"Well...at least no one teetered on the brink of death this time."
Idyll's single chuckle, while still encased within a thick layer of discomfort, brought a hint of calm to Cter after her retelling of the day's event. As much as she could and was allowed to, that is. There was still a lot she neglected to tell her best friend despite needing to be more open that a door-less frame so that she could process what she heard and saw through both her own ears and eyes and Frioke's respectively.
"That's a good sign, isn't it? That you've learned and been able to make this type of magic require less of the monster." With a fading smile Idyll began distrusting her own statement. There was something Cter hadn't told her about what happened in the study. "I'm assuming that Frioke is fine. I mean, I know I kinda...wasn't, but Priestess Frioke is much more well-versed with her magic than I was with mine." A spark and a crackle popped off inside Idyll's half-closed hand before a small flame swirled to life caged inside her fingers.
While focusing on it with both her eyes and aura, Idyll moved the flame underneath a small metal construction which to Cter's mind looked like a wrongly reassembled dish rack. After a focused and sharp inhale through her nose, Idyll split the flame into two and placed them to hover underneath a lidded pot and a cloth-covered oven form hiding some rounded lumps. "Better than what I am now too, but her teachings is just something out of this world, isn't it? I mean...besides asking you to let her memories take your over, that is. Have you had any other lessons with her that are more conventional?"
Another chuckle was built up during Idyll's last sentence which she let slip from her lips. They closed together a brief moment afterwards as Idyll struggled to move her hand away from the two split fires. Her claws began to shake as she reached the length of her longest finger away from the flames, and her hand looked to be stuck there despite how much she wanted and tried to pull it away.
Cter reached out with her sleeve. "Just let me know."
Idyll nodded, knocking away some building drops of sweat from her forehead. "In a bit when I can't no more." With her free hand she swept away some of her hair away from her face. There were no indications of them being darker than the last time Cter saw Idyll. Even as Idyll pushed away more hair over her raven-feathered cheek the strands looked more like contrasts rather than the opposite. Cter was happy for that. It had been a week since that one night and Romrom's influence seemed to only extend over half of Idyll's face and not much more. A relief to Cter.
Something she very much needed.
Two more minutes managed Idyll of her tensing her magic before she had to borrow some from Cter. As she touched the afterglow of Frioke's magic lining Cter's sleeve in her heavily breathing state Idyll spoke out of reflex to feeling the aura. "Tomorrow after my breakfast shift, I know." Once she'd gotten enough of Cter's boost to comfortably remove her hand and have the conjured flames be only a vague thought instead of requiring intense focus, Idyll realized that she said something, and her cheeks blushed through even her dark feathers. "This is like calling your teacher mom, isn't it?"
Cter only laughed with Idyll and not against her. The Monster Mage was impressed by how quickly Idyll had managed to be comfortable with her new magic in only a week's time. Being near that fire chef must've helped something immense with Idyll's new fire magic, but Cter struggled a bit to come up with how Idyll would improve her ice magic.
Simplest solution was just to ask. Cter did want to move away from what she had told Idyll about yet again breaching the depths of a monster's soul and memories in order to experience like the monster did. She was sure Idyll would've wanted to move away from it too. "How about your ice, Idyll? You're getting a lot of practice with it cooking, but how about your ice? Are you getting practice with that too?"
"Yup," answered Idyll with a smack of her tongue while lifting the lid up on the pot slightly to check if it had begun boiling. Cter could smell that it was just about to begin simmering. "Since I am getting more practice with my fire outside of my lessons with Frioke we are focusing more on ice and theory, so to speak, during the lessons. I have gotten a bit of a step ahead with it due to that one human mage chilling the wine down in one section of the basement though." A quick point was thrown down towards where the dining hall was located across the Royal Garden through some of the green crowns swaying gently in the evening breeze. "Barbeqa, my boss, says that the human magic gives the Royal Purple a corrupted taste. She says it's like the wrong kind of pepper to the seasoning."
The notion wasn't completely out of left field to Cter. Since fire magic and fires from wood and coal distribute heat differently there have been developed different monster and human variants of human and monster dishes that take advantage of those differences. Easier broiling with magic fire since it can just hover above the dish and be projected downwards, but wood and coal have an easier time getting to much higher temperatures. It doesn't require a lot of effort to let wood burn compared to putting a lot of effort into raising the temperature of the magical fire.
