadels come and go while the earth endures. It was only when the Verlimes began to dig deep into the earth that the elves saw they needed to act; and on the very night that the excavators broke through into the veins of the Child, the elves rode out from the Kingswood and cleaved the citadel in two.
Hooks:
- Who is this lunar god? Is (s)he still around?
- Why did a part of the moon break off? Is this really a story of deities in love, or a garbled record of an astronomical cataclysm?
- Could the Earth-Child ever be awoken and brought to the surface?
- What’s inside this long tunnel that leads from the Child to the Sunless Sea?
- Where else have elementals spread to, and what are their mysterious goals?
- What’s the relationship between the elves and the elementals? Are elves a more refined form of the same nature spirit? Where does the Green Lady fit into all this?
- The Verlimes provoked the elves to attack them by chopping down the Kingswood and delving into the earth. This is starting to sound like Isengard. What were the Verlimes trying to accomplish? Were they after umberstone?
