The Moonlight Falls Diaries (1810s)

Constanza Lionetti, beautiful, charming and poor, without a home, but endowed with a tenacious disposition, seemed to possess too few of the blessings of existence to weigh against her life’s miseries; for despite her merely fourteen years of age, she had to find a working position to escape starvation.

Or so I would start this were I trying to emulate Jane Austen without using the overdone “It is a truth universally acknowledged” quote. So, I used the first sentence of Emma instead.

So, what is this?

I am currently playing a proper Ultimate Decades Challenge over on my other side blog @townsenddecades. Playing that one is a lot of fun, but after four months straight of management heavy gameplay and writing a lot of story posts, I was feeling a bit burnt out. So, I decided that I needed some variety and decided to do some low-effort, loosely UDC gameplay in a regency version of Moonlight Falls. And the first six years of that gave me so much drama that I decided I wanted to share them. This is what you’ll be seeing here.

At its core it’s still an UDC (although by necessity I will be using Several Person’s rules or make up my own after 1815), but I will probably be much looser with it. Because otherwise, what would be the point of playing another save because the management in my main UDC was stressing me out? I just think rolling dice for survival adds some welcome unpredictability.

So, in essence:

If you want to have decently polished, long story posts: have a look at the Townsends' story.

If you want some fun (and sometimes not so fun, because it's the 1800s) little snippets of Constanza’s (and her descendants') supernatural adventures: stay here.

Navigation:

Chronological

Gen 1 – Constanza Lionetti: 1800 | 1805 | 1810 | 1815

Additional:

Family Tree

Rules:

UDC

As the year draws to a close, there is still no end to the war in sight, and thus, no sign of when Jules will return home. Constanza tries not to let that discourage her. She still receives letters from him, and while is it not a pleasant outing, he says that he is in good spirits. That is something.

She always reads his letters to the children (at least those parts that are appropriate for their ears), and often finds herself sitting with them in the evening, with Joy playing on the floor and Elissa and/or Adriano indulging in some quiet preoccupation while she reads or knits.

It feels stifling, sometimes, that she is homebound looking after them, but if she had to decide, she'd say that those quiet moments are nevertheless her favourites.

Like most witch children, Joy too first exhibits her spellcaster powers by making her toys disappear and reappear. She seems confused by the effect at first, but after a while, she makes it into a game, proud to be able to do something her much older siblings cannot.

After Julian’s birth, Constanza often finds herself exhausted. Partly because she is hurting for weeks afterwards, as is usual after the rigours of childbearing, but also because between keeping the house tidy and clean, seeing to the children, being woken up several times each night and trying to write in-between to secure them a little additional income, she hardly gets a moment’s rest.

She is glad that Adriano and Elissa do their share in tending to their vegetable garden and herbs – it means she has to worry less about the high food prices, at least. It may only be one less worry, but these days, she is thankful for anything that eases the burden on her shoulders.

Name: Julian MacDuff

Generation: 2

Birthday: 14th September 1812

Parents: Jules & Constanza MacDuff

Life State: Witch

Traits: Disciplined, Loves the Cold

Finally, in the middle of September, Constanza’s water breaks and it is once again time for her to enter the birthing bed. She calls in a midwife this time, because however much she doesn’t want to spend the money, it is the sensible thing to do. She doesn’t wish to go through childbirth alone, and she especially doesn’t want Adriano to have to deal with the consequences if something goes wrong.

Luckily, nothing does, and after half a day of labour, she is delivered of a somewhat small, but healthy boy – a second son. Even through her exhaustion she can’t help but think that Jules, at least, will be pleased.

She decides to name her new son Julian, after his father, absent though he is.

I just found this cute when looking through my screenshots. No story post this time, just Adriano obviously wanting to take after his mother. (I assume he had a whim to gain the writing skill, but because this was more than a year ago, I don’t know.)

By the end of July, five weeks or so after Jules’ departure, Constanza feels like a beached whale, with at least a month still to go until her torment is ended. Despite this, she tries her best to stay on top of managing her household, paying the bills, and spending time with the children. Even with Constanza having little James to care for, Joy demands a lot of attention, and gets rather clingy when she doesn’t get it.

Elissa, meanwhile, decides to help her step-brother out with gardening. She may only be seven, but she knows how scarce food it. Even if she doesn’t particularly like getting her hands dirty, she thinks she should know how to grow it. Just in case.

The house feels quiet with Jules gone. The whole town does. Theirs is hardly the only family that contributed menfolk to the war, and although most of their neighbours still prefer not to associate with Constanza, she can tell that the same worry that made its nest in her lungs is haunting them as well.

