So many things had changed.
"Another helping?"
Cter had learned of things she'd never imagined she'd known. Never imagined she wanted to know too.
"You've only had two helpings, chickling."
She'd traveled.
"How can you not want more?"
She'd learned.
"Did you not like it? Did it not taste good?"
She'd become one of the most powerful mages in the world.
"No, don't take too much. Save some for the others."
Everything had changed for her.
"Why aren't you eating more?"
Yet everything was the same.
"Peel the egg, chickling. Don't they have any manners in Jarasevo?"
"No, it's–" Cter tried to explain before the egg was taken out of her hands by a raven-black swoop. A quick and surgical slash later the peeled egg was handed back to Cter, who flinched at the soft, gelatinous feeling of it. With a splash it landed in her bowl of nettle soup, floating gently in its undressed, white display.
"Remember this, my chickling dear?" Romrom said with a nostalgic fluctuation in her voice. She wrapped a large wing around Cter's shoulder, with the same claw extended that she used to cut the shell of the egg. "When you and I were exhausted from a day's worth of magical practice?" The claw punctured the egg at its tip. "With your faint aura strained, but your body clean from a dip in the lake?" Yolk mixed in with the chopped nettle in the soup, pushing it away in a yellow circle. "And I used to make your eggs like this?" Romrom carved along the side of the egg, flipping it over once she was done. The two white sides of the egg spread out onto the yellow yolk.
In the shape of a monster soul.
"Eat up and one day your soul will be like that," Romrom said in a whisper quivering with overflowing pride. A sharp exhale she coughed with a crinkled sniffle and a fluster to her aura. "Didn't I tell you it would happen, Cter?" She pecked with all the love she had onto her chickling's cheek, leaving a dent filled with cherished pride. "Oh how much a monster you've become!" Romrom's other wing enveloped Cter too, cocooning her in a cooing canape of soft, dark feathers. "My Cter! My chickling! Welcome back!"
The pretenses of the lunch being between a Monster Mage and a Village Elder melted quicker than the yolk into the soup.
"It's good to be back," Cter replied as she dove into the down of her grandmother stroking her head so gently and tenderly. "It's so good." Her hug tightened around the raven monster with her aura doing just the same with Romrom's. For a brief moment Cter could be Romrom's chickling again. For a brief moment she could be a child hugging her grandmother.
God, she needed that.
"There there, Cter."
She needed it!
"Just let it all out."
She needed it so much!
"You're home now."
To just…
"You're with me."
To just be normal!
"You're with grandma."
Not a normal that she rationalized! A normal that everyone could agree was normal! Just for a minute!
"You've been alone in that carriage for a while now, haven't you?"
Just for a second! It was all she needed! Please! Just please let her have it!
"Shh. Shh. Shh."
Cter's aura was thrashing like the core of a wild thunderstorm. Like lightning whipping out, her aura radiated explosively in every direction it could. Romrom could feel it. Definitely. Both like a monster grandma, and a human grandma. In that moment she was both. She had to be for her chickling.
Who was both human and monster.
A human and monster who's tears rolled off the warm tuft and plumage like marbles down a slope. They collected at the black tips of the long feathers, dangling for a bounce before detaching and crashing down on the floor.
"You're home now," Romrom repeated with a whisper as her beak plucked the tears away from Cter's flushed face. Up and down, the dark-grey beak massaged the pink cheeks, scraping away all the worry like it did in years past, long, long ago.
Grooming away all the sorrow. Nipping off all the sadness.
Comforting the soul.
"You've been doing a lot while you were gone, haven't you, Cter?"
She nodded into the soft tuft of Romrom's chest.
"My chickling. A Monster Mage."
Another nod. Just as soft.
"We barely had time to hear the news before you came to visit, you know?" Romrom chuckled, pushing more of her soft feathers around Cter's face. It darkened completely for Cter, and she accepted it wholly. "You've not had a chance to just sit down and breathe out, I reckon. I could see it the moment you stepped off the carriage. You reminded me of me when I was younger." A long, feathery stroke ran from the top of Cter's head down the length of her back. Romrom couldn't care less about that it was Xoff silk her arm caressed over. It was only Cter that mattered. "You poor thing. I had you take too much after me."
The apology weighed heavy onto Cter. Heavy, but not uncomfortably heavy. A comforting heavy. Like a thick, securing blanket it had Cter exhale everything that ailed her. A cloud that seemed to curl the raven tuft towards Cter rather than away, stretching for her to help.
"I've done things, Romrom," Cter coughed after a quiet minute. Again the feathers refused to bend from the forced-out air, instead reaching back towards her cry. "I've done things." A comforting tired washed over her similar to what she forced upon her in her carriage the day before. It was different the second time around though. More natural. More comforting. Not simply putting it aside to deal with it later.
