Surmarsh
The Surmarsh is a wide, fetid swamp on the southern shore of the western end of Lake Mulsantir, at the point where the River Sur flows into the lake. This cold and dreary place lies beyond the effects of the Red Wizards’ weather magic and is exposed to seemingly endless rains as the cold air of Ashanath and Rashemen meets the warm, stationary air mass artificially maintained over the Plateau of Thay. Fierce thunderstorms even in the depths of winter are not uncommon here.
The Surmarsh swarms with tribes of lizardfolk. These primitive humanoids spend most of their energies struggling with one another for supremacy over this soggy piece of land. Some Red Wizards think the lizardfolk may be the descendants of the serpent-people who built the Citadel, an ancient fortress buried beneath the highest peak in the Thaymount. If that is true, a once-proud folk have fallen a long, hard way.
Almost all the tribes here have a treaty of some sort with the Red Wizards. The lizardfolk agree not to bother the Thayans of the region, and the Red Wizards promise not to annihilate the lizardfolk. The treaty specifically does not apply to foreigners wandering through, whom the lizardfolk capture or kill and turn over to the next Thayan patrol. This is usually rewarded with a bounty of 10 gp worth of food per captive or corpse.
The lizardfolk of the Surmarsh consider it a great honor to be drafted into any Thayan armed force. Many have proudly served in the distant Umber Marshes during numerous campaigns against Aglarond. Thayan nobles sometimes enter the Surmarsh on hunting expeditions, employing the local lizardfolk as porters and guides. The swamp is infested with dangerous creatures, including ropers, otyughs, and beasts even more threatening. The prize trophy of the land is the head of a black dragon. A clan of the creatures lairs in the depths of the Surmarsh, and dragons are routinely spotted soaring high above the swamp. Finding such monsters is hard enough, and besting them is even more unlikely, but several parties of nobles give it a try every year just the same.