So in that regard magical cooling could alter the taste of the stored wine, especially if the human mage was deriving his ice magic more from memories of physical ice rather than magical ice. Since what would be normal for wine to be cooled with being just the ambient surrounding of the basement that the barrel resides in due to it being more gentler to the wine, having physical ice that not only chills as it is solid ice but also will chill more and differently when it's melted and pooling on the floor rather than standing higher up when it is solid there could be potential temperature gradients that differ enough to introduce some more turbulent convection in the barrels that could impact the taste so that–
A thick waft of coriander and oily vegetables had Cter blinking out of her thoughts. As she mulled on them she looked at her sleeve to conclude that it had to be some of Frioke that took over her again. After flexing her hand a couple of times and letting the Delta Rune fall back down flat by expelling some stasis magic on a nearby lightning rod similarly to getting rid of a cramp by stretching the muscle out, Cter poured herself some water from the jug Idyll brought with her.
"Oh, yes," reacted Idyll with a quick beckon for the jug. "Just gonna dilute this a bit. I added too much lemon." Two...three glasses of water appeared to be enough. "There we go. Now the stuffing isn't drowned-out and we can eat."
Cter caught that Idyll had used some ice on the knob of the lid to hold it without burning her fingers. Again, she was quick to adapt to the widely different magic that Cter had changed for her. Just wonderful that she had this passion for cooking to help her along with it quicker than how it otherwise would've been. Professor Laurell always spoke highly of having a hobby or passion to express the magic through so that it would go through more than just one type of emotion and therefor come more natural.
Well...another type of emotion that was positive and constructive, that is. No negative one. No hateful emotion that would be stemmed from breaking bonds rather than forming ones. Anger can still be constructive if it is stemmed from a want to better. Anger against injustice, for an example. As soon as the goal was to do harm though the Cooperative Connection would not work. He even demonstrated why. Took an entire lesson to just show how it would not work.
A lesson full of lies, Cter had learned. Learned just how Frioke had learned it. The monster who had discovered human magic, and therefor put the entirety of monsterkind in more danger than it had ever been in before. She had done it not out malicious intent, but of a want to do good and to further build the relationship between monsters and humans. It fit perfectly within the Cooperative Connection that she had concocted later on.
A lie that stemmed from building and not destroying.
Even if the intentions were good, the Cooperative Connection was still a lie. Even when everything fit with it. Of course it did, for that was how it was created to be. Again, it was created to build relations, so it did prove itself to boot!
Again with Frioke's presence...
"Seems like you have a lot on your shoulders being a Monster Mage," tittered Idyll from behind the steam of the stew she was holding out for Cter to take. "Your eyes are more tired than when you took on that ridiculous order for the Spider Butcher, remember?"
Cter did. It took her an entire week of commanding spiders and lifting meat from crack of dawn to late dusk. Her feet could've lit fires after just two days of walking around in the summer heat while strained both physically and magically. "I never got to thank you properly for making sure I had food and doing the dishes that week." With the bowl in both her hands it was almost the same. "And now you're feeding me again."
"You've not gotten used to that?" Idyll scoffed with disbelief, knocking away some steam in front of her as she did. Her uneven smile was even more uneven with her face divided into one side of scales and another of feathers. "Jeez, it's not like I've done it for over a year and am about to do it for the rest of your professional career too!" A friendly arm cut through the smoke to grab Cter by her shoulder and give her a reassuring tug and a shake. "Come on now, you silly mage. If I need to rearrange your breakfast to spell out how far you and I have come each and every morning then so be it!"
Idyll squeezed down on Cter's shoulder as the steam parted itself to show the concerned. yet still hopeful. look on her face. She even tilted her muzzle down and angled it to show her feathers more than her scales. "However, you have to realize how far we've come too. It's work, Cter, and deep down we knew that it would be a lot of work, but now that we have it we can't just let it go, can we? We had a rough first week down in our apartment before we began getting used to our new lives too, and look where we headed from there."
Idyll turned first to try and look over the top of the roof the two were sitting on, but she couldn't. "Well we can't see the building right now, but damn it takes like an hour or so to get to it from here, you know? You remember, I mean. When we dragged our bags down the mountain without saying anything to the other. Just you asking which way and me pointing the corners."
Cter did. She needed only her own memory for that to be vivid to her. Idyll was right too. Cter did need to cheer up. Easier said than done though what with her identity as a mage having been shattered earlier that day, in more ways than one. She sighed, sending the thinning steam in a sharp bend that it had difficulty recuperating from. She'd come far. Oh so far she'd come. Further than anyone when it came to understanding human magic. There might've been three before her which had learned of the truth regarding the Cooperative Connection, but she was the first Monster Mage to truly feel it the same way Frioke did when she found out about it.
