Unless a crew fancies three weeks of inching along narrow, icy ledges in the Grensa mountains, the best way through Oria is the tunnel. At its west entrance, a colossal lodge house towers overhead. This is the House of Houses, the Gatehouse of Jegervalt.
Jegervalt is the largest Oric lodge house, both in size and population. Two towers flank the entrance to the tunnel, with a massive structure suspended over the arch between them. The three sections frame the tunnel’s mouth against the sheer face of Mount Roet. The stacked chambers of the two towers and skyway are spacious enough to house its twenty thousand Orians.
Layered Lodge
Each tower’s outer gate is 20 feet high, leading into the cavernous ground levels of Jegervalt’s interior. Most levels in the towers are a sprawl of stacked wooden structures, and each of them has 15 floors. Individual family homes cover the stone floor, and the 40-foot ceilings create the feeling that one isn’t inside a structure at all. A network of staircases facilitates travel between floors, along with elevators powered by copper pipes delivering water from underneath the gatehouse.
Each level has a different purpose and layout. Some layers are dense residential blocks, each a neighborhood with its own distinct identity. Other floors are open gardens with planters under Summerstone outcroppings. To preserve the Summerstone for use within the towers, the Orians carved Jegervalt out of the mountain just as much as they built around it.
Some Layers of Jegervalt to See
Field
Only a few closed buildings dot the layers with large, continuous Summerstone veins. These floors are wide, grassy fields under a blazing min- eral sun. This space is a precious stomping ground for locked-in youth during winter months.
Smithy
The smithy layers are hives of craftspeople, well-ventilated and bustling at all hours of the day. Despite the name, the smoky districts are also where tanners, stonemasons, and other workers ply their craft.
Garden
The large residences on these layers are each constructed around their own smaller cluster of Summerstone. Each personal source of sunlight feeds a large vegetable garden. The largest can even bathe orchards of fruit trees in perpetual sunshine.
Triple
Each tower has one layer with ceilings twice as high. A wide road supported by stone columns bisects them, connecting opposite elevators halfway up the wall. These levels are bursting with a maze of dense housing, built wherever it will fit and stacked three floors tall. The layers within layers are housing for Jegervalt’s refugees and poorest citizens. Every berendey hopes that “living in the triples” is a temporary arrangement for their people.
Lake
The lake layers both feature a long, circular path surrounding indoor bodies of clear water. An orb of magic light permanently surrounds a Summerstone crystal above each of them, a believable substitute for the sun. Tiny pebbles of faery fire in the lakes gleam every night when the orb is covered.
Open
A ring of stout columns surrounds a layer open to the elements, dividing both towers into an upper and lower half. Insulated stone doors wall off the stairs and elevators passing through, but these open layers allow air to flow up through the floors above. Dozens of wild birds zoom at a time between the columns in spring. In autumn, the open floors fall silent.
Roet Mole District
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