Tag: magic

There was one important reason that allowed this “mystery” of making a sword or knife to continue and flourish. The reason was very simple. The makers themselves did not know why the swords they produced were good, mediocre and a few really bad. These last they threw back into the pot to be re-melted and re-forged. What they did know was that if they used ore from a specific place, and did certain things by rote, taking a specified time to do it, and in a certain manner, they frequently came up with a good sword blade. And rarely, a truly superb sword blade appeared. But they did not know why.

The real secret to this was simply carbon content in the iron. But since the science of chemistry and metallurgy had not yet been developed, no one knew it. The average person is quite surprised to learn how late it actually was before the impurity, carbon, was proved to be what turned iron into steel. Some recent discoveries in England have shown that very high quality steel was produced in England in the “Dark Ages” (circa 476-1000 [C.E.]). Hamwic was a Saxon port that is under modern Southampton. Much of it has now been excavated, and a very interesting discovery was made. Several blooms of very high quality steel were found, plus several knives with high quality steel edges. These blooms are homogenous steel, with about two percent carbon. Properly forged, this could produce exceptional quality blades.

Shortly before this discovery, another one equally fascinating was announced. It seems that a monastery, abandoned when [King] Henry VIII split from the Catholic Church, was also a metal producing factory. This is not unusual in itself. But what is unusual, is that the process they used was identical to the Bessemer process that was invented by Sir Henry Bessemer in the 19th century, and was in use in manufacturing until quite recently.

In 1740, Benjamin Huntsman, a maker of watch springs, found that he could produce much superior steel by melting the steel, allowing the slag to rise to the surface, and then skimming it off. This is much the same technique as was used in producing Wootz steel of India. But carbon wasn’t discovered until 1774 by Swedish metallurgist Sven Rinman. In 1786 French chemist Guyton de Morveau showed that the substance isolated by Rinman was carbon, introduced into the iron, that turned the iron into steel.

As early as 1540 an Italian had suggested that steel was the “pure” form of iron, and to achieve this purity the iron was heated up: and charcoal, leather, and other such substances added to help burn out the impurities. Since charcoal and leather both contain carbon, he was on the right track, but going in the wrong direction. It was the impurities—sulfur, phosphorus, nitrogen, hydrogen, total oxygen, and sometimes carbon—that frustrated steel production. Modern steelmakers grapple with these impurities today, but with a clear understanding of what they are fighting.

The ancient blacksmith could only fall back on empirical knowledge gained from trial and error.

— The Book of Swords, pp. 26-27

The line between medicine and magic was blurred in ancient Egypt, and priests of Sekhmet often also acted as doctors. In the absence of effective remedies to cure many ailments, they turned to spells and rituals. Some magic was “sympathetic,” using curative substances that were similar to the perceived cause of the ailment, such as dung to alleviate gut problems.

Magicians used spells either as a direct measure, such as “ordering” a stuck bone to leave the patient’s throat, or indirectly, for instance, telling the spirit (often identified as a foreign demon) responsible for the illness to leave the sick person. Amulets were also placed on afflicted parts of the body or used to stave off illness.

Death was the greatest challenge. Observances on behalf of the dead were elaborate, at least for the elite, and aimed to unite the ka and ba, the two parts of the soul, in death. Incantations and mummification were carried out to protect the ka, the life source, and to release the ba, which contained a person’s character, on its journey to the underworld.

For kings, Pyramid Texts, written down from the 27th century BCE, let their souls fight demons, pay off otherworldly boatmen, and reach the next life. It was another 600 years before texts appeared offering magical protection to a wider section of society.

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft, and the Occult, A Universal Force

In ancient Egyptian belief, the ba (the element of the soul that contained the personality of the deceased) faced a series of trials on its journey to the underworld. Failing these trials would mean a second death—obliterating earthly memory of the deceased, who would wander as a ghost forever. To avoid this second death, the Egyptians covered the walls of their tombs with The Book of the Dead, texts containing spells for the soul’s protection. The scene here shows the ba (in white) accompanied by jackal-headed Anubis, who watches the soul’s sins being weighed against a feather. If the sins are heavier, the ba will be devoured by Ammit, a crocodile-headed demon.

