Assuming magic is an ability that only needs gestures and words and that general ilk for focusing the mind, what childish ways might an eleven or twelve year old witch activate their powers?
When someone says 'And Pigs Might Fly ...' A pig flies. Stealing bits of cake and the cake replenishing itself. Breaking someones window with the ball and it repairs. Actually finding the salmon of knowledge and it doing your homework for you Entry to a secret world of your imagination. Toys coming to life. Someone who bullies you falling off their bike into a mud puddle.
I kind of meant childish ways of achiving an end, like making your shadow puppets minions, or drawing something in order to conjure it.
OK maybe using the phrases that get thrown at kids: Your face will stick like that Pigs might fly Making dolls to get revenge It depends if you want white or black magic here ?
Well what are their basic personalities and the goal of the story ? Without that all we will be doing is listing things they could do.
Well they're powers are unstable (as in hard to control) due to bad training from their grandmother, whom they accidentally killed. So they start a magic club at their school to channel their excess power into their classmates, for arcane rituals, and they've been placed with a foster family who doesen't know what they are. The kid's are called Edelyn (girl) and Marvok; (boy) well they're cousins but since they were raised as brother and sister they consider each over as such. Edelyn is shy, kind but something of a doormat, believes herself to be a freak, sporty. She really wants to have a real family life with their foster family, the two's upbrining with their grandmoter was not a happy one. Marvok seems to be doing an eternal immitation of a vulcan, possesis rather a dry wit, considers normal people a bit below him and Edelyn, and at first he considers his foster parents mere tools for survival, but slowly that view changes into one of genuine love. When he get's angry it's quite frightening.
ok so they could use almost anything: Bouncing three times on a spacehopper Game of hopscotch with a special rhyme Maybe skimming stones on a pond. Cycling over a certain speed Maybe even magic wands they made themselves or a plastic disney princess one
Are twelve year olds really that childish? I wasn't scribbling with crayons and playing with dolls at twelve, that's for sure. At that stage in my life, I wasn't mature, but I wanted to be. I had developed interests in books and movies. As a fantasy equivalent, maybe they write your world's equivalent to a haiku with a few slant rhymes to try to do something. A young boy might do some sort of lame attempt at fighting, with some really low kicks he thinks are quite high and some weak punches that he thinks are well timed. Kids at that age are beginning to think of what they want to be, and presume they are already there. They likely have interests, in books and plays and maybe even chores or careers. Perhaps come up with a fictitious, fantastic equivalent of Pokémon. Don Quixote was an old time equivalent to any modern pop series. Have the kids pretending to gallop on a horse and running from windmills.
A child is quite capable of following a ritual, though they may break or forget a step. At twelve, they could easily pick up Buckland's Blue Book and use wicca to channel their magic. (I don't know the proper name for it, and last I heard Llewelyn did change the color of the cover.)
Hopefully I'm getting what you're after, this thread is a little cryptic. Some ideas might be trying to levitate before falling asleep, which would be sleeping on a cushion of air and could lead to falling awake. I was a big reader at that age; having the book float in the right spot and flip pages by itself would be spiffy. Bringing army men to life to fight each other, having simple origami fold itself, etc. It'd be easy to make a little magic night-light to read or draw after bedtime and lights out. Of course, with that type of power, it'd be easy for more mischievous pranks to be pulled as well. Water to be summoned over someone's head, especially when they walk through a doorway; fire to melt all the army men in the war, even if they didn't come alive; water constantly swirling in the toilet even though it isn't being flushed; duplicating a ghost by magically creaking stairs and moving things; etc. Just some ideas for you...
Hmm I should have worded it clearer. I meant childish foci for magic, you know how in some stories wizards focus magic through song and dance. Good ideas though Sorry for being unclear.
Although the powers are inherent traits what you ask seem to be rituals which would be learned or devised rather than inherent. They could be anything from pulling legs off flies, waving a wand, chewing on a sock, kissing a toad's bum, making a doll and sticking pins in it, drawing pentagrams on the floor, using nursery rhymes as incantations, using words from Macbeth etc
If it takes place in the modern day, then my original suggestion is even easier to apply. Just remember that twelve year olds are not that childish. Children, but on the verge of adolescence. Most of them aren't still having tea parties with Mr. Snuffles or dressing up Barbie dolls.
Oh, I get it, the things that would help kids focus to keep control of their magic. It might seem strange, but simply sitting extremely still might help them focus. If you're looking for more of a medium, having beads or legos or something like that to throw your magic about might help. "Talking with your hands" is a natural way to go about it, and if they are pacers (naturally walking around aimlessly), that would keep their minds focused a little more too. I could see painting possible helping too, just a really messy, quick way of visualizing the magic swirling about. Hopefully this is closer to being on the right track?
So what about a witch's appearence and their local enviroment could be affected when they're casting spells?
I couldn't agree with this more. When I was 12, my activities ranged from climbing trees and playing boy vs. girl wars with the neighborhood kids, to games like Manhunt/neighboorhood-level Capture the Flag, to slumber parties...sleepovers on the weekend consisted of things like Truth or Dare (or Truth/Dare/Haystack if I was with my friends who weren't too goody-goody, because I was the wilder one by comparison), gossiping, making stupid parody recordings of stuff and playing it back and laughing at it, scary movies etc... No way I was doing things like nursery rhymes, dolls, dressup, etc when I was 12......... I'm still a little confused on what you're asking for. Are you asking for what they would do with their powers, or for rituals they'd create? I know some friends who did Wicca at around 12 and they were capable of it...
Rituals they could create. And yes I know that twelve year olds aren't that childish, but they certainly have childish stuff they can do. There is a middle ground between adulthood and tea parties with dolls.
Yeah....like childish dares that are really stupid....like "walk over to the group of high school guys and go "ommmmmmmmmm" like an idiot" was one I had to do at 12. Rituals, well, that's a pretty broad scope. It depends on what they're trying to achieve with the spell, you know? Or do you mean a really generic ritual that ties their group together?
Do the twelve year olds understand and believe that the magic isn't about the right words or rituals, and that it instead comes from them? (I say "believe" because even if they've been taught that, adolescents don't necessarily believe everything they're told.) If they don't, then I could imagine that they would put time into (1) finding out the "secrets" that they believe that the adult mages are declining to provide and (2) repeating whatever has succeeded for them. So if a child happened to make something magical happen while, say, throwing a baseball, then they might spend hour after hour trying to throw that baseball in the same way. They made something happen while drawing; the reason might be the focus and concentration on the drawing, but maybe they think it was really the pencil, and that pencil becomes their magic wand. Or if there's a particularly adept adult mage, they might study him - hey, he never wears leather shoes; I'll start wearing my canvas sneakers. He grows his hair long; that must be a source of power, so I'll do it too. ChickenFreak
