How to Civilise an Orc Tribe

Upon our return we were greeted by Irakin and Anataea who sat in the common room over a cup of wine, clearly relieved by the return of peace to the city. For the second time this day we recited what had happened in the past night. It will never cease to amaze me how good of a listener Anataea is, and our halfling companion had learned his fair share of this trait as well. Thus, weaving a tale came easily and time flew faster than first thought. After finishing, I asked if the food shortage would be solved now with the city reopening which Irakin confirmed and explained that they had to redispose and turn to other means of procurement for the past few days. Anataea chimed in that her friend Birel had helped out in this regard as well.
This was the first time, she called the mysterious drow woman by name and Kyla promptly used it to hook into the conversation and ask more about the underdark, especially now that we would potentially travel to this place. My foster mother admitted she would not know terribly much about this, Birel might be of more use there and should be back in the next few days if we chose to speak to her directly. Still, she explained that the drow typically lived in a tyrannic, strictly ordered, maternal society under the constant gaze of Lolth. Their lives often were marked by numerous hardships, intrigues, or even cold-blooded murder. Yet if one decided to leave this community, there was no return. However, drow of a good or neutral alignment do exist, just as any other race has a mixed bag of individuals and intentions. The underdark itself was an entire biome in its own right with many alien-seeming creatures and monsters, some mindless some of intimidating intelligence. The only vegetation one would frequently find there would be mushrooms, due to the absence of light in the tunnels and chambers. This topic sparked Teynos’s interest in particular. The half-orc had before already appeared quite fond of fungi of any variety and the notion of discovering new, potentially edible species seemed to fill him with excitement. Kyla said she had learned a bit about the drow pantheon before and while Lolth was the most widely known, they had further deities, most of them as nefarious as their leader. Yet, she always had been most fascinated by er daughter Eilistraee, The Dark Maiden, as she was said to be the only “good” amongst the Dark Seldarine pantheon. Now we knew who we might turn to for information on this underground realm. And while I was burning to learn how Anataea had met this Birel, the look and apologetic smile she threw me told me she was not going to tell me this particular evening. And thus, soon enough all of us bedded down for the night.
 
We were woken by the sounds of playing kids all throughout the house the next morning, who joined us also for breakfast. When we had a few moments for ourselves, Kyla began counting the reward Lord Neverember had gifted us and came to an astounding sum, causing us to decide to first go shopping for some artifacts that might aid us in the battles to come, ‘ere we would go ahead with our plan of visiting the orc camp in the northeast quarter of the city. And for some reason, during breakfast Nysqwen decided to name our walking cauldron Bert.
 
Grum spearheaded our way to the Protector’s Enclave. He led us past the faction houses towards a small shop, sat on the main road with a sign that read “Ironbell’s Illustrious Items”. Inside, he introduced us to Yonove Ironbell, the gnomish owner of the shop who he used to have business with when pursuing help for Quercus. The woman turned out to be rather talkative, yet instantly likable. While she apparently was not blessed with the highest insight (she initially tried to convince Archie to buy a heavy axe), she knew very well what wares she had to offer and how useful these could be in a pinch. Once Archie showed her his own inventions, her saleswoman-attitude turned over curiosity to an almost childlike joy over the strange mechanisms and she instantly offered to buy Ori from him. Slightly saddened by the young man’s determination not to sell his friend, she turned back to the rest of us to help us with whatever we might require. The most pressing matter was Teynos’s repeated knockouts in our last encounters, as Kyla insisted, and thus the shopkeeper produced a set of finely crafted bracers that he told the half-orc to fit to his wrists. The pieces were almost closer in appearance to some fine adornments of noble attire than armour, so thin and brandished were the hammered golden pieces. He followed suit and I swear by the never-ending song of Oghma that the metal bands grew taut against his wrists, almost locking themselves in place. Still, Teynos lazily shook his forearms complaining they would be too loose and that he was always uncomfortable putting on more garments than was absolutely necessary. A flash of silver cut through the air and with a bright ringing sound, a small throwing blade bounced off from the bracers on our friend’s unnaturally quickly risen forearms. Mistress Ironbell lowered the hand that had thrown the projectile with a mischievous grin on her lips, asking if Teynos had any further reservations towards her wares. He just silently shook his head, eyeing the bracers with new-found appreciation.
After this was settled, we continued to purchase a golden headband for my old dwarven companion that would help keep his mind sharp at any given time and a periapt with a large red gem inlaid into finely forged golden hands for Kyla, to avoid her falling in battle as easily as she was key to helping us survive any strenuous encounters. With all of these purchases, mistress Ironbell granted us a discount on the wares tied to the promise to return to her shop in time. Still, gearing up in this way took all the money we had been rewarded for taking out Lystramon. But it definitely felt like money well spent!
 
