Written by Steven Schutt
Introduction
Nestled between two mighty mountains and set within a small depression in the earth, Hidden Vale was, once, a quiet place where those seeking peace could come and go as they pleased. There was always a warm bed available, simple food, light ale and friendly people. It is now a cracked reflection of its former glory. The town remains quiet, though now it is an unnatural thing, as no one wishes to make themselves or their home known to the world at large. The guardians at either end of the pass are vicious in their defense, and none in Hidden Vale have any way to remove them from their posts.
Worse, with no influx of new arrivals due to the quarantine, the inhabitants of the Vale grow old and die, sometimes without leaving heirs. Those couples already with children do their best to raise them in a cautious fear of the guardians at the edges of their prison-home. This serves only to further isolate the town from the rest of the world, hastening its spiral into oblivion.
Perhaps the greatest harm for residents of Hidden Vales comes in the form of knowledge, or in their case, the lack of it. As the fifth and final guardian annihilates the last vestiges of the Vale’s history, the less chance there is of anyone coming to the rescue. Scholars of the region have little to go on nowadays when it comes to finding the Vale, and several adventuring parties sought out its now well-hidden location.
Of the two that returned, one had only one remaining member, and he died of his injuries before he could relate what slaughtered his band. The second group was more successful, and came away with information on the tactics of the golems and topography of the region. Unfortunately, that information disappeared too within a few weeks of its transcribing, and none of the adventurers ever reappeared after leaving on their next journey.
Background
The history of the Vale itself is a long one, as the town inside it only appeared recently, perhaps within the last two hundred years. Settled initially as a buffer zone between two nations with old, often hostile relations, its first inhabitants were military personnel. These troops fell under the command of an exiled colonel who thought little of either nation. Within weeks of its founding, what would become Hidden Vale cut off connection with both nations after the drafting, signing and ratifying of a loosely binding treaty. So long as the nations did nothing to harm the citizens and any trade that came through, Hidden Vale would not knowingly harbor traitors from either nation. Both nations agreed, and dismissed their troops to commingle in the city proper.
Several years passed and the soldiers either settled down into families or left to pursue their futures. A steady stream of immigrants, adventurers, exiles and aging folk began to come and go, some staying, some leaving after a time. The town did well, and the population grew at an even pace, reaching a healthy three thousand at the height of the Vale’s prosperity. Money was not an issue for a good majority of the townspeople and crime, though a problem, was never widespread enough for any more than a few dozen watchmen to be on duty at one time.
This all changed when the nations that founded the town and gifted it to the colonel went to war once again. The treaty still stood, and the nations, while not kind or gentle, were honorable and let the town go about its business. On and on their war dragged, neither side gaining ground. Refugees from destroyed towns flooded the Vale several times, and many a tent went up in the fields outside the town. One of them, a tinker named Renderson Forgegrinder, went so far as to set up a shop on the outskirts of town. When men of the king came to retrieve him for escaping his duties, the people remembered the treaty. On the one hand, now that they knew a traitor lay in their midst, they were honor bound to return him. On the other hand, however, the soldiers possessed no evidence of the dwarf’s treason. Until such could be procured and presented to the town governor, Forgegrinder went nowhere.
It was not long after that the people realized that they should have sent the dwarf packing. The guardians in place, their creator dead, the people of Hidden Vale were trapped in their own home, left to watch as the world forgot them. Nothing they could do would prevent their slow decent into eternity.
Appearance
Once a bustling town filled with the sounds of life and progress, Hidden Vale now sits destitute and stagnant. The houses have begun to fall to the winds that sweep through the pass, and the lack of incoming trade and materials further deteriorates the brick, wood and stone buildings. The signs on the three inns of the town are no longer readable, the well dried up some time ago, and several homes collapsed within the last year, leaving piles of rubble scattered throughout the town.
Two areas of the town, however, remain in perfect condition: the military barracks at the north end and the gates to the south. The barracks once served as disadvantaged housing and its basement held weapons and supplies should the need arise. The sentinels positioned themselves at these places and maintain them to better protect the town from without and within. The gates are literally welded shut and their size makes it all but impossible to ever open them again. The barracks, while of no particular use to the guardians, are incredibly defensible. The store of weapons allows the guardians great leeway in how they deal with intruders or escapees.
Using Hidden Vale
Hidden Vale is easily placed into any fantasy or steampunk setting that allows for golem creation and rune magic. The only requirements are two nations with strained relations and a valley between them to serve as the site of the town. There need not even be mountains, though this certainly makes the town more difficult to invade. With the guardians standing watch, it makes for a wonderful site to hide ancient evils, artifacts or malcontents who somehow manage to slip inside, only to be trapped once within its walls.
Adventure Hooks
- I Left My Heart in Hidden Vale: An old man approaches the PCs and offers them everything he has, which is quite a bit, to secret his wife from Hidden Vale to his arms before he dies. In his age, he neglects to mention the guardians and the awful state of the town. However, before he can secure his last remaining map of the region, the fifth golem murders him and destroys the map. The party must find an answer on two fronts: who committed a murder and where the town of Hidden Vale actually is. Until they secure the wife, the fortune remains in the bank.
- Lights of Heaven, Fires of Hell: A strange light appears in the western sky, bright as the sun and shining at all hours. Indeed, the sun does not rise while this light sits in the sky. When the PCs find an entire village scoured of life, they discover clues that point to the strange light as the cause. Following the light, they arrive at a strange apparatus in the heart of a desert. Once they disable it, the party finds the rune of Renderson Forgegrinder etched onto the glass emitter. If the party wishes to discover the perpetrator, they must hunt the dwindling information on the dwarf tinker and his creations. This brings them into conflict with the fifth automaton, who too seeks the criminal that stole its old master’s creation. Who arrives at the answer first: the destroyer or the savior?
- Let Me Sleep: A king of great age falls ill to a wasting plague unlike any before it. Only the magic of his clerics keeps him alive, and he wants to keep it that way. Unfortunately for him, he knows a great deal about Hidden Vale, as he rules one of its border nations. When the PCs wish to entreat the king for some quest he asked of them, they find themselves stymied at all levels. No one gives them a straight answer as to what goes on in the castle and everyone seems to have conflicting information. The king long sewed dissention among his ranks, and the fifth automaton takes advantage of this to work his way up to the royal bedchamber. When the PCs intervene, the golem races to finish its plans and makes a critical error, putting its mission in jeopardy. Can the party catch a killer before it commits regicide, or will a king live to see another day?
The Hidden Vale by Nevermet Press is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.nevermetpress.com/contact.
