Day 13 - Plot Hooks and the Speculative Element

I've been very busy lately, and I'm losing steam. I don't mean that I'm losing steam for the story, well, alright I am a bit. I'm mainly losing steam for the exercise, but I'm also losing a bit of steam for Fantasy. It's been foggy and cloudy and great weather for Mystery, and I haven't finished my NaNoWriMo novel from November yet. I will stick to this exercise though, because I said I would and I think the Mystery could stew a bit more.

- "If you have some idea of your plot by now, get out whatever plot notes you have and write down ten things (minimum) that your speculative element can do to your plot."

- I guess I should tell you what my plot IS then. There are a small group of people trying to smuggle Sourcerers away from Wispollil, as part of an underground railroad called, "The Movement." They're chased off track and they find a new land, new allies and new enemies on their way to the Empty Lands.

With that in mind here are ten things affected by my Speculative element of Magic:

1. Magic allows for flying machines (airships, gunbirds) that allow the heroes to fly over the North Pole.

2. Magic comes from people called Sourcerers who are afflicted with a kind of autism and must go into a trance to produce magic. They are vulnerable because they can't use the magic themselves, but they are very valuable. Because they can't defend themselves and are being abused. Because they are being abused and can't defend themselves, the Movement was formed.

3. Magic can make their pursuers able to track them.

4. Magic can help them hide.

5. Magic helps both sides fight.

6. There are no true Sourcerers anywhere else in the world. They are valuable to everyone everywhere. They could be a cause of danger in foreign lands.

7. Wizards are magic users who only perform magic on non-conscious things (plants and inanimate objects). They are in conflict and competition with the Preistesses, who can only perform magic on conscious things (animals and people), but they must work together to get to the Empty Lands.

8. Magic is a power that corrupts, as it becomes available to those who didn't have it before it could corrupt those who hadn't known it before.

9. What do the Sourcerers think of the Movement? Most are grateful, but wouldn't some be resentful and want to use the magic themselves?

10. Fjordlanders have Paladins who are a mix of the three elements of the Wispollil magic system. Do the Sourcerers look to them as inspirations? How much of a threat are they to the Wizard and Priestess?

11. Will magic be too much to keep the alliance together, with Wizards, Priestesses, Sourcerers, Desert people and Fjordlanders? Who will split off first? Who will split off and stay split off?

12. Priestesses use magic to enchant others, most powerfully with their sexuality and through sex. Can the males trust that their feelings for the Priestess are their own true feelings and not magically influenced feelings? When/if the Wizard and Priestess get together romantically, won't magic cause him to doubt himself and his love? What about her, is she confident that she hasn't enchanted him or herself unintended?

EDIT (Additions):

13. (in association with 8 above) What does magic use do to your ego? Doesn't it make you full of yourself? I think in a lot of people it does. It also makes people jealous and/or put off. It's kind of like people who are literally geniuses. Some of them are regular people and some of them are either always saying, "I'm a genius you know," or giving you the impression that that is what they are thinking. The non-magical peoples (like the desert people of Wispollil and the people of the Great Old Empire) react this way toward magic users.

14. Are Wizards standard crew members of magical vehicles (airships, dirigibles etc.)? I think they are. They are usually found in the bowels of the "ships" and if the ships are owned/operated by non-magical people (Golchin nobility (rather than the Priestesses), the Desert people of Wispollil, and others) then they downplay the indispensable role the Wizards have to play with the operation of the ships. Like the British Navy in the early days of Steam, the engineers were often working class people who were looked down on by the line officers who were more often of higher birth.

EDIT (Additional Addition):

From a friend I got this line of questioning:

15. Can a priestess control what type of baby she will have (gender or if it's a Priestess or a Sourcerer)? I'm thinking that they can to some extent, but they don't let on to the nobility. Some of the nobility suspect. An alternative is that they negotiate it when they negotiate the reproductive contract. I think I don't like the second scenario as much because it makes the Priestesses seem more cold hearted and less sinister. I think I will go with they can to some extent (some are better than others), but they generally don't let on and it normally doesn't enter into the contract unless both the noble and the priestess are both cunning and conniving.