can't stop thinking about good light mages who are anxious as fuck trying not to hurt anyone.
starlight is the devin/ruby baby, right? who you said was potentially a fairly powerful light mage?
i have Thoughts (which do include AU-typical harm to kids and canon-typical gaslighting, so be warned).
Ruby finds out her son's a light mage, and it's okay! He learns how to make illusions, and she thinks--this is good. This will make him better at hiding. He can hide his sister, too. This is a good thing.
And it is a good thing. Lily loves watching Starlight's illusions. It keeps both kids occupied, those hard early years, when they barely have enough money for food, let alone toys. She loves it less when he uses the luck portions of his magic, always managing to draw just the right card in their games, but ruby tells him that if he's going to manipulate luck then he needs to make his sister lucky, too. And they play card games where both of them always draw exactly the card they need, and it's. It's good. Things are good.
And then, the kids are ten and Lily gets hurt. They're playing in the creek bed, and Ruby has told them to be careful a million times, and they usually are, but this time they're not. Ruby hears a scream and she runs. it takes her two minutes to get there.
Lily is the one with the giant gash on her arm. But it takes Ruby a moment to see it, because she's looking for an injury on Starlight. Because it's Starlight who has tears on his face, and Lily doesn't look like she's in pain at all. She's smiling, actually, and telling Starlight that it's okay, that's she's okay, just like she said, come on, it's fine. You said I was going to be okay and you were right, I don't know what you're worrying about.
"What did you do?" Ruby asks Starlight. He's her son. She remembers the moment he was born, he looks so much like her, all of the time. He's not Nova's, but in that moment, there's a ringing in her ears and all she can hear is Nova's voice, telling her that it's going to be okay. Lying.
"I don't know!" Starlight says. "I was just trying to help, I... she fell, and I was trying to help her, but..."
"Stop," Ruby says. "Stop, Starlight, just... get out of the way. Lily, come here. You're hurt, and we need to take care of it."
"But it doesn't hurt," Lily says. "It's okay. I don't understand why you're worried."
Ruby doesn't say anything else, just guides Lily inside to the first aid kit. Starlight gets out of the way.
A week later, Starlight is introduced to the Oichen light temple, where he's told he'll be learning to control his powers, so that he doesn't hurt anyone. He goes without complaint. He never wants to see that look on his sister's face again. He never wants to hear that tone in his mother's voice again. Ruby has told him that she's not mad, that she knows he can't control it, but he can learn to, and everything will be okay. It's less convincing out of her mouth than it is out of his.
He'll learn to control it. It will be okay. Right?
He wishes Lily had light magic, so she could make him believe it. And then he thinks that's the worst thing he's ever thought. But that doesn't make him stop wanting it.
He learns to control it. He makes a list of words he can't say anymore: you're okay, you're going to be okay, you can do it, you're safe.
Three years later, his sister disappears.
Three years and one month later, he meets his sister's other mother. She tells him that he's going to be okay, that his sister is okay, that this is the way things are supposed to be.
He wonders if this is what Lily felt. He feels like he should be afraid, but he can't hold onto it. His mother's in a cell and he can't see her and he doesn't think that's supposed to be okay, but it is okay, and it feels like his heart is tearing itself apart.
He adds "this is the way things are supposed to be" to his list of phrases.
He resolves to find a time when Devin is alone, and ask him if it's possible for an earth god to remove a light mage's magic. He heard, in Oiche, that Nova had done that to earth mages before. He should have asked his earth god, Saoirse, to do it three years ago. Four years ago.
Devin's not his god. But he's his father, and maybe that will be enough.
I realized halfway through that Lily's supposed to be immune to magic gaslighting so the scenario I was picturing wouldn't work, so I'm saying that in this case she's immune to magic gaslighting from Nova specifically but not from other light mages.
I think being Devin's son gives Starlight just enough to know that something's wrong but not enough to fix it.
Also I can't remember if Ruby's a light mage or not, so I glossed over it. In this scenario if she does have it she's not using it at all.
Nova has not actually removed earth mage's magic, that's a rumor based on the devin-earth-mage-eating thing that got twisted.
I tried really hard to not character assassinate Ruby and I hope I succeeded. She loves both of her kids, and she does not know about Starlight's list and would be horrified to find out.
ruby is not a magician! one of the few major characters with no magical ability at all, light or earth magic. also i can definitely work with lily only being immune to nova, OR with lily being immune to everyone EXCEPT starlight, because something something the shared genetic connection to an earth god, i don't know. i play loose and fast with the rules around magic bc my worldbuilding is usually based on just. What's The Worst That Could Happen
also i do not think you character assassinated ruby. she is very practical and would be pretty focused on an injury like this... in top form she'd probably tell starlight "honey, i'm not mad at you, but i need you to go back inside, yeah?" and then starlight would hear the strain in her voice and go Oh My God My Mum Hates Me. Born To Die.... World Is A Fuck....
but that's in top form. ruby cannot be a paradigm of perfect emotional stability at all times!
i'm so compelled by the idea of starlight being one of sorcha's apprentices (maybe even his sole apprentice) and then getting poached by nova. the political drama of this goes CRAZY. everything about the oichen twins' personalities is subject to change, but for Now i picture sorcha as being like.... in some ways the anti-nova. he's cold and remote as opposed to warm and friendly. he's a control freak who is (rightfully) hyperfocused on all of the threads of possibility and luck and misfortune within oiche itself, as opposed to nova's lackadaisical "oh they asked me to bless our soldiers. sure!! love our beautiful troops. who really knows what they need the blessing for...."
and also. unlike nova. sorcha gets Deeply attached to people other than his sister-soulmate. (in more of a parental-platonic way than something horrifying.)
so to have nova INSIST on taking the kid is like. oooh boy she's made an enemy of the oichen gods. except the twins can't declare that openly bc they are both still very weak & even at their full strength, tachni's power is Orders Of Magnitude larger. so they have to grit their teeth through diplomacy while STILL focusing on issues within their own borders, bc their country is in Fucking Tatters.
POLITICS AND DRAMA. I LOVE IT
there's also a potential alt timeline if lily IS blanket immune to light magic.
things start as an in-joke between the siblings: whenever they want ruby to sign off on something dangerous or they need something else from her, starlight is always the one to ask. bc ruby doesn't say no to him! lily's like "it's because you're small and cute" and starlight is like "trueee :)" and there's not much more to it than that. there might be a LITTLE bit of hurt and sibling rivalry bc starlight seems so obviously the favorite, but like, lily's friends say that's just because she's the eldest daughter. they're sure it doesn't mean anything. & lily's like yeah okay! probably true!
and then something like in this story happens. lily gets hurt. starlight is crying. lily is trying not to freak about this bigass gash in her arm. ruby comes running and starlight's like "she's okay, she's okay, she's okay, right, mum? she's okay??" and ruby's concern sort of slips off her face and she's like oh yeah it's just a scratch :)
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