Aes'teera

Aes’teera is a winter festival celebrated by the W'hoorn race on their homeworld of Benu Wen. It is a festival of the skies.

Historically, the W’hoorn worshipped a pantheon of Gods, but barring a few cults, they're no longer believed to be real. Their Gods included Sorass, God of the Hunt, Aes'ti, the Goddess of the Skies, Credador, the God of the Wind, and Aes'tun, sister of Aes'ti, and Goddess of War.

Aes’teera is a festival that happens at the end of every Wennian year (the time it takes the planet Benu Wen to orbit its sun Benu) - around once every four galactic standard years.

It falls on the day of the year when the planet is at its furthest point away from its sun Benu, and the sun is small and weak. The festival marks the point at which the sun begins to get bigger and warmer again, and is both a celebration of air, light and warmth, as well as a time when many traditions encourage the return of the sun - including cultural rituals such as asking for forgiveness (so that the sun will return), giving gifts to one another to symbolize an offer of a fresh start, lighting torches and beacons to lure back the sun, flying kites, lanterns, and many many fun (and sometimes dangerous) gliding games.

Most of the religion upon which Aes’teera was based has now faded in popularity, but many stories have passed down and are now just popular and fun W’hoorn traditions which mark the hump of the darker, cooler, wetter months with a nice, festive pick-me-up.

A traditional W’hoorn Aes’teera song:

‘Aesti’s Realm is Huddled In’
(unknown author)

When the nights get colder And the days get long

The sun gets dull and tiny Sing her our Aes’teera song

Aesti’s realm Is huddled in The skies too hard for gliding

We’ll wrap up warm Spread out our wings And sing our loud glad tidings!

When the wind is bitter And Credador bites hard

Thaw your icy feathers And let your heart let down its guard

Aesti’s realm Is huddled in The skies too hard for gliding

We’ll wrap up warm Spread out our wings And sing our loud glad tidings!

The voices of our people Will lift up Benu Wen

They’ll sound all the way to Benu And bring her back again.

Aesti’s realm Is huddled in The skies too hard for gliding

We’ll wrap up warm Spread out our wings And sing our loud glad tidings!