Descent into Avernus

their community, the halfling cleric and his adult chil-

d ren Hansen and Sissa (both lawful good strongheart

halfiing a colytes) can inevitably be found here chatting

with the city's downtrodden, offering what healing and

alms they can.

The church's only source of non-donation income is

a twisting series of crypts that extends down from an

entrance behind the altar, at several points piercing the

city's sewers. For a small fee, anyone can have a corpse

brought down into the cramped tomb, where hordes of

sewer rats flood in to eat the flesh, leaving (mostly) clean

bones to be interred in the attached ossuary by llmater's

faithful. While a somewhat ignoble end, it's often the

only holy-ground burial the city's poor can afford, and

Brother Hodges does his best to bring quiet dignity to

the practice. However, a fertile carrion crawler has

recently slithered up from the sewers to feast on the

corpses in the tomb, leaving a trail of squirming young

wherever it passes. Brother Hodges is incensed by the

desecration, but doesn't dare face the beasts himself,

and the Flaming Fist has been slow to come to his aid.

Though the church can't pay, he would gratefully offer

free healing to anyone who dealt with the menace.

SMILIN' BOAR

With its downright ribald menu of salaciously renamed

breakfast foods, the Smilin' Boar was always intended

to cause a stir in well-to-do Bloomridge. Yet the current

buzz is more than owner Jentha Allinamuch, a chaotic

good female strongheart halfiing commoner, ever

intended. For the past six months, bodies have been

appearing in the alley just behind the halfiing's cafe.

More than a dozen have appeared so far, never with any

witnesses as to how they go there. The victims have

no apparent commonalities-being of all ages, races,

genders, and social classes, and having disappeared

from points all across the city-yet there's no question

in anyone's mind that the same killer is responsible, as

each is fou nd with curved slices across their wrists and

a heart-piercing wound. The whole district is astir over

the murders, but so far the Fist hasn't been able to turn

up any leads on what locals have fearfully dubbed the

Sickle Man. With business plummeting, Jent ha is as

eager as any grieving family to find answers, and would

happily pay independent investigators to help track

down the killer. In fact, the killer is not one person, but

a group of Dead Three cultists looking to spread fear in

the city (see "Hamhocks Slaughterhouse," page 197).

SORCEROUS SUNDRIES

A dome of stained glass roofs this tall, round shop, cast-

ing chaotic shafts of color down across several open-air

floors that rise upon wooden pillars, connected by stair-

cases and ladders. While the living quarters upstairs

teem with rare plants and bookcases, the bottom floor

acts as one of the most popular magic shops in the city.
Inside its delicate-looking but magically warded walls,

customers can buy and sell all manner of curios and

common magic items from the eccentric shopkeeper,

Rivalen Blackhand, a neutral male human mage with a

withered right hand.

Blackhand almost always has potions of healing avail-

able for sale. He also typically has up to 500 gp on hand

to buy items from those with interesting magical wa res,

though he's a savvy bargainer and rarely pays anything

close to full price.

Currently, the wizard finds himself in the grip of an

unusual protection racket. His supposed apprentice

Gilligunn, a neutral evil female rock gnome spy, is ac-

tually a Guild member. Whenever Blackhand makes a

sufficiently large transaction, Gilligunn secretly tracks

the customer, leading an appropriately sized group of

Guild toughs to ambush them days later, knowing they'll

be carrying either a large sum of money or a valuable

magic item they can sell back to Blackhand. Though the

shopkeeper isn't happy with the arrangement, the Guild

varies its patterns enough to keep suspicion away from

him, and he has to admit it's a better deal than paying

protection money himself.

WATER QUEEN'S HOUSE

The oldest temple in Baldur's Gate, the Water Queen's

House clings to its enormous pier like a monster of the

deep, its stone walls trailing over the side and descend-

ing down beneath the waves and river mud. At the pier's

tip, a huge fountain in the shape of a sinking ship sprays

water high, reminding faithful of the price of failing to

appease Umberlee.

The intimidating Allandra Grey, a chaotic evil female

human priest, leads the temple's score of waveservants,

most of them women widowed or orphaned by the sea.

Ordinary Baldurians rarely see the waveservants, and

never step inside the temple. When the faithful wish to

make offerings, they must ring a bell by the door. Two

waveservants (chaotic evil female human acolytes) an-

swer the door, one accepting the offering inside while

the other says a short prayer in the doorway. Once the

prayer is spoken and the donation collected, they step

back and close the door.

Though no outsiders know exactly how the tem-

ple's finances work, the dour waveservants buy little

in the markets save essentials. The rest of the tithes

are carried in solemn procession down crumbling,

moss-covered stairs that cling to the outside of the tem-

ple and descend into the murky water. The waveservants

disappear below the water for a few minutes, only to

return empty-handed. What happens to the treasures

is anyone's guess, with some suggesting they're hidden

in underwater vaults. Others believe the gifts are borne

away by Umberlee herself. In truth, the waveservants

leave the treasures at the bottom of the staircase, where

they are fetched within the hour by 2d6 sahuagin led by

a sahuagin priestess. The sahuagin make the long trip

from the Sea of Swords to obtain these treasures, and

in exchange, they refrain from attacking the city, its har-

bor, and ships heading out to sea.

If the waveservants wish harm to befall a ship or its

crew, they leave a clam with the treasure in the water.

When the clam is opened, it magically recites up to 25

words in Common. This information helps the sahuagin

identify the ship. The sahuagin priestess uses a tongues

spell to translate the clam's words, then executes an at-

tack on the ship during the next new moon.

BAI.DUR'S GATE GAZETTEER

193