The People
The Riders of the Watch
A network of scouts, messengers and light cavalry keeping the roads open and gathering intelligence across the North Watch, funded by commissions from the Lord Warden. Based at the chapterhouse in Fallcrest.
They are overextended, and they know it. Which is why they keep hiring the party.
Banner runs them. Stern, pragmatic, mission-focused, and a trader by instinct: when the party wanted help against the Spider Queen he did not say yes, he said investigate the Shrieking Mire and I'll see what I can free up. That trade produced the proof of the Iron Circle–Gulthias pact.
He hired the party for the first job — find three missing Riders — and everything since descends from it. Two came back. Rylan did not, and the party returned his Rider's Ring.
| Name | Role |
|---|---|
| Banner | Leader |
| Sharwyn | Bard. Rescued from the Gulthias Tree |
| Braford | Fighter. Rescued from the Gulthias Tree |
| Ser Garran Dorn | Veteran ranger and scout |
| Captain Ysolde Flint | Veteran rogue scout. Touched the runed stone that spoke |
| Kvothe | Sworn |
| Jocelin | Sworn — killed 29th of Autumn |
Nobody has told the Riders that Jocelin is dead. Kvothe is the party's only Rider now.
The Lord Warden of Fallcrest
Governs Fallcrest. A pragmatic devotee of Pharasma. He deeded the party the Spiderfell and Broken Spire Keep in exchange for clearing it, hallowing the shrine, and sworn fealty — which the party gave.
He had nobody to spare when the Spider Queen was a problem, and pointed them at the Riders. He already knew about Voren's abduction when they came to tell him. He sent a dozen guards to the keep before the Iron Circle assault.
Gulthias's ultimatum was carried to him by Banner. What he did about it has never come back to the party. Nor has anyone told him that Gulthias is now walling Fastormel, or that the party are in a working truce with him.
Voren the Green
Septarch of Fallcrest's Mages Guild. Missing.
A bald, hunched wizard in green robes, and for most of the campaign the party's answer to any question they could not punch.
- Scried Jaylin three times, worse each time: a dark cell; an underground tunnel with iron cart tracks and a Brokenskull Orc; and finally Jaylin alone on a stone floor with a mind flayer standing over her.
- Traced the womp womp to the Underdark, far deeper than the party had ever been. Suspected mind flayers. Doubted portals were the cause.
- Warded his tower against the pulses and offered it as shelter, and handed out emergency teleportation tokens at Midsummer
- Gave the party a Wand of Magic Missiles
- Took the Golden Apple off Kvothe in exchange for spells. What became of it, nobody knows
He also said this, unprompted, while Freya was travelling with the party:
"Limit your interactions with dragons. Even the good ones."
The abduction. The party found his tower empty. Purple ichor on the floor of the office and signs of a struggle. The only recent visitor had been a grocer delivering food, and hidden in the basket was a rune-inscribed coin — later identified by Sparky as an Underdark spell anchor, one of a connected pair. The grocer across the street described the caller as a tall figure in deep purple robes with a hood. Witnesses saw him, spoke to him, touched him, and could not remember him afterwards.
The last thing he sent was a voice in Agatha's head:
"There have been incursions against my wards at towers. Beware of incursions against you."
The Way told the party to get into the City of the Glass Pool and locate high-value prisoners. Voren has not been seen since.
Leander
Itinerant priest of Erastil. Found imprisoned in the cells during the party's first assault on Broken Spire Keep, and a steadfast ally since.
He cast the Hallow on the shrine to Asmodeus — a twenty-four hour ritual, completed while the keep was under attack.
He was in Nenlast through the siege, and he was the enemy's named priority capture target. He was never taken. He held out in the inn with the remnant of the town and reached the party by Sending.
He is one of very few people outside the party who knows the truce with Gulthias exists.
Oleanne
Druid of the Spiderfell, with two wolf companions. Lives in a cave in the forest.
Their first push into the Spiderfell against orcs, spiders and an ettercap was going badly until she and her wolves arrived. She then told them what was happening in that forest — the alliance, the keep, and the travellers being fed to the spiders.
