The story of The Midwinter Festivals’ deck starts over a century ago when a young winter elf lass had a tryst with a human and ended up giving birth to her first child, a half-elf son named Kurteth. Growing up, Kurteth was bright and eventually joined a wizardly academy where he became quite accomplished. He kept in contact with his mother when he could, but spent most of his early years adventuring. He amassed a sizable fortune and after a few decades, did what most wizards do; retired to a small tower he called his own, near his homeland in the frozen north.
 
Kurteth worked on the deck off and on for many years afterward, trying to perfect it. However, somehow, the deck resisted him. Every flaw he corrected brought a new complication, and ultimately, he had to resign himself to failure and resort to his previous ways of delighting his family. He concluded that fate or luck or some unknown force demanded that the deck have some element of real danger to it, even if it was intended for fun. In the years since the formula for making the deck has been leaked to the wider wizarding community, and some particularly accomplished wizards have sought to perfect the deck, but each ended up just as stymied as Kurteth was.
 
Kurteth’s version of the item is a deck of 22 heavy vellum cards, but other wizards have modified his design, creating trees with presents under them, or shoes or stockings that produce varied items. There are even rumors of a bonfire that lights itself during the midwinter months. One can pull a stick out of the fire that grants magical effects. Regardless of the presentation, these artifacts produce one of twenty-two random effects, and each person can benefit from any given artifact only once a year, during midwinter.