Post by dee on Mar 7, 2023 20:59:00 GMT
Calla has dinner in the Three Headed Dragon most evenings, but since the Fair she’s been largely eating in her room. It takes four nights for her to brave the common room once again. It’s lively. Without any discernible disaster, the mood for the last few days of 1499 is jubilant. Sat in a darker corner, Calla picks at her food. A book on Faerunian divination sits next to her, open to an illustrated spread. One leaf shows a robed figure stood behind a table, a wand upraised, the other hand lowered. The second page, a wall of text. Calla’s moving finger magically highlights words as it travels: opportunity, decisive action, manifestation, commitment, ambition, caution. As a familiar figure approaches the digit rests on a peculiar phrase, but one that her prestidigitation fails to note: “As above, so below”.
“Ah see I thought I recognised her Miss Kennari! Hello Calla!” Greets the smiling cloaked form of Mittens the Tabaxi, a light dusting of already melting snow settled atop his coal dark fur clutching a huge bag of what appears to be groceries. A much taller similarly cloaked smiling woman follows in his jovial wake, a somewhat smaller bag tucked under her own arm, the tips of her long elven ears peering out from furry earmuffs amongst a wild mane of flaming red hair.
“Mittens!” Calla looks up from her reading, happy to see a friendly face, “Miss Kenari”. She nods, and quickly rattles off something in broken Elvish, that probably neither understand. Looking down at the book she quickly memorises the page number, and then closes it firmly. “Won’t you join me?”
The tall woman smiles with cold-kissed rosy cheeks and bows her head in greeting towards Calla. “Greetings lyth Fae (young one)” she responds in perfect elvish with a refined scholarly tone before switching to a much more relaxed common, “Please it’s just Kennari, Mittens insists on being so formal all the time.”
“Well you are me teacher Miss Kennari, and me ma always taught me to respect me elders..” Mittens states as he takes a seat. Kennari, who to Calla only appears to be a young woman in her late mid twenties gives her a pretend-insulted response before rolling her eyes playfully at Mitten’s naive innocence.
"A pleasure to meet you, all the same". Calla gives Kennari a briefly mischeivous look before turning back to the tabaxi, "Have I mentioned I'm 110?"
“W-what?!” Mittens exclaims in shock, jolting his perch on his barrel stool that it tips beneath him, sending him on a rapid fall to the tavern floor his his rapid fall to the ground slows suddenly, an amber glow radiating around him as he touched down gently.
“Well at least he’s got that rule right!” says Kennari, the last of the sudden amber light dying in her eyes as she gives Calla a wink whilst helping the stunned Mittens back onto his seat, “Never ask a lady her age!” Calla startles as Mittens falls from his seat, instinctively dropping a hand to her pocketed arcane focus and then relaxing visibly as Kennari beats her to the spell. The sudden release of tension is the first time Mittens has heard Calla laugh. It’s brief, quickly tamed to a chuckle.
“Don’t worry, I spent a good 80 of it reading, attending stupid dances, being generally useless. By my people’s reckoning I’m only just old enough to marry. But thankfully I’ve evaded that.” There’s an equally brief moment of arrogance. “Anyway, all in the past. How are you? How are the lessons? What have you been busy with?”
Mittens manages to pull himself out of the stunned state with a shake of his head and starts slowly as Kennari takes a seat opposite the two, adding her own parcel of goods on the floor next to mitten's.
“Oh um, well working on me illusionary magic and projecting, bit for show bit for protection you know. So you don’t wanna get married then?”
“Mittens!” Kennari exclaims after turning away from a nod of the distant barkeep despite not a word being uttered between them.
“What I’m only asking?!”
“It’s fine, don’t worry. It was an arranged thing. I didn’t even really know them except by reputation. And it wasn’t a great reputation at that”. She gazes in the direction of Daring Depths. “It’s been over a month now, so I’ve probably got away with it?” A second or two passes, more than enough to communicate how uncertain she is. “Regardless, I’m off to Port Ffirst this week for some work if you’re at a loose end. The books don’t pay for themselves, sad to say!”
