Crag Halyv

**Crag Halyv**

NE Small City (Eastern Region)

Corruption +1; Crime +1; Economy +2; Law +1; Lore +0; Society +4

**Qualities** Magically Attuned, No Questions Asked, Strategic Location, Supportive

**Danger** 5

**Government** Autocracy

**Population** 9000 people (7000 tieflings, 500 oread, 1500 other)

**Notable NPCs**

**Emily Ardensman** (N Female Human Sorcerer 9/Pain Taster 3)

**Galtania Ardensman** (NE Female Tiefling Sorcerer 17)

**Guindara Heldring** (NE Female Oread Oracle 13)

**Marketplace**

**Base Value** 5200 gp; **Purchase Limit** 30,000 gp; **Spellcasting** 8th

**Minor Items** 4d4 items; **Medium Items** 3d4 items; **Major Items** 1d6 items

Crag Halyv is a strategically-located, heavily defended bastion of
evil in the eastern reaches of the realm, located high atop a
particularly active series of volcanic mountains. It's often been
described as a place most people would rather not go, owing mainly to
the fact that the entire city is magically attuned to the Neutral Evil
plane. As a result, few pure humans are born there - instead, most
births ultimately seem to wind up creating Grimspawn, Tiefling with the
blood of Daemons flowing through their veins. A relatively small
population of Oread seems immune to this effect (nobody is quite sure
why), and they serve the city as guards and heavy laborers.

Despite its well-deserved reputation for evil, Crag Halyv is actually
 quite supportive of its citizens, offering them relatively high amounts
 of freedom and protection from outsiders. This may have something to do
 with the "us against the world" mentality that many of its citizens
have. They don't ask visitors for information about themselves because
they don't *want* to get closer to others.

The city is ruled by its most powerful sorceress, a daemon-blooded
tiefling named Galtania Ardensman. Her main interests are protecting the
 city and expanding its power, and she usually does this by arranging
for attacks on anyone who hasn't purchased protection from them. The
fact that the city is located in a strategic, defensible spot makes it a
 lot harder to avoid these payments than many others would like -
unfortunately, the city is a nut not so easily cracked.

Interestingly, Galtania has a human sister, a sorceress in her own
right. Emily isn't as powerful as her sister, but the taint in her
bloodline is pure, and the result of a daemon breeding into her family
just two generations back - which would be nice for her, except for the
fact that Crag Halyv has *quite* an obsession with daemon-touched
blood. Galtania spent several years conditioning Emily to pain and blood
 loss, and now Emily is mostly kept in a cage in the center of town,
carefully bled so the city's tiefling citizens can partake of her blood
and, they hope, increase the taint their own children bear. The city
taxes foreigners fairly heavily, but merchants can waive half of the
normal fees if they're willing to drink Emily's blood instead. In this
way, Crag Halyv works to slowly spread the taint of daemonkind
throughout the land...

The oread population is led by Guindara Heldring, an Oracle of Adankora who constantly presses her kin to work harder and aim to
achieve greater heights as part of their support of the city.