The Debt of Iron Hollow

Karguk Vane was born in Iron Hollow, a mining town where the half-orc children of caravan guards were tolerated so long as they worked. His mother, a human smith named Petra Vane, taught him that a blade is a promise: it does what its wielder swore it would do, nothing more. When the Ashveil Company annexed the mine, Karguk signed on as a picket guard to keep Petra's forge open — and learned too late that the Company's ledgers held more cruelty than any raider's axe.

The night the Company flooded the lower galleries to bury a wage strike, Karguk broke his contract and his captain's jaw in the same hour. He pulled eleven miners out of the dark before the water won. The twelfth, his friend Doss, pressed a brass ledger-key into his hand and went under. The Company posted a bounty for the 'oath-breaker of Iron Hollow' by morning.

Karguk has carried the ledger-key for three years, working escort jobs under borrowed names. He still sends coin to his mother through a fence in Highmoor who may or may not be skimming. Somewhere in the Ashveil Company's vaults is the drowned ledger that key opens — and with it, proof of what was done in Iron Hollow. He means to collect.

Personality Traits

• I keep every promise I make, which is why I make very few.
• I stand between danger and anyone smaller than me without thinking first.
• I distrust written contracts and read them three times anyway.

Ideal

A promise kept in the dark matters more than one kept in daylight.

Bond

My mother's forge in Iron Hollow stays lit, whatever it costs me.

Flaw

I will always stop to settle an old debt, even when the timing is fatal.

Important NPC

Petra Vane, Karguk's mother, still smiths in Iron Hollow under Ashveil's eye. She believes her son is dead and pays a portion of her earnings toward the bounty on him — not knowing the money is hunting her own child.

Unresolved Secret

Karguk was the one who unlocked the sluice gate that night — following what he believed was an evacuation order. The Company made him the flood's author; he fears they might be half right.

Why They Join the Party

A party is a contract written in deeds instead of ink — the only kind Karguk trusts. Traveling companions also make excellent cover from bounty hunters.

Three DM Hooks

1. The brass ledger-key opens vault nine in the Ashveil Company's Highmoor counting-house; the drowned ledger inside names a sitting magistrate.
2. Doss's daughter, now a Company clerk, recognizes Karguk in a market crowd — and must decide whether to report the man who couldn't save her father.
3. The Iron Hollow bounty is quietly bought out by a rival mining cartel that wants Karguk alive, as a witness against Ashveil.

Character Sheet Summary

Half-orc fighter from the mining town of Iron Hollow. Broke his mercenary contract to save miners from a deliberate flood; branded an oath-breaker with a live bounty. Carries a brass ledger-key that proves the Ashveil Company's crime. Protective, promise-bound, cannot walk past an old debt. Mother Petra believes he is dead.