Baize
FaeTricksterTabletopHousehold SpiritBritish Folklore
Lore
Baize is a Fae bound to tables, hearth-edges and the green felt that gathers a household's small fortunes. It smells of chalk dust, warm ale and old coins; it sounds like the soft slide of cloth, the tiny clack of a die answering to no hand, and an amused, breathy chuckle just beyond sight. Its temperature reads cool and cellar-like, with quick, teasing warmings where it brushes skin or cloth. A field naturalist records it as furtive and precise: lint gathered in tidy piles, card corners nudged into place, and a preference for shadowed edges where fingers leave impressions.
Origin: Breton/Norman folk belief • Brittany / Normandy, France
Classification: Fae (Trickster)
Field Notes
Observations
- A perfect crescent worn into the edge of a green cloth, a stray die that always shows the same face, or tokens rearranged into near-perfect lines.
Encounter Advice
- mischief: Baize delights in small, rule-shaped pranks: swapping cards between hands, hiding a single pawn under the board, nudging a die to the edge so it tumbles on the next throw, or making a scoring mark vanish. Its tricks are precise rather than violent — designed to confuse, to upend certainty, and then to watch the fuss with gleeful impartiality.
- interaction: Approach Baize with rules and hospitality. Speak aloud the turn order, leave a square of green cloth or a clean die at the table's center, and play with steady, good-humored attention. Do not accuse the spirit of cheating; accept its gambits as part of the evening and respond with a small, compensating gesture (a tidy stack of tokens, a whispered thanks) to end an incident.
- offering: A neat scrap of green felt or a well-rolled die; a piece of plain biscuit or a small, honest coin set on the cloth will placate it; a fair game offered at dusk often wins a lasting truce.
Abilities
- SpindlebindWith a single pluck of its phantom spindle the Baize tangles a household's fortunes into literal threads—mending goodwill or knotting luck into months of misfortune until the weave is righted.
- Green-Table GuiseIt summons a strip of green baize that cloaks a table or surface, producing convincing illusions of food, coin or kin that distract or beguile those who touch them.
- Mendfast RibbonThe Baize weaves a narrow ribbon from dropped wool and ties it to a person's clothing to strengthen a vow or slice it loose to secretively unravel a promise.
Weaknesses
- Salt Hearth LineA line of coarse salt drawn across a threshold bars the Baize from crossing the home boundary and strips its weave-magic within sight of the line.
- Scorched YarnBurning a skein of wool that was pledged as an offering severs the Baize's claim to a household and causes it to recoil and retreat for days.
- Iron NeedleAn iron sewing needle stuck point-first into a chair or spindle anchor pins the Baize's hands and dampens its ability to manipulate threads.