Description

The Basalt Keep Freehold can be found in the far west of London Proper. A ruined Castle Keep and walls stand in the Near Dreaming, though a lively enough tavern and a Scholar Smith Workshop remain in current use. The twin Penants of Houses Scathach and Beaumayn fly on the roads to and from the keep.

History

During the War of the Trees, the Basalt Keep was a crossroads outpost near a Bronze Age settlement in what is now Ruislip in the Autumn World. As is the way of the Dreaming, the history gets murky between the War of the Trees and the start of the Interregnum. However, some time before the gates of Arcadia closed, when the flow of Glamour began to diminish rather than dwindle, the bordering Scathach and Beaumayn Counties began to shrink and, rather suddenly, ever Freehold became important. The Morphean Oracles of House Scathach and the Highest Seers of House Beaumayn both conceded that any cost paid in conflict would be too high and so a simple marriage was arranged between the two Baronies.

As the Barons, Knights and vassals of Basalt Keep underwent the Changeling Way, or went back to Arcadia, the balefire began to diminish. Though it is believed to have been rekindled several times between the Interegnum and the Resurgence, it largely languished unlit during the famine of belief that closed the gates of Arcadia.