Castle Parravon

“All the nobles ride Pegasus and so forget that the rest of us need roads to get around. Double all travel time estimates if you want to be sure.” Eldegar of Busreq, Coachman

Parravon is a starkly impressive city, carved directly from the rock of the mountains. It is part of an outcrop at the edge of a spur of the Grey Mountains, and the River Grismerie runs along its base. Over the millennia, the people of Parravon have cut homes, businesses, walls, Grail Chapels, and palaces from the stone.

Bretonnia’s sumptuary laws state only nobles can use stone in building. However, the Dukes of Parravon have never wanted wooden buildings messing up their glorious city, so they have long maintained that a peasant living in a carved stone building is no different from a peasant living in a cave. Indeed, given the quality of many peasant homes in Parravon, the difference really is minimal. The wealthy merchants of Parravon naturally push this allowance to the limit.

Parravon is the only city in Bretonnia with a substantial population of Dwarfs. Most of them were originally Imperial expatriates, but some came directly from the Dwarfholds of the Vaults and World’s Edge Mountains. There are now some Dwarf families who have lived there for generations, though they still keep themselves somewhat apart from the Human citizens.

Castle Parravon, seat of the Dukes, dominates the top of the outcrop with its soaring towers. Like the rest of the city, it is carved from living rock, and thus has not been significantly altered since it was first carved, two thousand years ago. The Dukes have needed more space, however, and have extended the castle down into an extensive series of tunnels.

Underground rooms are quite common in Parravon, as they are often less work to carve than an aboveground house. Tunnels linking those rooms are also common, and tunnels further back into the mountain provide more storage. It is said that you can go from any point in the city to any other without taking more than ten steps under the open sky. Parts of the tunnel network have been abandoned by Humans, and darker creatures now live there.

Source

 * Warhammer Fantasy RPG 2nd ED -- Knights of the Grail (pg. 87).