The great stone span of Sharkfin Bridge arches across the Kingfisher River, its massive keystones blackened by age and spray. Built long before Saltmarsh was ever a village, the bridge is said to be the last surviving relic of an ancient settlement whose ruins lie northwest, where the Tower of Zenopus now crumbles. Broad enough for two laden carts to pass abreast, the bridge has carried centuries of trade, conquest, and rumor across its worn stones.

Scholars whisper that it was raised by hands not wholly mortal, and some claim its name comes from the jagged, fin-like silhouettes of its arches when viewed from the sea.

Those with fey blood; elves, half-elves, even druids attuned to the wild, feel a faint sickness when they cross Sharkfin Bridge. The sensation is subtle but undeniable: a queasy lurch in the gut, a ringing in the ears, a sense of being unwelcome. Local lore blames an ancient curse placed upon the bridge when the original settlement fell, long before Keoland rose. The details are lost, but some believe the curse was bound to the bridge to keep something in rather than to drive mortals away.

Shops and homes have sprouted along both sides of the bridge. Shops offering food, ale, tackle, clothes, and strange items to those interested. The bustle is constant, fishermen unloading catches, sailors drinking at roadside benches, traders haggling, and thieves quietly working the crowd. Sharkfin Bridge is rarely quiet, and rarely safe.

Below, clinging to the muddy banks, sprawls the shadowed shanty-town of the bridgefolk. Derisively called castoffs by guards and loyalists, they are the poor, the dispossessed, and the unwanted. Their shelters of driftwood and patched sailcloth sag against the arches, their fires smoldering. The guards turn a blind eye so long as the bridgefolk stay beneath the bridge, out of sight, out of mind.

Rumors whisper of darker things lurking among them: a pale man who never blinks, voices in the reeds at night, and smugglers who slip through hidden culverts under their huts. To most townsfolk, the bridgefolk are simply beggars; to adventurers, they may be the key to secrets older and fouler than Saltmarsh itself.