House of the Helm

The House of the Helm was a shrine dedicated to Tempus in Voonlar.

Location
Voonlar was a trading town and farming community located in the southwest corner of the Moonsea region of north Faerûn. The shrine itself was on the outskirts of town, on the North Ride, seen on the left by travelers coming into town from the south. Behind the shrine was open pasture and a cart track that led over the mild hills to a rocky place on the verge of the Greentree (the local name for the branch of the Cormanthor forest nearby) where charcoal burners kept huts.

Description
The shrine was a pavilion open on all sides. The floor was a raised stone slab with an altar in the center, also made of stone and covered in bloodstains. The roof was another large stone slab held up by four thick pillars, each of which leaned outward slightly from the center, making the shrine look like a truncated pyramid turned upside down. Smaller pillars (also leaning outward) like giant stalks of straw about five feet (1.5 m) tall jutted out of the floor in the spaces between the large pillars and were used to display helms, weapons, or other spoils of war as offerings.

Activities
There were no priests of Tempus that made their home in Voonlar, but the House of the Helm was attended by a steady stream of traveling clergy that kept an eye on the shrine in case any followers of Cyric attempted to deface or desecrate the holy place.

The most adamant caretaker was Hammer of the God Beldryn Klynrin, working from a base in northern Sembia. He and a handful of veterans and one or more junior priests made a point of checking on the shrine and filing complaints (along with dire warnings of Tempus's disfavor) if they noticed any sign that offerings had been removed. Many guerrillas that harassed Voonlar from time to time would leave battle trophies, like bloody gauntlets, at the shrine as they retreated back into the forest. This enraged Buorstag Hlammythyl, the local Bron (sheriff), but he knew that Beldryn would blame him for any thefts and Buorstag was loathe to risk the wrath of the Foehammer.