Hopeless Love

6-I Really Like Scavenging

I woke from my dream of swimming with Sebastian with great reluctance. I sighed as I opened my eyes to the new view of a black tent. I remembered after a few seconds of confusion how we had got it for me yesterday. I sighed again and climbed from the warmth of my bed. I pulled on my socks and boots and left the tent. I screamed when I saw Sebastian exit his tent.
My brain was not so good at processing things in the morning. So when he left the tent, what I saw was this: a tall man, with blood in his hair, a gigantic smile full of razor sharp teeth, and bloody knife being pulled out of a sheath on the psychopaths's waist. Sebastian looked at me with a confused look on his face and my brain reprocessed. I realized the blood was the light of star bugs and he had been putting the knife back into the sheath. His teeth were really sharp though.
I calmed down as I told him, Don't worry. I'm just not good at processing things in the morning. My brain misinterpreted you. He looked at my clothes. I had worn them yesterday. He frowned. You need new clothes, he said to me. I have worn these for ten years, Sebastian. I think I'll be fine, I responded. Yea, but before, you were alone. You couldn't really get new clothes. But now you are here. You have a home again. You have people that care about you. I care about you. I want you to have clean clothes. I want you to have nice things. I want the best for you, he said. We all do.
Tears welled up in my eyes. I hadn't had people to care for me for a decade. Once I find a good source of money and buy back my ring, I will get new clothes. But I don't you buying things for me. Only on my birthday, I promised him.
I needed to shower and clean my clothes. I let Sebastian pull me to the bath pool. He set a cloth for me to dry with on a rock next to the pool. I took off my clothes and changed into my beastia. I carried my clothes over to Sebastian behind a tree. He would clean them for me.
I climbed into the pool and changed into my humanaria. I sank into the warmth of the bubbling hot spring. I closed my eyes and let the warm warm clean years of dirt from my skin. The last time I found a good bath pool was two or three years ago. I sighed and soaked in the warm water. I ducked my head under and cleaned my hair. I shook out my long, jet-black hair above the water. It was a bit lighter now. So was my skin.
"Your clothes are clean, Jet," Sebastian shouted at me. "Okay," I shouted back. I peaked above the edge of the pool. I couldn't see Sebastian anywhere. I climbed out of the pool and quickly wrapped my self in the drying cloth. It was black. I squeezed as much water as I could from my hair. I hadn't cut it since leaving Grimalkin and it was just above the ground now. I glared at my hair. I had wanted to cut it shorter for a while but had never been able to. I walked behind the trees and grabbed my clothes from Sebastian. I hung the cloth from two branches of the tree and changed behind it. My black tank top was now gray, and my shorts were a similar grey, slightly lighter. I pulled on my chest bind and underwear, then my shirt and shorts, and finally my clean socks and my boots. I folded the black cloth and handed it to Sebastian. He put it on the tree branch to dry so the next person could use it.
"What are we doing today," I asked Sebastian. He turned with an excited look on his face. "Today," he said, "we are going scavenging." I smiled, excited.
He walked into his tent, grabbing things for our expedition. I grabbed my bag while he was in his tent. I sheathed the small ebony and onyx dagger I had used to keep myself safe over the years. I had found it a few months after leaving, when I had finally calmed down. I had found a burned down camp, and the dagger was in an iron chest that had survived whatever happened. I had used it ever since.
I walked outside the tent to see Sebastian waiting. He had a black bag that didn't really have anything in it. Mine just had my sack of cockle shells. I had 13. He started walking towards my cliff.
"We're gonna start in an abandoned fairy cave colony somewhere around the bottom of this cliff. I have heard about it for a while but I was...I was too scared to go on my own," he said scratching the back of his head.
"It's okay. Also. I know where that cave is. I found a cave when I got here...actually about three days after I got here. Anyways, I walked into it a bit and there were some little balls that looked like swallow nests? I'm not sure. The ones that look like balls of twigs and stuff hanging off the walls. They looked like those, except with feathers and fur and stuff. That's on the other side," I told him.
He looked a little stunned before he shook his head and started walking around the cliff. I had no idea when we had gotten here. I was too focused on him and talking. I stopped him at the cave. It was about his size which I thought was extremely unfair. He slipped inside the cave and I followed.
I was still mesmerized by the little colorful lumps on the walls of the cave. Some were iridescent, being made of bright feathers, and I had thought they belonged to higher ranking fairies. Others were white and brown, farther down into the cave like the fairies had been trying to hide the uglier houses from view to promote a better reputation.
I took the right side and Sebastian took the left. I reached carefully into the first home. My hand touched something smooth. I closed my hand around it and pulled it out. It was a little chest, about the size of my palm. The other houses all had the little chests as well and I carried my bag over my chest instead of my back. They were all locked and I hadn't found any keys. I met Sebastian at the back of the cave where there weren't any houses. I showed him all the little chests.
"Wow. I found a bunch of gold nuggets. I didn't find any keys though. Maybe they are under the houses or in a little hole in the back of them," he suggested. I looked under the first hole. I found a little tunnel under the house, close to the wall of the cave. It was about the size of my claws. I sighed and set down my bag. I changed into my beastia and stared at Sebastian until he got the message to pick me up. He lifted me towards the bottom of the first nest and i gently reached a claw into the little hole. I snagged something circular with the curve of my claw. I pulled it out and saw a little key hooked onto my claw. I set it in Sebastian's hand. I got all the keys out from the houses I had taken the chests from and looked inside them to make sure there was nothing else.
Sebastian set me down on the ground and I shifted back into my humanaria. I put my bag back on and put all the keys in my bag with the little chests. It was dark now. I slept near the pool at the back of the cave in my lioness form with our bags next to me while Sebastian slept in the luckily saltwater pool in his discus fish beastia.
When we woke up, we walked out of the cave. We sat down in the light of dawn to look at the things we found. The pieces of gold Sebastian had found were perfect spheres, engraved with images of flowers and animals. The engravings revealed a silver layer beneath the gold outside. The most beautiful sphere was also the biggest. It was engraved with a beautiful woman with large wings. I could only assume she was the queen of the fairies, at least the ones who had lived here. Some of the balls were plain, unadorned, and made of iron or copper. They had come from the houses near the back. He said he would keep the engraved ones and sell the rest. There were thirteen smaller ones. One of the plain ones was made of gold, and looked like it would have been engraved at some point before the fairies left.
I gently scooped out the chests and keys. I laid all the chests in a row. Some were gold and engraved like the balls. Others were copper or iron and plain. I looked at the keys. Around the rings they had carvings that matched their chests. In the first chest there was a gold ring, carved with words in a strange language. I opened the next. There was a medallion for a necklace. It looked like a shining white dragon that blew glittering black flames into the air. The other chests had little gold cockle shells and rings and necklace medallions and, in the last, a pair of copper rings, one engraved with a long fish. There was a layer of silver under the copper. The other ring had an engraving of a cat. I hid them from Sebastian immediately. I had a very sloppy plan for those rings.

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Hello land sharks. Hope you liked it. What do you think Jet will do with the rings? °^° See you next week or Friday. What do you guys think of me posting Monday and Wednesday for this story? Merry Christmas!!! 0)