Dream magic

The primary form of magic in the esture of Ses, dream magic gets its name from the fact that the magical potential used to cast it is gathered through dreams. As far as most celemologists can tell, during their dreams people—or some aspects of them—travel to some other realm or esture, which some refer to as "Goëtogenia". There they accumulate dream energy they can use to wreak magic when they wake (or, in the case of sleepcasters, unconsciously while they're still sleeping). This theory does leave a few details not fully explained—such as the existence of the ambient magic that seems to exist independent of dreaming—but it fits the facts well enough to have won wide acceptance.

The same dream energy that can be used to power spells and other magical abilities can also be used to dampen or resist the effects of dream magic. This facility is called dreamwarding, and is a capability that some develop by conscious effort and for which others seem to have an innate knack. It is not necessarily linked to the ability to use dream magic; while there are powerful dream mages who also have strong dreamwards, there are also skilled spellcasters who have not bothered to develop any dreamwarding proficiency, and there are individuals who have strong wards and can throw off all but the strongest magical effects but cannot use any magic on their own. In any case, dreamwards only protect against direct physical effects of dream magic; they might prevent a person from being transformed into a donkey or turned to stone, but would not stop deadly projectiles magically propelled toward them (since it is the projectiles, not the person, that the magic is directly acting on), or help them see through a magical illusion.

The term "dream magic" is one used primarily by comparative celemologists, or by others who have frequent occasion to refer to multiple arcana. Those who are conversant only or principally with dream magic are likely to simply call it "magic"—after all, it's the only form of magic they know of, or at least the one they know best, so further qualification is unnecessary.

Origins

Ses didn't always have magic; dream magic was apparently brought to the esture long ago by the being now best known as Gomar the Ancient, then a mere mortal but now a god of magic worshiped on many worlds and by many names. Exactly how long ago this happened isn't clear, but it was tens of thousands of years ago at least, and could have been an order of magnitude more. Before Gomar, according to some accounts, there was only one plane in Ses, the universe of Charos, and the people there lived and worked without magic to aid them. But then Gomar created Goëtogenia, and people began to draw power from their dreams, and magic was brought into being—an event sometimes called the Dreambirth.

There are multiple contradictory accounts of how Gomar the Ancient brought magic to the esture. Celemologists and historians disagree as to which, if any, of these discrepant accounts holds the most truth, and it's possible that they're all myths and that Gomar had nothing to do with the origin of magic. What is more firmly evidenced is that however dream magic first entered the esture there was, indeed, a time when it didn't exist, or at least when it wasn't known. Even now, there are large parts of Charos that dream magic has apparently not reached; when there is cause to speak of them, the hosper where dream magic works is called Gomara, and the part of Charos without magic is called Aramog.

Still, such an accepted part of life is dream magic now that it is referenced in the esture's name—Ses is an acronym for the Calorran "Surdán es Sobindoys", which means "World of Dreams". While dream magic may not pervade all the esture, it is only those who are aware of other estures who need a name for their own, and given that travel between estures is usually effected only by magic, it's perhaps unsurprising that the name was given by inhabitants of Gomara. Even so, it may not be entirely inappropriate even for Aramog—it does seem that to some extent dreams do predate dream magic. Not just the fact that people dreamt while they slept, but also that dreamscapes appear even in Aramog, and there is reason to believe that this happened before the foundation of dream magic. So even before the advent of dream magic, it seems dreams had enough of a presence in Ses, even if people didn't then accumulate numen from theirs, to perhaps warrant naming the esture after them.

Darks

The main way that dream magic works is through arcane cause-effect links technically called "darks". Darks are essentially the fundamental principle of dream magic. Every way that dream magic is used is ultimately simply a type of dark—at least, according to many scholars. It is possible for mages to create new darks, though it takes considerable magical skill. Indeed, it's generally believed that all darks were at some point created by mages, or groups of mages; there are no darks that are inherent to dream magic and existed from the moment it first entered the esture.

Basically, through a dark, a specific action or process becomes associated with a specific magical result. Thereafter, any time that exact process is undertaken, that result occurs. This simple formula can apply to a variety of different combinations, and the ultimate possibilities for the uses of darks are nearly unlimited. There are some overarching darks that define whole categories of effects and powers, and facilitate the creation of narrower darks within those categories; these metasystemic darks are known as bare darks.

It is possible to create a local dark that works only within a particular region, and in fact most darks probably fall into this category. There are, however, also universal darks that are in force throughout Gomara, many of which have become so well known, at least on some worlds, that they are simply thought of as intrinsic aspects of dream magic. Even these universal darks, however, are not necessarily known and used on every world; it could be that a dark that on one world is familiar to and utilized by almost all the ellogous populace is on another completely unkent. Some of the best known and most widespread universal darks are described below.

