Harcnost

Lost City of the Fog

The peninsula of Caradas dives deep into eastern Derelict Sea, receiving the warmth of the ocean currents that travel down the Sarapride Coast. Jungles cover this region and once a thriving city stood. It stayed up on a bluff overlooking the bay that sheltered many merchant ships passing by. Old elven merchants and sailors speak of the city that overlooked the bay and its majesty. This city could sally forth from its gates to the bay with a thousand spears in five minutes, meaning amphibious raids were neutralized. The bay itself was not as worthwhile due to the a superior road network that ran up the bluff to the city and allowed safe passage of treasure and goods into its security.

Heyday

Around 4E 2490 sometime in the summer, some aggressive pirates raided the Sarapride and went south to Caradas. There are no records of the event but merchants fleeing saw red in the sky for two nights. It was decades before anyone dared venture back, fearing pirates had made a hideout of the place. To the sailors' surprise a dense fog formed around the bay and surrounding hills.
When the sailors, a motley crew of rare sea-dwarves, elves, humans, and halflings, came to the bay they saw masts sticking up from beneath the waves. Several, including First-Mate Filanto of Samba Ka, took a small row boat to the jutting masts. They confirmed upon their return the masts were of sunken ships, the decks of which could still be faintly seen beneath the dark waves. Negotiating carefully, Captain Tucklend of Iron Quay breached the fog to reveal a ghastly peculiar scene.
The dock was perfectly intact, with the warehouses and wharfs looking as if they were still open for business. The bay town, however was leveled. Only foundation stones remained and a few patches of stone wall. Beyond, up the bluff in a dizzying haze lay the jagged walls of a ruined city. Captain Tucklend ordered his personal wizard, a gnome named Glorge, to relay the news to the Iron Quay.
Coming ashore, the sailors carefully made their way to each ruined building and shuddered when approaching the open road that wound over bumps and hillocks to the feet of the cleft bluff. The way up would be fruitless as the cleft road showed no way around. Luckily, the crew had an aarakocra who began an ascent. They watching him laboriously flap up. He shifted and spun in the air, losing height in seconds before recovering only to lose more again. He came back down and apologized. "Strong winds, cap'n." Night began to fall upon them and no sailors wished to stay there, so they all boarded the ship just as the last light winked over the western waves. That night, Glorge used magic to gather what happened. He screamed most of the night, unable to withdraw himself from the meditation he put himself in to view the events.

Tale of the Town

Both Bay Town and its castle were on the bluffs. The pirates that came were a cruel confederation of captains drunk on the spoils of the upper coast. The sky was black with clouds when the pirates came lanternless into the bay. The watch along the shore noticed them too late, and the crack troops atop the hill were alerted too late to save the town. The confederation stole into the bay and put the place to sword and fire. The small bay population scattered into the hills and jungle, and some made for the keep on the hill.
As the orange flames roared into the sky did a horn from the hill sound down. The blazes of the Bay Town illuminated the ghastly pirates who looked fey upon the descending soldiers. Sorcerers and wizards flew down to cast spells upon them, but the pirates were not without their defenses too. The battle was short and the spellcasters were felled. By the time the crack troops from Harcnost arrived, the pirates had easily averted them, encircling them. Truly they were a formidable force.
Up the road the pirates went with all the hell they could bring with them. The spellcasters with them that still had their abilities threw fireballs at the stone walls. The gates stood against them with magical wards on them. Dispelling the magic, the pirates set to razing the gatehouse itself. The small gleam of sunlight barely lit the eastern horizon when the doors gatehouse was clear. The pirates thought it interesting that there were no other defenses.
Here is the the unspeakable thing that occurred. Something happened that caused Glorge to scream all night and occasionally for the next few nights. Something was laying in wait in the courtyard of that dark and missing place that even evil-soaked pirates would not touch. The confederate leader saw a large shadowed shape rose from the walls, tumbling the remaining stone, and descended like a dark waterfall down the bluff and into the Bay Town streets. It engulfed the pirates, swallowing them without any resistance and overwhelmed the coast. When it hit the water it sizzled and the turned gray. Glorge wouldn't divulge more details of what transpired or of the faces those evil pirates made as the darkness swallowed them. All he could say more was their ships sank but as to why they did not sink to the bottom of the deep bay he could not say.

The Flight of Captain Tucklend

Captain Tucklend was with Glorge as he relayed the information to him. Hearing the report, he said, "We are leaving," and ordered their departure. The anchor was caught on something and the men cried when their restless eyes glanced shoreward. Many cried they saw a great "something" moving between the streets. The "something" they would have described as a water if it had not also climbed up the road to the keep. The full moon was bright that night, an unfortunance for the sailors who saw a blackness swallow the stars above the bluffs and meet the rising shadows from Bay Town.
As the ship turned, the fear-stricken men prostrated themselves on the ground and prayed to gods of ocean and travel, Melora and Avandra, for swift winds while Glorge screamed their doom before being knocked out for the good of the crew. Blessedly, the winds blew and caught the sails. Cheers croaked from dry throats until they saw that the shadows now raced ever fast to them. It skipped across the water like a ship on smooth waters, uninhibited by them. The blackness turned gray once it was well into the bay. Captain Tucklend maneuvered around the masts and lost a piece of his mind as he saw them shudder and move in the water in unison, as if controlled by something underneath.
The fog caught up to them and men on the stern readied any armaments they could. The gray fog churned like a storm cloud and grew closer. A wizard, not Glorge, threw magical lights into it and regretted it wholly. For inside a dark shape loomed, half submerged in the ebony waters, with many spikes protruding from it. One of these spikes, covered in some lines that must have been seaweed, shot towards them. The few men who looked wished the pluck their eyes out. For what came from the fog wasn't a claw or metal pole or spear from some forgotten god, but simply a mast, and the tangles of seaweed were putrid, waterlogged flesh. Just then the fog stalled and receded, the mast being pulled back into the fog with a wet suction.

Aftermath

Once back safely in Iron Quay, every sailor took a week long rest. Tucklend and First Mate Filanto took a beleaguered Glorge to the Queen. In private they spoke to her about the events and she, in her wisdom, agreed that nautical maps would do well to avoid that place at all cost. They renamed it Harcnost and warned other countries that there was a great cove of pirates there that would be best left alone. Some nights when the clouds gather over the eastern horizon, from beyond the sea, every sailor shudders and remains restless until morning.

Type

City

Location under

Caradas