Orshore

An incredibly corrupt and xenophobic city where non-humans are treated as second class citizens at best. Those that create what many consider to be “proto-humans” are treated worse. In the eyes of many they are simply blood traitors who have sullied the good name of all humans. While all this is true at the same time gold is gold, and those with it are treated as the ones with power. Should city folk be dealing with a non-human with gold they will smile through gritted teeth hiding as much of their contempt as possible. Mixed groups will result in the cityfolk only paying attention to the humans.

Non-humans are always offered less gold for whatever item they are trying to sell and are charged more if they are trying to buy. This is a dedicated effort of the merchant class to keep them down and from gaining any power in the city.

There are those that oppose this treatment of the other races but they quickly find themselves under much more scrutiny than others if they do. The non-humnas who oppose this have created their own underground network of tunnels to smuggle goods around. Create their own black markets and bypass the gates and guards in the city when they need to avoid detection. People only use these routes if rarely to avoid drawing too much suspicion to the fact that people are not using the overground routes.

Orshore is ruled by the council of merchants who meet in the gilded keep where the current head of the council lives as if he were a king. Merchant Lord Tyrus Tate and his wife are a cruel lot who work their servants to exhaustion and dock them money when they are too tired to carry on. They take particular glee in this when it is aimed at their non-human servants.

Officially while the council elects a head this is now largely a farce as the Tates have run the city for close to 100 years and expect to continue this line for many more years.

The Tate’s gained their power when the now defunct Lewis family who lost all their money in a series of unfortunate pirating raids. For failing to prevent these attacks the Tates demanded their expulsion from the city and what little property that Lewis family still owned seized in order to pay the city back for its loses in trade income. The Tates quickly seized their their chance through fear and bribery to take control of the council and thus the entire.

While officially there is no standing army at Orshore people are forcefully encouraged to join the guards for training if they are not from the merchant families. Usually those that still choose not to forced to give a charitable donation to support those that do train, although inr eality this money is fed right back to the gilded keep. This inflated guard is used in both the defense of the city, usually from pirates, and the expansion of the city, although the city borders have not expanded for quite some time. The city finds that it needs no army to defend from the other cities as it creates so much money in trade for them that Orshore is left to their own devices to continue making money.

The large guard are used primarily in the more affluent sections of the city to protect the wealthier citizenry and the areas in which most of the cities money is made. While this is particularly effective in those areas it means that poorer districts have descended into cesspits of crime and anarchy. Most having little problem with this. This has lead to in some instances, bodies piling up in the streets and no one doing anything about it.