The town of Alice

 Located at the northern border of the Scarlet Principality, the town of Alice is the largest community in the Cardinal Duchy. The Cardinal Duke resides in a stronghold just outside of Alice. Of all the fiefdoms within the Scarlet Principalities, the Cardinal Duchy lost the most territory during the previous Nadir, and the numbers of Alice and the surrounding communities have been swollen by refugees from the towns and farms to the north that were abandoned during the raids of the orcish armies led by the warlord known as the Snake that Strikes.

Alice is currently an urban center with a Market Class of 6 (see Into the Wild). The central, original part of the town is of wood-framed construction, with wood shake roofs. A stone wall with parapets and towers surrounds the original section. Surrounding the wall is a shanty village of nearly twice the size, with many of the dwellings being slowly transformed into actual houses by the residents, most of whom arrived twenty or thirty years previous, when the orcish raids were at their worst.

Alice is dirty and muddy, a town that has grown far faster than the existing infrastructure can support it. At this point, at the beginning of the 16th Apex, it is seems unlikely that all of the refugees from the north would return to their previous communities were they made safe again, although some certainly would.

Alice is known primarily as a staging point for the road north, to the Theocracy of Kimrid, a town devoted to the living prophet Mnencir and known throughout the Principality as a source of dervishes, the highly trained, highly skilled warriors of Mnencir that hire out as sell-swords and bodyguards to those who can afford their services.

The road to Kimrid has not been traveled since halfway during the previous Nadir, when the orcish raids began, and the Cardinal Duke is eager to open up the trade route again, both to make contact with the Temple of Mnencir and as a waystation on the trade route that winds northwards.

• NPCs in Alice include the Cardinal Duke and his staff, Kirra Lec, a representative of the Scarlet Prince, Matts Olny, head of the Northern Mercantile Exchange, and Jadas the Magnificent, alchemist.
• There are two inns in the town proper -- Three Oak Tavern and the Broken Bough -- as well as a half dozen small taverns and wineshops. Several smaller, less reputable inns exist outside of the town walls.