Duals: Jonathan Fesmire's Awesome Fantasy Concept

When you get into my fantasy fiction, soon enough, you'll be introduced to the concept of "duals." It is spelled "duals," rather than "duels." The latter refers to a type of battle, as in, "I challenge you to a duel!" The former refers to a special group of people in my magical world of Taibril, people with a special dual nature.

If you think it might be cool to be a dual (rhyme not intended), then read on.

Some Notes about Taibril

Before I get into what duals are, let me give you some context. In my fiction, duals exist only in a world called Taibril. Most of Taibril is at a technological level comparable to our Renaissance. Magic and religion are important to most Taibrilians; most cities have a Wizards' Guild which is also a school, and in every inhabited place, you're likely to find at least one temple to the gods.

The three gods of Taibril, however, are not all worshiped equally. Lothay is the father god, sometimes depicted as a bear; Moreri is the mother goddess, representing all things feminine, yet strong; and Rhatlan is a trickster god, often seen as a mischievous boy. Most people worship Lothay and Moreri, and consider Rhatlan to be downright evil. The truth is, Rhatlan is the deity the most willing to help the people of Taibril, often by challenging them to better things.

On Taibril, there are several common names for duals. The first, of course, is the world "duals" itself. There's also "twiceborn," and "children of Rhatlan."

Based on that last, you should have an idea of what people think of them.

How Does This Dual Thing Work?

Duals are actually twins, joined in the womb by some unknown natural, yet magical, process. It's as if the mother was supposed to conceive just one child, so nature pushes them together so that only one of the twins can be visible at a time. (Note that duals can be fraternal or identical twins.)

Once they're born, they have to "switch" once or twice a day. To an observer, this looks like the duals are shape changing. What's really happening is something more complicated and ultimately more interesting.

With duals, there is literally room in the world for only one to be "overt" at a time. The other gets magically pushed back into another dimension.

This strange place, where the covert dual goes into a protective bubble, is commonly called "the dual realm." It is also thought to be the space one passes through between death and life, giving people another reason to fear and mistrust duals.

Through their mental connection, the covert dual experiences everything the overt dual is doing: every sight, every smell, every touch. They are able to speak to each other through telepathy, but can also hide thoughts from each other. If they are lucky enough to learn some dual magic, they can block each other out at times.

How Did Jonathan Fesmire Come Up With Duals?

I have been asked many times how I came up with the idea of duals. It's actually a rather simple explanation.

They first came to me in 1994. I was looking at a set of fantasy art cards, letting my brain play with the images to come up with some story ideas. I stopped at one card, interested. One side depicted two men fighting on a city street. The other depicted a beautiful woman standing in the wilderness, with a city in the distance. What if, I thought, the woman was going to the same city as on the other side of the card? And what if she's hidden somehow within the man being attacked? What if that man is being attacked because he can shape change into the woman?

Yes, the genesis of my duals was that simple.

Of course, as the idea developed, they were not shape changing at all, but switching places, and I worked out the mechanics, why there's prejudice against them, and much more.

Life for the Twiceborn

As I've alluded at, there is a tremendous amount of prejudice against duals on Taibril. One aspect of this is their association with Rhatlan, which is more real than some actually think. Another is fear of the unknown and of being deceived. Yet another is jealousy, especially by those who know that duals live about twice as long as ordinary humans. Finally, homophobia plays a role. See that beautiful girl over there? How do you know she doesn't morph into a man?

Duals have to keep their nature a secret from most people. Small towns are likely to lynch duals. In most cities, there are no laws against being twiceborn, but their freedoms may be restricted.

Among wizards, dual magic is largely considered a close cousin to necromancy and demonology. All three classes of magic are banned, and one can be expelled from a Wizards' Guild just for ever having used them.

A Note on Terminology

For arguments sake, let's take Garum and Vayin, the protagonists of my first full duals novel, Children of Rhatlan. Garum is a man, and Vayin, a woman.

Individually, Garum and Vayin can each be called "a dual." When referring to the pair as two different people, they're called "duals." If we were talking to Garum about Vayin, or the other way around, we might say, "What does your dual twin think?"

Twiceborn is used as an adjective and a title. One would say, "You are twiceborn," not "You're a twiceborn." "The Twiceborn" could refer to all duals, one member of a dual pair, or a dual pair. This term is less common than "dual."

Conclusion

I hope this gets you excited enough about my duals to read my books! Children of Rhatlan is the first novel about Garum and Vayin; my anthology, Seeds of Vision, features some duals stories; and duals even make an appearance in my amnesiatic-sorceress-must-save-the-world novel, Tamshi's Imp.

You can even listen to the audio version of Children of Rhatlan at Podiobooks.Com.

As of this writing, I am, slowly but surely, writing the sequel to Children of Rhatlan, titled Women of Moreri. There will be a huge announcement in my blog when it's available!