The Duchy of Magnolia's Home is a contested Fief in the Kingdom of Willows corresponding to the state of Mississippi.
Overview[]
While the Duchy of Cotton ostensibly includes both the states of Mississippi and Alabama, in actuality, this is a duchy under siege by a fiesta duchess, Igrania, determined to wrest the western half away from Duke Firedrake and claim it as her rightful holding. In this land of hot, humid days and drowsy evenings, the dreams of the Old South atrophy while angry dreams of unfulfilled equal rights battles make themselves heard. The struggle against stereotyping both within and outside the Dreaming, forms one of the major issues in the Duchy.
Physical Geography[]
The Duchy of Cotton forms the eastern boundary of the contested Duchy of Magnolia's Home. To the west, the Mississippi River flows southward to rendezvous with the Gulf of Mexico (through New Orleans and the Mississippi Delta). The Gulf of Mexico forms the southernmost border of both duchies, while the Duchy of Graceland's (western Tennessee) Memphis-Chattanooga line runs from west to east like a straight-edge across the northern edge of both the Duchy of Cotton and its rebellious western half.
The Duchy of Magnolia's Home contains fertile farmlands in its interior, a white-sand coastal strip lined with stands of oaks and, of course, the floodplains of the Mississippi Delta. Many changelings bask in the warmth and sensuous lethargy of the Deep South, and African-American Kinain whose ancestors left in the wake of the Civil War are now returning, bringing with them eshu who have been raised in the North but who feel the pull of their Southern heritage.
Major Cities & Landmarks[]
The essence of the Old South lives on in the disputed Duchy of Magnolia's Home. Watered by the Mississippi River, the land contains farmlands, bayous, and pine forests. Antebellum plantations now serve as historic sites and tourist hostels.
Biloxi[]
The Duchy's third-largest city, Biloxi holds the distinction of being the Gulf Coast's oldest unbroken settlement. Proud Kithain who recall Mardi Gras' beginnings in this area (rather than New Orleans where it has gained enormous popularity) helped build and now maintain the Mardi Gras Museum. While the Unseelie revel during New Orleans' Carnival, Biloxi's Mardi Gras serves as the destination for most members of the Seelie Court. A few changelings claim various antebellum mansions; some of them give guided tours to mortals and Within fascinated by the South's past. One motley of pooka have claimed a particularly well-kept mansion and give mock tours and "formal" dinner parties for commoners who don the chimerical garb of sidhe nobility (usually taken to grotesque exaggeration) and spoof the manners of the genteel Southern belles and gentlemen of times past.
Jackson[]
Mississippi's capital since 1821, Jackson's Kithain patronize the Governor's Museum and the Mississippi Arts Center. The Eudora Welty Library attracts the changeling literati, while the Davis Planetarium (the Southeast's largest) holds endless wonder for Magnolia's childlings, who regularly swarm the place.
Natchez[]
At one extreme of the Natchez Trace Parkway, Natchez is the home of the Grand Village of the Natchez Indians (a museum and park), as well as numerous old Southern mansions, some of which now serve as hotels and nightspots. Though not spoken of, Natchez is usually considered to be Nunnehi territory. Unlike their more aggressive cousins, though, the nanehi who frequent Natchez apparently hold no enmity against European changelings, and even acknowledge "Duchess" Igrania's claim to a freehold there. Rumors that Igrania has recruited an important nanehi medicine woman into the Cat's Cradle are whispered in several circles, but as yet that story is unconfirmed.
Oxford[]
The home of "Ole Miss," the University of Mississippi, this quintessential Southern town achieved literary fame in its guise as Jefferson, Mississippi in the works of William Faulkner, her native son. The city also houses the Center for the Study of Southern Culture. While a few Kithain reside in Oxford and serve as muses to mortals caught up in literary pursuits, several younger fae find the town far too staid for their liking.
Tupelo[]
Now a center for the arts and noted for its medical practice, Tupelo is the birthplace of "the King." Fans come here to see the two-room house where Elvis was born and to visit Elvis Presley Park, the Elvis Presley Museum, and the Elvis Presley Memorial Chapel. Despite the Duke of Graceland's claim as the most refined Elvis impersonator among the Kithain, dozens of wannabes flock to Tupelo searching for the inspiration that will place them beyond the imitative and into the echelons of true originality.
Natural Places[]
In Magnolia's Home, the Bynum and Emerald mounds attest to an early tribe's engineering skills. The 400+ mile Natchez Trace Parkway from Nashville to Natchez traces the oldest routes of the region's native people's through some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the South. While open to the public, some of the areas just off the trail itself are rumored to hold Nunnehi enclaves that have never been discovered by Europeans. Another rumor tells of a dark dell somewhere along the trail where a Lost One dwells, spinning off nightmare dreams that afflict any Kithain who travel through the region
Enchanted Places[]
Dramatis Personae[]
References[]
- CTD: Kingdom of Willows, p. 52-56