Just finally dealing with it.
"Wonderful things," Romrom replied. She knew full well what Cter meant, but she wasn't gonna let her chickling disappear into despair. Oh no! Not on her watch! "Such wonderful things, my dear chickling. How could they not be wonderful if you were the one to make them?"
Yeah…
How could they?
"I got a letter signed by Sir Gerson himself about you visiting here, Cter. From the monster who commands the respect of not only his own military, but the military of Hjearta and Xoff as well. He asked me, a simple Village Elder of a small village with no influence outside its own county, and barely even that, to house a Monster Mage on his behalf. He put me above him in his letter, and that's because of you, Cter. You are important enough for the monster below only the Monster Royals to humble himself underneath someone he'd never pay any mind to otherwise. Someone who'd his position would never afford him to acknowledge. Understand, Cter, that you've achieved something greater than anyone else has."
Understand…
That was what Cter could not.
She tried. She tried her hardest to find some solace in that and use it to lift her spirits. Yet, she couldn't. Even with her soul and mind forcing it she couldn't. Another perspective for her to consider. Another perspective so utterly different from hers. It wasn't easy for her to consider Romrom's side and thoughts about it. Not with her gone from Cter's sleeve. Cter knew that Romrom had noticed. She had to have noticed. There wasn't a chance in this life or the next that she wouldn't have noticed.
It must've been why she was so much more articulate in her comforting than before. She knew that Cter had someone else for her magic. Their close connection had become more distant in almost all senses of the word. It was a sign more ablaze than the sun that Cter had grown up to become an adult. That she had become her own person with her own beaten path both in front and behind her.
She...just had to be a child for one last time. Just one more. Then she'd be an adult for the rest of her life. She promised. Just one more.
Just one more time, Romrom.
One more time before Cter had to return to carrying the world on her shoulders. Before she had to again think in three directions at the same time. Human, monster, Monster Mage. She didn't want to think for this tender moment she had with her monster grandmother.
Just a bit more, Romrom.
"That letter I will treasure for the rest of my life, Cter. Not because it is penned by Sir Gerson, but because it is penned by Sir Gerson because of you. Even when you return to your new life as the most powerful mage in the world, I will still have everything I need to have to know that you'll be doing fine. That you're safe and sound, and that you're growing up into something I could never be too proud over." Romrom bent down her forehead onto Cter's. The touch was so delicate it was as if the two were never meant to be apart. The warmth so filled with love and care that their auras almost became as one. "You'll always be my chickling, Cter. You'll always have made me happier than I could ever be."
Oh how Cter needed that.
Her raspy whimper ruffled Romrom's feathers, but the old raven monster did nothing in response. She only let her forehead rest heavily onto Cter's, secured and comforted. Like Cter was an egg set to roost. The moment was long, so, so very long.
"Now eat up before it gets cold, Cter."
It had to end though. Not in a negative sense, however. Once Romrom felt that Cter had exhausted herself, expunged from her soul all that she needed, then that was the moment where the child had become the adult, even to her grandmother.
And adults needed their food, just as much as kids.
"I have an ovencake for you when you're finished with your nettle soup," Romrom informed after drying the last tear from Cter's puffed cheeks glowing red. "With cloudberry jam I picked earlier this year. I'm not saying that I knew that you were gonna come visit this year, but I'm gonna still say that I picked them just for you." The long tail feathers caressed the puffy cheek before they rounded the corner into the kitchen. "And if you'd come later the jam would've been mead instead."
Too bad Cter didn't come around later then.
And damn, the egg had sank too into her soup.
Gone all mushy from the warm nettle soup. Fell apart when she took it out of the soup with her spoon. If it was supposed to be a metaphor for a monster soul it was a quite harrowing omen seeing it melt off the edge of Cter's spoon and drool back into the yolk-mixed soup. Had it been in its shell it would've–
With a splash and a clink, the spoon fell out of Cter's frozen hand, sliding down into the soup to join the drowned egg.
She couldn't believe it.
She just made a positive case for eating eggs with the shell on.
She was over it.
She was over it all!
Her arms extended high above her head, hands clenched into tight fists. "Woohoo!" fluttered from her lips with happiness galore. She turned her head towards the curiously angled head of her grandmother leaning into the kitchen door frame. "I did it!" she conveyed with a smile. "I did it, grandma!"
Oh she was such an adult, wasn't she? The most adultest of them all!
"You did it, Cter," Romrom congratulated with a gentle nod. "Now eat your soup."
She would.
And she did.
