Milbourne

Connected to: Andrian Barthlew Darius Carman Dirkaster Grizzler Haldelar Nafton Rastifer Rendennis Semeran Semheis the Tormtar Thimson Walright

This is a town of some 160 people, most of whom live in the farmsteads that surround the town on both sides of the river. Buildings are almost all of wood; only the Old Granary, the Mill House, and the Mansion House are of limestone (from the Blanryde Hills). Virtually everyone here earns a living either from farming or from mining in the southern Blanrydes for lead and copper. Near the town itself, most work is agrarian; the miners live in work camps just outside the mines, though they bring their ores into town to sell at the Exchange. Trade is fairly circumscribed. A handful of outside merchants visit periodically to negotiate prices for the ores, but the Carman family handles almost all ore sales, and new-comers to the trading business are given short shrift. Trading has been conducted between the same leading families for generations, and old habits die hard. Wood from the area's woodlands is good enough for local use but not worth the expense of conveying any distance to sell. There is some seasonal trade in fruit, especially from the Redwood, and in good years a little surplus produce or wool from local farming and herding.

Milbourne is unlikely to grow any larger, simply because there is not much in the way of decent farmland which isn't already being used (the moorlands have poor soil, suitable only for grazing). Prices for goods are normal. Uncommon or rare goods won't be found here, unless encountered at Rastifer's shop.

The people of Milbourne are fairly friendly but insular, quite happy that their town is a backwater. They hear tales of monsters and adventures and heroics from travelers now and again, and they think that kind of thing is all very well for people with more enthusiasm than sense. They are mostly decent, honest people, getting by day to day without much in the way of undue disturbance. When the PCs begin to have some exploits in the area, they'll rapidly become celebrities in the town, with children pointing at them In the streets, a sudden hush falling in the taverns as they enter, etc. Milborners are mostly of good alignments; very few evil folk live here.

The lands in Haranshire are owned by two families of note. The Carman Family owns the mines north of Milbourne and most of the farmsteads around Milbourne, together with some properties in the town itself. They are charged, among other things, with maintaining a town militia for defense of Milbourne. The Parlfray Family owns many of the farmsteads around Thurmaster and property within the village and also has an ancestral keep in the easternmost hills. They have a responsibility, likewise, for the defense of Thurmaster. Both families set taxes and tithes to maintain defenses, and for other expenses - both predictable (enriching themselves) and less obvious (the Carman family spends money to maintain the dam at the Eelhold, for example). Neither family is particularly unpopular among those who have to pay taxes to them, since their levies are not excessive. No standing militias are kept in either Milbourne or Thurmaster. These are peaceable communities, and militias are raised as and when necessary.