The more I sit and think about the Light and Dark world with much “encouragement” from the Sidhe (who are NOT allowed to mock human understanding when they live in a human’s head. There must be a law about that somewhere).I think it’s probably my most complicated world. Spark in Darkness has more detail, more breadth and just more information about it, but it isn’t nearly as complicated. Nothing’s simple in Light & Dark (hence the discourses).
I still can’t nail down the courts. I very badly want to just think Seelie = good, Unseelie = bad. But that so definitely doesn’t work and neither Sidhe are particularly willing to accept it. Even Seelie = Order and Unseelie = chaos doesn’t particularly work. I mean, if the Unseelie were the epitome of chaos they wouldn’t BE a court. On a shallow level you can look at Order/chaos or even stasis/change, but it’s only really the surface philosophy and really people don‘t follow their philosophies that closely anyway.
I finally grounded on the idea that Seelie were probably very idealist (truth, honour, goodness and light awwww, bless) but the Unseelie were more practical (having few black letter laws and more principles that are followed to the spirit not the letter). Kind of like a chivalric knight , all rigid rules and impossibly high standards (and ends up knocking boots with his King’s old lady behind the scenes) vs. a good (they exist. Honest.) politician who accept that things need to be flexible and the art of compromise.
Now? The fae bitched and argued and suddenly everything’s reversed. The UNSEELIE are the idealists - wonderful principles that aren’t really all that workable. It’s like communism or libertarianism - nice on paper but they don’t really take into account human (or faerie) nature. It’s the SEELIE who are, in many ways, far less trusting and more practical. They don’t rely on principles, they have laws and penalties and an actual system that might actually work and doesn’t require everyone to be nice happy people for it to do so. Alright, it’s about as restrictive as a straight jacket that has shrunk in the wash, but it actually WORKS. The Unseelie ideals - while honest and pure and clear - don’t. What DOES work is the underlying “the Sidhe will give you a good kicking if you don’t comply” rule coupled with the “if we’re not united the Seelie will give us a good kicking” rule.
And my head’s kind of hurting now, because, apparently, if you REALLY dig through every discourse the ideals of both courts are identical. (Both the faerie boys are looking at me like I’m a madman now). But they ARE - kind of. I think. If you strip away the philosophy, the different motives, the different methods - the actual goals and values are much the same. It’s kind of like… well an analogy, two sides valuing security. One side decides to be secure it needs to be friendly and well liked so there isn’t actually a threat to defend against. The other side is belligerent and powerful so it can face any threat. Both have the same goal and value the same thing - security - but their methodology is so alien that they will actually be bitterly opposed to each other. Not quite like that, but you get the idea? I think it was their rambling about oaths that got me and made me think - because their motives WERE the same. Just the Seelie try to explain it more but confuse the issue and the Unseelie take it at it’s ‘purest’ but also it’s shallowest. Kind of. In that situation. I’m looking at the others and wondering - what if they hadn’t finally decided to ‘agree to disagree’. What if they have pushed on to find the root? Would we see identical views? I don’t think either would be especially comfortable with that.
Which of course brings me full circle of head-hurtiness - are there really any courts at all? If, at the core, the ideals are basically the same, why is their magic and identity so incredibly different? Is the divide between the courts entirely artificial? Are they just political bodies? Could someone even *gasp* jump court?
And now there’s 2 ancient Sidhe in my head. I don’t even have names for them yet, or revealed personalities, but they’re smiling and nodding. This can’t be a good thing.
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