On Entering Elfland from The Fields We Know

How does one find the Twilight Border between Elfland and The Fields We Know? Is it a static, reliable landmark? Or is it something more nebulous? Something that could remain elusive even after a lifetime of questing? Or is it sheer accident?

Folklore and stories provide many options. In Lord Dunsany's The King of Elfland's Daughter, it is a permanent landmark, some 20 miles from a castle in England. 

Stepping into a fairy ring is one of the most common folkloric methods. Typically a combination of a chance encounter and an act of carelessness, stepping into a circle of mushrooms could immediately transport you to the Realm of Faerie.  

One can be lured there by a resident of Faerie

"Come away, O human child!

To the waters and the wild

With a faery, hand in hand,

For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand."

-W.B Yeats

Arthurian myth features a magical horn:

"That bids the charmëd sleep of ages fly,

Rolls the long sound through Eildon’s caverns vast,

While each dark warrior rouses at the blast,

His horn, his falchion, grasps with mighty hand,

And peals proud Arthur’s march from Fairyland.”

- Sir John Rhys

In the context of your TTRPG, requiring a physical object can be a great excuse to send your party on a mini quest. I've leaned into the legend of The Voyage of Bran, which features a silver branch with white apple blossoms, from the realm of Emain Ablach.

A branch of the apple tree from Emain

I bring, like those one knows;

Twigs of white silver are on it,

Crystal brows with blossoms.

Taking a cue from Outlander, I have made circles of standing stones or columns the geographic location for the portals to Elfland. There are always seven of these in a circle, one for each of the gods in my pantheon. On their current adventure, my party has learned that they need a token from Elfland in order to use the circle as a portal. They have learned of the location of a silver apple branch, and are off to find it. I'll be running them through Necrotic Gnomes "Winter's Daughter" to find the branch.

Edward Robert Hughes