Morninggold Keep

Morninggold Keep, also called Castle Morninggold, was the county seat of County Morninggold in the Golden Marches of Tethyr. It was the former home of then-countess and later queen Zaranda Star.

Location
The small keep was located in a broad valley around a corner of foothills in the northern regions of the Iltkazar Highlands, near the Shining Stream.

White and brownish-red cows grazed in the fields surrounding the manor.

Structure
The building was a fortified house, with two- and three-story sections, constructed with granite from the Snowflake Mountains. The pitched roof was tiled in red half-tubes. A stone path led up to the arched front doorway.

Attached to the back of the house was a circular tower, which was older than the rest of the structure. Its smooth rounded stones were a yellowed fieldstone, which looked like gold when the setting sun shone on it. Its lower heights were covered in ivy.

Surrounding the main manorhouse were a few other stone buildings, including a set of stables. There was also a vegetable garden.

Defenses
There was no wall or moat, but the building was surrounded with thorny rosebushes. It had been built and/or rebuilt with defense in mind. The earlier low, broad, arched windows had been covered with stone and positioned higher in the form of narrower slits crossed with arrow loops. The upper windows of the tower were open to the air but crossed with bars.

Interior
The great hall had a hearth large enough for three adult men to stand within. Above it hung a boar-spear. On another wall were a pair of crossed battleaxes and an old shield. A candle chandelier hung from the high, timbered ceiling.

During Zaranda Star's time as owner, she kept the rooms furnished with beds with feathered mattresses and had at least one hot-water tub for soaking. The master bedroom was located at the top of the tower keep, below an observatory for watching the stars. The observatory was accessed by a series of extra-steep stairs.

Furnishings
During Zaranda's ownership, the master bedroom contained a chest of drawers decorated with relief sculptures of smiling goblin heads. The bed was made of oak and had four spiraling columns supporting a silk canopy with fringes, which Zaranda had looted off a Tuigan chieftain during the Tuigan War. The bedspread was embroidered with images of elks and penguins.

History
The keep and its county at first belonged to the Gulderhorn family of Tethyr.

After the fall of the country into anarchy on the Ten Black Days of Eleint, former adventuress and commander in the Tuigan War Zaranda Star used the spoils of that war to purchase County Morninggold and its keep from the Order of the Silver Chalice in, to help fund the Order's operations in restoring nobility in the land. Zaranda spent most of her initial time as countess at the keep, restoring it and fixing it up to her liking. However, her funds began running low, so she sought a means to pay off her debt and retire at the keep. Her solution was to obtain expensive magical items from Unther and Thay and then sell them in the city of Zazesspur.

The journey did not end quite as she had planned, and she found herself entangled in war and political intrigue that ultimately led to her rising to the leadership of a resistance movement and her crowning as the queen of Tethyr over the course of a year. At the end of the Reclamation Wars in, Queen Zaranda restored Aalangama Gulderhorn's lands and titles back to her family as a reward for her bravery and leadership in the battle.

Inhabitants
When Zaranda Star lived in the house, she was served by the bugbear Gisbertus as a butler and head steward and sometimes cook.

Countess Gulderhorn, the keep's owner from, split her time equally between the keep and Mount Noblesse, the headquarters of the Order of the Silver Chalice.

Appearances

 * War in Tethyr