Sylvaeren Lore | A Glimpse into Soultide: When the Starlight Listens

As the leaves change colour and the air grows crisp, nature prepares to transition from the warm, bountiful days of summer to the introspective and magical season of autumn. The days grow shorter, the nights lengthen, and we enter the dark half of the year.

We are invited to slow down, reflect and let go of what no longer serves us. We are given time to embrace the quiet time of the year and to prepare for the introspective months ahead.

There's a certain magic that settles over the world. Many of us feel it as Samhain (Halloween) approaches, a time when the veil between worlds feels a little thinner, and the memories of those we've lost feel a little closer.

Samhain is a deeply rooted Celtic festival that marks the transition from the light to the dark half of the year. It honours the cycle of life, death, and rebirth, and celebrates the thinning of the veil between the living and the spiritual worlds.

The traditions of bonfires, offering food to spirits and fairies, dressing in disguises, and carving turnips to ward off evil have evolved over centuries into the modern Halloween practices we know today. Whether through costumes, trick-or-treating, or Jack-o’-lanterns, the essence of Samhain and practices like honouring the dead, protecting against spirits, and embracing the natural cycles of life remain central to these celebrations.

In my world of Sylvaeren, this sacred time is known as Soultide. It’s an important festival that the Humans of the realm celebrate.

As we enter this season of remembrance, I wanted to share a piece of my world’s heart with you.

The Fate of Souls in Sylvaeren

In Sylvaeren, death is not an ending but rather the return of a soul to the universe. Both Humans and Fae share the core belief that when breath leaves a body, the soul ascends to the sky. Its essence dissolves into the starlight that adorns the night. Thus, the heavens are not merely a space, but a living, shimmering resting place for souls.

The natural cycle of flesh returning to earth and spirit returning to the stars is a belief that transforms grief into a conversation with the sky and gives loved ones a glimmer of hope.

To the living, this offers comfort: that no love is wholly lost, and no voice entirely gone. The constellations themselves are said to whisper with the memory of those who came before. Children are told their ancestors watch from above, and lovers speak to the stars as though their beloveds still listened. In this way, grief becomes a conversation with the sky, and remembrance an act of faith.

The stars make no judgment of race or lineage. Light and shadow are both sacred to the Divine Makers, who wove balance into all things. What matters is the harmony a soul carries when it departs. Those who lived with honour, whether Human, Luminaris, or Umbrionyx Fae, rise into the firmament. Their essence dissolves into the star-tide, their light joining the eternal dance above.

Souls that die unbalanced, those consumed by hatred, cruelty, or betrayal, cannot ascend. Heavy with corruption, they are pulled instead toward the gulfs beneath the firmament, where the Void waits to unmake them.

So the people of Sylvaeren look to the night sky for solace and guidance, believing that each star is both a memory and a promise: that to live in balance is to be remembered, and to keep faith with love is to shine forever.

From this belief, the festival of Soultide was born.

The Soultide Ritual:

"The living speak, and the starlight listens."

On the night of Soultide, it's believed the veil between the living and the departed souls thins. The ancestors draw closer to the warmth of the living world, and for a few precious hours, they are listening.

To honour them, the people of Sylvaeren practice a beautiful ritual. They craft small, delicate lanterns, often from waxed paper and shaped like autumn leaves, with a candle in their middle. Holding the lantern, a person whispers a message into the flame, not a demand for a favour, but a cherished memory, a hope for the future, or simply the name of a soul they miss.

Then, they set the lantern floating on the water, and the surface becomes a mirror to the heavens. A constellation of wishes for the constellation of souls. They believe that if a lantern drifts further across the water, or to the centre, the message has been heard across the veil. It is a beautiful conversation with the sky, a ritual that affirms that no soul is ever truly lost, and no love is ever forgotten.

Why This Is So Personal to Me

This tradition is deeply personal. Over the last decade, I've said goodbye to many people who were pillars of my world, including my beloved mother. In my own search for peace, I've found immense comfort in looking up at the night sky and feeling that the people I've lost are not gone, but have become a part of that eternal light.

My grandma used to tell me about our loved ones in the stars, and when I was little, I would lie in bed, sending 100 kisses to my grandpa’s star. It’s a memory I treasure, and a belief that has helped me navigate my own journey with grief.

It’s the reason why, after my mother passed, I got a flat piercing with a star — to forever carry the memory of my mum not just in my heart, but on my body as well.

It’s a belief I wanted to incorporate into my writing. The themes of grief, found family, and finding the "butterfly in the storm" are at the very heart of my story.

In Sylvaeren, just as in our world, the darkness can feel overwhelming, but there is always a reason to look for the light.

This Soultide, as you remember your own loved ones and ancestors, may you find comfort in the stars.