The Feywild

Few destinations in the multiverse are as fabled as the Feywild. Resting as a demi-plane in convergence between the Elemental Spheres and the Prime Material world, the Feywild is the source of Orr's seasons, and in turn, its weather, and its nature. It is a plane coursing with elemental magic, and filled with incredible, strange, wonderful, and harrowing creatures, and denizens; Above all of which stand the Elladrin. The Archfey. The first of all immortals. During the time of tyrants, and crisis before the arrival of Rizion it is belived that the Elladrin were the ones to shape the common ancestor of Orr's races into what would become the Mer, or the Elves, whom they bestowed their beauty, their magic, and their likeness.
Like all demi-planes, the geography of the Feywild is somewhat of a slanted mirror of the prime material world. Significant features of the environment can be trusted to make their appearance, but beyond these very broad brushstrokes, it is a wild gamble as to what one may find should they stumble into it. Perhaps more pertinent to planar travelers is how the landscape changes as the power of the Crown of Calyx bestows its rulership to each of the five Seasonal Courts in their appointed time. This transition of power not only determines who by rite will rule the Feywild, but completely shifts the terrain, and the landscape to reflect this rite. Another curious aspect of the Feywild is its dissassociation with time. Upon treading into this demi-plane there is very little way of knowing how much time will pass in the Prime Material world. Some vistors have spent years among the Courts and returned home only minutes after they have left, while other travelers and fools who have tripped barely beyond its gates have turned back to find decades lost. For this reason alone, The Magisterium, and anyone else of knowledge and good reason, have advises travelers, and explorers to avoid the Feywild.

Portals in the Groves, and Ancient Places

Magic Portal by Samuele Bandini

Like other demi-planes such as the Shadowfell, the Outer Night, and the Underdark, the Feywild is tethered to the Prime Material world, and overlaps it in cosmic position. Due to this, portals, gates, and doorways to the Feywild occasionally apparate in places of synchronicity. For the Feywild, these are ancient, and storied places, as well as woodland groves, but they have been known to also appear in places of power, mystery, and even whimsy. There are tales of children's storybooks erupting into planar gates, and of maidens straying off the woodland path and passing into the Feywild between the knit boughs of ancient trees. Perhaps the most exceptional gate ever recorded was one that appeared in the whirling eye of a hurricane as it touched down upon the shores of the Freelands, and for a hundred years an village vanished until another similar storm passed again many generations later.

Beware lights in the forest, and moulding ruins. Beware the still places. Beware the ancient places. Beware rings of toadstools, and flowers shaped like snares of whimsy. Beware the places where power has long dreamt and grown roots into worlds beyond. They are no place to tramp, lest you lose more than just your way.

— Gnomish Warning

Thorns by Jack Bailey

The Hedgemaze

Uninvited travelers to the Feywild often first arrive in a magical border to the plane created by the Elladrin with their great magic called the 'Hedgemaze'. This labyrinth of wild growth, and strangling thorn is filled with the darkest of the Feywild's denizens. Creatures and beings that slake their thirst with mortal blood, and succor the marrow from bones. Creatures of such vile, and gruesome appetites for sowing discord, and misery that only here, in the dark and twisted bramble, far from the eyes of the pix, the fairies, and the Elladrin, they can satiate their voracious needs. The Hedgemaze is as unhospitable as it is impossible to navigate, and It is widly believed that only the Elladrin can open a doorway from it to their wider domain.

Hedgeknights

The arm, and sword of the Season Courts throughout the Feywild are the Hedgeknights. They act as the enforcers, and warriors of the Elladrin, and are called upon in matters of war, defense, and duels of pride. They are fierce beings gilded in the finest armor, and raiments that their court can provide. Their loyalty, however, is a fickle subject for the Hedgeknights are mortals enslaved to the purpose of the Elladrin; Children who were stolen and replaced by fetches, or mercenaries whisked into the Feywild as they tried to cut a day's travel off their journey to a foreign city. Even kings of Iskandar have unwittingly been snared in the eternal service of the Elladrin.

A year, and a day. This is the pact of the Hedgeknight, and once given, an oath to the Elladrin cannot be broken; even if they conspire to stretch that time into eternity.

Green Knight by Antti Hakosaari

Children of the Seed, Grain, Flower, Nut and Thorn

Happy New Year by Olivia Rea

While travelers to the Feywild may anticipate what strange, and beautiful denizens they will meet amongst its forests, and glittering groves, few understand the relationship between those creatures, and spites that dwell among the wood. Each of the fey beings of the wilds is drawn, year after year, lifetime after lifetime, into the intrigue of the courts who must war against one another in order for the seasons to begin, and end in their appointed time. For the Crown of Calyx to pass into the hands of the next season's court, they who possess it must be dragged low, and their power stripped. This requires subterfuge, sabotage, and a war of compliments, insults, and stabbings of pride. This courtly affair always plays out in the same vivid order even if its particulars change with each year's renewal. The rulers of the court always exhibit the same fallencies, the same weaknesses of character, the same blinded eye towards their sister, and brother courts that inevitably ends in betrayal and upsets of their power that one would believe such storied figures to be far too wise to fall for again, and again. While each renewal of the court does see new, and novel ways to achieve these ultimate ends, it is the same story, season after season; And yet the Elladrin follow this endless waltz, seemingly unaware of the cosmic dance that they are a part of, or perhaps simply having no way to break it.
This is perhaps the saving grace of mortals, for the Elladrin are so consumed by this natural order, and in the vying for their thrones, that they rarely gaze out to the other planes where their considerable power could be used to unimaginable effect.

