Chapter 8 #3
“You’re on.”
* * *
Thursday, May 21, 2167
Casper Mountain
Casper, Wyoming
Upon learning there might be gemstones in the dirt and rock along the exposed rock face, Garnet and Citrine went to work, pawing and digging at anything that might hide something sparkly.
As we had no idea what we were doing and only a vague idea of what we were looking for, we put our heads together while browsing the guide we’d purchased at the store, which explained what sort of gems and minerals could be located at the mine and surrounding sites.
In good news for us, the mere possibility of finding stones excited the carbunclo; with the jewels we’d purchased for them at the store, I held hope they wouldn’t be burdened from disappointment in case they didn’t find anything.
“In good news for us, quartz seems abundant enough, so we should be able to find at least a few crystals even if we don’t find any good gems,” Erik muttered, eyeing where our beasts dug around in the dirt, engaging with each other in a steady stream of chirps, mews, and other sounds.
“I’m hoping we can find an infused stone. They’re useful.”
I eyed my new husband with interest. “That tone makes it sound like you knew about infused stones before coming here.”
“I did. Infused stones are prized by dragons. They enhance abilities. So, in your case, you might get more information from touching a corpse or a murder weapon, right down to knowledge of when something happened. Which you already have to some degree, but it might let you know the time down to the second. You might have a larger range of vision and awareness of who or what is around the victim, things like that. Yellow dragons tend to get the least benefit unless we’re gardening.
Our gardens do really well if we’re carrying an infused stone with us while working.
My father has one, and I fully intend on stealing it for a while when we’re working on our new estate.
Really, I want the stone for you, but I’m hopeful you’ll let me make off with it every now and then.
We will have to take care to make certain we don’t have any infused stones in our bedroom, though, unless you want a large clutch, in which case, we should steal every infused stone we can get our hands on. ”
I raised a brow and regarded him without bothering to mask my skepticism over his motivations. “You want a clutch, and you’re going to try to sneak an infused stone into our bedroom, aren’t you?”
“Just one clutch?” he asked, and he pouted at me.
“Maybe after the case is closed, but not before then.” I pointed at one of the yellow beryls with a hint of orange in it. “I want one of those.”
“Then you better get digging, my beautiful wife. You won’t find it looking in the pages of this guide.” He pointed at one of the lime green stones. “I will be looking for one of those for Peridot. He’s really insecure, so I want to give him a few extra stones so he feels more at home.”
“You better find at least two yellow beryls for Citrine,” I warned him.
“I’m certainly going to try. I’m going to be nice and give you a ten minute head start, as I’m going to be checking over all the types of stones that can be cut so I have practice material.” He moved the guide out of my view and waved me off. “Go play in the dirt.”
Sometimes, like me, Erik needed space, and I recognized that he wanted some time to think without me hovering. And, because Erik was Erik, he wanted me close so he could reassure himself.
I accepted the blame for that, although I refused to feel much in the way of guilt for how things worked out.
I had done what was best for both of us at the time.
With Tourmaline flitting along, I wandered around the area, eyeing the ten to twenty feet of exposed rock face. Heavy machinery had, somewhat recently judging from the damage to the foliage, torn away at the wall, leaving exposed chunks of pale, crumbling rock.
Glints of color betrayed the presence of minerals and gems within. Careful to keep my steps soft, I went to investigate one such glimmer, which was in the lime green Erik wanted for my father’s kitten.
Armed with a small chisel and hammer, I went to work tapping around the sparkly, breaking away the pinkish stone to reveal the treasure it possessed. I suspected the use of a backhoe against the rockface had done most of the work for me, as it only took me a few minutes to wiggle the gem free.
While only half an inch in length, the green stone caught the light, revealing a network of fractures within. I skipped back to Erik with my prize, setting it on the guide he read. “Here is a present for Peridot. You won’t be able to cut it, but there are definitely shiny rocks to be found here.”
Erik chuckled, picked up the stone, and put it in his pocket. “That didn’t take you long at all.”
“The stuff is just embedded right in the rock. I’ll go check on the kittens to see what they’ve found.”
“Well, this is a new reveal, and the mining company only took the most obvious and large stones before allowing us to pay for access. And we paid a premium to get early access, so I’m not surprised you’re finding things.
I’ll be looking for interesting pieces of feldspar to practice cutting with, so at least that way we’ll get back our fee. ”
I reminded myself I dealt with a sneaky yellow hatchling with frugal tendencies. “I’ll save any pretty pieces for your cutting adventures,” I promised before heading off to check on the kittens.
