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Title: metamorphoses
fandom: Ars Magica
square: gender play
word count: 627
summary: Hermetic magic cannot forever alter something's essential nature, regardless of its external state or how it was born. As an apprentice, Lycoris Laskaris experiments with transformation spells.
content notes: underage character (16), no other standard notes apply: voluntary body transformation
Lycoris already knows that there is power in beauty, just as there is in words. A sweet smile at the right time can distract as much as a careful phrase, and the two used in conjunction can be as deadly a weapon in its own way as a knife or a sword. He listens to his parens's lessons, takes them to heart: there are many ways to wage war, or prepare for one, and a knife wrapped in silk is as deadly as any other knife.
(he finds the spell in an older book, when he is sixteen, sixteen and no longer growing, no longer physically changing: he bends his head over the text, studies it close until he internalizes the words, the gestures, how to channel his magic, because he sees the possibilities in it)
A tilt of his head, a demure little smile: Lycoris is practiced in those, soft gentle words that promise both nothing and everything, and he murmurs liltingly under his breath, fingers tracing complex sigils into the air. Hs body changes with the spell he spent so long learning, and he regards his changed appearance thoughtfully in the little mirror of polished silver, runs his hands down his body curiously.
To unpracticed eyes, he still looks much the same, small and slight and fair, a flower still in the midst of blossoming: he never finished his growth, and this spell only makes him his own twin sister, physically female but otherwise identical in appearance. Beneath his robes and beneath his hands, he can feel barely budding breasts and narrow hips only slightly more curved than his own. It makes him blush to think of exploring further, pressing his legs together without thinking, and he can feel the absence between his thighs, startling for a moment but not unpleasant, just strange.
He tries to take a step and nearly falls, uncertain of his balance in his changed body, catches himself on the desk and tries again, and a few more shaky steps later, he has his balance back, mostly, remembers how his sister walks and adds a bit of a sway to his step, and makes note to observe how women walk and move, to practice more. To pitch his voice properly, phrase his words properly: more lessons that he needs to consider, to make the illusion complete, all lessons that his parens has tried to teach him, while teaching him how to craft personas for spying.
Lycoris knows he cannot hold the spell forever, and lets the enchantment fade before it breaks on its own, faint curves disappears as though they had never been, body settling back into familiar lines and edges: it was a good enough try for the first time (and as long as it is by his own will and by his choice, he does not mind the changes, temporary as they are: by his will and not chosen for him) and Allectores has set him other things to study, that he needs to work on first, before further experimentation: without thinking about it, he remembers the first lesson on magic his parens taught him, the very first thing, before he opened his Gift to the Arts.
His magic cannot make him forever like this, no more than it can make him forever grow up, now that his inability to grow and change is forever etched into his bones and flesh, into his very nature and definition. Hermetic magic cannot forever alter something's essential nature, regardless of its external state or how it was born (impossible to alter someone's definitions, difficult yet easier to alter a body forever to their definitions), and it is not in his nature to change like this eternally, though it might be in another's.
fandom: Ars Magica
square: gender play
word count: 627
summary: Hermetic magic cannot forever alter something's essential nature, regardless of its external state or how it was born. As an apprentice, Lycoris Laskaris experiments with transformation spells.
content notes: underage character (16), no other standard notes apply: voluntary body transformation
Lycoris already knows that there is power in beauty, just as there is in words. A sweet smile at the right time can distract as much as a careful phrase, and the two used in conjunction can be as deadly a weapon in its own way as a knife or a sword. He listens to his parens's lessons, takes them to heart: there are many ways to wage war, or prepare for one, and a knife wrapped in silk is as deadly as any other knife.
(he finds the spell in an older book, when he is sixteen, sixteen and no longer growing, no longer physically changing: he bends his head over the text, studies it close until he internalizes the words, the gestures, how to channel his magic, because he sees the possibilities in it)
A tilt of his head, a demure little smile: Lycoris is practiced in those, soft gentle words that promise both nothing and everything, and he murmurs liltingly under his breath, fingers tracing complex sigils into the air. Hs body changes with the spell he spent so long learning, and he regards his changed appearance thoughtfully in the little mirror of polished silver, runs his hands down his body curiously.
To unpracticed eyes, he still looks much the same, small and slight and fair, a flower still in the midst of blossoming: he never finished his growth, and this spell only makes him his own twin sister, physically female but otherwise identical in appearance. Beneath his robes and beneath his hands, he can feel barely budding breasts and narrow hips only slightly more curved than his own. It makes him blush to think of exploring further, pressing his legs together without thinking, and he can feel the absence between his thighs, startling for a moment but not unpleasant, just strange.
He tries to take a step and nearly falls, uncertain of his balance in his changed body, catches himself on the desk and tries again, and a few more shaky steps later, he has his balance back, mostly, remembers how his sister walks and adds a bit of a sway to his step, and makes note to observe how women walk and move, to practice more. To pitch his voice properly, phrase his words properly: more lessons that he needs to consider, to make the illusion complete, all lessons that his parens has tried to teach him, while teaching him how to craft personas for spying.
Lycoris knows he cannot hold the spell forever, and lets the enchantment fade before it breaks on its own, faint curves disappears as though they had never been, body settling back into familiar lines and edges: it was a good enough try for the first time (and as long as it is by his own will and by his choice, he does not mind the changes, temporary as they are: by his will and not chosen for him) and Allectores has set him other things to study, that he needs to work on first, before further experimentation: without thinking about it, he remembers the first lesson on magic his parens taught him, the very first thing, before he opened his Gift to the Arts.
His magic cannot make him forever like this, no more than it can make him forever grow up, now that his inability to grow and change is forever etched into his bones and flesh, into his very nature and definition. Hermetic magic cannot forever alter something's essential nature, regardless of its external state or how it was born (impossible to alter someone's definitions, difficult yet easier to alter a body forever to their definitions), and it is not in his nature to change like this eternally, though it might be in another's.