The Book of the Dead was never codified and no two copies are the same. Each was composed at a patron’s request, incorporating prayers that best reflected the individual in order to help them in the afterlife. Composition of Books of the Dead began around 1700 BCE, replacing earlier texts. Spells were added until a body of around 200 became common by about 1500 BCE. Contained in scrolls up to 22 yd (20 m) in length for commoners, or for royalty painted on tomb walls, the spells were said to be spoken by the ba at key points along its journey. Spell 4 is to let the ba turn into a snake, Spell 89 to return to the tomb at night, and Spell 98 to grant it passage on a ferry to the underworld. So powerful was ancient Egyptian belief in their efficacy that the scrolls were popular until the Roman conquest in 30 BCE.

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft, and the Occult, Spells For the Afterlife

Wearing amulets was another part of protective magic, and such amulets often portrayed the spirit they were supposed to ward off. For instance, Pazuzu, the king of the wind demons, would be depicted as a creature with a bird’s chest and talons, holding a thunderbolt, and Lamashtu, who preyed on pregnant women, as a hybrid of a donkey, lion, and bird. Amulets could protect a traveler in hostile territory inhabited by demons, such as the desert, or keep disease away from a house during an epidemic. In the Mesopotamian world much was unpredictable, and magic tilted the balance just a little in people’s favor.

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft, and the Occult, Magic All Around

The Mesopotamians believed that objects had an animate quality and could act as the receptacles of enormous magical power, helping to ward off evil spirits and thwart their actions, or gain the favor of a god needed to drive them away.

Royal palaces were guarded by monumental statues of lamassu, winged creatures with the head of a man and the body of a bull or lion, which blocked and supported gateways, corridors, and the entrances to throne rooms. These thresholds were seen as particularly vulnerable to infiltration from the underworld by demons such as Rabisu, “the crouching one.” Poorer people placed figurines of gods or hybrid creatures such as fish-men with pointed hats and scaly skins under doorways or windows….

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft, and the Occult, Magic All Around

When the Emperor Kammu established Japan’s capital in the new city of Heian-kyo, he could not have foreseen the splendid success his action was to bring. Soon after the city was founded, in 794 [C.E.], it became a flourishing center of culture, the home of a decorative society that for more than 300 years was like an endless pageant embellished with art, literature and music and spiced with titillating love affairs.

The site chosen for the capital was almost ideal for the nurturing of such a society. The gently sloping site was open to the south but enclosed on other sides by forested hills or mountains. The dangerous northeast direction, from which demons were most likely to swoop, was shielded by Mt. Hiei and its protective Buddhist monastery. Many fast-running streams brought clear mountain water, and a navigable river, the Yodo, provided convenient barge transportation to the sheltered Inland Sea that separated Honshu from the island of Shikoku.

— Early Japan, p. 31

Personal misfortune or sickness was often blamed on witches or demons. Witches were also thought to secretly put curses on people. Priests developed rituals to counteract malign influences and collected them in nine Maqlu tablets, first compiled around 1600 BCE. They were passed down through generations of ashipu for about the next thousand years. A collection of 100 incantations, across eight of the tablets, enabled the ashipu to identify and tame evil magic; the last tablet gives instructions for a ritual to banish a curse, which involved burning a figurine of the witch responsible. Exorcists often doubled as doctors, and another tablet contains a spell calling on Gula, the goddess of health, to drive out the ghost making a patient ill.

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft and the Occult, Chapter 2

Beneath the official pantheon, including the likes of Enlil, the Assyrian sky god, and Ea, the god of wisdom, was a layer of demons, such as Lamashtu, who threatened pregnant women, and Namtaru, the plague-demon, who needed to be mollified. Natural phenomena such as floods and lightning, or epidemic diseases, were not scientifically understood despite Mesopotamian advances, and so people at all levels of society preferred supernatural explanations. Disasters were believed to be caused by mamitu (curses) laid by witches, by victims committing offenses (sometimes unknowingly) against the gods, or through unintentionally ignoring divine signs. Kings guarded against these occurrences by consulting temple priests, in particular ashipu (exorcists), who performed magical rituals, and baru, who interpreted omens. Palace archives were stocked with collections of clay cuneiform tablets containing spells, incantations, and omens. Huge numbers have been recovered from the palace library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal. Ordinary people also called on the services of ashipu to cast protective spells, and used amulets and enchanted figurines to dispel evil spirits.

— A History of Magic, Witchcraft and the Occult, Chapter 2

“You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making,” he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word—like Professor McGonagall, Snape had the gift of keeping a class silent without effort. “As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don’t expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses…. I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death….”

— Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 8

The best part in the Harry Potter series is the inclusion of potions as a properly fundamental, effective, and useful aspect of the magical arts.

