The Ice Princess

[Kōsetsu "Sue"]

Kōsetsu had almost decided to skip class today. But she didn't, and now she's been pout together with the girl from the ice rink yesterday.... and someone she doesn't recognize yet.


"umm... i didn't get your name yesterday......"


well that's true, though Kōsetsu has the nagging suspicion that they should already know the name they are about to hear....

[Jill "Kenzie" Mackenzie]

The girl looks up, as though surprised to be addressed. "K- Kenzie." She whispers, presumably her name.

The little snout pulls back, nestling into her hood safely once more.

[Kōsetsu "Sue"]

"Kōsetsu, but call me Sue. No one ever gets my name right, not even my parrents." is the reply.

[Deitha Albron]

Deitha frowned for a moment, and then added, "Hi, I'm Deitha." She paused. "I'm sure I'd get your name wrong if I tried to pronounce it, so Sue and Kenzie it is - pleased to meet you." She hoped the tone was more friendly out loud than it sounded in her head.

[Kōsetsu "Sue"]

Kōsetsu nods. studying the assignment carefully. Clearly not a talker. Still she's not exactly rejecting company either. She'll warm up eventually, right? yeah... probably.

[Jill "Kenzie" Mackenzie]

The assignment seems pretty straightforward: they're to brew a potion, a simple mixture that should bring relief to minor ills and block the pain out from major ones. The panacea is one of the most important potions to get right; unfortunately, it's also one of the most fiddly, difficult potions in the beginner book. If they can get it down pat, they'd have a job offer with any military in the world, brewing it by the barrell for troops and humanitarian relief.

Three is an important number in spellcasting; three witches can often pull off what one alone cannot. The cauldrons are also specialty made, likely to help account for small mistakes. And they have an hour and a half to brew what should be a twenty-minute potion, to a reasonable degree of success. It's still not an easy task, by far.

Given that Kenzie and Sue both seem inclined to keep quiet and work on their own, Deitha's unfortunately thrust into the position of being the group leader -- and trying to figure out what's wrong with their first attempt, which has thrown up a noxious smoke that makes all three of them cough and gag.

[Deitha Albron]

Deitha wondered how she ended up being the group leader, and wasn't it the place of leaders that let their troops deal with things when they went wrong? At least, once she'd wafted the worst of the smoke away from herself so she could breathe again.

"Right, so we did something wrong - we followed the instructions, right? Let's see, we added the snarlswood flecks, we stirred until they were dissolved into the liquid... did we add in the... oh, I think we put too much althalberry essence in, the recipe says three drops but I think we did it as spoonfuls? No wonder!"

Deitha isn't sure whether she's annoyed at the group for getting it wrong or relieved to have worked out what the problem is. At least it was a mistake they all made, no fingers pointed... yet.

"Who wants to clean the cauldron so we can try this again?"

[Kōsetsu "Sue"]

Kōsetsu reaches for the cauldron wordlessly, she seems to have defaulted to taking the manual labor steps of the potion making without question.

"I wonder why the potion is so complicated?" she muses, her tone hinting that she thinks there's a much simpler way to accomplish the same effect and so there must be a reason for all this fuss if there is a simple way..

[Jill "Kenzie" Mackenzie]

"All potions are complicated," mumbles Kenzie, unhelpfully. She's exaggerating, of course, but potions do seem to be more temperamental than spells -- the price for portability. Still, she seems more glum than the situation warrants.

[Deitha Albron]

"If potions were easy to make, they wouldn't be making us learn them, they'd just get some poor person to make them already." Deitha's tone was a little haughtier than she had meant it to be.

She paused, then muttered, "Thank you for cleaning the cauldron, Sue."

[Jean Grey]

Kōsetsu shrugs, returning the clean cauldron to the work table. It is clean but very cold. the sides bead with condensation as it sits there, waiting to be filled. Kōsetsu seems rather annoyed at herself. And with good reason, she's been trying to keep it suppressed, to keep it under control. She even wore jacket and gloves to the skating rink yesterday to prove it was under control, and she had been under control! and now it slips out like that?!

"It seems sometimes that the belief is more important than what the potion actually is." Is all she explains, trying to cover for her annoyance. Maybe she's right? maybe not. It's interesting to think about anyway.

[Jill "Kenzie" Mackenzie]

"The... Believe?" Asks Kenzie, her voice timid and small.

[Kōsetsu "Sue"]

"Yes. Believe in a thing and it happens. would the potion work if it isn't believed that it will?" Kōsetsu replies equally softly. almost as if she doesn't want the teacher hearing her musings....

[Deitha Albron]

Deitha frowned again. Belief had never been a critical part of her studies thus far - though she wasn't exactly a perfect student and a certain amount of undue haughtiness probably came from her background and family rather than talent or skill.

"Well, I've never heard of belief in a thing making it possible." But she didn't say it loudly enough for the teacher to hear, just loud enough for her group. "Come on, we need to get on with this. Right, cauldron's up to the boil, now we need to add the snarlswood flecks."

[Jill "Kenzie" Mackenzie]

"R-right!" Stammers Kenzie, grabbing for the flakes. "Sorry!" 

She turns to add them, tipping her hand just a bit to let some in... As the liquid reacts violently, bubbling up toward her hand. She cries out, dropping the rest of the flakes as she snatches her hand back from the boiling liquid.