Serpent's Trail

Vesarca's  longest canyon, the Serpent’s Trail follows the path of a winding, long-dead river just south of the Serpent’s Den Desert. Though its two ends are not especially far from one another as the crow flies, the meandering course of the canyon twists back and forth on itself for hundreds of miles. Deep and narrow, the canyon was likened to the coils of a snake by the earliest peoples to live around it, and eventually the nearby desert too would be named for it.

Within the twists of the canyon lay ruins of early settlements of the Evlus people, small dwellings atop one another built directly into the canyon walls. Though the canyon was long dry even in the time of the Evlus, it seems the defensive benefits were worth the hardship of living in a dusty gorge with little potential for agriculture; the Evlus were surrounded by the warlike tribes of the Iglih, Jaipha, and Aslaimok. These tribes lost dozens of war parties in the blind curves and craggy depths of the Serpent’s Trail before they decided the Evlus were simply not worth the trouble of raiding. One notable chamber, carved directly into the canyon wall, still holds the bones of the slain raiders stacked in careful pillars, while their skulls hang from ropes from the ceiling. It is said the Evlus would show this chamber to visitors from other tribes as a warning before any business would be done.