Green Orb: This is a rather prosperous village for Daggerdale, but one that the Freedom Fighters keep their eyes on. A good 25 farms are scattered across the countryside here, along with several miles of fruit orchards. The village has a smithy, a schnapps distillery and a tavern (no accommodations) called the Schnapps Queen, which has two separate guest rooms, one for locals and one for strangers. People in Green Orb are suspicious of and rather unfriendly toward natives of other parts of the Dales. This village produces fruit schnapps of very high quality with a good reputation in much of the Heartlands.

The Zhents, soured on by a fanatic priest of Bane, managed to persecute and financially abuse the farmers of Green Orb to such an extent that the last of them at last left, and the highly profitable schnapps industry collapsed. Realizing the mistake that was made, financially wiser Zhentarim saw to it that loyal farmers from the Moonsea and Zhentish spies from elsewhere were brought into Green Orb to revive the schnapps industry.

The majority of these folk had been followers of Bane until the Time of Troubles. In the intervening years they rejected Cyric. Three different priests sent to Green Orb by the church of Cyric simply vanished, and their takeover of Bane's temple was a short-term matter. After the Time of Troubles and the Destruction of Zhentil Keep, the people of Green Orb turned to the worship of Iyachtu Xvim.

A low level priest, Ruinlord Radargh from Xvim, came to Green Orb in the Year of the Gauntlet (1369 DR) and reopened the Banite temple there, but it was destroyed in the same year by Randal Morn's Freedom Fighters. Radargh vanished - into the hills behind Green Orb, where he maintains a small, makeshift cave chapel for the villagers.

The main Zhent agent in Green Orb is the town councilor Heldarm Dernesch, who also owns the tavern. Dernesch and other village leaders have been debating just what position they should take in the future. They are beginning to believe that Daggerdale is lost to the Zhentarim. However, they do not want to lose their rich farms.

Randal Morn's deputy governor, Captain Mestin Troll Durmark of the Freedom Fighters, in her last visit to collect taxes in Green Orb, made it quite clear that the villagers have very little time left to integrate themselves as loyal Dalesmen, or they will be deported back to the Moonsea. Dernesch and the others are looking for no new conflicts at present.

Green Orb

The name of the village came from the small, green glass dome that once stood upon the old temple to Chauntea just northeast of the village on the edge of the hills. In the 1340s DR, the puppet village leader of the Zhentarim feared the low level but ambitious priest of Bane, Dreadmaster Delidus, who had built a small temple under protection of Zhentish troops in the village. Delidus ordered the Zhents to destroy the Chauntea temple in the Year of the Saddle (1345 DR), and since that time, there has been no more green orb in the village.

The decade Delidus spent in the village was a time of persecution, financial abuse and terror for the native farmers. By the Year of the Morningstar (1350 DR), the last of the locals had packed his or her bags and fled or had died at the hands of Delidus and his henchmen.

Strangely, this was one of the few things Delidus could have done anywhere in Daggerdale that was financially costly to the Zhentarim. Green Orb has miles of fruit orchards beginning in the village and spreading westward, and it has a distillery where fruit juices are made into some of the finest schnapps available west of the Impilturian swamps, schnapps that bring a proud export price.

By the Year of the Bridle (1349 DR), the Black Network had realized the price it had paid for Dedilus' mad persecution of Chauntea's church in Green Orb and the church's followers. Fruit went to waste in the orchards and the doors of the abandoned distillery slammed open and shut in the wind. The lucrative profits that Green Orb Schnapps had earned for Zhentarim traders were no more.

Zhentarim assassins saw to it that Delidus paid for this deed with his life before the Year of the Morningstar had ended. But the assassination did not solve the problems caused by the abandonment of Green Orb and its orchards and distillery. It was then that a young, ambitious Dreadmaster in Fzoul Chembryl's service (who died later in the Battle of Shadowdale in the Time of Troubles) came up with a means to resolve the problem in a very useful manner for the Black Network.

Farmers from the Moonsea who were loyal to the Zhentarim and persons from other areas who had served as Zhentarim spies and were in danger of being discovered were brought into Green Orb to revive the schnapps industry.

As a result, with the exception of a few lean years in the late 1340s and early 1350s DR, Green Orb has been the most prosperous village in Daggerdale, one that the Freedom Fighters now keep a close eye on. A good 25 farms are scattered across the countryside here, along with the orchards. The village has a smithy, a schnapps distillery and a tavern (no accommodations) called the Schnapps Queen, which has two separate guest rooms, one for locals and one for strangers.

People in Green Orb are suspicious of and closed to strangers and natives of other parts of the Dales. They know they are viewed by many as traitors or "the enemy," and they aware that they live at some risk since Randal Morn's return to power in Dagger Falls.

The majority of these folk had been followers of Bane until the Time of Troubles. In the intervening years they rejected Cyric. Three different priests sent to Green Orb by the church of Cyric simply vanished, and dead Bane's symbols quickly replaced those that the Strifeleaders had mounted in Bane's old temple.. After the destruction of Zhentil Keep, the people of Green Orb turned to the worship of Iyachtu Xvim.

A low level priest, Ruinlord Radargh from Xvim came to Green Orb in the Year of the Crown (1351 DR) and restored the Bane temple there, reclaiming it for Xvim. The interior of the temple was burned out in the Year of the Gauntlet (1369 DR) by Lord Morn and his Freedom Fighters. Radargh vanished - into the hills behind Green Orb, where he maintains a small, makeshift cave chapel for the villagers who still worship Xvim.

