Over a crown of moun­tains, a wind drew open the benight­ed sky.

And through the part­ing veil, dif­fuse­ly orange at the sep­a­rat­ing edges, there bloomed the autumn moon: Burn­ing, huge, lard­ed in vapor. Smok­ing like an eye of mag­ma in some tro­pos­pher­ic fuma­role. Swollen hot with a fever absent the wind-bit­ten slopes and rip­pling waters of the moun­tain tarn below.

And the moon neared—terrifically. Its swelling lumi­nance burst through night’s black nim­bo­stra­tus like a tiger-vis­age through black jun­gle. The last palls of cloud fled, burned off the lunar face as it careened ever clos­er through short­en­ing vast­ness to swell dupli­cat­ed in the moun­tain lake, blaz­ing and shiv­er­ing with frigid fire. The clam­my air whis­tled and surged as if com­pressed, and the mar­itime pines atop their steep moraine shiv­ered and blanched ochre, stained by hideous jack-o’-lantern light.

Under the near­ing moon, on the wind-whipped bal­cony of a dark­ling cas­tle piled high on the wood­ed slopes beyond the lake, there played a man on a sitar. Cross­legged on a vel­vet pouf, wrapped in a shawl over his lin­in suit, he played. Worn brown hands run­ning slow over the three top­strings, draw­ing out pen­sive res­o­nant drones, neck craned at the near­ing moon. His lined brown eyes heavy, full of cop­per. Steady, as if hold­ing the gaze of a beast in an alien wood.

Behind him, through baroque lead­ed win­dows heavy with salt cruft, a small par­ty laughed and drank, their affair lit by the orange bale-light of autumn and by the gild­ed shim­mer of mov­ing pic­tures pro­ject­ed on a stone wall. They heed­ed the whirring pic­ture machine and its con­jured spec­ta­cle of high-kick­ing cabaret, laugh­ing and exclaim­ing, but not the pre­cip­i­tous, seething moon. Only the man and his instru­ment did. Breath white, eyes full. Alone, com­muning.

The par­ty grew loud­er a moment. A door clicked shut. The rev­el­ry qui­et­ed again.

“Put! Oh, dear Put Anti, there you are.”

Put—the man—broke his gaze to greet her: A freck­led young Firl in a sleeve­less laven­der suit with a fan­cy ermine ruff. She wore white cock­tail gloves and clutched an emp­ty glass.

“Lenore,” he smiled, still­ing the sitar’s strings.

She tip­toed near, clutch­ing her ruff, shiv­er­ing.

“What are you doing out in this weath­er? We miss you.” She sat on an adja­cent pouf. She smelt like crushed basil, and olives, and gin.

“I am observ­ing your moon.” He inclined his head to it. It was near­er than ever.

“The moon? You can see it any night, Dear. Elquist is show­ing his newest pic­ture rib­bons. Do come join us!”

“Soon, soon. It will come soon, and I do not want to miss it.”

“Miss what?”

“The win­ter sol­stice, I believe you call it.”

“Oh, is that tonight?” She looked briefly up. “I sup­pose it must be, but why?”

Put smiled. “Where I am from—Tchum Jare’ach, which you call Jerosia—such things do not occur.”

“They don’t have sea­sons in the world to the south?” She shiv­ered.

“We do, but not as yours.”

“What are they like?”

“Hmm,” he said. “You see: Past the swel­ter­ing mal­pais of Bar­ramec­ca, past the poi­son cereus groves, the dust­lands will take you out of Nôren and into the vast domain under the Man in the Moon. * Into the glo­ry of His cre­ation. There, he wheels over­head, unchang­ing, vis­it­ing night­ly to see his peo­ple. The sea­sons and tides he makes for us are mild. Nev­er cold. He is gen­er­ous, and he grins down at us, glad at what he sees.”

Lenore twirled her glass in her hands. “Sounds very nice.”

“I miss it,” smiled Put. “I have been away from home for so long, but I have nev­er seen your chang­ing of the sea­sons. How ungrate­ful I am.” He gazed up, and his eyes shone bur­nished orange. The wind snared and whis­tled, tug­ging at his shawl.

Lenore looked up too. “Per­haps this one would be less angry if we loved it as much as yours.”

Put nod­ded solemn­ly. He removed a pock­et watch from inside his jack­et. “A minute more. Will you sit with me and wit­ness it? Then we will rejoin Elquist and his pic­tures.”

Lenore gig­gled, shiv­er­ing. “Fine, but let me have some of that shawl.”

