Castle Athassel

**Castle Athassel** was once one of the most imposing fortresses in the western islands and the home of the powerful House Kear. Located on a sharp outcrop on the stormy coast, the castle is surrounded by extremely steep drops on either side, making it virtually unimpregnable. Though many tried to conquer it over the ages castle Athassel has never fell to no man, sword, or pike, or cannon ball. Roving clans or Ogre foemen, Athassel stood against them all.

The doom of the castle would end up coming from within when the Kears fell into financial troubles due to their incessant warring with the nearby earls and counts. Unable to maintain the fortress and pay their men, the Kears weighed their option and in desperation decided to forge a pact with the witches of the Coven of Black Velvet.

A terrible pact was the forged for the Kears to offer their firstborn son as sacrifice for 66 generations and in exchange the witches would grant them power and wealth. This pact was maintained for three generations and the Kears would regain dominance on their island, subjugating its unruly princes with an iron fist.

The fourth lord Kear however, fell in love with Kungota, one of the witches of the coven. At first she was only interested in using the lord for her own ends, but eventually, seeing his heart was almost as black as hers, they grew to truly love each other. Kungota would eventually bear a child to the lord, a being she foresaw to have an enormous magical potential. Thus she secretly started to labour on a plan to preserve the life of the child.

The lord however still feared the coven and unsure if this was some sort of test, secretly decided to sacrifice the child in spite of his wife's wishes. Thus when the young one was born and the mother exhausted, the lord laboured to substitute the newborn with a different one and handed over his son to a witch of the Black Velvet.

When Kungota found out about her husband's treachery and her child's death she went into a black rage and channelling all of her arcane powers placed a powerful curse on the House of Lear and Castle Athassel. A magical storm came in with powerful winds and torrential rains. Walls of stone came crumbling down and into the sea and many souls were lost against the raging might.

Ever since then, Castle Athassel has been nothing but a cursed and decaying ruin, haunted by dark spirits and monsters that were drawn to this place by its dark aura. Locals say that most of the ruins are nowadays home to a horrific race of semi-intelligent giant grey spiders that have been known to prey on local yeomen on particularly dark nights.

## History

An often forgotten historical fact is that the Wizards of the Isle of Wizards didn’t always control the entire island.

When Celin arrived on the island intent on making it a utopia for magic users, it was ruled by a patchwork of independent counties, earldoms, Azanese remnants, and Eteran inspired magocracies. Most of them were weak and had little support from the commonfolk. Due to the power of Celin and the other magic users he gathered to his cause, combined with the weakness of the existing rulers, there was no opposition to the powerful mages setting up towers and academies where they liked, and ignoring any local laws they found inconvenient. The common folk soon started looking to the wizards to resolve any issues of note, and the other rulers on the island soon withered to being figureheads, most of which disappeared entirely after a few centuries.

But along the well populated southwest coast, humanity has deep roots, and the folk there have ancient tribal loyalties to their counts and earls, unlike the scattered farmers living on other parts of the island who are a mix of indigenous peoples and colonists from all over the northern Azan Empire. Here, the earldoms and counties maintained a prickly independence, lasting for centuries before being absorbed by their rivals.

The **Earldom of Athassel**, led by House Kear, was generally considered the most powerful. Ruling over two reasonable sized islands, each containing small port cities along a major trade route, the House acquired a reasonable amount of wealth over its long existence, and used it to build the mighty Castle Athassel, as well as wage countless wars against its rivals.

But by around 2.700 ABE, the House was in steep decline. It had sold one of its islands to Bumi, while the other had fragmented into many criminal fiefdoms ruled by renegade members of House Kear known as “young princes”. Furthermore, the few remaining earldoms and counties of the southwest coast were planning invasions, seeking to settle old grudges and conquer one of the few remaining nearby territories not under the protection of the Wizards. Although Castle Athassel was legendarily impenetrable, House Kear had no funds to pay his soldiers, and the old tribal loyalties that Athassel and other similar nations relied upon to motivate their men had almost completely faded by this point.

