Devil's Elbow

Devil's Elbow is a small island in the Varisian Gulf, two miles from land and about 18 miles southwest of the city of Riddleport. It is shaped like a crescent and covered in forests of conifer trees. It was the scene of a strange mining boom in 4708 AR, when a meteorite containing a significant amount of the skymetal noqual impacted the island.

Devil's Elbow is cursed, and only the most desperate pirates take temporary shelter in its natural harbor.

History

For most of its recent history, Devil's Elbow has been largely uninhabited. The island was historically avoided by the local Varisian and goblin tribes due to its single intelligent inhabitant, a siren named Virashi. This changed when a Chelaxian merchant named Yaris Neraken was shipwrecked on the island. Yaris spent some time as Virashi's captive, but the two eventually fell in love, and Yaris persuaded Virashi to let him leave and bring others back with him to establish a permanent settlement on Devil's Elbow, arguing that this would allow them to remain together while still enjoying the comforts of civilization. Yaris returned to Magnimar and convinced potential settlers and investors that Virashi was nothing more than a rumor, leading to the village of Witchlight being founded on the island's shores in 4680 AR.

Witchlight faced struggles soon after its funding. As the island's terrain is unsuitable for farming, the settlers had to import wildlife to create hunting stock with which to sustain themselves. Witchlight also found itself dependent on imports from Riddleport, and with little of its own to export. The town was further struck by multiple disasters: a fire destroyed one of its watchtowers, and killed several workers; a shipwreck cost the town a large supply of grain and loosed numerous giant centipedes on the island; and a load of sickened cattle brought an outbreak of anthrakitis that killed a third of the settlers. Witchlight's citizens began to attribute this misfortune to "Virashi's Curse", supported by rumored sightings of the siren. After a priest secretly followed Yaris on one of his trips to meet with his lover, the town's population learned of her presence and the location of her cave. The next morning, a mob entered Virashi's lair and killed her in her sleep.

Virashi's death proved too much for the already despairing Yaris, who killed himself when he woke to find his lover's corpse on public display. This in turn was more than the town's flagging morale could endure, and the demoralized settlers soon after abandoned the town entirely for Varisia's other, more stable settlements.

In 4708 AR, 28 years after Witchlight's ill-fated founding, Devil's Elbow became the site of an experimental drow ritual meant to direct a meteor to impact Golarion's surface. The test worked and caused a relatively small meteoroid to impact on the island. The rock itself bore a cargo of precious noqual, drawing several teams of prospectors from Riddleport to the island to harvest the metal, but also loosed several akatas on the island.

Inhabitants

Devil's Elbow is home to a variety of mundane wildlife, chiefly the deer, boars, donkey rats, and rabbits imported by the original settlers for food, as well as wild dogs, bloodseekers, and snakes. The giant centipedes brought by the shipwreck are still present on the island, and have over time become quite common. Most recently, the falling meteorite has brought several akatas to the island as well.

In addition to the natural and extraterrestrial wildlife, Virashi's ghost also lingers on the island.