#fablehaven beastiary

[magicae-est-realis]

I'm gonna be honest, I don't know what's going on here. My little sister suggested it. So I drew it.

In order to justify this lil' dude's addition to my Fablehaven Beastiary, I'm going with a mildly crazy hedgewitch named Aisteach a couple hundred years ago. She was trying to learn transmutation, wasn't particularly good at it, but realised she loved her weird creations and made a bunch.

So. Many.

These half/half hybrids are all considered the same species, Aistechi (single Aistechus)- named in her honour.

Due to a weird twist of magic, even though they have no special properties or abilities themselves, if they breed with any of the components of their crosses (in this case, a squirrel or an octopus), all their offspring will ALSO be Aistechi of the same kind.

A couple got out near the beginning of the debacle, and... well...

They're generally considered either highly invasive and irritating pests or cool pets in reserves, depending on which form of Aistechi they have and how easily they can breed with the native wildlife in the area.

Reserves have a difficult time trying to contain them, stop them breeding wildly, while also fending off poachers, due to the pet market for some of the cuter forms among the rich and elite. Most preserves just try to avoid having any at all.

Fablehaven has exactly 0, because possessing this species is rather counter-productive if they're going for secrecy. Though Seth may smuggle one back from a knight's mission from a preserve madly trying to rehome the children of a grey wolf x sandpiper (who found another sandpiper- don't ask me how that worked) and name him Zip sometime in the future. Nobody can persuade Seth to give Zip up, and they go flying occasionally.

Seth has to get written permissions and several licences just to keep Zip, let alone bring him along on adventures. The less said about getting permission for Zip to go to other preserves with Seth, the better. Most have the instinctive reaction of looking at Zip, pointing, and screaming. Which is wildly hilarious, as he's adorable.

[magicae-est-realis]

A Basilisk redraw for the Fablehaven Beastiary, because the previous one was seriously irritating me.

Played around with shading and highlights, figuring out effects I like.

Really happy with this lil' dude, I reckon she's adorable.

Same information as the first-

"Size is ambiguous- lil babies are the size of teeny tiny gecko hatchlings (still just as dangerous but also really cute help) but they never stop growing, so you get adults several centuries old that are twice the size of an average human or more.

Don't look them in the eye :)"

Though I'd expand that that's for females- like many birds and reptiles, females are significantly larger than males. A male will stop growing at around lace monitor length- small for a Basilisk, but by no means something you mess with if you value keeping all your limbs intact.

Males tend to gather in social groups, around 10-20 lizards in size, where they hunt together to take down larger prey and share sunny spots. Females are solitary, and extremely territorial.

Colour range is in shades of green, yellow, brown and red. Bright warning colours.

[magicae-est-realis]

A Nøkken, also called a Nøkk or Nixie is a shapeshifting water spirit similar to a Kelpie- some myths say they're guardians of water bodies and others say they just drown people- luring women by shifting into a young man playing the fiddle or children by shifting into a white horse with black eyes.

I'm ignoring the drowning part. In this, they're the more benevolent cousins of Kelpies. They're guardians. That's not to say they don't drown people, but those they do tend to deserve it for messing with their water body.

[magicae-est-realis]

A Manticore! I will eat my shoe if there aren't Manticore in the Fablehaven world. I'm like 95% sure one was mentioned at some point.

Lion/Dragon in this design. The human face doesn't work for me, and I don't think it was specifically mentioned to have one in the books. Creative license.

Yes, I'm mildly salty about the whole tying-to-eat-me thing. Am I exaggerating? Probably. Do I care? No, it's a great story. As such, his face became the man-eating Manticore's face.

[magicae-est-realis]

In tribute to Jorge's amazing new Wisdom Saga (from Epic: The Musical) which I've been listening to on loop for the last hour, the newest Fablehaven Beastiary addition had to be Sun Cattle.

Fablehaven never alluded to any gods or religions, so creative liberties have been taken, since neither Apollo nor Helios exist. But I think they're adorable so I had to add them.

The cattle contain mini suns held between their horns- several preserves keep them for energy sources. They're long-lived (several centuries at least) and cows normally only have two separate calves in their lifetime, though twins and triplets aren't uncommon. They're born teeny tiny, without horns or suns for better camouflage. Their colour slightly undoes this, but the cattle live in preserves now so haven't evolved a smarter approach.

