Chapter Text
It was Magic Day.
Angus was practically bouncing off the walls with excitement. It had been a while since the last magic day, what with the Tres Horny Bois going off and getting another magical item, so it was even more special than usual! Angus had made sure that he went to bed extra early (he needed sleep if he wanted to learn as much as possible!) but ended up waking up early, too. He had spent most of the morning checking and rechecking that he had everything he could possibly need. It didn't matter if Taako told him it was just going to be "a chill sesh, no stress and all that," Angus knew he should be as prepared as he possibly could. Detectives should always be prepared. Especially since Taako’s definition of "easy magic" was assuredly different than almost everybody else’s. Who knew what he had in store! Angus bounced as he went up to the apartment that the adventurers shared and knocked politely.
Magnus opened the door with a smile. "Hey, Ango!"
“Hello sir!”
“Magic day?” Magnus questioned as he opened the door wider to let Angus in.
“Yep!” Angus held up his wand, fumbling with a tome, pen, and notebook in the other arm.
“Here,” Magnus grabbed the precariously stacked items out of his hand. “And I won’t even hold it where you can’t reach.”
“Excuse my language, sir, but you and I both know that’s horseshit,” Angus said, exasperated, as he carefully toed off his shoes.
Magnus giggled. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s way too much fun.”
“Magnus, have you seen the- oh, good, Ango is here,” Taako was a whirlwind as he rushed through the hall to the kitchen, opening and closing various cabinet doors with a clatter. Suddenly, the noises stopped and Taako backtracked, arms full of various spices. “Why’d you take your shoes off? We’re goin’ out today.”
“We are?” Angus looked from his shoes to the papers Magnus was holding and back again.
“Well, I needed to get some ingredients for this spell potion I’ve been trying to make and I thought ‘hey, why not go with the boy detective and make a day out of it?’ And then I thought about your wristbow and that made up my mind.”
“My…wristbow?”
“Pumpkin, it’s tacky as all hell. We can find you something much better.” Taako looked at Magnus and hastily continued. “Which I only care about because you’re around me all the time and I can’t be seen with someone wearing that.”
“Right,” Angus smiled, “but it’s still Magic Day?”
“Of course it’s still magic day,” Taako rolled his eyes. “We can still do it on the road. Won’t need those though,” he nodded at the books in Magnus’ hand.
“Aww,” Magnus whined, handing the books back to Agnus, “it’s no fun if he doesn’t want them.”
“Since you’re as early as ever-”
“I’m on time, sir.”
“-and you’ve got your shoes off anyway, c’mon. We’ll practice disguise self before we go.”
---
"Now, the key to a good disguise self is the details. You gotta know what you want," Taako rummaged around his room, grabbing money from various areas around the room. "What do you want to look like? What do you want to change? You've gotta ask yourself those questions and you gotta be specific or it'll turn out like shit."
"How specific, sir?"
"It's Taako, Agnes," Taako moved to face Angus. "And you gotta be specific enough to- ugh, hold on."
Taako paused for a minute, thinking. "Alright, say you want your nose to be bigger. If you just cast minor illusion with no other thought in your noggin than 'bigger nose,' you could end up with something as big as a trunk - or you might not make it big enough."
"Okay. I...kind of get it."
"All magic works better the more specific you make it, Agnes," Taako sat down on his bed next to the detective. "Now, say you got your nose to the right size. Now you can decide how to shape it. Do you want a ridge? You want a bend? You want it perfectly contoured? The more details you add, the better it will be."
Nerves rose in Angus' stomach. Minor illusion suddenly seemed much more complicated than it sounded.
Taako clapped a hand onto Angus' shoulder. "You'll do fine. Now, what do you think I use disguise self for? Other than to be someone else, of course."
"An outfit? Makeup?" Angus guessed.
"Got it in one, bubeluh. Of course, if I want the look to stay all day, or if I don't want to use up my magic juice, I'm gonna want to do that shit manually," Taako laid down dramatically on the bed. "But sometimes you just wanna look bomb without worrying about the goddamned weather or you got a special occasion or something."
Angus smiled. "Right, sir."
"So, whaddya wanna cast your illusion on?"
"An...outfit maybe?" Angus was dressed for a magic day, with brown slacks and a fun top. He wouldn't say that he was dressed badly, but he certainly wasn't dressed for a day in the town.
"Straight for the full body look, nice," Taako hummed approvingly. "Well, you can, but we'll be out for a while and you'll need to recast after an hour. If you're down for that, hell yeah."
Angus built up his confidence. "I can do that, sir!"
"Alright. Think about what you wanna wear, then wave your wand down over yourself and circle back. You wanna do this without an incantation or with?"
"With." Angus answered immediately. Taako always asked this question and Angus had yet to say a different answer. He was pretty sure only Taako would be able to learn a new spell without any sort of incantation, but he kept that to himself.
"It's just Poreri Maer. Wait, fuck," Taako shook his head. "I mean Dissimulato Se."
"What was it in elvish?" Angus asked after scribbling it down in elder common.
Taako's ears reddened. "Uh, it's not really important which language you say it in so long as the magical intent's there. Usually old speech like elder common has more power, but you could probably just say 'Disguise Self' and it would work fine."
Angus waited patiently.
"Uh, it might be a little tougher to pronounce. It's Poreri Maer."
Angus scribbled out how the word sounded and tried it out. Taako corrected his pronunciation and pulled the pencil from Angus' hand, scrawling the words in the elvish alphabet onto the paper. Angus nodded and took the notebook back, studying Taako's looping and curling letters.
"Anyway," Taako clapped his hands. "Think about what you want to wear. Make it specific, hun. As for me," Taako glanced towards his closet. "I got an outfit to rock so I'm all set there. Maybe some makeup to spice things up?" Staring at himself in the mirror, Taako swung his umbrella around in a circle in front of his body.
Angus watched as the makeup appeared on Taako's face, highlighting his cheekbones and causing his skin to glow more than it usually did. Taako frowned at his reflection and spun the umbrella around again, adding light eyeshadow and lipstick.
"There we go," Taako checked each side, making sure they were even. "Ready to give it a shot, pumpkin?"
"I don't know. Um."
"Darlin, I swear it's a lot easier than it seems. It's actually harder to enhance yourself than it is to just make yourself look like someone else, since it's a concept, but I know you can do it. Ain't a thing."
"Uh, alright," Angus glanced over at Taako, who suddenly found something to do on the other side of the room. Angus was grateful. He thought of the words, practicing them in his head, then took a breath and waved his wand over his body.
He checked himself in the mirror. He looked the same, but now he was wearing a blue button-up and a little bow-tie, with a sweater vest over the top, and some nice-but-casual pants to go with it. It was good, but something was missing. He took a glance over at Taako, who had gotten up on a chair to pull a small bag of coins out of - was that the ceiling? Satisfied that he wasn't looking, Angus scanned what Taako was wearing and tried again, this time changing the button up to a pastel color, adding a contrasting bow-tie, and giving himself little star earrings.
"You done?"
"I think so?"
Taako hopped off the chair with a flourish, skirt billowing out at the movement, and looked him over. "Nice work, pumpkin," he finally nodded, "though if you wanted your nails to match mine, you coulda just said so. I got stuff for that, you know."
Angus looked down at his hands. His nails, which he hadn't even thought about, matched Taako's starry nail art. He squeaked. "Oh, I'm sorry, sir, I was just checking to see what I was missing and I didn't even notice that I had-"
Taako waved a hand in the air. "Don't worry about it, hun. You ready to go?"
"Ready!"