E14 — Lower Landing / Dock – The Price of Prophecy (Production)

Reiver's Right — Location 14

Lower Landing & Dock

Arrival Beneath the Bluff

The barge noses toward a narrow timber landing tucked beneath the river bluff. From midstream, Reiver's Right is little more than palisade and rooftops above the trees, but up close the cliff reveals the machinery that connects the camp to Profit's Flow.

Heavy pilings support a broad loading platform pressed against the rock. Above it, a timber chute climbs steeply toward the camp, disappearing beneath platforms, braces, and an enormous hoisting frame high overhead. Chains hang beside the chute, thick enough to anchor a ship, rising through pulley blocks toward a great iron-shod drum at the top.

The river moves hard against the pilings behind you. Ahead, there is only the dock, the cliff, and the long climb into Reiver's Right.

For characters arriving aboard Captain Sella Varn's Long Dividend, the Lower Landing is their first location in Reiver's Right. The barge puts them directly onto the dock beneath the bluff rather than carrying them around to the South Gate.

The landing was built for ordinary logging traffic. Timber could be lowered from the yard to waiting barges, while food, equipment, replacement hardware, and other cargo could be unloaded here and hauled up to the camp. Like much of Reiver's Right, however, the legitimate operation has been quietly adapted to support something much larger.

If the party comes aboard the Long Dividend, begin their exploration here. Sella brings the barge alongside long enough for the characters and their gear to disembark.

Unless the party previously earned arrangements for her to return, she does not remain tied to an apparently abandoned logging camp. River current and commercial schedules make waiting here impractical.

From the dock, the obvious route into the camp is the steep timber stair and work platforms running beside the log chute. Climbing them brings the party directly toward Location 13 — Log Chute & Hoist.

No check is required to recognize that the dock handled regular commercial traffic. Thick mooring posts, reinforced decking, cargo skids, rope wear, and the massive chute overhead all show years of heavy use.

The dock also reinforces an important truth about Reiver's Right: the logging operation was real. Timber genuinely moved from this camp to the river and onward toward Macridi.

Challenge 1: Read the Dock

The landing's wear patterns reveal that the traffic here was not limited to logs coming down from the camp.

Primary Check Perception DC 15, Sailing Lore DC 14, Mercantile Lore DC 15, or Labor Lore DC 15

Critical Success The character distinguishes two different kinds of traffic. Long scrape marks and timber scars show logs being lowered toward barges, while deep wheel impressions, reinforced cargo skids, and concentrated wear beneath the hoist show heavy loads being unloaded from vessels and hauled up the bluff. Clue: Reiver's Right regularly received unusually heavy cargo by river in addition to shipping timber out.

Success The dock shows substantial incoming as well as outgoing traffic. Clue: Barges regularly delivered heavy cargo that was transferred to the hoist and taken uphill.

Failure The heavy wear is obvious, but the character cannot distinguish inbound cargo handling from ordinary timber shipment.

Critical Failure The character assumes nearly all of the wear came from logs being moved onto barges.

If the party has already examined Hendrick's records, the Storehouse, or other Lower Works evidence, the dock provides an obvious logistical connection. Lamp oil, iron fittings, drainage pipe, chain, tools, food, and other supplies could arrive here by barge and be hauled directly into Reiver's Right.

The landing does not prove where that material ultimately went. Location 13 provides the stronger evidence when the party examines the hoist itself.

Challenge 2: Examine the Hoist From Below

From the landing, the full scale of the chute and lifting mechanism is easier to appreciate. The chain rises nearly the entire height of the bluff through reinforced guide frames.

Primary Check Crafting DC 16, Engineering Lore DC 15, or Sailing Lore DC 16

Critical Success The character recognizes that the lower guide frames and attachment points were designed to take tremendous upward strain. Several fittings show wear from dense loads being lifted repeatedly rather than merely from controlling descending logs. Clue: The hoist's secondary purpose involved hauling weight upward from this level or from somewhere within the bluff.

Success The lower mechanism is substantially overbuilt for simply lowering timber. Clue: The hoist was intended to raise very heavy loads as well.

Failure The machinery is clearly massive, but its design could plausibly be explained by the steep bluff and large timber loads.

Critical Failure The character assumes the entire mechanism exists solely to prevent runaway logs from crashing onto the dock.

A short distance from the landing, a narrow pipe and stone-lined channel emerge from the bluff and empty into Profit's Flow. Only a slow trickle runs through it now.

The outlet is easy to dismiss as storm drainage until examined closely. Its fittings match the narrow drainage pipe found among the specialized supplies in the Storehouse.

Challenge 3: Inspect the Drainage

The outlet provides another physical indication that substantial work exists somewhere inside the bluff.

Primary Check Crafting DC 15, Engineering Lore DC 14, Mining Lore DC 14, or Perception DC 16

Critical Success The character recognizes a constructed groundwater drainage system rather than ordinary rain runoff. The pipe runs directly into the bluff at a shallow downward angle, and fine gray clay has accumulated around the outlet. Clue: Someone built drainage specifically to keep an underground work area inside the bluff from filling with water.

Success The outlet is too substantial and deliberately constructed to serve only surface runoff. Clue: It drains something inside the bluff.

Failure The pipe appears to be part of an unusually elaborate drainage system, but its source cannot be determined.

Critical Failure The character assumes it simply carries rainwater and seepage away from the cliffside structures.

Fine gray sediment has accumulated in cracks beneath the hoist and around the drainage outlet. Characters who have already encountered the distinctive gray clay elsewhere recognize it automatically.

Here, however, the material has been diluted and washed by the river. It confirms that the same subterranean environment lies somewhere within the bluff, but it does not by itself identify an entrance.

A steep timber stair climbs beside the log chute from the Lower Landing to the upper hoist platform. It is a normal work route rather than an exploration obstacle, though the height and exposed river bluff make the ascent impressive.

No Athletics check is required under ordinary conditions. The stairs, railings, and intermediate platforms remain structurally sound enough to use.

At the top, the party arrives at Location 13 — Log Chute & Hoist, where closer examination of the machinery can reveal the concealed secondary chain run and evidence of the former hauling tunnel into the Lower Works. That tunnel is completely collapsed and impassable; the stair provides access to the surface camp, not to the underground complex.

If the party earned a second Transport Point or otherwise arranged a return pickup with Captain Sella Varn, this is where she will come back for them.

Sella does not remain at the dock while the party explores. She continues along the river and returns at the agreed time or signal.

If the party earned only passage to Reiver's Right, no barge is waiting when they return. The North Road remains their straightforward surface route back toward Macridi.

The Lower Landing introduces Reiver's Right from the river and immediately shows the scale of the infrastructure built into the bluff.

A thorough investigation can establish three things: the camp genuinely shipped timber by river, heavy cargo also arrived here and was hauled uphill, and a constructed drainage system leads somewhere inside the bluff.

The landing should raise questions rather than answer them. The machinery above is where those questions begin turning into direct evidence of the Lower Works.