Because Cter was very hungry. Pouring out your heart and soul for someone else takes a lot of energy. Cter was a Monster Mage. She had to eat a lot to become stronger!
A strong adult.
Yes.
"So," Romrom quipped as she put down the ovencake a few minutes later. She swatted away Cter's eager hand that instantly reached out for it. "Let it cool a bit." Romrom then sat down on her chair opposite Cter. "So, what is the official reason you've come here, Cter?"
Already? Cter still had some more things she wanted to talk with her grandmother about. Not to go directly into the official part. Then it would've been difficult to segue back to what she did want to discuss. "Actually, Romrom," Cter spoke with a slight reservation to her words. "There are a few other things you should know before that."
The raven monster nodded respectfully. "Of course, chickling. I thought you wanted to perhaps change the subject away a bit to come back later, but if you want to talk it all out now I'm all ears." Her plumage expanded, spreading each black tuft out like black fingers. "All feathers, really, but you know..."
Cter did. She appreciated the levity though. In disregard to table etiquette she placed the entirety of her sleeved arm onto the table. "You've already figured that I no longer have your sleeve, Romrom." That much was blatantly obvious. "The one you made for me I left back in Jarasevo Castle in my room."
"Your room?" Romrom's feathers perked at the mention. "How is it?" she asked while inching forwards, almost taking flight and snuffing the candles. "Is it big? Where is it located in the castle?" Hearing herself mention the word, Romrom's feather again stood on edge, puffing her size up twice as much. "Oh! The castle! Jarasevo Castle! You have to tell me about it, chickling! And the town too! How have things changed since last time I was there? I gave you some of my memories in your sleeve. Did you meet Krygino? Did he remember me?"
Cter was happy seeing Romrom happy. It had been years since she last saw the faded beak bend the best it could into a smile. "I'll tell you later, Romrom. Okay? I...I have to tell you some other things first. Some important things. Very important to me, in fact."
The excited fluctuations in Romrom's aura calmed down as she saw the serious valleys crinkling Cter's forehead. "Of course, chickling." She sat back down with her wings bundled. "Tell me whatever it is you need to say."
The light in the humble dining room drained with Cter's steeling inhale. She held her breath for a moment to let the air roll all the way out her limbs, filling each nook and cranny of her body. After that she exhaled, but the light did not return to the room. "I met a friend in Jarasevo. A friend that I lived with. We shared an apartment in the outskirts of town. A friend that I...hurt. Hurt in a way that no one's done before, Romrom."
"How so, chickling?" wondered the worried grandmother. "I'm sure that–"
"No."
It hurt Cter to her very soul to spout such a deny to her own grandmother.
"Come now, chickling. You know full well about magic and its potentials. How can you be so sure that it has never been done before?"
With another disregard towards table etiquette, Cter reached over said etiquette-derived table and grabbed a hold of her grandmother's arm. "Do you know why I am a Monster Mage, grandma? Why I was granted my title?"
Romrom looked down onto Cter's sleeve beginning to glow. Like small rivers from melting glaciers, magical lines began to grow from her spiraling one and reach up towards her fingers buried in the black raven feathers. "I was hoping you'd tell me, Cter."
No.
Not tell.
Show.
The black eyes flushed with shocked surprise at the magic and memories that Cter gifted her grandmother with. Memories of the message Krygino asked Cter to give to Romrom, and magic enough for Romrom to freeze the entire lake should she want to. Before retreating her giving magic, Cter also surrounded Romrom's soul, caressing it with a hug from her aura, but also sensing it. Cter knew how Romrom's magic was. She'd worn it on her old sleeve. To show Romrom more Cter wanted to demonstrate that she could on her new sleeve as well. Not the magic Romrom projected from her memories, but what her soul did to form her.
Romrom's soul allowed Cter to copy from it. Even if Cter didn't wear Romrom's sleeve her soul still remembered the Cooperative Connection it had made with Cter. Slowly, from inside the forest of feathers, sprouts of black ran down the magical lines until they reached their spiraling core. There the raven bumps erupted into magical feathers. Dark just like Romrom's.
Dark just like Idyll's.
"C...Cter," Romrom exhaled in a weary breath unsure how she should feel. Her aura melted and solidified like silt gliding over ice. "This is… Is this you? Is this your magic?" Her black eyes blinked, a faint white haze fading away with each stunned blink. "Chickling..." She stared at her wings where frost had begun to grow onto her feathers like a layer of bright-blue crystal. "I have no words." Even her beak looked to become more solid due to ice filling in the weathered scratches on its graying surface. "I've never felt more...alive!" The ice on her feathers crunched with a hollow ring to them. Almost instantly the ice grew back, stronger and with more glimmer than before. "Is this what made you a Monster Mage? This magic? Your magic?"
