Event Focus - La Fête Humide

The Rivière Tumultueuse raises dangerously every three years

    La Fête Humide (The Moist Party) is a huge celebration that takes place once every three years in Ville des Marai. The entire city takes on a party atmosphere, music abounds and smiles are everywhere. Taverns offer reduced prices for alcohol (the difference in price is reimbursed through slightly lower taxes for the year), various types of competitions are held (including the Guerre des Bardes, or War of the Bards) and everyone is generally in a celebratory mood.

    Twenty-four years ago the realm endured a massive series of earthquakes, the actual cause of which remains unknown. Theories abound, some of the most popular of which revolve around the black dragon Shimrexxafaque fighting against various bayou loa or dwarves mining too deeply and awakening an ancient evil. The wizard Kelwyn has claimed that he discovered what happened, but due to a multitude of reasons he is unable or unwilling to reveal the truth.

    The Rivière Tumultueuse slowly begins to rise starting on the first night of the year that Mother Moon and Father Moon are both new (this year, 1485, will see this happen on Last Winter 1). The river takes a single week to rise a full 10' above high tide levels, remains at that height for 8-10 days and subsides over the next week. Les Gardiens de L'eau (the Guardians of the water), a group of dozen arcanists that live in the city and are chosen by popular vote, gather at Le Poste de Garde (the Guardpost) just outside The Keep and cast a specialized ritual that creates invisible walls of force along the length of the river where it bisects the city. Every day a pair of the spellcasters return to the Guardpost to magically reinforce the walls. The high ground outside the southern walls of the city are naturally protected from the river rising due to a quirk of geography, and because of this those living there don't require additional protection.

    Seeing water rushing by in thin air is an amazing sight, no matter how jaded against magic one may be, and it's not unusual to look out the windows of dry shops to see alligators and various river animals swimming by. A popular drinking game is to sit by the river and take a shot every time something larger than a fish swims by, and this game (poisson ivre, or "drunken fish") often results in immense inebriation among the participants in a very short period of time. There are various forms of the game that narrow the choice to a specific animal (alligator, turtle, nutria, etc), but even these often result in easy drunkenness.

A common scene during La Fête Humide, an
alligator or two outside a merchant's window

    The celebrations started almost by accident. Folk within the city assumed that since they had nowhere to go and that they would drown, they might as well have a good time before dying. This morose celebration brought out the best in everyone, moods heightened and a good time was had by all. Hastily researching evocation rituals, the city arcanists came across a book buried deep within their halls that detailed what was needed to be done to protect the city. Oddly, no one had any memory of ever seeing the tome before it's discovery and it wasn't listed in the library inventory. No one cared, however, since time was running out and the river was starting to flood the city.

    The spellcasters quickly assembled in front of The Keep and performed the ritual. Blue walls of magical force suddenly flared into existence and slowly faded into invisibility, but the water was held back. This caused a joyous uproar, and the party atmosphere figuratively exploded. The wizards and sorcerers were hailed as heroes and the saviors of the city, and on that very day the group that would be known as Les Gardiens de L'eau was formed on the spot.

Beads, feathers and masks abound.

    Over the past decades, traditions sprang up among the citizenry and have blended together harmoniously, much like a big pot of gumbo. Masks started to be worn that were decorated to look like Les Gardiens, but this gave way to simply wearing masks in the official city colors (green, gold and purple). Beads made of wood, bone, ivory and a variety of more expensive materials, such as silver, gold and pearls, are worn by nearly everyone, and the less expensive kinds are frequently tossed from balconies to passersby when they are requested with the cry "jette moi quelque chose" ("throw me something" in common). A flash of bare breast is usually given in thanks for the more expensive trinkets, and this public lewdness is usually ignored by the constabulary.