She guarded the keep during the early Underdark expeditions and joined the assault on it.
After the battle for the keep she revealed herself as a Silver Raven, after years of quietly helping without saying so, and brought word that Nenlast had gone silent.
With Jocelin dead, Oleanne is the party's only surviving link to the Silver Ravens. Nobody has reported back to her — not Jocelin's death, and not the truce.
The Silver Ravens
A covert resistance network working to break the Iron Circle's grip and its slave trade. Base unknown. Meetings at the standing stones south of Fallcrest.
Tradecraft: meetings on the 30th and 60th of each month, with messages left at the stones when a meeting cannot happen. Ciphers — their scroll cases are engraved with a raven perched on a mirror and the phrase "truth is seen in reverse," which is both a motto and the key. Flying messengers, hidden informants, and silver raven pins as identification.
The cell: Elias (leader and contact), Serena (half-elf sorceress), Morgana (cleric of Erastil), Jasper (halfling rogue), Cedric (dwarf fighter).
What they gave the party. Their courier Kaelen Vey was murdered in a Fallcrest alley by the Iron Circle spy-hunter Tarmon Vale, carrying a coded letter. The party found him dying, killed Vale, and Jocelin broke the cipher:
"Contact established with the Lord of Mist. Vale to confirm Gulthias' pact at Mire altar. High Circle arrives in four days."
They also delivered the assessment that the Iron Circle is not strong enough to take Fallcrest yet, and is waiting for something.
⚠️ The party's only member is dead and nobody has been in contact since.
The Thornapple Clan
An eccentric halfling family in Fallcrest, running Thornapple's Marvelous Marvels. Supply, identification, muscle and poisons.
- Thistle — the shopkeeper. Produced the barrow map, sold Jocelin the armour, and is more curious and opportunistic than reliable. He consistently overstates his own contribution.
- Sparky — the arcanist. Identified the Potions of Domination, the runed coin as an Underdark spell anchor, and the Iron Circle's High Circle
- Booger — courier and bag-carrier; stores the party's loot at the shop
- Assassin — crafted five sleeping arrows for three vials of spider venom
Uncle Bill, a strange but learned halfling, identified the tainted spear: powerful enchantments, and a bad feeling.
Jaylin and Andrin
Jaylin is a red-haired mage in a green cloak, apprentice to Voren the Green. Her disappearance is the thread that pulled the party out of frontier troubleshooting and into the Underdark plot. Kidnapped by the Iron Circle, sold on, and held for transfer — the party got her out of the portal chamber minutes before she went through, along with Atun, Bern and Heinrich.
Andrin is her fiancé, a jeweller's apprentice in Harken. He is the one who was sitting in the Hungry Hound looking for her, and he gave the party the bronze locket that made the scrying possible.
They intend to marry at Broken Spire Keep once their apprenticeships end, and to set up shop there. Agatha will officiate.
The Goblin King
"Red Hand," ruler of Goblintown. For years his people were the enemy: harassing the keep, working with the bugbear Vargath, supplying prisoners to the Iron Circle, and feeding humans to Araniax in exchange for her protection.
They turned after the party captured goblins and released them with a message — and after a dragon told the Goblin King to rebuild the keep and promised help against the Spider Queen. He has no idea how to contact it, and his goblins are terrified of it.
He sent four goblins to help kill Araniax, twenty-five workers to rebuild the keep, and troops to hold Goblintown against the Iron Circle's second front. He is now a genuine ally.
Hand Solo is his diplomat.
The deep gnomes of Rockhome
Bogani is a bald deep gnome with a greyish beard who has spent the campaign stepping out of walls at useful moments. He identified the City of the Glass Pool and the alliance holding it, warned that a new portal would likely be built, told the party the kuo-toa are working with the mind flayers, and guided them — blindfolded — to Rockhome.
He works on a schedule, and the party's Underdark calendar is largely his: every seven days, at the junction of the portal cavern and the Rockhome path. The most recent scheduled meeting was the 37th of Autumn.
