The Providence Queen
The Providence Queen is a merchant vessel that typically runs trade routes between the Sword Coast and the kingdom of Keoland. It became a vital asset to the adventuring party known as the Magnificent Five during their journey to the far northern reaches of the continent.
Crew and Command
The ship is under the strict command of Captain Eriac, a stubborn, pragmatic mariner who operates under a rigid code of seafaring survival. He holds a firm boundary between his crew and outsiders, famously stating:
“The one thing a ship’s captain never does is trust someone who isn’t on his crew.”
Captain Eriac is supported by his first mate, Nika. During the ship’s final northern landing, the crew was aided by Mittens, a sailor who had been impressed into the Waterdeep navy off the Serpentwind Coast.
The Northern Charter
Seeking a swift and discreet route to the northern shores west of Luskan—as close as possible to the Throat of the World Mountains—the Magnificent Five negotiated the hire of the vessel at the Neverwinter docks. Utilizing connections through Erëvyn’s sister, Ophelia, they secured the charter of The Providence Queen for 500 gold pieces.
The initial leg of the voyage was peaceful and uneventful. Gilmore Stork occupied his time by catching a humongous fish using traditional fishing tactics from his home island of Stork’s Rest.
The Morkoth Incident
On the fourth morning of the voyage, The Providence Queen was enveloped by a dense, unnatural fog that defied all magical and mundane attempts to see through it. The vessel scraped against hidden reefs and became moored against the rocky coastline of an uncharted island.
While scouting the island for timber to repair the damaged hull, the party discovered a bizarre landscape littered with eclectic art, ancient sculptures, and mismatched treasures. This collection belonged to a hoarding Morkoth residing in a central cavern. During a chaotic skirmish in which the creature telepathically turned Erëvyn against his allies and reflected the casters’ spells, Gilmore managed to strike the beast down from his magical broom. After securing the Morkoth’s massive hoard, the party spent a day assisting the crew with hull repairs before sailing north as the fog lifted.
Life Aboard the Ship
During the final days of the voyage, several notable events occurred among the passengers:
- The Rotten Fish Prank: Seeking payback, Erëvyn snuck into Farwald’s cabin and used Mage Hand to hover rotten galley fish over his head. The prank backfired when Farwald’s seagull familiar woke up and ate the bait. In retaliation, the seagull spent the remaining days of the journey eating its catches inside Erëvyn’s quarters.
- Nalini’s Deep Swim: Utilizing a Ring of Control Water Elementals, the druid Nalini wild-shaped into an orca to run alongside the ship at sixty feet of speed. Through this experience, she discovered that she had to sing in order to utilize her echolocation, expanding her understanding of the ocean’s vast ecosystem.
- Farwald’s Divination: Sitting at the bow, Farwald cast a divination to locate potential allies against the White and Green dragons. The whale songs and waves returned a vision of a female figure trudging through the snow with a small flying creature on her shoulder.
Landfall at the Throat of the World
Although Farwald attempted to persuade Captain Eriac to take the ship further toward a nearby dwarf city—offering Nalini’s water control and an orca form to help break the ice—the captain flatly refused. Pointing out that he did not possess an icebreaker and that the Sea of Moving Ice carried city-sized floes, he rowed the party to a pebble beach at the foot of the Throat of the World Mountains in a dinghy crewed by Mittens, leaving them to continue their quest on foot.