Boareskr Bridge

Boareskyr Bridge

Boareskyr Bridge carries the Trade Way over the Winding Water, north of Nuts Deep. A black granite bridge bearing sculpted images of the gods Cyric and Bhaal — legend says Cyric slew Bhaal here during the Time of Troubles (1358 DR), and the river ran black below it for years afterward. The company reached it in Session 54 on the trail of Varram the White.

The town

"Some people call it a town, but it's barely a town" (Otho). It is a tent city around the crossing: caravans hauling goods up the Trade Way meet river traffic coming east and west, most of the population stays weeks at a time, and a few tents have stood for years. Elturgard keeps a detachment of paladins here to hold the peace over traffic that is, in large part, "probably not on the up-and-up" — the crossing prizes the freedom to pass through untracked, which is why hoods stay up.

The fixtures:

• The inn — one of the only true buildings, run by Othavir ("Otho"), who has kept it for years and knows the crossing's history. Half the room drinks ale, half sarsaparilla, and half whiskey.
• The bridge station — where Ostrand has tallied everything crossing the bridge and moving on the river for twenty years.
• The stables — the other solid structure, across from the inn.
• Bolo's market — the halfling trader Bolo has run the midway trade for eight years out of a decommissioned circus tent: caravans from either side of the customs line trade with her rather than crossing themselves, and she handles the taxes and customs (plus a concealed cache for goods best moved at night). Her guards Shem and Blam sit by her fire.

Session 54 — the serpents

The party arrived to find dead Yuan-ti staked ten feet high at the southern entrance — the work of Varram the White, who weeks earlier had unmasked and killed a clutch of serpent-spies from the Serpent Hills (stabbing the first through the eye at a table in the inn) and is now toasted as "Varram, the hero of Boareskyr Bridge." She left immediately afterward with her entourage, toward the Serpent Hills.

The company finished what she started: two more hooded infiltrators unmasked and killed in the street, and a Yuan-ti Anathema — the worst thing to show up in Ostrand's twenty years of books — slain as it came out of the river, then harvested on the spot. In the aftermath the whole crossing went hoods-down, and its security was rearranged:

• The Anvil (Order of the Gauntlet) ordered in by Xanphina to hold the crossing — about three days out by horse.
• Carl stays to keep the peace until they arrive; the Elturgard paladins left one of their number while the rest hunted down four Cult of the Dragon agents (killed on the road north — see the session log).
• Otho now quietly tracks the crossing's traffic for the Harpers — the network's first standing source on the Trade Way north of the Chionthar.
• Bolo is now the ZhentarimTemplate:'s path through the bridge.

Business is expected to boom: "clearing out the yuan-ti has definitely helped… people are gonna feel more comfortable coming through."

What the company knew coming in

• The shrines. There are shrines to both Cyric and Bhaal on the bridge, and people leave offerings at both. The old fort's moat is poison still.
• The crossing. Ostrand takes a copper a head to cross, two after dark. On the south bank, a caravanserai.
• Tamal Thent. In 1450 DR High Overseer Tamal Thent of Elturel vanished at the south-bank caravanserai with her entire caravan. Elturel's riders found no bodies and no wreckage, and nobody who would say they had seen anything. Elturel raised Thavius Kreeg to the seat in her place (see The Rise of the Companion). The Harpers' Archives would like the 1450 guest ledger copied (see Harper Dispatch: A Source at the Bridge — still open).
• Varram. The Council of Waterdeep's best information placed the Wyrmspeaker here (Session 43); the Harpers' road-desk in Berdusk had a newer fourth-hand sighting (see Harper Dispatch: Boareskr Bridge) — confirmed in spectacular fashion by what the town itself witnessed.

Nearby Locations

• Trade Way — the road it carries; yuan-ti attacks reported between here and Dragonspear Castle
• Winding Water — the river it crosses; Varram's trail runs northeast along it
• Serpent Hills and the Forest of Wyrms — to the north-east
• Troll Claws — to the west
• Soubar — the next town south along the Trade Way; Triel beyond it

Appearances

• Session 43 - The Council of Waterdeep — named by the Council as Varram's last known location
• Session 53 - The Battle of Nuts Deep (2026-08-09) — confirmed as the next destination
• Session 54 - Serpents at Boareskyr Bridge (2026-08-30) — the company arrives; the serpents are cleared
• Harper Dispatch: Boareskr Bridge · Harper Dispatch: A Source at the Bridge