Vadym Burza

Vadym's earliest memories involve meeting his best friend Oya in an orphanage in the Okulari capital city of Imzilut. The five year drought turned the steppes into a dusty waste and destroyed the fortunes of many families, leaving orphanages full to bursting with destitute children. Vadym lacked a bully's strength and a sneak's coordination, but he could talk to anyone and be heard. One time he talked a rogue air elemental out of a raging whirlwind, saving the orphanage. He could also summon light and heal with a touch, which he used sparingly in an attempt to hide his differences from the rest of the kids.

He had always dreamed of the sea. He shared his dreams with Oya, and when they came of age, they headed east toward the shore. Oya had a way with swords and had a knack for thunder magic, and Vadym could heal and tame the wind. They had several mishaps before making it to the shore in southern Dunhill and finding a captain who would take both of them, but they joined the crew of the Grey Rover, a pirate ship that stole cargo between Fellport and Dunhill. Vadym had a knack for calming storm winds, so he became the crew's good luck charm. Oya had loftier ambitions and worked her way up the ranks to become one of Old Captain Pete's officers.

They served for a couple of years, then Old Captain Pete went down in a shore raid. Vadym stayed behind to try and heal the captain, telling Oya to head back to the ship. Mercenaries working for Fellport captured Pete, Vadym, and a couple other pirates that day. The Fellport Council sentenced Captain Pete to hang from Execution Wharf until death, while Vadym served two years in a cell on the Lakeside Wall. At least he could still see the ocean from his cell.

He made a deal with an air elemental to keep the prisoners cool in the high summer. One of the guards made the offhand comment that he could sell his cooling services after his release. So he did. He talks his way through the paperwork to start a business called Elemental Solutions, and makes a killing by making deals with elementals to cool the mansions of Topside. He made Sails & Lines safer by removing the dust from the ropewalk, thereby reducing the risk of combustion and lung damage for the workers. Every contract has a yearly renewal fee, where he renegotiates the contract with the elemental or summons a new one to serve for a year.

He still sees Oya (now Captain Oya Stormqueen) whenever she comes to town, and he holds no grudges about abandonment. Every timt they talk he tries to convince her to settle in Fellport when she tires of the roving life. He resides in Fellport full-time now in a modest home on Level 13, and has a guest bedroom for her whenever she needs it. He uses his excess riches to make life better for everyone, funding Highwater House and other charitable organizations in town.

He has coffee-with-a-splash-of-cream brown skin, but his white hair and sky-blue eyes mark him as different. His cheekbones also sit much higher than a human's, and his wide smile sparkles in the heart of his face. He speaks with an odd accent - almost Slavic despite his upbringing steeped in the far more musical Okulari tongue. He naturally puts people at ease with his unflappable attitude of "How can I help you today?" He has a good heart and the means to make his uplifting ideas of equality and justice work in the face of a cynical society.

Vadym Burza
Protector Aasimar Storm Sorcerer (Level 7) (Sailor Background)
Str 12  Dex 8  Con 12  Int 14  Wis 14  Cha 18
Arcana +5, Athletics +4, Perception +5, Persuasion +7

Part of T.W.Wombat's #City23 project. See the Fellport Index for all entries.

The Council House

Council Plaza leads from the Lift to the Cliffside Wall in the heart of the city on Level 9. Just past the fountains and public square lies an Ionian mansion made of brick and marble, complete with a tall entry flanked by even taller columns holding up the slightly peaked roof. Tall glass windows look over the harbor and the Sea of Sorrows beyond. Originally built by Regulus Aelius under a decree from the Emperor Maximus and named Silex Regia (Flint Palace in Latin), it housed the ruler of Fellport during the Empire's reign.

When the Empire collapsed and the Republic took control, the mansion lay empty for years, a symbol that the Republic stopped paying attention to this haven for rejects and undesirables. When Fellport asserted its independence, the people came together and refurbished the Silex Regia as a seat of government for the Fellport Council. The main ballroom became the primary council chamber, and everyone started calling the building the Council House.

