Should be simple.

When do you guys think Harry would get his Cutie Mark, if he was a Pony?

My bets on the first fight with He-Who-Walks-Behind because A) It's his first demonstration of Harry's talent at combat magic in a fight, B) He was born under a certain star and that has something to do with his ability to combat outsiders, and C) It was a moment of great destiny where he realised something about himself, even if he's blocked it out due to trauma.

My bet on his actual mark is a pentagram, made out of almost microscopic stars, and the whole faintly shines and shimmers in the dark.

5210897
I bet it's a baseball from getting hit too many times

Jk. I think you're right about the pentagram. Probably silver in color just like the one he wears. I think he would get it when he first starting realizing his magic though, cuz wasn't he like sixteen when he left his adopted "dad" I'm blanking on his name, but the one that owned Bob previously I think after getting him from that one necromancer. Dresden files are awesome I love those books

5210897 That sounds about right to me for the story, although I would go with a simple pentacle for the mark itself. It is also possible it could have a ruby in the center to reflect the one that he later inherited from his mother, although that might be something that waits until after his resurrection.

I support the pentagram theory.

5210897 Actually, Harry's terrible at Evocation. That's why he needs so many Foci. His true talent lays in the field of Thaumatergy.

If we're going to say he got his Cutie Mark by standing up to He Who Walks Behind it shouldn't be a pentagram. At the time he wasn't a member of the White Council and didn't know about their philosophy. A pentagram represents the elements of magic bound within a circle of human will, and the responsible use of magic on top of that. Fighting He Who Walks Behind didn't bring any of that into play.

So if we're going to make "Standing up to monsters" Harry's special talent then his cutie mark should be a shield or something like that. A pentagram would be if you focused on his skill at and love for thaumaturgy and being a magic nerd.

5211156
Amen

5211202
That's not White Council philosophy, that's Harry philosophy. That's what the pentagram means to him, in addition to his pentacle necklace being his only real connection to his mother (up until he discovers his brother).

It should be obvious that isn't White Council philosophy, because the Council includes wizards from all over the world, including people like Ancient Mai who would be using Eastern elements.

5211221 Harry's fervent belief in the responsible use of magic and all that comes with it IS the White Council's philosophy. He says as much many times. It's basically his religion, and pre-McCoy he hadn't been introduced to it.

What elements are represented by the pentagram is a red herring. The pentagram is the White Council's symbol of magic bound by mortal will and used according to the Laws of Magic.

5211156 I think one of the funny unspoken jokes of the series is that in a lot of ways Harry is half-trained and would be a lot more powerful if he'd swallowed his pride and made peace with the Council sooner. Remember how he said that McCoy didn't really teach him much about magic as opposed to how and why he should use magic? Yeah.

5211234
Can you back any of that up with a quote? I can't recall any other Council member using a pentacle at all. Harry says that a pentagram (without the circle) is a symbol of power and he describes what the pentacle (with the circle) represents to him, but does anyone else use a pentacle anywhere?

5211265

Hmm, I always thought it was a White Council symbol, but a quick check of half a dozen books doesn't turn up anything specifically linking the two.

Though his talk with Murphy at the beginning of Small Favor does say that it's a symbol of order.

“A pentacle is a symbol of order,” I said quietly. “Five points, five sides. It represents the forces of air, earth, water, fire, and spirit. It’s contained within a circle, the points touching the outer ring. It represents the forces of magic bound within human control. Power balanced with restraint.” I gestured at the symbol. “See here? The points of the star fall far outside the ring.”

And that a lot of people use it, so admittedly it could have other meanings.

So I was wrong about that, but what Harry associates it with is still the Laws of Magic and the White Council (via McCoy)'s general teachings about responsible use of magic. So if he got his cutie mark from the encounter with He Who Walks Behind I still don't think it makes sense to use a symbol that at the time didn't mean much of anything to him.

From his encounter with the Black Court vampires in Blood Rites (shortly after the turkey incident):

But that didn’t matter. I wasn’t holding a crucifix in the thing’s face. I was holding the symbol of what I believed in. The five-pointed star of the pentacle represented the five forces of the universe, those of air, fire, water, earth, and of spiritual energy, laid into patterns of order and life and bound within a circle of human thought, human will. I believed that magic was fundamentally a force of life, of good, something meant to protect and preserve. I believed that those who wielded it therefore had a responsibility to use that power in the way it was meant to be used— and that was belief enough to tap into the vast power of faith, and to direct it against One-ear.

5211289 Do we know when he got it? I know it was his mother's, but I can't remember if he had it before his encounter with He Who Walks Behind. If he did, he might still have gotten that symbol without fully understanding the meaning beyond generic magic and then discovered more about it as he learned about himself under Ebenezer.

5212344

Well, I can't imagine DuMorne gave it to him. If Leah had done it Harry would have realized she was connected to his mother a lot sooner. Ditto for McCoy. So I figure he must have gotten it from his father pre foster care system.

Could have been left to him when his father died, but then who would have told him it was a memento of his mother?

5212355 That was what I was thinking as well, and he would definitely have been able to at least learn it was a symbol of magic while in foster care assuming DuMorne didn't give him a full explanation of the meaning (probably while saying she didn't know the meaning to throw him off) or give him access to a book with that information.

5212375

Pretty much everyone knows that a pentagram is a magical symbol of some sort. If I had to guess I'd say McCoy filled him in on what exactly it meant and that reinforced how important of a keepsake it was to him.

5213610 That was my thinking as well, and that is also why I think he could have earned it in the conflict with DuMorne. Harry didn't really see himself as protecting anyone or being a hero there, just surviving on the basis of his magic so a mark in magic is a reasonable outcome of that conflict. He would then have learned more about it with McCoy as you said, but magic was already an essential part of him at that point and the teaching would have just depend his connection to his mark just like how it deepened his connection to his talent and himself in the books so I think the pentacle would make the most sense.

5214304

Eh. Getting his cutie mark for facing He Who Walks Behind could work because that was something that ended up being a defining trait for him: standing up to monsters on behalf of people who can't. It's something that he does throughout the entire series and it's what most of the action of the Dresden Files revolves around.

Killing DuMorne was him breaking the First Law to kill a sorcerer and save himself. It's something he does again in the future, but he doesn't like doing it and he avoids it as much as possible.

I think we can agree that protecting others is a lot more characteristic of Harry than protecting himself alone. I mean...that moment when he sees the gas station clerk die and thinks "That wasn't right" is pretty much the instant he becomes Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden.

5214657 Yeah, that sounds about right. What the mark would be is a bit dependent on what he knew about the symbology behind his amulet at that time, but I still think the pentacle is the most likely result.

5214903

Yeah. Parts of it seem off, but overall a pentagram fits best if only on the grounds that it's already a symbol associated with the character.

5210936 hey, you joined!