A great black shadow rises up before you. Finnesburgh, the great hall of the north. The entrance is covered by a flap of cowhide, a man like a troll pulls it aside and lets you in. The light is dim. A vast open hearth smokes orange and gold in the center of the space.
Great hounds lounge about or gnaw at bones underfoot.
You scan the room for a place to sit and choose a bench where there's still some room, and a place to lean your back against one of the mighty columns. The hall is huge and unlike most, round. The roof is a broad dome. Through the smoke hole you can see the sky, black yet filled with stars and the flickering green and blue shadows of the northern lights. Where the columns join the roof there are stange and beautiful carvings, of monsters and gods that seem to move as the light of the fire agitates them.