Exposure to Magic?

[nedserD C B yrraH]

My books are packed (moving in a week) so I can't check. My recollection is that Charity swore off magic the day she met Michael. Michael doesn't seem the type to have premarital sex. So I doubt Charity performed any magic while pregnant. There may have been some lingering in her blood from the lifestyle she had been living, but I don't recall her using magic while with Michael.

[nadia.skylark]

My recollection is that Charity swore off magic the day she met Michael. Michael doesn't seem the type to have premarital sex. So I doubt Charity performed any magic while pregnant. There may have been some lingering in her blood from the lifestyle she had been living, but I don't recall her using magic while with Michael.

She didn't have to be using active magic to have it moving through and around her, any more than Harry has to be actively casting a spell to fry technology. It helps, of course, but the fact that hexing occurs when wizards are not using active magic demonstrates that a practitioner has some level of magic flowing through them at all times.

I don't have my books with my either, but as I recall it takes a while for one's Talent to fade when one is trying to make it, so Charity would still count as a practitioner for at least several months after she gave up magic, and possibly for as long as a few years.

[nedserD C B yrraH]

My apologies for being unclear. I meant in regards to the comparison of Lil Harry vs Molly in utero by Mr. Death. The specific statement that Molly was regularly exposed to magic throughout the pregnancy. My statement did allow for potential holdover from her former lifestyle.

My personal theory is that a gentic component is needed as well at least one the parents having used magic enough that it is part of their soul. The souls mingle during sex, per Bob and Thomas, and sex can create a new soul. So if a soul involved in creating the new one has magic in the mix, it shows in the offspring if the necessary genetic component is present. Which might explain the need for time to lose one's Talent; more along the lines of the body recreating its cells over seven years and less like erosion.

[nadia.skylark]

My personal theory is that a gentic component is needed as well at least one the parents having used magic enough that it is part of their soul. The souls mingle during sex, per Bob and Thomas, and sex can create a new soul. So if a soul involved in creating the new one has magic in the mix, it shows in the offspring if the necessary genetic component is present. Which might explain the need for time to lose one's Talent; more along the lines of the body recreating its cells over seven years and less like erosion.

I agree about the genetic component, but I don't think the soul thing works. After all, the fae are known to be really good at magic, and they don't have souls.

[Mr. Death]

My apologies for being unclear. I meant in regards to the comparison of Lil Harry vs Molly in utero by Mr. Death. The specific statement that Molly was regularly exposed to magic throughout the pregnancy. My statement did allow for potential holdover from her former lifestyle.

I should've been clearer. I didn't mean that Charity was actively using magic during the pregnancy, but that she still had magic during that time, even if she wasn't using it.

[nedserD C B yrraH]

Mr. Death, I appreicate the clarification.

Ms. Skylark,  (please forgive any misgendering)
I did not state nor imply that a soul is required to manipulate magical forces.

However, secondarily and separately, I do postulate that a soul is required for a mortal to do so. The twin sides of Hellfire and Soulfire seem to imply that a soul can be used for magic. Heck dresden as a soul used himself to fuel his spells in GS, and we know he was nothing but soul.

[nadia.skylark]

Ms. Skylark,  (please forgive any misgendering)

You got my gender right.

I did not state nor imply that a soul is required to manipulate magical forces.

Sorry, I misunderstood.

However, secondarily and separately, I do postulate that a soul is required for a mortal to do so. The twin sides of Hellfire and Soulfire seem to imply that a soul can be used for magic. Heck dresden as a soul used himself to fuel his spells in GS, and we know he was nothing but soul.

It's possible, I suppose, but there are a few issues:

1) Is it possible to be a mortal and not have a soul? I had thought that Bob implied that if Harry burned up all of his soul, he would be destroyed. Also, Uriel said that he was a soul, so...
2) Soulfire and Hellfire appear to be different power sources that interact with magic, but are not themselves magic. Bob describes them as rebar and concrete, respectively.
3) Harry appears to be using magic in Ghost Story in the same way that other ghosts do, and other ghosts don't have souls. It's a little ambiguous, because the only other "ghost" that we see using actual magic is Corpsetaker, and he/she does have a soul, but Sir Stuart uses the same technique to make his bullets, and he doesn't have a soul.

