Rose Point

Rose Point's First Floor (Rough)

Reese Eddings's castle in Firilith province. Some stuff about where it's located and what the weather is like and the sea and stuff and maybe some compass directional data or whatever.

History

The original capital of the Eldritch, abandoned after the fight with Corel. (Purportedly).

Recent history: the Castle deeded to Reese Eddings, just prior to the Eldritch civil war; used for refugees from Ontine during the war; then its post-war history (from Jubilee Summer and Heartskein).

Physical Attributes

Weather, the land around it (coast, fields, forest, and the town down the path to the south: "To the south, though, the coast zagged inward toward a forest, and there if she squinted she could see gray roofs." ).

• Hundreds likely thousands of large white roses, spilling over trellises and gates, like frozen waves off an ocean of brambles" "All smelling of the sea.""Smelling of Sea Salt, and winter and woodsmoke and blossoms", Reese Ed

From another reference, by memory, all over the ruined tower, the tower broken by Corval

Facade and Exterior

The castle wall has enormous doors, "centuries old," which were originally levered open and closed with chains. The walls have narrow corridors, for defenders to move through them. The keep is set back from the forecourt, and is entered by way of a set of stone stairs leading to another pair of large doors. These doors open directly onto the main hall.

The towers all have walkways around the conical roofs, accessed by stairs with landings. The wall walks have benches.

The castle "smells like flowers" inside, even in winter. (Especially in winter.) The interior is all blocked stonework; unusual among the Eldritch anymore, who plaster and paper over the insides of their palaces. Only churches and cathedrals retain the building style of Rose Point.

Modern Bits

• power plant (where?) (mentioned in RPH, Chap 7)
• greenhouse (where?)

Layout and Rooms

The corridors in the castle have arched entries.

Has more than one drafty hall.

Great Hall

The great hall is accessed immediately off the doors leading into the keep, and has a hearth that is "longer than Reese is tall." The floor is stone, and communicates the cold well.

There is a balcony on the fourth floor that overhangs the great hall, facing south, and it is apparently the tallest of the balconies in the castle.

Towers

• The nursery is in one of these, above the ground floor, and it's separated into halves for sleeping children and playing children. There are windows on both sides.
• Kis'eh't's office/lab is on the ground floor of one of these

Reese's Study

A chamber Reese appropriated for an office, with a desk, a few chairs, a moth-eaten rug, and a hammock in the corner so she can nap with Allacazam. The floors are heated; she plans to have bookcases in it, eventually. It has a fireplace in it.

Office of Development

Taylor's office, from which she does all her planning for infrastructure and building for the province of Firilith. Has a table.

Lady's Suite

Reese (and Hirianthial) sleep in a suite. The lady’s bedroom suite hs a balcony that faced the northern vista, in fact, something Reese had often wondered about since the view now was desolate.

• has a closet "six times too large" with a padded bench
• the bedchamber has a window
• the (renovated) bathroom has a bath large enough for two and a working shower

Sitting Room

The third floor sitting room, situated on a corner of "Reese's side" of the castle, is traditionally the site of the women's vigil, and has windows facing south, and a fireplace on the northern wall. It overlooks the courtyard and is tucked directly over a second floor room that opens onto the castle’s wall walk. The windows are set into deep walls and have deep windowsills; the window panes have leaded glass frames, and the catches are antiquated and shaped of beautiful metal. From this room, sound in the nearby stairwells can be heard, when the door is open.

It is furnished with a rocking chair, a bench, several more chairs grouped around the fireplace on a soft rug. The fireplace has inglenooks.

Reese likes to read here.

Imperial Suite

Laisrathera has a suite set aside for imperial visitors in one of the towers: a round room so large it had been partitioned into a receiving chamber, a bedroom, and a thankfully modern bath. Its balcony runs almost half its circumference and offers a magnificent view of the sea to the east. The balcony door has to be physically opened by sliding, and the balcony itself has a couple of wrought iron chairs. This suite has no genie (as of the events of Sediryl's investiture) . The interior walls were left the same stone texture as the building materials; the vaulted ceiling follows the contours of the tower's cap, complete with rafters.

The largest room, for receiving, is partitioned into a study (by way of furnishings being grouped together), and a sitting room, with a couch and several chairs.

This suite is up four flights of stairs (inside the castle proper) and then another flight of stairs in the tower.

Kitchens

On the ground floor. "The kitchens were enormous by her standards, and every time she entered them it struck her again. But one of the features of Eldritch kitchens was a large nook for eating, one that Felith had explained was usually reserved for the staff. It had taken Hirianthial to tell her later that it wasn’t unusual for the noble family to sneak down to the kitchen to snitch food from indulgent cooks, particularly the younger members of the household, or those considered favorites by the servants."

The private dining room is somewhere near the kitchen; there's also a servants' dining room.

Grounds

Rose Point Forecourt the town that has grown up in the immediate vicinity of the castle.

Winter Roses (lioyasea)

History

Val tells Reese: "These are special. They are lioyasea, white roses, the roses of sacrifice. They bloom only in winter, the cruelest season, and grow only by the coast where there are storms. And it's said they were born of Elsabet's blood when she died here."

In Reese's Time

The gardens are overseen by Bryer: "The scent was being produced, he discovered, by roses. Hundreds—maybe thousands—of large white roses, spilling over trellises and gates, like frozen waves off an ocean of brambles." It took a while for him to prune them back, implying they're very hardy flowers: "Bryer had made significant headway on the overgrowth of the garden, but there were still more winter roses in places than there was clear ground."

"These flowers have always bloomed here in winter, and they’re special to Lady Eddings. But there’re so many of them that her gardener has to prune them constantly. In fact, if you poke around in the garden long enough, you’ll find a station with shears, if you want a rose for yourself." This is done by leaving shears and a weatherproofed paper of instructions in covered baskets throughout the gardens. The instructions are handwritten, and in Universal, and tell the user how to clip the roses (where, what angle, etc).

Biology and Appearance

White roses, growing from nearly black brambles (a very dark brown). Very strong scent.

"The roses, when he brought them to his nose, smelled of the sea, and the fragrance was so concentrated amid the silky petals that the fur on the back of his neck prickled all the way under the collar of his shirt."

Mentions

This is where you put all the times someone has given someone one of these flowers (and why), or other trivia.

Gifts

• Bryer gave Reese a winter rose on her first holiday on Escutcheon, the "first cut of the new year," for her to wear, in a scene where they discuss the various symbols it might be (since it is perfect, except for a single creased petal). He does this every year, now.
• Hirianthial now smells of winter roses (during that season, presumably, when his home is rife with them).
• Armin Palland clips two, one for his wife and one for his mother-in-law, when he first was exploring Rose Point.

Decorating

• Shield General puts arrangements of winter roses in its patients' rooms, and outside in their gardens in large stone amphora in winter, when other flowers are scarce.
• Laisrathera's holiday decorations involve winter roses: "Those garlands still bedecked the hall, but they’d been woven through with strands of winter roses tied with silver ribbon. The perfume added a floral topnote to the bouquet of evergreen and the scent of burning wood in the fireplace, and it was perfect."

Military

• When the Eldritch borrow the concept of ship heraldry from Fleet, they will start designing devices for their ships. Winter roses are used on the coat-of-arms for REN Elsabet the Faithful.