Karagunn
The border is the business. Forts and patrol roads run out from Stonewend, and the threats that reach them fall to the house's own watch. Karagunn keeps forges of its own.
Ask Karagunn to choose between its people and the draconic order. Its answer follows the people, which leaves a gap in the assumption behind Clause I that every dragon will join the punishment. The Forge has planned around that gap for centuries. Its institutions are divine. They hold both moral extremes and regard the middle as a failure of nerve; the tradition signed last and grudgingly.
The holding
Sleetgate — the hold that collects on another house's die
Where the Anvil Stair drops to the tundra coast: watch-towers, a smithy row, one pass mouth
Where the Anvil Stair breaks down into the tundra coast there are two watch-towers, a smithy row on the level ground, and one pass mouth carrying the ridge road up from the Storvald Wolds. Above the last grazing nothing is farmed, so two thousand quarters of barley a year come over the ridge under escort. Firebrick for the hearths comes off the Thrangar kilns to the west, pig iron goes down the coast road to Brimholt, and the Kilngate gate stands two days up the Stair with its stamping floor still working. From the upper tower the Redgate approach is visible in clear weather.
Connections
Karagunn garrisons what other people need to move through and takes the rent in kind.
Allies takes this house’s side 4
Brakkenstone 08 Karagunn married a Brakkenstone daughter in 806 and got the charcoal road above its gate as the settlement. Brakkenstone's priests will not share a burial ground with Karagunn's, so both copies of the contract say the children are buried at Brakkenstone.
Maeryvane 24 Maeryvane raises and quarters a company of four hundred under a commission that names Karagunn as the issuer and no employer at all. The pay comes through a foreign mint, and the men appear in the tax survey as road labourers.
Brannhold 39 Brannhold's land rents are recorded on split lead plates, and Karagunn holds the matching halves at its gate, which makes the leases good in a dwarf hold and nowhere else. The local assembly will not recognise a bargain nobody swore aloud.
Caelithil 74 Caelithil spent four seasons arranging the marriage between Karagunn's gate-daughter and the senior local family, and had the settlement written for the elves, spoken aloud for the assembly and cut in lead for the hold. It took its fee as the right to be heard in Karagunn's court.
Neutral trades, and no more than that 4
Emberkeel 42 Emberkeel sold Karagunn a survey of the stair approaches in 791, then sold the same survey again inside the year. Karagunn now pays on delivery and keeps both halves of the contract itself.
Gundvarr 44 Gundvarr owes Karagunn tribute and carries 600 hundredweight of crop up the stair every autumn at its own cost, past three tolls charging full rate. Karagunn counts it against what Gundvarr owes and has refused for nine years to say what the balance now stands at.
Grivane 60 Six hundred hundredweight of iron goes down the coast road from Karagunn to Grivane each season, weighed in one system and paid for in another. The difference is argued every spring and settled at whatever the smelter needs that month.
Belcarrow 78 Karagunn's watchtowers cover the ridge road, and two thousand quarters of Belcarrow's barley cross that road each autumn under Karagunn's escort. The price is fixed in spring on last year's tonnage, which suits a garrison on fixed rations and not a farmer with a variable crop, and the March thinks Belcarrow is paying well over the odds.
Enemies has something open against it 2
Grimhaldr 13 Karagunn buys about a third of Grimhaldr's firebrick and has started demanding two years' supply in advance. With nobody left at Grimhaldr to object, it has also claimed the kiln road and the sulphur pool against an unpaid builders' bill, and two other holds have claimed the same ground.
Anvilbrand 23 Karagunn holds Anvilbrand's gate, runs its testing floor under its stamp, and collects eight coppers a hundredweight for it. No ruling has ever said which of the neighbouring holds inherited that fee.
The full account — 10 houses, 12 arrangements
Karagunn garrisons what other people need to move through and takes the rent in kind. Belcarrow pays for the ridge road and the Redgate approach in barley and in not asking what the pass toll is on paper, at a price fixed each spring on the previous year's tonnage, which suits a garrison on fixed rations better than it suits a grower. Ground rents at Oathcairn are cut in lead and matched at Sleetgate, so Brannhold's grazing leases are good in a Kazdrunn gate and nowhere on the March. Grimhaldr's kilns supply a third of the firebrick and can produce nobody to answer for the ground they stand on, and two Sleetgate watch-posts have been moved above the sulphur tarn since 802. Three holds have now entered claims on the same Kilngate courses.
