High Summer Festival

The High Summer Festival is the only holiday of the Kingdom of Invar, and is highly anticipated each year. It is held at the height of summer, and lasts for a week, the 4th day coninciding with the summer equinox. The festival itself is held at the base of the Silver Mountains, at the location believed to be the first place a Larrentell put up a tent. Despite this, many towns and villages are too far away from the Silver Mountains to make the journey every year, and as such hold their own smaller festival. Although it is expected that each person makes the journey to the main festival at least once in their lives.
The High Summer Festival is the most colorful place in all of the Kingdom of Invar, having lots of hues of yellow, orange and red, to celebrate the sun and summer. In the same vein motifs and depictions of the sun can be found everywhere during the festival, on banners, mugs and clothes. Traditionally, during the festival a special type of dress is worn by everyone, called a Insun. a Insun is a fill body dress that has laces on the side of the stomach to hold it in place. The top part of the dress will typically be very form fitting, while the bottom part will be very loose, and often either open in the front or split in two to follow each leg. Insuns are mixtures of yellow and orange in color, red being reserved for nobles and the royal family. Insuns are also very expensive to make, and as such most people only own two Insuns in their life, usually passed down from parent to child. There is the child version that they would wear when young, and then the adult version when they outgrow the child one. As such Insuns are seen as very personal and sacred, and marring or destroying another persons Insun is a great offense, and is grounds for duel overseen by nobles.

The festival attracts all sorts of types, and as such there is plenty to do, with many different stalls and food carts. Even merchants from other kingdoms make the journey to earn money during the festival. On the second day, the royal family will bring down part of their own personal ale collection for all to enjoy, an important tradition during the festival, signifying the royals approval of their subjects, and their commitment to keeping them safe. While the Kingdom of Invar typically has quite dull cuisine, during the festival, many use more exotic species and bring out recipes that would usually not sell. The festival is a time of renewal and new life, menaing many are willing to try out new things. A dish that become a festival staple, is a sunflower head prepared in spices and fried in oil, known as Sun-Bloom. It is prepared with the flower petals still on to give it the sun look, and is eaten much like corn. The seeds of the sunflower having been made soft by the frying in oil and the spices giving it exceptional taste.

The fourth day is seen as the most important of the festival. On this day mages will be hired to keep the skies clear at any cost, to make sure that the sun will shine directly above the Silver Mountains, giving them the same perfect shine that was observed when the Larrentell family first arrived here. When this happens, it also signals the start of a yearly play about the history of the Kingdom of Invar, overseen by the king or queen. At the end, they must give their approval of the play, or great calamity will befall the Kingdom of Invar (or at least so it is believed). After this day, the festival starts to die out as people begin making their journey home, and after the seventh day the festival is officially over.