They hud­dled close and peered up. Put plucked and droned on the sitar, fin­gers slow. Lenore rubbed her gloved hands; her fin­ger­bones chirped like mar­bles. Above them, the autumn moon of Nôren threat­ened, humungous. Bright like hot cop­per and gory with craters. A spot of laugh­ter tit­tered inside the cas­tle.

A rush of air swelled. The pines lashed and fled their nee­dles. The salt lake hurled and churned. Around the tow­ers and but­tress­es and crenela­tions of the shad­owed cas­tle, the wind screamed and tore. A slate tile hur­tled down, spin­ning light like a leaf towards the bowl of the lake. Lenore gasped. Put’s heart ham­mered hard in his throat.

On the watch in Put’s hand, the sec­ond hand crossed mid­night.

Then, all was still. The trees stayed their boughs. The lake calmed. The orange light was gone, replaced by cool, spec­tral blue.

Put beamed. Beside him, Lenore hur­ried up, shiv­er­ing hard and laugh­ing at his expres­sion.

“Well, it was love­ly. I hope it suit­ed you; now, let’s go where it’s warm!” She hur­ried away.

Put Anti lin­gered a moment. Still he gazed, eyes high and full of won­der at the moon: At the plat­inum win­ter moon and its lam­bent blue com­pan­ion. Dis­tant and cool. Frigid, but very far away.

He stood and col­lect­ed his shawl, his sitar. Before the went inside, he smiled at the moon and spoke in a lan­guage not spo­ken any­where else that night in Nôren.

“Thank you.”

The seasons

The Coast is a bro­ken world. A rem­nant frag­ment of a mur­dered uni­verse. Its edges are con­vo­lut­ed and myr­i­ad. They con­nect to neigh­bor­ing worlds at lat­i­tudes, lon­gi­tudes, and alti­tudes unpre­dictable and often imper­cep­ti­ble. The sky is one of these edges: Past a cer­tain alti­tude, the world’s own vault is no more, and the heav­ens beyond not its own. These sov­er­eign nightscapes and their wheel­ing con­tents belong to oth­er worlds entire­ly, and they play in turns with the pass­ing of the sea­sons.

For every sea­son, there is a moon. A starfield. A tapes­try of con­stel­la­tions. Their effects on the world are pal­pa­ble and fear­some: They bring dis­parate tides, weath­ers, and stel­lar maps by which to nav­i­gate. It is their con­tin­u­al chang­ing that so hin­dered Coastal sailors’ jour­neys of old, requir­ing nav­i­ga­tors learn the paths of ersatz lodestars. For this, the first trans-lat­i­tu­di­nal voy­age occurred in 2.647, far after schol­ar­ly nav­i­ga­tors plot­ted the route. It would be anoth­er 600 years before Lit­toran sailors breached the dol­drums West of the Lantrim sea and first sailed into anoth­er world. **

The moons’ influ­ence is felt also in liv­ing beings. Some folk are born sen­si­tive to one or more sea­son­al spheres; endur­ing men­tal, phys­i­cal, and spir­i­tu­al vagaries while their moon roves the sky. These unfor­tu­nates are lunatics, and the Coast is not often kind to them. † Those with agency and not too debil­i­tat­ed by the spheres seek to flee the world. They become whalers beyond the Gate of Sloe, fruit-pick­ers in the lus­cious groves of Pan­tea, or explor­ers to yet-unchart­ed realms beyond the West­ern seas, rev­el­ing in cho­sen exile in their free­dom from the hor­rid moons of Nôren. †† Oth­ers are not so for­tu­nate: Crip­pled by their lunar neu­roses or giv­en no choice by guardians, they are entrust­ed to asy­lums. Some receive attempts at humane treat­ment involv­ing fresh air, moun­tain water, and nuveau med­ica­tion. Oth­ers are shut away like ban­shees to guilty mad­hous­es, nev­er to be seen again.

Few Lit­torans know the ori­gin of the sky’s chang­ing spheres. They do not know the grim ancient his­to­ry that began it all. But they do know the moons. They know that a new astro­nom­i­cal season—a new moon—comes with the sol­stices that start the 3rd and 9th months and the equinox­es begin­ning the 6th and 12th. They know their names, their per­son­al­i­ties, and the host of super­sti­tions that sur­round them:

The spring moon

Alberon. Yel­low, large, and low. Regard­ed as a source of mad­ness and feared to be the vis­it­ing moon of the Oth­er­world. Every night, it dims as it nears the west­ern hori­zon, an effect that wors­ens towards sum­mer, lead­ing to three late-spring morn­ings of abject darkness—the so-called Can­dlenights or Moons of the Owl. Alberon is loathed not only in the wood­ed East—which abuts the Otherworld—but also by sailors, for its influ­ence on the tides and the weath­ers at sea is wan­ton and capri­cious. In any book of fairy-tales, there will be a ship­wreck, a beloved roy­al fam­i­ly dashed down to the ocean­ic abyss, and an orphan made fresh by Alberon, who is the sinker of ships. Sailors show Alberon obei­sance by nail­ing sil­ver coins to the mast, and march­land farm­ers hang sil­ver plat­ters on their doors, hop­ing the spring moon or its älfen kin will catch a glimpse of itself and be pleased.

