ORIGIN

There was a flash of light from within the nearest hut, and then a soft mutter of surprise. A moment later, the black-beaked hybrid poked her head out, blue eyes blinking and bright. There was a sheen of pink-orange gem dust over one foreleg and her beak, spattered too over her chest-feathers; she'd been hard at work. And the new dye (End's Sky) that Dewberry had painted on her shimmered a rainbow turquoise in eye-spots on her wings.

The structure from which Azure poked her head was blackened, in places, as were many of the old ruins Raheerah had half-decimated in his rampage a few cycles back. This one, in the first couple 'rows' of Orion's buildings, was mostly cleaned of its rubble but still an obvious ruin. Rugs and skins hung here and there, and baubled lights kept it lit and announced it as a home and workshop.

"Oh--hey," she greeted, a little surprised--and then--pushing past the slight nameless anxiety she felt at the sudden visit of a stranger--spoke with humor. "Well, I'm definitely a bird-thing. And I do make stuff, for sure! It's probably me you're looking for?" There was amusement in her tone. "I'm Azure." She dipped her head in greeting, then inclined it to the doorway, turning and stepping back out of sight.

"Come on in; I was just working on crushing up some dye." In the brief moment she'd studied Kitty she'd noted the bow ribbon and the spectacles; she was wondering what it all was, but it seemed odd to just stand outside and ask.

The interior of the building could best be called a beloved mess.

There were half-organized stacks and piles of things strewn about, carefully arranged but still littering half the clear space on the floor and on the makeshift shelves: gemstones, mortar and pestle, pouches, cords of woven grass, little ceramic jars (some open, some not) and bowls, drying flowers, and more. Off in the left front corner, half-hidden by a crumbled wall, was a nest of woven grass and feathers. In the back, hidden completely behind another wall, was Dip's makeshift forge here in Orion; the scent of burned wood and coal was noticeable.

The whole room was illuminated by baubled gemstones--some sitting about, others hanging off more cords along the ceiling and the walls. They all glowed either soft golden-white or rich cobalt blue. Azure stopped, lit by them, before her pile of dyes; she turned, peering at Kitty. At her feet was a tattered leather mat, the mortar atop it, and the pink-orange gemstone powder was sort of... everywhere around. She'd made a mess, it seemed.

"Nice to meet you too. Oh, about dyes-? I mean, nobody taught me so--I don't know everything, I'm sure. Uhh. I make it up as I go along, I mean," she explained. She felt it important that this stranger know that she was just a hobbyist; that she wasn't very good at what she did. At least, that's how she saw it; and she didn't want to represent herself as more than she actually was.

"Tools? Oh, I might be able to help? Uh, what sorts of things did you have in mind?" She listened in silence to the offer of a fortune, and this idea was met with wariness, interest, and fear all at once. She wasn't sure she wanted to know. She was happy as it was, and the offer at once made her unhappy. Curious, but unhappy. She'd been happy up until just now, and she didn't want that ruined by what she didn't doubt was going to be an awful future and damn it now she was thinking about it again. That unhappiness briefly creased her features in a sort of grimace around the eyes. And see the past-? Oh, boy, she didn't want Kitty seeing that. She edged back a step, determined not to let the stranger touch her. But she didn't grow unfriendly.

"Uhhh, I don't need payment. Maybe you could come by and, you know, share any other dyes you make? Like--I made that one," she explained, and paced over to touch the starlight dye that streaked one portion of the wall (and much of the walls were painted, with swatches here and there of various colors, perhaps for testing or for decoration). The patch was a deep violet-black strewn with glowing specks of nacre, with the overall effect of being like Orion's distant ceiling--or a starlit sky.

"And if you like this?" she added, waving one of the dotted wings, "My sister made that!" Oh SHIT, what if she recognizes the name-? Azure's enthusiasm briefly wavered, and she had to force it back again.

"She's just getting started, but she's really good at this. She made it from a bit of the Spire, actually, and I used my magic to make it stick! You can do that," Azure explained; "the magic keeps the dye from ever fading. It's not easy, but it works."

She ruffled her wings, and settled them against her back. "But yeah, uhh--come in, make yourself at home-? And let me know what kinda tools you had in mind. And, um, I can teach you anything I know, but again, it--isn't all that much," she warned.

It wasn't entirely true--though certainly self-taught, her crafting was not as bad as Azure thought it was. Her pressed and glowing preserved flowers, encased in gem and hanging on cords, were certainly pretty enough to look at--if not a mastercraft work of engineering.

"Can I ask what those, um--that thing is--that you have on the string there?" she asked, at last, curiously nodding toward the spectacles.

She beamed at the compliments to Dewberry. "She's great at it, isn't she?" she half-repeated, her tone warm.

Azure then eyed the glasses, for a long moment, fascinated by them. She didn't know what they were, of course, but something about the finely-wrought metal appealed to her sense of the aesthetic: someone had spent time crafting those, and they were pretty.

"Can I ask where you found them?" she asked, turning and pacing to the center of the room. One forelimb began to work at sweeping a spot of rocky floor clear. There was a crack across the floor, filled smooth with pink gemstone, and this quickly became visible as she made space.

"And what color do you want this stuff? It'll take some time to make, and it's pretty tiring, so it may take a bit of time," she added, glancing up at Kitty in warning.

Opaque lavender, huh? Azure pondered this a moment, trying to picture it in her head. "I think I can do that," she said, at last.

Something hard enough to grind other stone, then; something that wasn't brittle, either. Once she held the image securely in her mind, she concentrated, leaning down and touching her beak to the rock between her foreclaws.

"Oh, I wouldn't ask you for your stuff," she murmured, loud enough to hear, but it was clear that she was distracted by her work. Black beak tapped stone, and a gem began to form. It was, indeed, slow going--but it took shape, nonetheless. "It'd be cool to see them, though, like--if you ever have them in the area."

Azure grimaced--at least, her eyes and the area around them did; a soft exhale of exertion escaped her. Up, the stone seemed to sprout: forming first the pestle and then, attached only by the thinnest strand of gem and growing up beneath it, the bowl-shaped little mortar. Both were thick, if slightly small, and when at last they'd fully formed Azure let out a huff.

Her entire body sagged; this was never easy, and the mental focus often left her with a headache. This one had, for whatever reason, been harder than most.

She turned away and gave the pestle--still standing, attached by that thin bit of rock, to the mortar--a light kick of a hoof. It cracked off and fell away, and she turned, giving it an approving once-over.

"...Okay, that one worked. You'll have to smooth out the pointy bits where they were connected, but that shouldn't be too hard. Will that be okay?" she asked, glancing up at Kitty.

She was already picturing the bowl in her mind--but she needed a moment's rest, beforehand.

She rocked back a little, not sitting but relaxing some in place. She'd give herself a breather, then try for the bowl, as well. "Well, just rub 'em on other stuff. Until the hard bit goes away. That stuff should be really hard as it is, but if you grind it down long enough it'll get smooth."

Azure was confident in that much, at least. She'd ground down more than her fair share of gemstones (almost all of them, of course, formed herself). "Right--lemme give this bowl a try. You'll be able to get these back wherever you're going?" she asked, glancing up at Kitty; she wasn't sure how good the creature was at carrying things.

Black beak dipped down to the rock, again, as Azure concentrated. And now, the bowl itself formed: larger, a little shallow compared to the deep mortar, but solid and serviceable.

With a sigh of relief, Azure backed off a bit. "There you go," she said, weary satisfaction--and a little bit of relief--in her voice. Magic wasn't always so cooperative; she'd been preparing for a long series of failed attempts, but all things considered, this had gone pretty well.