Curels

Also known as vocational darks, among many other names, curels are prescribed lifestyles and professions that people can pursue, in return for which they get magical powers—if they follow certain procedures and strictures. There are a wide variety of curels, some known and practiced on many worlds and some confined to a particular rew, or a particular land within a rew. Where curels are common, people frequently identify with the curels they follow, to an equal or greater extent than their occupation or other personal qualities and lifestyle aspects. Indeed, one's curel and occupation are often related; some curels lend themselves particularly well to certain occupations, and in some cultures it may be expected that everyone who seriously pursues a particular vocation also takes on a certain curel related to it.

The powers granted by a curel may increase over time, or as the person following the curel completes certain tasks. Some curels may offer a selection of powers and benefits their adherents may choose between; others grant a fixed set. It is possible to pursue more than one curel at once, although the divided attention means that one who does this is unlikely to attain the same level of ability within a given curel as someone focusing entirely on that curel.

Fasures

Fasures, or figural darks, associate different shapes with particular powers and qualities. Each shape is initially defined through a paragon, an object that serves as an "ideal" advantage of the shape. Other objects sufficiently close in shape to the paragon gain special powers, the more puissant the closer they are. In general, the rarer the shape, the greater the powers gained by its imitation. The quindent is a shape that rarely occurs in nature nor, in most worlds, in manufacture, and thus it is relatively easy to fashion a quindent that will gain power through its form; globes, on the other hand, are ubiquitous, and so to gain any appreciable power from its fasure a globe must be very close indeed to its now-lost paragon (which was not itself a perfect sphere).

However, fashioning objects to closely match the shapes of paragons is not the only way to make use of this dark. More commonly, it is used metacelemically, applying a given fasure as a parameter to a spell or to some paracarminical effect. Many spells and other magics tap into the power of fasures, altering their effects based on a fasure that is chosen at the time of casting or effect. In the case of an effect involving transfigurement, arcession, plasmation, or osiosis, the connection to the fasure is usually straightforward, with the fasure determining the shape that the object is transformed into or the shape of the summoned or created object. For other effects, the relation between the alteration and the shape may be less obvious.

Geasa

A geis is a magically binding vow taken by an individual or group—the geiseach—, in return for which they are granted particular powers. Geasa differ from curels in that they do not grow over time or with further devotion, but have their full effects immediately—but also in that there are consequences for failing to adhere to them; violating a geas may result in devastating curses. On the other hand, the powers granted by a geas may be much greater than those from a curel requiring a similar level of commitment, although the power levels of geasa vary by how limiting their strictures are and how often they come into play.

Not for want of trying, no one has found a surefire way of predicting the powers granted by an unfamiliar geis, or the penalties for breaking it. For that reason, most people who take on a geis choose one that has already been taken on by others, and so the effects of which are already known. Some reckless or adventurous souls may try to invent new geasa, swearing geisach vows that have not (to their knowledge) been previously essayed, but they do so at some risk, since they cannot know what powers they will gain or what consequences they may incur for breaking the geis—and whether these powers and consequences are worth what they promise.

Names

Apparently as a consequence of another bare dark created millennia ago, names have magical power in Gomara—power that, depending on the nature of the name and how it is used, can be utilized either by the named individual, or against them. This applies not only to the names of people; objects, beasts, groups, and places may have names that can be tapped for power by those who know how. Naturally, where the power of names is well known and much used, those in the know have significant motivation to keep at least part of their name secret—although like most of the other darks described here, the daracic effects of names are not familiar to those on every world.

Not all names have the same power, or can be used the same way. The name by which a person, place, or thing is most commonly known is its use name—and if this is the only name they have, then it can be used to exert considerable power over them. In cultures where the power of names is known and where people want to avoid this vulnerability, people are often given different names called deep names at birth or other special events; these deep names take on most of the power from the use names and are not shared except perhaps with those the named individual implicitly trusts. Other types of name include the deed name, granted in recognition of some honor or achievenement; the high name, a name that can grant the named individual great power but also may bring great peril it others discover it; the switch name, a name that applies to only one identity of someone who has several; and the false name, a name that has no power over the one who bears it, but is not easily gained.

Pales

Some worlds or large regions of worlds of Gomara are divided into pales, discrete areas subject to different magical and perhaps physical conditions. Each pale, where they exist, is covered by a rhegus, or multiple rhegi, with different effects than those of neighboring pales. Among many other possibilities, some pales might have unusual weather, they may have triggered enchantments that take effect under certain conditions, or they may be home to strange magical creatures not found elsewhere.

