Harrowgate

A coastal city that once thrived on trade and fish curing, now limps along after a devastating plague hollowed out whole wards. The harbor still moves money, but the older neighborhoods have gone to ruin, and the sewers are crowded with undead that slip through cracked stone and forgotten burial tunnels. Guilds keep the city fed, while the old river of death under the streets keeps reminding everyone that the plague never really ended.

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Harrowgate

A salt-stained harbor city where the dead are still on the books and the sewers are starting to collect their debts.

TypeCity

PopulationAbout 18,000 in the active city, with another 4,000 living in the outer wards, dock camps, and plague-adjacent tenements. The population is smaller than it was before the fever, but the streets still feel crowded because so many families share space now.

WealthUneven. Merchant houses and guild masters still have coin, but ordinary families live in narrow margins and pay in silver piece and barter.

GovernmentMerchant council under emergency plague statutes

ReadinessUneven. The harbor is guarded well, but the lower wards are underpatrolled because too many watchmen refuse sewer duty. The city can answer a dock riot or a smugglers' raid, but not a coordinated breach from beneath. In an emergency, the bells can rouse militias, yet half the men who answer will come with old masks and little discipline.

“Salt wind, shuttered windows, and the smell of tar over old sickness. The city looks half-awake, like it never fully recovered from the plague and has simply learned to keep moving. Carts rattle past boarded chapels, guild banners hang from repaired facades, and everyone speaks in lowered voices when the bells ring after dusk. The streets near the harbor are busy, but the back lanes still feel watched.”

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Connections

Geography

RegionA sheltered bay at the mouth of a slow river, with marshland to the south and chalk cliffs to the north.

ClimateMild coastal weather with cold fogs off the sea, hard rain in spring, and damp winters that make rot and mildew constant enemies.

TerrainHarbor piers, low stone wards, old drainage canals, and deep brick sewers cut through the oldest quarter.

Travel Links

Sea lanes to the western portsA toll road inland to the grain estatesA ferry crossing upriver to the mill villagesOld service tunnels beneath the plague wards

Culture

The city prizes endurance over virtue. People admire those who keep accounts, repair roofs, and show up for the shift even when grieving. Mercy is respected, but only if it is paid for or organized. There is deep suspicion of strangers who talk about cleansing the city, because too many officials once used that word to excuse cruelty during the plague.

Races

HumansDwarvesHalflingsHalf-elvesA few tiefling families

Religions

A healing sea-chapel dedicated to mercy and safe passageA funerary cult that keeps plague names and burial ledgersSmall household shrines to ancestors and local saints

Arts & Entertainment

Before the plague, the city loved dockside songs, masque plays, and public recitals by guild poets. Now entertainment is smaller and rougher: dice in taverns, candlelit recitations for the bereaved, and street singers who trade mourning verses for hot soup. People still dress well on holy days, but they favor practical dark wool and scarlet cords to show they have survived sickness.

History

The city survived by keeping its harbor open and its dead counted. That compromise built today’s problem: the plague never truly vanished, because the records, the burials, and the closed streets were never handled honestly. The council tells a story of recovery, but the undercity still remembers the panic, the shortcuts, and the bodies that were never laid to rest properly.

Before the plagueThe Harbor YearsThe city grew rich by salting fish, repairing ships, and collecting customs from the bay. Its harbor walls made it safer than neighboring ports, and its river access made it useful even in bad winters.

The first plague summerThe Long FeverA fever swept through the lower wards and filled the burial pits faster than the gravediggers could work. The council claimed order was maintained, but several neighborhoods were left to fend for themselves behind locked gates.

Two years after the plagueThe ReopeningOfficially, the plague ended when the chapel burned the mass graves and the council reopened the market. Unofficially, entire families paid to have their names removed from the dead rolls, and some of those same names now appear in the sewer ledgers.

Government

LeaderCouncil Chair Elsbeth Vale, who is careful with numbers and terrible with people. She can balance a city ledger down to the copper piece, but she hesitates when faced with bloodshed or hard public blame. She relies too much on assistants and delays decisions until factions force her hand. That indecision keeps the peace in daylight and lets the sewer rot spread at night.