Administrative offices took over the main floor, surrounding the council chamber, but leaving space for the kitchen and a small dining room near the back of the building. Bedrooms and suites take up the upper two floors, mostly used for guests, but occasionally one or more Councilors will spend the night when working late on some decision or policy. The basement holds a larger dining area, some training rooms for combat, a communal bath, a small library, and several bedrooms once used for servants, but now used for lower-ranking staff and people under the Council's protection.

Sariel, the Wood Elf Steward of the house, lives in a hidden bedroom on the top floor. She has served various masters of the house for at least 200 years, and she has intimate knowledge of every closeted skeleton in the house (and a fair few across the city). She usually defers to the Councilors on decisions, but she will kindly push back against unwise decisions and get her way. She handles all hiring and firing decisions, delegates responsibilities amongst the staff, controls room assignments, and keeps the house budget.

Part of T.W.Wombat's #City23 project. See the Fellport Index for all entries.

Tor-Sariel

Sariel serves as Steward of the Council House (her title translates to Turindar in Elvish) in Fellport, and has for the past 247 years. She grew up with a devil-may-care attitude, and she fenced goods for all manner of unsavory characters across the Elven nation of Alfinwald. One day she bought a pile of magic items for a song, only to find a glowing book with an eight-pointed star on the cover, a holy relic stolen from the Lightwood Sanctum. She read some of the stories of gods and heroes fighting world-devouring demons which straddled the line between history and myth, and her life changed. She found her purpose in those few pages. She walked the book back to the Lightwood Sanctum and returned it on the condition that they also take her and put her to work.

She trained hard as a holy warrior, eventually taking the Oath of the Watcher to protect the world from these extraplanar invaders who thought they deserved this world as their plaything. She mastered the Interception style, protecting those near her from harm with lightning-fast parries. The Monarch of Alfinwald had a special assignment for her: go to Fellport and find evidence of a hidden entity that speaks in dreams. She needed a cover story, and the Monarch sent her to server as a servant to the Ionian governor. She eventually rose through the ranks to run the entire house, and then the city declared independence.

The new Council didn't exactly trust her, but after a year's probation they found they couldn't operate the Council House nearly as efficiently without her century of expertise. She has served faithfully, helping the Council as needed while still maintaining her investigations in the wider city. She has a large web of informants within the city. Nazar, the Councilor of Arcane Affairs, knows a little of her history and that she holds far more power than a typical servant, but not the full details about her mission. She has taken lovers, but she never married. Her work always came first. Rumors persist about her half-elven child, though her direct denials seem genuine.

Sariel maintains an unassuming appearance, with her brown hair pulled into a businesslike bun and her hazel eyes taking in all the details of a person. Her force of personality effortlessly directs her subordinates (and sometimes the Councilors when conflict rears its ugly head), and she rarely reacts to even horrible news. She wears a full suit of Elven Chain beneath her uniform, and she has a ring that stores her rapier Acumen in an extradimensional space. She always wears a moonstone amulet engraved with a tower and an eight-pointed star which serves as her holy symbol to Corellon and lets her cast Intellect Fortress on 4 people per day. She has a longbow and shield in her room if needed.

Tor-Sariel
Wood Elf Watcher Paladin (Level 12) (Criminal Background; Skill Expert Feat)
Str 10  Dex 18  Con 16  Int 15  Wis 16  Cha 20
Acrobatics +8, Deception +9, Insight +11, Intimidation +9, Perception +7, Stealth +8

Part of T.W.Wombat's #City23 project. See the Fellport Index for all entries.

Amos Dowd

Amos started life in Battan, the northernmost coastal city in Dunhill Confederacy. He grew tall and strong, encouraging rumors of giant ancestors, but early on he learned to talk his way out of problems instead of fighting. He always had a talent with magic, but he didn't need another reason to get picked on, so he hid it. He secretly used mending to fix his mistakes, prestidigitation for cleaning, and comprehend languages let him understand speech and script that he had no business knowing about. His parents trained him as a weaver and tailor, but like many in Dunhill, he left home and found work as a warrior.

