#the nac mac feegle beat up racists

[wendynerdwrites]

A Notable Bi-Magical Union

My contribution to @jonxsansafanfiction‘s Twelve Days of Shipping. 

Dec 30th Hogwarts or Magic Au ❖ Bed Sharing Trope 

Because I’m me, I went with a Discworld AU with Jon as an Unseen University Professor, Sansa as a Witch and Nac Mac Feegle Hag/Duchess, featuring Arya as a Fairy Godmother, witch, and wizard. To stay true to Sir Terry’s writing style, this includes footnotes which will be designated by asterisks. 

Beware: Utter farce, drunk pictsies, and the Stark sisters being ALL OF THE EXTRA below:

The Ankh-Morpork Times had run its first engagement announcement in the liner notes of the ‘Society’ Section in the year of the Mongoose, an act which kick-started a trend among the aspiring aristocrats of the city to declare the impending nuptials of their sons and daughters through the press, paying a modest fee to see their children’s names in small print. These announcements were restrained to small blurbs of no more than fifty words apiece, as there was only so much any writer was willing to do for ten pence and two delusional strangers. The founding editors of the Times, William de Worde and Miss Sacharissa Cripslock, had Views on the matter of publicizing one’s private life (these Views, coincidentally, were the same reason that Miss Cripslock refused to be addressed as Mrs. de Worde).

The Society pages of the Times were usually more concerned with public events and exhibitions than people and whatever nonsense they got up to with their Favors. Even the marriage of the Right Honorable Samuel Vimes II, son of Their Graces Ser Samuel Vimes and Lady Sybil Ramkin Vimes, the Duke and Duchess of Ankh, to Princess Tiffany With Two F’s Please Don’t Say This Part Aloud Oh Bugger of Lancre* got the same space as Miss Muffy Butcher and Mr. Jiminy Stronginthearm.

There was one wedding, however, which even the intractable de Worde-Cripslocks admitted was newsworthy enough to earn a proper article.

“Notable Bi-Magical Union! Acting Wizard Legally Marries Witch!”

This was deemed newsworthy for three reasons.

The first was that by law and custom, acting Wizards (with few exceptions) were celibate, as certain accidents of wizarding genetics had a tendency to… snowball. An eighth son of an eighth son (or, in one accidental case, an eighth child of an eighth son) was an automatic wizard. The eighth son of an eighth son of an eighth son was a global catastrophe colloquially known as a Sourcerer. Thus, if a wizard did take it upon himself to wed, he was required to surrender his staff and magic to the Unseen University and retire.

Professor Jon Snow, DThau., DMS., DCM., and Her Grace Lady Sansa Tully-Whent**, Duchess of Genua, Hag o’ the Waters***, received a special dispensation for the marriage from Archchancellor Lannister for a whole other newsworthy reason: that being that they, along with the Her Grace’s sister, had rescued the Main Continent from a hoard of dragons and Ice Demons led by the bastard son of the Wintersmith and the Disc’s first ever Sourceress.

The third reason this event was deemed relevant had to do with the events of the wedding itself. The Duchess, mindful of the historic significance of the occasion, had reportedly summoned over four dozen witches from all across the main continent and employed over a thousand Pictsies, gnomes, and golems in order to create the perfect magical wedding. The Archchancellor himself was to officiate the ceremony, which would consist of over an hour of ancient rituals from nearly every major nation of the Main Continent, for the purposes of cultural sensitivity. The bride was to fly down the aisle on her broomstick, which had been refurbished and gilded with white gold, sapphires, and opals by the dwarves of Uberwald, who had also crafted over fifty ornate centerpieces for the reception. The gown had a thirty-foot train of Klatchian silk.

Professor Snow, rarely seen wearing anything but his severe black robe and hat, agreed to all of this on the condition that he not be required to take the courtesy title of “Duke of Genua” upon their marriage.

