Broken Compass

City Description

Population: ~500

Founded: 2205 (185 years ago)

It's unclear who the original inhabitants of the city now known as Broken Compass were, but what is clear is that they left the city in a hurry and all at once. What they left behind was a city of mansions, towering buildings built with a taste for the extravagant atop picturesque vistas overlooking the sea. When the sailors of the Arrowhead Isles came upon the city for the first time, unfamiliar with its history and what caused the people to vacate such a seemingly perfect place, they found tables set for dinner, doors hanging open, and tools left in gardens. Sailors are keen on curses, so the city earned a reputation as a place of which all ships steered clear.

That is until Captain Selwyn "Chit" Chataway, a woman known for spitting in the face of tradition and lacking a healthy dose of fear, decided to sail right into the well-preserved docks of the wealthy city and call it home. Word spread of her taking her crew into the city without a name. Then rumors spread of her crew dying off. Then legends sprang up of her going crazy and murdering her crew. The saying made its rounds: "You'd only sail to that place with a broken compass." And so the city earned its name.

Despite the rumors, Captain Chit continued her successful tirade as a fierce and merciless pirate. It turned out her crew was not dead, but Broken Compass had already become a place of superstition and curses. When Captain Chit retired and presumably died, her crew initiated others, and it wasn't long before the city had quite a community moved into the abandoned mansions. But the culture of the city developed independently of the profits-based focus of Topside. Broken Compass, either due to the nature of superstition or the nature of the city, bred a more serious sort.

Tradition is everything in Broken Compass. The pirates who reside there have a strict code and will kill any of their own who breaks it. They call this code the "Benthic Creed." It goes as follows, as anyone in Arrowhead would tell:

1. Those in the water belong to the water

2. Questions are for land and answers aren't for all

3. Do not look away

4. A shrouded past is a buried past

5. If you hold the key, you keep the gate

While the Creed is known to most anyone on the Isles, what it actually means is a matter of much debate. It's known the denizens of Broken Compass understand it well enough but they're not forthcoming with any answers, presumably due to number two.

Over the centuries, lush vegetation has overgrown much of Broken Compass but the buildings still stand strong. The people of the city haven't changed a thing, preferring to preserve as much of what was left behind as possible. Nowadays, the pirates of Broken Compass are considered akin to a cult, but they're inarguably the best pirates in the Arrowheads, so no one gives them much trouble about it. One can find them out and about in Topside, Cypress, and Grugar's Anchor, and find them easily enough due to their tendency toward dated outfits and grim demeanors. While the city has lost some of its superstitious reputation, it's still a place to which only a broken compass would lead.

City Landmarks

Chateau LeMarque - the largest and most noticeable mansion in the city. It's where the leader of the Broken Compass crews holds court. It is here trials, judgements, and decisions are made and sentences are carried out. It's where the Benthic Creed is discussed, and it's also where any interloper or non-crew are forbidden to go.

Pendulum Square - outside the Chateau are the crow cages where those who offend the pirates of Broken Compass hang until dead. It's common to see birds flocking the square after a recent verdict and the cages swinging in the wind like pendulums.

Lockdaam Wharf - while Topside and Grugar's Anchor know alcohol, and Cypress knows ships, it's Broken Compass that knows how to fish. All manner of exotic sealife can be caught, cooked, and served on Lockdaam Wharf. There are no restaurants and nowhere to buy the finest foods, there is simply a community wharf where the day's catches are brought in and served to the denizens of Broken Compass.

People of Note

Captain Saoirse Chataway: Female Human, descendent of Captain Chit and leader of Broken Compass, master tactician and supremely intelligent

Adewale Okonedo: Male Human, Chataway's second-hand-man and merciless executioner, unmatched ship-deck combatant

Dee Dee Shen: Female Elf, historian and lead researcher into the mysteries of Broken Compass and the surrounding islands

Words Without Meaning: Male Tabaxi, the only Tabaxi ambassador from the Jungle That Bides Its Time to the Pirates of the Arrowheads