What if her husband doesn’t return? What then? They have enough money to live on more or less comfortably for a while, but she’d be on her own securing the children’s futures. She misses Jules for his sake, and the idea that she might never have him tease her or talk to him or watch his eyes gleam at some successful prank cuts her deeply, but even that pales compared to her fear for the future.

But she only allows herself to give into these feelings when she is alone. When the children are around, she is as cheerful as ever, so as to not frighten them unduly. Maybe she is wrong. Maybe everything will turn out fine.

And so she tries to continue her days as before, preparing for the arrival of this new child and writing her letters, just like she promised.

Sadly, the MacDuffs can’t escape the rumbles of war forever. When it is finally officially declared in June, Jules has no choice but to go, loath as he is, especially now that Constanza is expecting again. She is used to handling their children alone, but they haven’t been apart overnight since their marriage. Not to mention the very real possibility that he might not return.

Despite her own anxieties, Constanza forces herself to appear serene and simply wish Jules well when they all see him of, for the children’s sake if nothing else. They are frightened enough without her or her husband adding to that.

“I’ll pray for your speedy return”, she promises Jules as he holds her tight. He draws back, nodding curtly.

“I wouldn’t dare hope to be back before our newest little one is here, but I will think of you every day. Do write to me – I want to know how you and the children are faring.”

It isn’t the most romantic of goodbyes, but they already shared a much more intimate one earlier. Once Constanza has promised that of course she will write to him, he turns towards their children, embracing Elissa tightly and having Adriano swear that he will look after his mother and younger siblings. It is quite the burden for one so young, but Adriano nods gravely as if he has been entrusted with defending the entire town.

After that, Jules heads off to join his regiment, leaving Constanza and the children to wave after him until he is out of view.

By April, Constanza cannot delude herself any longer: she is most definitely, if unexpectedly, carrying another child. Part of her wants to curse whatever deity saw fit to punish her like this, and she very nearly swears at Jules when his reaction to her announcement is “Oh, so that’s why you’ve been in a temper!”, but all of that doesn’t change the fact that she is pregnant. She wishes it could.

Wishing her child away is probably wrong of her. And she is certain that once this new little one is out, she’ll view the situation much more calmly. But right now, it feels like nothing but a misfortune, and she hopes to the Watcher that she doesn’t end up resenting the baby over it.

The children find their own ways to amuse themselves while their parents are busy with preparing for the new arrival. Adriano, upon learning about precious stones from one of his books, makes a came out of trudging around Moonlight Falls to try and collect them, while Elissa takes advantage of her little sister now being old enough to play with.

Both are good distractions from the whispered, serious-faced conversations their parents have about the impending war.

Over the next few weeks, Constanza does her very best to ignore the possibility that she might be with child again. She even hides her nausea from her husband, because Jules would certainly start asking questions if he had any inkling about it. And Constanza doesn’t think she could handle that anytime soon.

Instead, she almost throws herself into her work, from cooking to childcare to knitting to writing, and grits her teeth whenever she feels ill, determined that if she simply ignores it, her fears won’t come true. It’s too soon, and four children are more than enough. Fate wouldn’t be so cruel as to have her fall pregnant again immediately.

If she were in a calmer state of mind, she would probably be aghast about her own thoughts, but her mind and body have hardly recovered from carrying James. The very thought that she might be about to go through the same ordeal again to then have a toddler and two infants in her home makes her want to cry, and that weakness in the face of difficulty makes her even angrier.

For all her best efforts, Jules and the children do notice that she is in a foul mood, but none of them even suspect the real reason. Only Jules is bold enough to ask what is bothering her, and upon being rebuffed, quickly decides to simply wait it out, figuring that it may be one of those mood swings women are prone to, or anxiety about the war that seems so imminent. The children try to steer clear of her altogether, judging that this is the easiest way to avoid incurring her ire.

Baby James is hardly three months old when poor Constanza finds herself feeling nauseous again. This time, she truly does believe that it must be due to some illness. Surely, the few weeks since she and Jules have returned to having marital relations haven’t been enough for her to conceive again.

That conviction starts to crack when her nausea lingers and her courses fail to return.

With the family growing and 1812 being the year the war of…well,1812, begins, the time felt right for a family picture. No, I don’t know why I didn’t take one without the plumbob hanging over the cat’s head.

They do make a handsome family, though. Maybe I’ll even try to turn that picture of Constanza and Jules into cc at some point.

Even with their house constantly busy with the four children and whatever other business wedges itself into their day, Jules’ help affords Constanza at least some time for herself in the evenings, when he takes over looking after the children. With his days already busy, she can’t thank him enough for that.

In fact, they still find some time for themselves as a married couple, too, at least when the children are in bed. Two years of marriage might have rubbed some of the shine off, with petty squabbles, daily annoyances and the like, but at the end of the day, they still adore each other far to much to let any of it come between them.