#treegona

lost: 1 afternoon

gained: 1 thiefy boi

it's a really good deal imo 😌

also, i'm so excited you read Scholomance, those books fuck, and — you read the first two? meaning you've paused on book 2's cliffhanger? you're so strong. or suffering so much, depending

i love Golden Enclaves soooooo much, it's really the book that makes you go "OH that's what this trilogy is about." the realizations Naomi Novik sets you up for... it's so well done. the worldbuilding shaping the plot is so perfect

Scholomance is really one of those books where the world matters. it can't take place in some other fantasy or urban fantasy world, it's this one and I love that

This is such a neat challenge! And now I’m imagining the kinds of magic that would allow Harry Potter style fusion, imagine two young lesbians experimenting with Animagi and self-transfiguration and Unbreakable Vows and ways to put themselves in each other because, I don’t know, they’re Ruby and Sapphire and it’s something they want that badly, can you imagine? Like, if we take you incredibly literally right now, and assume that they are actually physically combining and therefore so are their wands.

Of course, the alternative is 1) they’re just… still gems and also witches, calm down RI, or 2) they exist and Garnet also exists and is just. The midpoint between their personalities. In a normal, human way, or maybe vaguely-destiny-conflated way.

However far down the speculation hole you want to know, here’s what we’ve got:

Ruby: red oak and dragon heartstring, eight inches, brittle

Red oak is associated with short tempers. That’s true for Ruby, entirely, but Ollivander argues that a more accurate assessment would be that it seeks owners with fast reaction times in battle, adaptable, quick-witted. Quick-witted isn’t something Ruby would say about herself, but she is absolutely a quick-thinking and rapidly reacting soldier: think about The Answer. She’s adaptable, too, she surprises the one person in her court who knows most possible futures, she does of course get incredible anxiety and anger over the tiniest things but she also adapts so quickly, like she’s upset and frustrated about it but she processes it all in one big bang. In “Here Comes a Thought,” she can work herself past her own anger and anxiety to reach out for Sapphire, before Sapphire can get to her.

Dragon heartstring is volatile, but produces powerful, flamboyant magic. It’s the core most prone to accidents and misfires. Temperamental powers, like her feet burning through the carpet or setting grass on fire. Dragon heartstring wands from strong bonds with their owners, and Ruby is an intensely emotional person, I believe the two would be complimentary. 

Ruby’s wand is eight inches long because that can start to mean something Ollivander calls “lacking in character,” but that’s not how I mean it: she’s short-tempered. Brittle not because she doesn’t change, she changes and learns and grows so constantly. It’s about how she reacts, and her quickness to anger and frustration when she doesn’t know what to do.

Sapphire: silver lime and unicorn hair, nine inches, slightly yielding

Silver lime has little description in canon, but it does have two very important qualities: highly coveted by clairvoyants and Legimens, and as such assigned considerable status. Sapphire is a Seer, clearly, but I think we shouldn’t ignore the association of Legimency with Sapphire: the power to shut others out of your head. Her powers will betray her in times of crisis, as the time when she froze her motel room shows us, but she bears a straight face and keeps her head up. And in The Answer, she shows no distress at the idea that she would be hurt. She knows her mind well, uses her clairvoyance well, and the only thing that throws her off is things she didn’t have control over and cannot know.

Unicorn hair produces reliable magic, is loyal, and is, in a way, emotional. Unicorn hair wands can “die” if seriously mishandled, and can grow, as Pottermore puts it, “melancholy.” I think of “Here Comes a Thought,” and the way Sapphire will let herself be overwhelmed until someone reaches out to her. She’s very dedicated, quiet, and will just keep moving forward until she’s unable to, and unicorn hair strikes me as a core that would… empathize with her, for lack of a better word.

Nine inches because she is quiet and physically, emotively reserved. Slightly yielding because she has learned to love change and fell in love with the unexpected at the same time as she fell in love with Ruby.

Garnet: silver lime and dragon heartstring, eleven inches, reasonably supple

Garnet doesn’t keep Ruby’s quickness to anger or frustration, but she does keep Ruby’s intensity. She is more showy and dramatic than Sapphire, but keeps that “strong, silent” Legimens’ demeanor, and her Future Vision.

Silver lime is drawn to Garnet for all the reasons it is drawn to Sapphire, but also because she is a more effective and creative Seer with Ruby as a part of her. Dragon heartstring is drawn to her despite the fact that she has tempered Ruby’s outbursts and Sapphire’s anxiety, because she shows off, her fighting style is flashy, and she is confident. Garnet’s anger is forceful, her fun is exuberant, she can be goofy and emotive and angry or stony-silent and that’s the incredibly rare personality type a silver lime and dragon heartstring wand is drawn to.

I think cryptids are a Whole Other Thing. They’re not confined to thin spaces, the same protections don’t work, they don’t follow the rules of the Gentry. Like ghosts, in thin spaces they could probably be believed into existence, but also like ghosts, they exist in the real(er) world on their own, independent of Elsewhere weirdness.