#and MAGIC

[bookofsecretstotell]

"Irulans fate"

[fairytalesofforever]

hey have you ever thought about how inej describes kaz's hands as being for making things vanish? how one of his classic magic tricks is making things disappear? how she describes her trauma response/dissociation as vanishing? how she is the Wraith and it is her greatest skill to disappear?

how we can imply from this that she feels like a) kaz's touch will trigger her and make her vanish and b) he only values her for that skill?

but how, the one thing he does, every time, is see her? is not let her disappear? is ask her, multiple times, to stay? is tell her, "don't slip away from me?"

"but it's what I do best."

[cherry-pop-elf]

God imagine the conversation Charlie and Ron must have had after the war was over

Charlie: “You did WHAT at Gringotts?!”

Ron: “Yeah we road the iron belly out of Gringotts…”

Charlie: “How?!”

Ron: “I just…Remebered what you taught me.”

Charlie: “You listened to my endless rambles?”

Ron: “Course. Yer my brother-!”

Like I said. Ron is the GOAT. Like if his skills were more utilized ((more like his family in GENERAL)) Voldemort probs would have been killed before book three. IM JUST SAYING

[breakandbuildfiction]

Meeting Other Royals

After becoming the Ghost King of the Infinite Realms, Danny finds himself having to take on a lot of new responsibilities. Chief among these is the duty to represent the Realms at interdimensional events for High Society. Luckily for Danny, he isn’t the only teenager/young adult forced to attend, so at least he has some people he can hang out with between schmoozing it up with his fellow bigwigs.

[timidxtempted]

so let me see if i've got this right

we were here

then...

you were on hiatus for a long time

and...

i got deleted like four times

but...

i looked for you every time

then...

you found me

and...

you still find me

every single day

[felonytaxevasion]

Glad you enjoyed pact!

I'd love to know your thoughts on the magic system and diabolism in general, also what did you think of Black Lambs Blood?

Also if you actually want wildbow long windedness in his supernatural setting, then I can say thats Pale's biggest weakness, so if you are okay with that I can heartily recommend it

Diablerism/Black Lambs Blood was my favorite part of the Pact magic system by a long shot actually. I wouldn't say there were any parts of the magic that I didn't like or enjoy to some extent but the best part of Pact for me was the character work and I feel like diablerie was the most realized supporting metaphor for the relationships between those characters.

For example, and I promise arent critiques so much as comparisons to illustrate just how good the diablerie is, the DuChamps enchantress magic system is pretty solid. They manipulate connections and in the process the connections within the family lose the authenticity within their relationships with each other and only end up being connected through magic and false promises. Pretty well realized metaphor for how focusing on a family's position rather than the family unit itself will weaken the unit to disrepair. Mara for all of the side eye worthy racial politics of her character, also has a fairly realized metaphor about family dynamics. The parent draining the life of the child to prolong her own youth only to ultimately fail to realize any new goals as youth was never a requirement necessary for change in the first place.

I will say where pact starts to lose me is the other Jacobs Bell Powers. Mags works to an extent. The representation of how violent trauma affects a person who then carries that violence forward and inflicts it on others. My main critique with that is that Pact is such a family focused story I wish we got to see more of Mags and her dads and how the metaphorical violent trauma separated her from her family. Padraic being the one to sever the connection rather than Maggie's specific individual practice hobbled the thematic resonance of goblins for me, personally. I also won't lie, I'm fairly confident that there IS a strong metaphor within the Behaims chronomancy. However, said metaphor went completely over my head. Chronomancy was a super cool magic and I loved reading about it and the Behaim family dynamic was also interesting, but since I couldn't see the correlation between the two it weakened both elements impact on me as a reader.

So with all that said. On the other hand: Diablerie. Honestly incredible work in terms of landing a metaphor. There's a lot with passing on karmic burden as the cycle of abuse that's great. What really hits for me though is the idea of Permanent Damage. Society really supports the idea of family as the strongest most unbreakable bond in the world. So writing a family then explicitly filling it with the power of completely unfixable never able to be undone damage is really good. Pact doesn't play around with the idea that the Thorburns could ever completely fix their family to have a normal or entirely healthy relationship ever again. Rose Sr broke them in a way that can't be fixed. There's no amount of family therapy or Wanting to be a family that can undo what's been done.

I think part of the reason Black Lambs Blood is such a good side story about diablerie is because it also centers a family unit and how a demon can destroy it.

What I really love about dark urban fantasy compared to standard fantasy is that there's no escapism present. Like I love escapism but I love magic as a storytelling tool to tell human stories about inhuman characters. Which is very much the core of pact and why it works for me.

In terms of Pale though. Eeehhhh? I'm going back and forth on it because like you brought up, length in and of itself is not something that bothers me. However, how that length is used IS pretty critical. Worm and Pact both like to put the protagonist in an unwinnable situation where Taylor/Blake try several strategies that fail before either finding the solution or suffering a great loss. I think this style can bother people because the failures, especially in large numbers, aren't necessarily adding new character development or plot elements to the narrative and they would much rather just skip to the loss/solution. But personally I love when things get drawn out in this way because it helps hammer home the emotional feeling of victory or tragedy. The reason I'm apprehensive about Pale though is that I do not think that Ward used it's length well and that's when I started to get bored. Victoria would have very long fight sequences where she wouldn't need to find new creative solutions so much as continue through waves and waves of goons before she could reach the final boss and either win using the same strategy she did in the beginning, or lose using the same strategy. And like the things I like about Worm and Pact this definitely CAN work for people, it makes her victories via punching very hard feel earned. For me though it just felt like a slog and I've heard from some friends that Pale can fall in to this category in its latter half as well. Also frankly, the idea of pulling the magic outside of a family narrative and into a Magic School sounds like the least interesting possible choice to me. So while I'm sure it's more interesting than I'm imagining it is a steep barrier to entry for me.

[theroundbartable]

You guys remember the episode where Gwaine appears the first time?

The melee that they attend is the "ultimate test for strength and Courage"... Yeah. Just leaving that out there.

[easily-distracted-by-fandom]

Eclipse just hit totality. Magic is real. There is nothing like an eclipse lol

[thehyperfixatedfan]

🤠🛐🐍

We recorded a new episode tonight! That means it’s time for emoji hints! What do you think our new episode is about?

[pretty-pup-stevie]

Caring for younger me is putting up glow in the dark stars on my ceiling

Caring for older (current) me is making constellations and animal shapes with them

[cyansongz]

Now this one started as not fan art and stayed not fan art, but with wings.

I started it yesterday and finished it today. I would’ve finished it last night but Doggo wanted snuggles

[maxisbea]

[ladyjuxtaposition]

I promised pictures of my hooded cloak, but then I discovered a movie making app & inspired to create a video instead.

This is now the new tradition every Halloween: get or make a cloak, add some embellishments, become magical & have fun.

Wishing everyone a safe and happy Halloween! 🎃

[inspiredrawaw]

So my 2 oc stories Starry Orchard and Aces and Omen right? Yes.

SO as I’m writing the story for Starry Orchard I’m realizing both of these stories is about a deer character finding out their parents love has hidden them from the embodiment of Death itself but now Death has found out and is pissed and will kill the deer by any means necessary.

Featuring 5-7 death omens and magic