The steam from the filled porcelain cup adorned with the Delta Rune inside its ear flickered as the morning breeze invited itself through the opened window on the Monster Mage tower. Not unopposed, as it was strained through the chestnut-brown hair settled nicely onto the relaxed shoulders warmed by the Golden Flower tea held warm by magic.
Cter inhaled the breeze through her nose, letting it fill her chest to then exhale the dry air from the night's sleep. She hadn't really dreamed anything, but that was fine. Just meant that she saved some time making her bed since she hadn't been moving around in her sleep. It was why she took the opportunity to seat herself on the stone window sill of her tower window. One leg hanging inside and with a lean inwards, of course.
Monster Mages still went splat after falling out from windows high up, after all. Even if there hadn't been any others before her that had done so, it was still an axiom Cter was quite comfortable with living her life after without the need for proof.
She drank some more tea after her cleansing exhale.
How great with a day that began quiet and without anything planned. It had been a while coming. Even if it had been quite a while since she returned from Hjearta with her new magic figured out and conjured in front of her Monster Mage colleagues, Sir Gerson, and Priestess Frioke, it had been a time of intense studying and training of her magic and her further duties as a Monster Mage. The morning that was calm enough to not even wake the roosters was the start of a day filled with nothing.
Cter could sit on the window sill looking over the gentle smokestacks from Jarasevo bending in the wind and the glittering of the lakes beyond all day if she wanted. A part of her did want it. A part of her just to sit without anything in her mind and just look. To ignore the permanent proof of her new magic which reflected a textured green from where it lay on her night table, and instead only have the warmth of the sun put color on her skin. A flush, or perhaps even a light tan. She even considered taking off her magical sleeve for a moment, but if she was never ever again taking it off then why should she then care about strange tan lines on her left arm?
Besides, she liked her tea hot, and for that she needed magic to heat the Golden Flower tea. It brought out more of the sweet angle of the tea, and coupled with some drops of honey it was like drinking a liquid dessert in the morning. A treat to herself to enjoy the careless day to its fullest.
Complete.
Utter.
Carelessness.
Well, not entirely. Not completely entirely.
It was the morning of the day marking the second year of her discovering her own magic. She had to at least make a passing notion of acknowledging it. "Cheers," she said to the brisk morning outside. "To another two years." The same morning had greeted her each and every day, so it was only fair that it would join in with the small celebration. The more the merrier.
The morning the merrier, in this case.
"Two years," Cter exhaled over the rim of her cup. As she drank some more her eyes came to rest onto her sleeve. She had her spiraling line drown in the liquid crystal of her magic, which she then applied onto the surface of her porcelain cup. Purple crystal grew to envelop the porcelain, with a white Delta Rune facing away from her. "Two years," she repeated with a satisfied nod to how easy it felt making the crystal.
The reflective crystal bathed the Monster Mage study in a thin purple that moved as the cup did, shifting the colorful shadows and reflective textures across the room and back again as the crystal-covered cup was put down on its saucer again.
The color that reflected was quite calm and subdued compared to Cter's first real attempt at her crystal magic though, which sat permanent and patient on her night table waiting to be worn again.
"Two years."
Two years minus a couple of hours, technically, but who was counting, really?
"Two. Years."
Two years after the night of Cter staring out the window while sitting on its sill in just her nightgown. After all that time in the carriage traveling to and from Hjearta, Cter spent over an hour just sitting and taking in the view of Jarasevo and Monster Country again during that night. How the many dots of lights from Jarasevo gradually faded into the dark-blue of the countryside, with patches of smaller lights spread out up and behind the rolling hills in the distance to then be indistinguishable from the twinkling stars. From as high as Cter sat it was as if the horizon was a still lake, with the night sky reflecting the light from below.
It was, in all senses of the word, magical.
The lights were still there on the morning two years after, but not as magical.
Because it was not only the night sky that reflected during that night.
Cter did too.
Of everything that had brought her to that point. Of all the monsters and humans who she'd met after becoming a mage. Not a Monster Mage, but a human mage. For all that everyone said about her needing to leave her days as a human mage behind her to properly become a Monster Mage, they all said it without knowing what Cter's own magic really was. It wasn't crystal magic, for that was only one expression of it. A very splendid and eye-catching expression that would immediately put anyone in awe, which was why she chose it.
Well, partly.
Cter liked the pretty colors too, and since both humans and monsters liked the pretty colors she was still representing both sides as a Monster Mage.
