Helm's Hold

Helm's Hold was a fortified city and cathedral located near Neverwinter.

Location
Helm's Hold was located around twenty miles (less than a day's travel) south east of the the city of Neverwinter, not far from the edge of Neverwinter Wood.

History
Founded at the beginning of 1340 DR by Dumal Erard, a priest of Helm and former member of the Company of Crazed Venturers, as a farm that was originally known as Helm's Stead. Other followers of Helm arrived, electing to stay, and by 1353 DR the site had grown to become a fortified town of seven hundred surrounding an abbey.

The town lost prominence following the Time of Troubles when the people of Neverwinter proscribed the residents for the actions of their god.

Cultists responsible for infecting Neverwinter with the Wailing Death used Helm's Hold as a base in 1372 DR, posing as Helmites while desecrating the abbey until the Hero of Neverwinter entered a portal that led there to arrest Desther Indelayne.

After recovering from its losses, Helm's Hold gained a reputation for safety over the next several decades and began to quickly grow again. The abbey became a grand cathedral and the town itself grew to become a small city. Though only a few actual Helmites remained in the cathedral after their god's apparent death in 1384 DR. This fortune changed once the Netherese briefly conquered the place but then it was allowed to be retaken when Mount Hotenow erupted.

Helm's Hold became a prime site for refugees fleeing Neverwinter's destruction, many infected with Spellplague energies. Though none of the residents held any preconceived notions against such people, many of the uninfected refugees brought theirs with them and persecuted any who showed signs of spellscars. Those who were persecuted against fought back, forming the Heirs of Azure to retaliate against their oppressors.

Because of the already high population of spellscarred within Helm's Hold's walls, and the success that some of the priests had shown in suppressing symptoms, Dagult Neverember issued the Protector's Law, an edict that required all those showing symptoms be sent to the Hold for treatment.

Unfortunately, an agent of the Abolethic Sovereignty named Rohini (known in the Hold as The Prophet) capitalized on this turn of events, acting as a double agent working on behalf of the Ashmadai to convert the spellscarred to their service. With this local increase in membership, the Ashmadai seized Helm's Hold. This in turn drew the attention of the Neverwinter Guard, who laid siege to the city - Rohini's plan all along having been to expose the Ashmadai and have the forces of Neverwinter engage the cult so that the two were preoccupied with each other.

Rumours and Legends
Rumours persisted that passages formed when Scar Alley was created led up and inside the Sanatorium. Nobody who ever explored that way was seen again but it didn't stop the brave and the desperate from trying.

Crypts of the Vigilant Eye
A veritable city beneath a city, the Crypts were a secret burial place located beneath Helm's Hold. Their existence was made public when they were discovered by those constructing the Cathedral. The crypts were occupied by the Abolethic Sovereignty who posted undead guards created from the interred. These former faithful of Helm hesitate to attack those prominently wearing the holy symbol of their former god, but their numbers are supplemented by foulspawn who have no such compunctions.

The Sovereignty and its servants were not the only residents of the Crypts, as a team of Gray Wolf Uthgardt infiltrators once made a camp after foolishly digging their way into one of the catacombs. The werewolves went mad with hunger after their entry tunnel collapsed behind them, attacking anything they could conceivably eat.

A beam of of focused Spellplague energy generated by the Hex Locus travels through the Crypts, warping reality as it goes.

The Crypts are connected to Neverwinter's Chasm by a long tunnel.

The easternmost crypt, known as the Crypt of Vigilance, was found under the boughs of the Watcher's Forest, the section of the Neverwinter Wood traditionally cared for by the Hold's inhabitants. This crypt was made for the rest of paladins of Helm, fallen protecting the innocent, but was abandoned after Helm's apparent death. The Ashmadai eventually found and secured it, hoping to turn it into a sanctum for devil-summoning while the spirits of long-dead paladins watched in horror.

Heartward
The centre of this marketplace in the middle of the city is a hangman's scaffold. Heartward was haunted, manifesting on nights when a waning moon is covered by clouds. Apparitions appear at these times, going about their business and occasionally performing a hanging. On the edge of the marketplace is a shrine to Sune, from which the place gets its name.

Helm's Cathedral
Dumal Erard's abbey to Helm was expanded into a grand cathedral which was constructed shortly before the Spellplague. Furnished with grand statues depicting the god and heroes of the church, Helm's holy symbol was displayed prominently in the stonework, on wall-mounted pennants and on suits of armor that lined the halls. The walls were built for acoustics that block all but the most raucous sounds, creating an impressive, but peaceful place of worship. Very few devout of Helm remained here and eventually, The Prophet took the cathedral as her seat, dispensing her prophecies to congregations of loyal acolytes, fawning supplicants, and awed spellscarred patients, though she laid no claim to the actual structure.

Old Dirty Dwarf
This inn and tavern weathered the Netherese invasion and the Cataclysm, staying open and welcoming through it all and continuing to serve high quality provender. It wasn't the cleanest place and some of the staff discriminated against spellscarred, but the Old Dirty Dwarf was justifiably popular with everyone. Unknown to most however, The Prophet had spies keeping the establishment under constant surveillance for 'interesting' looking newcomers.

Sanatorium
Located beneath the Cathedral, a confusing collection of corridors and rooms were eventually adopted as a place to securely hold the spellscarred patients sent here by the Protector's Law.

Scar Alley
When Helm's Hold started growing again towards the end of the 14th century, a project to expand the Hold's basic sewer system was begun. Work stalled when the Spellplague magically weakened the ground that the Hold was built on and the original sewer system collapsed. The poorest refugees moving to the city found refuge in the submerged tunnels, building a shanty town, though it quickly became a place of violence. When the Ashmadai took over the hold, they raided Scar Alley for human sacrifices to fuel their devil summoning rituals.

The Warrens
Beneath Scar Alley, are the original crypts of Helm's Abbey, long abandoned and forgotten by the people of the Hold. These crypts are infested with stealthy spellscarred monsters.