150 years ago, explorers set forth from the continent of Sah-teer seeking treasure in new lands. Aboard the ships, dwarves accompanied men, braving the great sea, questing for the truth of their ancient legends; mountain holds still filled with the legacy of their great forebears. When finally they arrived on the shores of Pharse, they began a new colony with moderate success. More came and moved inland, to the mountains and fields and forests.<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/a/a0/Rehl%27me.JPG)</div>Landfall was what they named the place where the first expedition made landfall. Flowing there from the northwest was a lazy, easy flowing river they named the L’haka. Following a week upriver, the men and dwarves found a curious feature; a series of fords leading from a lake, as well as another river, with its own ford, leaving the lake to the southwest. Between the rivers was high ground and here they built the town of Two Fords. Long years did the colonies prosper, gold and lumber and grains and other raw materials flowing home to the Sahteeric Empire of the Upper Lippz. But from the plains beyond the forest, a new enemy stalked man and dwarf. Called “orc” by the elves, the creature stood as tall as a man, powerful of build and possessed of a murderous cunning. The orc never sought parlay or trade, only to take what it wanted. As men and dwarf skirmished with the orc, the elf seemed to recognize common cause with the newcomers. Thus, 30 years ago, came the Battle of Two Fords.<br/><br/><br/>The orc chief calling himself Rakr’ewn had, by force of arms and deft maneuver, assembled a horde of fourteen-some orc tribes and descended on the men of Two Fords. Whiel the Lippzhite garrison fought bravely, it would have been destroyed and the town sacked had not the men and dwarves and elves reinforced the lines. Reinforcements from Landfall arrived three days later to the survivors led by Hugh Bryes. Declaring the Sahteeric Emperor to have abdicated his oath to defend them, the local lords declared their feudal oaths void and elected Bryes warlord of the New Rehl’me, who would answer the arriving Lippzhite forces. The revolution succeeded after several years of guerilla warfare to see Rehl’me as a republic, its Senate led by the First Citizen, the first of whom was Hugh Bryes.<br/><br/>Two Fords is still an important garrison of Rehl’me. Flowing into the Cold Lake is the Cold River coming down from the mountains. Whether the dwarves found their lost cousins is a moot point as gold and crafts come down from the mountains to be traded to the rest of Rehl’me and beyond in Two Fords. Lumber also flows downriver to Landfall, now called Ka’ap Ital, to fuel the growth of that city. Elves still roam the North Forest, by treaty a separate nation within Rehl’me. And the garrisons have pushed north ending in the March of the Watch to protect Rehl’me from future orc invasions.<br/><br/>It is here in Two Fords our story begins. Trade flows both up and down the L’haka river and Ka’ap Ital, as well as to the southwest of Rehl’me along the River Fitz. But boats can’t cross the fords into the Cold Lake and so a signature industry of Two Fords is the portage companies, men who move goods overland across Two Fords from one river to the other. Among them is the Blackfoot Portage Company, so called because the workers are usually covered to the knees or above with silt from the rivers by midday. And the Blackfoot workgangs tend to frequent a pub Known as the Don’t Fall Inn.<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/5/5d/Don%27t_Fall_Inn.JPG)</div>The pub’s name is the work of its proprietor, a heavyset strongman called Gretch. The entrance to his pub, in roughly the middle of the building, leads directly to a short flight of stairs. To the right of the door is roughly the same level as the boardwalk outside (necessary due to the proximity to the L’haka and frequent flooding of the street), while the stairs lead down to ground level flagstone. The Blackfoot know this is their area of the pub, where they shed mud as it dries and falls from them over the time they spend lunching and Gretch and his daughter Gretla can quickly clean with several buckets of water.<br/><br/>Assembled in the Don’t Fall Inn are a motley collection of humanoids in the right hand, upper tier of the pub. A workgang of the Blackfoot has just left from their lunch break and the staff has yet to clean up after them.<br/>