And that representation was her own magic.
The magic of changing magic.
Which meant that Cter still needed to consider her life as a human mage in order to know how to change it. From her time spent at Fenkeep Castle with Huvett and Huvtvao and Terri Fyed she came to finally put the last pieces of her puzzle together. Ice magic to crystal magic, an expression of what she had been tasked to develop as a Monster Mage.
So with the cool night breeze bringing all of her memories back to her from the three countries, Cter summoned up the feelings of all the monsters and humans she had met on her travels. Their smiles and thanks flowed from her soul and through her sleeve, manifesting themselves as translucent, conjured images that filled her study like ghosts of her past. Not come to harm, but come to help. To remind her in that moment of everything she had accomplished.
Every smile and thank culminated within her sleeve, whirling and chiming as many branches and vessels reached up from her spiraling line spiking with sharp shards. As the magic reached her hand it first took the form of a colorful gas that shimmered from orange to blue and teal, then yellow to purple, green to red, and finally white when all the colors merged together with a melodic tone as if striking a tuning fork on expensive glass. The color drowned her room, with long and sharp shadows growing and turning as the gas swirled inside its cage of tensed fingers.
The town criers spoke of the colorful event on that night, of how it illuminated the castle in breathtaking glimmer and glamour.
What only became a faint rumor from that night was the sound of both the rigid from the metallic fork and the fragile from the glass singing together as the gas turned liquid, bending and massaging itself while the tune became more muffled inside it.
Cter then made a final push of emotion through her soul as the tears which had been swelling within her from all of the memories that flushed throughout her soul dropped heavily into the liquid congealment of magical crystal. From her tears the liquid solidified into a flower with a petal each of teal, blue, purple, orange, red, green, and yellow. In the middle sat a white core holding them all together, opening up with a pleasant melody to it. The crystal glistened in the moonlight, refracting into a splendor of colors that danced around her study's ceiling and walls with each heavy breath she took.
Tenderly inside her sleeve's hand the flower sat, the culmination of her journey as a mage, and the definitive proof that she had come to grips with her magic of changing magic. It was beautiful. It was intricate. It was magnificent. It was…
Too much.
It was way too much for her.
Yes, it was the culmination of her journey as the Fourth Monster Mage and the representation of a completely new magic which the world had never seen, with all colors of magic known…
But it still was too much.
Even the faint images of everyone she had met and befriended were a bit on the fence with their ghostly murmurs and not-subtle ghostly coughs.
So Cter grasped the flower in her hand until it became as liquid again which she immediately turned a deep forest-green to match her eyes, the windows to her soul. If Terri could make a wholesome story about forging a path of ice magic from being told that his eyes were that of ice, then Cter could have her own magic be her eyes' colors too.
Then it was just the matter of shape and use.
Well, shape mostly, as use she already knew fully what it would be. She already knew what she wanted.
She. Knew. Exactly.
A brooch to have in the loose part of her hair. A green, crystal brooch that she would wear as a constant representation of her own magic. The emergent shards that had grown on her sleeve's lines, both its spiraling and its branching vessels, migrated up towards the green, morphing liquid glob of crystals. Like pieces to a puzzle, the shards of crystals spawned from her focus and determination slotted onto the magical liquid, hardening it on the spots the pieces slotted themselves onto. Between them the liquid was peer pressured into taking similar shapes, but did so in a manner than was distinctively different from the pieces from her sleeve.
Two becoming one.
Monster and human. Two.
Monster Mage. One.
That was good. That was subtle enough not to be screamed and boasted instantly once someone laid eyes on it for the first time. At the same time it was just peculiar enough to be a conversation starter should the need arise.
Cter slept very well that night two years before her two year anniversary of that night.
She drank some more tea to commemorate sleeping that well.
The actual brooch part of her crystal hair brooch was given to her by Priestess Frioke, as it was her turn to provide a gift for the newest Monster Mage. Kry's glasses shaped by Gerson's hammer. Kurant's rings forged by Asgore's fire. Sund's ear ornaments woven by Toriel. Then finally Cter's crystal made a brooch by Frioke's sewing.
It was a vivid memory to Cter the moment she put on the brooch for the first time before King Asgore and Queen Toriel in the Royal Garden. The voices that rung out among the many blooming bushes and trees.
"Gaah!"
"I'm blind!"
"My eyes! They burn!"
