Event: Sorrows

The long, cold winter’s opening is marked by Sorrows, which occurs at the juncture of the months of Little Yule and Great Yule.

What is Sorrows about?

The purpose of Sorrows is to commemorate the dead, to remember friends and family lost to the sands of time and honour them. Along with the mortal dead, the festival also serves to honour Voland; when Bishal cut him down, for all intents and purposes he was dead, and so Sorrows remembers the sadness of having lost him. Finally, the festival also marks the beginning of the Namelessness, when children are stripped of their name and treated as dead. Namelessness is part of remembering Voland’s death; children are made to be ceremonially dead for six months, the same amount of time as Voland was.

Though the colder weather usually arrives before Sorrows, it is officially viewed as the first day of winter. The Libram tells that after Voland died, the world was plunged into the first winter as Bishal let loose the ice of Nifel, the frozen hell that Bishal hails from. This part of the story is meant to explain the cycle of the seasons; prior to the Freeze this was used as evidence by the sceptical that the Libram was largely fictional, a view which has waned in support in the Bay in the present.

What are normal Sorrows activities?

The festivities of Sorrows occur in the first half of the day, culminating in a modest feast at midday. Prior to the feast, many people sing various traditional songs about Voland, death and rebirth, and the remembrance of those loved ones that are gone to Muspel to reside with Voland and bask in the heat of his eternal flames. Sometimes games are played in the morning, especially by the children who are about to become Nameless. These activities and the midday meal that follows are often conducted with just the family.

After the feast, people begin to make their way to the kirkhall for the holiday service. Traditionally, the service begins with a reading from the Libram, the first chapters up to the death of Voland and the coming of the winter. Following the reading, the service takes the form of a funeral for Voland complete with a coffin surmounted by a large red candle; various songs are sung, laments for the dead and messages of love and remembrance. When sunset approaches, it is time for those children who have reached the age of twelve in the past year to become Nameless.

The children are dressed in white robes and each given a candle. One by one, they approach the head of the kirkhall and are given a blessing by the Keeper. The child lights his or her own candle from the flame of the red candle on Voland’s coffin, then one of their parents or another family member such as a sibling or an aunt or uncle proceeds to remove the child’s hair with a saege knife. The child speaks his or her name aloud for all to hear, and hands the Keeper the candle. The Keeper declares the child dead, and places the candle with Voland’s. Once all the children have become nameless, one final lament is sung, and the people return home for bed. The candles of the nameless are watched over by the Keeper, keeping the flames alive and exchanging spent candles for new ones all through the winter.

What is eaten during Sorrows?

As mentioned, the feast on Sorrows is modest, but still larger than a normal meal. The contents of the meal are very simple, the only special feature being cinnamon loaf baked and distributed by the Keepers. The Order maintains a number of trees from which cinnamon is harvested specifically for this purpose. The rest of the meal traditionally consists of porridge, cheese, and apples, though some people also include small portions of reindeer meat. Cider and rosehip tea are the usual drinks for all ages.

Possible Adventure Hooks

Namelessness can prove to be quite an ordeal, being without contact from your family and friends for so long, and the prospect of it can frighten many preparing to undergo it. Your adventurers could be enlisted to find and return children who have run away, hoping to avoid Namelessness. This mission would come with a time limit as the ceremony cannot be performed on any other day, and a child who has not undergone his or her Namelessness will never be considered an adult.

Because of the war, malicious people on both sides might attempt to disrupt the Sorrows traditions in order to damage the enemy’s morale. This may come in the form of a minor disruption, such as the cinnamon being stolen before it can be used in the baking of the holiday loaves, or it could be a more significant matter, such as stealing or destroying the candles used in the Sorrows service.

Lastly, the ceremony itself could be interrupted. Perhaps midway through the service, Voland’s empty coffin opens itself, and someone claiming to be Voland emerges. This could be a genuine visitation from an aspect of the god himself, or it could be a malicious spirit or being with some sinister plan that involves gaining the trust of the people.