Kennari carefully watches Calla's period of being lost in thought whist Mitten ploughs on regardless. "Oh well better to know the prince was a toad before you kiss him or something like that me Ma says! Oh I would love to come but I've signed up for an ice hockey tournament, I used to play it with friends back home each winter when the lake froze over."
"You know, I'm starting to think your Ma's very wise... I'm afraid I have absolutely no idea what eyes hawk key is though. You'll have to tell me all about it when I get back. I'll swap you, if the Runaway Library is what I hope it is".
"Ah yes I've been meaning to visit there pretty soon Quite the unique collection so I hear." Kennari says, suddenly waggling her fingers towards a two steaming cups upon from the platter being carried towards them by a waitress, the gnome's face turning to awed as the cups gently float up an towards their table only to be exchanged a few seconds later with two gold coins, one of them insistently tucking itself into waitress's apron pocket at a wink and lift from her newly aquired cup by Kennari. "So tell me dear." She directs towards Calla before taking a sip of her beverage. "What magical aspirations are you seeking to fulfil as a student of the academy?"
“Well, by the common-tongue I’m an abjurer, but in Sylvan I’m a...” Calla clicks her tongue while searching for the right word, “Labyrinthanite? Imbroglian? Safe-maker? Uh... mmm... maze-builder?” Unsure that Mittens understands the distinction she digs deeper. “You only ward or seal things that are precious, right? But there are lots of ways to protect precious things. A promise is a kind of ward, and so is a lock, and so is a maze. In the end it’s all about how much effort the promise is to break, the lock to crack or the maze to solve, and what happens if you do. That’s where a lot of people stop, but for a maze-builder, if you protect something too much, the precious thing winds up being useless, or forgotten, or lost. The trick is not to protect something so much it’s invulnerable, or impenetrable, but just enough that only the people you want to get to it, can. Or, I suppose...” A funny look flickers across Calla’s face. One that Mittens is unlikely to parse, but that Kennari will no doubt understand. It’s not greed. Not quite. More like ambition. “Them and those who know how mazes are built.” The look vanishes as fast as it came in. “And I’m having a wonderful time talking to all the wizards and reading all the books, but that’s why I’m the Academy’s new assistant cartographer”.
Mittens face contorts with increasing mixtures of puzzlement till Calla finds the name, maze builder! “So it's like when adults put the best stuff on the top shelf in the kitchen but then don’t put a invisible poisonous spider up there that could bite them as well as anybody else.” He gives a fanged grin at Kennari’s raised eyebrow. “Well a dragon wouldn’t fit in a kitchen would it?”
“Well I must say I’m impressed Calla,” Kennari smiles back at her. “It’s nice meet more gals chasing their chosen professions over those ‘given’ to them!” Her words almost coming out in a tense spit at the end of her statement, the air turning chill slightly around them before returning to its regular steamy warmth.
"That's... huh. That's exactly it". Calla flashes a slightly bemused smile at Mittens before raising an eyebrow at Miss Kennari, "But it seems like there are many in the Dawnlands who've done much the same? Sooner or later?"
Kennari smiled, "Yes I suppose so, speaking of which I really should get back to work myself. I'll take the groceries Mittens, why don't you stay and talk with Calla for a bit. If she wants you to of course!" The elven woman stands and with surprisingly little effort takes up both bags from the tavern floor into one arm. "It was lovely meeting you Calla." Extending a patterned fingerless gloved hand towards her after adjusting her cap.
"And you!" Calla dips her head as she takes Kennari's hand. "Of course Mittens can stay. I probably should give myself a break for an hour or two at least".
"Yes, as much knowledge as there is in the world our brains can only take in so much at a time. And talking about knowing things you were right about another thing..." Says Kennari as she makes her way towards the door with snow the speckled doormat.
"Oh-And whats that?" Mittens calls after her above the hubbub of the the pub.
"She is very pretty." Echoes Kennari's voice in both he and Calla's minds, her smile not lost in the transmission as she exists through the door with her back turned in a soft flurry of snow before it swings shut.
"Hey I-I didn't say-I mean.." Mittens glances as Calla, his pink nose almost turning cherry red. "Not that you aren't but-Owh..Bugger it!" He sits back down with a cross-armed huff.