Unfortunately for the bride, things did not quite go as planned. The Duchess’s sister, Dr. Arya Tully-Whent, DThau., DMn., DMS., BEIL., F.G, was a notable bi-magical union in her own right, being only the second woman in history to master Wizarding magic and attend the Unseen University, a reluctant witch, and, thanks to her guardian’s sense of irony****, a most reluctant fairy godmother.

The good Dr. Arya was the Maid of Honor  and tasked with following her sister on her own broom and carrying a portion of the bride’s train. Prior to the wedding, the Duchess made the mistake of enchanting her sister’s broom to sprout roses. The furious wizard proceeded to attempt to undo the spell as they flew down the aisle of U.U’s Great Hall, resulting in a mishap in which the bride’s skirts burst into violet and emerald flames. A panic erupted, more as a result of the “help” the bride received from her guests. Many of which, unfortunately, were witches and wizards. The Great Hall of the University erupted in blasts of stray magic.

The Duchess was thankfully unharmed, having the good sense to avoid spells altogether and simply tear off her skirts and fly towards the nearest mop-bucket, which she immediately had to empty onto her bridegroom, who had been struck by a poorly-cast Luthsome’s UN-cinerater. By the time most of the guests fled and the ash and thaumaturgy had settled, the Great Hall was in a shambles and the Duchess’s once-glorious Klatchian silk gown had been reduced to what amounted to some conveniently-placed bandages.

Dr. Arya chose this moment to start another fire, this one smaller and more contained, at the center of the Hall. She then grabbed her dazed sister and brother-in-law by the wrists and rushed them towards the flames, yelling, “Leap, Knave! Jump, Whore! Be married now forevermore!”

The Times was lucky enough that their Chief Iconographer, Otto Chriek, was there at precisely the right moment to capture the happy moment. The Duchess had envisioned a more elegant public wedding portrait. She was later crowned ‘Best Legs on The Disc’ by Ankh-Morpork Masculine on the basis of the image, an honor which became less dubious to her when she continued to receive fan-mail from gentleman admirers well into her golden years. She was spared some humiliation at the reception, when her loyal Pictsie Companions decided to steal everyone else’s clothes and present the garments to their beloved Hag. The entire affair would go down in history and legend as “The Nude Wedding.”*****

For her part, the Duchess got revenge on her sister by casting a new spell on Arya’s broom to sprout roses, daffodils, lilies, hyacinths, and azaleas. Arya took her vehicle to every broom-maker and magical authority on the Disc and never managed to reverse it. To her extreme annoyance, she eventually earned the nickname ‘The Flower Fairy.’

Even well after their literally-explosive wedding, the marriage of Professor Snow and Her Grace attracted plenty of interest and attention from the gossips of the Disc. Professor Snow had famously refused to cast the final anti-sourcery sequence during the Battle for the Dawn until Archchancellor Lannister granted him a dispensation to wed the Duchess******.

The passion the two had for each other was mystery on its own to those who took interest in such things, as they were deemed ‘ill suited’ for one another. The Duchess had inherited her position in Genua from her elderly Aunt, the Baroness Ella Saturday. Not content with being a mere ‘Baroness’, she had herself upgraded within the peerage to the rank of Duchess. She was known as a passionate supporter of artists and up-and-coming magical talent, eventually starting the Genua Home for Magical Ladies, a halfway house for displaced witches, and a high-profile advocate of Female Dwarf Awareness. Under her rule, Genua became the art and fashion capital of The Disc.

Professor Snow, on the other hand, was a student of the legendary Ponder Stibbons, the founder of the University’s High Energy Magical Department. He’d received his basic education in the Assassin’s Guild as one of the charity cases, but declined his Black Syllabus on the basis of it being “Too Posh” and transferred to the University instead. After acquiring his Doctorate in Thaumaturgy, he was granted a Professorship in the field of Magical Avoidance. While professors at the Unseen University were famous for acquiring the body mass index of an adolescent whale, Professor Snow was one of the few faculty who could keep up with the hunting schedule of the resident ghost of the late Archchancellor Ridcully, and was Captain of U.U.’s official Foot-the-Ball team. Under his leadership, the school’s team gained its first legal win.

