Gorse Faerie [Petty]

Gorse are the smallest faerie folk, about a quarter the height of a grown atomie, and in some ways the most beautiful. They are built like human children though fully adult, differing only in size, fragile wings and faintly pointed ears, and unlike some fey they lack antennae. Their plain clothes look like those of humans or elves, usually in green and yellow to match the prickly, yellow-flowered evergreen shrub, gorse, they inhabit. They speak their own language and willingly use the tongues of sprites and pixies. Being so small, they survive by staying secretive and unnoticed.

Beyond hiding in thorns, gorse carry weapons made from their bushes: bows that shoot 30 feet, spears thrown up to 10 feet, and swords like needles, each inflicting 1 point. Fine tips and practiced hands earn them +2 on attack rolls. A tenth of their arrows bear a mild toxin that leaves a target confused for 2d4 rounds on a failed save vs. poison.

Daily, every gorse has one use of mirror image (the 2nd-level wizard version) plus three small tricks equal to a cantrip, each completed in the round it begins. One gorse in ten can also cast spike growth and goodberry once a day, either to protect their home or as payment to keep clever creatures from harming them.

Gorse live in the thorny, flowering bushes that share their name, which keep out most predators too large to weave through the thorns. Any creature more than twice gorse size pushing into the bushes loses 1 hit point each round if its AC is 6 to 10, or 1 hit point per two rounds at AC 4 or 5. Inside, anything of size S through L crawls at a quarter of its normal rate, while larger or smaller beings pass freely. When threatened, gorse retreat deeper, drawing pursuers through the densest thorns and over hidden logs, pits and other natural snares.

Nearly everything is huge to a gorse, so they stay wary of big folk, but they will deal with woodland neighbors like dryads, satyrs and centaurs, as well as humans and demihumans, who arrive bearing presents such as honey, milk, bread or fresh fruit. Those who do them a good turn, a druid who slays a menacing beast or elves who stop a forest fire, earn their protection, and a tribe may send a few members along with its big friends while they stay nearby.

Potions turn up in some lairs, and a single dose serves 20 of them. So a crowd of them might polymorph, resist fire, or turn rainbow colors at will for short periods. Potions that affect others, such as control potions, work only if every gorse who drank concentrates on the effect together, so those tend to sit unused in their hoards, traded for something better or given as bribes and rewards to big folk.