"I... what?" Calla's cheeks and ears have suddenly gone very shiny, with both her eyebrows practically lost in her fringe.
"I'm not... you don't... " She stammers for a liitle before closing both eyes and taking a deep breath. “Miss Kennari’s more trouble than she seems, huh?”
“She acts more like me big sister than me teacher sometimes!” Mittens mutters more to himself than to Calla, before trying to shake himself out of his embarrassed slump. “Did ye want some food, I could order us some?”
Moving the large book she's been studying aside, Calla smiles wearily and reveals what's left of a picked-over dinner. "You go ahead, I'll just get the spiced wine they do. But then I want to hear about how you found the fair".
After returning with a spiced wine for Calla after making his order Mittens retakes his seat. “I thought it was grand. We have a our own Winter fetes back home in Origin but nothing like the size of that one! I ate so much I thought I’d burst! Got to see a musical bout old hag Granny Longtoothy that was a bit of a foot stomper! How bout you? Did ye have a good time?”
"Uh, not so much. Broke some stuff. Got a very intense fortune...that I'm, uh, preparing for?" Calla's gaze settles back on the book before she perks back up. "Did learn a lot about the Dawnlands though! Where's Origin?"
“A fortune eh? That’s not like real magic though? Is it?” Mittens looks up foam lipped from his mug of milk. “Oh it’s back on Faerun, little farming village to the south, really nice. Ma and Pa have got quite a large farm and small holding there. Miss Kennari bought us both here when she..When she…Hm. I don’t really what she did actually.” A faraway look fills the kittens eyes for a few moments before ebbing away. “Oh well! What’s your home like?” He asks suddenly with his usual pep.
"Um, I think it might have been, yes. And not anywhere I'm keen to go back to. It's... a lot. You remember how dangerous I said the Feywild is? Even though it looks very pretty? It's worse than that. Honestly, yours sounds an awful lot nicer. How did you even meet Miss Kennari in the first place?"
"Oh..I’m sorry ..Uhm..Well, it was back during the Summer actually. I went to market with Pa see, to sell some of the crop and Miss Kenner was there doing a show. A little magic show you know? We have all sorts come through our village. Acrobats’n jugglers, bards a plenty and even see the odd knight or two. But Ke-Kennari was different.The illusions she made, t-they were was so real you felt you could touch them. Fierce dragons that really roared. Giant glimmerin'fishes that swam in the sky. Fresh snow fall that actually felt cold as it touched ya. I’ve always liked magic, we even had a local druid that came helped us cleanse the land if we have a bad harvest on a crop cause of some breakout or sumthing.
But Kennari’s show It was..Amazing.” Mittens eyes sparkle in the light as he talks. “She then asked for a volunteer. Course everyone’s hands went up, and well, I’m not the biggest fella. But I felt her eyes land on me, and she asked me into the circle of the crowd she had drawn. She said, 'Would you like to perform magic one day?' I minced my words a little. I said I’ve never tried before, but I’d like to. I-I’ll be honest. Much as I love Ma and Pa and the farm, I’ve..always kinda, wanted to do something more.Something more than just…milking the cows or digging up carrots. Well. Kennari announced to the crowd, that with her help, before their eyes, she was gonna try to help me become a wizard. She anyone could try, but that only those that hold the spirit of magic inside of them truly become one. She then summoned a fireball in her hands and offered to me to take it from her."
"I do remember you saying you'd been set on fire a lot, when we met", Calla muses.
"Uhm well not intentionally!! But well, I took it from her, and held it in me paws. At first I thought it would feel hot. but it didn't, it was actually kinda cool. Well cool and coool, like cold. She was a bit impressed and then she tried to change it into butterflies. But the flames didn't go away..Instead, I felt like a pulling in me gut, and the flames..well they got bigger. And Bigger! And then so big they actually started to feel hot, I thought I'd singed me whiskers off, but then she managed to grasp them from me hands and launch them up into the air, were they turned into fire works..The crowd were a bit bit shocked, but then, they thought it'd had all been part of the show. But Kennari was just staring at me, and..then she smiled, she was..impressed." Mittens pulls his head out cloud of memory he was reliving and looked back at Calla, scratching one of his ears shyly.
