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Jensal has a lot of work to do. Her house is going to collapse; nobody had better be inside when it does. She is briskly bundling adult miracles into groups who have at least one decent job between them, she is writing to agencies that handle adoption for the ultimate disposition of kids who don't get picked up because she's reasonably sure that they will not all get picked up, and when parents do drop by to collect their little ones she is signing papers for every set of them with slightly gritted teeth. Lots to do. Her hand is cramping from paperwork and she doesn't care.
"There is a very straightforward way to make people less rude to you," mutters Kaylo under his breath.
shrennaki
Mial looks at Kaylo. And smiles slightly, in a not particularly friendly way. And doesn't ask him to repeat himself.
Kaylo obligingly does not repeat himself.
Korulen rolls her eyes at him and he has the decency to wince.
"Other features of siahrs include," says the white miracle briskly, "assorted reproductive traits, songs, customary ages at which various things kick in, answerability to the dragon council -"
Present members of the dragon council look at him very abruptly.
Korulen rolls her eyes at him and he has the decency to wince.
"Other features of siahrs include," says the white miracle briskly, "assorted reproductive traits, songs, customary ages at which various things kick in, answerability to the dragon council -"
Present members of the dragon council look at him very abruptly.
adapt-again
"I'm sorry," he says, calming himself. "It's just that my daughter-in-law's opinions on answerability to the dragon council are part of why Mial hasn't just made her a dragon and, if not avoided, at least postponed this entire enterprise."
shrennaki
"Answerability to the dragon council is certainly a traditional feature of dragons," says Mial. "Individual third-siahrs might or might not choose to adopt it, and of course it's entirely up to you lot whether or not to let them on your island, I wouldn't dream of trying to put forward an opinion on that question. But in terms of magical rather than political characteristics - yeah, songs seem handy to keep, kicking in at four syllables minimum seems like a reasonable default even when that's not such a significant number... we can maintain line names at two consecutive syllables from a same-gender ancestor, too, I think that's much less of an issue than the personal names... and I don't see any reason to mess with the age thresholds for languages, shifting, or fire, or with the aging rate package as a whole. What else did you mention...?" He looks at the white miracle.
"Siahrs are highly crossfertile," (a few people glance surreptitiously at Korulen and and Koridaar, the only non-siahrs present), "may gender-select offspring, and, with non-siahr partners, produce either thudias or parunias," says the white miracle levelly. "Since these are magical traits it seems worth considering them particularly."
"Ah, the line names thing could be a problem if somebody doesn't have more than one syllable in their entire name. I don't know if this ever happens," says the spelter.
"It happens in Eem," says the violet representative, glowering slightly at Mial, "at least."
"Ah, the line names thing could be a problem if somebody doesn't have more than one syllable in their entire name. I don't know if this ever happens," says the spelter.
"It happens in Eem," says the violet representative, glowering slightly at Mial, "at least."
shrennaki
"Thank you," says Mial to all three of them generally. "Okay. In the case of having a one-syllable name, I think repeating it might be a viable way to come up with a line name in a pinch. In the case of, for whatever reason, not having a name at all, maybe the person should be able to invent a line name out of thin air... but I'm not sure I wouldn't want everybody to be able to do that if some people could. And I'm not sure I want everybody to be able to do that. Should everybody be able to do that? I'm definitely coming back to the reproductive traits, but I want to deal with this first because it seems less complicated."
He adds a Reproductive traits? list item.
He adds a Reproductive traits? list item.
"Not everybody should be able to do that," says the obsidian. "There's already precedent for people without magical names being able to use anything they identify with as a part of their name, and you're fixing the spelter's problem separately anyway. People who don't want to have names shouldn't be giving them out."
shrennaki
"Fair. Okay," says Mial. He notes down the things that third-siahrs are explicitly keeping the same: Namesong available at four syllables and Language and firebreathing kick in at about a month, shifting at about twenty years. "But the repeat syllables thing seems like much less of a problem." The list item goes down as Line names can be assigned by same-gender ancestor using two consecutive syllables (or one repeated in case of extreme scarcity).
nonbird
"Regarding thudias and parunias," Lazarus pipes up, "that variation also has to do with levels of dragon magic, so it won't naturally occur with third-siahrs. I think probably the most natural thing to do with third-siahrs is have all of their children turn out to be third-siahrs in a parunia-like way, except for ones they have with other siahrs, who might be parunias instead for dragon magic reasons. ...Although now that I've said that, I definitely want us to pay very, very careful attention to how the offspring of dragons and third-siahrs might turn out, because I am afraid that dragon magic will find a way to make it go horribly wrong if we don't."
nonbird
"Dragon magic is obnoxiously hostile," says Lazarus. "It exists in an amount and if an egg is laid while there's not enough to go around, it either turns out as a shren, or as a silently doomed baby totally outwardly indistinguishable from ordinary dragon babies who will go on to die of not having enough dragon magic before they are a month old unless someone comes along with a miracle and fixes them! The cause of death by old age in siahrs was all of their dragon magic spontaneously draining out and leaving them to die, before I came along and made it stop doing that! Esu exists! Esu exists and shrens exist and siahrs aren't able to shift forms until they're twenty years old! And don't get me started on my opinions about Draconic, because then I will tell you my opinions about Draconic and no one wants that!"
nonbird
Lazarus takes a deep breath and lets it out.
"Sorry. Um. As I was saying. I think that in the case where a third-siahr and a dragon have children, enough dragon magic for a dragon should result in a parunia who isn't a third-siahr and not enough should result in a third-siahr who is also a thudia. That seems simplest and I think it can be accomplished easily and will not give dragon magic any opportunity to screw things up."
"Sorry. Um. As I was saying. I think that in the case where a third-siahr and a dragon have children, enough dragon magic for a dragon should result in a parunia who isn't a third-siahr and not enough should result in a third-siahr who is also a thudia. That seems simplest and I think it can be accomplished easily and will not give dragon magic any opportunity to screw things up."
nonbird
"Yes. A third-siahr with an extra form that works just as though they had been a thudia of some less complicated non-dragon species."
nonbird
"Because left to its own devices, dragon magic sorts the children of dragons and non-dragons into parunias and thudias depending on how much of it is available at the time," he says, "and I don't see any reason to argue with it about that when I have so many better things to argue with it about, and it's easier to design the miracle that creates third-siahrs to work around the way dragon magic naturally deals with things than to try to make dragon magic acknowledge third-siahrs as a special case. I see magic. I know these things."
"This seems like if, say, a third-siahr and a dragon of the same color had children, most of those children would be third-siahrs of that color able to shapeshift into ten things of their choice at age twenty and then able to turn into smaller versions of themselves somewhere between forty and sixty," says the obsidian. "There is nothing strictly intolerable about this but it seems, ah..."
"Silly," says the emerald representative.
"Silly," says the emerald representative.
nonbird
"I agree that it is silly. But I would rather let it be silly than try to anticipate in advance what dragon magic will do if we forbid it to be silly in that way," says Lazarus. "I don't know what it would do. It might do nothing and be perfectly fine. It might come up with yet another way to kill or torment innocent children for no reason. Silliness seems preferable."
nonbird
"Miracle magic as a whole is extraordinarily bad at producing information unless you are reasonably clever and already have a pretty good idea of what you want to know, and it can't predict the future in any way that would apply to this situation," says Lazarus. "I can see magic and get all sorts of helpful information that way, including things I didn't know I needed to look for, but I do need to be near a particular magic in order to see it, which means that I am not very good at figuring out ways in which a type of magic I don't fully understand yet might interact with a thing that doesn't exist yet at all."