He earned entry into the Gallowglass Mercenaries and made his name there for three years. During that time he struck up a friendship with a Goliath mentor, and Amos eventually talked him into teaching Runic. After learning the basics of runecraft, he pilgrimaged to Geldungur in the Surtsey Islands to study with Goliath elders for a year, pass the trials, and get his face tattoo (a horizontal blue stripe across his nose from ear to ear). He came back to Gallowglass and put in a couple more years' work, then retired and came to Fellport to work with the Goliath population there.

He found work at Sails & Lines, working his way up from weaver to shift supervisor to manager over 15 years, taking time off for the odd mercenary gig. In a surprising turn of events, Amos inherited the business when the old owner died 7 years ago. Now he leads the company with his team, and he still takes the occasional side job. He lives on a lovely estate in Talltown.

At fifty years old, his golden blonde hair shows streaks of silver, but his piercing blue eyes remain undimmed, still matching his tattoos. Middle age has not softened him as much as he feared it would. He maintains a rigorous physical workout regimen, always ready to get physical if needed. He usually comes across with a soft touch (he jokingly says "I'd rather deal with this than a Barbary Horde!" more often than he should), but he can still raise his voice and scare the pants off of people if needed. Everyone at Sails & Lines views him as tough but level-headed and fair, and other merchants seek him out to arbitrate disputes on a regular basis, preferring his judgement to the Council's.

Amos Dowd
Human (Goliath blood) Rune Knight Fighter (Level 8) (Guild Artisan Background; Magic Initiate Feat)
Str 18  Dex 10  Con 12  Int 13  Wis 10  Cha 14
Athletics +7, History +4, Insight +3, Intimidation +5, Persuasion +5

Part of T.W.Wombat's #City23 project. See the Fellport Index for all entries.

Sails & Lines

The sign hanging on the front of this quarter-mile-long building reads "Sails & Lines, Outfitting Ships Since Their Arrival At Fellport". The well-worn and patched wooden building fills the space between the Cliffside Ramp and the wall on Level 2, leaving some room on the harbor side of the broad road for other structures. Sails & Lines has occupied this area for so long it gave the Hempenway its name. The building won't win any design or aesthetic awards, but it still stands and it suits its purpose of making ropes and sails at industrial scale.

The front has eighteen foot tall double doors hung on rails in the middle of the building to allow carts entry to the facility. Carts pull in and deliver huge bundles of hemp fiber to the spinning room, which produces giant spools of filament. The spools move to a cramped storage chamber to just barely fit on the shelves, sorted by length. The cordiers here can make rope in any size from quarter-inch light cord to three-quarters hauling rope to four-inch anchor line in any length up to 200 fathoms (1200 feet) by feeding filaments through a metal die and letting the water-powered machinery twist them into shape. Workers walk the newly formed rope down the ropewalk and close the ends at the desired length.

Some of the filaments go to the weaving room to the left of the main doors, where workers make canvas in ten-foot-wide lengths. The sheets get pulled up to the seam room that takes up the entire second floor, where they come together into strong canvas sails made to order for your particular ship. Sometimes the owner, Amos Dowd, allows a client to dye their sailcloth, but he makes sure they pay for the privilege. He works from the office space upstairs, but he usually wanders the floor to talk with his employees and keep connected to the daily workings of the business.

The old ropery shed still exists inside the main building on the left behind the weaving room, seeing occasional use for making shorter ropes during times of high demand. At less than half the length of the new building, it leaves plenty of room for an open space past the far end of the old shed, with tables used for lunches and an open pitch used for various games. Weavers vs Cordiers games of rugby and cricket keep almost everyone entertained and productive. Weavers tend to win cricket matches, but the slightly stronger Cordiers have the edge in rugby games. Everyone helps make the rope nets hanging between the pitch and the ropewalk, preventing both balls and zealous workers from crashing into the work machinery.

Dust and fibers fill the air when the machines form the ropes, which caused flash fires in the past. Sails & Lines maintains a contract with Elemental Solutions for an air elemental powered exhaust system to vent dirty air over the wall at the far end of the building, preventing destructive incidents since its installation.

Part of T.W.Wombat's #City23 project. See the Fellport Index for all entries.