Sandwater Slough

"This city stinks, of olives, brine, coin and smoke."

Sandwater Slough is a free city on the southern coast, sitting where land, swamp and sea refuse to fully agree. It is the home base of campaign 4 (from 18 Suns Dusk 1047 PC). Stilted buildings lean out over dark water thick with fish and stranger things, stone streets sweat in the heat, and olive groves blanket the hills to the south; their oil fuels the city's wealth and its quiet brutality. The Slough owes fealty to no crown, only to trade, contracts and leverage.

It looks like an old coastal city of the late medieval age: tiled roofs, narrow alleys, public plazas, and fortified estates rising above the rest. The port never truly sleeps and cargo shifts at all hours. Ledgers matter more than bloodlines. The city prospers; its people do not prosper evenly.

Peoples

• No goblins. Goblins do not exist here. Something happened, and everyone agrees on that much, but no one agrees on why: see The Goblin Curse.
• Dwarves are exceedingly rare. The desert dwarves who once lived west of the city vanished nearly thirty years ago, when trade collapsed and The Restless Expanse dried into abandonment (see The Dwarves). Any dwarf met here has crossed half the world to come, and likely has a reason.
• Humans are numerous, but do not shape the Slough alone. Halflings are common throughout the docks and markets, deeply embedded in fishing, trade logistics and everyday commerce.
• Dragonborn are not merely visible but institutional, overrepresented in The Sandwater Constabulary, the harbour guard and the enforcement arms of The Barons' Council. Their presence is normal, official and quietly resented in equal measure, because the Creratis Imperium to the south is ruled by dragonborn. No banners are flown and no claims are made, but the overlap is impossible to ignore (see The Dragonborn Factions).
• Outsiders arrive in a steady flow: mercenaries, scholars, pilgrims and traders, and many peoples from The Khevasa Wildlands and beyond. Beast-blooded lineages, animal-hybrid folk and avian peoples are an everyday sight, especially along the wharves, in the markets and in the public districts. Water genasi are common.

A past that won't stay buried

The Slough was once a slavery hub, infamous across the coast. Officially those days are over; unofficially the stigma has simply shifted. Indenture contracts are long and brutally enforced, prostitution, gangs and debt bondage thrive, and the law is not on the side of the indentured. The meatpacking quarter of The Northern District still carries the stink of the old practices. A 2022 Scabard page describes slave operations as still openly known (conflict #50), but by 1047 PC slavery has been officially abolished through the Baron's King in Yellow deal. Profits rose after the great drying of the Expanse.

Government. The Barons' Council of barons and merchant princes rules from The Barons' Council Hall, the former Temple of the Bound Martyr (Ilmater), whose worship the city reduced after abolition. One of its barons, Baron Sharid, appears in the campaign 2 List of Contracts (6 of Clubs): "wealth beyond his wildest dreams, which cannot be lost except by the hand of the King in Yellow". In campaign 2 the Slough was also home to the merchant prince Lorbid.

Beyond the walls

• West: The Restless Expanse. Once a grassland route linking the Slough to the dwarven holds, now abandoned and silent, eroded and turned to desert. No caravans have returned in decades; what remains are dunes, salt scars and rumours that some great calamity befell the dwarves of the plains. The drying, The Great Evaporation, began in 1019 PC but took nearly fifteen years to reach the Slough, around 1034; by 1047 the desert stands right on the city's doorstep.
• North: The Khevasa Wildlands. A vast jungle territory of loosely allied tribes. Their capital, Wildharbour, is reachable mostly by sea; inland travel is slow and dangerous. A mystic conclave of ogres oversees the region (some say rules it), and contact with it is rare, deliberate and never casual.
• South: the Creratis Imperium. An expansionist empire that paused, not out of weakness but out of patience. For thirty years it has pushed south instead, absorbing the fungal realms of Mycelia into compliance. Sandwater Slough remains useful to it, for now.

The swamps

The Slough is built on water and life. The surrounding wetlands teem with fish, crustaceans, birds and stranger ecosystems. Fishing is the city's second-largest industry, and the abundance means imports are luxuries rather than necessities.

Districts

• The Wharfward Strip: The Velvet Ledger House, The Brinewake Chandlery, Netmenders' Court
• The Crescent Promenade: The Driftwhisper Amphitheatre, Three Anchors Square, The Reeve's Measure, The Hall of Radiance, The Star Dancer's Stage
• The Gutterline Warrens: The Gilded Maw, The Low Lantern Archive, The Tallow Stair, The First Thorn House
• Highspire Court: The Ember Parlour, Olive Press Row, The Trade Temple
• Sojourn's End: The Nightmint Tea House, The Saltglass Baths, The Bent Compass
• The Central City: Shrinewalk, The Barons' Council Hall, The House of the Poisoned Tear
• The Northern District and the outer swamps: The Blackwater Weirs, Marrowhook Yard, The Weaver's Knot
• The Southern Slopes: The House of Amber

Temples

Seven temples are licensed by the city, and each holds a civic contract (see The New Gods):

Temple	God	Domains	Symbol	Civic contract
The First Thorn House	The First Thorn (Loviatar)	Death	A whip entwined with thorns	Sanctioned punishment, penance and suffering
The Hall of Radiance	Radiance (Sune)	Life, Light	A flame-shaped ruby	Public healing, ceremonies of union, civic blessings
The House of the Poisoned Tear	The Poisoned Tear (Talona)	Death	Three droplets on a petal	Funerals, disease observances, declaring contaminated zones and goods; a triage hospice
The Trade Temple	The Opulent Broker (Waukeen)	Knowledge, Trickery	Scales balancing a coin and a gem	Witnessing contracts, arbitrating trade, sanctioning risky or deceptive exchanges
The Star Dancer's Stage	The Star Dancer (Lliira)	Life	A dance of colourful stars	Festivals, celebrations, milestone rites
The House of Amber	The Amber Queen (Chauntea)	Life	A golden crown with grain	Agricultural blessings, harvest rites, protecting stored food and lineage goods
The Weaver's Knot	The Blood Weaver (Bhaal)	Death	A teardrop filled with blood	Executions, sanctioned killings, lethal pacts

The Bound Martyr's old temple is now the council's hall, with a small shrine kept by decree. The players' notes speak of the city's "four goddesses": the Opulent Broker, Radiance, the Amber Queen and the Star Dancer.

Beneath the city

Below lie ancient sewers and the astral-elven city of Rillachor, with its crashed stargate; the city above was built on a former elven colony. In campaign 4 corruption is spreading through the depths.