Even King Asgore and Queen Toriel had to shield their eyes and look away from the sheer amount of reflective light that Cter's crystal brooch blinded the immediate area around in the Royal Garden with, although without any startled screams about being blinded. The green-tinted light reached the guards stationed on the balconies above the Royal Garden. It reached the guards stood in the glass hallways around the Royal Garden. It even reached Kurant enjoying a nice, quiet walk through the castle.
She suggested a jeweler in Jarasevo that could help after Cter's ceremony with the Royal Couple. A suggestion she made with eyes closed and both arms folded over her eyes. "Not to spoil your moment, that's not my intent, but I don't think anyone in the castle can get any work done if your brooch is as reflective as it is." The purple of her arms were completely taken over by green as she spoke from behind the fabric. "I mean if Kry sees your crystal through his glasses I think his eyes are gonna catch on fire."
Kurant had a good point there, and Cter made sure to take her suggestion and visit the jeweler to help with her brooch.
With it in a darkened box, naturally. A darkened box which she walked with in her hands down Castle Hill.
It was a pleasant walk that had Cter meeting with the people of Jarasevo again. Walking among them again felt nice, as it reminded her of a time when things weren't as important. Where she wasn't known by everyone that she passed by, but only by a handful few who were the only one to wave at her since she had helped them with her magic. The monsters and very few humans that waved at her walking to the jeweler were only waving at the Monster Mage Cter, and not just Cter, who happened to also be a monster mage. They were waving towards the Delta Rune on her purple mantle and the Delta Rune on her green robe. The title, and not the monster.
While it didn't feel quite as personal before, the sheer number of monster hands and the one or two human hands greeting her and wishing her long life did compensate for the lack of personal matter she had with each one. The same skeleton child that she saw sitting on its human parent's shoulders she did spot again, waving with both hands eagerly enough that they ran the risk of flying off the child's wrists.
Cter made sure to leave a bit of magic behind her for the people of Jarasevo to enjoy. At Time's Square she coated the ground around the clock with a layer of crystal slick enough to skate on. She gave it a colorful gradient that reached around in a full circle, like a rainbow, but a wheel instead. Rainwheel. It wasn't long until her choice to give the shallow crystal lake color was overshadowed, literally, by the amount of monsters trying their darnedest to keep balance on the slippery crystal. Cter made it as slick as ice, so the monsters who did know how to skate did manage it well across the surface. Surprisingly to her, the one that was the most familiar with skating was a pink slime monster, who effortlessly navigated through the stumbling crowd of monsters with long steps of his tendrils.
The Monster Mage left when a few locals gathered together with instruments to give the event musical accompaniment. To Cter that was enough to compensate for her leaving the people of Jarasevo to enjoy her magic on their own volition. She still had somewhere to be with something to do for the someone there, but it was clear that it was the start of a tradition of sorts to her.
Once Cter arrived at the jeweler the music had faded behind her to just the sound of pleasant wind. The jeweler, a jester monster with subtle-brown gradients to his otherwise-orange cloak, bowed deeply to welcome the Fourth Monster Mage into his humble shop.
A humble shop that was everything but humble.
Fitting for a Monster Mage though, Cter supposed.
Once she described her order to the monster jeweler though, his bow turned confused, and despite his reluctance to speak against a member of the Royal Councilors, he still had to wonder why he was asked to dull something rather than to sharpen which was what every single other of his commissions had ever been, ever! Disgustingly provoked, the jeweler was, in a way.
Once Cter opened the darkened box though the jeweler quickly understood, and nodded to accept the job an arm's length to the side of where Cter stood while blinking his button-like eyes with stunned stupor.
Curiously, the jeweler used human-made tools for his reluctant work. His usage of magic was minimal, and only really to provide light at angles that couldn't be reached with candles. Once his aura wasn't as tensed with focus to the point of snapping at the briefest touch, Cter inquired why the monster jeweler used human tools.
His answer was both simpler and more complex than she had imagined.
"It's just how I was taught, that's all, Monster Mage."
Taught by his monster master, who also used human tools during his craft. It was human tools through generations of monster jewelers, but eventually the jeweler's telling reached back to the country of Xoff, where the craft had begun. The human tools provided more-equal methods to the different jewels the monster jeweler was commissioned to work on. Using magic was necessary in a few cases, but as many as one would expect, including the Fourth Monster Mage, tt was important for a jewel to look like it had been worked on for it to be seen as legit for a potential buyer. Magic could be used as polishing and making sure that any wrong scratches or similar mistakes were obfuscated, but the jewel still needed to look like it had been worked on for trust to still exist in the market.