Merchant council under emergency plague statutes

Key Laws

No one may enter sealed plague streets without a guild writ or chapel tokenBurials must be recorded before bodies are burned or sunkSewer work is taxed but required by law from each guild in rotationForeign healers must register all remedies with the chapel clerks

Problems

The city is one bad week away from a breach into the harbor quarter.

Undead are crawling up through the sewers into the lower wards, but the council cannot agree on whether to seal the districts, burn them out, or reopen them for trade. Every delay means more deaths and more rumors.

The records themselves have become a weapon, and everyone knows it.

The plague ledgers have started showing citizens as both dead and active, which means some families are being taxed twice while others are claiming houses that were never formally released.

Short-term cash is being traded for long-term disaster.

The council is quietly selling access rights to the sealed wards, hoping to raise money for repairs. That keeps the city functioning, but it also feeds the factions that want the plague streets opened before the dead are properly contained.

Economy

Industries

FishingShip fittingSalting and curingLedger work and customs collectionGrave services and plague recovery trade

Scarcity

Fresh grain, clean cloth, and trained labor are all short. Anything that helps against disease, rot, or sewer infestations sells fast.

Wealth LevelUneven. Merchant houses and guild masters still have coin, but ordinary families live in narrow margins and pay in silver piece and barter.

Exports

Salted fishTarRopeHarbor repairsFuneral paper and burial cloth

Imports

GrainLamp oilMedicineTimberIron fittings

Defenses

Fortifications

A seawall with patched cannon mountsThree harbor watchtowersLocked ward-gates around the oldest plague districtIron sewer grates bolted from the street side

The Harbor Guard(About 180 sworn guards, with 60 more temporary dock spears when the bells ring)

A small civic guard reinforced by hired dock militia and a handful of plague veterans who know the sealed streets. They are brave in daylight and superstitious after dark.

Law & Order

crime Level: Moderate in the harbor, high in the lower wards, and almost open in the abandoned plague district after dark.
enforcement: The Harbor Guard patrols the streets, but sewer law is enforced by whoever can prove they know the tunnels and carry the right tokens. Bribes are common, and chapel writs can override almost anything.
typical Punishment: Fines in gold piece or labor on the seawall. Sewer offenders are often conscripted into night-cleaning teams, and grave robbers may be branded and exiled instead of hanged.

Hestia Noll

NPC

Chief clerk of the council

A thin, ink-stained man who can quote shipping totals from memory and lies badly when cornered.

Brother Oren

NPC

Funerary priest

A broad-shouldered priest with smoke-burned sleeves and a habit of staring at doors instead of people.

Tobin Ash

NPC

Tavern keeper

A one-legged innkeeper with a scar across his throat and a bark that ends every sentence.

Mara Dene

NPC

Seamstress and undertaker

A sharp-eyed seamstress whose hands are always busy, even when she is speaking.

Jarek Thorne

NPC

Apothecary

A tired apothecary with red-rimmed eyes and ink smudges on both wrists from constant note taking.

The Red Jar

Shop

Apothecary

A cluttered apothecary with hanging nets of herbs, glass jars of fish oil, and a locked cabinet for imported medicines. Customers leave with more questions than they brought in.

Mara's Thread

Shop

Clothier

A narrow shop packed with needlework, wax, salt, and bundles of funerary cloth. Families come here when they cannot afford the chapel prices but still want a decent burial.

The Millstone Inn

Tavern

Dredgers, guards off shift, small merchants, and anyone who needs a room no questions asked.

A run-down tavern with warped floorboards, cheap stew, and a back room that smells faintly of seaweed and bleach. It is one of the few places in the city where different ranks still drink under the same roof.

The Black Ledger

Faction

Burial clerks and record keepers

They claim the city must honor the dead by keeping their names, wages, and tax obligations active until every burial claim is settled. They run copies of the old plague rolls and control who is officially considered gone.

The Dredgers' Guild

Faction

Sanitation guild

A practical guild of sewer workers, corpse haulers, and night cleaners who know the undercity better than the watch. They are paid to keep things flowing and are expected to stay silent about what they see below.

The Saltwright Guild

Faction

Merchant guild

Merchants, chandlers, and small shopowners who back any policy that gets trade moving again. They fund repairs, pay bribes, and prefer order to honesty if it keeps the harbor open.