Perhaps with rare exceptions, all pales of Gomara are allodial, their powers and nature under partial and perhaps subconscious control of some individual (or small group of individuals), who is referred to as the pale's sire. Unlike in many allodial pales, the sires of Gomaran pales are not usually confined to their own lands, and can leave their pales if they wish, though they suffer consequences if they spend too much time beyond their boundaries. The details of how a new sire takes the position when a sire dies or for some other reason loses their dominion varies from pale to pale—generally pales of the same world will have similar systems of succession, but this is not always the case.

Shards

Thanks to a universal dark that makes it possible, dream mages can develop the ability to split off small parts of their own mind and soul and place them in other objects. The receptacle of this part of the mage's self is called a shard. The presence of the soul fragment does not automatically grant the object in question any senses or mobility it did not otherwise possess, but of course the mage can use magic to move the shard and sense its surroundings. In this way, the mage who created the shard can surveil an area where they are (or at least their body is) not physically present, and can even cast spells as if they were there.

A mage may choose to invest a portion of their soul in a living creature, creating a living shard. Depending on the creature, this may give an advantage in that the vessel already has the power to move and sense its surroundings, and so the controlling mage doesn't have to bestow these capabilities magically. However, in order to have the living shard do what they want, the mage must overcome the will of the vessel's own soul. This is rarely a problem with alogous vessels of relatively little mental power; a mage can make a shard of a fly or a worm need have little fear of its turning against them. But the greater the intelligence and consciousness of the vessel, the greater its power to resist the mage's control. A spider or a snail may have little ability to fight the mage's influence, but a mage who makes a shard of a dog or a dolphin will find themselves in a constant struggle against the vessel's own desires. This issue of course is even greater for shards made from humans or other ellogous entities—a few powerful and steel-willed mages have used such shards, but they are very rare, the more so since they are—among those who understand what shards are and how they work—widely considered an unconscionable violation of the vessel's agency.

Tokens

Many mages augment their power through dream tokens, another mechanism of dream magic that owes its existence to an old universal dark. Unlike shards, dream tokens do not actually hold part of their creators' souls; nevertheless, like shards they can be designated as an origin point for a mage's spells, allowing them to work effects at great distances from their bodies if they have a token there. More importantly, dream tokens absorb ambient magic from the mage's surroundings, making it available for their owners' use.

A mage doesn't have to separately ordain each token to its purpose. Rather, the mage designates one or more criteria that describe their tokens, and anything meeting that description becomes a token. While in principle nothing prevents a mage from choosing a token criterion as broad as "all rocks" or "all cubes", such a choice would be wildly counterproductive. Tokens do tap into the mage's own power to function, and the more tokens a mage has the more power they draw off. When a mage has only a few tokens, the boost to the mage's power they grant from the ambient magic they absorb is greater than the power they draw off, and the effect is a net positive. However, as the number of tokens increases, the amount of dream energy they drain from the mage grows faster than the amount they grant, so when they grow too numerous they reach first a range of diminishing returns before they become actively detrimental. Depending on the mage's skill and power, they may be able to have a few dozen to a few thousand tokens before their cost overtakes their benefit. It therfore behooves a mage to designate specific criteria for their tokens that not too many objects meet; one common choice is to designate as the mage's tokens all objects that bear the mage's chosen sigil.

Spells

One of the most obvious uses of dream magic is in spellcasting. While technically spells, collectively, are a dark—or a set of darks—few people other than celemologists think of them as such. There are many different forms of spellcasting in Ses, stemming from different ways that people have found to channel dream energy into their desired effects, but they all come down to the same basic idea: the caster goes through the mental processes required for the spell, and something happens.

Because of the way that spells have developed from each other and evolved over the years, the known spells of dream magic have been classified in a system of carminical taxonomy. Many casters specialize in knowing spells from particular taxonomic groupings; it's certainly easier to learn a group of closely related spells than it is a collection of spells more distantly connected. The highest-level taxon of dream magic is the path, each path representing an entirely independent development of spellcasting, or at least a wholly distinct method—indeed, they differ enough that some celemologists consider each path to be a separate arcanum, and dream magic as a whole to be a superarcanum, though the fact that most of the paracarminical magics of dream magic are not associated with any particular path complicates this, and it is currently a minority view. While each path works its effects in different ways, each is versatile enough to accomplish most anything any other path can do, though certainly some effects may be achievable more easily or efficiently in one path than another. It is commonplace to refer to the "twelve paths of magic", although not necessarily accurate—there are some questions and disagreements about the exact number of paths, and depending on which ædeologist you ask the actual number may be anywhere between seven and twenty-four. The lowest-level primary taxon, corresponding to the species in etorical taxonomy, is the incantation; generally speaking, it is the individual incantations that are considered separate spells. Few if any wizards are skilled with all known paths; most wizards specialize in a single path, or even in a single circle or lower taxon.