Sure enough, our carbunclo had found sparkling pieces of beryl, all in varying shades of yellow-green to green. I discovered their claws could slice away at the feldspar holding the beryl hostage and that the kittens possessed a startling finesse when it came to digging out their prizes.
I went back to our packs, retrieved pieces of velvet for the kittens, and laid them out on the ground, gathering each one’s pile and setting it safely aside. “If you need another piece of velvet, come let me know, babies.” I rewarded each one with a petting before heading off to my hunting spot.
With luck, the kittens would find more beryls than we did.
And if they didn’t, I foresaw us adding to their hoards until they emerged the queens of our roost. Whistling a merry little tune, I went back to my wall, located another colorful glint in the stone, and went to work extracting it.
Unlike the first one, my second find popped out with only a few taps, came in at over an inch and a half wide but rather squat prism, and possessed the yellow tone I’d desired.
Rather pleased, I went to Citrine, waited for her to drop off her latest find, which proved to be a clear quartz shard, and showed the stone to her.
“Look what I found for you, Citrine. It’s yellow! ”
The kitten squeaked, and she bounded over to investigate my present before erupting into a chorus of mews. I placed the jewel on her pile and petted her head. “Good girl.”
Garnet squeaked at me, and I smiled at my little baby. “I’m going to look for one for you next,” I promised, took the time to pet her and praise her for her tiny pile of finds, and went back to work to appease the hoarding ways of our carbunclo.
An hour into my hunt, Erik joined me, and he eyed the wall I worked on. “I’m surprised you went for the wall instead of the exposed rough material. It’s easier to get the stuff out of the exposed material.”
I gestured at our kittens, who rampaged and built towering mountains of shards on their pieces of velvet.
“I’m leaving that for them. While it seems their claws are suited for this, they’d have to cling to the wall to get at these, where I can just stand here and chisel away at it.
I’m spoiling them. Let me spoil them in peace. ”
He laughed. “Find anything interesting? I noticed you stopped ferrying your finds over to our kittens about twenty minutes ago.”
“I gave them five nice stones each. Citrine got the yellows, and I gave Garnet the yellow-green ones. I also saved five for Peridot, which are all green.” I dug Peridot’s out of my pocket and handed them over before pointing at my fledgling pile of finds.
“I did find a weird one. It’s pink that had a thought or two of going to purple but didn’t.
I’m keeping it. The color is fascinating.
The interesting part was how easy it was to extract from the wall.
Once I located it, it practically fell out.
I almost dropped it because I wasn’t expecting it to just wiggle free.
” I pointed to the section of wall I’d retrieved it from.
“All the other stones from there were the good greens I saved for Peridot. I’m not sure why this one is pink.
” I kept tapping away at the wall, working on extracting the yellow-orange jewel I’d located.
While tiny, it fell into the fierce category.
After a few more taps and a wiggle, I managed to extract it from the stone, holding my prize up to the sunlight.
Unlike most of my stones, I couldn’t spot any flaws in the light. “Oh, this one is nice.”
Erik came to investigate, peering at the gem. “You’re right, that is nice. Show me your pink one.”
I handed him my latest find before going to my pile and locating the stone, which was a little longer than my index finger and an inch wide with both ends of the prism intact. “It doesn’t have much in the way of flaws, either, but I think I want to keep this one as it is. It’s too pretty to cut.”
Erik whistled, taking my prize and holding it up. “Yeah, I wouldn’t want to cut this one, either. This is nice. I have no idea if it’s actually valuable, but it’s gorgeous. You should definitely keep this one for your hoard.”
I nodded, and as I’d already given him Peridot’s presents, I put the gem into my pocket. “Then it’s settled. I have found my first jewel for my hoard, and I will invite our parents over for dinner sometime next week to show them my prize.”
“Spoken like a proper and proud dragon,” Erik praised. He pointed at a nearby section of wall, which showed evidence of having been scraped at with heavy machinery. “Can I hunt there?”
“Sure. I haven’t looked there yet, and I have plenty of little sparklies to find here. And if I run out of sparklies, then I will become worried and locate a new section of wall to play with. When are we leaving?”
“The sun will be going down in three hours, so I want to be heading back to the SUV in two hours. I have flashlights, but that should give us enough time to get back before we have to hike in the dark.”
Two hours worked, and at the rate I pulled gems out of the wall, if we stayed any longer, we’d break our backs. “That sounds good. May the best rockhound win.”