Leaving the shop, Archie and I went to the Harpers house, as we still had to hand in a book about devils and how to summon them, while the others went back to Merreck Proudfoot to stock up on potions of healing. Nissa seemed very pleased with how things had turned out and even more so as we handed her our find. Again, I might be imagining things but was there a hint of pride on her face? She told us that we were on a good way to rise to the rank of Harpshadow, if we continued our service to the faction in such a fashion, which would come with its own merits. However, shortly after we exchanged our respective perspectives on the past few days, we bade our leave to meet up with the others at the northern end of the Enclave to head towards the camp of the Many-Arrows tribe.
 
While I had visited this part of the city before, mostly in the context of dealings of Cor or over the sky path, the streets north of Neverwinter River were less familiar to me than their southern brethren. While after the Ruining most of the former Blacklake district was mostly ruined, certain survivors had established themselves in the ruins and defied the rule of the Lord Protector openly, making for often violent incursions. Maybe because of these very instabilities, some excursions had led my path into some of its reaches. However, since the arrival of the orcs no Neverwinterian had entered the district and returned to tell the tale. Who knew what would await us in the occupied area?
From far down the road, we could already see the roughly assembled wooden barricade marking the entrance. The surrounding walls had painted on them the symbol of the tribe, an encircled skull pierced from the bottom by three arrows, all mostly painted in red and brownish colours. ‘Ere we reached the barricade, a loud shout came from the other side and an unusually large orc with dark, blueish skin approached, climbing over the defences. Teynos murmured that this variant of orcs called orogs was rumoured to be more intelligent than their green siblings and tend to be in leading or otherwise prominent positions within the tribe. During his approach, the orc was directly addressing Teynos in the guttural orc tongue, yet as he had no weapon drawn, we were not too concerned, especially as we were here with Mantka Riiba’s blessing. They conversed briefly, after which the stranger turned and clambered back across the wooden slates. Teynos followed suit and signed us to do the same. Just as I crested it, I saw the large orc facing our friend and suddenly punching him square in the chest! Teynos almost stumbled a step backwards but before any of us could draw weapons, the orc just stood there, visibly presenting his chest. He apparently awaited Teynos returning the favour which, without much hesitation, he seemed almost too eager to do. The other just gave a brief, satisfied nod, then he continued to lead us further into the camp.
 