Felani is High Priestess of Rockhome and head of its council. She made the party earn the meeting first — twelve trolls in the mushroom farms — then cast a translation spell and spoke plainly. Her read on the womp womp: a mind flayer experiment, psychic attacks under test, and she does not like it.
The alliance came with one non-negotiable condition: Rockhome's location stays secret.
Her ask in return: stir things up. She is not being generous. She is hiring a proxy who can make noise in places her own people cannot afford to be seen.
Vortikand
Derro wizard. The first Derro in this campaign who talked instead of fighting.
Met on 7 August in the aftermath of the battle at the Sunless Sea. He survived, did not attack, and negotiated. Undercommon was the language that worked, with Dravona interpreting.
He drew the distinction himself, unprompted: "Smart Derro" — his own people, free-minded, fighting the illithids — and "Stupid Derro", the ones serving the Great Ones, and not by choice. The mechanism has a name: Brain Capture, total psychic enslavement.
He struck a truce on shared hatred of the Fish Folk and the Great Ones, led the party to a hidden outpost and let them rest in it, warned them the Great Ones could track the kuo-toa scroll they had just opened, and agreed to guide them south.
Halvriss is his forward scout. Muranekk leads the rebels at the stronghold the party are marching toward, and is unmet.
Everything he has told them so far has checked out. They have known him about an hour.
The Keeper and the Way
Two figures tied to the Sanctuary of Whispered Stars. They are a pair, they both serve an
unnamed "master", and neither has explained anything about themselves.
The Keeper came for the Windsong bow on Jocelin's watch, the night after the party took it off the altar. She said it did not belong to Jocelin, and that if it were not returned, "the way" would come. Jocelin gave it back — and the Keeper's response was not a threat: she told the party they could use the Sanctuary for rest, drew a circle on the ground, walked through it, and was gone.
The Way appeared for the first time on 3 April, alongside her, and did the talking. He is
the source of everything the party knows about the Old Ones. He is forbidden from helping
directly and will not fight alongside them, but he is permitted to improve their odds without
showing his master's hand — which is how the party ended up with the Chain Breaker.
He examined that warhammer with visible reverence and knew immediately what it was.
Caldris watched them both very closely, with an odd look on his face, and said nothing.
Percival
A pseudodragon ranging the Winterbole between the Throne of Antlers and Nenlast. Jocelin camped in his nest by accident, apologised, and then needled him about whether she might pet him. He tolerated it. By morning she was calling him Percy, over his objections.
He gave the party the first hard number anyone had on the siege of Nenlast — more than fifty and fewer than a hundred undead — and an assessment: they were all going to die.
Two nights later he was out on patrol with the winter wolf's pack, and the pack tried to kill them.
Cheerfully rude, genuinely informative, and not aligned with the party. He liked Jocelin.
The Winterbole council
Nine leaders, advisors and scouts sit at the Throne of Antlers. The party spoke to three.
Valdris Oakheart · Elk Heart chieftain, keeper of the Throne. Traditionalist and mediator. He stopped the party at the perimeter, admitted them on Ubo's account with a warning not to break the peace of the council, and later delivered the ruling.
Mira Ashford · River Crow chieftain. Fishers and traders on Starfall Lake, and the tribe with the most contact with southlanders. She sought Agatha out specifically, told her the story of Thornback the Badger, named the two things the party could do that would actually count, agreed to stall the council, and then coached them on how to present the truce. She is Dravona's mentor, and she staked her own credibility on the party and told them so.
Ylva Bloodfang · daughter of the Storm Wolf chieftain Korrath. She invited the party to dinner out of cautious curiosity, and then laid out the two reasons nobody at that council should listen to them: no authority, and no demonstrated power. She has private reservations about allying with the undead, and she is a loyal daughter who follows her father.
Also present and never approached: Korrath Bloodfang (Storm Wolf, favours the alliance), Tormund Gravebane (Shadow Bear, desperate and torn, has destroyed a dozen of his own ancestors by hand), Grandmother Yew (Elk Heart spirit-speaker), Fenrik the Gray, Old Marsh, and Seela Nightwhisper, the Shadow Bear scout.