The doors opened onto darkness.

They were too deep into the cave now for the light to penetrate from outside, and only the faint glow from the magical-bridge in the previous room behind Horatio caught a few hints of something twinkling inside this new one.

‘I can’t see,’ he announced to the others. ‘It’s too dark.’

‘I’ll help with that, lad,’ said Primus, barging past him rudely. ‘Fire,’ the mage said quietly, holding out his hand, and a little flickering orange flame appeared atop it, giving light to the room.

Horatio’s eyes stretched wide.

‘Oh my…’ said Primus.

His fire spell had lit another circular chamber of stone, but this one was piled high with heaps and heaps of gold pieces, gemstones and jewels.

They glittered.

‘GOLD!’ yelled Egea, running past the two men. ‘I knew it! Haha!’

Before anyone could stop her, she dived forwards into the nearest heap, sending coins and jewels scattering everywhere, which winked with rainbow-lights in the glow from Primus’s fire spell.

She emerged from the pile and twisted around to face them. ‘We’re rich!’ she exclaimed gleefully. ‘At last! Yipee!’ In her excitement, she had lost her expensive feathered merchant’s hat, which now lay somewhere amidst the hoard.

Egea opened the pockets of her yellow-and-purple silk suit and started to stuff whatever she could get her hands on into them.

‘Slow down, Mistress Egea,’ said Primus. ‘I would be surprised if we had reached the end of this tetrachamber already. Not all that glitters is gold…’

Egea screamed.

‘What is it?’ said Horatio. ‘What’s wrong?’

Egea held out two handfuls to show them from where she lay amidst the treasure.

In her hands were an assortment of dull, grey rocks and pebbles of different sizes, made of the same stone as the cave.

‘They turn to stone as soon as I touch them!’ wailed Egea, looking like she had just found out that several of her close relatives had died. ‘My pockets are all weighed down! And not with gold!’ She broke off, starting to sob.

‘I think you may have missed something, dear Egea…’ said Ceres.

Horatio followed the direction she was pointing in with his gaze.

Beyond the piles of ‘money’, on the wall of the chamber above the top of yet another set of stone doors, was more blue writing, set in the same curly script as before, as if someone had written it with a large quill or somehow with their finger. Horatio had not noticed it until now–like Egea he had been distracted by the shine of the magical fake-gold.

The measure you take is the measure that will be taken from you. The measure you give is the measure you will receive. She is no fool who gives what she cannot keep to gain what she cannot lose.

‘What do you suppose that means?’ said Horatio.

‘Oh, it’s quite simple enough, really,’ said Primus. He nodded towards the merchant. ‘I think Young Mistress Egea knows full well what it means.’

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Egea had gone tight-lipped and silent. Real tears glistened on her cheeks. Does she really love gold that much?

‘Do I have to be the one to do it?’ said Egea mournfully. ‘Don’t any of you have any coin on you? You must do, old man?’

‘Of course I do,’ said Primus, ‘and less of the “old man”, please. But I don’t think it will work if I do it. You are the thief–ahem, I mean, the trader. The architect of the chamber even made the inscription refer to a woman. It’s like they knew that you would be the one to overcome this challenge. Or maybe it changes depending on who is in the chamber. It matters not: I think needs to be you. But I will try for you, anyway. I suppose I can spare a coin or two…’

Horatio watched as Primus rummaged around inside his red robes with his free hand, took out a couple of glinting coins, and tossed them onto the treasure heap.

Nothing happened.

Was Horatio the only one who had no idea whatsoever what was going on? He looked over at Ceres and quirked a questioning eyebrow at her when she met his gaze. The priestess shrugged. She didn’t appear to know what was going on either. At least they were ignorant together.

‘Yes, I’m afraid it will need to be you,’ said Primus.

Egea wailed again.

What in Gard was going on?

Before he could ask out loud, Egea stood up amidst her gold pile, one hand stuffed into the folds of her suit, and said, ‘And I’m really going to lose it, aren’t I?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

Egea was still a long moment, staring at nothing.

Then she appeared to make some sort of decision, spun round, and drew her hand out of her suit, flinging a money pouch into the pile of treasure. Coins spilled out of the top of it and over the others already in the pile.

As they landed, the strangest thing happened. Not only did the coins from her purse visibly lose their glow and golden colour as they landed, turning into dull stone, but the other coins and gems that they struck turned into stone too, a whole section of the gleaming hoard transforming into pebbles. And not only that, but as they did so, the other piles of gold in the room seemed to shrink, reducing in size, so that more and more of the opposite wall and the doors set in it became visible, reflecting the light of Primus’s fire.

Horatio stared with an open mouth. This was even more incredible than a magic bridge appearing out of nowhere in response to a prayer.

Without pausing, like she was getting it over with as quickly as she could, Egea continued to throw more pouches and purses onto the shrinking treasure heap, and then fists of loose coins which she kept about her person. Apparently she had quite a lot stashed in there.

As she threw more and more of her money away onto the treasure-pile, Egea began to cry again.

‘Damn it all!’ she cursed between sobs. ‘Damn this magical tetra-whatever! Damn my plucky proactiveness for wanting us to go on this stupid side-quest! There better be really good treasure at the end of this!’

‘I’m sure there will be!’ Primus called back encouragingly over the sound of clattering coins. ‘Something we “cannot lose”!’ he added, quoting the writing on the wall.

At last, Egea finished throwing her coins.

The treasure hoard had completely disappeared, leaving only a small collection of pebbles littering the floor.

The last of Egea’s sobs faded away, just as her money had.

‘Thank you, Eg–’ Ceres began.

‘Don’t!’ yelled Egea at once. ‘Don’t anyone talk to me about this ever again! Just go through the damn doors!’

‘Right you are,’ said Horatio, keen to dissolve the tension. He walked across the pebbled ground to the next set of doors. ‘Are we ready for the group of monsters we know are going to be waiting for us in the next room?’

The air gusted a little around Egea, rippling her red hair where she stood with her empty fists bunched together, her jaw set tight. ‘Let me at them,’ she said.

Horatio opened the doors, and sprang back as the monsters poured out of them, apparently as eager to escape the room they had been inside as they were to attack the party.

Random Battle 4!