Bellemuir

Brick Town

Bellemuir, often called Brick Town, has a population of 11,000 people. It has been inhabited for all of known history, in one form or another, but it became self-regulated and semi-autonomous, per charters from the palatine duke in 1078 and again in 1143. Its crest is a simple knot paley around a fausart falchion of a field of party per bend sinister or and purpure.

This town is a sea port on the Sea of Arlin, and it is surrounded by agricultural land. Politically, it is located in the Barony of Charkston, the County of Hexton, the Palatine Duchy of Hexton, in the High Kingdom of Rhonce.

In the hills above the town there is giant salt cutting of a ship and another of a giant with a battleax.

This is officially a free town, with no laws, but peace is kept by decisive tactics. Pirates (the Sea Serpents) are welcome here, and this has boosted the local economy as the pirates visit, trade, build personal homes, and spend their ill-gotten gains.

Bellemuir begun as a planned settlement, with a street grid arranged around the castle, church, and wharfs. It has since exceeded its walls twice over as it has grown organically. Its buildings are built in an attractive half brick/half timbered style, and the city lies between a fortified church to the north and the castle on the south, with the city square between them.

The city’s curtain walls and towers are made of brick, making them unusual by Aorlisian standards. They are only semi-defensive, as the pirate-friendly politics has spared the town from sea-bourne assaults. The city square and primary boulevards are paved with bricks. The city’s large church is made of brick and fortified, and it is dedicated to Bellemuir’s patron saint, Jordinus One-Armed.

Bellemuir Town is connected to Lidby Town to the northeast by Suth Street and then Never Street; to Eubrac City in an easterly direction by Suth Street; to Maldum City in a northwesterly direction by Suth Street and then Marling Street; and to Highgate City in a southerly direction by a secondary road and ferry trip.

Morality isn’t a sticking point here, and the native’s business practices have a merciless, practical bent. On solstices and equinoxes, the Bellemuir people celebrate the Devil’s Dance. Dancers dress like demons & monsters, raise a cacophony with drums & bells, to scare away evil.

This is one of the few remaining towns in Aorlis that still practices brickmaking. The Karmithians knew this craft well, but it was lost in the centuries after they left, and all the other Aorlisians turned to building from cut stone.

Bellemuir’s historical personage of note is Calgacus Portman, the harbor master who invented the treadwheel crane in 1017.

Doors throughout the town are known to disappear or move randomly, and rooms and floor plans may shift without warning. If that weren’t troublesome enough, odd corners, bends, and forgotten passages randomly manifest Grim World traps (see High Strangeness). Sea wyverns are common here, and they will steal food, barrels, children, pets, and livestock as opportunities present themselves.