Most of the buildings lining the streets here were mere ruins, crumbled when Mount Hotenow erupted thirty summers ago. In their place numerous tents had been erected around which many orcs but also a few ogres and slightly smaller figures as well as kobolds and lizard folk were gathered and stared blatantly in our direction upon noticing us. Most of them were aimed at Kyla, the tensions between orcs and elves were well known, but many also were for Grum and Archie. For once, Nysqwen and myself were hardly regarded and Teynos seemed to fit right in. The smell of burned hair and roasting meat hung heavy in the air as the corpses of giant rats turned on wooden spikes over dozens of campfires. Within the camp, the remnants of the walls were covered in runes written in a similar dark red colour. Grum identified the used alphabet as dwarven although the language was alien to him. Teynos murmured that most of the scripture was related to Gruumsh, the main deity of the orcs.
Towards the centre of the district, we came onto a larger, more cleared square. Merchant tents, food stands, and various carts were strewn over the area in an unordered mess that bared any structure and equally tumultuous noise filled the air. It smelled like burned fur, cooked meats and onions and wet earth. Not a bad combination by any means, especially as far as cities were concerned. The shops here offered all kinds of weapons, armour, food, cloth and everyday accessories, very akin to what one would expect to find in the more “civilised” parts of Neverwinter, only rougher around the edges. And of course, the previously mentioned looks continued to follow us everywhere.
Our guide headed straight across the square towards a larger building that looked like a small fortress within the city, built on the foundations of several former houses. From the battlements dangled marred, severed heads, some seemingly days if not weeks old and picked clean by birds and insects, others still dripping blood. Kyla’s gaze turned expressionless. Every single head was of elven descend. This would remove the last of our doubts as to what the intentions behind the looks we received were. The ongoing feud between orcs and elves was well known and at the heart of many tales and songs. Yet to see it displayed in such a gruesome, tangible fashion and tasting the electric tension in the air was almost unbearable. We quickened our pace to head inside, hopefully out of view of the tokens.
The entrance was barred by an iron gate and guarded by two orogs in the same armour as the bodyguards, Mantka had brought to the council meeting. They opened upon recognising our guide, allowing us to step inside. We were led into a large room, its floor draped with various pelts and its walls with weapons and hunting trophies. Across the room was another door, flanked, same as the door through which we had entered, by two guards. In the centre was a slight recession with a fire pit, its flames lighting up the room.
Shortly after our arrival, the door on the opposite side opened an in strode Mantka Riiba, clad in the same outfit as on the previous day and accompanied by one of the two orogs that were with her before. She gestured us to take seats with her around the central fire and welcomed us in Grommash Hold. With an almost apologetic nod to Kyla and Grum, she explained that most of her followers were not used to seeing what they would call pointy ears or midgets. There is not much love lost between their races, dating back as long as memory on each side holds. And cleaning up with prejudices, while desired by her, is a long, arduous road away. And orcs as well are more than mere pillaging and incendiary savages. She intends to establish orcs and their allies as functioning parts of Fearûnian society, starting along the Sword Coast in Neverwinter, her appearance in the council the other day being not only proof of at least that part of her aims but also of the progress she had already made. Well knowing all the difficulties that would arise on both sides, with deep seeded despise she said she was aware that not everyone, also not every orc would welcome such a change. But there would always have to be sacrifices to guarantee progress.
At this point, Kyla interjected that she was faced with such prejudices for the first time in this city as where she had grown up, such things were not part of society. She described her home as a place where anyone, regardless of their racial origin was welcome and there was no strife between age-old factions. In response, the same expression of envy mixed with doubts as to the totality of her statement appeared on all our faces. While there were many humanoid races present in Neverwinter, it would be a blatant lie that not every single one was thinking themselves as being superior to the others. After all, obscuring the depth of the heritage of certain individuals has almost become second nature to said folk…
The orc leader replied that, if possible, she wanted to build towards a world closer to this ideal and asked if she might count on us to help in this endeavour. There would be plenty of convincing necessary on both sides, diplomats carrying the word into neighbouring cities or hired hands trying to keep marauding hordes in cheque. In response to what would make her trust us with such missions she said that after what we had done for the city, she was confident we would put the greater good before all else and that clearly, we would see that bringing an end to the constant battles with orcs would go a long way in achieving that. Plus, with a long look at Teynos, she said that we had a great hero among us. An interesting proposal.
Something tells me that what Mantka said was nothing but the truth although it probably merely revealed a fraction of her true intentions. There was something else brewing and I cannot discern yet if the smell is to my liking. We thanked her for this offer, promising that we would consider working together to achieve what today only sounds like a dream. But we also explained that first we would have to settle some of our own affairs. She nodded satisfied and added that if we would come by Phandalin, there was a splinter group of her tribe that she had not heard of in a while. And its allegiances were uncertain.
With this she bade us farewell, as she had other matters to attend to. However, pointing towards the orog bodyguard we had seen twice now, she offered her brother Tarosh as a guide through her city district. And, should we eventually choose to take her up on the offer of working together, she would appoint one of her own to travel with us to act as her voice.
 
