What Is a Fae?

A fae (pronounced fay) is a faerie, but not the Tinker Bell kind. In the old stories from Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales, the fae are a whole other people living alongside ours. They’re usually beautiful, often immortal and almost never on your side.

People in those stories didn’t like saying “faeries” out loud. They called them the Good Folk, the Fair Folk or the Gentry, the same way you’d be polite about someone you were scared of. That nervousness is what modern fantasy picked up on, and it’s why fae in books are so much more fun than the glitter-and-wings version.

Where the word comes from

“Fae” and “fey” both trace back through Old French fae to the Latin fata, the Fates. That root is worth knowing. A fae creature in folklore wasn’t cute. It was tied up with destiny, death and things you couldn’t control.

The rules (mostly)

Every author tweaks them, but some rules turn up again and again because they come straight from the folklore:

• They can’t lie. But they can mislead you so completely you’ll wish they’d just lied. Holly Black’s The Cruel Prince builds a whole court around this.
• Iron hurts them. Cold iron burns, weakens or binds them. It’s the oldest protection in the stories.
• Names have power. Know a fae’s true name and you have a hold over them. Never give yours away.
• Don’t eat the food. Eat or drink in Faerie and you might never be allowed to leave.
• Bargains are binding. A deal with the fae is magically enforced, and the fine print always favors them. See basically all of ACOTAR.
• Time is strange. A night in a fairy hill can turn out to be a hundred years outside it.
• Don’t say thank you. In some traditions, thanks implies a debt, and you don’t want to owe them anything.

Seelie and Unseelie

Scottish folklore split the fae into two courts. The Seelie Court is the “blessed” one, more likely to help a human, though it still punishes insults. The Unseelie Court is the dark one, made up of the creatures that hunt travelers at night. Plenty of modern books use that split. Karen Marie Moning’s Darkfever is one of the best-known.

Quick note: Seelie doesn’t mean good. It means less likely to hurt you today.

Fae vs. elves vs. faeries

Mostly a matter of which tradition (and which author) you’re reading. Norse elves, Irish aos sí, English fairies and Tolkien’s elves all overlap. In romantasy, “fae” has become the go-to word for the tall, pointy-eared, dangerous-courtier version, and “elf” tends to show up in softer books like A Deal with the Elf King.

Why romantasy loves them

Fae solve a lot of storytelling problems at once. They’re immortal, so a human romance is automatically lopsided. They’re bound by rules, so every conversation is a puzzle. And they’re beautiful and terrible, which is basically the job description for a morally gray love interest.

Want to go deeper? Read our guide to the types of fae, grab a name from our fae names list, or browse every fae book we’ve rated.