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The Old Families
FactionsLocal

The Old Families

Stone-rich landlords whose names are older than the town's debts — and whose hands are never empty.

Scope
Local
Alignment
Patrician families
Relationships
  • The CouncilSubsidiary

    The family heads sit on Marshedge’s council.

  • The GuildsRival

    The Guilds generate much of Marshedge’s wealth and chafe at Old Family power.

Four families, four manors of cut stone, and a hand in every transaction that happens between Marshedge's walls. The Ferriers, Hawtreys, Tricklebanks, and Eldershaws are the Old Families — High Town's stone-rich landlords and the inherited wealth the rest of Marshedge negotiates around.

They own the fields stretching east and south, dominate High Town, and sit at the center of the town's inherited wealth. Their power is not uncontested: the Ferriers have lost clout, the Hawtrey patriarch is tied to Brennan, and the Guilds chafe at Old Family dominance.

The oldest bargain

Every seven years one of the Old Families delivers a child to the Willow Witches as part of Marshedge's oldest pact.

Hooks

Use the Old Families for inherited obligation, land, secrets, High Town privilege, old bargains, and the kind of civic authority that can survive scandal if the rest of town still depends on it.