The Five Courts of the Seasons

Commissioned - Densebourgeon Forest by Asur Misoa

As the seasons turn, and the Crown of Calyx exchanges its right of rule, the fallow courts weave their plots against the head who bares it, and prepare for the return of their own power. Each of the five courts play ancient, and dignified roles in this ecosystem, some of which the Elladrin, and the fey, are only vaguely, or subconsciously aware of as they work. Each court is called towards certain duties, and each court unwittingly aspires to certain tasks of rule which inevitably lead to their destruction and the passing of the Crown.

The Court of Greenspring

Dryad by https://www.artstation.com/sustarik

The 'false spring' Court is born from the belly of the winter wolf into a land of freezing snow slicked red with blood. The land is hard, and cold. They must break the earth, thaw the ground, and plant seeds to grow in the coming seasons. The court of Greenspring is hardworking, unrelenting, stern, and reserved. Theirs is the impossible task of repairing the world lost, and so devoted to this task do they become that they never expect the betrayal of their sister court that would strike them once the last of the seeds have been planted, and their strength has been spent.

AncientDreamOne Sistina by Hoàng Lập (Solan)

The Court of Flowerbloom

Flowerbloom, the Court of beauty, and radiance. The court of false smiles, and overwhelming decadence. Their role in the seasons is to flower and burn bright with passions. To paint the colors of the valleys with a brush of living pigments, and life. To husband the creatures and beasts of the wilds. To prepare the lands for the first, rich sowing. Theirs is a naive court eager to waste away the nights of their rule with lavish displays of indulgence, and overconfidence, unaware that in the shadows of their ballrooms their brother court of Goldsummer is slowly turning the hearts of the Feywilds against them. Again, and again, Goldsummer will entreat their fellows and devise ways to insult, and condescend Flowerbloom, until, at last, the vivid flowers upon the Crown of Calyx will melt into strands of gold, and their court will be reaped like grain. Thrown from the steps of their own castles into the mud of the street, the fey will revel in Flowerbloom's fall.

The Court of Goldsummer

Widow by Taras Susak

The mature court of Goldsummer will continue the work of its preceeding court with a much more rigid, and reserved hand. The valleys, and forests will grow ever more green, and rich, while the fields grow thick with summer wheat. In the times of harvest there will be held banquets, and displays of rule, but nothing so gaudy, and lavish as the courts of yesteryear. The Feywilds will become placated, and fat with this arrangement. The golden days will beat down upon the wilds in such a way that it will seem they may never fail, and the summer will go on forever. Lulled nearly to sleep by their own success the court will be surprised to find their goblet poisoned, as the days grow shorter, and the Crown of Calyx wilts red.

Faeries by Taras Susak

The Court of Redleaves

The court of Redleaves always spends the seasons planning, and scheming for their time, yet always going too far... always committing to something far more horrible, and reckless than can be forgiven. They spend it desiring revenge for the wrongs done to them in the seasons before, but when they have finally stolen the right of rule, they often know not what is to be done with it. They spend their seasons attempting to prove their greatness over the other courts. They spend it quelling the flames caused by the betrayal of their much more beloved brother court. In their jealousy, their envy, and their desire to be loved as equally of their siblings they will set the forest alight with new patterns, and new colors to awe the wilds, but their crown was soon wilt into nothing more than thorns.

The Court of Frostfall

Enter Fenrir by Romain d'Escrienne

All things must must come to an end. When the crown of flowers wilts into thorns, and the time of the winter court arrives all the denizens of the Feywild tremble in fear. The head of the Elladrin upon which the Crown of Calyx falls will morph, and shape them into a hundred foot dire-wolf, for as the 'weakest' and most despised among the Court, their nature over the course of the four seasons preceeding it has made the heart of the Elladrin into a beastly, ravenous thing to behold. The lands will be covered in freezing frost, and blistering snow, and the wolf of winter will slaughter every living fey in the wilds. The snow will be slicked red with blood. None have ever survived the fell wolf's coming, and the season shall not end until the great black wolf of winter has eaten until its stomach bursts. From its bowels, a new Elladrin baring the Crown shall be born, and the cycles of the season will renew once again...

Flower Crown

The Crown of Calyx is the heirloom artifact of the Seasonal Courts which denotes to whom the rulership of the plane falls. The magic woven into the Crown causes the Elladrin to spring, bloom, flush, wilt, and die in their appointed time, and ensures that no one court possesses power over the plane indefinitely. The Crown of Calyx is believed to be one of the most powerful magical artifacts in all the multiverse, but whether a mortal could possess the crown and wield its might over the seasons, and nature is unknown.

Type

Dimensional plane