Daoine Sìth of Alba

The elves of Alba—Daoine Sìth—grew hard on moor, brae, and sea-mist. Early halls were raths under heather and cairn, courts kept by chiefs whose right came from presence, prowess, and the keeping of guest-right on stormy borders. Kin to Éire’s Sidhe but never their mirror, the Sith learned law through feud and raid: terse terms, swift reprisals, and reckonings sung as much as tallied. Warrior-poets made verse a blade; a stanza could wound a name as surely as steel could part a plaid.
  Invasions and neighbors tempered them. Trollholds rose in the high corries and caverned bens; Álfar longships tested the Pentland swells; giants claimed old passes and exacted tolls; Albion and Éire sent reivers who knew the quick roads over moor and firth. The Sith did not centralize—the land resists it—but they did polarize into two great assemblies that could muster clans by horn and pact: Seelie and Unseelie. These were never “good vs. evil” so much as day-road and night-road coalitions, but their reputations stuck. Seelie prefer open challenge, ransom, and wergild; Unseelie license ordeal, fear as tool, and justice with teeth. Both despise treachery at table, both keep keening paths clear, and both set invaders above internecine feuds on their list of enemies
  Their lore names figures mortals half-remember. Nicnevin’s Ride was not a witch-sabbath but a night levy to clear oath-breakers from the passes. The bean nighe at the ford is mercy, not malice—warning enough to settle debts before dawn. The baobhan sìth are not random dancers of death but huntresses licensed to take those who spurned fair terms and preyed on guests. Redcaps in a keep mean the laws of hospitality have failed there; Ghillie Dhu keeps sacred groves with a quiet that turns steel-cold when broken. Thomas the Rhymer and Tam Lin are remembered among the Sith as men who kept bargains to the letter and were answered in kind.
  Clans—cinnidhean Sìth—swear to a ceann-cinnidh and a place: of Ben Cruachan, of Skye, of the Machair. Feuds must name cause and end: a fine, a hostage, a season of service. Seelie set truces on quarter days; Unseelie allow declared blood-nights but forbid slaughter of sleepers. Hospitality holds unless the guest came in lie; then judgment falls in the doorway where all can see. Offers are made thrice; the third binds. Counting the gathered aloud is ill-luck; iron bells in halls are outlawed.
  With Albion and Éire the Sith have waged wars and marriages both. Raids over the marches made heroes on all sides; hostage-fosterage braided kin across the firths; in the worst winters Seelie and Unseelie together stood the passes against trolls and Álfar riders, proving a truth they teach their young: we quarrel like kin, but invaders we teach once.
  In the modern era, the courts still ride—covertly. Seelie operate in the open air of festivals, patronage, and road-keeping: music halls, Highland games, rescue on hill and sea, arbitration that feels like ceilidh more than courtroom. Unseelie keep to crisis and edge: night security, counter-raid, the quiet removal of predators who wear polite faces. Clan feuds play within strict forms; when Alba is threatened, banners that brawled at dusk will share a fire by midnight.
  Seelie Court (day-road): generally beneficent, graceful, and exact; returns kindness, punishes insult within measure; linked to summer and bright running roads; values beauty, love, oath-keeping, and inspiration.
  Unseelie Court (night-road): harsher coalition of wardens and avengers; permits ordeal, declared ambush, and fear as a lawful tool; linked to winter and the hinterlands beyond firelight; values clarity, exemplarity, and the macabre’s hard truths.
  They are the elves of Alba: beautiful yet wild, courtly yet to other elves nearly barbaric, divided in reputation yet united where it counts. Invaders have learned the fixed lesson—Seelie and Unseelie may feud for a century, but they hate the theft of Alba more than they hate each other.