"I'd imagine she would be! It takes a lot of skill to conjure even a shadow of the Real from a glamour. No wonder she's taken you on as an apprentice". A trace of jealousy colours the elf's speech, but no more than that. "Back home there was never anyone to learn from. The House of Echoes are all useless. To hear them speak of it you'd think 'study' a dirty word. I've read every book in their grasp, and like I said, I'm not that old. It's all 'listen to the world itself' and 'don't you feel it in your blood?' But no, actually, no I don't". Calla mutters a despondent word in an obscure language, and is outlined in a flickering and pale aurora. Purples, blues and pinks shimmer in stuttering and uneven waves. It's dim enough that no-one except Mittens even notices. "That's all I have for faerie fire. One day I'll find a teacher of my own. Not Kennari, but someone".
“Well to be honest I’ve not been able to do anything like that first time.” Mittens admits a little sadly. “I feel like, like I am letting Kennari down at times I’ve never had any..magical ability before, least I can remember. Maybe, maybe I’m just taking up a spot for someone like who could could be a much better student for her.” He swirls the final dregs of milk around slowly in his cup as he talks.
"If you value her teaching so much, you must value her choices, no? And if you do, it's you she's chosen". Calla smiles and raises an eyebrow. It's a small maze, but she likes it all the same.
“Heh, thanks I guess, thanks Calla.” Mittens smiles back. “Are ye sure you’re alright now? That was a nasty blow you took from that Tortle fella, even the biggest of folk would’ve felt that in mornin’so to say!”
"Oh, right! I'd almost forgotten. The healing fixed me up just fine. No scars at all. If I'm honest then it hurt my pride more than anything else: A lesson worth learning, I suppose. I'll not make those same mistakes again". Her gaze shifting back to the outside world, she tilts her head, and looks Mittens dead in the eyes, "Are you okay though? I thought we'd lost you there for a moment. I.... look, I've never been as... good, as you are now. Don't throw that away any time soon, okay?"
“Oh, um. Well I just, just lost me temper is all. It’s the first time I’ve seen one of me friends get hurt like that and it..kinda shook me a little.” The Tabaxi’s ears flatten but then peak again at Calla’s words as she finishes.
“I-I won’t. A-and you look after yourself too okay?” He places a paw ontop of her hand. “I know I’m well, only 12-going on 13 though-but, doesn’t mean I don’t care about..my friends.” He gives her a sweet cat smile back.
“Ah see I thought I recognised her Miss Kennari! Hello Calla!” Greets the smiling cloaked form of Mittens the Tabaxi, a light dusting of already melting snow settled atop his coal dark fur clutching a huge bag of what appears to be groceries. A much taller similarly cloaked smiling woman follows in his jovial wake, a somewhat smaller bag tucked under her own arm, the tips of her long elven ears peering out from furry earmuffs amongst a wild mane of flaming red hair.
“Mittens!” Calla looks up from her reading, happy to see a friendly face, “Miss Kenari”. She nods, and quickly rattles off something in broken Elvish, that probably neither understand. Looking down at the book she quickly memorises the page number, and then closes it firmly. “Won’t you join me?”
The tall woman smiles with cold-kissed rosy cheeks and bows her head in greeting towards Calla. “Greetings lyth Fae (young one)” she responds in perfect elvish with a refined scholarly tone before switching to a much more relaxed common, “Please it’s just Kennari, Mittens insists on being so formal all the time.”
“Well you are me teacher Miss Kennari, and me ma always taught me to respect me elders..” Mittens states as he takes a seat. Kennari, who to Calla only appears to be a young woman in her late mid twenties gives her a pretend-insulted response before rolling her eyes playfully at Mitten’s naive innocence.
"A pleasure to meet you, all the same". Calla gives Kennari a briefly mischeivous look before turning back to the tabaxi, "Have I mentioned I'm 110?"
“W-what?!” Mittens exclaims in shock, jolting his perch on his barrel stool that it tips beneath him, sending him on a rapid fall to the tavern floor his his rapid fall to the ground slows suddenly, an amber glow radiating around him as he touched down gently.