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Ground rents at Brannhold are cut in lead and Karagunn will match the halves at its own gate, so the grazing leases are good in a Kazdrunn gate and nowhere on the March. The Falkvald assembly does not hear a bargain nobody swore aloud, and Brannhold has stopped putting them to it.
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Six hundred hundredweight of Anvil Stair pig goes down the coast road from Karagunn to Grivane each season, weighed on the Kazdrunn hundredweight and paid on the Falkvald. The difference is argued every spring and settled at whatever the smelter needs that month.
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Karagunn holds Anvilbrand's gate, works the stamping floor under Anvilbrand's die and collects the test fee at eight coppers per hundredweight. No ruling says which of the Anvil Stair holds inherited the fee, and the collecting goes on.
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Karagunn's watch-towers cover the ridge road and the Redgate approach, and Belcarrow pays in barley and in not asking what the pass toll is on paper. Karagunn wants nothing that reopens the arrangement, and Belcarrow is thought on the March to be costing what the ground would be worth without it.
Two thousand quarters of barley come off Belcarrow to Karagunn each autumn, carted over the ridge road under Karagunn's escort. The price is fixed in spring on the previous year's tonnage, which a garrison with fixed rations prefers and a grower with a variable crop does not.
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With no living names at Grimhaldr, Karagunn has entered a claim on the kiln road and the sulphur tarn, arguing that the gate courses are Karagunn masonry and the masons' bill is outstanding. Two other holds have entered claims on the same courses.
Karagunn's smithy row and both watch-tower hearths are lined with Grimhaldr firebrick, and the whole northern order comes off one kiln bank. Karagunn takes about a third of that output and has begun asking for two years' supply in advance.
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Gundvarr answers to the Seventh Gate and sends a tenth of Quellborne's crop up the Anvil Stair each autumn as gate tribute, 600 hundredweight carried at its own cost past three tolls that stand at full rate. Karagunn takes the tribute, counts it against the granary's gate course, and has declined for nine years to say what the count now stands at.
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Karagunn took a Brakkenstone daughter in 806 AF with the charcoal road above Karagunn settled on the match. Brakkenstone's temple side will not bury with Karagunn, so the settlement provides in both halves of the cut plate that the children are laid at Brakkenstone.
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Maeryvane musters and quarters a company of four hundred under a commission that names Karagunn as issuer and no principal at all. Maeryvane draws the pay through a Corvantine mint and the men appear in the survey as road labour.
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Emberkeel sold Karagunn a gate-course survey of the Anvil Stair approaches in 791 and sold the same survey again inside the year. Karagunn now pays on delivery and keeps both halves of the plate.
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The match between a Karagunn gate-daughter and the senior Drusenmark assembly family was brokered over four seasons by Caelithil, with the settlement written for the elves, spoken at the assembly and cut in lead for the hold. Caelithil took its fee as a right of audience at Karagunn's gate court, which it values above the coin it could have asked.
Carters on the ridge road say the Sleetgate escort bills would buy more than the March supposes, and that barley keeps the figure off paper. Said in the Anvil Stair
The public record
- Plate
- 34 of 81
- Seat
- Stonewend
- Holding
- Sleetgate
- Region
- the Anvil Stair
- Position
- hex 15,5 in r2c4
- Extent
- a broad march (5 of 10)
- Culture
- Kazdrunn
- Thick on this ground
- Kazdrunn
- Iron
- Warm
- Living names
- 14
- Roster
- Established
- Ancestry
- Dwarf
- Kinship
- Kinsworn
- Major activity
- Marchward
- Minor activity
- Forgewright
- Tradition
- Divine
- Alignment
- LE
- Stake
- Holds
- Band
- Middling
- Weights
- 3
Arms
A mountain gate flanked by two carved stone sentinels, a smith's tongs barring it like a portcullis, a votive flame above the arch.
Or, party per pale by a line Gules, a tower and a mount Gules; in base a hammer Gules; a bordure of warm iron. (Plate 34; fourteen living names.)
The field colour is the house's tradition and the bound edge is the state of its plate, and neither is the house's to choose.