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On Monday, Bella arrives at school completely and stably human shaped, with everything she has learned about critters (except for her own species, which she isn't liable to forget) written down as margin notes on a page reminding her to ask Darren about D&D and filler decoy notes about that. She's probably going to have invent an actual cipher alphabet or something eventually but for the time being she thinks this will probably do for casual inspection.
She sits next to Darren in English.
shesepankh
castmyown
"Yeah, I figured. But it's the kind of thing I'm going to warn you about beforehand so you don't end up on the news."
morethanimaginary
"I am very happy my brother can geek out about magic with someone," she says.
(She's also glad that he and his crush get along.)
(She's also glad that he and his crush get along.)
shesepankh
"Why wouldn't you want to become invisible, anyway? I don't get not wanting to learn it."
morethanimaginary
"Ehh, too much work. Like, yeah, it's useful, but honestly most of the time I can just do my own thing and get whatever it is I need done through that. Plus, not willing to play at stakes that high."
shesepankh
"At some point someone is going to have to be more specific with me about exactly what happens if one wrecks a spell besides 'considered harmful; avoid'."
castmyown
Darren will be the one to do this!
"It depends on the spell! Off of the top of my head - transfiguration spells, for example, can permanently disfigure whatever you're changing. Invisibility spells can mess up and turn part of your eyes invisible and then you are blind because light isn't directed through them. Elemental spells, you can lose control of 'em or they start taking on properties you didn't expect, like - water that suddenly is stuck at boiling temperature, and so on. So for a lot of things, we're not sure what the effects will be."
"It depends on the spell! Off of the top of my head - transfiguration spells, for example, can permanently disfigure whatever you're changing. Invisibility spells can mess up and turn part of your eyes invisible and then you are blind because light isn't directed through them. Elemental spells, you can lose control of 'em or they start taking on properties you didn't expect, like - water that suddenly is stuck at boiling temperature, and so on. So for a lot of things, we're not sure what the effects will be."
castmyown
"You're welcome."
They have arrived at a grey-brick house that is probably their home! It helps that Vernon's pulling into the driveway.
They have arrived at a grey-brick house that is probably their home! It helps that Vernon's pulling into the driveway.
shesepankh
"So, wait, if invisibility is working on a principle according to which having your eyes invisible means you can't see - does that mean that while invisible you can't see - or is this side effect the result of forgetting a safety that under normal not-messing-up conditions will allow you to see?"
castmyown
"Actually, that's exactly what makes being invisible to cameras tricky. If it's just people, you make yourself look invisible but light will still interact with you, they just won't see you or your shadow or anything. With cameras, you've got to actually make yourself properly invisible and that comes with the caveats of needing light to interact with our eyes to see. So it's a bit more delicate, because you've still got to make sure the specific part of your eyes that needs light to pass through it is visible. If you want it to be nearly perfect then you make it so that people don't see those, either, but I don't know of a way to trick cameras perfectly."
shesepankh
"...So the illusion that does not fool cameras isn't a thing out in the world so much as a - mental trick. I might regret asking, but how much mental trickery is there?"
castmyown
"Hmm. Some? Problem is, I don't know all magic, so I can't give you all of the specifics, but the general rule is... If you understand what's at play you can figure out you're being tricked. I don't think there's any magic to directly hijack or steal thoughts or anything, but there's probably something that could confuse you into telling them yourself."
shesepankh
"You have anything in the way of paranoid defensive magic? Do I have, like, an energy supply I need to be conservative with or is it a matter of whether I'm willing to spend the time on any given thing?"
castmyown
"Luck charms you already know about. There are other objects that do different things - I know there's one that will hide you from bugbears. There might be a few others that protect you from anyone messing with your head. I don't know how to make them, though. There's no energy supply, it's a matter of time investment. I suppose I can get started on magic tutoring now, we're not in school. I'll just be honest with you and say we're probably not going to get to any actual magic for a while, I'm afraid. You've got a lot of runes to learn before we do anything."
castmyown
"Well. Remember the chemistry analogy? It's kind of like a mix of the periodic table and the alphabet. You can get by with just some, but honestly it's better for your magical education if you eventually learn them all. I'll teach the ones you can use for invisibility first, so it's not all just - here's a rune, here's another rune, okay now prove you can draw them fifty times. Once you've got enough runes for a spell I will help you cast it. It's getting there that's the problem."
castmyown
"Depends on the spell. The simple ones you start off with will have just four to eight or so, but around twenty tends to be typical. There's no cap for how many runes you can use, so if it's a super complicated spell you could theoretically use them all. I don't know what on earth that spell would even do, but it's certainly possible."