Port Avanthyr Rumors

[Atmosphere]

Port Avanthyr: Click Here For City Details

Sitting outside the Stouthammer's Brews:
The smell of fish and salty air fills the port as Meriadoc Swashbucklers and the Northern Watch patrol the streets giving travelers a sense of security. Merchants debate the recent trade ban on Thayan goods but will often praise the local banking system. Besides seafood, most eatables are fairly expensive making fish and fish soup a fairly common cuisine among the poor. The pick pocketing of foreigners and travelers is a continuous issue. There is an attitude of unity among this fairly diverse population but its often shadowed by one's own desires and or ambitions.

Having a drink at the Menacing Mariner:
Unlike Stouthammer, the Menacing Mariner is filled with the lower class local flavor of sailors, dockworkers, and shady characters who speak with colorful language. The quality of drink is much lower but more potent as people who drink here more often drink to get drunk. Fighting for fun and seeking out a quick romance is common as sailors are looking to have a good time before their next long voyage. On less rowdy nights, one may hear hushed conversations about the local black market and possibilities of smuggling goods from the newest black market, Thayan goods.

[Vaelek]

Partnership! Militant merchants?

The Northern Watch continues to integrate itself within the weave of Avanthyr's merchant and noble classes, now more recently with the partnership of the local Emporium to the chivalric order. Grandmaster Esmond Aurelianus spreads the news both directly and indirectly, ushering the traveling knights and more stationary man-at-arms to publicize the change. Expanded inventory, new services and a commitment to a righteous cause are the proclaimed note for the Emporium following this expansion.

Reportedly the Grandmaster all but bought the store out from under it's proprietor, one Leithian. The trade savvy Elf is since seen with a quartermaster title around Northern Watch knights, enjoying an expanded managerial role. As by Esmond's own words; "There's really no one better."

[Fateful Encounter]

Pirate Graveyards

More and more often, rumors begin to circulate the Port that ships passing through to reach Avanthyr are met with wreckages small pirate fleets that have been utterly decimated. Wherever these whispers go, the words "Red Ships" soon follow ...

[[DM] Grinning Death]

Zakaharan Emissary

Rumor has it that one of the Red Ships has landed in Port Avanthyr, and an Emissary has met with Lord Meriadoc and his Northern Watch. After some time, the Emissary left the Meriadoc Hold and returned to his ship.

A few hours later, Zakaharan warriors began unloading into the docks, and making their way outside the Port proper. Tents have been set up outside the city, and the foreigners have apparently been granted leave to set up a temporary residence.

The people of the Port have viewed these strangers with a degree of mistrust, but less so than most of the valley due to the number of foreign people that usually traverse the Port's docks and town. Still, they wait to see what they will do, and what their interactions with the people of Sundren will bring.

[Atmosphere]

Counterfeit Stags

The Waukeen Bank has reported a surplus of counterfeited coin within Port Avanthyr. This has bankrupted a few small independent merchants within the Port. And, recently, has started to effect those who trade regularly with Port Avanthyr.

[Fateful Encounter]

A Legionnaire's Legacy

The body of Immunes Anna Loren was discovered dead in the Avanthyr port, drowned. There were no signs of a struggle; that, coupled with the trial and execution of her brother Bartleby Loren on the charges of treason and conspiracy with the Black Hand, led to her death being ruled a suicide.

[DM_BAMF]

Black Hand Propaganda

Though the subject has been mostly silenced by Meriadoc guardsmen and Helmite Sentinels around the port town, the Sanctuary of Ilmater allegedly suffered a mystery crate bombing filled to the brim with Sestran propaganda. As incredulous as the report sounds, sporadic witnesses confirm a cloaked figure hurling the crates at the building until they broke apart, revealing the contents for those nearby. They then eluded approaching guardsmen by leaping off the docks and disappearing into the midnight waters.

The nature of the propaganda itself remains somewhat suspect, as unlike most examples of rhetoric scrawled over posters whatever was inside was largely claimed by vagrants and dock waifs prior to law enforcement's arrival.


In seemingly unrelated news, many children around the town and docks in particular all sport new stuffed dolls in purple armor.

[DM_BAMF]

The Zakharan Disappearance

The spiraling, snake-like pattern of Zakharan campfires and tents have been a prevalent sight outside Avanthyr for what seems an eternity.

As morning broke on a new day and the thick fog lifted, Helmite watchmen and Meriadoc guardsmen stared on in disbelief as the entirety of the camp had disappeared in the night without alarm. The campfires snuffed out and the wagons, tents and arms absent, the march of the foreign warriors was well on it's way long before those closest to them knew they had gone.

[Fateful Encounter]

A Meeting of the Watchful

Corvin of Helm and Avanthyr's Northern Watch is seen to be preparing to receive Sir Aruvven Tareil from the City's chapter of Helmites in a meeting long overdue between the City and the Port's faithful. Curiously, the effort seems to be somewhat of a last-minute arrangement, as though the two parties had only recently agreed to meet. Most ignore this curiosity, however, with the hope that a unified front from the Helmite church might lead to improved security for the populace of both Avanthyr and Sundren City.

Aruvven makes journey from the City to the Port with a sizable contingent of Helmite warriors in tow, due to arrive within the month. They make short work of bandits and Bloodmaim along the way.

[Fateful Encounter]

Aruvven and his forces encounter strange events as they make their way to Avanthyr. Rallies, illusions, and erratic mages plague their journey. Though easily dispersed; each event does serve to delay the Helmites' progress to the Port.

[Fateful Encounter]

Rumors swirl that Aruvven and his City Chapter of Helmites arrived in Avanthyr not too long ago ... only to discover that Corvin has no recollection of requesting an assembly. Furious, Aruvven orders his forces on an immediate march back to Sundren City.

[Atmosphere]

Of Food & Hope

Its said that a group of adventurers and some claiming to represent the Thayan Enclave aided an Exigo merchant with the delivery of grain to the Port. It seems to have given the locals a new hope in the future of not only Port Avanthyr but in that of the entire Valley of Sundren itself.