The Celestial Elements of Light and Dark
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The College of Celestial Magics is concerned with the practice of those arts having to do with the Elements of Light and Dark.
Here are a few explanations of the behavior of Dark and Light as Elements (and not as Electromagnetic Radiation).
Why Darkness pools under Tables
Observed fact: Darkness pools under tables, under chairs, in cupboards under the stairs and at people's feet; the question is why?
The simple answer is because Darkness naturally goes down and Light goes up, just as the element of Water flows down and Air is well, up in the air, but naturally, it is more complicated than that. If it were that simple, all the valleys in the world would be full of Darkness, there would be no shadows on the tops of mountains, and no day or night, but just as air can be found in caves and water falls from the sky as rain, so too are both the elements of Light and Dark found all over Alusia.
The reason for this is that just like Air and Water, Light and Darkness also have "tides" and "currents" that flow and move; the most obvious of these is the "tidal" effect we call night and day. During the day, there is lots of Light about and very little Dark, and as the water left on the seashore as the tide goes out becomes rock pools and wet surfaces, so Darkness during the day appears as shadows. At night Darkness is the dominant element and Light forms pools or, like smoke, is an almost imperceptible cloud in the air seen only where it gathers as beams.
So why does the Darkness left during the day pool under the bed on the second floor rather than all being in the cellar? Well for a start, there is no room for it - the cellar is probably full of Darkness already; secondly, while Light and Dark are slightly repulsed by each other, they are attracted not only to themselves, but also to the other elements, and some of each can always be found mixed in with any of them. Light is more strongly attracted to Air and Fire, and Darkness to Earth and Water; the attraction of light to Fire and Air is why small rooms can be lit by candles and why light forms beams in the air where there are windows or cracks. Fire has its own light, and also releases the small amount of light trapped in the candle; this attracts the tiny amount of scattered Light suspended in the nearby air, filling the area around the candle with light. Beams of light are the Light in the air being attracted to one area where it has contact with the Light though the crack or window and further concentrating by being repulsed by the Darkness all around.
Shadows are pools of Darkness that have gathered together, attracted by other Dark and repulsed by the Light; they are attracted to objects and entities by the Earth and Water (and other Elements) in them and they lie on the ground because Dark tends to go to the lowest point. (Yes, I know you get shadows on walls and ceilings but that's object attraction at work, and they are usually weak shadows with less Darkness in them.)
How Dark a shadow is during the day is dependant on the intensity of the Light; the more Light there is the stronger it repels the Dark from the air in these areas and so more Darkness from these areas gets compressed into the shadow. Darkness tends to gather on the opposite side of objects from the strongest Light, using the lee of an object to shield it from the Light's repulsing effect.
So Darkness pools under tables because the object, the table, is drawing all the Dark nearby to itself, because beneath the table it is generally shielded from the point of strongest Light (lamps are usually on top of tables or hanging above them), and because Darkness is drawn to the lowest point.
Why there is Day and Night
Observed fact: over most of the surface of Alusia in each 24 hours there is a period of Day when there is lots of the Element Light present and a Night when there is lots of the Element Dark present. The length of these Days and Nights varies from season to season in a regular and repeating pattern each year, the question is why?
What are Day and Night?
Why do the lengths of the periods change with the seasons?
The answer to the first question is relatively straight forward: there is on Alusia a large amount all the elements (with the exceptions of Fire and Ice). The majority of these elements can be found in a single contiguous mass: Earth is everywhere and under almost everything; Water in the form of Seas and Oceans covers huge areas which flow into one another and around the land masses; above both of these is a thick layer of Air, forming one continuous blanket covering all.
Now most of the Light (and Dark) in the world is formed into a great blob that is all mixed in with the Air and the top layer of the Water. The Light blob is Day and the Dark blob is Night: Twilight is found along the edges where the two elements mix and intermingle.
Now Light and Dark are slightly repulsed by each other just as they are attracted to themselves, and up there in the sky is this thing we call the Sun which is a great big ball of elemental Light (and may in fact be a light elemental). Therefore, the big Light blob of day is attracted to the Sun and as the Sun travels across the sky the centre of the Day tries to stay directly under it. Meanwhile, the big dark blob of Night is repulsed by the Sun and the Day, so is pushed out of the way by the day and tries to stay in the lee of the world from the sun.
The answer to the second question is a bit harder to answer. The Sun follows changing paths across the sky at different times of the year. In the summer it follows a long high path taking many hours longer to cross the sky, in the winter it stays low in the southern sky and doesn't take as long to go from horizon to horizon. Yet the regardless of the season the sun always reaches its highest point in the sky every 24 hours.
Because the day follows the sun, the length of the days and nights changes with the Sun. Why the Elemental called the Sun changes its path across the sky with the seasons no one knows, although there are several theories. One theory is that it is performing some kind of extended ritual; another is that it doesn't like the cold.
Other topics for later discussion
When I get around to writting these ideas down.
- Why creatures have light and dark aspects
- Why celestial wings work
- Gravity, why things fall;
- Why you never see a light or dark elementals
- Never? WordSmith begs to differ - and will tell the tale over a whiskey.
- How Ice and Fire mages are alike