Doctor Strange:

…Welcome to the Chamber of Extrospection. The Orb of Agamotto for the most part suffices for me, and so I do not come here often.

Topaz:

I—see….

Doctor Strange:

This should be the portal by which we may see something. I need you to sit here.

Topaz:

Of course, Stephen.

Doctor Strange:

Now, by the void which halts the word—by the blind, unthought, unheard—let the curtains part and show—what we need and wish to know!

Topaz:

It’s a mirror!

Doctor Strange:

Yes—but look at the mirror and not what it shows, Topaz.

Topaz:

I don’t under—but there’s something—it’s so cold out there—cold and—and angry—!

Doctor Strange:

That’s it, Topaz! Keep on! Keep on!

Topaz:

Something’s beginning to form—but what…?

— “Doctor Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts” #78 (1987)

Used without permission.

…When his feet touched the floor, however, it was no longer Feldegast the juggler who stood there. In place of the roguish entertainer stood the gnarled, hunchbacked shape of the sorcerer Beldin. With a sudden evil laugh, he began to hurt his fireballs at the startled [Grolim priests] and their warriors.

His aim was unerring, and the deadly fireballs pierced Grolim robes, Guardsmen’s mail coats, and Karandese fur vests with equal facility. Smoking holes appeared in the chests of his victims, and he felled them by the dozen. The throne room filled with smoke and the reek of burning flesh as the grinning, ugly little sorcerer continued his deadly barrage.

“You!” [King] Urvon shrieked in terror, the sudden appearance of the man he had feared for so many thousands of years shocking him into some semblance of sanity, even as the terrified Chandim [man-hounds] and their cohorts broke and fled, howling in tight.

“So good to see you again, Urvon,” the hunchback said to him pleasantly. “Our conversation was interrupted the last time we were talking, but as I recall, I’d just promised to sink a white-hot hook into your belly and yank out all your guts.” He held out his gnarled right hand, snapped his fingers, and there was a sudden flash. A cruel hook, smoking and glowing, appeared in his fist. “Why don’t we continue with that line of thought?” he suggested, advancing on the splotchy-faced man cowering on the throne.

Then the shadow which had lurked behind the madman’s shoulder came out from behind the throne.

“Stop,” it said in a voice that was no more than a crackling whisper. No human throat could have produced that sound. “I need this thing,” it said, pointing a shadowy hand in the direction of the gibbering Disciple of Torak. “It serves my purposes, and I will not let you kill it.”

“You would be Nahaz, then,” Beldin said in an ominous voice.

“I am,” the figure whispered. “Nahaz, Lord of Demons and Master of Darkness.”

“Go find yourself another plaything, Demon Lord,” the hunchback grated. “This one is mine.”

“Will you pit your will against mine, sorcerer?”

“If need be.”

“Look upon my face, then, and prepare for death.” The demon pushed back its hood of darkness, and Garion recoiled with a sharp intake of his breath. The face of Nahaz was hideous, but it was not the misshapen features alone which were so terrifying. There emanated from its burning eyes a malevolent evil so gross that it froze the blood. Brighter and brighter those eyes burned with evil green fire until their beams shot forth toward Beldin. The gnarled sorcerer clenched himself and raised one hand. The hand suddenly glowed an intense blue, a light that seemed to cascade down over his body to form a shield against the demon’s power.

“Your will is strong,” Nahaz hissed. “But mine is stronger.”

Then Polgara [the Sorceress] came down the littered aisle, the white lock at her brow gleaming. On one side of her strode Belgarath [the Sorcerer] and on the other Durnik. As they reached him, Garion joined them. They advanced slowly to take up positions flanking Beldin, and Garion became aware that Eriond had also joined them, standing slightly off to one side.

“Well, Demon,” Polgara said in a deadly voice, “will you face us all?”

Garion raised [the Sword of the Rivan King] and unleashed its [blue] fire. “And this as well?” he added, releasing all restraints on the Orb [of Aldur].

The Demon flinched momentarily, then drew itself erect again, its horrid face bathed in that awful green fire. From beneath its robe of shadow, it took what appeared to be a scepter or a wand of some kind that blazed an intense green. As it raised that wand, however, it seemed to see something that had previously escaped its notice. An expression of sudden fear crossed its hideous face, and the fire of the wand died, even as the intense green light bathing its face flickered and grew wan and weak. Then it raised its face toward the vaulted ceiling and howled—a dreadful, shocking sound. It spun quickly, moving toward the terrified Urvon. It reached out with shadowy hands, seized the gold-robed madman, and lifted him easily from the throne. Then it fled, its fire pushing out before it like a great battering ram, blasting out the walls of the House of Torak as it went….

