There are eight kinds of elemental magic in this world: earth, fire, air, water, metal, lightning/magnetism, sound/music, and blood. Each mage only has one kind of magic, usually referred to as a 'thread.' The ability to wield magic is hereditary, as is a mage's thread. However, threads can skip generations--sometimes even several generations. Someone who's Unthreaded has a magic different from their family/the majority mage population of their birth town. This is mostly a big thing in the relatively isolated areas of the North, the Islands, and the City of Glass, since most of the other nations (particularly the big/wealthy ones of Asendar and Feredar) are fairly blended. So, an earth, fire, air, metal, lightning/magnetism, sound/music, or blood-mage born in the Islands (like Taz's father and sisters) would be called Unthreaded, and a mage gifted with anything other than fire-magic born in the City of Glass (like Lonura) would be. Being Unthreaded carries a significant stigma in the Islands, where Clan ties are everything. In Glass, it's not so much a stigma, but can cause difficulties depending on where in the desert you are and what your Thread is.
The other difficulty with being Unthreaded comes from environmental impacts on mages. A water-mage couldn't survive long in the desert, for example. Most Unthreaded these days are from mixes about a thousand years ago, before the Blood War.
For more information on how magic functions and the world mythology that basically every nation shares, see this post.
no subject
There are eight kinds of elemental magic in this world: earth, fire, air, water, metal, lightning/magnetism, sound/music, and blood. Each mage only has one kind of magic, usually referred to as a 'thread.' The ability to wield magic is hereditary, as is a mage's thread. However, threads can skip generations--sometimes even several generations. Someone who's Unthreaded has a magic different from their family/the majority mage population of their birth town. This is mostly a big thing in the relatively isolated areas of the North, the Islands, and the City of Glass, since most of the other nations (particularly the big/wealthy ones of Asendar and Feredar) are fairly blended. So, an earth, fire, air, metal, lightning/magnetism, sound/music, or blood-mage born in the Islands (like Taz's father and sisters) would be called Unthreaded, and a mage gifted with anything other than fire-magic born in the City of Glass (like Lonura) would be. Being Unthreaded carries a significant stigma in the Islands, where Clan ties are everything. In Glass, it's not so much a stigma, but can cause difficulties depending on where in the desert you are and what your Thread is.
The other difficulty with being Unthreaded comes from environmental impacts on mages. A water-mage couldn't survive long in the desert, for example. Most Unthreaded these days are from mixes about a thousand years ago, before the Blood War.
For more information on how magic functions and the world mythology that basically every nation shares, see this post.