Bard's Crossing

**Bard's Crossing** was a large bridge-town and notable landmark in the western Danderillon.

## Name

The town and bridge were both named Bard's Crossing, from the Euluska **Kaiës Kardaiätzak Läzëka** (Crossroads of the Bard Luska). This name came about because in the ancient Euluskan epic poem The Epic of Luska, the titular Luska was said to have crossed the Dvoryac river roughly around this point-ish. Luska was a lute-playing bard in the saga, and she parted the floodwaters with her lute to get past.

## Location

Bard's Crossing was located on the western reach of the Forest of Firth, about halfway on the route between Jarren's Well and Accipiter. It was built and founded in the late colonial period (i.e. the 900s TE) by the Lusken Empire as an important crossing spanning a gorge over the river Dvoryac. It facilitated an easy land trade route between the Northwest Danderillon down to Accipiter, as a gateway to the eastern half of the continent.

## Specifications

It spanned a distance of 2.4 miles, incredibly impressive for a medieval stone bridge (built before Felonil/Halcyon's industrial boom and commercial ironworks era). The gorge it spanned was over the Dvoryac river, at a height above it with a minimum of 100ft, average of 300ft and maximum of 540ft. The bridge was around 100ft wide on average, including the houses that overhung its edges. The bridge had two street levels: the main was cobbled and covered in several stories of houses, and then the sub-level just below the surface span was made of metal platforms, with more houses and buildings within the struts and edges. The houses were incredibly densely clustered - in its heyday it had a population density comparable to a slum, due to the verticality of its houses.

## Construction

Bard's Crossing was conceived in the 900s TE. For six hundred years prior, Lusken-Danderillonian traders had been travelling a similar route, founding the nearby fort of Vintner's Keep to protect their winding route down the gorge and back up it at its easiest point. Way before that, the native Vrei and Vist cultures had hunted and travelled the valley, but never settled the area fully.

Construction began in the early 900s. It took about 9 years to finish, and was a complex mechanical undertaking using lots of pulleys, ropes, and great amounts of wood. A few workers fell to their deaths and progress was halted during a very stormy season halfway through, but then construction was completed with the help of recruited gravity mages from the Burning Hills to help raise the stone supports. Once it was built, trade sprung up around it, so people began to settle it rapidly. Due to the presence of hostile Vrei natives on either side of the bridge, the buildings were clustered on it for safety, leading to the population density.

In its heyday during the 1300s and 1400s, the bridge supported almost 100,000 inhabitants. However, its population dwindled in the late 1400s and 1500s because of the rise of commercial sailing ships making sailing round the continent faster, as well as the popularity of the much safer, less rocky Great Southern Way road across the Danderillon to the south. By the 1600s most inhabitants had moved to nearby cities instead.

## Abandonment

During the God Wars, the bridge became highly unstable due to repeated attacks and battles nearby. This prompted the remaining few thousand locals to evacuate rapidly around the 1670s TE, leaving the bridge as an abandoned ghost town and thoroughfare. Many travellers still passed through it hastily. Those who explored found eerie old buildings, abandoned homes ready to fall off into the river, and the sub-level full of loose flooring that would lead to an early grave. Passing groups of travellers and Vrei Headhunters used it as shelter in storms, but the bridge was generally abandoned.

## Battle of Bard's Crossing

In 251 C, there was a large three-way decisive battle here, known as the **Battle of Bard's Crossing**. The adventuring party called Wildecards faced off against a small contingent of elite Headhunters Vreigardts as well as a pack of werewolves led by Zhila Greymoth, wielder of the Black Blade Xánwyr. The fight was quick and brutal, taking place on the full moon, ending with a total Wildecard victory.