— Demon Lord of Karanda, Chapter 18

…The Thousand Son [Space Marine] intoned words of power and an ellipsis of light burned into the deck plate. The Prosperine hieroglyphics on his staff flared bright vermillion. Spinning the staff around, Mhotep drove the scimitar into it pommel first and it became a spear.

— Battle for the Abyss, Chapter 7

My…tutelage with the mist began, in earnest, only after I loosened my soul and softened my piercing gaze. Until then my eyes did not allow me to see the magic of life around me. In time, however, I slowly came to understand that when approaching nature and spirit, one must enter these realms with a gentle openness of heart. We cannot make demands when encountering the sacred world. It is the overly analytical perception of reality, as well as the belief that we are somehow owed an experience, that immediately exiles us from the richness of the numinous power around us, within us, and within the earth. We have to be open. We must be, as the eloquent Zen tradition tells us, “empty cups,” ready to be filled, without preconceived notions of what awaits us.

In time I experienced a gradual settling in my evolving…mysticism. It was a settling of my striving. This settling informed me that the sacred was all around me, and that, in addition to developing the proper eyes with which to see, I must also cultivate the proper feet with which to walk the path. One gains the proper eyes and proper feet, I have found, by slowing down….

— The Mist-Filled Path, p. 8

A portal opened…. The apprentices moved toward it, falling into a line. Once through the portal, Galen found himself on a path lined on both sides by mages. The path led to a tent standing separate from the others, a tent he hadn’t seen before. That was where his transformation would take place.

The interior was dark, and as Galen entered, he found himself somehow alone. No one seemed to be in front of him or behind him. A globe of light appeared farther inside the tent. It hovered over a table of dark crystal.

In the faint light, Galen noticed that to the side of the entryway were several stacks of canisters. The canisters were smaller than the ones that held the chrysalises, about two feet high and one foot across, and they were covered in an opaque outer layer that was ornate, carved with runes. This must be how the Circle stored the implants, once they made them. Galen marveled that something so intricate and so powerful could be so small.

Galen approached the table and rested a hand on it. The cold surface stung his raw skin. Obviously he was meant to lie on it. He eased himself down onto the crystal table. As soon as he was supine, a great force—like an invisible hand—slammed down on him. He was pinned flat against the cold surface. His breath came in short gasps. He couldn’t move. His lungs couldn’t fully inflate against the pressure.

The light above him went out. All was silent except for the panting of his breath. A line of fire cut through the darkness above him, curled itself into the rune for solidarity. The rune descended until it hovered just above him, the same size as his body. The heat of it awakened more pain in his skin. He tried to turn his head to the side to escape from it, but he could not move.

Then the rune began to unravel. The line of fire whipped out and down, driving into the flesh of his shoulder. Galen screamed.

Fire burned like a micro thin wire shot down his arm. It split into three parts as it reached his hand, running down his thumb, index, and middle fingers and exiting out the tips. The three lines of fire rose and turned back toward him, plunged into the fingertips of his other hand and blazed up his arm, joining and popping our at the shoulder.

Galen’s breathing grew harder, faster. The fire ran up into the darkness and vanished. He lay in blackness, the line of fire an afterimage above him, anticipating the appearance of the next rune. He didn’t know if he could stand six more of them.

He remembered Fed joking nervously, If it were painless, then everyone would want to do it, right? Fed was going through the same thing.

If Fed could do it, then he could do it.

As he lay in the dark, though, something glided over his raw shoulder, faint as a shoulder. He started, but the jerk of his muscles had no effect against the force holding him clown. Something thin and cold and wet pushed into the tiny hole burned by the fire. It worried inside him, deeper and deeper, generating a dull tingling hat spread like goose bumps down his arm. On his shoulder, the length of its body followed into the hole, contracting and relaxing, contracting and relaxing. Its head passed his biceps and continued toward his elbow, drawing a line of coldness with it.

At the other shoulder a second invader stirred, wriggling its way inside. This was not the way it had felt when he’d entered chrysalis stage. One implant had been inserted at the base of his skull. He’d been asleep during the procedure, and he’d awoken only with a vague headache. He’d never had the feeling of something inside him, something other.

These new implants would connect to that original one, accessing all the information that had been gathered and stored while he trained with the chrysalis. Yet they felt different. These things moving inside him that were not him were wrong. They did not belong.