The Bell and Candle Society

Faction

Religious and civic burial order

Priests, gravediggers, and fever nurses who believe the city offended the dead by rushing burials and hiding the worst death toll. They maintain the old chapels, tend the poor, and watch the sewers for signs of rot and walking corpses.

The Pale Wards

Point of Interest

A broken district of boarded houses and sealed wells where the plague hit hardest. At low tide, the streets smell of brine and old ash.

The South Drain

Point of Interest

A cracked underpass where the sewer water runs black and warm. Rats vanish there, and the walls are marked with chalk warnings in three different hands.

Mariners' Row

Point of Interest

A busy harbor market rebuilt on old foundations. It looks prosperous from a distance, but every stall is one bad winter away from ruin.

The Ash Field

Point of Interest

A small hill of lime pits and unmarked graves outside the city wall. The chapel visits often, and no one else likes going there.

Calendar of Events

Fifth day of Highsummer

Bellfast Market

The Bellfast Market opens with stalls for salt fish, свечes, and burial cloth. Guilds use the day to settle debts in public, and the city clerk reads the names of those still owed wages from the plague years.

This year, the clerk quietly adds three names that were officially recorded as dead.

Last night of Harvestwane

Lantern Procession

The Lantern Procession circles the old quarantine wards with warding candles and prayers. Families place food on doorsteps for the poor and for the dead, though most know which is meant for which.

A sealed sewer grating opens every year at the same corner, and something inside always takes the food before dawn.

First week of Frostfall

Harbor Tally

The Harbor Tally is taken at the customs steps, where captains swear how much salted grain, fish oil, and medicine they brought into port. It decides winter ration rights and guild favors for the coming season.

Several cargo manifests are being altered after dark by someone with the city seal.

Secrets

The city has been treating certain dead citizens as legally alive whenever their estates are useful. This is not only fraud. It is also keeping a door open for something in the undercity that responds to the same names, so fixing the records will change who can claim property and who can command the sewer dead.

City-wideCompare old burial rolls to current tax records and notice the same dead names appearing in both books.

Bodies from the plague years were never fully burned. They were moved into hidden pits and used to conceal an older burial chamber under the city. If exposed, the plague district becomes a lawful battleground over who owns the streets and who must answer for the dead left behind.

The Pale Wards and sewer access tunnelsFollow the smell of bleach near the sealed wards and listen for carts leaving after midnight.

Hestia Noll has been altering council seals to fund repairs and pay off debt, but his forged records are also hiding a quarantine breach. If the players reveal it, several powerful families lose property at once, and the council may collapse into open blame.

The Counting HouseWatch which lamps burn in the counting house after the clerk leaves.

Rumors

The sewers do not produce the undead on their own. Someone is feeding them bodies.

A council clerk has been signing tax waivers in the name of dead citizens.

There is a dry tunnel beneath the old plague chapel that leads straight to the harbor crypts.

The apothecary's suppressant works, but only because it masks symptoms long enough for the infected to keep working.

One of the harbor watchtowers has a hidden signal lamp used after midnight.

Plot Hooks

The Sealed Ward Job

A guild contract offers good pay to escort workers into a sealed ward to retrieve a buried shipment of medical supplies. The crates are real, but they sit on top of a hidden ossuary, and the workers intend to quietly take the bodies' rings and teeth before the escort can object.

RecoveryJarek Thorne40 gp, plus first access to useful medicines

Names in the Dark

Brother Oren asks the party to clear an infestation from a sewer shrine. The shrine is not abandoned, however. It is being used as a meeting place by people who are copying the plague rolls and smuggling names out of the chapel archives.

InvestigationBrother OrenA blessing, burial favors, and 25 gp

The Night Cart

Tobin Ash offers free rooms if the party will escort a night cart through the lower streets. The cart carries more than refuse, and the route passes a gate that only opens when a council seal is presented by someone who should be dead.

EscortTobin AshLodging, drink, and a share of whatever is found

The Wrong Shrouds

Mara Dene asks for help finding who has been stealing burial cloth and replacing it with cheaper cloth stamped with the wrong house marks. The thief is not just a fence. They are changing the identity of the dead so certain properties revert to the council.

Expose a schemeMara DeneTailored gear, hidden names, and 30 gp

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