Gifts

The Gifts

When a young witch demonstrates a knack, they receive one of the three Gifts: Glamour, Growth, or Sight. This ritual typically follows the Kindling ceremony, during which a parent reveals the chosen Gift. Most people believe Gifts expand a witch's potential and strengthen their pre-existing connection to magic.

History
1890s - The rise of the Gifts coincides with the first magical universities, now referred to as the Historically Magical Universities, the first, oldest, and most prestigious of which is New Salem University. This period is considered the end of a dangerous period of wild magic.

1950s - The Gifts are credited with the meteoric rise of GDP in the Thirteen States and attract witches from all over the world. Gifts are widely accepted and viewed positively as a societal equalizer, a force for assimilation. The view of the Thirteen States as a melting pot for multiple races and witches originates during this time.

Types of Gifts
Traditionally, Gifts are chosen for young witches by their mothers, though in recent decades it has become more common for parents of any gender to choose. In the late 19th century, teenagers were considered wards of their parents and incapable of such decisions.

The Gift of Glamour bestows magical abilities including illusions (visual, auditory), glamours, and enchanting objects. Symbolized by rings.

The Gift of Growth bestows magical abilities including healing, agriculture, architecture and material (stone, earth) manipulation. Symbolized by flowers.

The Gift of Sight bestows magical abilities including clairvoyance, future-sight. Sight witches specialize in specific vehicles for sight, such as tarot cards, reflective surfaces, materials (see The Justice), dousing rods. Symbolized by eyes.

See also list of professions organized by Gift.

Gifting Ceremony
The Gifts look like leather tomes with embossed silver text, but inside is more than a written spell--the book is partially hollowed out and contains the following items:


 * Clay doll representing recipient
 * Baby teeth
 * Birthstone
 * Candles
 * Salt

The ritual requires a coven of three witches to cast and has origins in West African magic. Usually, the casters are the most senior witches within the recipient's family, but they can also be family friends or notable members of the magical community.

The ritual mutes all magic other than the specified Gift and includes a binding spell that prevents a witch with a Gift from speaking/writing/communicating the true nature of the Gifts to anyone. Recipients do not remember the ritual.

Perception of Gifts
To receive a Gift, a witch must have a knack that indicates an ability to manipulate magic.

Most people believe Gifts expand a witch's potential and strengthen their pre-existing connection to magic. The Gifts are considered a major breakthrough from the turn of the century that allowed the 13 States' witches to surpass the witches of other countries.

In actuality, Gifts mute all magic except Glamour, Growth, or Sight.

The trade-off: a single magical ability will be stronger as a result of muting all others. This also means witches are cut off from destructive, dark forms of magic.

Controversy & Rumors
Occasionally, humans and pre-Gift witches have glimpsed inside the Gifts. Rumors swirl about the items inside the Gifts, but most young witches are ignorant. If they have heard hints that the Gifts suppress magic, they typically get a Gift anyway because it is so socially acceptable. Meanwhile, humans just feels a sense of shaudenfreud--like, let the Gifts have a high cost, who cares if it's a little creepy.

In the past decade, views have been shifting. More people than ever are questioning the harm Gifts may cause by stymieing magical abilities. The Gifts are a powerful tool for assimilation, but in the past ten years there has been a movement reframing assimilation as erasure. See counterculture movements in the Thirteen States.

Gift of Glamour

 * Osmarra Blumfeld-Wright - Protector of Calypso

Gift of Growth

 * The Gardener - Em's mother

Gift of Sight

 * The Justice