The entry to the Delve is a dwarf gate called the Hotbed. The dwarves see the location as a fortification with a trading post added as something of an afterthought, with a fringe of human settlement that has built up over time (enough that humans now have to get a permit to build near the gate.) Humans see the Hotbed as a permanent town flavored by trade with the dwarves. When humans want to deal with dwarves, they go to the Hotbed.

The Exchange

The central exchange of the settlement is a stepwell with shops built in to the walls. A bright mix of restaurants, merchants, and artists must get permission from the Trade Council to locate in the public exchange. The exchange is rigged to flood should aggressors try to lay siege to the dwarfgate. Beyond the exchange, there is a mix of human and dwarven construction for the families of merchants, workers, and servants as well as the hospitality industry for travelers.

The Trade Council

The Trade Council has seven voting seats, with five dwarves representing Rumbleseed families and two humans. The humans have only had seats for the last two centuries, grudgingly granted to try and reduce tensions between the races. The representation has not eased matters much, since wealthy merchants have taken the human spots and deal with the dwarves from a trade perspective that doesn’t do much to address the concerns of the numerous poor living in and near the Hotbed. Dwarves take care of their own, and expect humans to do the same.

The Greatest Flattery

The last century has seen an economic resistance movement growing up in the Hotbed as artisans gather under the direction of The Polishers, a criminal organization focused on imitation dwarven goods. They study real goods, and hone their skill at crafting forgeries. Adding insult to injury, the organization moves the goods through channels that will do as much damage as possible to the dwarven reputation. Over the last sixty years, eight of the leaders have been caught and punished, but humans crop up as fast as you can uproot them.

Powder’s Rest is the clanhome for Clan Rumbleseed. The fortress is close to the surface of the Delve, and at the beginning, in the grandad time (about 900 years ago), the first families in grabbed tracts of territory as fast as they could. The spread out homestead forts based in Powder’s Rest created a kind of gold rush town culture that continues to the present, with suspicious noble factions vying for influence and territory.

Grimeater Family History

The Grimeater family was a pack of sky dwarves who were familiar with the upper areas of the Delve, and they offered to assist the gunners when the Rumbleseed formed a new clan–in exchange they got a hereditary seat in the clan council, and some holdings, as well as coming under the Stonefist shield.

Dunn Family Hopyards

The Dunn family controls a massive hopyard spread, several levels below the clanhome in the Delve. Their management of the source of grain for alcohol and food gives them significant clout in the clan, and other families always keep an eye out for how to take over the choice assignment for the clan.

Macropede Chasm

To get from Powder’s Rest to Dunn Hall requires crossing a chasm that the dwarves have not bridged for security reasons. There are shattered columns of rock in the fissure, and once or twice every three days or so one of the massive 100 meter scale macropedes scrambles smoothly over the obstacles to cross the chasm; this behavior is encouraged and reinforced by specialty delvers who track the macropede movements and provide something like an irregular train schedule to travelers. Wagons and travelers must leap onto the macropede’s broad back and be carried across, disembarking at one of several identified points before the macropede slides back into tight tunnels on the route.  This workaround is necessary to avoid passing into Deadfast Reach territory.

Mire of the Forgotten

On the far side of the fissure from Powder’s Rest, but before getting to Dunn Hall, there is a passage to a cursed valley that hosts the Mire of the Forgotten. An otherworldly fog hangs over this bog, and those who breathe deeply of its vapors become forgetful as the mist erases their memories. A small settlement, Mourning Rest, services the guilty and the grieving and supports a fringe of dwellers who try to manage the amount of mist they breathe. Visitors experiment, trying to ease their minds without erasing their identities. Those who venture into the mire become dull, then eventually feral, all traces of their former lives gone. This location attracts humans, elves, dwarves, and stranger races. The obelisk by Mourning Rest is carved with an old saying; “Remember, if you see something, say nothing, and drink to forget.”