The Magician's Rules, Rule #1: CYA Options

[Ancient History]

Although magicians are a rare breed, conflicts between them are not uncommon. The terrible will and awesome confidence required of magicians is part of the problem, as powerful egos quickly chafe and bruise in any social setting. Then again, a magician is most terribly vulnerable to their own kind, and the knowledge and fear of this weighs heavily on each of them. Most of all, there is a kind of madness inherent in magicians, a lingering insanity that may creep unsuspected into the mind, to coil around a thought and bring placid emotions to hideous boil.
Or so they say.

The wise magician must take every precaution, even the most chaotic shaman maintains some semblance of these disciplines for fear of their enemies. Thus, the first of The Magician's Rules governs protection.

Beware of Blood
Because of the dangers of ritual sorcery, a magician takes care to protect their blood, hair, and nail clippings from others. Some magicians become meticulous in their appearence, cutting their hair and filing their nails regularly, burning the dead follicles and pairings. Others persue a farther extreme, refusing to cut their hair or nails, adapting ancient styles for hair and nails of unsual length. Most magicians fall in between the two extremes, but still take care about where they get their hair cut, their manicures, or where they place used band-aids or cloths with their blood. Many wizard's home are regularly cleaned to prevent skin samples from laying around, and sheets are often changed and washed.

Beware of Mirrors
An ancient tale tells of how a wizard looked within a mirror, and part of his reflection was trapped within by a rival. When the rival broke the mirror, the wizard died, bleeding from a hundred cuts.
The truth of this is that some may use a photograph, portrait, or other portraiture of a magician to direct ritual magic against them. While rare, some obscure magical traditions are rumored to be able to steal a piece of a magician's shadow or reflection...the truth of this is unknown, but magician's must beware such traps.

Beware of Knowledge
While some astronomer-sorceror may divine a link to you through a casting of your horoscope, or the permutations of your full and true name, most cannot. Still, the less that a magician knows about you and your capabilities, the better. Conceal your family, your friends, your school and your abilities, reserve your most potent magics for when they least expect it. Magicians tend to seculsion, which helps add an air of mystery, but watch out lest your enemies strike at your friends or family!

Beware of Sanctums
It is too easy to pretend you are safe in your demense, amidst your charms, wards, and library. An apartment is no defense if your rival attacks the building, or simply levitates an explosive up to your window and detonates it. Beware the unexpected, and don't keep all of your gear in the same place.

Beware of Friends
Your allies become targets. Though a magician is not liable to survive, they will attempt to discredit you from the magical circles you travel in, aiming for your talismonger and sources of aid and information. A well-placed word or ill-timed threat can find you alone, without a target and without a plan, when the final blow looms in.

Beware of Silence
Some of the deadliest magical duels are of reputation, not overt conflict. Your articles may be refused, your promotion denied, your duties turned minimal by the merest word.

[The Grifter]

Don't forget "Beware of Greed", for those neophyte magicians who think they can harness too much power too fast.

[Ancient History]

I'm sure I had a point to this...something about reviving the old rules for "grabbing" a magical link along the lines of the old Voudoun govi, except applied to mirrors. But then I thought about the Mitraic Cults who burned and buried the hair and nail clippings of royalty in secret to protect them from magic and...fudge, I got lost.

[Talia Invierno]

Beware of Learning
For it is certain that the Awakened will make enemies, who will envy the magician their insights and seek to use them against the magician. The life of the Awakened must always be a lonely one, since the magician must shelter themself not only from those who would betray him or her, but also from any trace of originality in their understanding of magic and the world that may become a point of vulnerability. The more isolated the magician even from others' suspicion of awareness of any uniqueness in their existence, the better.

Beware of Living
Life is the single most dangerous thing for a magician, for inherent within life are all the greatest perils a magician may encounter: speech and silence, society and sanctum, social networks, study, sapience, self-reflection, the semblance through which the unhappy magician chooses to meet the world each morning, and especially sanguinity. Stop the blood from flowing, let the magician disconnect it from themself, and all will be well.