Gaentalos

A small village within the westernmost reaches of the Forest of Arduvei, about a day's ride from the town of Corfinium.   Originally a thriving settlement, Gaentalos' proximity to an illithid colony resulted in most of its residents either fleeing or being taken over the years, until only two small families, the owner of the town trading post, and an elderly priestess of the Cat Lord remained.  The owner of the trading post had survived by acting as a middleman between the slavers and the illithids, and the priestess, one Mathaye Saltonstall, bent her powers to protecting the remaining two families (and the settlement's felines, most of which had become feral).   When a party of adventurers entered the village in search of missing kin, they befriended Mathaye and banished the owner of the trading post -- whose body was found in a ravine in the forest not long after, his neck broken in a fall.   It is hoped with the illithids and the slavers gone, the settlement will be able to revive and return to its former place as an important stop on the trade road between the West Kingdoms and the elven and halfling tribes of the Forest.