While Idyll knew exactly what to say to bring Cter courage she did not know that it was Frioke's emotions Cter was feeling. The contemplative stress and exhaustion weren't Cter's. Cter understood why the lie had to be told. She didn't like it. Everything she had been taught was a lie, of course she didn't like it. There was a difference between not liking it and feeling a dread stemmed from the fact that you might have just doomed your entire race to death, even if it was more complete disgust rather than not liking it that Cter felt.
She understood though.
She was a monster. She had to understand, and in a sense it made her feel more comfortable about being a Monster Mage. That big a revelation not even Professor Leraull was informed of, and Cter, one of his students that might not even have passed her final exam under the Professor's tutorage, was the one of the less-than-handful few to be taught a truth he was deemed unworthy of.
So while Cter felt a bit more comfortable about her given position she wasn't all too happy about it. Even if it was a necessary lie concocted so that monsterkind wouldn't be enslaved or deemed completely useless it was still a lie. Not one Cter could fault Frioke for concocting though, of all the lies that could have been told the Cooperative Connection was enough to convince the fact that only constructive relationships could create human magic.
And if that wasn't a lie of so much white that even snow on a bright day looks dark then Cter must have been blind.
"Better eat some before you run out of energy to keep on mulling internally, Cter."
Idyll must've known Cter better than even Romrom did by that point. How lucky Cter was to have such a friend by her side. Not only to cook, but to also be happier than Cter despite everything. Despite everything, it was still Idyll.
Cter couldn't say the same about her.
For starters she was a monster sitting next to another monster.
She was human before, so that was quite the change right there to begin with. Continuing on from there was kinda moot in comparison, so Cter instead took a bite out of the stew.
The cracking taste of the eggshells mixed well with the coriander and diluted lemon and…
Cter sighed her head down.
Frioke again.
"You have to accept being a monster, Cter." Idyll's reminder was full of childish enjoyment seeing her best friend struggle with accepting that she had to grow a taste for eggshells. Snails were next, so if Cter weren't able to stomach eggshells then how were she ever gonna learn how to stomach snails? "Us monsters aren't just magic and auras. We have to eat the eggs with the shells still on. That's how we are taught, and that is how we live. You're one of us now, so again you gotta eat up. I told you I would help you learn to enjoy shells, and I'm not gonna let that promise fall on the wayside while you learn how to become the greatest Monster Mage there ever was and ever will be!"
Lead a horse to water, as they say. Seems like Idyll is gonna hold that horse's head underneath the surface of the strangely colored water to have it learn to appreciate the taste though.
"And if you don't eat up your stew you won't get your just desserts either," Idyll added lastly almost like a threat before slurping loudly some of her stew. She held the suspense of Cter's raised curiosity for what the desserts might be by exhaling the richness of the stew long and slowly. "They are cardamom rolls."
Carda…
Cardamom rolls!
"Ah ah ah!" With a stern hand Cter's eager lean over the cloth was pushed back away from the humps poking out their alluring shapes. "After you've finished your eggshell-sprinkled stew. And seconds. After what you've gone through today and that it caused you to miss lunch you better eat up plenty so that you can do more of your duties tomorrow. You're answering to the Monster King and Monster Queen directly, need I remind you? It will reflect poorly on them should you decide to sleep in after your first real day of Monster Mage duties." The stern hand turned into a single claw resting on its tip on Cter's forehead. "Besides, you won't be enjoying my cooking for a while starting next week, right?"
The tip of the claw was swallowed inside the folds of Cter's furrow. "What do you mean? Are you traveling somewhere?"
"What?" Idyll replied with just as deep a furrow to her forehead. "Wait..." She pulled back her hand back to herself, leaving the red dot her claw had created deep in the dark of Cter's forehead folds. "You don't know that you're traveling to Xoff next week?"
Traveling to...Xoff?
"Guess not," tittered Idyll to Cter's thrown-up eyebrows. "I mean, it is amazing that there are actually secrets in the castle with how loudly everyone talks. Your colleagues were discussing if you would still be in good enough shape to travel to Xoff during lunch today. Didn't even try to keep it as whispers. It had that one hedgehog Royal Guard a bit worried hearing that you were confined to your room for the day, and he volunteered to keep guard should it be needed. I gave him an extra serving of fruit as thanks for that. There was real and pure gratefulness in his aura when he volunteered. I could feel it from all the way across the dining hall when he made the offer to your colleagues after having struggled to climb up on a chair to then up on the table. Again, Cter, you are doing good already being a Monster Mage. You have nothing to worry about when it comes to that. The Spider Butcher will visit tomorrow on a first delivery of meat to become a Royal Supplier, and I'm sure he'll be bringing something special just for you. I'll just have a nibble of it, nothing more. Promise."
To Xoff.
