Glendovel Close
Small streams pouring down from the heights of the Stoneheart Mountains wash water, sediment, and other nutrients onto the fields that make up Glendovel Close. This fertile soil yields an abundance of grains including wheat, barley, rye, rice, and oats that these farmers harvest for their own sustenance as well as export to Bard’s Gate to the south and Darnagal to the east. In addition, vast herds of livestock graze on the lush pastures adjacent to the expansive farmland. The sprawling community stretches across thousands of cultivated acres with isolated homesteads separated by great distances from their closest neighbors. These parcels of tilled earth have belonged to the same families for many generations, which simultaneously forges the bonds of deep-seated friendships, often solidified by arranged marriages, and bitter rivalries between fierce competitors. Bard’s Gate has a vested interest in maintaining stability within the boundaries of its northernmost ally and veritable bread basket. Therefore, the metropolis garrisons 20 Waymark cavalry troops at the site to help its homegrown militia of 120 men and women defend the crucial agricultural hub against internal and external threats.
Sheriff Beauregard Dufresne, the town’s elected leader, and the 32 deputies under his direction, discreetly and delicately keep the peace within the farming community. They rarely interfere in personal disputes or even patrol the outlying areas. They focus their attention on the town’s bustling market district where farmers sell their crops to purveyors from Bard’s Gate, Darnagal, and even distant Freegate. While they keep a wary eye out for thieves and pickpockets, they primarily strive to ensure fast-talking merchants offer the genteel folk under their charge a fair price for their crops. They immediately notify new traveling wholesalers about this simple rule and the repercussions for disobeying it through permanent expulsion from the town’s market square or several nights of lackluster accommodations in a prison cell.
Glendovel Close sits at the terminus for roads leading to and from Bard’s Gate as well as Darnagal. For much of its existence, it functioned as a mere provider and distribution center for foodstuffs heading to these settlements. However, recent talk of reopening the Old North Road through the Desolation and the lands beyond have rekindled interest in expanding the town into a trading center linking the giant metropolis with underserved markets in Apothasalos and the landlocked Northlands. The great distances separating it from Acregor, the Desolation, the Azure Mountains, and the Dragon Hills keep those dangers at bay for now, but the sudden influx of newfound wealth and prosperity could potentially usher in a wave of envious outsiders seeking to claim a piece of the action for themselves. In this case, Sheriff Beauregard and his underlings would turn their gaze southward to Bard’s Gate for protection against these combined menaces. At the moment, Glendovel Close retains its bucolic existence, though the question of how long it can remain out of the spotlight depends upon developments in the Desolation.
Settlement
Glendovel Close, Town of
Type
Town
Owning Organization
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