The Powers That Be had a plan: start the ball rolling with life on Earth, then sit back and let the rules and laws they'd put into place (i.e., Evolution) handle the rest. That was the plan. Things don't always go according to plan.
For one thing, the Fey showed up, unplanned for and unexpected. And, for another, there were the problems they were having with "Cain" (as he'd later be called by first the Jewish people and then the Christians).
While working on making a new Death and trying to deal with Cain, humans began to develop. The PTB were in agreement that humans should be the new dominant species (sorry, dinosaurs), but they were split on how, exactly, to go about ensuring this. Some PTB members believed that it was inevitable at this point, that evolution was enough, and they were content to sit back and let them develop on their own. However, there was a minority group that believed that more drastic measures were needed. Death was too powerful, and if humans were going to be in charge, they had to have a way to at least stave him off for a while. They had to be more powerful than mere animals. MUCH more.
So while the main group of PTB sat back and watched "Adam" and "Eve" develop, this side branch created a human of their own, their own pet project: Lilith.
From the jump, Lilith knew she was better than the "normal" humans. She knew she was superior, and she pitied them. She expected she would be given an equally-powerful mate, and that she and her partner would rule the humans for their own good. This mate never appeared, because the rest of the PTB became angry with those members who had strayed from the plan.
When humans think of things like "fallen angels who became demons" or any sort of adversarial deity, what they really mean is this group of PTB members who went off and did their own thing in creating their own human without consulting the rest of the group. There isn't really any sort of formal "adversary" to the PTB, unless you count Cain himself.
As for Lilith, she was disappointed and, over time, grew lonely. Like most humans, she felt the need to continue her line. And so she did.
Lilith is more powerful than mere humans, but not as powerful as the PTB (of course). Her power rivaled the Queen of the Fey, but though she was meant to stave off Death, she was never meant to overcome it completely. She was meant to live a long life and then die, but she instead began to search for a way to become immortal. She kept finding ways to extend her life, but it was just a few hundred years here, another hundred there. It wasn't true immortality. This might be where the legends of her "eating babies" and such come from. Perhaps, in desperation, she used magic to take the souls of children, or even the newly born (thus with the most "life" in them to take).
She became obsessed with this quest, this refusal to die, to submit to anyone, even her own creators' wishes. Even though Cain is no longer Death, she did everything she could to make sure she could never die. In the end, it consumed her, but by that point she'd lived so long that she was now part of the fabric of the world as much as Cain was. His opposite and equal, in a way.
The Fey felt bad for her, a once proud and powerful champion of Life now twisted into this mad creature, so they used their own power to seal her away before the PTB could curse her the way they'd cursed Cain. She is still In the World somewhere, not taken away to the Fey Kingdom, because she's too tied to this world to take. But she's sealed in eternal slumber, guarded by brave Fey warriors. Her prison can, in fact, be moved, and often is, to wherever the Fey feel is the strongest place to keep her asleep. (Thus, right now, she's likely in Ireland somewhere, most likely the Hill of Tara, though few - if any - in the world know this. The Fey keep her resting place a very closely guarded secret.)
Most humans think of her as Evil, as a Monster or Demon of some sort. They connect her to other demons or fallen angels (who are, in reality, almost certainly either PTB members or her children and not, in fact, her mates or counterparts). And from a demon, you get demonspawn, more monsters. Those are the legends.
But Lilith's bloodline - collectively (and archaically) known as "Lilim" are not monsters. They're simply more powerful than normal humans. The ranks of Lilim are as diverse as those of humans: some are good, some are bad, most are a mix of the two. Merlin was a Lilim, as was the "mad priest" Rasputin. In her very long life, Lilith explored the world and met (and mated with) many of its inhabitants. Real Shaman, Real Priests of "strange" cults, anyone who isn't a Witch and yet wields magic can trace their line back to Lilith. Even some Witches revere and worship her, though they're few and far between; most of them have forgotten her or never knew her to begin with.
Lilim blood is not like Fey blood. It can be diluted, turned into basic human blood. Most who are descended from Lilith don't even know they are. But so long as even a drop of Lilim DNA remains in you, the Fey can find it, if they so choose. They can find it and, being creatures of Life and Chaos, they can manipulate it, amplify it, if they so choose. Why would they do such a thing? Who knows? The Fey are mercurial, their ways and desires secretive.
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