Black Brine

The Red Chain Bridge is more than stone and rusted links—it’s the spine of Black Brine’s soul, and the fracture that never healed. Stretching across the Daggerflow, it binds East to West, law to wilds, and past to present. The old red chains, dangling like bloodied vines, clatter in the wind with secrets. Locals claim they were once shackles, though no one agrees whether they held prisoners, gods, or something worse. It’s the city’s only bridge, a bottleneck of coin, gossip, and quiet dread. Crews pay toll in silver or scars. Rosy’s men guard it like treasure. The statues at its midpoint—faceless, weather-worn—never move, yet shift when no one looks. And sometimes, when the mist rolls thick, the Nameless Watcher stands between them, still as sin. Even the fishing fleet is split by it. North fishers brave the deeper waters and darker omens. South fishers call them fools and say they drag ill luck back with their nets. The two sides drink in separate taverns. Pray to different saints.

The Red Chain Bridge looms out of the fog like a scar across the river’s throat—stone worn slick by centuries, rusted chains swaying like gallows rope. Approaching on foot, boots echo over pitted cobble, each step louder than it ought to be. The air tastes of iron and rain. Old scratches line the parapets: names, threats, prayers—none fresh, all desperate. Midspan, the faceless statues leer in silence, and between them... sometimes, a third figure stands. Hooded. Still. Watching south, always south, toward the open sea. Sailors spit and cross themselves without slowing. No one speaks on the bridge. Today it’s empty. Today. But the damp stone near the midpoint is too wet, too cold—like something heavy stood there just moments before. Like it’s watching you now, from somewhere just out of sight.