Yesterday, I remember clearly. The plague had come, sweeping Banality before it like a cold wind. Iron could be tasted in the air. The Gates were closing. That was the day we left. I stood in my place in the procession, guarding those criminals who were to be prisoned in the Wheel of Time. The clarion sounded, echoing from the hills. We marched through the gate. And I found myself lying upon the hard stone earth before a narrow canyon, my sword "the Cold Light of Truth" hanging limp from my hand. I was bathed in blood, soaked to the bones in it. My sword was clotted with gore, my armour rent beyond repair. Before me, screaming monsters with skins of iron tore the air, running upon black legs. I lay in a pool of shattered glass, and the moon grimaced down upon me.
 Two warriors in dark blue armour raced toward me, leading a vast beast forged of white iron. It screamed in rage at me, its howl echoed from the high stone walls behind me. Dark, crimson fire fueled by hatred burned and flared behind its eyes at it raced to devour me.
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 The warriors reached out to grab me, to feed me to the beast. Weak and injured as I was, I fought them off, the Cold Light cut through them like the wind through the air. They fell bleeding and, dragging my shattered leg behind me, I escaped into the night.
That was three years ago. Since then I have found my Queen and other sidhe. I have learned that I have lost six centuries of my life. Six centuries! In trade I have gained a few weak years in the story of this pitiful excuse of a man, whose life pretends to be my own.
 Only the barest fragments of my life in Arcadia remains to me - images really, blurred and dim. The glory of my life is stolen from me by this cold and unfeeling world.
A crown of silver with ten points, although only eight retain their diamonds. It rests on black velvet beside a broken sword. A mountain that walked across the sky. Two chargers, fully armoured for battle. One white, one black, they stood upon the field of war, but of their riders there was no sign. Three strands of ivy, twined about the statue of a gryphon. These things I remember, weakly, as from a forgotten dream. They are all that remains to me of home, of my life. They are all that I have. - Sir Halfdane ap Dougal, sidhe |
Although they seem confident, serene, and even arrogant to the common fae, the sidhe bear a great and injurious scar. The period between the Shattering's apex (approximately AD 1349, the height of the Black Plague) and the Resurgence (1969), 620 years, are erased from the sidhe's collective memory. In comparison they have had only a few decades to reconstruct their entire lives in a world that is changed and hostile. Some of them adapt remarkably well, while others are emotional cripples in some respects. As a rule childlings and wilders adapt better than grumps. Grumps, however, often have a serenity that allows them to transcend this lack of memory. Greybeards and Grandams form the bedrock of sidhe society on Earth.
When Magellan burned his ships behind him to urge his men onward, he unknowingly mirrored what the Twilight Times did to the sidhe. The sidhe are in many ways a tabula rasa. Since they cannot go back, they must go forward. [...] The alien nature of the earthscape is a constant and often frightening challenge to them. It is greatly to their credit that they have succeeded in so many ways.
 Almost all sidhe have a deep, abiding desire to return to Arcadia, which they consider their rightful place. Yet none can remember it in any detail. Arcadia is like a fond, but rapidly fading dream. This desire obsesses some sidhe to the point of madness. There is some real anger felt by these imperious nobles.
The Chrysalis is, perhaps, the most dangerous time for newly arriving sidhe. Unlike the commoners who, through their blood ties to humanity, have something of a cushion during the emergence of their fae seeming, the sidhe have no such protection. During the early years of the Resurgence, sidhe were forced to "posess" adult humans in order to protect themselves. Many liken the experience to that of being born. Thrust without preparation into the cold, Banality-saturated realities of the modern world is a painful and disorienting experience, one not softened by years of life as a mortal (like most commoners). The experience drives some sidhe slightly mad, though this madness is almost always temporary.
 As the sidhe psyche emerges, it often experiences flashes from the human's receding memory. These "psychic jolts" can be both painful and disorienting. In the end, however, the human memory becomes faint and distant. Just enough remains to allow the sidhe to begin exploring her new world. Often the sidhe will meet the friends and family of the person she changes places with. This can be an excruciating experience for both parties. The loss of this second set of mortal memories just after losing their Arcadian identity is a devastating blow to the sidhe. It is a credit to them, as a people, that they are able to bear this burden.
During the early years of the Resurgence many sidhe also found wounds on their human bodies when they came through. It is believed that these injuries are caused by wounds inflicted on the sidhe as they battled their way from Arcadia.
 Now that the sidhe are somewhat better established in the Waking Lands, they usually start their lives as children. Adult sidhe protect their newfound childlings (many of whom were probably adults in Arcadia) with a passion. As a rule, the transition is much easier for childlings, who retain most of the memories of their mortal seemings. In general, the younger a sidhe changeling is, the more she remembers of her human life. Sidhe childlings regain their pre-Interregnum memories very slowly, often not until adulthood.
