Jarrisbadda

The city of Jarrisbadda is not what most expect.  It is a city-state in the sense that it is an island completely covered by the city itself, though it isn’t an island.

Jarrisbadda was founded when some human fishermen discovered the hulls of three elven ships that had wrecked on a coral reef.  An elven warship was escorting two merchant ships when a storm pushed them onto the reef, ripping their hulls open.  It is believed that there were other ships in the convoy because very few corpses were found with the ships.

At first when the fishermen discovered the wrecks, they treated them as taboo.  No one wants to bring their boats too close to known danger.  But the lure of possible loot overcame caution.  While the ships had been cleaned out of some of their most valuable equipment and treasures, there was still quite a bit for these fishermen to gather. Fairly quickly, they began to pull the ships apart and use the wood to create structures on the reef, effectively using the wrecks as cabins for when they didn’t want to sail all the way home.

As these sailors became more and more familiar with the location, they started to bring some building materials with them when they came out, expanding the reef structures, though they were still anchored by the shipwrecks.  It is unknown at what point the merfolk began to come out to trade with the fishermen, but some believe the merfolks were the ones who originally informed the fishermen of the wrecks.

The community grew.  More fishermen were building “cabins” on the reef, typically shack buildings built on stilts above high tide but anchored to the coral.  Between fishing for food and trading with the merfolk, these simple fishermen only needed to gather enough fresh water from the frequent rains to survive.

Jarrisbadda survived like this for a generation as several sons of the original “settlers” made this their permanent home.  It was around this time that the community became known well enough that it attracted the wrong kind of attention - pirates.  Perhaps fortunately, the first two pirate ships that came here arrived about the same time.  Looking for a safe harbor, they agreed that the “island” as it was becoming known would be neutral ground - well, sort of ground.

Over the next few years, more and more pirates began to come to the village, primarily to trade for food.  Some of these pirates would tow nearly destroyed ships and trade the husks to the villagers who were interested in cannibalizing the looted ships for the wood and other materials.  Additionally, some of the fishermen were hauling wood and other materials out to the island, often to assist their family members who had decided to live out there.

Jarrisbadda is still tiny.  The “island” measures about a third of a mile in diameter, though clearly it is not all that circular.  The highest reef points have been used to anchor collections of buildings, while other buildings are floating and simply tied off to the ones that have been “planted”.  The population of this community is likely around 500-700, depending on which pirate ships happen to be tied up to the floating piers.  Much of the surface area is used to catch the rains, though other fishermen make frequent trips here to sell fresh water.  The settlement is just about a day’s sail from land for the larger sailing ships, which was the initial reason some liked the location.

Beneath the waves, the mermen have set up a community as well, often living in the sunken sections of some of the wrecks, both those that sank here and those that were towed.  They trade with the surface dwellers, often then acting as merchants who bring the human products to various merfolk communities.  There are likely only 200-250 merfolk who live here.

While the town is considered to be a pirate stronghold, the pirates typically respect the village’s neutrality.  None of them want to ruin the good thing they have, plus these fishermen are a hearty lot who would be difficult to destroy with next to no profit in it.  Most just sail over, mindfully of the well-marked danger zones, tie off, and trade with the locals.  A couple of pirates seem to have overstayed their time, as their ships become a permanent part of the floating city.

The city’s culture is mostly Cheilmaddb, but as often happens with pirates, it has become quite cosmopolitan.  The population of women is less than 20%, but again, the site’s neutrality seems to hold.  There are no police, but every man and woman is considered capable of handling themselves and various blades they will have on them, so people tend to leave each other alone.