[hr][hr][center][img]https://i.imgur.com/0SdKWRg.jpeg[/img][hr][COLOR=CCA1A1]Location:[/color] ??? -> Mikkail's Sitting Room
[COLOR=CCA1A1]Grimoire:[/color] N/A
[COLOR=CCA1A1]Skills:[/color] N/A
[url=https://i.pinimg.com/originals/26/90/9f/26909fcc172c4b9c3263269a858b3bb1.jpg]Current Outfit[/url]
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[i]Warmth trickled into the space, the lingering warmth of a hot summer's day fading in the face of encroaching night. It eyed Cassie's approach somberly. Cassie knew it had been waiting for a long, long time. A meeting, a moment delayed over and over and over by each reflection in the flowers. It was wild and powerful, but dangerously fragile. It had called, it had beckoned, it had offered fate and destiny into her hands - what reason did it have to offer such power now, denied so thoroughly over and over again. 

Cassie could feel it, the voice the butterfly before her did not have. And in it she knew it had been waiting for her. Was it the sheer power she had unleashed before finally awakening it? Had it known her all her life, always slightly out of view as she was denied opportunities? Why had it not stepped up before during those moments when she needed power the most?

[color=CCA1A1]”What are you? Why have you called me here?”[/color] She was worried about the answer, but she knew, somehow, she needed to hear it. 

Magic, chaotic and wild, exploded in the void beyond the field. An electric symphony drowning the world in blinding light before it settled into a gentle aurora that shimmering in swirling colors. The glass flowers caught the light and reflected it a million times, memories fading away beneath their brilliance. The flower clinked together and a soft, yearning song wrapped around the space. It was an old song - never sung but always playing, a constant melody beckoning those who could hear. It never stopped playing, a song that always was, always has been, and always will be. It has been calling for an eternity - the question was why did she ignore it for so long? 

[color=CCA1A1]”Because I was scared,”[/color] she said without thinking, as if the essence had vocalized a question. The brilliance around her had swirled into a question she yearned to answer. [color=CCA1A1]”Because they made me scared. They made me worried about what I could do. They never let me explore or work on what I could do.”[/color] Her mind raced to the mysterious man who all but said he would keep an eye on her and, if the worst came to be, take care of the problem. Her parents locked her away so often she never felt at home. And yet, all the while, there was a voice that was in the shadows. Always calling. She knew she heard it multiple times in her life. When she was crying on her bed after being locked in yet again, when she was put on a pedestal in front of guests and auctioned off, when she was forced to choke down a belief she never could grasp because of all the inconsistencies she faced.

Was she ready to answer now?

[color=CCA1A1]”I am sorry we never got to meet before, but I am glad to meet you now. Please, what would you have of me?”[/color]

Vines of shimmering magic sprouted at her feet, following her legs up and up until it grew past her hip and curled around her back to follow the slope of her shoulder down to the wrist where it pooled in her palm and another stained glass flower bloomed. The purpose of all life was to grow, to survive, to flourish, to stain reality with irrefutable proof that it existed. What greater purpose was there to simply be? To choose a fate beyond what those around you would shackle you to? To break the mold of expectation and live wild and free forevermore? 

The flower beat like a heart and the same rippling sunlight poured out of it. It was Cassie's and Cassie's alone to determine what purpose there was - no greater power ought lie beyond one's own will. The creature had only one last lingering concern.

Cassie stared at the flower in her hand and felt the pulsing of it on beat with her own. It was her’s to choose. It was her decision in what to do with her powers. She was no longer controlled by others, those who would fear her. Instead, she was like the butterfly, once coccooned, now spreading her wings and going where she wanted to.

[color=CCA1A1]”I still feel concern. What troubles you still?”[/color] Was it uncertainty in her abilities? Was it forces beyond her control that wanted what she had? 

A crack ran through the butterfly. The glass flowers wilted and turned to sand. The aurora fades way as if chased by the wind and as more cracks spread through its body, one question lingered in the dying melody:

Why would one escape a cage only to walk into another? 

The butterfly shattered. 

Cassie stood there, transfixed for a moment. The words echoed inside her head. Was she walking back into a cage? Was the school the cage? Was it her coven? Her peers? Or was she finally inside a place that would allow her to soar? These were questions she would need to answer on her own, at her own time. 

For now, she needed to wake up.[/i]

[hr]

Cassie's eyes fluttered open slowly. She took the immediate scene around her. She spotted Connie first, the girl concentrating on something. Then the others. She felt...there was no word she could immediately grasp. It was both wrong and right. The message still fresh in her mind. 

[color=CCA1A1]"What...happened?"[/color]