Exposition
You awake just before dawn to the sound of rattling and rustling near the mouth of the cave you’ve camped in. the clanking of metal sounds a touch frenetic, like one of your travelling companions routing through a pack to try and find a particular spice or a fresh pair of socks. Sounds that you’ve grown rather accustomed too so it’s not out of the ordinary for you to take your time. You stretch, pull on some fresh clothes and strap up your bed roll, before heading to the mouth, but oddly, the sounds don’t end.
Out of curiosity more than anything you walk the few paces towards the light of the morning and find your campsite empty. Your companions gear still sits in place dotted around the glowing embers of a morning fire. A pot of coffee hanging suspended from a spit spanning the fire with steam still escaping it’s spout.
You scan the area and see your pack a few feat away from where you placed it with it’s flap open. With a yawn you take a few steps towards it think the wind might have blown it or perhaps some animal in the dawn searching for a snack or two.
As you get closer the bag hops nearly a foot into the air and the familiar sound of metal clanging ripples out as the bag lands with a clank and a plop. Something must be trapped inside.
Maybe it’s the perceived size of the creature being able to fit into the pack that you do not find threatening but with all the confidence in the world (and knife still in it’s sheath) you pick up the pack and look in.
Sitting comfortably inside of one of your metal pots is a dark blue hummingbird contentedly snacking away on your whole loaf of honey bread. The creature stops gnashing it’s beak as your peer in and looks up at you, it’s face looking like a mischievous smile, as if to say “oh no, you caught me but I still got a good portion of the bread”. You smile to yourself and delicately reach into to scoop out the bird. It hops onto your hand then flutters onto your shoulder. Still smiling your break off a few crumbs of the honey bread and feed the perching bird as you make your way back to the fire with your pack in hand. The bird stays on your shoulder.
You fill your cup with some warm coffee and sit down on a log near the embers, all with the bird still on your shoulder. It lets you enjoy your first sip of the warm beverage but immediately after you swallow it nips at your ear lobe and in the ancient Sylvan tongue it speaks to you: “Hey, dickhead, I let you get your coffee, now how about another piece of that honey bread? Keep me fed I’ll tell you where you can find some crazy shit.”
Introduction
James: Green-Crowned
Freeman: Ultrasonic Thrust
Source: Bestiary 3 p. 132
Reading List: The Sibley Guide to Birds
Pathfinder Lore
Appearance
· Blue bird, listed as “brightly coloured” but, just look at the art
· Doesn’t really look like a humming bird
· Stellar jay traits
· Calling it a Green-Crowned Plovercrest
· Image also has a pretty cool looking helm with google like eyes and a Greek—Ish crest
Ecology
· Tiny birds freely roam First World
· Can be companions of high ranking fey such as members of the Seelie courts
About
· Only those with good hearing can identify the soft buzz of their wings
· Usually all invisible due to their speed
· Intelligent and curious
· Will fly through gates to the Material plane to expand their knowledge
· Some choose to stay there after looking for weird shit
· This leads them to contact with adventurers frequently
Companions
· When treated with respect they will aid
· Resent being treated as pets
· Fight to the death to avoid capture
· Can take on non-fey adventurers as their companion, but is unlikely
Sidebar Sweet Eats
· Have rapid metabolisms
· Eat mostly flower nectar
· Develop a taste for other sweets: cupcakes, cookies, pies, wine, etc
· Can be expensive companions to feed
· Easy to tempt with a sweet that it hasn’t tried yet
1e
· Newp.
Mythology and Folklore
· Kept auto correcting to Harmonia, so we’re going to just talk about the Green-crowned Plovercrest
Green-Crowned Plovercrest
· Native to Brazil
· Likes forests, scrublands and vegetation close to water
· Usually found around sea level
· 8.5 – 9 cm (3.3 – 3.5”)
· 3 – 3.4 g (0.11 – 0.12oz)
· Short, straight black bills
· Shaggy, mostly iridescent green crests
· Kind of it, not really an interesting bird
Comparison
· Bot definitely birds
· The art doesn’t really look like a hummingbird with it’s long tale, blue hues, large wings and non-rounded head
· It was the head plumage that made me go with the Green-Crowned Plovercrest as the comparison, most other hummingbirds don’t have this
· Those others that do have the ubiquitous short, sharp beak
· The art clearly shows more of a corvid, jay or even starling face, hence why it let me to the stellar jay