Gone on Holiday: Returning January 3, 2011 for a full week (five days) of posts. Resuming the normal schedule the following week.

Event: Hallows

As the first in our series on festivals and other special events in the Bay, we take a look at Hallows, which takes place at the juncture between the months of Little Tober and Great Tober.

What is Hallows about?

The primary purpose of the Hallows festival is to celebrate the end of the year’s successful harvest. Hallows is a time to thank Voland for the bounty of the season that will hopefully sustain everyone through the long winter. The festival can be seen as an analogue of Thanksgiving.

Because the start and end of seasons can vary from year to year, sometimes the harvest runs later than expected; when that happens Hallows is postponed until the work is done. What this means is that Little Tober continues, adding more days beyond the usual 25, until the harvest’s end, at which point Hallows day occurs. Days added to Little Tober are subtracted from Great Tober.

Though not directly related to the harvest, tales of horror abound during Hallows. Somewhat linking to the harvest, many of the stories include scarecrows come to life roaming the countryside. One particularly famous scarecrow is known as Mister Unlucky, who has a massive pumpkin for a head and is said to devour children in the night. The stories say that children can protect themselves from Mister Unlucky and the other scarecrows by saying a prayer to Voland and hanging a wreath in their windows on Hallows night.

What are normal Hallows activities?

On Hallows day, a special service is held outside of the kirkhall. A large bonfire is built up, but not immediately lit. Instead there is a ceremony where a pumpkin is placed among the wood by the Keeper as a symbolic sacrifice to Voland. Only once the sacrifice is in place is the bonfire set ablaze and the pumpkin is consumed by fire, symbolizing Voland’s acceptance of the gift.

After the ceremony the Keepers generally organize games and festivities for the children, while adults go about their business. One game involves the Keeper masquerading as Mister Unlucky and chasing the children, who must hide from the mad scarecrow or be gobbled up. This game is usually the last played, and concludes with the ringing of the kirkhall bell at sunset, signalling the dinner hour.

While some of the time without the children is spent preparing the evening meal, it is tradition among many for a couple to take the opportunity to share their bed. As a result, many children are conceived on Hallows, and there is a spike in births around the end of Great Solen and beginning of Little Greening.

What is eaten during Hallows?

The highlight of the festival is the evening feast. The term feast may be a bit misleading; the people of the bay in no way overeat as is common in real world Thanksgiving, but they do eat more than usual. Waterfowl is the traditional dish, usually duck among the commoners, while nobles and the wealthy eat goose. Some families may not be able to afford even a duck, and so they will often resort to other fowl such as chicken or squab.

Side dishes that you might find at the meal include potatoes, squash or pumpkin soup, and a variety of greens. Some households also bake a special cranberry bread for the occasion. The specifics of the food in any given table can vary wildly, just as in the real world.

Possible Adventure Hooks

The most obvious adventure hook relating to Hallows is Mister Unlucky. You can have your adventurers deal with disappearing children, and discover that the stories of living scarecrows are more than just stories. This adventure should probably conclude with a fight against Mister Unlucky himself, perhaps with a retinue of ghasts or scarecrows.

A more mundane threat to deal with during hallows might be bandits. Following the successful harvest, the freshly reaped food is nowhere to be found. The player characters may discover that varkers are behind the missing stores, or perhaps the culprits are closer to home, people living in their midst looking out only for themselves rather than the community.

If you want to bring the Blackwood Scions into your adventure, either of the above hooks could be adjusted to their aims. Mister Unlucky and his followers could be constructs created by the Scions to spread terror and undermine the Baron’s rule, or could even simply be Scions in disguise. For the missing food hook, the Scions could again be attempting to undermine the established authority, or they may be simply building up their own stores in preparation for something bigger.

Monday: The Hodekin Nation

Culture: Calendar

After the Freeze began and it became clear that the world was changed, the leaders of the Bay decided to alter their calendar to reflect the new state of affairs. Part of this change involved numbering years relative to the start of the Freeze. The current year is the 147^th Year of the Freeze (YotF).

