Chapter 265: A Phantom Festival
The festival in Ashlynn’s memory was filled with the bustle of people, the sounds of laughter and music and the smells of dozens of dishes overlapping with the salty air of the fresh sea breeze.
The Holy Festival of Light was the largest festival of the year in Blackwell County. In places like Lothian March, the Lord’s Harvest in the fall was even bigger and Ashlynn had heard that in the northern territories, Mid Winter’s Night held the crown for the largest public celebration, but in Blackwell, the Holy Festival of Light had always been the busiest and most enthusiastically welcomed festival of the year.
People spent an entire week before the start of the festival setting up stalls and booths that lined the streets of the city center. Some families spent an entire year preparing their wares. Children combed the beaches each morning for perfect shells or rare sea glass while their parents transformed these treasures into delicate wind chimes that sang in the breeze or intricate jewelry that captured the ocean’s beauty.
The simplest crafts were often just strings of shells that children had cleaned and polished themselves. While they weren’t highly prized by locals, sailors from across the sea would still pay as much as a whole copper penny for a single string of shells that were free of chips or blemishes.
Meanwhile, families with older children or adults who were particularly skilled worked with delicate tools to turn the treasures of the sea into beautiful hair combs with intricate patterns of shell pieces or set sea glass into walking sticks carved from driftwood that were admired by everyone from young merchants to aging pensioners. These handcrafted pieces would either be sold at family stalls during the festival or given away as prizes by those with the business acumen and wealth to host games for the common folk.
Most importantly, the spring squalls had ended and the autumn gales had yet to blow in, making this the best time of year for visitors from across the sea. The busy port was filled with foreign traders, eager to snap up a piece of the ’new world’ to bring home to the old countries and flaunt their status before their less traveled peers. Even a common deckhand with a few copper pennies in his pocket could find hours of entertainment and chances to bring home souvenirs worth their weight in silver across the sea.
"What kind of games are played at Eldritch festivals?" Ashlynn asked, as she guided Nyrielle to a street filled with small stalls and barkers trying to lure people to one particular game or another.
"You’ve heard about the arena in High Fen City," Nyrielle said, gazing more at the joyful expression on Ashlynn’s face than the sights of the festival around her. "The Eldritch prefer physical competitions. If it isn’t gladiatorial combat, it might be wrestling matches, archery contests, or any number of other things."
"In the Southern Steppes," Nyrielle continued. "They play a game where brightly colored rings are hung on strings from poles and people from the Swift Hoof Clan race around a track with spears to catch as many rings as they can. People from other clans may ride horses to compete alongside them. The Eldritch value strength and most games they play have some martial application."