Minor House Spotlight: House Moon

Silver stained the knights lips and tongue as he spoke, flecks of liquid starlight escaping from the gaps in his teeth and the corners of his mouth. Both Ser Maynard and his stallion were barded in pink and purple, chequey fabrics with long, trailing dags that were cut to resemble moons in crescent - more mummer than mercenary in every way. When he spoke it was high pitched but stern, it seemed to Ser Cledwyn to be a failing battle to sound serious with an outfit like that.

House Moon is a strange house that occupies the keep of Moonhold, set atop the famous "Mummer's Hill" in Oakenshire. The hill, surrounded by standing stones carved with the images of the Cornayan Gods, is often nicknamed "Mad Moon's Mound" by the less-than-kind locals that neighbour it and its bizarre nobility. House Moon are legally vassal subjects to House Longreed, though their relationship is distant and their liege lords offer them little and expect little in return - preferring to keep the Mad Moons at arm's length. A White Moon with a face on a field of chequey pink and purple makes their heraldry, a strange outlier to the usual stylings of Oakenshire houses that favour agricultural symbols and colours of their liege lords. House Moon's words are only ever written in Old Cornayan, though their translation comes to mean roughly "Keepers of Light" or "Containers of Light" depending on interpretation. This is an aptly chosen phrase, for Moonhold's most famous feature is its Moon Well.

The Moon Well is a deep stone well in the centre of Moonhold containing what the Moons describe as "Liquid Moonlight", a shining, silvery, metallic liquid that can be retrieved from the deep well via the chained bucket there. The Liquid Moonlight has long been consumed by the nobility of House Moon as a means of religious worship and divination, though many contemporary scholars and physicians believe that the liquid is the reason for the family's eccentricities and occasional madness. One thing that is for certain is that the intake of the Liquid Moonlight is what has permanently dyed the mouths and teeth of the nobility of House Moon, leading to a silvery mouth and, in extreme cases, silver staining around the eyes, nose and ears. The continued drinking has built up a resistance to the worst of the symptoms over generations and generations, though those without such a resistance have been known to be reduced to fits, painful stomach aches, and even death as a result of the Moon Well's waters.

Because of this strange practice, the nobles of Mummer's Hill are seen as strange and peculiar. Everything from their silver-dyed mouths to their draping, extravagant outfits reeks to the average citizen of Oakenshire of an unwelcome otherness, a strange half-memory of folk practices and loud, boisterous worship from long before the formation of an official structure of the Cornayan Faith. No member of House Moon is exempt from this reputation, least of all the head of their house, Lady Merilda, who is known to take to horseback in a silver, crescent-shaped wicker mask and long, veiled pink-and-purple robes to avoid the sunlight when travelling. The current nobility of House Moon consists of Lady Merilda, her husband Lord Giles (formerly of House Torbow), and their three children - Lady Mathilda, Ser Maynard and Lady Marian. As the oldest child, Lady Mathilda is expected to inherit Mummer's Hill and Moonhold Keep - a fitting role for an heir so similar to her mother. Lady Mathilda is considered eccentric even by Moon standards, her eyes and ears stained from excessive consumption of the Waters of the Moon Well and pink clothes hand-painted rather than embroidered with white constellations. It is of little surprise that, despite being heir to an ancient house, Lady Mathilda is yet to marry - most likely a third or fourth child of a neighbour will be sent to fulfil the duty once she comes into power.

Ser Maynard is the middle child of Lady Merilda and Lord Giles, a tourney knight of little success but great reputation. Ser Maynard consistently wears no shoes in combat, having been heard stating, "All spirits should be grounded to the Earth when worshiping". The Fool Knight, as he is often nicknamed, is dressed in chequey pink and purple with unique dagging resembling moons on his mantle. He fights with a two-handed warscythe prominently, the haft of which is tied with dozens of strips of pink, purple and white fabric that flail madly when Ser Maynard swings the blade. Ser Maynard has had very little success in the lists of notable tourneys, though he has made great success amongst the accompanying Mummer's Lists that often arise alongside formal tourneys, informal fighting circles funded by the bets of commonfolk and the practice of entry fares. At Weavewold Tourney, Ser Maynard entered both the Tourney List and the Mummer's List - being unseated from his speckled grey destrier by Ser Gerold Whitecliff, "The Black Lance", and then making it far into the Mummer's Lists before meeting his defeat at the hands of a newcomer knight relatively unknown to the realm. Lady Marian is the youngest and third-born child of House Moon, a young girl set on the ideals of knighthood and chivalry through the teachings of the Shepherd in Orange. Though Lady Marian has yet to enter the role of squire to any knight, likely due to her family's reputation and an unwillingness to squire under her brother, she is already competent and efficient in the duties she will undertake - training herself in the practice of the two-handed weapon and the care and maintenance of tourney horses and their equipment.

The one thing that ties all three children and their mother together is the supposed visions they receive from the Moon Well's Waters, deeply metaphorical and symbolic glances at the future they claim are granted by the will of the Cornayan Gods who placed the Liquid Moonlight into Mummer's Hill during the early days of the Cornayan Conquest - visions that drive their drinkers into crazed, furious fits of passion and hysterics that see them praying and dancing and singing through the entire duration of their supposed divination. Ser Maynard claims it was these visions that told him to become a knight, that the Knight in Scarlet herself told him to do so. It is these visions that Lady Merilda listened to when she swore to hide her skin from all daylight, leading to her great mask and robes. It is these visions that told the nobility of Oakenshire that the Moons of Moonhold are a strange and untrustworthy group of lunatics.