Ruins of the Moat House

Dar Khazad Home

Cobbler Home

  This place was once the outpost of the Temple of Elemental Evil, its watchtower and advance base for raids, looting, and destruction. From this area, servants of the Temple were to bring the Village of Hommlet and all the lands around it into subjection. The subjugated folk were then to be used as slaves to construct yet another fortress further west, as the evil power of the Temple spread in ever-growing rings to encompass all of the land round its base. In fact, this outpost was ignored in the destruction of the Temple, for the army of good which came against the wicked hordes was so strong as to be totally immune to any pin pricking from the garrison of the moathouse. Only after the battle which destroyed the main armies of the Temple of Elemental Evil had ended was attention turned to this place. Then, a detachment of horse and foot with a small siege train came to the marshlands to lay the castle low. The common folk for miles came to help, and the moathouse was surrounded, cut off, and battered into extinction. The place is now shunned by the people of Hommlet, who hate its former evil and the memory of the terror brought to them by the black lord of the fortress, a vile cleric of damnation, and his evil men and humanoid troops.

Hommlet Home

  A scrub of thorns, thistles, weeds, and shrubs grows thickly along the edge of the track which leads to the ruins, and even the track is mostly overgrown and cluttered with fallen branches and trees. Here and there it is washed out, in other places a mire. Evidently some game still follow the pathway, however, for after a mile or so faint pathways can be seen. Even considering this, going is slow, and it takes over an hour to reach the place on horseback, two to trudge along on foot, and considerable hacking and clearing is necessary to make the way passable the first time, so double the time is required. After two miles of distance, the land begins to sink and become baggy, as the track turns more northerly, and tall marsh plants grow thickly where cattails and tamaracks do not. Off to the left can be seen the jagged silhouette of the moathouse. The track continues past the ruins for many miles - seven leagues, in fact—until the temple area is reached. A side path, banked high to cross over the wet land to either side, juts north to the entrance of the ruined place. The track here is only about 15 or so feet wide, with crumbling enbankments making travel near the edge dangerous. The bogs here stink, and the vegetation appears dense and prolific, but somehow sickly and unhealthy, creepers and vines throwing their strangling loops over the skeletons of dead saplings and living bushes alike. The rushes and cattails rustle and bend even when only a slight zephyr blows over the marsh, and weird bird calls, croakings, and other unwholesome sounds come faintly across the fen.