In the early centuries of magic, before the Ministry of Regulation and Orderliness gained the strength and understanding necessary to force boundaries and guidelines on it, magic essentially was a wild animal. Somewhere near sentient, but not quite. At least, not sentient enough to listen to reason, but sentient enough to pay attention to the wishes and beliefs of all sentient beings.
The end result being that whatever people of all races and levels of magical powers believed about magic, that was how magic behaved and reacted. Thus, the many and varied and sometimes totally illogical and/or contradictory so-called rules of magic, depending on the cultures that were trying to either control or annihilate the ephemeral, sometimes hard-to-define power loosely known as magic.
To illustrate this simply: because people believed that Faeries had pointed ears and were two inches tall and had sparkly wings even Tinkerbell wouldn't be caught dead in, that was how Faeries often appeared when they were spotted moving among humans. A belief that they gave off sparks and scattered pixiedust wherever they went imposed sparks and sparkles and rainbow streaks and pixiedust and other useless, tattletale images on Faeries. Which made it hard for them to conduct ordinary lives and necessary business among mortals or humans or whatever sometimes derogatory labels the Fae imposed on the non-magical or wannabe magical races who remained anchored solely on Earth. Thus, part of the reason why the Fae refer to themselves as the Fae, and not Faeries -- to cut the ties with the misnomers and damaging, handicapping beliefs slapped on them through the strong, misguided beliefs in what exactly constitutes magic and magical beings.
For a time, some beliefs in magic and magical beings were beneficial, such as imposing wings on the Fae. Or the power to snap their fingers or wriggle their noses and teleport from one place to another. Or split the curtain of time and space and slide into other dimensions. This helped in the development of the portals to other realms, as mentioned in the Ether Lexicon entry on the Fae Enclaves and other dimensions.
However, as the Ministry of Regulation formed through utter necessity, as a survival tactic and to put a harness on magic to make it a servant and not a quixotic, childish overlord, some telltales and tattletales and dangerous giveaways had to be removed. Such as being limited to two or six or ten inches tall, sparkly butterfly wings and blushing in multiple colors and giving off sparks when they sneezed or laughed. Wings were much easier to remove than rainbow blushing and sneeze sparks, perhaps because some Fae enjoyed being able to fly with wings, rather than teleporting. There was a sense of style to using wings. The nearly-sentient aspect of magic cooperated with those imposing controls on it when it came to wings, because the Fae still allowed wings. They just wanted some say in when they wore wings. As the centuries wore on, wings fell out of favor as a fashion accessory except when infiltrating human parties or playing nasty tricks at various supernatural events and locations such as the Bermuda Triangle or Stonehenge, or enjoying the Aurora Borealis. Other telltales and tattletale signs such as blushing rainbows and sneezing sparks were harder to rid out. Magic gave in partially by attaching those markers to certain family lines. Breeding did tell, in many cases. Some speculation abounds that the Eclipse-level magic and all the problems that attach to it was a result of the Ministry of Regulation, and other ministries that didn't last long, but tried to impose stricter controls on magic, caused a sort of bottleneck or logjam in the development of magic in certain family lines, thus resulting in the massive and sometimes fatal fluctuations in power and control over magic. Thus the tendency of many males in family lines cursed with eclipse-level magic to flee to the human realms, to learn to live without magic before it failed them entirely. (That is a discussion best left for another entry. Especially the many arguments and sometimes outright feuds over the centuries over whether the treatment for the fluctuations in eclipse-level magic actually caused the magic to fail entirely, and whether the phenomenon known as Fixation developed as magic's double-edged sword of cure-and-curse to deal with the power surges.)
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Side note: Despite numerous attempts over the centuries to remove ear points as one of the major telltales of Fae genetics, magic never gave in. Fae proved to be just as ridiculous as humans, when it comes to something they can't cure or control, and over time ear points became not just highly fashionable, but a fashion statement, and in time, rather alluring. Especially when Need manifested. Many a young Fae male who had plenty of warning hesitated too long when a young woman in Need got close enough to throw her metaphorical noose around his neck, because he took too much time rhapsodizing over the delicacy of her ear points. Poems and artwork focused on ear points have sometimes crossed the line into dangerously sensual, and been censored, forbidden to anyone under the age of two centuries.
Sadly, while illusion spells work quite well to disguise ear points when traveling in the human realms, males have a distressing tendency to forget to use and then update those spells, and quite often they are caught because someone with enough knowledge of genuine means to trap Fae saw those ear points and had the self-control and intelligence to move with stealth and patience. On the other hand, quite a few experts in the statistics of Fae males not returning home from wanderings on Earth believe that these particular Fae males are of the persuasion that Fae females aren't worth the risk of being caught by Need, so they let themselves be caught by Human brides, thus giving them an excuse to stay on Earth among humans until the particular Fae ladies trying to trap them capture someone else.
Side note: Fae do use wands. There is some discussion both for an against the theory that wands were forced on Fae by magic during its wild centuries. Most wand use occurs before maturity, and by the time most Fae reach the end of their second century, they no longer need wands to help them focus their magic. Those who venture into the human realms disguise their wands, usually as rings or earrings or necklaces that can be hidden under their clothing, so even the most alert and observant humans don't realize that some magical tool is being employed. Wands have technically gone by the wayside in most of Fae society as cumbersome and old-fashioned. Except, of course, during occasions of high pomp and ceremony, such as the installation of a new Administration King or Queen.
Side Note: the Ministry of Misinformation is one of the most popular and creative and, admittedly, most fun bureaucratic departments to work for, because essentially everyone there is paid to lie, to let their imaginations run wild. And who wouldn't enjoy finding new ways to bamboozle humans and lead them down multiple branching side roads and rabbit trails. One of the most successful and award-winning lies spread early in the history of the Ministry of Misinformation was the belief that magic changed and followed totally different rules every time someone crossed a boundary, whether running water, a mountain, or the ever-fluctuating political and ethnic boundary lines. Those who believed strongly enough in the Fae to consider them either a threat or an opportunity for boundless wealth and power wasted quite a lot of time pausing and trying to learn the so-called rules of magic every time they fled into a new country or took over another culture or went exploring beyond the horizon. That gave the Fae living in those regions more than enough advance warning to set up new diversions and illusions to better hide their presence and activities. For several centuries, the brash younger generations made it a rite of passage to wander about openly in the human realms with their ear points showing and giving off sparks or blushing rainbows, and being totally ignored by the humans who were within arm's reach, simply because those humans believed some new fabrication of utter lunatic idiocy about the telltales of the Fae.
