Ask Luna #168

From: Kevin

Do you think Richard coming back either exactly or close enough to ten years later some form of gate magic requirement like the bubble realm in Syria? I think Alex mentioned in Chosen that it was about ten years so have you ever heard of special conditions needed to travel to other worlds and back to this our own, since it is almost certain Richard went to one to study the jinn.

Probably, yes. I don’t really know any of the details, and right now we’ve got more immediate problems to worry about.

From: Adam

Dear Luna,

A couple of simple questions.

1) It seems as though your family were unusual in that they had a link (albeit a terrible one) to magic that spanned generations. Are there many (any) other families like that, whether the link is good or bad?

2) It seems as though each country does its own thing magically,and mages have a pretty easy time flitting around the globe. Given the times I was wondering does the British light council have any kind of travel advisory system? If so what would get a country on the do not visit list?

1) Probably quite a few, but they don’t advertise. It’s really hard to set up those kinds of family curses or bloodlines but once you do they tend to last, so even if there aren’t many mages doing them they do add up.

2) I think there’s a kind of travel advisory thing, yeah, but I haven’t looked at it. Western countries are generally safe but there are protocols. The more unstable countries are another story, and there are a handful that the British Council just get on really badly with for some reason (no, I don’t have the full list).

From: Alicia W.

Hey, Luna, how’s things?

I have what I hope are some easy, “softball” questions that aren’t too personal.

1. I’ve seen pictures of the typical “English breakfast” (was even served a traditional English breakfast a time or three when I visited London 20 years ago). I’m talking toast, baked beans, fried eggs, sautéed tomatoes and/or sautéed mushrooms with bacon and/or sausage. It seems like an awful lot to eat early in the morning. Alex doesn’t seem like too much of a “foodie” from what he’s said in the books, so he doesn’t strike me as the traditional English breakfast type. How about you? Sorry if this is a silly question, but for some strange reason I am curious about what you both like to eat for breakfast.

2. Can you give us some examples of the most annoying or amusing questions or requests you’ve gotten from customers at the Arcana Emporium v. 2.0? Alex seemed to get particularly annoyed when asked about:
a. sparkly vampires
b. stage magic tricks
c. love potions, and
d. what the admission requirements are for Hogwarts

3. Can you tell us how to get into Hogwarts?

Thanks!

Alicia

1) I’ve hardly ever met anyone who eats a full English every morning – they’re too big! I think you’d be more likely to find someone eating one at a pub or cafe than in their house. Then again, maybe I just don’t know the right kind of person.

For breakfast I usually have cereal. I got into the habit a while ago since whenever I did any kind of real cooking it tended to go badly and I just didn’t want to face that first thing in the morning, and now it’s a routine. Alex usually has toast with either a piece of fruit or a raw carrot. (He likes the things, don’t ask me why.) Probably not a very exciting answer, sorry!

2) Ugh, too many to answer. I’ve had all four except the Hogwarts one for some reason (I guess the kids who grew up reading those are too old now). The ones that bother me aren’t the annoying ones, they’re the creepy ones. There’s one guy who kept on coming back asking about how life magic could be used to give people heart attacks/brain aneurysms/strokes. As in, CONSTANTLY asking, and digging for details. When I finally told him to get lost I started getting ‘anonymous’ emails to this address asking the exact same thing. Maybe it’s just me, but it feels like the worst questions I get are worse than the worst ones Alex used to get.

3) Okay, NOW I’ve had all four.

From: Charles

So I just realized something, you know all these questions you are getting about why Richard didn’t go after Anne and Alex after she connected with the Jinn? Or why didn’t he reveal she was behind the prison breakout, and why Morden was imprisoned for so long without any apparent gain?

Do you think Richard might have problems we don’t know about specifically with his Cabal that may explain these actions or lack thereof? I get the feeling that people are acting on incomplete information that without context could skew how they view things but what do you think?

Lastly, I was kinda of confused about you guys not knowing what Richard’s and Morden’s plans are? You think they might have something else planned aside from overthrowing the Light Council?

Yeah, definitely. It was something that Alex drilled into me. Always remember that what Dark mages are most worried about is other Dark mages. Their biggest enemies are other people like them, so the best way to deal with them is to avoid getting their attention. If you can do that, it won’t take long before they’ll start something with another Dark mage, or another Dark mage will start something with them, and they’ll be too busy with each other to bother with you.

As for their plans, well, that seems to be part of it (Richard, anyway, I’ve no idea what Morden’s endgame is). But practically everyone on the Dark side and the Light side wants to get more powerful at the expense of everyone else. When I say we don’t know what their plans are, I mean the specifics.

From: Logan

Can Alex pathwalk reading books and retain all the information? I just thought it would be pretty awesome, but wasn’t sure if it works like that. I know he got a lot of information pathwalking in Morden’s place in Fated, but it mostly sounded like physical actions where he could see a result, as opposed to pathwalking long hours of just reading say, a French text book, and suddenly he speaks French.

No. Or, yes, he could, but it wouldn’t actually be any use because it doesn’t let him learn things any faster. So he could path-walk reading a book, but that wouldn’t let him do anything that he couldn’t do already by just reading it. To memorise huge loads of info like that you need mind magic, not divination.

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