Alberon cre­ates the most numer­ous and the most mis­er­able lunatics, who suf­fer every night of spring, even into the day, wracked by epilep­sy. sleep­walk­ing, or notions of invis­i­ble fairies wreak­ing tor­ment near at hand.

The summer moon

Luna, the true moon. She who belonged to the world when it was whole; who com­mand­ed the sky above the Nôr Glob­al­i­ty and all that came before it for untold mil­lions of mil­len­nia, just and soli­tary. Now, she is one among four, bid­ing her time in spaces unknown when the usurpers come to play in her sky.

Luna is sil­very and detailed, her sur­face cratered and lined. In places, mas­sive geome­tries twin­kle on her face: Immense glassy crys­tals, vis­i­ble by pow­er­ful tele­scope to be larg­er than moun­tains. Or per­haps struc­tures: Lunar palaces erect­ed by the Nôr in a time of unknow­able plen­ty, when the human species owned a beau­ti­ful intact globe entire and its moon togeth­er. Rumors and pulp-nov­els say that some Nôr still live up there, that there are men on the moon. Whether or not they vis­it us varies by sto­ry. Accord­ing to some, they invade and abduct chil­dren. To oth­ers, they are are con­sumed by guilt and will not return to the ter­res­tri­al world lest they be pros­e­cut­ed for crimes of the past. The most scan­dalous say the moon-men are mad: That Luna’s nine-month dis­ap­pear­ances into the unknown have wracked their brains and exposed them to extrater­res­tri­al hor­rors that swim between stars.

The autumn moon

Hal­low, or Sanc­tus. Large, pocked, and cop­per-tint­ed, the autumn moon grows sub­tly larg­er as win­ter nears, begin­ning, small­est, as the Har­vest Moon and grow­ing ter­ri­fy­ing­ly large in a calami­tous perigee come the win­ter sol­stice. Its steady approach affects a year­ly sea­son of storms that wors­ens through­out autumn before abrupt­ly abat­ing come win­ter.

Hal­low’s final night coin­cides with its accel­er­at­ed approach in the night sky, a fear­some event that con­jures severe weath­er. Ships do not go asea this night, should they help it, and no sane folk enter the forests of the world. Most Lit­torans pre­fer to spend their win­ter sol­stice indoors, be it by the fire­side or in mid­night mass. Hal­low is invari­ably ful­ly illu­mi­nat­ed on this night, bathing the world in bur­nished light.

To mark Hal­low’s oncom­ing night of fear, a mid-autumn hol­i­day is held: Hal­lowtide, cel­e­brat­ed on Octo­ber the 31st—directly pro­ceed­ing the Avethan hol­i­day of All Sain­t’s Day. Hal­lowtide cel­e­brants engage in feast­ing, child­ish div­ina­tions, crafts, games of skill, pranks, and ges­tures of appease­ment towards the Oth­er. Most notably, they hold sun­wise, or “wid­der­shins,” rit­u­als: Bon­fire dances and cir­cu­lar torch­light pro­ces­sions around prop­er­ty and coun­try­side, held against the direc­tion of the ris­ing moon. It is a pagan prac­tice, but still seri­ous one, espe­cial­ly on the north. These are deemed nec­es­sary to “wind back” the autumn moon suf­fi­cient­ly to pre­vent its col­li­sion with the world come the sol­stice. Hal­lowtide is thought also to mark the Oth­er­world’s strongest day of influ­ence, and the fes­tiv­i­ties and icon carv­ings held then are intend­ed to bring folk togeth­er for col­lec­tive safe­ty and to carve veg­etable tal­is­mans against fairies, both.