I would postulate that you need to have a spirit to use magic rather than a soul--Bob describes them as being a seed and soil, respectively, and I think he says that fae only have the former. The comparison of two things working together to become more is used both for spirit and soul and for magic and soulfire, so I think it fits. Also, angels are only soul, and they don't appear to be able to use magic (I don't think. I think that Bob says something about them using soulfire rather than magic, but I'm not sure).

On the other hand, evidence for a soul being necessary for mortal magic is that at the end of White Night Bob says that you use bits of your soul in magic. This appears to be retconned in Small Favor, where it's revealed that using your soul as energy is a different thing altogether, namely soulfire, but it could have been a case of Bob not getting it, since he's explicitly not good at angel stuff.

[KurtinStGeorge]

Aside from being Harry's daughter and having a half-vampire mother, is Maggie getting long-term exposure to magic because Mouse is constantly with her?  This might not be a determining factor in Maggie developing magical ability, but I wonder if it could be a factor in how soon her magic manifests and how powerful she becomes.  Spending time with Bonnea might also get added to this equation.

[peregrine]

They may be on two different wavelengths.  After all, the rest of the Carpenter clan lived in a house with a major magical artifact most of the time, and it didn't change them all that much.

[nadia.skylark]

After all, the rest of the Carpenter clan lived in a house with a major magical artifact most of the time, and it didn't change them all that much.

...what? Are you talking about Amoracchius? I had thought that the Swords were explicitly not magical.

[Bacchus]

I still think that magic ability would have to be interwoven with our core body systems/central nervous system. Dresden first did magic in grade school but i say since before his birth it was already inside him
specificlly it would be forming in the first trimester of the pregnancy like almost all of that stuff does.

this magic forming in a fetus should be by far the most susceptible to outside influence during this time.

Just like the first 2 months or so is when all the craziest and worst birth defects form on humans and the risk to the fetus from drugs is the highest.

     also Charity had just been rescued from death by a knight in shining armor along with some love at first sight stuff.  Its easily possible they got the order of things wrong, got pregnant the first night, then spent a week in a magic lair cleaning up the mess left behind by a dead dragon and cultists.

    Susan early pregnancy would have been running around south America with supernaturals spying on supernaturals.

[Mr. Death]

also Charity had just been rescued from death by a knight in shining armor along with some love at first sight stuff.  Its easily possible they got the order of things wrong, got pregnant the first night, then spent a week in a magic lair cleaning up the mess left behind by a dead dragon and cultists.

She may well have offered, but Michael is staunchly Catholic. I seriously doubt that he'd have had premarital sex. It's just not something he could do.

Also, why would they spend any time cleaning up the magic lair, let alone a week? They weren't going to take his hoard and they're not going to be staying there.

[Bacchus]

um not trying to be insulting but that's an area where human nature conflicts with religions and its an often broken rule.
being staunchly religious doesn't mean you've never missed the mark or made mistakes.
about staying around, yeah your kinda right, i could think of a lot of minor wounds that could keep him  from hiking out for a few days but i know I'm kinda stretching now

[Mr. Death]

um not trying to be insulting but that's an area where human nature conflicts with religions and its an often broken rule.

Yes, but we're talking about Michael here. He has his flaws, but for the most part he's not someone who lets his base human urges overcome his faith and beliefs.

[nadia.skylark]

I still think that magic ability would have to be interwoven with our core body systems/central nervous system. Dresden first did magic in grade school but i say since before his birth it was already inside him
specificlly it would be forming in the first trimester of the pregnancy like almost all of that stuff does.

this magic forming in a fetus should be by far the most susceptible to outside influence during this time.

Just like the first 2 months or so is when all the craziest and worst birth defects form on humans and the risk to the fetus from drugs is the highest.

This makes sense.

Yes, but we're talking about Michael here. He has his flaws, but for the most part he's not someone who lets his base human urges overcome his faith and beliefs.

Agreed. Also, given that he is the wielder of Amoracchius, I don't see him sleeping with anyone he doesn't love, and he'd just met Charity.

Also, we don't know exactly when Charity gave up her magic. She could have not worked to give it up until Michael proposed to her, because she wanted to be worthy of him or something--it's pretty clear that she thinks of magic as a bad thing, but not the kind of ultimate evil that would require her to give up magic in order to think of herself as anything but a monster. I can see her thinking of herself as a not-particularly-good person after the dragon thing, given that the person making deals with the dragon and feeding people to it was essentially her mentor, so she might not have thought she could be a really good person even if she did give up her magic until Michael convinced her otherwise.