The main Zhent agent in Green Orb is the town councilor Heldarm Dernesch who also owns the tavern. Dernesch and other village leaders are beginning to believe that Daggerdale is lost to the Zhentarim. However, they do not want to lose their rich farms, and they are trying to come to terms with the shift in way of life that will be necessary to avoid their being evicted from Daggerdale.

Randal Morn's deputy governor, Captain Mestin Troll Durmark of the Freedom Fighters, in her last visit to collect taxes in Green Orb, read an edict from Lord Morn stating that the villagers have very little time left to integrate themselves as loyal Dalesmen, or they will be deported back to the Moonsea.

Dernesch and the others are looking for no new conflicts at present. Instead, many of the immigrant villagers are trying to learn to understand at last what it means to be "good folk." It may not be surprising that many of them are having great difficulty with this task.

Your PCs will not receive a welcome in Green Orb, but they also will not be harmed if they keep their noses out of village secrets.

Map of Green Orb

3 - Grain Elevator and Storage Barns. A part of the Dagger Wash Mill (see below).

4 - Dagger Wash Mill. The millstones here grind flour from wheat, rye and spelt grown in the fields east of the village, and the hammer makes oat meal and vegetable oil from sunflower and thistle seeds. The miller, Danus Treagh (hm, thief lvl 5, AL: NE), used to own and run the mill in Corm Orp in Sunset Vale. He was the secret head of Zhentarim operations there, until the Black Network learned that a Harper agent from Twilight Hall in Berdusk was given the mission to eliminate Treagh. The Harper still is seeking the miller, who was spirited off to Green Orb by the Black Network in the Year of the Banner (1368 DR), and who was magically given a new appearance.

5 - Home of Heldarm Dernesch, the village leader.

6 - Schnapps Queen Tavern. Owned by Heldarm Dernesch. On the east side of the building, Dernesch also has a small malting house and brewery. His light, top-fermented house ale (which he has not named) is sold only in the tavern. However, in the course of the evening, some locals who aren't occupying a seat at one of the tables will enter with a ceramic quart/liter tankard with a tin cap, have Dernesch fill it, and then return home to enjoy their nightcap.

Dernesch's employees live in the east wing, next to the brewery. Locals use the west wing, which is entered through a rear door. Anyone else who enters the Schnapps Queen is seated in the main guest room, which often is empty. The locals of Green Orb are not willing to mix with strangers, often out of fear that such strangers may be ghosts of their Zhentish past coming to haunt them, or worse.

The Schnapps Queen has no rooms where travelers can spend the night, nor is there any other facility in Green Orb with guest rooms. The only food available is thin, hard, smoked ham slices on dark rye bread with lard and horseradish sauce, served on a small bread board, at 5 silver falcons. Dernesch's beer costs 3 coope4r thubs for a quart/liter tankard, and local fruit schnapps goes for 3 silver falcons a shot/0.1 liter glass.

The Queen's waitress, Nella Weibhardt (hf, thief lvl 3, CE), who lives in a room in the east wing, has no fixed prices. She starts out asking for what she wants and usually ends up settling for what she can get. If one is bound and determined to spend the night indoors in Green Orb, a deal with Nella usually is the only road to success.

7 - Green Orb Distillery. The distillery is a cooperative, owned by master distiller Hieb Jenton (hm, lvl 0, AL: LE) and the farmers of Green Orb who own the fruit orchards. Jenton was a successful businessmen in Melvaunt, heading the distillery there, until his cover as a master agent of the Zhentarim threatened to be blown, and the Black Network spirited him out and to Green Orb in the Year of the Shield (1367 DR). After the fall of Dagger Falls to Randal Morn, Jenton concluded that the days of the Zhentarim in Daggerdale are past, and he accepted an offer from an agent of the Iron Throne to keep his eyes and ears open on behalf of the Throne.

8 - Ruin of the Xvim Temple. All that still stands of the temple are the roof and parts of the unstable walls, which threat to collapse soon. The interior of the temple was gutted by Randal Morn and his Freedom Fighters in the Year of the Gauntlet (1369 DR).

9 - Green Orb Keep. The Zhents built this small, fortified keep in the Year of the Boot (1343 DR), when the late Dreadmaster Delidus was at the peak of his power. It had a permanent garrison of 10 Zhentish soldiers. Since late in the Year of the Gauntlet (1369 DR), it has been in the hands of the Freedom Fighters, who have a contingent of eight men stationed there. Some of the Freedom Fighters can be found in the public room of the Schnapps Queen evenings, drinking local ale. The Freedom Fighters are not seated in the wing used by the locals, who do not mix with them, although they do treat them civilly when they come in contact with one another.

10 - Ruins of the Chauntea Temple. Only the overgrown, charred foundations remain. The temple was destroyed by Delidus in the Year of the Saddle (1345 DR).

11 - Cave of Ruinlord Radargh from Xvim. After Dagger Falls fell to Randal Morn and the Zhentish troops fled from Green Orb, Radargh hightailed it to out of the village. Unknown to the Freedom Fighters, he's holed up in this hillside cave, which he's also turned into a makeshift Xvimist temple. Villagers bring food and offerings to Radargh and Xvim, but the longer the Zhents remain out of power, the fewer villagers come to him. It's only a matter of time until someone tips off someone else to his whereabouts.