Intrigue, as with so many other aspects of noble life, is considered a high art form. The sidhe, in particular, view every minute of their lives in the Dreaming as being part of a living story. They savour every breath they take. A sidhe lord, in search of an angle can bring far more imagination and perseverance to solving it than most any other creature in the World of Darkness. The sidhe are forced to be particularly innovative in lieu of their lost memories and lack of experience in the earthly sphere.
The sidhe have forgotten much of their past and know little of the modern world. Still, there are reasons why they are the lords of the Kithain. Despite their many centuries of amnesia, the sidhe have memories far older than any kith. There are sidhe lords alive today who remember Charlemagne, the fall of Rome and even the Time of Legends. They know little of computers and popular culture, but they know the old secrets, denied to all but the greatest scholars of the other kith. Theirs is the knowledge of the trees and the secret places, of the mountain roots and most especially of the Dreaming. Even the sluagh are jealous of the many old secrets known by the sidhe.
 While in their freeholds, safe from the icy winds of Banality, they recreate the high magics of yesterday, unseen by other Kithain for centuries or even millennia. It is little wonder then that many commoners welcomed them back as the true leaders of the Kithain. Noble freeholds are magnificent affairs, sometimes approaching the grandeur of Arcadia itself.
[Nobles : TSH] |
 Modern sidhe are descended of a noble lineage stretching back through the mists of time. Absent from the world for centuries, they returned several decades ago to a world transformed. Gone were the castles and open spaces they had known in the past, and in their place were skyscrapers and sprawling urban jungles. The life they had known in Arcadia became only a distant memory, and the sidhe found themselves in a world they no longer recognized, surrounded by subjects who resented their very presence.
 The modern world is alien to the sidhe, compared to the lives they have known in Arcadia. In the time before the Shattering, they knew respect and obedience from their subjects, and Banality had not yet spread its dark stain across the world. These ancient sidhe were the embodiment of nobility -- strong warriors who were fair of face, who knew as much about the courtly arts as the arts of war.
[Player's Guide]  [Many themes run through the sidhe in the Shining Host. Yet at the heart of them are two main threads that define the nobility of the fae. The first is one of alienation. Strangers in a strange land, the sidhe are unlike anything the World of Darkness has seen in many centuries. They are anachronisms, relics, reminders of a world of faerie tales and happy endings. These things are despised by the dark powers of the world. Banality, as represented in a thousand forms, seeks to snuff out the guttering flame of hope that the sidhe represent. Daily, banality's forces seek to make this hope seem alien and evil to those who surround them, sundering the sidhe (indeed all the Kithain) further from the dreams of humanity. Added to this is the loss of identity and memory that struck the sidhe when they first came here. The fae are living creatures of legend, and to separate them from their past is an act far more real and painful than the severing of any limb. In the short time the sidhe have been here they have recreated much of their legendry to fill this yawning chasm in their souls, but these legends seem superficial and insufficient to most of them. Many sidhe are half mad with desire for their past lives, a desire that will never be fulfilled.
[The other theme is one not commonly seen in the World of Darkness, for it is one of hope. The sidhe represent a force of nobility and inner strength rare in these dark days. Their survival, with much of their nobility intact, is a testament to the forces of light and life and love amid the gathering clouds of Winter. If there is a force for good in the World of Darkness, the Seelie fae nobility are a strong part of it. Nor are they passive in their desire to change the world for the better. The sidhe are an inherently powerful, if still formative, force in the modern world. The sidhe are everything that the dark forces of the world wish people to believe they can no longer be. They are, for the most part, kindly, honest, genteel and brave. Even in the absence of their memories (and much of their old power), they still have the will, the power and the leadership abilities to blast much of the darkness back to whence it came. Nor are the sidhe creatures of unrelenting seriousness. Whimsical, "fay" aspects of their nature are readily apparent for those who look. Underneath their lordly demeanour, they are not so far removed from the commoner kith as one would at first believe. [Nobles : TSH] |
There is a second page on the sidhe, featuring a Player's Guide to roleplaying this kith.
Note: the Changeling Palace appears to be closing its doors. This link will take you there until we manage to rescue its contents from the cold clutches of the Mists.
Also, the Global Specialist Advisor for the sidhe kith has a website with a growing amount of content.
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Most of the stuff on this page is copyright by White Wolf Publishing Inc. Used without express permission, and without any intent to challenge their rights to the material. Much of the artwork is copyright T. Diterlizzi. You should visit his gallery and support this fine artist. The purpose of this site is to provide support for a Live Action troupe who create improvisational stories through Changeling:the Dreaming.
