Aereni worshipers express their reverence for the Undying Court in a number of ways.
Prayers
Aereni prayers are simple utterances, little more than the name of an ancestor (often preceded or followed by an honorific), and then a request or expression of thanks. For instance, “Revered Vellaye, honored grandfather, grant me the patience to deal with these outlanders!” Aereni never pray to the Undying Court as a whole, believing true divinity is beyond mortal understanding. Rather, a worshiper offers a prayer to a specific ancestor—usually one with relevant interests, such a great-great-grandmother soldier on the eve of battle—or to direct ancestors as a whole. These ancestors act as spiritual emissaries, carrying the prayer to the Undying Court or, if their own powers are up to the task, dealing with the matter themselves.
Minor Rites
The Aereni hold rituals regularly, to celebrate births or deaths, to request aid in an endeavor or intervention in their followers’ lives (such as during times of plague, war, or famine), and simply to honor the Court. Every family marks the deathday of each of its members who have gone before, and they hold a rite at sundown to commemorate that anniversary. Depending on the size of the family, this can result in daily observances.
Aereni rituals seem alike. Worshipers light flames, draw sacred symbols on the ground in wine or blood, and engage in somber, dirgelike chants and prayers. Rites usually involve slow, steady dances with steps determined in advance by the leading soungral, based on what movements most please and honor the undying being invoked. While the Aereni worship the Undying Court as a whole, most such rituals name a few specific ancestors to carry their words and petitions to the Court. Rites last anywhere from a few minutes to several hours, depending on importance. Funerals, for example, can last an entire day.
Major Rites
The greatest ritual of the Aereni is the Rite of Transition, or the levan mordr-aer. This rite can take place only in the City of the Dead, a region particularly suited to this activity due to streams of positive energy emanations from the plane of Irian. The rite can be performed on the living or the dead, so long as the corpse is no older than three months.
The levan mordraer requires the participation of multiple mordraloi. Tradition demands that at least one of the undying stand as witness, and the closest relatives of the subject are present as well to herald his passage. The priests bathe the subject in oils and embalming fluids (which include, among many other substances, distilled mordrei’in), lay him upon a bier, and draw holy symbols on his body in the willingly given blood of witnesses. Finally, the mordraloi cast a sequence of spells over the subject, including either create deathless or create greater deathless, as well as spells of blessing and other mystical utterances that do not appear to be part of any known spell. This 48-hour rite, empowered and modified by the ambient forces of the City of the Dead, anchors the resulting deathless to the energies of Irian. Deathless created elsewhere can never become ascendant councilors, no matter how old they grow. The Aereni claim that the rite functions only on elves, but since it has never been attempted on anyone else, the truth of this statement remains in question.
Leaves of Death
During rites, Aereni priests and practitioners might consume the mordrei’in, or “leaves of death”. These are the leaves of the mordril, a tree that grows only on Aerenal, and only in grave dirt. The leaves are deadly when eaten raw, but with the proper application of herbal and alchemical techniques, they become only mildly poisonous and enhance the consumer’s ability to focus. Worshipers hold this trancelike state to be a bridge between the living and the dead—and, thanks to improper treatment or low resistance, some practitioners don’t return from the journey.
The Calendar
The Aereni calendar is a strange affair, practically unreadable to anyone not raised with it. It measures time in repeating cycles. For instance, while the calendar acknowledges the concept of “days,” they are not considered important measurements of time in their own right. Rather, they are the component parts to overlapping cycles called tuernai (singular tuern), which consist of three days each and are the primary unit of measurement on the Aereni calendar. A similar overlapping cycle of twenty-one tuernai equals a luenir, roughly three months on the Galifar calendar. This process continues, with luenirai overlapping to eventually form the Aereni year, years forming cycles called ruelnai, and ruelnai forming nuerlnirai (roughly analogous to a decade). Only then does the calendar restart. Specific holidays vary by family and the deathdays of ancestors.