But where in Xoff? The Xoff royal court perhaps? If so then afterwards it has to be Hjearta's royal court, right? Maybe then Cter can request a detour to her village. She promised her family she'd return a Monster Mage there, so about time she made plans to fulfill that promise. To swim in the lake again would be something she'd travel there by foot for.
"If I've put together the context clues together correctly I think..." The last syllable was hissed from Idyll's tongue that she held tense with her eyes narrowing in thought to make sure that she did indeed put it all together correctly. The amount of strain on her face was showing more effort than the thought warranted. "I think you'll be traveling there with Kurant, if I'm not mistaken. She specified something about Xoff coffee a couple of days before during breakfast. Pretty sure she's asked Barbeqa to make a requisition for it so she can make a stop along the way to wherever you two will be going."
A glimmer of both hope and contemplative hesitation to not fuel that hope too much was reflected in Idyll's eyes. She rubbed the rim of her bowl with her thumb before breathing in long through her nose. "If...if by chance you are traveling to Bonny Sallus' clinic, or hell, if you stop by there briefly for whatever reason." She looked through the veil of her bright hair hanging over her face enough to only permit the edge of her muzzle visibility through it. Cter sensed that her friend was looking straight into her eyes though, so she met them where she felt, and knew, where they were. "Could you?"
"Sarbor," Cter nodded. "Yes, of course I will. If Kurant is getting a say in the matter then I want one as well." She leaned forwards and met her friend in a tender embrace where Idyll's hair fully drowned Cter's. There was a different weight from Idyll's chin onto Cter's head due to her new feathers, but it only reminded Cter of how much she too had to dedicate herself to her friend. It steeled her, and she would use that feeling to push back should she not get a say in visiting Bonny Sallus' clinic. "You'll see him soon, Idyll."
A heavy sob filled with hope that Idyll finally allowed to explode in her aura shook both friends with its longing.
"I'll drag him here via stasis magic if I have to."
Another chuckle thankful for the joke gave the two a reason to release from the hug and go back to their eating.
"As long as his mouth and stomach works I will be happy," replied Idyll before slurping the last of her own serving of stew. "Although try to bring everything of him if you can, please."
"Might be difficult since I'll have to tell him that he'll be eating his eggs with the shells on," Cter shrugged. "So no guarantees."
The two joined in a laugh.
Although when it finished Cter got to thinking. Sarbor had been in monster employment for far longer than she had been. Perhaps he'd taken a liking to eating eggs with shells? Or maybe Bonny Sallus had taken a liking to eating eggs without shells? In any case Cter outta ask when she arrived there.
When.
Not if.
When she arrives there.
She won't take no for an answer when it comes to that! Never in a thousand years!
"And while you are away in Xoff I will try and come up with a good enough reason for the two of us to visit Mt. Ebott, Cter. Just you and me. Together. I've always wanted to see it. Always wondered what was inside. You only have to ask the question, Cter. I'll figure out what you'll say and I'll cook the meal for the banquet where you'll ask it to the appropriate Xoff representative. It's a foolproof plan!"
Mt. Ebott.
Cter had wondered about it too. Everyone thought that there would be the place where human magic was somehow discovered. The Xoff royal court was quite open with it to Prince Soulay and Monster Priestess Frioke if her residual memories inside Cter's sleeve were to be believed. They weren't vivid enough for Cter to feel some emotion about the mountain though, so if she and Idyll were to come up with a reason for the two to visit it then it would still be the first time Cter saw it.
A memory she would treasure forever.
"Sounds like a plan," Cter said with a nod. "Maybe you can ask Sarbor about it when I get him here. That's first on the Xoff agenda."
"Nah," Idyll disagreed. "The first on the Xoff agenda is you traveling there." She shifted up the roof slates to reveal another pot that she'd kept hidden. "And to give you longing to return I've figured out a way to improve upon the cardamom rolls." She opened it up. "In here is a mix of whipped cream and almond paste."
Ooooooooohhhhhh!
"Then I'll just take one of these rolls that are. For. Dessert," Idyll reminded with a nod towards Cter's half-finished stew. "And slice it across so that you get a wide base and a smaller hat." Which she did with a claw. "Lastly you apply this mix between the two and close it."
Dear. God!
It looked so delicious!
"I call it a semla," cheered Idyll. "It sounds Hjearta-like, doesn't it?"
It did.
And Cter's Hjearta stomach was hungry for it!
But her monster stomach had to be filled first with the stew and the eggshells.
Oh, what terrible fate of being the two races combined!
"You may know magic beyond even my comprehension, Cter, but I know the way to your stomach."
With a grandiose pose, Idyll held up her bitten semla.
"I am, a Human Chef!"
Fair enough, Idyll.
Fair enough.
