Follets, who appear under most circumstances to be flesh and blood people like you or I, have been thought of at various times as fairies, fallen angels, sexual demons, and gods and goddesses. To those of us who care for and safeguard them, they are indisputably the latter. They are the descendents of a primeval entity referred to by some as the Dark Mother who personified, paradoxically, both creation and destruction. Her origins are shrouded in mystery—it is not known whether she was a genetic aberration or something less easily explained—but she has found her way into the folklore of almost every culture on earth. In India, she was known as Kali, the sexually ferocious goddess of eternal night. To the ancient Mesopotamians and Sumerians, she was the fertility goddess Lilith, later interpreted in Jewish and Islamic folklore as Adam's upstart first wife, who became an immortal succubus.
The Greeks knew her as Hecate, goddess of the dark moon, the Scandinavians as Freya, goddess of love, sex, beauty, prophesy, and war. To the Babylonians, she was Ishtar, goddess of love, sexual power, fertility, and war.
The Dark Mother begot many races of follets all over the world, each with its own unique characteristics. Within those races are numerous sub-races, and within them, a great many individual variations, follets being extremely susceptible to genetic mutation. The four follets who make their home at Château de la Grotte Cachée are: Elic, a dusios from a sub-race of Nordic elves; Iluti-Lili, a Babylonian succubus; Inigo, a satyr of the early Greek variety; and Darius, a djinni of ancient near-Eastern lineage.
In one way or another, every incubus and succubus feeds off the sexual energy of those with whom they mate. In this respect, they can be thought of as sensory predators. But they have cousins, other descendents of the Dark Mother, whose predation is of a far more visceral nature, and who have been known to make themselves unwelcome guests at Grotte Cachée.
Some, such as the wickedly beautiful Huli Jing of China, or Ireland's Leanhaum-shee, seduce young men into exhaustive lovemaking so as to drain their life force through orgasm. The alluring Baobhan Sith of the Scottish Highlands, like the Empusa of Greece, captivate men with their sensual charms, only to suck their veins dry afterward. Equally treacherous are the shape-shifters: the Romanian Virolac, who satisfies his appetites in the form of a wolf, or the Bori of West Africa, who will appear to be one's friend or lover, only to punish the slightest offense with a slow, wasting disease. More famous, or infamous, is the Slavs' bloodthirsty and sexually predatory Upír, from whence evolved the word Vampire.
Follets are, as stated above, virtually immortal. Once they reach their physical peak, usually between the ages of twenty and thirty, they stop aging, and will live indefinitely unless they are killed in a specific manner. Elic, Lili, and Inigo can only die by being burned alive. Darius, who was born of fire, is only susceptible to drowning. From the Bronze Age on, there have been humans who've viewed the follets as malevolent demons and figured out how to kill them, forcing most of them into hiding. Despite the dangers, there have always been some who've tried to assimilate, passing for humans with varying success and always with a great deal of difficulty. Sadly, untold thousands of them perished during the European Witch Craze.
Protection from such barbarity is the primary reason our four follets took up residence at Grotte Cachée, although they had secondary reasons, as well: Elic and Lili's desire to be together, Darius's aversion to human contact, and Inigo's inherent laziness and self-indulgence; why go out in search of playmates when they're provided on an ongoing basis with no effort from him at all?
The world is safer for follets now, given that modern people—those in the developed world, at any rate—don't acknowledge that they're real. Indeed, so skeptical are most humans of the existence of nonhumans that they refuse to believe even when presented with cast-iron evidence. No longer is it necessary for our resident follets to hide themselves away as they did in the past. Therefore, although they spend the vast majority of their time at Grotte Cachée, Elic, Lili and Inigo will make occasional forays into the greater world. (We keep houses in Paris and New York City for their convenience.) Darius, wary as he is of human contact, never leaves the valley.
As for our houseguests, I think of them as a source of sustenance for living gods who rely for their well-being upon frequent and passionate sexual encounters. These liaisons are hardly one-sided, however.
They benefit not just the follets, but their human partners, who are likely to depart Grotte Cachée changed and rejuvenated. Some of them might wonder if what they experienced was real, or just the most profoundly erotic dream they've ever had, but all of them, without exception, leave Château de la Grotte Cachée feeling thoroughly enraptured and fulfilled.
