The Moors

The Moors is a Logical, Wicked world that is the main setting in *Down Among the Sticks and Bones*. It briefly features in *Every Heart a Doorway*.

## Description

The door to the Moors opens up in different places, but the one featured in the books is a Chest in the Wolcott House, which opens into a descending staircase. At the bottom is a door, made of pines, wtih a sign hanging above it that only says "Be Sure." The Moors get many travelers to populate itself, as children are rarely born there.

Outside the door is a field that runs up the edge of a slate-gray ocean, against a rocky shore. The ground has shrubs and bright flowers in blue, orange and purple, as well as bone-white and bile-yellow. The moon is huge and ruby-red, surrounded by many stars. Nothing red grows on the Moors.

The Moors exist in eternal twilight. The Moor is divided into villages and moors and protectorates, with a master/mistress ruling over each one. In the mountains is a world of snow, full of werewolves and unforgiving Lords of Eternal Winter. In the sea, there is a world in the moment of drowning, full of sirens, half-sunken buildings, and ghost lords.

Around the Master's house is a wall, sharpened with stakes and bound with iron and ropes. Inside the wall is a medieval courtyard, with a fountain and a bronze-and-steel statue of The Master. After that is the silent town, and then the Master's House, behind an iron door and gray stone wall.

One of the laws of the Moor is that visitors were to be granted three days of hospitality and safety; once that is up, they are exposed to the laws of the land. Should the visitors reject the hospitality, they are subject to the laws of the land before the three days are up. There is also a law as old as the Moors itself, that if a foundling finds their doorway to another world, they must be allowed to go, with nobody stopping them. Around the Moors, everything comes down to blood some way or another.

### The Master's Castle

The Master's House is kept behind a gray stone wall, with an iron door. On the other side is a normal castle hall, with stone walls, a faded red-and-black carpet, and spider-webbed chandeliers. Following that is the staircase to the dining room, with a long mahogany table. The food is prepared by a kitchen-witch.

There are no mirrors in the house, and doors to other rooms appear when needed.

When Jack and Jill stay with the Master, they sleep in a round tower room, which had two teardrop-shaped beds and barred windows for protection. At the bottom of the tower is the bones of many children who had climbed out the window and fallen to their deaths.

The Bathroom has glittering blue and silver tiles, pointing to the domed roof, with little nooks in the walls filled with candles. The floor is a narrow lip, no bigger than two feet, with the rest of it a large basin of water with delightful smells.

### The Master's Village

Once arriving at the Village Gate, residents speak first to announce themselves, to give them the opportunity to scream for help if need be. There is an inn in the village- The Sign of the Hind and Hare- and several storestalls.

The Village apparently trades vodka with the Sea Creatures for chocolate, rum, tea, and the occasional cursed idol.

### Dr. Bleak's Windmill

Dr. Bleak's house is outside the Wall, in a large windmill on the top of a steep hill, surrounded by green plants. Inside the Windmill is a large room that is twenty feet high, covered with stuffed animals, while the walls are covered with racks and shelves, and three fireplaces. The smallest of the fireplaces is behind a large oak table, while in the center of the room is a surgical table and a spiral staircase going down into the basement and up into the second floor.

## Place on the Compass

The Moors is described as a High Logic, High Wicked world. It is unknown where it falls on the Rhyme, Linearity or Vitus/Mortis sections.

## Known Members

* The Master
* Doctor Ghast (deceased)
* Doctor Bleak
* Bela (deceased)
* Mary
* Ivan
* Alexis Chopper
* Ms. Chopper
* Mr. Chopper
* Jack Wolcott
* Jill Wolcott (deceased)
* Fire-Haired Boy (formerly)

## Trivia

* Seanan McGuire has said that if she were to go through a portal, she would like to end up in The Moors.
* Seanan has compared The Moors to being like a Vincent Price movie.