“Well at least he’s got that rule right!” says Kennari, the last of the sudden amber light dying in her eyes as she gives Calla a wink whilst helping the stunned Mittens back onto his seat, “Never ask a lady her age!” Calla startles as Mittens falls from his seat, instinctively dropping a hand to her pocketed arcane focus and then relaxing visibly as Kennari beats her to the spell. The sudden release of tension is the first time Mittens has heard Calla laugh. It’s brief, quickly tamed to a chuckle.
“Don’t worry, I spent a good 80 of it reading, attending stupid dances, being generally useless. By my people’s reckoning I’m only just old enough to marry. But thankfully I’ve evaded that.” There’s an equally brief moment of arrogance. “Anyway, all in the past. How are you? How are the lessons? What have you been busy with?”
Mittens manages to pull himself out of the stunned state with a shake of his head and starts slowly as Kennari takes a seat opposite the two, adding her own parcel of goods on the floor next to mitten's.
“Oh um, well working on me illusionary magic and projecting, bit for show bit for protection you know. So you don’t wanna get married then?”
“Mittens!” Kennari exclaims after turning away from a nod of the distant barkeep despite not a word being uttered between them.
“What I’m only asking?!”
“It’s fine, don’t worry. It was an arranged thing. I didn’t even really know them except by reputation. And it wasn’t a great reputation at that”. She gazes in the direction of Daring Depths. “It’s been over a month now, so I’ve probably got away with it?” A second or two passes, more than enough to communicate how uncertain she is. “Regardless, I’m off to Port Ffirst this week for some work if you’re at a loose end. The books don’t pay for themselves, sad to say!”
Kennari carefully watches Calla's period of being lost in thought whist Mitten ploughs on regardless. "Oh well better to know the prince was a toad before you kiss him or something like that me Ma says! Oh I would love to come but I've signed up for an ice hockey tournament, I used to play it with friends back home each winter when the lake froze over."
"You know, I'm starting to think your Ma's very wise... I'm afraid I have absolutely no idea what eyes hawk key is though. You'll have to tell me all about it when I get back. I'll swap you, if the Runaway Library is what I hope it is".
"Ah yes I've been meaning to visit there pretty soon Quite the unique collection so I hear." Kennari says, suddenly waggling her fingers towards a two steaming cups upon from the platter being carried towards them by a waitress, the gnome's face turning to awed as the cups gently float up an towards their table only to be exchanged a few seconds later with two gold coins, one of them insistently tucking itself into waitress's apron pocket at a wink and lift from her newly aquired cup by Kennari. "So tell me dear." She directs towards Calla before taking a sip of her beverage. "What magical aspirations are you seeking to fulfil as a student of the academy?"
“Well, by the common-tongue I’m an abjurer, but in Sylvan I’m a...” Calla clicks her tongue while searching for the right word, “Labyrinthanite? Imbroglian? Safe-maker? Uh... mmm... maze-builder?” Unsure that Mittens understands the distinction she digs deeper. “You only ward or seal things that are precious, right? But there are lots of ways to protect precious things. A promise is a kind of ward, and so is a lock, and so is a maze. In the end it’s all about how much effort the promise is to break, the lock to crack or the maze to solve, and what happens if you do. That’s where a lot of people stop, but for a maze-builder, if you protect something too much, the precious thing winds up being useless, or forgotten, or lost. The trick is not to protect something so much it’s invulnerable, or impenetrable, but just enough that only the people you want to get to it, can. Or, I suppose...” A funny look flickers across Calla’s face. One that Mittens is unlikely to parse, but that Kennari will no doubt understand. It’s not greed. Not quite. More like ambition. “Them and those who know how mazes are built.” The look vanishes as fast as it came in. “And I’m having a wonderful time talking to all the wizards and reading all the books, but that’s why I’m the Academy’s new assistant cartographer”.
Mittens face contorts with increasing mixtures of puzzlement till Calla finds the name, maze builder! “So it's like when adults put the best stuff on the top shelf in the kitchen but then don’t put a invisible poisonous spider up there that could bite them as well as anybody else.” He gives a fanged grin at Kennari’s raised eyebrow. “Well a dragon wouldn’t fit in a kitchen would it?”
