Mercy Thompson Magic System Explained: Werewolves vs. Witches vs. Fae

So we talked about Wolf last month, and it was a great conversation.

We had some great comments on Patreon and elsewhere.

And Asna, you mentioned kind of keeping the ball rolling, and this one kind of interests me.

And I was having tea with my lovely wife, who is also a huge fan of the books this morning.

And we were discussing werewolves and witches and fae and how the Mercyverse magic really works.

And what I think popped into my brain real quick is that you're looking at two different things, mostly.

You're looking at hereditary magic And that would be things like witches and fae and probably shapeshifters.

And then you're looking at contagion, which would be anything like werewolfism, vampirism, zombieism, you know, that kind of thing.

Whereas it takes a catalyst, like a bite, to make that happen.

Thoughts about that from you guys?

I would say there's more to it because with... with werewolf magic and vampire magic there's similarities but at the same time there's differences um you've also got wizards you've also got sorcerers um you also um have witches and then the magical systems for for those three supernatural beings are all totally different so the more you go into it the different it is and then you um I do agree with the hereditary thing with like, you've got the walkers.

That's a hereditary thing where you're kind of descended from an avatar.

So, and, and Patty is widened that with different mythologies.

So that's interesting how that pans out because it depends on the avatar and how, um, that magic manifests with their descendants.

It's different.

So it's not like, oh, it's strict.

I think the witches are more like that.

But then you've got the witches, you've got the grey witches, you've got the white witches, and you've got the black witches.

And with the black witches, they feed on basically torture and pain on others.

The grey witches, they feed on themselves to basically fuel their magic.

So Moira is a good example of that.

um and then you've got the white witches which is basically kind of like more of i wouldn't say a purer form but where they don't actually harm anyone it's more kind of like innate but there's no harmful element in that magic that makes sense

yeah yeah

Yeah, no, I agree with your concept like contagion, yeah, because you can't become a werewolf when you can't become a vampire without being bitten,

right? Exactly, exactly.