Although the exact enumeration of paths varies between scholars, the following seven paths are more or less universally agreed on:

Achara

The path of Achara began with systems of warping space. It is often associated with translocation, though its techniques have wide enough applicability to admit many other uses.

Binela

The earliest uses of Binela were to change the fundamental colors of objects—essentially effecting transmutation—though it was later extended to other physical manipulations.

Chasa

Apparently branching off from Achara (as Achara did from Legera), the path of Chasa was originally based around movement between different planes.

Chora

Chora is known as the "dark path"; it was originally designed—and still is primarily used—for spells involving stealth and misdirection.

Legera

Called the "first path" because it is widely believed to include the earliest spells developed, Legera was initially pricipally based around motion, though this is a wide enough purview that nearly any effect can be readily done in it.

Sorna

The path of Sorna specializes in affecting dreams—which, given the large rôle dreams play in dream magic, is less narrow a scope than it may initially seem. Spells of this path tend to be relatively easy to cast but imprecise or unpredictable.

Ujara

One of the most mysterious paths, with several strange claims about its origin, Ujara is based around spells that manipulate time, change, and cycles.

Magical creatures

As in most hospers, dream magic gives rise to a great number of creatures who either rely on magic for their continued existence, or at least owe to it their origin. Many such beings are endemic to specific rews of Charos; others are found throughout the esture, but are nowhere common. A few types of magical creature that are known throughout most of Gomara follow.

Bengorros

The bengorros are demons that supervise the torment of the wicked whose souls the gods postmortally remand to their ministrations. While native to and most active on the terrible plane of Listix, bengorros do venture to other planes on malevolent missions, and can be found with varying frequencies on many rews of Charos. They come in a wide assortment of different forms and kinds, with a rich panoply of powers.

The leader of the bengorros is a shapeshifting being called the Dengue, who may be a powerful bengorro himself, or may be something more akin to a god. The Dengue is sometimes seen as an evil counterpart of Gomar the Ancient, and there may be some closer relationship between the two—many have it that when both were mortal, the individuals that would become Gomar and the Dengue were brothers, though both then went by different names. The Dengue is also often credited with having some part alongside Gomar in bringing magic to the world, though the accounts vary in the details of his rôle in the affair.

Some gods have taken it upon themselves to try to create a strain of beings that personify good and counterbalance the evil of the bengorros. Several such attempts have been made, the most successful giving rise to entities called kallyons. Even the kallyons, however, are still far outnumbered by the bengorros, and have influence on far fewer worlds.

Caculæ

Wherever people use magic, some apply it to create caculæ, personal servitors either created wholesale through magic or transformed from existing creatures and bound into thraldom. There are many sorts of cacula, including those produced by processes peculiar to particular wizards, but there are a few kinds that have become widespread and are found throughout much of the hosper. Among the most common and best known caculæ are the arate and the lacker.

Arates are caculæ formed from blood, from either a living organism or a fresh corpse. They take their personalities and usually memories from the creature the blood came from. There are multiple types of arate, with varying means of creation. Some are made from the creating mage's own blood, others from the blood of the mage's allies or enemies.

Lackers are diminutive doll- or statue-like creatures granted life by giving them special, powerful names. They may be made from wet clay, from cloth, from metal pieces jointed together, or from almost any other material that allows them mobility either through pliability or through articulation. Though on many worlds lackers are most often created in the form of small winged humanoids with grotesque features, this is a matter of tradition rather than necessity, and they can be made in any shape.

Gods

While most mages and other Gomaran creatures with magical abilities use the numen they accumulate in their own dreams, there are ways to tap into the dream energy of others. The onirarchs of Dadauar, for example, have mastered this art, and attain great power by taking the dream energy of their subjects. But there are other, older entities that go further, convincing people to dedicate themselves to them, and then absorbing the souls of their faithful into themselves upon their deaths, keeping them in a constant state of dreaming and using the dream energy they produce to boost their own power. These beings are known as gods, and are probably the most puissant personages that exist in Gomara, the oldest and most widely worshipped gods having sufficient power to create or destroy entire worlds.

