WINTER - YEAR TWO
Celestia burned sun rays into the plain wedge of clay standing before her. It lay perfectly smacked in the center of the old dusted pottery wheel. Weighting in at just three-fourths of a pound, it was only a mere nuisance to the almighty ruler of Equestria.
Celestia had already decided she was going to tackle this task and shape it into the mug it was destined to become! She just needed to put in the work, which had now seemed to be easier said than done. Regardless, she was determined to make a perfect mug for a certain, talented, student of hers.
Shopping for gifts as the sole monarch of Equestria has always been easy. Things were always accessible with her title alone; even her signature would have sufficed. However, shopping for a gift for Twilight Sparkle should have been even easier. Just get her a book and she would be content for the next new moon. But something within Celestia wanted to do something more for her faithful student. To be able to give something with more sentiment, and have it act as a reward for the stellar work she had continued to put out consistently.
So now Celestia was in a local pottery store and she was regretting her choices. Celestia was never one to give out sentiments considering the nature of her position. It was simply easier to keep ponies out of reach, out of sight. However, even as she tries to push Twilight away she comes back so seamlessly through a soft hug, a smile, or a gleeful hop after mastering a new spell. She had quite a soft spot for her faithful student.
“Okay Princess, are you ready to start?” The shopkeeper and expert, Stone Weaver, asked beside her with a smile. He had his own pottery wheel in front of him to demonstrate, his cutie-mark which bared a pottery wheel, told her that he had lived and breathed pottery his whole life.
“Yes, what shall we do first?” She asked, determination flaring up in her eyes.
Stone Weaver smiled and looked down at his own piece of clay and started the wheel, it spun quickly as he brought a small sponge to hydrate the soft clay. Celestia stared intently before doing the same, albeit fumbling with the switch.
“First of all, you want to center the clay by bringing it up and down,” he started, using his hooves he guided the clay to a cylinder and then back to its original size, it was now much rounded.
Celestia followed suit. Step one is easy.
“And then you want to make it into a burger shape like so…” he put a slight pressure into the clay and now it was lying flat. “Next, you want to open it up like so,” Stone Weaver used the tip of his hoof to create a hole in the burger-shaped clay and brought it to the ends, “This will create the base… now pull it in for you walls… and then you want to pull up your walls.”
She nodded, glanced back to her own wheel to do the step, and then glanced back and he was now twenty steps ahead of her. Celestia’s eyes widened at the speed he was going in and she hadn’t even finished her burger.
“Keep pulling up your walls to get the correct thickness and height…” Oh no, he was going too fast, “And then start using this wooded curved tool to make it nice and straight… and voila! I say give it a bit to let it dry and then we can get in with the metal tools to make it smooth!” He said stopping the spinning of the wheel.
Stone Weaver’s content smile immediately dropped when he saw the bits of clay scattered throughout his studio, the source? The pony beside him. “Oh dear,” he mustered.
Celestia simply blinked. Her mug was very un-mug shaped. Very flat. Very non-existent. Celestia cleared her throat before speaking in her friendliest tone to mask her own horror at the atrocious mug, “Don’t worry, I have a spell for this.”
She channeled her magic as she tried to recall Star Swirl’s Amniomorphic spell. Seeing the clay pick itself back up she grinned and began molding it to the proper shape. A proper mug.
“Voila!” She smirked. Stone Weaver shook his head. As a unicorn himself, he, of course, read on the Amniomorphic spell, and instead of implementing its properties, he moved further away from it. Using it felt like an insult to his practice, his art, and his talent. He was always one for traditions.
Still, the fact the Princess took her time to come down to her studio herself during her own break was already amazing. Her initial determination could allow him to ignore the shortcuts.
“Brilliant, Princess,” he smiled. Before quickly fixing a handle for his own mug and lifting it up from its base and bringing it to the giant oven-like contraption behind them. “Now we just need to fire this up in the kiln.”
Using his magic he ignited the wood below the kiln and let it heat up the pieces inside. The pair peered inside the small window, satisfied with her work Celestia stood up and took off her apron. “Well, I suppose I’ll see you tomorrow when the kiln finishes firing the pieces.”
“Of course, Princess. Good work today…. Even if it was barely any work,” he muttered bitterly.
Celestia laughed it off, “Thank you, Stone Weaver, farewell!”
“Goodbye!” He waved.
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Celestia swore she was following the reference photos to a tea. It was just being stubborn.
After her pottery session with Stone Weaver, she had thought it would be a brilliant idea to paint the mug, it would add a touch of personalization! And after all, who would want a plain mug? Thus, when she returned to the castle, she went to the library and checked out a simple foal’s book about great Equestrian heroes. It was because they had simple illustrations. At least that was what she had thought. Her logic was that if she simply copied the drawings and transferred them onto the cup she would have exactly what she was envisioning.
That had not been the case at all.
Stone Weaver gave an encouraging nod as she continued to mess up her drawing of Clover the Clever. Looks more like Cover the Stupid. Celestia thought to herself. Her rendition had it so his cape made up most of his body—a brown blob with elements of some limbs.
Okay. Fine. It looked fine. Celestia thought to herself.
Celestia steadied her grasp on her paintbrush, years of meticulous use of her horn were now so easily betraying her. A dip in the gold paint and just a swirl of the navy should procure the legendary unicorn Star Swirl the Bearded! Minus the beard, of course, it was just a bit too complicated for Celestia’s admittedly ammeter skills.
Her ambitious plan to include all of the heroes of Equestria was failing her, all she managed to etch on were the two unicorns, who could easily be mistaken for Earth ponies.
Celestia groaned while meticulously wrapping her creation in the detailed galaxy print that characterized all of her presents to Twilight. She made sure each constellation had the right number of stars and vertexes, a detail she knew her student would appreciate.
☆ ☆ ☆
“You have one more present, Twilight. I made it myself!” Celestia explained, presenting Twilight with the perfectly wrapped gift.
Twilight took the gift into her telekinesis, her expression faded into confusion. “Princess, you shouldn’t have, you already got me everything I could have asked for!” Twilight said referring to the new updated Equestrian Encyclopedia she got from her mentor, not knowing that was the replacement gift to hide the nature of the mug.
Twilight’s excitement quickly faded away as the beautiful paper revealed what was hidden underneath. Twilight spun the mug around and sighed, “Princess, Star Swirl had thirteen bells on his hat not four,” she explained with a rise of her eyebrow as if it were common sense.
Celestia cleared her voice, masking her embarrassment. “Twilight, where is your imagination? The picture is two-dimensional, the other nine bells are obviously on the other side young one!” Celestia argued.
Twilight laughed and fell into Celestia for an embrace– which resulted in a surprised ‘humph’ from the alicorn not expecting the warm physical affection. Twilight has always been quite cuddly.
“No, it’s perfect, Princess. Thank you very much,” she laughed.
Celestia pulled Twilight closer to her, wrapping her wings around her, and whispered, “You’re welcome, my faithful student. Happy Hearth’s Warming.”