“Well I must say I’m impressed Calla,” Kennari smiles back at her. “It’s nice meet more gals chasing their chosen professions over those ‘given’ to them!” Her words almost coming out in a tense spit at the end of her statement, the air turning chill slightly around them before returning to its regular steamy warmth.
"That's... huh. That's exactly it". Calla flashes a slightly bemused smile at Mittens before raising an eyebrow at Miss Kennari, "But it seems like there are many in the Dawnlands who've done much the same? Sooner or later?"
Kennari smiled, "Yes I suppose so, speaking of which I really should get back to work myself. I'll take the groceries Mittens, why don't you stay and talk with Calla for a bit. If she wants you to of course!" The elven woman stands and with surprisingly little effort takes up both bags from the tavern floor into one arm. "It was lovely meeting you Calla." Extending a patterned fingerless gloved hand towards her after adjusting her cap.
"And you!" Calla dips her head as she takes Kennari's hand. "Of course Mittens can stay. I probably should give myself a break for an hour or two at least".
"Yes, as much knowledge as there is in the world our brains can only take in so much at a time. And talking about knowing things you were right about another thing..." Says Kennari as she makes her way towards the door with snow the speckled doormat.
"Oh-And whats that?" Mittens calls after her above the hubbub of the the pub.
"She is very pretty." Echoes Kennari's voice in both he and Calla's minds, her smile not lost in the transmission as she exists through the door with her back turned in a soft flurry of snow before it swings shut.
"Hey I-I didn't say-I mean.." Mittens glances as Calla, his pink nose almost turning cherry red. "Not that you aren't but-Owh..Bugger it!" He sits back down with a cross-armed huff.
"I... what?" Calla's cheeks and ears have suddenly gone very shiny, with both her eyebrows practically lost in her fringe.
"I'm not... you don't... " She stammers for a liitle before closing both eyes and taking a deep breath. “Miss Kennari’s more trouble than she seems, huh?”
“She acts more like me big sister than me teacher sometimes!” Mittens mutters more to himself than to Calla, before trying to shake himself out of his embarrassed slump. “Did ye want some food, I could order us some?”
Moving the large book she's been studying aside, Calla smiles wearily and reveals what's left of a picked-over dinner. "You go ahead, I'll just get the spiced wine they do. But then I want to hear about how you found the fair".
After returning with a spiced wine for Calla after making his order Mittens retakes his seat. “I thought it was grand. We have a our own Winter fetes back home in Origin but nothing like the size of that one! I ate so much I thought I’d burst! Got to see a musical bout old hag Granny Longtoothy that was a bit of a foot stomper! How bout you? Did ye have a good time?”
"Uh, not so much. Broke some stuff. Got a very intense fortune...that I'm, uh, preparing for?" Calla's gaze settles back on the book before she perks back up. "Did learn a lot about the Dawnlands though! Where's Origin?"
“A fortune eh? That’s not like real magic though? Is it?” Mittens looks up foam lipped from his mug of milk. “Oh it’s back on Faerun, little farming village to the south, really nice. Ma and Pa have got quite a large farm and small holding there. Miss Kennari bought us both here when she..When she…Hm. I don’t really what she did actually.” A faraway look fills the kittens eyes for a few moments before ebbing away. “Oh well! What’s your home like?” He asks suddenly with his usual pep.
"Um, I think it might have been, yes. And not anywhere I'm keen to go back to. It's... a lot. You remember how dangerous I said the Feywild is? Even though it looks very pretty? It's worse than that. Honestly, yours sounds an awful lot nicer. How did you even meet Miss Kennari in the first place?"
"Oh..I’m sorry ..Uhm..Well, it was back during the Summer actually. I went to market with Pa see, to sell some of the crop and Miss Kenner was there doing a show. A little magic show you know? We have all sorts come through our village. Acrobats’n jugglers, bards a plenty and even see the odd knight or two. But Ke-Kennari was different.The illusions she made, t-they were was so real you felt you could touch them. Fierce dragons that really roared. Giant glimmerin'fishes that swam in the sky. Fresh snow fall that actually felt cold as it touched ya. I’ve always liked magic, we even had a local druid that came helped us cleanse the land if we have a bad harvest on a crop cause of some breakout or sumthing.
