after my quibbles"es reentry into the Digest, another piece of hardwork for your perusal. This is taken from my current campaign.
Hospital of the Spring
The Hospital of the Spring is a small community run by the sisterhood of St. Chalana Arroy. It is centered upon a spring inside a slab of rock which, if drunken directly from the small pool at the rock, has a strong healing power.
Where in the World: ASCII-map (sorry <g>)
. ~ "~": Solthi River
.~~~ ".": Royal Highway
~~~~~1~ 1: Jansholm
~~ ~~.
~~ .
~ .
~ :::: . ":" forest
~ ::::::: . "," mill creek
~ :::,,,: .
~ ,:::,,X . X: the Hospital
~~ 3 . 3: Jaransbyrig
~ | , . "|": the cliff
~ | , .
~~ | , .
| , 4 . 4: Milran
| , . "=": Mirrorsea Bay
||||, . ~~~~~ 5: Sklar
5 ,| .~~~ "~": Syphon River
=====,, | |||| ~~2 2: Backford
====== ||||||||||| ~~~~~
=== ~~~~
(Compare the Holy Country map from RQ Companion or the map in KoS p.105)
The hospital is built around two triangular inner courts whose surrounding buildings join at one corner - the form of the Fertility Rune. The court with the spring inside houses the sisters and their inner temple, the other court houses the sickrooms and a guestroom for travellers and visiting kin of the patients. Around the hospital, a typical rural hamlet of the Heortland plateau provides the sisters with basic produce to even out the flow of the gifts of gratitude from former patients and the surrounding lords and chieftains. The village is subject to the rule of the ealdorman of the Jaraning shire, but no important decision is taken in the village without approval of the abbess of the hospital.
The origin spring is connected to Conall's Barrow, an ancient grave mound dating back from before the Grey Age and Time, an hour's footmarch away from the spring.
The spring is the chief source of the mill creek of the town of Jaransbyrig, but is joined by a number of minor tributaries around Beaver's Lake, an ancient abode of these animals in the patch of forest in the triangle between the Solthi Gorge and the Royal Highway from Jansholm to Backford.
Jaransbyrig is a town of maybe 300 houses crowded around a classical hilltop roundfort with an outwork, surrounded by a ditch-and-rampart palisade, with masonry-filled framework facing outside around the roundfort and the outwork.
Jaransbyrig is the centre of my Heortland campaign, and fairly detailed. I might throw out more of this in the future.
Mythos and History:
King Conall was chief of the Vingkotling tribe which dwelt above the mud flats left by the hiding of Choralinthor.
When the Hidden Kings had outwitted both Death and Disease by shapechanging and moving around among the glaciers of the heights of the mountains, the last tribes of the Vingkotlings eked out a harsh existence on the slim stretch of land between the edge of the ice, with its hills of clay and ground rock, and the drop into the muds of the decaying corpse of Faralinthor. When Death had been released from the honourable blade by the dark lord of fear, Earth had gone into sleep or hiding, and nourishment was few. No crops could be planted, as the hungry soil had to take as much as it gave, and most plants had followed the Goddess into sleep. Instead of reaping golden rows of grain as Barntar the Plowman had shown the Vingkotlings, man was reduced to dig up roots and seeds waiting for the Earth to awake again. Many a sleeping plant was taken from this world by the hungry people, at which the walking plants still grudge; the many daughters of the Earth understood, though, and willingly sacrificed part of their retinue to keep the rest. When men dug up the sleeping seeds, they never took all, and in recompensation for their lost kin the men left their blood for the remaining seeds, sharing their life with the seeds so they would find their way back when the Earth would awake.
Sometimes the men would gather in greater ceremonies to thank the Earth for their sacrifice, and the blood of their sacrifices could make an Earth daughter stir for a while, or even awake and share her hidden bounty. For there still was hope, as the King of the Gods had gone on a quest to awake his wife and his mother, and when the Vingkotlings had been called to stand by his side on a distant, purple shore, they had faithfully fought the men of dusk, and won the day. Later, when they felt the Tricktster try and poke up from beneath the Castle of Black Glass, they had gathered and stepped upon his probing fingers. As a result, it is said that Eurmal returned to the scattered questors and reunited them.