Instead, the Earl made a terrible pact with the Coven of Black Velvet, a powerful Gogotha cult posing as a minor hag coven. The pact worked for a while, with the coven’s subtle manipulations removing many rivals and funneling much wealth to House Kear, but after four generations, the Earl of Kear gravely angered a powerful witch while trying to adhere to the pact, resulting in the witch sacrificing herself to cast a powerful but unpredictable ritual in the castle.

The ritual resulted in a massive storm that badly damaged the castle and most of the other settlements on the island. It tainted the island with dark energies, and encounters with minor demons and undead spirits became a common occurrence. It also attracted unseelie fey and their pets, including hags, goblins, and giant spiders. The true nature remains unknown to this day, though some believe it partially opened some long dormant minor demon breaches.

Athassel Island quickly developed a cursed reputation, and no attempt was made to rebuild the castle, the port, or the various smaller communities. Eventually the island was abandoned entirely.

The other earldoms and counties had also been affected by the coven’s manipulations. With their nobility greatly weakened, the earldoms and counties collapsed into independent ports and townships that were far more likely to respect the will of the wizards.

Thus, the last meaningful challengers to the wizard’s power on the Isle of Wizards faded into history, and the Isle became a de facto fiefdom of the wizards.

## Government

Athassel Island is officially abandoned, but the coven still visits it for secret gatherings, and some live on the island full time (or more accurate in the faerie realm, only periodically visiting the island itself). The coven’s leader is a faerie lord named Vitalia who has an affinity for spiders, and who has made dark pacts with the demon lord Gogotha. Vitalia spends most of her time in the faerie realm, but will emerge periodically to provide instruction to the remnants of the coven, which have suffered from several purges by the wizards and their allies. Vitalia has a certain amount of control over the assorted monsters roaming the island, but allows them to attack at will unless it is a coven member or ally.

## Economy

Athassel Island has no economy to speak of, but prior to the ritual relied on herding, fishing, trade, and occasionally piracy against certain nations.

In modern times, the island is still occasionally visited by fishermen and pirates looking for short term harbors, fugitives looking for somewhere to hide, adventurers drawn by legends of hidden treasure, prospective coven members unaware of the proper protocols, and shipwrecked sailors just trying to survive until help arrives. As long as certain areas are avoided, it is possible to avoid trouble for days, or even months, but sooner or later some sort of trouble will arrive to stalk and torment any outsiders.

## Foreign Relations

Nearby nations now consider Athassel Island to be a part of the Isle of Wizards. Sailors in the region are aware of its reputation, but few know the coven is still active.

## Geography

Athassel Island is a rocky island about 20 kilometers wide at its widest. Its thin soil was never really suitable for anything other than grazing, though since the island’s abandonment, scraggly forest has covered much of it.

## Demographics

The original inhabitants were mostly human. Of the Westerling lineage, their ancestors were fierce raiders and pirates who got along well with the wilder of the fey. As they slowly became civilized by Azanese influence, many of those traits were dropped, but they did maintain an aggressive reputation right to the end.

The modern inhabitants of the island are the members of the Coven of Black Velvet as well as various monsters and other dark entities drawn to Castle Athassel. The coven itself are mostly human witches, with a few hags and elves of various sorts. Their servants include goblins, fairies, large spiders, and summon demons.

Undead spirits, rogue demons, assorted unseelie fey, and various sea monsters are also drawn to the castle. The coven’s control of these monsters varies.

## Religion

By the time the island was abandoned, the Azanese Faith was dominant, but aspects of the older faith, one which worshipped a vengeful sea god and saw many faerie lords as divine servants, still remained.

It was this tolerance for the darker aspects of fey religion and rituals that brought about the island’s downfall. The Coven of Black Velvet has a dark and powerful leader in Vitalia, but Vitalia and the coven also have pacts with Gogotha, which make them even more dangerous.

## Military

Athassel Island doesn’t have an army, though anyone who lingers on the island for too long, particularly near the castle, will run afoul either the coven or a rogue monster.