It was Cter's magic, yes, but it wasn't her own magic she could go around boasting about though. She still needed something like Sund's magic to woo the crowd. Infusing and changing another monster's magic came later, once she had gotten it under control fully. Once she wasn't afraid of it any longer.
"Yes, grandma," Cter acknowledged while displaying the black feathers spiraling on her sleeve. They weren't frosted like Romrom's, but there was no mistaking at all that it was Romrom's. "It is an interpretation of the Cooperative Connection that I found while in Jarasevo. It helped me for a year to pay the rent, and even have my name and my magic be known up in the castle."
However…
"However..."
The frosted feathers bent over to the tensed ones sprouting from Cter's sleeve.
"That magic, the same magic I used on you, it hurt my friend. Hurt her badly. In a way that had never happened before." Cter's eyes shut close. Every muscle on her face strained to close her mouth. "I...took her soul, Romrom."
A chill that had even the frost on Romrom shiver with a frigid fear that descended upon the dining room, solidifying the ovencake before even a single piece could be cut from it.
"My soul took my friend's. I fell into her memories. I lived her life. The only thing that kept her alive when I woke up was that my soul wanted more of hers. It was felt throughout Jarasevo, what I did. The reverberations of what I had done gave me a chance to bring her back to life. To show that there was a way to be able to control this new magic."
Romrom sat quiet.
"When I tried to save my friend I poured all of the magic I could find into her, and from that, all of your memories. Because of that, she has feathers on her too. Her entire right side of her face is identical to yours, Romrom. It is covered in raven feathers. She's asked me to ask you for tips how to care for her plumage. She wants to make it a part of her. She's strong like that, even after all I did."
A descending wave of agony down Cter's arm felled the feathers she had copied from her grandma. In pain they withered into dust, scattering onto the patterned tablecloth like spilled pepper.
"It's for her that I need to be a Monster Mage. It's for her that I travel to both Xoff and Hjearta to be a better Monster Mage. She's strong. Her resolve is human. She's...the part of me as a Monster Mage that is human. I don't care that she's a monster. To me she's more human than anyone I've ever met!"
Had Cter's hand not already been on the table she would've smashed it down. She would've added Idyll's old orange magic as well. She couldn't forget about it. It had to be returned to Idyll. Her old magic too. Cter still had it.
She had to figure out how to give it back!
Bonny Sallus Cter didn't care about at all. He was only a tool for her. Her goal was the same as the one she was given by the others sharing her title, but her target was different.
"I promise you, Idyll!"
The naked arm surrounded by orange magic slammed into the old wood of the decorated table. With a loud crack it succumbed to the hit, shattering in two and bending down. The smaller cutlery poured down the created ravine, clinking down like hail onto a metal roof. The pot containing the nettle soup got stuck halfway down though, and the form holding the untouched oven cake even further up the ravine too. Their edges were frozen to the angled wood, as was the plate Cter's bowl of half-eaten soup rested onto. A plateau of black core ice sturdier than rock, stretching across from the two halves of the broken table.
"Eat up, chickling," said Romrom in a calm, motherly tone. "Have as big a slice of oven cake you want as well. You need it for your friend." She stood up with her wings clasped on her lap, with a low cracking sound turned crunching as her feathers interlocked. "What did you say her name was again? Idyll?"
Cter nodded. "Idyll. Idyll Fech."
"That is a lovely name. Sounds Xoffian to me."
"Yes, she is from Xoff."
"How lovely," Romrom mused with an owl-like coo. "Of course I will give her every tip I can remember for caring for her new feathers, chickling. Now you just eat up and regain some of your strength and I'll fetch me some paper and ink to write. I'm guessing she doesn't have a bird monster in her family?"
"No," Cter said quietly with a slow shake. "She only has her human brother...left."
The black eyes turned somber. "Oh, chickling. I am so sorry. I didn't mean to." The frost-crusted feet hurried around the table so that the large wings could envelop once again with all the love and care the world could allow. "Then I have more of a duty to remember everything I can about taking care of feathers for her. You let her know that she can come here whenever she wants. That she has a family here if she wants. You've experienced her life, you said. To me that means that she's my chickling too. She is part of you, and you a part of her. The memories I gave you when you graduated Soul's School made them yours too, so you tell her she is welcomed anytime for as long as she wants."
Cter hugged her grandmother back. "I will, Romrom." Harder than she had ever done before. "I will. I'll let her know she has family here."
Idyll was a sister to Cter, after all.
A sister Cter would sacrifice anything for!
