Katapesh the Dark Markets
Do as you will, but do not interfere with trade. Such is the law of Katapesh, as enforced by the mysterious Pactmasters. With this simple directive, Katapesh has grown from a gnoll-besieged frontier town to one of the mightiest trade ports on the Inner Sea. People come from all over the world and beyond to haggle, trade, and profit, whether the merchandise is common foodstuffs, exotic spices, potent drugs, rare magic, or hardy slaves. Reviled by some for its lack of morals and indifference to human suffering, Katapesh is the place to go if you’re looking for something unusual and don’t particularly care where it came from.
But there is more to Katapesh than just the city. Often mistakenly described as a desert wasteland, Katapesh has a lush ecology that thrives on the spring storms. Bizarre creatures unlike any others in the world live and hunt here. Strange cults worship stranger gods in the secrecy of hidden canyons. Desperate alchemists seek life-giving herbs in bug-infested swamps. Poor farmers guard fields of narcotic cacti, harvesting the wondrous drug called pesh in quantities worth a king’s ransom in other
parts of the world.
