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court of night blooming flowers
The 13 Houses of the Night Court:
(essentially religiously affiliated brothels)
1. Alyssum - The House canon is modesty. Their motto is "with eyes averted", and the servants here are well-suited to acting shy, modest, and slightly uncomfortable with their own desires. If you wish your lover to tremble and blush with shame when you reveal their nakedness, this is your destination.
2. Balm - The House canon is compassion. Their motto is "rest and be soothed". Those who need healing and soothing through gentle touch and companionship may come here. These adepts are also the most skilled at massage of all the houses.
3. Bryony - The House canon is cupidity and the desire for money. Their house is more of a carnival of wonders, where you may gamble with your desires in a game of will and wits. Be careful what favors you gamble with though, for the adepts who work here are said to rarely lose.
4. Camellia - The House canon is perfection. Those who work here are physically perfect, without flaw, and as such they are considerably more proud of their station. Perhaps haughty and brilliant would best describe the adepts who reside here.
5. Cereus - The House canon is fragility, their motto "all loveliness fades". The youthful and delicate serve here, those who hold their beauty for a fleeting moment. Cereus also has the distinction of being the oldest of all the houses. The adepts here are ones who know the value of living for the present and making each moment count.
6. Dahlia - The House canon is dignity and regality. All those who serve in Dahlia house conduct themselves as royalty, with the proper mannerisms, decorum, and attitude.
7. Eglantine - The House canon is performance. Those who serve here are skilled in the arts of singing, dancing, and poetry and can perform together or privately for their patrons.
8. Gentian - The House canon is purity of spirit. The adepts here can read visions and dreams, and may reveal things that hold great meaning to those they share their knowledge with.
9. Heliotrope - The House canon is love and devotion. Their motto is "thou and no other". It is said that when one lies with an adept from Heliotrope, they shall make you feel as if you are the only one who has ever touched their hearts.
10. Jasmine - The House canon is sensuality. Their motto is "for pleasure's sake" and the experience is pure hedonism. Adepts are said to be the most exotic of all the houses, and they emphasize this in their dress.
11. Mandrake - The House canon is sadism and dominance. The motto is "yield all". Adepts are Mandrake are trained to dominate those who come seeking such release, using skills and tools to bestow plain and pleasure. A signal is arranged beforehand that patrons can use should they ever wish to stop their session.
12. Orchis - The House canon is mirth, its motto "joy in laughter". Adepts from this house are joyful people who believe in fun above all else. They are quick with a grin and a game, and are skilled in making their patrons smile.
13. Valerian - The House canon is submission, the motto "I yield". Adepts are trained from childhood to experience pain with all pleasure and pleasure with all pain. They also have a signal they can use if they need to stop.
no subject
From Kushiel's Dart:
Every House has its own masque at some point throughout the year, and each, I am told, is a splendid affair with a worthy history—but the Midwinter Masque is something different. Its roots are older than the coming of Elua, for it celebrates the passing of the old year and the return of the sun. Blessed Elua was so charmed, it is said, by the peasants’ simple ritual that he embraced it as well, as a rite that honored his mother Earth and her solar consort. It has always been the role of Cereus House, the First, to host the Midwinter Masque. On the Longest Night, the doors to all the other Houses are closed, their walls emptied, for everyone comes to Cereus House. No patrons are welcomed save those who bear the token of Naamah, a gift given only at a Dowayne’s discretion. Even now, when the night of the Thirteen Houses wanes under the light of profit, the tokens remain another matter, held only by those who lay claim to royal lineage and are deemed worthy of Naamah’s embrace. Days before the event, the house was shrouded in mystery and bustle. Mystery, for no one knew who would be chosen from among our ranks to play the key roles in the great masque; the Winter Queen was chosen, always, from among the adepts of Cereus House. The Sun Prince, of course, might be selected from any of the Thirteen Houses, and the competition was fierce. In Night’s Doorstep, Hyacinthe told me, they lay odds on the choosing. It is said that the Sun Prince brings a year’s luck to his House. I know why, now; Delaunay told me. There is an old, old story, older than Elua, about the Sun Prince wedding the Winter Queen to claim lordship of the land. Such stories, he said, are always the oldest, for they are born of our first ancestors’ dreams and the eternal turning of the seasons. Whether or not this is true, I do