Months

Each year is divided into six pairs of two months. The two months share the same name, with the 25-day Little month preceding the 35-day Great month. The months of the year, in order, are as follows:

Month	Light & Dark on Festival Day	Season
Great Solen	12 hrs day/night	Spring
Little Greening	24 hours day 0 hours night	Summer
Great Greening		Summer
Little Tober	12 hours day 12 hours night	Autumn
Great Tober		Autumn
Little Yule	6 hours day 18 hours night	Winter
Great Yule		Winter
Little Fevrem	0 hours day 24 hours night	Winter
Great Fevrem		Winter
Little Noer	6 hours day 18 hours night	Winter
Great Noer		Winter
Little Solen	12 hrs day/night	Spring

The first month of the year is Great Solen, which begins with an even split between day and night at 12 hours each, but ends with over 18 hours of daylight. This trend continues in Little Greening which ends its length with the sun not setting at all. During Great Greening the balance begins to shift back in the other direction, and by the end of Little Tober there is once again an even division of daylight and darkness. The diminishment of daylight slows now, and by the end of Little Yule there is still 6 hours of light each day. The darkness takes full control between the Fevrems, then light begins to return again. Slowly, the light increases each month for the rest of the year until it has reached balance again at the end of Little Solen.

The seasons shift with the amount of daylight; the Solens are considered spring, the Greenings are summer, and the Tobers are fall. The six remaining months are all considered winter as the temperature drops considerably during that time. It should be noted, however, that despite being referred to as summer, the temperature during the Greenings rarely rises above 15°C/60°F and the average temperature is closer to 10°C/50°F. During the winter, the temperatures can fall as low as -40°C/-40°F but are often much closer to -20°C/-5°F and sometimes rise above 0°C/30°F.

Weeks

The calendar of the Bay does use weeks, but unlike our calendar their weeks are only six days long. Because each pair of months contains 60 days, those days are evenly divided into exactly 10 weeks and the full year contains exactly 60 weeks. The days of the week are as follows:

Mondey

Tirdey

Welsdey

Fardey

Saddey

Volands

Volands, the last day of the week, is the day of prayer when the people attend services at the kirkhall, but it is not otherwise considered a day of rest and work often resumes after services conclude.

Festival Days

For each pair of months, the transition between the Little month and the Great month is marked by a festival day. These festivals are not considered to be part of any month, instead standing on their own in the calendar.

The first festival, Summertide, takes place between the Greenings. It is a day of celebration and merriment, and many traditional games are played at specific hours of the nightless day. Though the original purpose of this festival is unknown, many view it as a moment to have fun and unwind between the work of planting and fostering food crops and the work of harvesting those same crops.

Between the Tobers is the festival of Hallows, a day to celebrate the harvest and thank Voland for the season’s bounty. A good harvest is essential to lasting through the long winter, and so the celebration of Hallows is sometimes delayed so that the work of harvesting can be completed before the frost comes.

Once the winter begins in the months of Yule, the dour day of Sorrows occurs. A mock funeral is held to commemorate the death of Voland, and the day is also used to remember family and friends who have passed. It is also the beginning of the coming of age ceremony for all those who have reached 12 years. For six months, the children are stripped of their name and treated as if they have died, having to fend for themselves.

Chand, the festival of lights, occurs in the Fevrems. It is the darkest time of the year, and so it is tradition to light candles and multicoloured lanterns everywhere. This is the only night that the nameless are acknowledged and spoken to.

In the months of Noer is the festival day of the same name. Noer, unlike the other days, is not celebrated with special meals and parties. Instead, it is a day of quiet contemplation when one remembers their life and thinks of their failures and successes. It is expected that you not work, eat, or sleep between the tolling of the bells.

Finally, the last festival is Nighsend. Nighsend, between Little Solen and Great Solen, is the last day of the year and so serves as the new year’s celebration. On Nighsend, the nameless become alive again, and can reclaim their names. Once their names are reclaimed, each receives a Saex knife and is considered to be an adult.

Wednesday: The Leaders of the Five Nations and Influential Groups