Gomar the Ancient, creator of magic, is said to have become the first god, and by many (though not all) accounts is still the most powerful. But he is certainly no longer the only god; most worlds now have hundreds or thousands of gods worshipped by various groups of their inhabitants, and there are a handful of universal gods known on multiple worlds by various names—Gomar the Ancient prominently among them. Of course, most of a typical gods' worshippers are unaware of the exact source of the deity's power, and see them as transcendent presences that promise the pious the reward of an afterlife of everlasting bliss.

Rarely, the process of absorbing a mortal soul into a god goes wrong, and instead the mortal absorbs a part of the god, becoming some new being not fully divine but more than mortal. Such an entity is called a godling. Though some godlings are benevolent, and some use their semideific status to work toward becoming full-fledged gods, most godlings are driven mad by their experience, and become rampaging monsters that wreak chaos and destruction.

Mares

The mares are a separate strain of demon apparently unrelated to and not necessarily allied with the bengorros of Listix. They have no allegiance to the Dengue, but comprise a number of different contentious factions each led by a ruler that refers to themself by a royal title. Though the mares are not open about their ultimate ends, and it could be that different factions work toward different goals, it is widely believed that the mares seek to gain control of magic itself.

There is some evidence that mares did not originate in Ses at all, but are in fact natives of some other esture who enter Ses in their dreams just as the people of Ses visit Goëtogenia in theirs—but if so, they have found a way to establish a presence in Ses and accumulate power there to a much greater degree than most dreamers whose effect there is more ephemeral. Some mages have claimed to visit the world of the mares' origin, but their accounts are contradictory and uncorroborated.

Undead

The gods of Gomara have arrogated to themselves a near-monopoly on the souls of the dead. Even if a decedent worshipped no god in life, unless they were so scelerous as to merit being deputed to the bengorros, generally some deity will find a pretext to lay claim to their soul. Rarely, however, it happens for whatever reason a soul goes untaken, and lingers in the world either as an intangible presence or an animating force within its former body or some other material medium. These abiding souls are called undead, and take many forms, among the most common being the solid revenants and skeletons and the matterless ghosts.

There are even those who purposely seek out a form of undeath to tarry in the mortal world and avoid passing on to the afterlife. Of those few that succeed in finding such a way, some hit upon unique methods of their own, but there is a secretive cadre of individuals who have attained their status by a shared technique, becoming a special form of undead called an easad. All easade belong to an organization called the Repudiant Brotherhood, which stintily shares the secrets of securing this state; if any easade have tried to leave or betray the Brotherhood, they have been dealt with by their comrades before they did any damage. Easade are extremely powerful beings, either because it requires great capability to work whatever methods bring about this state, or because the easade only share their secrets with those they consider sufficiently accomplished—or perhaps both.

Urrers

Urrers, or nieus, are a variety of anek found in Gomara, which can change between different forms by everting themselves, the "inactive" forms otherwise being inside-out within the active form. In the case of most bilaterian forms, this most commonly means that the inactive forms are incorporated into the digestive tract, magically protected from any gastric acids or other digestive enzymes that would otherwise damage them while there. Some strains of urrer are allocradiac, while others are isocrades; etorists dispute whether these two groups have a common origin or developed independently.

Magic as a living entity

Increasingly, many celemologists have come to believe that dream magic itself is alive and conscious, based on scattered adminicles that are individually inconclusive but collectively compelling. This does not (necessarily) mean that each spell or enchantment has its own separate life and mind, but that magic as a whole is a living being, and one not entirely without awareness of the world around it. If this is true, then it could be that this entity already existed in Magogenia before Gomar the Ancient brought dream magic into being, and that what Gomar actually did was somehow invite or compel the entity to extend some portion of itself into Ses. The ultimate consequences and corollaries of magic's vitality are disputed; some celemologists go so far as to assume that various factors of dream magic that seem arbitrary and unpredictable, such as the effects of a given geas, in fact come about through the conscious choice of magic itself, though this remains only a hypothesis.

In a darker turn, some evidence suggests a connection between dream magic as a living entity and the Dengue, the fell leader of the bengorros. The exact nature of this connection remains uncertain; some have conjectured that dream magic and the Dengue are in fact one and the same, or at least aliters of each other; others that dream magic created the Dengue, or (contra the usual credit given to Gomar the Ancient) vice versa. It could be that the two are linked in some more esoteric way. Regardless, there are those on some worlds who have seized on this idea to declare magic in general inherently evil due to its connection with the Dengue, and who condemn or forbid its use. But in general magic has become an important enough part of life in Gomara that such ideas rarely gain much of a foothold, and most of those who are aware of this possible connection either assume that it will be ultimately found to be benign in nature, or just avoid dwelling on it.