Midwinter's Night (CTD)

Midwinter's Night, January 13th, is a festival of the Kithain usually celebrated by the Shadow Court.

Overview

Called “Midvintersblót” by the Norse, Midwinter's Night was also acknowledged as the Festival of Brewing among the Celts. Because of its Norse connection, many Unseelie trolls consider Midwinter to be their own special festival. They meet together in secret rites that they share with no other fae, even others of the Shadow Court.

Midwinter once signaled the date human tribes knew if their stocks of grain would last through the winter. If the stores were enough, mead and ale were brewed from a part of the supplies, enlivening the feasting, dancing and storytelling that took place on the longest night. If supplies were low, they were instead conserved and used as food.

Originally celebrated in regions where night covered the land for almost half the year, Midwinter was concerned with measuring how long it would be until the snows melted and spring returned. Lighting the fires at Midwinter thus became a symbolic, magical ritual designed to entice the pale winter sun to reignite in all its summer glory. The warming hearth fire was the heart of every home, and Glamour-fueled balefire the heart of every faerie freehold. On Midwinter Night, kings and queens of the fae sent out firebrands, messengers carrying brands lit from the royal balefire, to each of the freeholds within their demesne. Old balefires were extinguished, and the king’s Glamour-endowed balefire became the catalyst for the new fires lit during the festival of Imbolc.

Although High King David has reinstituted this practice in Concordia, the Seelie have failed to recognize that the kings who long ago sent the balefire to the myriad freeholds were not Seelie (for their rulership did not compass this part of the year), but Unseelie. The Shadow Court have not forgotten. Their ancient duties once called for them to rekindle the depleted Glamour within each freehold. Today they gather that Glamour in any way they must, be it through Musing or Ravaging (or stealing the balefire from the king’s appointed messengers), and they hold it close, to be used only when the coldest part of Endless Winter signals that the time has come to relight the dying balefires that power the creativity of the world.

References

1. CTD. The Shadow Court, pp. 42-43.