At last, as they each split into three and pushed into his fingertips, the movement slowed, stopped. His hands and arms tingled, infused with the cold. The tech was inside him now, waiting. Above him, a line of fire appeared and twisted into the rune for secrecy.

The pressure holding him down suddenly vanished. Galen’s gasp turned into a huge ragged inhalation. The desire to run was nearly overwhelming, though he felt too weak to move. Were they giving him a chance to leave? Was this another test?

The rune descended and unraveled, the end of the line of fire raised, poised to strike. Galen realized what was wanted of him. With numb fingers he turned himself onto his stomach. The pressure returned, and with it, the fire.

The pattern was repeated for each of the seven runes of the Code as Galen watched the lines of fire reflected in the table and panted against its surface. Twin tunnels were burned across the back of his shoulders, one down each side of his spine, and four from the base of his skull up into his brain.

Each time the formation of the tunnel was followed by the insinuation of the tech, cold, thin, and wet, contracting and relaxing, pushing inside him, stretching the skin of his back, sending prickles like tiny needles down his spine, driving the cold in intricate coils through his brain and settling there, making his body its home.

He sensed something then, like an echo of an echo of an echo, the faintest hint of what he had felt with the chrysalis. The echo carried his revulsion back to him.

The pressure lifted, and Galen’s head fell to the side in relief. Numbness spread through his body. He was not who he had been.

He was not himself anymore. He was something that was part himself and part other.

He was a techno-mage.

— Casting Shadows, chapter 6

Well, spell names. I have never been able to create original spells for Dungeons & Dragons. I would read the Pages From The Mages series in Dragon Magazine issues in the 80’s, and just be intimidated by the concept.

In forty years, I have compiled but a short list of original spells:

• Fire Lance of the Ifrits (inspired by Doctor Strange comic)
• Occular Arc of Flame (inspired by Doctor Strange comic)
• Breath of the Dragon (predates Avatar: The Last Airbender)
• Andesoln’s Unerring Aim
• Eldrughei’s Shroud
• Wrath of the Largorahr
• Arhis’s Shield
• Great Mother’s Succor

Imagine a setting where Charm Person sits within reach of every sociopath, malignant narcissist, fascist ideologue, sexual predator, human trafficker, abusive spouse and undifferentiated Just Kind of a Piece of Shit in the world. Think for a moment about how easy it would be to kill someone with Mage Hand and Shape Water.

That alone is more than sufficient to build a wizard-hunting campaign on, but wizards provide a great deal more practical benefit than just that. Why is there a dungeon that violates the laws of nature? Wizard did it. Why are their horrible monsters shambling through the hills feasting on travelers? Wizard did it. Why is there a nameless horror from beyond the stars with its sights set on our placid isle of ignorance? A wizard god-damn did it. Power corrupts because power is the ability to get what you want, and the more power you have the less anyone can get in between you and the thing you want….

— Exorcists and Wizard-Hunters: Alternate D&D Frameworks – Throne of Salt

I read the letter, a few sparse lines on the white piece of paper, a part of Spenser’s poem.

• “One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
• But came the waves and washed it away:
• Again I wrote it with a second hand,
• But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.”

Below four words were written in Greg’s blood.

Amehe

Tervan

Senehe

Ud

The words blazed with red fire. A powerful spasm gripped me. My lungs constricted, the room blurred, and through the dense fog the beating of my heart sounded loud like the toll of a church bell. A tangle of forces swirled around me, catching me in a twisted mess of slippery, elastic power currents. I reached out, and gripped them, and they carried me forth, far into the amalgam of light and sound. The light permeated me and burst within my mind, sending a myriad of sparks through my skin. The blood in my veins luminesced like molten metal.

Lost. Lost in the whirlwind of light.

My mouth opened, struggling to release a word. It wouldn’t come and I thought I would die, and then I said it, pouring my power into the weak sound.

“Hesaad.” Mine.

The world stopped spinning and I found my place in it. The four words towered before me. I had to say them. I held my power and said the words, willing them, forcing them to become mine.

“Amehe. Tervan. Senehe. Ud.“

The flow of power ebbed. I was staring at the white piece of paper. The words were gone and a small puddle of crimson spread across the sheet. I touched it and felt the prickling of magic. My blood. My nose was bleeding.

Pulling a dressing from my pocket, where I always carried some, I pressed it against my nose and leaned back. I’d burn the bandages later. The watch on my wrist said 12:17 p.m. Somehow within those few instants I had lost almost an hour and a half.

