~Soreatha~ - Lashunta Bridetide Customs and How to Break Them

So today’s Chapter 42 was long, almost three times the length of most chapters. However, its scene was all one day, which would have made breaking it apart difficult. Correspondingly, there is a lot to unpack, which is what I will try to do here.

While this chapter revolves around Kaure’s bridetide, this is not the first bridetide we have witnessed, with Remaue’s in Part 2, Lady Vaeol’s in Part 3, and Istae’s secret one in Part 4. The advantage of this repetition is that it has given me many opportunities to refine and adjust the concept. So here are some thoughts on common traditions or details considered standard for bridetides.

All terrestrial human stereotypes notwithstanding, it really is all about the bride under the Lashunta Matriarchy, simply because there is no groom. Unlike a wedding, which a personal and social union, a Lashunta bridetide is an investiture of a female as a fully entitled member of Matriarchy, signifying, at last symbolically, her becoming a cis-active, breeding member (remember: in a low-tech, pre-industrial society, childbearing undertakes a premium value as the source of the next generation of the labor force). While there is a male involved, the ~Daviras~ - First Man, he is not an equal partner in the ceremony, but rather something closer to a maid of honor or best man in a human wedding. He has a very specific role to perform: ‘helping the bride across the threshold’, so to speak.

Cis-amorous activities are highly discouraged among Lashunta in adolescence and early adulthood. Despite the premium on childbearing, females are expected to first complete their mandatory military service or begin a career, around 40 or 50 years old (20 - 25 in human terms) Most families plan a bridetide for their female children shortly after they finish military service. Since discipline tends to relax under the militia’s last year, some females may not reach their families quite so maidenly as assumed, or even ~aeashoni-zeasse~ - ‘already thickening’. In these cases, the bridetide ceremony undertakes a largely symbolic function.

The bridetide ceremony itself includes a number of standard features:

• The eve before, as mirthtide will be held as maidenhood’s last fling, much like a bachelorette party. Typically it includes females only, although there is no prohibition against lovers.
• The location may occur within a hometree or within a city: at the local neighbortree or within a house’s midyard, where typically stands a household shrine. 
• A series of traditional hymn-dances with very ancient origins, dedicated to both the bride and to Mahaere - Green-Mother (the deified personification of Castrovel), which invokes the mother-goddess’s presence and blessing upon the bride, thus spiritually investing her with the goddess’s power to bring forth life.
• Traditionally the bride will be clothed in a skirt tied with a ~tassoro~ - a brideknot - which the First Man will need to untie. She will also be topless, in contrast to the breast-halter maidens traditionally wear during military service (evolved from a support garment convenient both in wearing under armor and riding Shotalashu). The bride will have myrrh-gum applied to her bosom , and then have gold dust sifted upon as well. - She will traditionally have ~Haenulaeminu~ - dreyweep / weeping-maiden blossoms - set in her hair, a symbol of amorous superiority, and a bouquet or fan of milktree blossoms, for fertility. 
• Between the bride’s belly button and the brideknot will be drawn luck-glyphs, along with similar, related glyphs on her foot tops.- The treesinger or priestess of Mahaere who officiates the ceremony will formally invest the bride with the mother-goddess’s blessing by applying an unction mixed from myrrh-oil and glowrose-attar, upon the bride’s forehead, bosom, and belly.
• After the blessing and last hymn-dance, the First Man, wearing a loincloth, will be formally presented to her and will supplicate goodwill for her acceptance. Then they will adjourn to a reserved bower to consummate the ceremony, along with any other lovers they invite to witness and participate.
• Afterward, typically the next day, the bride will report either to her community’s headwife or the city’s Hall of Matrons to attest her wifehood. 
• At this point as a wife, she becomes eligible to own property (as a farmwife) or independently practice a trade or profession. She may also petition the Matronhood, speak within her community’s assembly, and vote. She may also issue a ~kezhi~ - curse/banishment - forbidding any male from her presence (and the first step in legally banishing him).

In the case of Kaure’s bridetide, while most of these elements are present, some have been modified or extras added, due to deviating circumstances. First, Kaure belongs to the Korasha female minority and Hauronil her First Man likewise is a male Damaya. Secondly, he identifies with the ~Damaelauras~ subculture: Damaya males who live as Elves (mainly in Qabarat) to avoid prejudices against cross-clade minorities. Thus this bridetide has been reworked as a hybrid ceremony involving both Lashunta and Elven rituals, invoking not only Mahaere but Shelyn (the ‘Elven’ goddess of love and beauty). Then in a controversial but perversely funny twist, Kaure leverages her Korasha strength to haul Hauronil to his feet and carry him off to the bridal bower (which I suppose still ends up reaffirming female superiority).

Lastly, and due to the obstacles she has faced, Kaure has become one of my favorite characters within A Castrovel Adventure. I love both her strength and vulnerability, and how she has fought to overcome her own shame and anxiety as a Korasha female striving for recognition with the Lashunta’s Damaya Matriarchy, which, with six-foot and taller Damaya females with Elven proportions suspiciously reminiscent of human supermodels (and that pesky +2 Charisma bonus if you’re playing by PF1E rules) can be fairly formidable. In some ways, I believe Kaure is a more relatable character to us terrestrial humans, due to her insecurities and social obstacles. At five feet tall, two hundred pounds, and ‘overwhelming buxomness’ to put an hourglass to shame, she like, many human women, easily suffers from issues with body image and self-confidence, even though she could take any willowy Damaya and break them like a sapling (something tells me that analogy translates almost seamlessly in Lashunta). She has been spoken down to, shamed, and told for most of her adult life that she is secondary and unworthy. Thus it has been my pleasure to write this chapter and so make her celebrated, honored, and uplifted. Thus let me end by saying to her: ~O’sevaea-yorualam~ - “We yield blessing.”

Lashunta Words & Phrases:

• Soreatha (comm): bridetide; female coming-of-age ceremony
• Daviras (masc): first man; chosen partner of a bride
• Aeashoni (adv): already
• Zeasse (fem particip): thickening
• Tassoro (neut): brideknot
• Haenulaeminu (anim): dreyweeps; weeping-maiden bloosoms
• Kezhi (spir): curse; ban
• Damaelauras (masc): Damaya-Elf; Damaya pretending to be an Elf
• O’sevaea-yorualam (incl-trans honor): we (all) yield blessing
• Foassi lere o'eazuline-yei - to break her like a sapling