Kambyra: The South-West

 

"There is little enough to love in the southwest of this accursed isle: before I took my tour there, some spoke highly of the wildness of the southern coast, esteeming its beauty, but beauty I did not see, merely savage cold storms and the hostility of a landscape created, seemingly, to stand in opposition to civilisation and human majesty. That the inhabitants were crude should scarcely occasion comment. They knew little of the imperial glory that sustains them, and less of the civility and proper sentiment that upholds that glory."

An excerpt from the Earl of Zastenuto’s “The Empire Abroad: An Exile’s Travels Throughout The Colonies”

"The southwest has few admirers, being mostly empty, wild and dangerous. But what of that? It has no need of them, being, as I say, for the most part empty, wild and dangerous." 

Calvid Rhoak, the Wandering Scrimshander

The southwestern quadrant of Kambyra is but lightly settled, with most folk dwelling in the sun-soaked north-facing foothills beyond the River Menner, where vineyards and sheep-farming prevail. Somewhat isolated due to the Fens of Vastroy north of the river, the folk who dwell here are stoic and independent. Their lands, save for a small area between the villages of Mennerley and Kemley Bridge, are not ruled by nobles, being instead administered by the colonial government through village councils and warded by local militias. 

At the westernmost point of this region, a lightly wooded range of low hills forms a small peninsula protruding into the open sea. Unprotected from the mighty winds that roar from the south, it is home to a few hardy crofters and woodcutters...and not a few brigands. Pirates sometimes lair in the lee of the hills. The colonial administration built the keep and lighthouse of Balepoint in the hope of suppressing piracy and banditry, but, starved of funds, it has lain empty for decades.

South of this quiet land, great peaks rear up, rising dramatically to heights in excess of 8000', with passage only possible in a few places where swift-flowing streams have carved narrow valleys. Even in these locales passage is precarious, where steep, rough-cut paths ascend to exposed cols and saddles - often blocked for weeks on end by heavy snows.

The mountains are home to several unfriendly lineages: Snow Ogres, Goat Men and Harpies plague travellers and those whose sheep stray into the higher valleys, whilst Peryton, Gyres and Wyverns contend for mastery of the western cliffs that lour above the savage seas. Only one path through the mountains is truly safe: that running from Kealey Bridge to Shatterspar Bay. It is protected by a small tribe of Cyclopeans, who have contracted with the merchants of Kambyra Town to keep the passage open. Led by the formidable witch-warrior Hekus, they are left unmolested in return for protecting the road and those who travel upon it.

South of the mountains is a region of windswept plateaus and towering cliffs. Safe anchorages are scarce, and there is only one settlement of any significance: Shatterspar Bay, where a deep harbour - the best in the colony, once one navigates the treacherous reefs and brutal winds that defend the mouth of the bay - can be found. The isolation and difficulty of the harbour means it is mostly ignored by trading vessels. The Imperial Navy sought to develop it as a naval base: a few collapsed earthworks in the lower harbour offer mute testament to the failure of the venture.

Shatterspar Bay would be almost completely ignored were it not for the incredibly rich fishing grounds directly south of the bay and the fact that a rare breed of sea-snail (akin to the historical murex of ancient fame) is found in the bay. The dye it produces fetches staggering prices, and thus the merchants of Kambyra consider it well worth the cost of keeping the road open. The snails themselves are harvested by a family of Merfolk. These folk jealously guard their monopoly - and protect it from over-exploitation. The merchants of Kambyra Town - led by the cruel and greedy Yehan Yon Vago - have long desired the overthrow, or, at the very least, the enslavement of these stalwart folk.

East of Shatterspar Bay there are no human settlements, and the colonial government - though nominally sovereign - has neither authority nor power. This heavily wooded and mountainous land is home to various tribes of indigenous Kambyrans locked in perpetual struggle both with each other and with hostile Fey, Forest Goblins and a particularly pernicious brood of Svarts beholden to the ancient and dwindling Raven-priests of Drakeheyr, last remnant of a once-powerful cult that dominated much of the island.

Drakeheyr itself, an extensive complex of towers and caverns honeycombing a rocky headland on the south coast was once a resting place for migrating Giant Ravens. When those mighty, amoral monsters lost their millennia-long feud with the Sea-drakes (who, in their turn, were driven almost to extinction by the Baal-rukh of Mriros and his minions), the Cult's influence rapidly dissolved, until its sway barely reaches beyond the quiet, decrepit towers and tunnels of the Priests.

Northeast of Drakeheyr lies Gaelhorn, an abandoned dwelling of the Koryato Elves - a vanished sea-faring Elven culture, destroyed in conflict with both the Raven-cultists and the Shokottu Elves of Kambyra's eastern regions. A mighty stone tree carved from a cliff-face standing at the head of a long, fjord-like harbour, it is heavily eroded, its vaulted halls mostly ruined, its subterranean docks empty of ships. Rumours abound of treasures and sea-faring lore stored in hidden chambers, but if any have tested the truth of such tales, they remain silent. 

What is known of Gaelhorn is that even the Raven-cultists and their Svart minions do not dare approach the empty dwelling, and that the oldest lore of the Shokottu Elves links their own descent into barbarism with the defeat of the Koryato, as if that proud folk were cursed and diminished by their own victories. And indeed, the arrival of the Imperial Navy followed hard upon the heels of that conflict, and the colonial contagion soon swept the Shokottu away, leaving them a tattered vestige at the eastern margin of the Island, their storied history reduced to nothing, their heroic songs and epics now meaningless laments, maps of a land that no longer exists.