From the flame-lit interior we stepped back out onto the noisy, sunny square. Hundreds of alien impressions attacking all senses simultaneously drowned out any thoughts or discussions we might share with regards to what had just been bestowed upon us, although I could see the same contemplation on my friends faces that I felt myself. Tarosh immediately began his tour by pointing out that we just exited Grommash Hold, the seat of power for the Many-Arrows tribe and home to Mantka Riiba. He proclaimed he would show us around the streets by following the most important temples and other constructs in their district, which would keep us out of any too-narrow alleys where the odd stares, Kyla, Grum and Archie were getting might give way to regrettable actions.
First on our way were the wrestling pits of Gruumsh, four dugout circles, each a good twenty paces across. Fighting was open to anyone and one of the few ways how outsiders might gain some respect quickly amongst the orcs, if one fought with honour and was victorious. Tarosh pointed out a priest of the primary diety who was watching over some lists. The orc had an eyepatch over his left eye. All priests to Gruumsh were expected to undergo this mutilation to honour their one-eyed god. Fittingly, in the large stone building next to the pits were the barracks of Ilneval, Gruumsh’s strategist, where the elite amongst the warriors were trained. With these words, Tarosh proudly banged his fist against his own chest, the dull sound bearing witness to the amount of muscle that the warrior had built up around his lungs.
Leaving the martial facilities behind, the orc now led us towards four connected tents. Its linen walls were decorated with craftly paintings of cave bears in a variety of poses, some intimidating, some more peaceful. The all-encompassing noise was slightly less intense in this part of the camp. A single female orc left the structure just as we arrived and reaped a respectful bow from Tarosh. She was clad in what seemed like earthen-coloured functional robes and wore metal claws on her fingers – the only weapon visible on her body. Our guide explained that this was the temple of Luthic, mate to Gruumsh, patron of all orc women, goddess of fertility and healing. As ferocious as her favoured animal yet cunning and benevolent to those that fought in war and suffered wounds in honour. Her priestesses were responsible for the survival of the clan and therefore enjoyed great reverence from the horde. However, their temper was as fabled as their healing powers so one should think thrice before crossing them or theirs.
Not far from the tent structure, Tarosh called our attention to a partially collapsed stone building with barred windows. The immediate vicinity was barren with hardly an orc to see. Here was the temple of Yurtrus, Lord of Maggots and god of sickness, disease and death. The orc spoke in hushed tones here, explaining that the white-hands, priests to Yurtrus cut out their tongues to honour the silent nature of this deity. One such priest stood out front, his hands dressed in white eponymous gloves that showed strange wrinkles and shifting complexions. Tarosh elaborated that these gloves were made from the skins of other humanoids, predominantly elves. The sickness these followers represented was wit plainly on Kyla’s face, general unease taking us all, urging us forward to the next point of interest.
Again, Tarosh led us to a stone building, this one even further collapsed than the last. Disdainfully he quickly explained that this temple was consectrated to Shargaas, the Stalker Below, god of darkness, stealth and cold. He resembled fear of the unknown and the dangers that lurked in shadows. According to our guide, he was there for weaklings, lone-wolfs and good-for-nothings. Orcs that took pride in their strength and ferocity as it was gifted from Gruumsh should do their best to shun those that dealt with Shargaas, although he had his steady seat in their pantheon. As I glanced over the rubble that marked the temple of the Night Lord, I noticed a trap door beneath some wreckage, hidden for the unmindful eye but plainly obvious for those that dealt in the shadows on occasion. There might be more to it that Tarosh was willing to say or even knew and it intrigued me. One day I might have to visit this place and see what webs were spun beneath the orcish civilisation.
Finally, we came upon a large field with a small stone structure in the easternmost parts of the district, right below the Cloak Tower. Dozens of aurochs were grazing on the field. Our guide explained that this temple was dedicated to Bahgtru, son of Gruumsh and Luthic and god of pure, physical strength. One day the god required a mount that would match his ferocity, thus he ventured forth to find an aurochs that he tamed with his bare hands and named Kazaht - creatively the orcish word for bull, as Teynos later explained. His strength and unbending nature were coveted by nearly all orcs and he therefore was revered by most common people. The aurochs were sacred animals that would be trained by the orcs to serve as mounts in battle and were treated with the same respect that an accomplished warrior would.
 
All throughout our tour, the same challenging glances greeted Kyla, Grum and Archie, while those that had heard of our deeds met Teynos with open respect and greetings. For once, no one really paid any attention to Nysqwen or myself and I greatly enjoyed the newfound indifference. Generally, life here seemed to take place far more under the open sky, tents or hovels only served for sleep or to escape the piercing sun. We thanked Tarosh for all his efforts and said our goodbyes to head back into the more familiar parts of the city. Tarosh faced Teynos and out of the blue gave him a deftly headbutt straight to the face. Without any hesitation, Teynos replied in kind. A sickening crack signified a likely breaking of the orog’s nose and dark blood splattered over our friend’s forehead. Tarosh staggered briefly, then caught himself and laughed aloud. After meeting Teynos’ gaze for a few seconds, he grinned, turned around and headed back to Grommash Hold.