not know; but I know of a surety that Anafiel Delaunay was not the only one who knew the story that night. But this was yet to come, and in the preceding days, the mystery-shrouded confines of Cereus House abounded with activity. The doors to the Great Hall were thrown open, and it was given such a cleaning as was seldom seen. The walls were scrubbed, the colonnades polished, the floor waxed and buffed until it shined like mahogany satin. Every speck of ash was emptied from the massive fireplace, and rickety scaffolding was erected so teams of agile painters’ apprentices could cleanse a year’s accumulation of soot from the frescoed ceiling. Slowly, the Exploits of Naamah brightened, colors emerging fresh and new from beneath the accretion of grime. When the empty and pristine hall was judged ready, it was decorated with fresh white candles, all unlit and smelling of sweet beeswax, and great boughs of evergreen. And then the long tables were covered with brilliant white cloths to receive the bountiful feast that was being prepared in the kitchens. Indeed, I was manifestly unwelcome in all my usual haunts, as everyone from the concierge on down to the lowest scullery maid was busy making ready for the Midwinter Masque. Say what you will of the Night Court, but no one entered its service without pride. Even the stables were off-limits, as the Master of Horse supervised through gritted teeth a thorough scouring of the entire premises. If Ganelon de la Courcel himself, King of Terre d’Ange, were to attend the Midwinter Masque (and such a thing had happened in other times) he would find his horses better tended than in the royal stables. Of course, I had witnessed such preparations before, but this year it was different, since I was to attend. Of my erstwhile companions, only the frail beauty, Ellyn, would be in attendance, for Juliette’s marque had been bought by Dahlia House, as all had guessed, and the merry Calantia had gone on to foster at Orchis when her tenth birthday had arrived. Ellyn’s pretty half-brother Etienne was too young, and must pass the Longest Night in the nursery. There were two other new fosterlings, though, whom I’d not met, for Cereus House bought the marques of children from other Houses too; pale Jacinthe, whose blue eyes were almost-but-not-quite too dark for the canon of Cereus, and a boy, Donatien, who never spoke. Like Ellyn, they were destined to be initiated into the mysteries of Naamah, and I envied them their surety of place. On the Longest Night, though, there would be no contracts, no exchange of coin. Among the Servants of Naamah and their elect guests, only such liaisons as pleased the fancy would be made; our role was to adorn the festivities. It is tradition to drink joie on Longest Night, that clear, heady liqueur distilled from the juice of a rare white flower which grows in the mountains and blossoms amid the snowdrifts. We were to circulate among the guests, offering tiny crystalline glasses of joie, which we bore on silver trays. Because it is the privilege of Cereus House to elect the Winter Queen, it is the theme we maintain, in costumes of white and silver. I was hoping to see Suriah, to show her mine. All four of us were adorned as winter sprites. We wore sheer white tunics of gossamer to mimic the effect of snow drifting in the wind, with dagged sleeves beaded in glass that hung down like icicles when we raised our trays in offering. Simple white dominos edged in silver, suitable for children, masked our faces, and we wore only a touch of carmine on the lips for colour. An apprentice ribbonnaire bound our hair, and did a very fine job, too, plaiting our locks with white ribbons to evoke a tumbling fall of snow. But Suriah did not come to see us, and it was another adept who gave us instruction in the kitchen. He wore white brocade trimmed in ermine, and the mask of a snow fox rode his brow, snarling above his own eyes. “Like this,” he said impatiently, correcting the line of Donatien’s arm as the boy lifted his tray. “No, no; smooth, elegant. You’re not hoisting tankards in a tavern, boy! What do they teach you in Mandrake House?” What indeed, I wondered. The Dowayne’s chastiser had been a Mandrake adept. Donatien trembled, and the delicate glasses trembled like chimes on the tray, but he raised it gracefully. “Better,” the adept said grudgingly. “And the invocation?” “Joy.” It was more breath than utterance, and Donatien looked like he might faint from the effort of it. The adept gave a wry smile. “Such a fragile bloom … perfect, sweetheart. They’ll be marking their calendars until you come of age. All right, then; you’ll see that guests are given first offer, and the Dowaynes second. After that it’s catch as catch can.” He turned then to go, drawing down his mask. “But …” It was Jacinthe who had spoken. The adept turned, his face now a mystery behind the sly features of the snow fox, dark shadows behind the eyeholes on either side of the sharp, cunning muzzle. “How will we know?” she asked sensibly. “Everyone’s in masque.” “You’ll know,” said the snow fox. “Or err.”
more information on the court, the servants of naamah, initiation, etc.