The two had met through Arya, and no one knows exactly where it went from there. Only that on three separate occasions at three separate society functions, Professor Snow was caught hiding beneath the Duchess’s voluminous gowns.*******

Furthermore, despite the great pains the two went to in order to wed, they lived surprisingly separate lives, mostly visiting one another on the weekends, flying back and forth between Genua and Ankh-Morpork. Despite this, the two managed to produce six daughters and were known to openly adore each other. When asked about the secrets of their success on their sixtieth wedding anniversary, Professor Snow replied, “Distance, affection, and very big skirts.”

*Youngest Sister of Queen Esmeralda Margaret Note Spelling I of Lancre

**Daughter of Catelyn Tully-Whent, who was Daughter of Minisa Whent. Witches aren’t really interested in their male forebears.

***The Duchess was the official witch or ‘Hag’ of the Genuan Clan of the Nac Mac Feegle. Despite the seemingly incompatible personalities of Her Grace and the Pictsies, she is credited as mastering the dreaded arts of “the crossin’ o’ the arms”, “the tappin’ of the feets”, and ‘“the knowin’ of the speakin’”. She was affectionately referred to as ‘The Fancy Hag’ by the Disc’s population of Feegle in general before eventually ascending to senior witch status as a ‘Hag o’ Hags.’

****Said Guardian was the Tully-Whents’ elderly aunt, the Baroness Ella Saturday, who had helped raise the girls after their parents’ death. Both girls were witches and their similarities ended there. Sansa had always yearned to be a magical fairy godmother and noblewoman. Arya, on the other hand, wanted to be a wizard and the next “Hag” to Genua’s Clan of Nac Mac Feegle. The Baroness, who had no small amount of experience with witches and fairy godmothers, arranged in her will for the girls to get some of what they wanted, but mostly what they needed. Arya got to go to the Unseen University and study under her idol Eskarina Smith. However, instead of being designated as the next ‘Hag o’ The Waters’, she was left the recovered Fairy Godmother’s wand instead. Sansa, as the elder sister, did inherit rule of Genua, but that also came with the deed to the Nac Mac Feegle’s mound, making her the new Hag (Hag being the Feegle term for ‘witch’). Thus it happened that in the annals of history, the tomboyish, staff-wielding Arya eventually became known as The Flower Fairy, while ladylike, delicate, class-conscious Sansa ascended to the revered position of ‘Hag o’ Hags’

***** “I wish,” sighed many a reader of Ankh-Morpork Masculine.

****** In order to ensure that the dispensation was honored, the dispensation was drafted by Her Grace’s clan of Feegles, for whom the concepts of law and the written word are weapons. It is a good idea "neever te sign a feegle contract; six inch high people write verra small print".

*******The Duchess’s dresses, and their thick, heavy skirts would acquire a legend of their own. It has been speculated that Her Grace popularized the trend of “poofy” skirts for the express purpose of having a place to hide her husband, who had been caught beneath them twice during the War for the Dawn and at at least three different foot-the-ball games. So frequent were these incidents that it became a running joke among the UU student body to reply to any inquiry about the Professor’s whereabouts to “check the Duchess’s skirts.” Others claim she kept to the seemingly-impractical style in order to house her Feegle companions, who she’d unleash upon any guests she found distasteful. The most famous incident involving her use of the Feegles in this manner was during a ball in Genua, when Lord Rust was overheard making a bigoted comment about Her Grace inviting goblins to the event and referring to the dwarf guests as ‘Lawn Ornaments’. The Duchess demanded an apology and, when that was refused, lifted her hemline and cried out “Alrae, Lads, gets dis Scuggan Offski!” Lord Rust was allowed to remain in Genua only long enough to collect all of his teeth.