User blog:GrandMethuselah67/Lore Sheet: Elfhome, the Abode of the Fae

Elfhome was a mistake. Years before the multiverse even formed out of a mistake from the primordial race known today as the Dragons, all realities were one. The lax physical laws allowed for organisms that lived for millions of years at a time, easily able to manifest supernatural or magical abilities. However, the Dragons had quickly reached a trans-dimensional status, engineering this "Alpha Universe" quickly into something that fitted their needs and their needs only. Eventually, the nigh-infinite energy of the Alpha Universe grew unstable, and this instability birthed the current multiverse known today. However, this isn't about the multiverse. This is about Elfhome.

Elfhome was born from the "Primordial Foam", a concentration of "raw existence" from which anything can be born. Interestingly enough, this Primordial Foam is exactly where Dkmak-Mab (later known as Queen Mab) was born, and thus she had a fundamental connection to this new quasi-plane. Of course, being fundamentally connected to the Embodiment of Chaos didn't do well for the plane. This new world constantly shifted and self-destructed, repairing itself all over again to start this new process. Chaos eventually decided to populate this plane, and from her very essence, she created twelve beings. These beings are now known as the nobles of faerie, and from them the rest of Elfhome was populated. The Fae were perfectly adapted to the chaotic landscape of Elfhome due to their status as being made from chaos, the only law that Elfhome seemed to consistently follow. The nobles of Faerie divided themselves into pairs, each claiming a sizeable amount of Elfhome and naming their "Court" after one of the four seasons, and the concepts that they were most connected to. Due to the Faerie Noble's fundamental connection with Elfhome, the environment itself shifted to match the noble's courts: Summer, Winter, Autumn, Spring.

And so...the reign of the seasons began, each court fighting each other for power under the delusion that there would be one season. The species and plane itself fluctuated as the fae changed, degenerated, and changed again -- nothing is constant in Faerie except for the Game. In modern times, Elfhome is warring against itself, with physical laws so chaotic and inconsistent that it's impossible to find any real order. The Eternal War is the war of the seasons to gain power, and the Game of Immortals is the "game" that faeries play in their lives, which replace any comprehensive physical laws entirely.

The Plane of Chaos: The Game of Immortals and other Physical Laws
Everything in Elfhome is sentient in some way, even the most abstract or mundane of concepts. If one wants to walk on water, one simply has to make a contract with the sea. If one wants to drink magma, one simply has to make a contract with the lava or the concept of heat. Contracts, oaths, and agreements replace physical laws in Elfhome, leading to truly strange and subjective physics (for example, someone in Elfhome may be able to swim because the water doesn't turn into fire upon their touch because they made a contract with the water, but someone else may simply be able to glide along the surface of the water as opposed to falling into an icy abyss). Outside of Elfhome, fae and other fey-creatures can use this contract ability to gain mystical powers via deals with real-world concepts. Inside of Elfhome, a contract is instantly bestowed upon simply entering.

The fae, especially Higher Faeries like Leanan Sidhe, Elves, and Nobles, have to follow a set of strange rules called the Game of Immortals. The Game is not only a code of behavior that all fae follow, but also the laws of their existence which they're absolutely unable to break. The Game of Immortals is possibly a result of Queen Mab forcing a contract upon the whole Faerie race, or it may be a set of rules they imposed on themselves; after all, all games need rules, right?

The rules of the Game of Immortals are as follows:

1) Never kill a mortal, unless in self-defense.

2) Never break an oath, promise, or contract. Always stay true to your word.

3) Never lie.

4) Always show hospitality to guests.

5) Always be remembered.

As masters of loopholes, the Fae have found numerous ways to break the Game of Immortals without truly breaking it (you cannot lie, but you CAN mislead; you must always show hospitality, but it never says what hospitality is). Due to the fact that the Fae are inherently delusional and alien-minded, this has led to a series of...strange actions such as stealing children in their sleep, destroying entire galaxies on a whim and re-creating them in a fit of sadness, and many other things. However, the price of directly (emphasis on directly) breaking the Game of Immortals is fading away from existence. Combine the Game of Immortals with the strange conditions that definitely come with making contracts with concepts, and the physical laws of Elfhome are definitely strange.

Into the Mind of Madness: The Psychology of the Faerie
To the average Faerie, nothing is real. Reality as a whole is one massive, elaborate game with no real consequences. Due to this sociopathic viewpoint, the Fae believe that they can do no wrong, and that each person they torment is really enjoying it. Furthermore, the Fae are in a permanently childish mindset, unable to comprehend anybody having a different opinion than them. Not only do they believe that life is an elaborate game without any consequences, but they also believe that everybody thinks the same way. This also leads to their many strange activities, which is really a result of their total disregard for everyone but themselves. Another interesting aspect of their psychology is their inability to realize any vulnerability in themselves, making them unable to recognize their limits and making them very spoiled. This applies especially to the Faerie nobles: practically omnipotent in their own domains, the Fae can be anyone or anything they ever want to be.

Interestingly enough, due to the fifth rule of the Game of Immortals, stating a faerie always must stay remembered, a Faerie must be in constant conflict to even exist. Due to the Faerie's inherently being unable to make friends, in a strange way, a faerie's enemy is the closest thing he or she will ever have to a friend. The constant struggle to stay remembered and recognized leads to the belief in each and every faerie that they are special, chosen, and "holy" in a way.

A Changeling Tale: How Most Encounter Elfhome
The Fae...love children. Children below the age of nine, to be specific. At that age range, they can see Fae as clearly as they can see anything else. Their dreams are vivid yet fluid enough to weave, allowing various sub-species of Fae to enter safely. It isn't uncommon that a child would be snatched from his or her home, taken to the dark land of Elfhome to serve whatever that faerie needs. Some children manage to get back, but more often than not, it all seems like a simple nightmare or dream to them. They don't remember it as a real memory, only as a vivid dream that can never truly hurt them.

For long-term stays, however, the Fae have an elaborate system. They stalk their prey for a while, getting a feel for their personality and essence. They somehow steal their shadows and weave it into small pieces of junk from the environment, allowing them to construct a perfect copy of the kidnapped. When the subject is kidnapped, the faerie replaces him or her with the copy, called a "Changeling", which will grow and mature as the original was supposed to, except he or she will always be "off". Changelings oftentimes don't know that they're changelings, and their artificial memories are a perfect copy of the original's memories. The parents, more often than not, never see the difference between the Changeling and the Fetch (the kidnapped). Now, the Fae don't always collect just children; adults and teenagers would do just fine if the Faerie wants a more challenging fetch.

As for the Fetch...they don't always escape. Sometimes they do, but it's not always easy to tell if you've escaped or not. If you have a more sadistic captor, the environment could easily be shifted to resemble your old home, and Changelings could easily be crafted to resemble your family and friends...

As for getting to Faerie, there are plenty of ways: mirrors, placing a phial of blood beneath a thorn bush, under certain beds...Elfhome collides with reality in various places too, creating weird amalgamations of both Elfhome and reality. In these areas, lesser Fae often roam with obscure goals.