Venaiel's Courts (Kildar Fey Subfactions)
Fey do not cling to authority for protection like mortals cling to their kings. Fey follow a Court because their nature aligns with the Court. The Courts are structured similarly to mortal political structures of the Guilds with merchants, experts, courtesans, nobles and commoners vying for power, creating alliances and plotting intrigues. Except the Fey, in an attempt to prove they are better than mortals, turn it up to eleven. Alliances are more fickle, power fluctuates constantly and intrigues are much more deadly than the games mortals play.
List of Courts
Non-Court Subfactions:
The Hags
General Fey Courts (Outside the Gleamvale)
The most common courts from traditional legends are the Seelie or Summer Court, and the Unseelie or Winter Court. The Seelie consists of more benevolent fairies, while the Unseelie consists of more malevolent, demon or goblin-like figures. However, that does not mean all Seelie fey are good in the sense we use it. They may trick mortals for fun in ways that are absolutely not funny to the mortal in question.
Two queens hold court in the Feywild, and most fey owe allegiance to one or the other. Queen Titania and her Summer Court lead the seelie fey, and the Queen of Air and Darkness, ruler of the Gloaming Court, leads the unseelie fey.
Seelie and unseelie do not directly correlate with good and evil, though many mortals make that equation. Many seelie fey are good, and many unseelie are evil, but their opposition to each other stems from their queens' jealous rivalry, not abstract moral concerns. Ugly denizens of the Feywild, such as fomorians and hags, are almost never members of either court, and fey of independent spirit reject the courts entirely.
The courts have warred at times, but they also compete in more-or-less friendly contests and even ally with one another in small and secret ways.
Seelie Fey and Unseelie Fey are two groups that often find themselves at odds. Seelie Fey cling to the trappings of civilization, value protocol, and uphold traditions. Unseelie Fey indulge their primal instincts, abhor adherence to protocol, and shun conformity. The two groups are not opposites morally or ethically; good and evil Fey can be found in both.
Seelie and Unseelie Fey gather in courts. The Seelie court is called the Summer Court, and the Unseelie court is called the Gloaming Court. Both courts stretch to the far corners of the Feywild, so their representatives can be encountered almost anywhere on this plane of existence. The Summer Court and the Gloaming Court are by no means the only great Fey courts, but they're the most wellknown to creatures on the Material Plane and the most widespread.
How the Summer Court and the Gloaming Court came to be is a mystery. Perhaps some Fey felt a deeper affinity with the natural world and chose to emulate it, while other Fey began to control nature, using magic to invent new ways of living. Whatever the case, innumerable Fey pursued these two paths, which became the two courts, and there have been squabbles between them ever since.
Each court tries to destabilize and demoralize the other. Both Fey courts have spies who dig up dirt, sow seeds of dissent, and cause mischief. Captured spies are either ransomed or made examples of in various humiliating, nonlethal ways.
Much of the gossip and chatter within the Feywild is fueled by the intrigue and drama between the two queens that rule the courts. Titania, the Summer Queen, is the regal and charismatic ruler of the Summer Court. Her court enjoys a tenuous peace with the unearthly ruler of the Gloaming Court, the Queen of Air and Darkness, who allows her kin to dabble in magic forbidden by the Seelie Court.
Conflicts between the Fey courts are often ritualized. Representatives of both courts gather in an amphitheater or field to have heated debates or energetic dance competitions that simulate combat, and these events are often laced with bawdy insults and lewd gestures. Only on rare occasions do things get physical, and even then, the Fey do little more than bite, scratch, and hurl mud at each other.
Every now and then, the two queens lock horns, causing tensions to rise throughout the Feywild. If only one of them can get her way, what would normally be a squabble can turn to bloodshed. But only the Fey queens can declare all-out war against each other, and it would take something extreme to have them abandon their relative peace and hurl their courts into violence and chaos.
The Summer Court and the Gloaming Court have nothing akin to a mutual defense pact, and the very thought of one is greeted by jeers on both sides. If a rising army of fomorians or some other threat endangers one court, it's widely understood that the other court will not intervene unless it, too, is threatened by the same enemy.
Summer Court (Seelie Fey)
Favors sunshine, butterflies, flowers, music, and singing birds
Values ceremony and refinement (for example, proper ways of speaking, formal etiquette, and extravagant dinner parties)
Favors elaborate, manufactured costuming with immaculate tailoring
Harshly judges those who don't exhibit the proper etiquette (adventurers who commit social blunders make fools of themselves, might be labeled buffoons, and might be laughed out of court)
Gloaming Court (Unseelie Fey)
Favors gloom, twilight, cobwebs, fireflies, hooting owls, and croaking frogs
Values the intuitive and instinctual (for example, mystical rituals, visionaries, and firelit parties)
Shuns the constraints of civilization (instead wearing only unfinished natural materials and sleeping under the stars)
Dabbles in mysterious magic and rituals (adventurers can run afoul of curses if they don't follow the Unseelie ways)