Faerie

Faerie (plural fae) is a generic term for an inhabitant of the Otherworld, a realm that runs parallel to Earth. The term *faerie*  comes from Irish mythology, however the creatures that are classed as faeries have counterparts in many different areas of the world, as they once lived alongside humanity and have similar variations in culture to what we do.

### Characteristics

Faeries, despite not being truly a unified species, do have a cluster of similar traits. Most, though by no means all, are roughly humanoid in appearance, and they may be beautiful or horrifying, or both, but are very rarely average. Most faeries are, while not immortal, very long lived, and this longevity has had significant effects on the psychology and culture of fae. As they live such long lives, most fae species rarely reproduce, and those in positions of power can hold their power for centuries, if not millennia. As a result, faeries are often inflexible to some extent, often insisting on abiding by a series of complex social mores that are no longer strictly relevant to the world around them.

Faeries are often considered by humans to be tricksters, and indeed this reputation isn't without some backing. Fae have often interfered with human affairs; misguiding tourists, stealing cattle, replacing babies with changelings. Whilst fae cannot be considered evil, they operate on different rules to humanity, and due to their long lives they tend towards arrogance, seeing human lives as, largely, inconsequential.

### History

Faeries predate humanity, by quite a lot. It’s hard not to, when even a “young” member of your species has a few centuries under their belt. Nobody really knows where they came from, because nobody was around to see it, fae don’t keep particularly detailed records (why should they? They were there to remember it), and most people’s reaction upon meeting one of the *good neighbours* isn’t to ask them anthropological questions.

Most likely, though by far least interestingly, faeries and other supernatural beings evolved in much the same way as did humanity, just a lot earlier and from a somewhat different source. Others call them the children of the gods, if not gods in their own right, or say they sprung force from magic, from the Earth, or simply because they *willed* themselves to. It matters, in practice, rather little.

What is known about the history of the other, is that they were already here, already had pretty well-developed societies when we started moving from caves to villages to forts, as we developed and refined spoken and written language, as we dipped our first, cautious toes into culture and civilisation. For the first few tens of thousands of years, they lived alongside us, observing and picking favourites and subtly altering the course of our histories.

So, what happened to all of the faeries, the djinnis, the angels and demons and imps? How did these creatures, spoken of so regularly by early cultures, come to be relegated to folklore, to myth? Nobody is entirely sure, but it is suspected that humanity simply got a bit too big for our boots; started taking up too much space and asking too many questions, and they preferred to retreat into their own spaces, to observe, to appear as phantoms and as devils and as religious ephemera, rather than to live side by side with a species that had rapidly grown to outnumber them. Others attribute some of the responsibility to medieval superstition, or to the rise of Christianity, depending on when exactly the split is believed to have occurred.

The barrier separating them from us is far from perfect, though, and sometimes we cross it unwittingly - building up our cities on land we have no right too - and sometimes quite on purpose. Many civilisations that were thought to be lost or fallen - Rome, Mesopotamia, Kemet, Atlantis, Sheba, and so on - allowed themselves to be quietly absorbed into Faerie rather than surrender to other humans, and were later rediscovered when we, deep in our, as it turns out, well-named age of discovery, learnt where the holes fall in the veil and how to prod at them, rather than wait for them to prod at us.

Either way, one of the few certainties is that they were here before we ever arrived, and will be here long past whatever foolishness we end up doing to our planet. They watch, they wait, they endure. None of this was an accident.

### List of known fae creatures

* Sidhe
* Pixie
* Djinn
* Gnome
* Troll
* Brownie
* Goblin
* Mermaid
* Dragon
* Unicorn
* Imp
* Nymph
* Demon
* Angel
* Vampire
* Lycan