Down came a blackbird

Drakien Lusk · 01-11-2012, 02:34 AM

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For Ariadne! Sorry, he ran away with me a little. ^^; :: Word Count → 774

After being here for a while, Drakien had decided he quite liked the ghost city. It had a number of brilliant treasures, just waiting to be dug up and hocked. He'd been rummaging for the better part of the day, having found a large bag--some sort of cylindrical shaped thing, nothing like the sacks he was used to, but it had been in a large store filled with metal-and-wood sticks--he recognized them as guns, which he'd only ever read about, but he'd been too wary to pick them up, let alone even think their name, even to himself--and other outdoors-men goods. He'd proceeded to go through the city and pick through everything, grabbing anything that looked relatively shiny or that might produce alcohol, or actually be alcohol, such as the bottle of "Jack Daniels" he'd found that had turned out to simply be better-brewed, if not quite as strong, Moonshine.

Now, on the edges of town well away from the crumbling buildings and eery streets, Drakien had built a small fire, and was setting his loot out before him beside it, glancing up at Breixo curiously to see what he thought of each item. There was a rather flashy necklace, with diamonds--he remembered importing them from Africa, and the jewelry that many European dogs wore incorporated precious stones such as those. He tucked that away in a hidden inside pocket of his cloak for now, running his fingers through the rest of it. Gold and silver rings, though when he tested them with his fingers, the gold didn't bend and break beneath his fingers; he estimated it to be around 14 karat, based on the rings he'd relatively demolished back in Russia; the best gold, he thought. It would fetch him a decent price, he supposed. It could be worn, after all, gold being a softer metal. Luperci had yet to make decent metal jewelry of their own, at least as far as he knew; most of the humans had taken their secrets with them, though he'd found an old book on the road that explained the rates gold had gone for back when the humans had been alive. It had taken a lot of questions, but he, and a few others from the caravan, had figured out the basics--pure gold didn't make good jewelry, was relatively useless, and could be molded easily with only a warm hand. The book had explained the concept of the "karat", but the most Drakien had gotten out of the lesson was that humans would pay more for more gold, and an estimation of about half, or 14 karats, was best.

The silver was relatively the same, all good jewelry--he could probably use it to bribe people, or save it for when he got a mate...pretty things for a pretty mate, he'd learned, would just about buy him out of any punishment. He swept the things back up into his new bag, taking a few of the finer pieces and stashing them strategically on his person and throughout his other things. If he were robbed, there was no way they'd get everything, and he realized he'd have to get a journal like the elders had kept and keep a log of everything he had just to make sure he didn't get robbed. Then he turned back to the rest of his loot. With all the pretties stashed away, there was very little left; a few old books he'd found that looked promising, if a little water-logged, two and one-half bottles of the Jack Daniels he'd found so delightful--so delightful he'd looted the rest of the town drunk, drinking a few mouthfuls whenever he began to sober up and thus losing half a bottle--and some clothes. Those he found particularly useful; it wasn't his style to run around naked, and wearing the same shirt and pants for the last few months had brought him to somewhat despise his lack of a change of clothes. He'd even gotten lucky and managed to find, if not silk like his current shirt, at least a soft, smooth blend of the stuff, and colorful, at that, something he absolutely adored. The jeans, denim if he wasn't mistaken, were also welcome, and he packed them away with a little grin that belied the fact he was still somewhat drunk, flying high on his successes.

Moments later, he'd taken out his lute, and his careless strumming soon turned into much more than banging on the instrument, as a song fell from his fingertips and his drunken singing filled the area.

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