infatuation and love are not the same thing (or: the ethics of love spells)
It turns out that love spells are not as benevolent and harmless as cutesy kids movies want us to believe.
(a second-part of i look at you and see who i might have been, but reading that is not necessary)
It wasn't until well into their first semester at Auradon Prep that Mal brought it up with Jane. The two of them had taken to 'magic-talk' on weekends, mostly discussing their own magic use or whatever abilities had been cropping up beneath Mal's skin in the months she been pulled to the other side of the barrier, and the reactions Mal's actions had been getting - she didn't get why she'd been getting disapproving looks from Fairy Godmother recently. When she'd confided in Jane, Mal hadn't been expecting the other girl's reaction at all.
"You did what?" The shorter girl's face was a mask of anger and disgust.
Mal felt her eyebrows twitch into a frown. She knew the love spell wasn't cool but she hadn't expected an explosion from Jane, the perpetual Refined Lady. "I gave Ben a love spell so that we could get at the wand." Jane looked even more disgusted. "I took it off him!"
"That's not the point, Mal. Do you have any idea how unethical love spells are? Sincerely?"
"No. I don't." Mal had learned that Jane possessed enough information about magic to write a book. She was willing to bow to Jane's knowledge here.
Jane made a 'scrrmm!' noise, dragging her hand over her face. She huffed a groan, waving her hands in the air. In an exasperated tone, she said "Okay, okay. Fine. Mal, sit down, and I'm going to explain you a thing."
Mal sat. She could tell this wasn't going to be a pleasant discussion, but she'd chosen to be good, so - uncomfortable conversation it was.
Jane just about threw herself into the chair opposite, a move Mal had never seen her do before. Jane was all about grace, poise, all the things the girls at Auradon Prep were apparently taught since at birth (also Evie, in Grimhilde's attempts to hone her daughter into the perfect princess-wife for a prince. But Evie was an outlier and did not count, in Mal's opinion, as a Perfect Lady). So Jane must be really upset.
"Love spells are not actual love." Jane began, her voice at a calm pitch, but Mal could still detect her anger. "They just create the obsession, an infatuation, with another person. They're called 'love magic' because those symptoms have been attributed to love over time. Using love spells on another person are considered - in the magic community, where there's laws to deal with this shit - some of the most morally unethical magicks that can be used. People have gone to jail for using them, because it's basically a fancy, sparkly form of rape. Love potions are controlled substances, and in Auradon they, along with all other magicks - mostly - are illegal. And you used some on the KING."
Mal was gaping by the end of the speech. She hadn't expected her actions to be that bad. Jane seemed calm, but every line of her body was radiating with anger.
"You haven't tried to educate yourself on this either." The other faery continued, "if you had, you would've learned this for yourself. And don't try to give me some shit about how magic is illegal in Auradon and therefore there is no resources to learn from: the practice of magic is illegal, not the study of it. You also haven't bothered trying to be discreet about the fact that you're using magic: you're using magic almost every other day - on other people's hair, granted, and they shouldn't be asking you to break the law for the sake of their vanity, but if you had researched for yourself, you would've known that. THAT'S why my Mum's been looking at you funny. You can't smash laws with a loud bulldozer and then be surprised when people are upset at the noise and have noticed what you've done."
Mal fired back - badly - with, "You've been using magic on the sly for weeks! Why are you yelling at me about it now?"
"Because the difference between you and me is that I've actually educated myself on the topic - your mother fed you biased information that you didn't bother to question, whereas I had to dig up knowledge for myself. You're smashing laws as obviously as possible, but I am practicing magic quietly, in my home where I am a private citizen, where I can pretend those laws doesn't exist without drawing attention to myself. What I do isn't less wrong, but it isn't openly giving authorities hard evidence to convict me with."
Well. That wasn't an argument Mal had expected to hear - nor it being so coherent. Jane wasn't out of steam yet, though, and continued. "You can't go around calling yourself a 'good person' if you aren't willing to put the legwork in to knowing what being a good person entails. You can't say you're a 'good' faery if you're not willing to shed the magicks of dark fae. Magic can be pretty binary, especially where free will is involved. Our understanding of the situation is different, and our reactions to that would be understandable, considering our upbringings. But don't you dare try to brush off failing to learn for yourself and then complain when you're tripped up by details."
Mal clenched her jaw. She didn't like Jane's anger, she didn't like having her own lack of knowledge thrown in her face. But Jane was right - something that Jane had proven time and again over the last few weeks of these hours together. "So I need to know more. Where do I start?"
Jane relaxed, slouching in her chair. She eyed Mal for a silent minute with blue eyes Mal knew that hid a shrewd mind behind them with a layer of expertly-created innocence. Satisfied with whatever she saw and a half-smile, she reached for a book on her table. Passing across a book called A Theory of Magicks: White, Black and Neutral, she said, "You start here."