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The Four-Fold World - The Bear's Valley
Tricky, trinky, trasket
Ne'er dare disturb the basket
Lest you wake the Old Bear
Children's rhyme in the City of Shadows
A steep Alpine valley in the Mountains at the End of the World is known as the Bear's Valley. It is ruled by a now sleepy, but formerly formidable creature known as the Old Bear. The only entrance to the valley is through the fort known as The Basket, thus-called because it appears to be woven from solid stone trunks and branches. There are five settlements in total in the valley, The Basket, the Knee, the Stomach, the Reach and the Den which is the Old Bear's lair. The valley is roughly 120 km long with each settlement located roughly 30 km apart. In cross section the floor of the valley is a shallow bowl 30 km across. After that the walls start rising more steeply in moderately wooded hills until they reach the heights where the mountains proper start. Here and there the mountains encroach closer on the valley and it narrows in spots.
In the mountains around the valley live fierce ogres and giants but they remember long-ago thrashings at the paws of the Old Bear so they behave themselves for the most part. Recently though they whisper that the Old Bear has become weak so they begin to grow bolder. The followers of the Old Bear love their ruler but few have seen him of late.
The Basket
The Basket is a large three story structure that appears to be woven entirely out of large branches or small trees made of stone. The walls are at least 30 cm thick. Its dimensions are roughly 30 m long x 16 m wide x 8 m high. The spaces between The Basket and the valley walls is filled with a mix of dirt, rocks and gravel defended by downward pointing wooden stakes. Since the only entrance into The Basket is through a trap door in the roof visitors into the the valley have to either climb up a ladder let down by The Basket's garrison or be hauled up in a basket. Then they have to repeat the process on the other side. The Basket sits length-wise across a narrow neck of the valley right before it widens into the valley proper. The Basket is always garrisoned by 20 members of the militia and usually 2 or 3 Bearkin.
A bowshot from The Basket is the small village also known as The Basket. The buildings here are mostly stone in homage to The Basket and every available surface is carved to resemble wood and basketry. Roughly 100 people live here. They mostly grow food for the garrison. (Of course the garrison spends most of their time helping grow the food as this end of the valley is quite peaceful. The ogres and giants don't usually bother this end of the valley since they prefer to avoid the River of Grass and The City of Shadows.
The Knee
The Knee gets its name from the enormous leg bones from a giant that spans the valley here. The huge petrified leg bones extends from the living rock on one side of the valley, angles up at a 45 degree angle ends in a knee joint and then angles back down into the solid rock on the other side of the valley. Since the valley is at least 100 metres or so across at this point the suggested size of the being the leg once belonged to is almost unimaginable. Nothing so tall has ever been seen in the valley. A watch post has been built atop the knee cap which is easily big enough to support a small house. Getting up and down involves a long rope ladder climb or if you're really in a rush you can slide down one of the leg bones by hanging from a harness draped over the left leg bone. (There's a large pile of hay at the bottom but this only lessens the impact a bit).
The buildings here are mixed stone and wood and are carved to fancifully depict giants and ogres cavorting and fooling around. Everyone knows that should a giant or ogre be pursuing you if you somehow manage to get to The Knee before being devoured the ogre or giant will stop chasing you and admire all the pretty carvings. Each one tries to recognize themselves in the carvings. The garrison makes good use of this fact. Sadly this doesn't hold true elsewhere in the valley no matter how good the carvings are.
Roughly 300 people live here and they make their living herding sheep.
The Stomach
The Stomach is the only spot in the valley where wheat can be grown so the 2 windmills used to grind grain into flour are found here. (There is an amusing tale told here about the near-sighted giant and his arm flapping lover. It's usually left until after the younger children have been sent to bed). The bulk of the rye, barley and oats grown in the valley are also sent here and vast caverns have been carved out of the bedrock to store food stuffs. Especially the beer brewed here. This is the largest settlement in the valley and over 500 people live here. They spend their time producing foodstuffs like bread and beer and arranging and organizing food stores. The beer produced here is an especial favourite target of ogre and giant raids.
The buildings here are primarily constructed from wood and are elaborately carved with every foodstuff produced in the valley and some that haven't been seen here in living memory like wine and seafood.
The mountain stream known as The Leap descends from the eastern mountain slopes here and ends its run in the supposedly bottomless hole known either as the Old Bear's Folly or the Piss-pot. A water wheel has been erected over the hole which provides power for grinding flour. A net is strung over the Piss-pot to prevent accidents. Occasionally very strange objects are found in this net.
The Reach
The Reach is so called because the walls of the valley here are deeply scored with claw marks. Legend claims that the Old Bear reached all the way from The Den to mark the walls as a warning to the ogres and giants. Here can be found the entrance to the Vale of Woe the long narrow valley that leads to the Court of the Ogre Duke. The inhabitants of The Reach raise cattle and work leather. There is only a small population of herders but the bulk of the Bearkin live here to guard the mouth of the Vale of Woe. The people live in tidy little wooden houses intricately carved with depictions of cattle and their life spans. Long ago the mouth of the Vale of Woe had a stout wooden wall across it but the ogre resented this and kept smashing the wall. Only the ruins of the wall remain. Only 75 to 100 people live here of which a quarter are bearkin.
The Vale of Woe and the Court of the Crimson Duke
The Den
The Den is a single, enormous wooden long house. The longhouse is built into the end of the canyon. The longhouse is covered with carvings depicting the life of the Old Bear all lovingly carved and stained. The carvings start around the massive doors in the south wall and extend almost the entire way to the mountain-side. The very last section of wall that was carved has been defaced by savage claw marks.
For a generation few have seen the Old Bear and he is represented by his regent, an outsider with a perpetually sour disposition known as the Old Man. He may complain almost constantly but he takes his duties very seriously.
Stories of the Old Days
The Magicians' War and Old Bear
The Old Bear and the Ogre Duke
Created July 16, 2012. Last updated August 31, 2022