The Avethan autumn moon tra­di­tion, All­hal­lowtide, is a tri­nary hol­i­day feast cycle com­posed of Hal­lowtide, All Saints’, and All Souls’ Days. Unlike the North­ern practice—deemed offen­sive and pagan—the hol­i­day is devot­ed to the hon­ored dead, who are believed to be retrieved to Par­adise by the prox­i­mal autumn moon should they be caught wan­der­ing as spir­its upon Nôren. Their com­men­da­tion on the 31st is required for their redemp­tive ascen­sion with the chang­ing moon. The lat­er two hol­i­days involve these saved souls’ beat­i­fi­ca­tion and ven­er­a­tion, respec­tive­ly.

In recent years, doom­say­ing spir­i­tu­al­ists claim that a sol­stice will some day arrive in which Hal­low does not stop in its earth­ward descent: That the peace­ful win­ter moons will not come, and that the world will be extin­guished by the autumn moon. They pro­pose far-fetched and var­i­ous solu­tions to this: Con­ver­sion to Aveth, that ones’ soul may be pre­served after the apoc­a­lypse. Absti­nence from cig­a­rettes, claim­ing that dox­bells are lunar spies implant­ed in the herb by moon-rays. The sever­est demand a com­plete ban on elec­tric light, claim­ing that all elec­tric lamps hum at a fre­quen­cy that weak­ens the mate­ri­als of the heav­ens.

The winter moons

Selas and Idē. Both dis­tant. One plat­inum-bright like a coin. The oth­er small and vibrant­ly blue. The small­er Idē orbits Selas, itself a moon. Its occa­sion­al align­ment cen­tral the larg­er is deemed by South­ern­ers to be an aspect of the Evil Eye, a por­tent most omi­nous. No church-rite nor sig­nif­i­cant deci­sion should coin­cide the for­ma­tion of the Eye of Selas, lest it be doomed to fail. The slight radi­al wrin­kles of the larg­er moon enhance the “Eye”, appear­ing as stri­a­tions of an icy iris around a blue pupil.

Despite their impor­tance in Alagóran super­sti­tion, both moons hold Agadese names and were dubbed dur­ing the Agadese Plenipo­tence. They had ver­nac­u­lar names before­hand, but few are remem­bered now, and none are names for Idē: Only Selas is men­tioned by any cul­ture before Mid­dle Aga­dion. None men­tion the small­er moon at all. Spec­u­la­tion abounds on this lin­guis­tic and doc­u­men­tary gap: Some claim the Agadese did not per­ceive blue; that they were unable to see the moon. ‡ More real­is­tic schol­ars posit that Idē was acquired by Selas some time dur­ing the Plenipo­tence; that it drift­ed through what­ev­er com­pos­es the night’s black ocean and became enthralled. Wilder schol­ars sug­gest a sim­i­lar vari­ant, but claim that Idē is a man­u­fac­tured prod­uct. A work of great sor­cery. An orna­ment applied by a blue-lov­ing cul­ture to their favorite, win­ter moon.

Regard­less of the small­er’s ori­gin, Selas and Idē both are loved in mod­ern times: They are cher­ished in Empereaux, where the Club Selascine—an à la mode social clique—reveres the win­ter moon and its daugh­ter, using their sea­son­al appear­ance to time extrav­a­gant par­ties. Atten­dees of these soirées report the con­sump­tion of strange tinc­tures that make crys­talline the dark­ness of the heav­ens, that the Impe­r­i­al Princess of Empereaux is a pre­sid­ing mem­ber, and that the win­ter moons make pos­si­ble in their sea­son the most won­drous of sor­ceries.

†† Pan­tea A par­adise shore recent­ly dis­cov­ered beyond the Track­less Isles. A going con­cern and sub­ject of musch spec­u­la­tion, not only for its secret loca­tion, jeal­ousy guard­ed by the Pan­tean Colo­nial Char­ter, but also for its super­abun­dant fer­tile zone: Fruit crops grow at incred­i­ble pace there, doughti­ly out­com­pet­ing the local flo­ra, which are all suc­cu­lents. This vast green zone is encom­passed by an abrupt desert beyond which fur­ther green oases are spec­u­lat­ed. In news­pa­pers, sailors’ sto­ries from Pan­tea are enchant­i­ng: They say it nev­er rains. That under six feet of dark soil the earth is all of cav­erns through­out bedrock. That colos­sal crea­tures walk on the desert hori­zon, qua­ver­ing with mirage, like ambu­la­to­ry moun­tains that observe but nev­er draw near.

Note

Pub­lished on the occa­sion of the super­moon.

I will con­tribute more moon facts/edits to this at a lat­er date.

Yes, the Emper­oussin cal­en­dar is famil­iar.

If you did­n’t know, Incunab­u­li now has a Dis­cord serv­er. Addi­tion­al­ly, the RSS feed is fixed and the Patre­on is back on.

⁂