The little intruder had only caused a slight delay. Eld'tide had simply grabbed the cat by the back of its nape again. She hadn't even bothered to put the adorable creature under a spell again. It protested against being woken and handled like that with pitiful mewling but none of us would be so easily swayed. Well, maybe Kaele could be. She looked really torn. But before she had a chance to have a change of mind our friend had disappeared outside again, taking the little intruder with her. She probably had released the cat back into the trees, where it belonged. I could understand though why it might have sought shelter with us for the night. I wouldn't have wanted to spend the night out there either.

Afterwards they had set out to follow the creek, that didn't look a whole lot like a nice little creek anymore, downstream. It was really impressive how it had swelled to what amounted to an angry little stream. Even if I had wanted to, I wouldn't have been able to jump across it. The wild, foaming, gurgling and rushing water was just too wide. I didn't fancy the idea of falling in either. We kept well away from it, to make sure none of us would slip on the steep embankment and fall in. I doubted anyone falling victim to such a fate would ever be seen again.

It took us a while to reach the spot where the overflowing creek flowed into the larger river. The river as a whole too was carrying more water than usual. It wouldn't be too much of a problem though unless it rained even more somewhere upstream. The river's bed was wide, encompassing multiple sidearms separated by marshland and small islands. It must have been more than a league, more likely two from here to the other side as a whole. Even after a storm like the one from last night it was not even near its limit. I could see wide stretches of reddish, muddy river banks to either side of all of the rivers arms.

I turned towards my sister. “Here we are. Which way should we go?” That was only one of a list of questions I had. Currently it was the one of the most imminent concern to us though. No, that wasn't quite right. As I thought about it some more another question rose to the fore of my mind. “And how are we supposed to find some rare, magical metal that none of us have ever seen anyway?” I nodded to myself. Yes, that sounded like an issue that should be properly addressed before we set of on a grand search for some kind of near mythical treasure.

Kaele looked around for a bit, pondering my questions. Then she pointed upstream. “Lets head in this direction. The creek flows into the river in the other direction and I don't want to cross to the other side as it is right now.” That sounded sensible enough. It didn't answer my other question though. She looked uncertain. Maybe she didn't have a clue either? Or did she? Before I could ask again though, she spoke up again. “As for recognizing Illuminium, that should be easy. It glows in a soft light after all. I think something like that should be pretty easy to spot on a muddy river bank. Yes?”

I wasn't too sure about that. It was in the very nature of mud to block out shiny surfaces after all. If there was magical metal to be found we would find no trace of it if it was hidden under as little as a finger or two of mud. I didn't speak up though. I just shrugged my shoulders instead. “Well, lets get going. We haven't gotten all day after all.” I felt that was a necessary reminder. After all we still had to make the return trip to our camp, no matter if we found anything or not. And I wanted to be back before it got too dark to get anything done around the camp.

I didn't want to go hungry either and I doubted we would find any of ingredients we would need for the mentioned sweet buns around here. We needed a contingency plan! I turned to Eld'tide. “Keep your eyes open for any game. A rabbit or two. A small deer. Anything that will make for a decent meal. That way we won't return empty handed no matter what else happens.” She nodded and readied an arrow. Holding the tension for any length of time would have tired her and maybe it would have ruined the bow as well. But with the arrow already on the string she could shoot at a moment's notice.

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Thus we set out on our search for treasure that might not even be there at all. I knew that mining metal usually involved moving vast quantities of rock or earth, even when one was looking for pure washed out metal in rivers and not ore. In a way our search could be called a fools errand. But we didn't let that stop us. We were on an adventure of sorts after all. We had to do some adventurous things. Otherwise we wouldn't have been doing this right. That logic was silly of course. Maybe it brought a smile to my face for exactly that reason as we moved out onto the muddy river bank.

Khuzan grimaced as his feet sank into the red mud all the way up to his ankles. I couldn't quite suppress a laugh. I sank into the mud as well. I even sank a bit deeper, as I was taller and heavier than our Darkelf friend. I didn't mind though as I was barefoot. He on the other hand was wearing shoes and the mud was trying to suck them of his feet with every step. I gave up and laughed out loud. That really looked too funny. The next moment a fistful of mud hit me in the face. That shut me up. Worse, I was knocked over by the surprise attack. I landed on my backside, promptly sinking into the mud a little.

Now my sister was laughing. The eyebrow above my left eye started twitching. “Oh, just you wait!” Eld'tide must have guessed what I was planning as she backed away from Kaele without a word. Just in time too, as the fistful of mud I threw after my laughing sister flew past her, missing its mark. I sent another hand full of red muck flying, but by now Kaele was dodging left and right. For a little while all seriousness was forgotten and we fooled around again like the little kids we no longer were. In the end Khuzan, Kaele and I were pretty much covered in red mud. Only Eld'tide had stayed out of things, keeping a watchful eye out for us instead.

That couldn't last forever though. Not even close. No matter how much we would have liked it to. In truth it probably hadn't been long at all. Most likely not even a fraction of an hour. The sun had barely moved on at all. We wiped ourselves off best we could, which meant that in the end we still looked like misshapen clay golems. Khuzan took of his shoes as well, tying their laces together and wearing them over the shoulder of his shield arm instead. We really needed a bath now, but that would have to wait. Instead we resumed our treasure hunt and we now were a little more earnest about it.

We fell silent as we started to move again. Not because we couldn't have spent all day talking about something or other but because we didn't want to scare any potential dinner away. Somewhere along the way I started picking up some driftwood. Curiously enough it was moderately dry. Maybe because its bark had been shaved off? It couldn't have been out in the sun for more than a few hours. Well, it would serve well enough. Whenever I came across a piece that wasn't too large I picked it up to put it into my pack. Not having to search for firewood once we were back at our camp would save us a little time in the evening.

Before long Eld'tide had brought down two rabbits as well. They had ventured out of the high grass framing the river in many places a bit too far. Now they dangled from a long piece of driftwood that the Gorgon carried across a shoulder. She had bled, gutted and skinned them right then and there. And once she was done with that she had packed them in a thick layer of clay to keep the flies away. She had even mentioned that we could put them into the fire like that. That the clay would keep them nice and juicy as they cooked. I had no idea if she was right, but then, who was I to doubt her. She knew a lot more about hunting and cooking than me after all.

As we reached a particularly large piece of driftwood, the half buried remnants of a true giant of a tree actually, we decided that it was about time to turn around and return to camp. I was all for it. At the last moment Khuzan stopped us. He pointed at the shadow at the base of the skeletal remnants of the tree. “Illuminium glows from within, right?” I stared. So did the others. Without the tree it probably would have been washed away. Without the shadow it cast we might not have noticed. But right there it was. It looked a little like a glowing spiderweb. Kaele broke into laughter and was down on her knees in the blink of an eye to dig this treasure out of the mud. The rest of us grinned as well. Today had turned out to be a pretty good day after all.