Connects to: 20.03, 26.01, 26.01.04 and the City of Shuttered Windows.
Northburn Holding is located here at the extreme edge of the Freeholds, wedged between orcish territory (26.01) and the Kingswood. But despite this the holding looks like a prosperous and contented place with fat cows munching at the grass as goats gambol around them.
Despite the close proximity of the orcs there are no defenses that can be seen around the town, only the burnt out ruins of the Puce Keep. Instead the largest building in town is the Hundred Cheeses which is famous for its wide variety of grilled cheese platters especially burnt cheese, a local specialty that is made out of a mix of goat and cow milk in which the curd is caramelized.
But a closer look reveals that each and every family has a child that seems just a bit larger, just a bit greener and just a bit rougher than the rest that constantly demands attention and food from its parents. These are the orcish changelings that orcish mothers, who are annoyed by the unfairness of the Double Duty, drop in local cribs every so often.
Parents have to be quick to remove their own child from the crib before its new foster sibling throttles it, but they never kill or abandon these orcish children as doing so would bring down the wrath of the mothers that sneak by every so often to peer in windows and make sure that their abandoned children are growing fast and strong.
Raising the changelings is a heavy burden that is laid on the families of Northburn but many think it is better than having to deal with orcish raiding parties, like the ones who burned the old lord out of the Puce Keep.
But still a large faction of the town chafes at the bargain that the town has made with the orcs. For example people here refrain from sex in the spring as orc children are usually dropped off at the end of the year and it is dangerous to have a baby in the house when an orc arrives (local superstition also says that sex delays the coming of spring). Also whenever an orc child dies a large and nervous feast is held for its true family to convince them it was an accident.
An especially large number of problems have cropped up recently. Messen Benatr, a local wealthy farmer, was been brutally murdered and people are squabbling over who will have to care for his changeling. Similarly, Simon the Scribe is soon to be executed in an especially brutal fashion for the crime of killing his wife as she has an especially vicious brood of three changelings that someone else will have to take care of now.
This has all come to a head with a recent raid by the major and his boys on the Shining Swordsman tavern under the pretext of “illegal badger baiting” as the tavern’s proprietor and several of the regulars have sought to bring in Grimkjel Koldranson (one of Koldran’s many children) and his band of mercenary gnolls to butcher the changelings and fight off any orcish retaliation.
A third faction of humans just does their best to avoid the whole issue and hide their homes, shave their heads to feign illness or live only with members of the same sex.
As for the changelings themselves, what is there to tell? Usually blood calls out to blood and the changelings leave their battered by relieved “parents” to head up into the Grey Mountains. But still, many of these orcs harbor fond memories for their foster home (so many cows to tip, so many weak human children to bully, truly a paradise) and would be most upset at anyone who harmed their childhood home. But a handful of changelings become fully assimilated into human society and either stay in Northburn and try to make a life for themselves or set off for the Shuttered City, where orcs are viewed with far less suspicion than the raid-scarred lands of the Freeholds.
Hooks:
- Have any other villages cut similar deals with the orcs?
- What is it like to raise a changeling? Do orcs and their “parents” ever develop close bonds?
- How do these changelings fare when they return to orcish lands? Do they know how to speak orcish?
- Can sex really delay the coming of spring?
- What can you tell me of Grimkjel Koldranson and his gnolls?
- Why does living with members of the same sex prevent orcs from giving you a changeling? Why would an orc care?
- Any notable changelings?
- Do the orcs ever steal human babies when they leave their changelings?