(This is still remembered in a trotting and stomping dance performed in Dark Season, called "Eurmal's Fingers". Young men and women line up in facing rows and dance on their places, marked by crossing sticks which are hopped across in certain patterns commanded by the musicians, until they and their partner step into the middle and perform special dancing feats on poles and benches about a feet above the ground. Occasionally the musicians will call for a "whirlwind", and the men rush across the centre poles, grab a new partner, and form for Orlanth's wheel (the Movement Rune), each three men linking their left elbows with a belt, the women hanging from their right shoulder, circling and stomping around. At another call, the rows are reformed with the new partner, and another round of stomping the fingers and paired feats are performed. Sometimes contests between villages are held, with elders and leaders judging the feats on the poles and benches. This dance is performed before and on the winter solstice, as well as at occasional private feasts. The Hendriki nobility enjoys displays of their farmers, too, and award prices to the most daring pairs.)
However, as the world fell apart more and more, more and more men lost their faith in the quest of their king, seeing the void approach more and more. So some began taking not only some of the leeping seeds, but all, and then turned upon one another as well as upon the faithful. Thus Chaos was strengthened, as fewer remained to confront the Void. The faithful rallied against these unfaithful, and drove them off howling to confront the Void, or else made up for their misdeeds by sacrificing their blood to the kin of those they had wiped out.
King Conall and his household had been foremost in protecting the faithful and keeping the unfaithful at bay. So successful was he that the unfaithful gathered and raided upon him, trying to remove him and get free course to the poor riches he preserved. But King Conall and his hird met them, and slew so many that their spilled blood revived a daughter of the Earth enough that, when the shrinking shield wall of Conall was so tired that they fell asleep fighting, she forced some of her nourishing milk from her shrunken breast, and a spring came forth in the middle of Conall's ring of shields. Those who drank from it reentered the fight refreshed, their tiredness washed away and their wounds soothed. Thus King Conall and his ring held a force many times their own numbers, and slew them all before succumbing to their own grievous wounds. The few survivors gathered their slain king and comrades and erected a mound upon a hillock left by an earlier atack from the glacier.
Later, when the Earth had been revived through the Lightbringers' Quest, the Earth daughter fet ashamed at her failure to keep her defenders alife through this fight, and she kept offering her bounty at this spring, and pledged herself to grant a favour to those who came to her with the blessing of Conall's spirit.
Jarani Stoutspear did so after the Hendriki had descended from the Storm Mountains and driven a host of Palangio's henchmen over the cliffs, to give her healing draught to Hendrik who lay sorely wounded at the shrine to the bull after he had single-handedly vanquished a chaos minion of the Iron Vrok. Jarani knew the right words to call the spirit of the King from Orlanth's Halls, and he spilled his blood upon his mound. King Conall gave him his blessing, and Jarani was granted to carry a helmet-full of the Earth Daughter's healing milk back to his warleader. Grateful for this timely aid, Hendrik later granted Jarani and his king the rule over the lands where this had occurred, and Jarani's descendants still hold it.
Rulesy stuff:
King Conall and those of his retainers who fell along with him are buried in a megalith corridor grave. Their spirits can be contacted with a sacrifice of the summoner's blood, an invocation in (ancient) Stormspeech, and a pledge of assistance.
For game stats, assume King Conall and his weaponthanes are "alfar" from Vikings. Those who can speak to spirits and know the right invocations can summon forth the king or one of his weaponthanes and enter spirit communication, as per Vikings Players Book "Getting Spirit Magic", p.37. Spells taught by King Conall and his weaponthanes include Detect Enemy, Endurance (max 7), Protection (max 7) by one "alf" with POW 22 and INT 15, Strength (max 5), Coordination (max 6) by another one with POW 19 and INT 11. The "alf" of the King himself doesn't grant any spells, but insted bestow his blessing upon those who successfully meet a challenge he imposes upon them. These challenges can be of athletic nature, like to climb a cliff wall and bring him a rare flower from there, or to jump onto a certain rock in the Syphon rapids and renew an ancient engraving the king had left there as mark of his territory, or to bring him the antlers of a roe-buck from the grove with its heartblood still warm upon it. He might also ask the applicant to take up a sleeping grudge, or to perform some other feat of arms - the king comes from an older, less civilised and rougher time, and still thinks like that. He'll bless only candidates he feels are worthy, therefore the tests. His blessing is that the character can go to the spring (now inside the Chalana Arroy Hospital) and claim a favour, like a special healing like Restore Health, Regrow Limb or even Resurrection, or any other favour from the priestesses there.
Since I play that initiates are limited to four points of variable cult spirit magic, spirit communication with the King's Weaponthanes is a way for non-Rune Level characters to get magic beyond the temple's offers.
The hospital is the current scenario location of my Heortland campaign. I might post more details about its buildings and residents soon - the thing is developing in play, and my PCs are having a difficult time, I hope.
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