The Bittun
Masked traders sometimes descend from the Stoutspires with pale cloth worth more than most travellers can afford, leaving with grain, tools and medicines but refusing escorts back into the mountains. The Bittun have survived generations of unwanted attention by keeping their world hidden, though a recent attack has made that much harder.
A Guarded Trade
Sperenweave withstands the crystal grit that wears through ordinary clothing. Soldiers need it to patrol the Shivefrost, settlers prize it above almost anything they own, and merchants make fortunes from the small quantities brought down from the mountains. The people who weave it are far less willing to talk about their craft.
The Bittun remember traders who sold their trust to Sarnath, bringing soldiers onto paths that had once been safe. Exchanges are now brief and carefully arranged, with questions about their homes or the cloth’s origins enough to end a meeting. Their need for goods from the valley still gives useful strangers a chance to earn trust that money alone cannot buy.
Kesh Hollow
Few outsiders have seen Kesh Hollow, where lanterns light homes built on carved terraces within the mountains. Woven bridges and ladders connect families high above the cavern floor, the work of generations building a place for their people to live beyond Sarnath’s reach.
Histories passed down through families preserve conflicting accounts of the Bittun’s past, even among their elders. People in the valley argue over how long they have inhabited the Stoutspires, their retreat into the mountains leaving outsiders with stories and very little certainty.
Strangers who reach the hollow are watched, disarmed and brought before its elders, who carefully judge whether they may remain. Even a welcome into the settlement grants no right to wander through the passages beyond it.
Goods From the Valley
The mountains cannot supply everything the Bittun need, making grain for poor seasons, iron tools and medicines worth the risk of dealing with outsiders. Silver is scarce and treasured, passed through families and repeatedly remade, while coloured glass, strong drink and finely crafted goods also have a place in their trade. Lorn Oggerkin helps arrange these exchanges, protecting their interests against merchants who see only the price of sperenweave.
The Pathwardens
The Pathwardens guard routes that disappear among the rocks and trees, knowing where to watch, where to set traps and where falling stone can stop a party before it reaches Bittun territory. Travellers may be followed for hours without seeing a defender.
Pathleader Breduk has tightened the watch since the Goruk raid. His sister Korr wants the attackers hunted down before they return, while Rusk believes trusted outsiders could strengthen a community that cannot keep every danger out. All three fought to defend the hollow, but their disagreement over how to protect it now makes a stranger’s welcome depend greatly on which of them they meet.
The Heart of the Mountain
The Bittun have built their lives around the speren, with families sharing the work of tending the brood, weaving, gathering food and maintaining Kesh Hollow. While caretakers work in the warm chambers below, others hunt the mountain slopes, repair the settlement’s walkways or prepare cloth for the rare exchanges with outsiders.
Sperenweave clothes their people, carries them across the hollow’s woven bridges and buys the grain, tools and medicines they cannot produce themselves. The craft takes patience and knowledge passed between generations. Waste is frowned upon in a community so dependent on careful work and a healthy brood.
They call the Queen the Heart of the Mountain, and caring for her and her young is a sacred responsibility. Keeper Vorrn oversees work that sustains every household, making the recent raid a threat to far more than their stores: it has endangered the living foundation of the community they built here.
A Divided Refuge
The Goruks carried away stores of sperenweave and killed the Masterweaver and her apprentice. Families are mourning, supplies are short, and the Bittun fear that stolen cloth will draw more people into their mountains. Secrecy failed to prevent the attack, leaving old disagreements much harder to contain.
Elder Marr has held the households together through years of compromise and believes their way of life can survive if they accept carefully chosen help. His oldest friend, Elder Karnn, sees a people exhausting themselves to preserve traditions that no longer keep them safe, and his blunt demands for change have won support among those tired of being told to endure.
The hollow needs medicines, recovered supplies and news of the raiders, bringing both elders into dealings with capable outsiders. Their requests reflect very different hopes for what the Bittun should become.