The four words of power. Obey, Kill, Protect, and Die. Words so primal, so dangerous, so powerful that they commanded the raw magic itself. Nobody knew how many of them there were, where they came from, or why they held such enormous hold over magic. Even people who had never used magic recognized their meaning and were subject to their power, as if the words were a part of some ancient racial memory we all carried.

It wasn’t enough to merely know them; one had to own them. When it came to acquiring power words, there were no second chances. You either conquered them or you died trying, which explained why so few among the magic workers could wield them. Once you made them yours, they belonged to you forever. They had to be wielded with great precision and using them took a chunk of power that left the caster near exhaustion. Greg and my father both warned me that the power words could be resisted, but so far I hadn’t had a chance to use them against an opponent that did. They were the last resort, when all else failed.

Now I had six words. Four given to me by Greg and two others: Mine and Release. My father taught them to me long ago. I was twelve and I almost died making them mine. This time it had been too easy.

Maybe the power of the blood grew with age. I wished Greg was alive so I could ask him.

I glanced to the floor. The orange lines of Greg’s ward had grown so dim, I could barely see them. They had absorbed everything they could.

The words clamored in my head, shifting and tossing, trying to find their place. Greg’s last gift. More precious than anything he could have given me.

— Magic Bites, Chapter 2

Author’s emphases, both bold and italic.

…Now we came to a region of caves, hollowed and windswept, and Buliwyf dismounted from his horse, and all the warriors of Buliwyf did likewise, and proceeded by foot. I heard a hissing sound, and verily I saw puffs of steam issue from one and another of these several caves. We entered one cave and there found dwarves.

They were in appearance thus: of the ordinary size of dwarf, but distinguished by hands of great size, and bearing features that appeared exceedingly aged. There were both male and female dwarves and all had the appearance of great age. The males were bearded and solemn; the women also had some hair upon the face, so they appeared manlike. Each dwarf wore a garment of fur or sable; each also wore a thin belt of hide decorated with bits of hammered gold.

The dwarves greeted our arrival politely, with no sign of fear. Herger said these creatures have magic powers and need fear no man on earth; however, they are apprehensive of horses, and for this reason we had left the mounts behind us. Herger said also that the powers of a dwarf reside in his thin belt, and that a dwarf will do anything to retrieve his belt if it is lost….

Now I saw that the hissing and steam issued from great cauldrons, into which hammered-steel blades were plunged to temper the metal, for the dwarves make weapons that are highly prized by the Northmen. Indeed, I saw the warriors of Buliwyf looking about the caves eagerly, as any woman in a bazaar shop selling precious silks.

Buliwyf made inquiries of these creatures, and was directed to the topmost of the caves, wherein sat a single dwarf, older than all the others, with a beard and hair of purest white, and a creased and wrinkled face. This dwarf was called “tengol,” which means a judge of good and evil, and also a soothsayer.

This tengol must have had the magical powers that all said he did, for he immediately greeted Buliwyf by his name, and bade him sit with him. Buliwyf sat, and we gathered a short distance away, standing.

Now Buliwyf did not present the tengol with gifts; the Northmen make no obeisance to the little people; they believe that the favors of the dwarves must be freely given, and it is wrong to encourage the favors of a dwarf with gifts….

— Eaters of the Dead, Chapter 11

Chinese cultures stressed participation in the world, so it is no surprise that magic was so central to cultural and political life. Chinese magic in turn [centered] on transactions, a series of bargains sought with the ancestors, so that the dead might aid the living. Through the emphasis on the ancestral dead, the working of qi (which animates all things, human and non-human), the influence of celestial bodies or earthly directions on people, in China, people and the world are closely interwoven. Imbalances in the human world, such as those brought about by an autocratic ruler, could occasion disasters in the physical world: a ruler who overstepped the mark might be seen as responsible for a bad flood or an earthquake. The Han likened these connections to stringed musical instruments: the resonances set up by people will cause similar notes to sound on the strings of the natural world. Harmony begets harmony, while imbalance also echoes through the cosmos.

— Magic: A History, p. 118

In the ancient world, people did not stand apart from the cosmos. Instead ancient states and societies explored how people were partners with a sentient universe. The cosmos operated through regular rhythms and periodic events. Much effort went into understanding the regularities of the seasons or the movements of astral bodies, as well as the generally prescribed life course of people, plants and animals. Disrupting regular changes were events, many of which were dangerous, such as famine, flood, disease, earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. Once it had come into being, the pantheon of gods humanized the world, both in its cyclical processes and periodic events.

— Magic: A History, p. 74