But Kennari’s show It was..Amazing.” Mittens eyes sparkle in the light as he talks. “She then asked for a volunteer. Course everyone’s hands went up, and well, I’m not the biggest fella. But I felt her eyes land on me, and she asked me into the circle of the crowd she had drawn. She said, 'Would you like to perform magic one day?' I minced my words a little. I said I’ve never tried before, but I’d like to. I-I’ll be honest. Much as I love Ma and Pa and the farm, I’ve..always kinda, wanted to do something more.Something more than just…milking the cows or digging up carrots. Well. Kennari announced to the crowd, that with her help, before their eyes, she was gonna try to help me become a wizard. She anyone could try, but that only those that hold the spirit of magic inside of them truly become one. She then summoned a fireball in her hands and offered to me to take it from her."
"I do remember you saying you'd been set on fire a lot, when we met", Calla muses.
"Uhm well not intentionally!! But well, I took it from her, and held it in me paws. At first I thought it would feel hot. but it didn't, it was actually kinda cool. Well cool and coool, like cold. She was a bit impressed and then she tried to change it into butterflies. But the flames didn't go away..Instead, I felt like a pulling in me gut, and the flames..well they got bigger. And Bigger! And then so big they actually started to feel hot, I thought I'd singed me whiskers off, but then she managed to grasp them from me hands and launch them up into the air, were they turned into fire works..The crowd were a bit bit shocked, but then, they thought it'd had all been part of the show. But Kennari was just staring at me, and..then she smiled, she was..impressed." Mittens pulls his head out cloud of memory he was reliving and looked back at Calla, scratching one of his ears shyly.
"I'd imagine she would be! It takes a lot of skill to conjure even a shadow of the Real from a glamour. No wonder she's taken you on as an apprentice". A trace of jealousy colours the elf's speech, but no more than that. "Back home there was never anyone to learn from. The House of Echoes are all useless. To hear them speak of it you'd think 'study' a dirty word. I've read every book in their grasp, and like I said, I'm not that old. It's all 'listen to the world itself' and 'don't you feel it in your blood?' But no, actually, no I don't". Calla mutters a despondent word in an obscure language, and is outlined in a flickering and pale aurora. Purples, blues and pinks shimmer in stuttering and uneven waves. It's dim enough that no-one except Mittens even notices. "That's all I have for faerie fire. One day I'll find a teacher of my own. Not Kennari, but someone".
“Well to be honest I’ve not been able to do anything like that first time.” Mittens admits a little sadly. “I feel like, like I am letting Kennari down at times I’ve never had any..magical ability before, least I can remember. Maybe, maybe I’m just taking up a spot for someone like who could could be a much better student for her.” He swirls the final dregs of milk around slowly in his cup as he talks.
"If you value her teaching so much, you must value her choices, no? And if you do, it's you she's chosen". Calla smiles and raises an eyebrow. It's a small maze, but she likes it all the same.
“Heh, thanks I guess, thanks Calla.” Mittens smiles back. “Are ye sure you’re alright now? That was a nasty blow you took from that Tortle fella, even the biggest of folk would’ve felt that in mornin’so to say!”
"Oh, right! I'd almost forgotten. The healing fixed me up just fine. No scars at all. If I'm honest then it hurt my pride more than anything else: A lesson worth learning, I suppose. I'll not make those same mistakes again". Her gaze shifting back to the outside world, she tilts her head, and looks Mittens dead in the eyes, "Are you okay though? I thought we'd lost you there for a moment. I.... look, I've never been as... good, as you are now. Don't throw that away any time soon, okay?"
“Oh, um. Well I just, just lost me temper is all. It’s the first time I’ve seen one of me friends get hurt like that and it..kinda shook me a little.” The Tabaxi’s ears flatten but then peak again at Calla’s words as she finishes.
“I-I won’t. A-and you look after yourself too okay?” He places a paw ontop of her hand. “I know I’m well, only 12-going on 13 though-but, doesn’t mean I don’t care about..my friends.” He gives her a sweet cat smile back.