As their horns grow, their suns begin to form, brighter and brighter as their horns complete a single loop. A broken horn will extinguish their sun, and as their suns give them their longevity, injured cattle will live the rest of their lives the same length as a regular dairy cow.

Their horns are magical. Kinda have to be to contain a sun. Horn poaching was an issue before preserves and the cattle nearly went extinct, an issue that heavily influenced the decision to create preserves at all. They have since recovered. The magic in their horns hold their sun in place and prevents it from burning anything. Touching the suns isn't recommended but it won't kill you due to their horns' magic. You will, however, likely have to visit the ER for a severe electrical shock from the magic and burns from the proximity to the sun (this heat is only an issue for any bare skin within a 10cm radius of the sun itself.)

The cattle are varying shades of glowing gold- excellent nightlights, but not if you're trying to sleep. Very gentle unless you mess with a calf. Known for regularly giving electric shocks to anyone who tries to pet them, though their fur is rather short to avoid being singed by their sun. They are immune to fire and heat and run warmer than any other mammal, though not by much. Enough you'd want cow cuddles on a cold day.

[magicae-est-realis]

A prompt from my little sister- a winged snow leopard.

So you know how there are two main spellings for Griffin/Gryphon? Personally, I like to think they're two related but different species. Gryphons are the average half cat/bird you think of (like the ones in Dragonwatch) while Griffins are simply winged cats.

While both are normally lion/eagle crosses, pretty much any cat/bird mix is possible, with some more common than others.

[magicae-est-realis]

Results for the poll I made the other week came in- the whale and octopus x squirrel tied, so I started with this.

I'm going with the whale being a queen-of-all-cetaceans kinda local deity. You think blue whales are large? She's the Viola (the cow not the instrument) of whales.

The largest blue whale ever recorded way 33.58m (~110' 7") long. Off that record, I'm going with this lovely lady being around 100m (328') long at least.

She guides regular whale migrations and has minor healing abilities. Mostly just a whale protector, but massive and magical. Hence the cool colours.

There is 100% an Atlantis preserve, hidden underwater for oceanic creatures and you cannot convince me otherwise. This whale lives there, under their care. She'll leave every couple months to check up on her whales and dolphins, but comes back for the free food and head scratches.

I'd like to say that most animal families (cervidae, canidae, felidae, columbidae, ursidae, etc) have their own magical minor deity. They're all massive, have minor magical properties and abilities and often have cool colouration. She is one of them.

This could also be taken a step further- with Milch creatures like Viola or The Walrus being their deity's offspring or the deities themselves. (Demigod Viola is going to take over my mind from here on out, thank you.)

[magicae-est-realis]

A Hippocampus!

Waiting for the poll to finish (because I, idiot I am, accidentally set it for a week instead of a day) so I drew one of my favourite mythical creatures.

Hippocamp are generally pale, iridescent and brightly coloured. Curved fins instead of hooves, dorsal and chest fins for cutting through the water and agility.

Hippocamp each have unique brightly coloured iridescent tail fins- generally similar to a betta fish's tail, but other shapes and patterns have been recorded. They're for attracting mates and identifying pod members.

Hippocamp also have unique bioluminescent markings along their tails and body for signalling and communication.

Deep ocean hippocamp have more markings in more elaborate patterns, darker body colours and paler tails They're the largest of the species. River hippocamp are the smallest, the palest and have bodies the same colour as the river they live in with very few thin striped markings. Tails are generally the dullest of the species. Stillwater hippocamp are the most middle-sized and the bluest, uniformly with tails in cooler colours and markings in dotted patterns. Reef and tropical hippocamp are the second smallest, the most brightly coloured with splodged markings, and the greatest colour variation. Open ocean hippocamp are the second largest and have the dullest body colours with the darkest tails and many striped markings.

Hippocamp hybrids can occur, though they're generally open ocean hybrids as they can overlap territories with all but still water hippocamp, or (rarely) river/still water hybrids after flooding recedes and strands a hippocampus from its own pod with the other species.