## References

1. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 52: There was a door. It was small, and plain, and made of rough, untreated pine. A sign hung at adult eye level. BE SURE, it said, in letters that looked like they had been branded into the wood.
2. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 129-130: There were very few people born to the Moors. Alexis, with her calm native acceptance that this was the way the world was intended to work, was more of an aberration than a normalcy. Unlike some worlds, which maintained their own healthy populations, the Moors were too inimical to human life for that to be easily accomplished. So they sent doors to other places, to collect children who might be able to thrive there, and then they let what would happen naturally... happen.
3. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 53: It was a field. A big field, so big that it seemed like it went on just shy of forever- and the only reason it didn't go on farther was because it ran up against the edge of what looked like an ocean, slate-gray and dashing itself against a rocky, unforgiving shore. Neither girl knew the world for "moor," but if they had, they would have both agreed in an instant that this was a moor. This was *the* moor, the single platonic ideal from which all the moors had been derived. The ground was rich with a mixture of low-growing shrubs and bright-petaled flowers, growing blue and orange and purple, a riot of impossible color.
4. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 61: Instead, they walked through brush and bracken, pausing occasionally to gather flowers that they had never seen before, flowers that bloomed white as bone, or yellow as bile, or with the soft suggestion of a woman's face tucked into the center of their petals.
5. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 58: The moon was huge, and red as a ruby somehow set into the night sky, surrounded by the gleaming points of a million stars.
6. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 171: But nothing red grew on the Moors. Not even strawberries, or poisonous mushrooms. Those were found only on the outskirts of the forest held by the werewolves, or in private gardens, like Dr. Bleak's. The Moors were neutral territory, of a sort, divided between so many monsters that they could not bear to bleed. Red was an anomaly. Red was aftermath.
7. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 61: The Moors exist in eternal twilight, in the pause between the lightning strike and resurrection. They are a place of endless scientific experimentation, of monstrous beauty, and of terrible consequences.
8. ↑ Every Heart a Doorway, page 81: "The world we went to, it was... feudal, almost, divided into villages and moors and protectorates, with a master or mistress holding sway over each of them."
9. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 61: Had the girls turned toward the mountains, they would have found themselves in a world washed in snow and pine, where the howls of wolves split the night, and where the lords of eternal winter ruled with an unforgiving hand.

Had the girls turned toward the sea, they would have found themselves in a world caught forever at the moment of drowning, where the songs of sirens lured the unwary to their deaths, and where the lords of half-sunken manors never forgot, or forgave, those who trespassed against them.
10. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 69: "This is your first night in the Moors, and the law says I must extend to you the hospitality of my home for the duration of three moonrises," he said solemly. "During that time, you will be safe under my roof as I am. No one will harm you. No one will hex you. No one will draw upon your blood. When that time is done, you will be subject to the laws of the land, and will pay for what you take as would anyone. Do you understand?"
11. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 91: "As yours has chosen you, and slighted me, what's to stop me from killing her where she stands?" The Master sounded bored. That didn't stop the fear from coiling through Jack's heart, where it lay, heavy and waiting, like a serpent preparing to strike. "She forsook the protection of my house when she rejected me."
12. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 96-97: "You will always be free to take the door back to your original home," he said. "I am bound by a compact as old as the Moors to let you go, if that's truly your desire. But I hope that when that door eventually opens, you might find that you prefer my company."
13. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 101: "I meant blood, little girl. Everything comes down to blood here, one way or another. Do you understand?"
14. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 108: "This is not your doorway home," she said. "The Master's castle is malleable, and matches to our needs. Go. Clean yourself up. It doesn't do to keep him waiting."
15. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 128: "The terrible things that dwell beneath the bay scavenge [chocolate] from the ships they wreck and trade it to the villagers for vodka," said Dr. Bleak. "That's also where we get rum, tea, and the occasional cursed idol."
16. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 99: "Dr. Bleak lived outside the castle, outside the village; outside the seemingly safe bulk of the wall."
17. ↑ Down Among the Sticks and Bones, page 100: Dr. Bleak led her through the bracken and brush, up the sloping side of a hill, until the shape of a windmill appeared in the distance. It seemed very close, and then, as they walked on and on without reaching it, she realized that it was, indeed, very large; it was a windmill meant to harness the entire sky. Jack stared. Dr. Bleak walked, and she followed, until the brush under their feet gave way to a packed-earth trail, and they began the final ascent toward the windmill. The last part of the hill was steeper than the rest, ending some ten feet before the door. The ground all around the foundation had been cleared and covered in raised planter beds that grew green with plants Jack had never seen before.
18. ↑ Every Heart a Doorway, page 50: "Jack and Jill are stupid, stupid girls," said Sumi. She stabbed a slice of melon with her fork, splashing gravy on the table. "They think they're going *back*, but they're *not*. Those doors are closed now. Can't go to high Logic, high Wicked if you're not innocent. The Wicked doesn't want people it can't *spoil*."
19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 Seanan McGuire's Continuum 13 Guest of Honour Hour