Cter's crystal brooch didn't though.
"No, it does not, but you are asking me to dull it and not to sharpen it, so I will make sure to cover it up when I am done."
Which took a couple of hours. Not a couple of slow ones though, as Cter was quite enthralled by the expertise the jester monster demonstrated as he worked with his button-like-eyes squinted against the reflective green of Cter's crystal. She was a bit hesitant at first to hand over the manifestation of her new magic to someone else to work on, especially when the work was to reduce its splendor and luster, but seeing the jester jeweler work his non-magic, Cter was at ease within just a few minutes of tinkering.
"Shame that it had to be dulled," the jeweler had commented once the brooch was done and re-fastened in Cter's hair. "Never again will there ever be something as flawless as what you showed me."
"For the better though, master jeweler. Can't enjoy something if you can't look at it."
"Still a shame though."
"Indeed."
If Cter was allowed to brag a bit.
The master jeweler was true to his title, as even two years after his commissioned work Cter's crystal still shone only bright enough to be enjoyable. The magical polishing to cover up the marks of the tool Cter helped out with by lending the master jeweler some magic so that he could be properly attuned.
"Two years," Cter said to the brooch picked up in her hand from her night table. Even after two years it hadn't gained any more luster to it. Two years of permanence. Two years of the crystal brooch being something physical and not magical. Two years of sitting pretty in Cter's hair and starting conversations.
Like with every morning, Cter fastened her brooch in the right side of her hair while magically braiding her left side. Both processes took the same amount of time, just a few seconds, and ended with Cter spinning her neck in a half circle to the left to whip up her combined, hanging braid over her right shoulder.
And like with every other morning, the hanging braid hit the hood on her Monster Mage mantle, prompting a sigh and a grunt from Cter as she lifted the braid with stasis magic. She again told herself that next time it happened she would just use stasis magic from the start, but that wouldn't be to any fruition.
As usual.
With herself dressed and ready for breakfast, Cter unlocked her door to let the one waiting outside in. "It's open," she shouted to inform.
The one that entered was Sund, with a puzzle box made from barricade magic dissipating from between his hands. "Good morning, Cter," he greeted with a happy nod to his head that had his upside-down-soul-shaped ear ornaments bouncing like they were Boss Monster ears. "Happy second anniversary to you discovering your own magic. Oh how the light plays with the brooch in your hair like best friends on a summer field."
An amused titter escaped Cter's fair nose. "Had it been Kry it might've sounded genuine, Sund," she let it be known by a sideways glance underneath her raised eyebrow. He immediately folded his act and shrugged to display his innocence. "Oh well," Cter then giggled at how disarming he made himself look. "What color do you want?"
"I was thinking a nice sky-blue if that's alright?" the Third Monster Mage answered with a point towards his hair. "Can you do a few dots of white like clouds as well?"
Cter leaned back on her dresser seat to get a reminder of how the clouds were outside for reference. "Like those?" she asked while indicating the fluffy puffs of cotton floating solemnly and silently. "Or more like thunderclouds?"
Her suggestion had Sund's aura surging with childish temptation. "With lightning strikes too?"
"I can do that," Cter mused with a mysterious flair to her sleeved hands and fingers. "Does it sound appealing to you?" She enjoyed playing it up like she did. Like theatrics, almost.
"I wouldn't say no," replied Sund with another shrug. "I would absolutely not say no."
With a teasing smirk, Cter froze her mysterious flair. "Neither did Kry who asked before you." Stopping where she did didn't run the risk of taking it too far. "A purple like our robes with flashes of lightning sporadically to bring an air of suspense."
Defeated, Sund sighed, with his hand rubbing his forehead. "His words?" he asked. "If so then I can at least tease him about that."
"Kurant asked for a modest orange with splashes of petals," added Cter as she stood up. She motioned for the door. "Both asked me after supper yesterday, so I'm afraid you're the last one this year."
"And here I woke up early just to get ahead of them." Sund shook his disappointed head as Cter passed him by. "Oh well, at least I'll be the first one to get my crystal for today this year?" He wasn't at all subtle with his leaning, both physically and figuratively. "As thanks for keeping you company to the dining hall for breakfast?"
Cter still had a clean heart and soul despite all of her crystal magic.
"Only if you close and lock the door after me."
Well, it was slightly crystal.
But only slightly.