The Ilear are a race of long-lived shapeshifters, not very well known among most existing cultures. The most common depiction of the Ilear is that of a race of fae who can take on other forms. This is not entirely true.

When a child of the Ilear is born, its form is nebulous, looking like little more than a wisp of faintly glowing fog. He or she takes in air, water, and nourishment by absorbing it directly, and remains in this nebulous state until adolescence. Mischievous Ilear children sometimes wreak havoc on unsuspecting folk, pretending to be ghosts or spirits.
During adolescence, some fifty years after birth, the Ilear child gains more control over its form and is able to take on the shapes of other creatures. It is at this time that he or she becomes the 'shapeshifter' that the Ilear is widely assumed to be. He or she remains this way for a fairly long time--depending on the individual, as few as fifty years or as much as a century.
During this time the Ilear can take on the shape of anything they choose, but are only partially free of the limitations of that form--in the form of an animal, an Ilear can usually speak (which in the past has resulted in numerous legends of talking animals), but beyond that is subject to that creature's limitations. An Ilear cannot change into anything smaller than a rat or somewhat large mouse, or anything bigger than an elephant--the Ilear have a fixed mass, and though this mass can be stretched and compacted quite a bit, there are limits. When taking the shape of a creature of magic, the Ilear cannot take on that creature's magical attributes. An Ilear in the shape of a gorgon cannot turn anyone to stone.
When the Ilear reaches what for humans would be considered middle age, at about seventy-five to one hundred and twenty-five years, changing form becomes more and more of a burden, and he or she chooses one particular form to keep for the rest of his or her life, another fifty to one hundred years. Usually this is a humanoid form, but there are a fairly large number of Ilear who choose animal forms.
When the Ilear dies, its body returns to the nebulous form it had as a child, then dissipates altogether.

The Ilear as a whole do not have a very cohesive culture. They tend to wander, slipping in and out of other cultures, and often settling in those cultures as they grow older. There are a few Ilear cities--the most notable is in the Ring of Tears--and these are very odd to visit, with any manner of creature imaginable traveling the streets and all manner of buildings constructed to accommodate them, with little organization whatsoever to anything.
In disposition the Ilear tend to be good-natured, if not entirely predictable. They do not work magic beyond their shapeshifting and, in fact, have a certain natural immunity to magic. They cannot be said to have a definite appearance or a predominant way of life, since every Ilear is liable to be something entirely different from any other. The Ilear are, needless to say, a unique race, and there are some scholars who study them exclusively.

Copyright © 1999 Abigail Laughlin and the members of the Circle of Stone.