The underworlds

**The underworlds** are a location in the fae realm where many gods of death, demons, and dark creatures dwell.

## Appears in

Major canon:

*The Nightingale and Terho the Mouse-Lad*

## Description

'The underworlds are a treacherous place. The energy alone wears at the innate nature of the fae. Not to mention that there are dark gods, disturbing creatures, demons and ghosts and ghouls, those of the dead who are lost. The very walls care not for one’s survival. No fae is truly equipped to survive down there.' Unseelie fae can handle it better than Seelie fae. The parts Terho the Mouse-Lad travels in are dark, filled with alien fungi, 'grains that grew like warts from the sticky, damp ground', and underworld demons who attack him. The underworlds are also home to various parasitic creatures, such as slurchers and memoryeaters.

After the Nightingale becomes a Mage, he becomes particularly interested in the underworlds, and Davix and Olphix somehow give him the tools to make a portal between the fae realm and the underworlds, so that he can enter the underworlds. The portal itself remains in place, destabilizing both worlds.

The underworlds contain 'the lands of the dead', which is where the Nightingale spends 'an unfathomable time' before returning to the fae realm, 'bloated with power, having found magical ways of consuming underworld creatures and, it is suspected, a demigod or two. His nature warped beyond recognition, darkness staining his steps in a way that bothered even the Unseelie, he wreaked havoc upon the fae world all so he could feed his insatiable appetite for misery and grief.'

Underworld Mages, who previously never cooperated with the fae, joined with a group of fae Mages to stop the Nightingale: they 'forced the Nightingale into his weaker bird form, then sealed that single Mourner nightingale into an enchanted cage down a forgotten corridor in . . . the underworlds.' They create 100 different doors and locks to guard the cage. Even with the Mages of the underworlds joining with them, the Mages are unable to kill the Nightingale.

A fae only known as the Healer, who taught Terho, has a locked book on the underworlds, that, when one touched a particular section, will teleport that person to the underworlds. Such was Terho's fate, when he uses his innate ability to unlock the book. Terho frees the Nightingale (not knowing who the Nightingale is), and the Nightingale blasts open the barrier separating the underworlds from the rest of the world.

While the Nightingale is free, he catches and tortures Augus Each Uisge for a year down in the underworlds, infecting the waterhorse with underworlds pollution. Underworld energy is a clinging substance that pollutes fae who encounter it or spend any time in the underworlds, and the fae realm when it is introduced there. Augus later mimicks the landscape he saw in the underworlds when he uses the Blight to destroy waterways in the fae realm. While the NIghtingale tortures Augus, he would sometimes possess Augus' body to explore places in the underworlds he was otherwise barred from by demons and gods.

Terho uses a life debt to lure the Nightingale, and Mages once more trap the Nightingale in bird form, and return him to his underworlds prison.

Kabiri is an 'underworld god', and holds power over dead souls. He also points out that the underworlds has its own magic and laws.

## Residents

* Kabiri
* The Nightingale

## Quotations

* Kabiri: 'We have our own magics and laws in the underworld, and you know a whole lot of nothing about them. Just because you visited briefly to lock that abomination back in *our* realm where he *doesn’t belong,* doesn’t mean you understand anything.’

## Trivia

* Although the Nain Rouge is curious by nature and seemingly curious about the underworlds, she does not travel there herself when the opportunity present itself, implying even she might have some fear of it. She can still sense the Nightingale trapped there.

## Image Gallery

Fanart of the Nightingale in the underworlds by Hyacinthess https://hya-chan-art.tumblr.com/post/98149234341/i-drew-this-during-a-lesson-cause-thatsFanart of the Nightingale and Augus Each Uisge in the underworlds by justsomeperson1920 https://www.instagram.com/p/Bb6B1zZl1wd/?utm\_source=ig\_web\_copy\_link
## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 not\_poignant. "The NIghtingale and Terho the Mouse-Lad." *The Fae Tales Verse, Archive of Our Own,* 5 May 2014. https://archiveofourown.org/works/1571246.
2. ↑ not\_poignant. “The Court of Five Thrones.” *The Fae Tales Verse. Archive of Our Own,* 6 February 2015. https://archiveofourown.org/works/1749290/chapters/7205945. Chapter 29: Classless.
3. ↑ not\_poignant. “The Court of Five Thrones.” *The Fae Tales Verse. Archive of Our Own,* 2 January 2015. https://archiveofourown.org/works/1749290/chapters/6705320. Chapter 24: Listen.
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 not\_poignant. “The Court of Five Thrones.” *The Fae Tales Verse. Archive of Our Own,* 4 July 2014. https://archiveofourown.org/works/1749290/chapters/4088631. Chapter 3: Disintegration.
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 not\_poignant. “The Court of Five Thrones.” *The Fae Tales Verse. Archive of Our Own,* 5 June 2015. https://archiveofourown.org/works/1749290/chapters/9186013. Chapter 46: Masque.