Highmoon
"Last night you told me about House Buran, up yonder in The Haft," I began, sitting with Buck by the fire as SelÞryn placed a bowl of stew and a mug of ale on the small table beside me. "You said they're on the edge of the old, deep woods in the Blackfang Mountains, in...Highmoon, was it?"
Geography
"Aye, Highmoon it be," said Buck, who had spent time enough in The Haft years back.
"Ye take the road west from the Woodmere towards the foothills, and ye come straight to Highmoon. When you're still aways off ye'll approach a stony hill, and see a keep atop it, walls around 'er. That's Highmoon Keep, bein' the home o' the Burans. Once ye're atop the hill, you'll see the woods stretching out into the distance, far as the eye kin see. Now, at the base o' the hill is þorngarn, the Gray Wolf River. She runs from the foothills' o the Blackfangs down further south into Lothyan. There's a great stone bridge there, runs down from the top o' the hill into the town itself."
"Now, Highmoon, she's right on the edge of the forest. Them trees run up almost t' the walls with jest a single road runnin' between em. She's a stone road and well good enough, but she's only there 'cause of the mines off in the south run o' the mountains. Once it branches off t'wards them, the road itself goes t'dirt, and then she's little more than a trail."
History
"Now, Highmoon, she's a town sure enough, but wasn't always such. For most o' her history she was just a hamlet. A tradin' post really, where the folk o' the deep woods would come trade furs, wood, or whatever for goods they couldn't produce. An bein' that they're pretty self-sufficient they didn't need much."
"Things started changin' when House Morym's prospectors started findin' copper, iron, gold, and other metals in the south mountains. Now, Highmoon is the last stop before you hit the woods, an' that means the last bit o' civilization, such as it was."
"Elegar Buran--he'd be the grandfather o' Elinora, the current Countess o' Highmoon--first thing he did was clear some land and build an inn and tavern on a small hillock, figurin' he'd better start making some coin from the folk travelin' to the mines. And the money was good--ye got the miners themselves and all their needs, plus inspectors, shipments goin' both ways. He built the walls around the settlement too, as it grew, and expanded the docks into a proper tradin' place."
"That's what ye call a boomtown. Now, his son, Aram, he kept on with the same ideas, and built the town up further. House Buran had always been content dealin' with the deep woods folk and bein' pretty settled with that, but Aram started up real trade. He cleared land east o' the town and settled farmers there, and found hisself a rich vein o' silver nearby, startin' a mine of his own soon after. That extra coin comin' through meant he could build around his family's hall on the hill and build a proper keep, which he did. Walls and all. So between trade, the new farms, the miners headin' west for House Morym's ventures and the new silver mine, things got a lot better for House Buran, and for Highmoon. She's still a small town, but an up-n'-comer, and bein' that she's out there away from the thick o' things, she's safe to grow. Balar's Rebellion never got near it, nor did Balar hisself ever even consider doin' so."
"Today the town keeps prosperin' an bein' close to the Woodmere it's a good place to stop for folks comin' up from the south before they get to House Aradin's lands and the lake itself."
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