Chapter 593: Chapter 593 - Plain Trust Is The Only Gift Whose Origin Story Matters Less Than The Danger Of Its Continued Existence

Her husband-wife had once confided in her that the act of giving something to someone who already wanted nothing else but your presence - a situation between them that was quite clear to the young and learning-to-be-a-good-partner Qat - felt like a *peculiar* kind of generosity. When anything would be acceptable, everything looked insufficient... except the most personal of gestures. Which is how the iridescent wax seal set came to mind, in particular.

Elua had in turn told Qat that when your wife told you anything was fine, she really meant for you to do your best on your own. The thought and effort - and often the story behind its procurement - were eighty percent or more of the importance of getting a gift from someone you would love either way. Which is also why she felt a lot of her own gifts weren’t as big of a deal as others might think.

Often they were whims with schemes layered post-origin, not deep thoughts with affection behind them. Even more often the effort employed was a fraction of what it would be for anyone else, so she didn’t even count a lot of them as hard work. Most importantly, the *real* story behind them was generally fake. Which made it, in some ways, more like the same surplus alms-giving she tended towards that placed her heart on the ’good’ side of the overall sea of morality.

"These came from somewhere I am not at liberty to describe in detail. I can only assure you they were not stolen. Do with them what you will - make pieces to your hearts content, sell them, display them for future commissions. They are yours with no strings attached."

But that didn’t mean she believed that what she chose for them was entirely thoughtless, she wouldn’t give a jeweler raw materials for a woodmaker. Nor did she do it without enjoying the looks on people’s faces. Which is why, as the older woman did not say anything immediately to her final clarification, she just let her stare at one of the pink points of rhodonite. With the frozen stillness of someone afraid to accept what was being given.

"Lady Goltbred, this is far too much."

A small, calm smile on the brunette’s lips hid the glee of a provocateur while the jeweler took another few seconds to recover her composure... from the weaponized charity. Finally, the woman nodded once before setting herself to a walk, patting her hand briefly on Onya’s head before taking her position on the shopkeep’s side of things.

The girl had gotten bored on the third explanation of her sister being a forceful benefactor, when the woman finally unsteadily stormed to the front door and *locked it*, and she drifted over to peer at the glass display cases. Though they weren’t designed for six year olds, so she found herself having to push up on her tiptoes to see properly. And repeat to herself not to climb them, to behave!

"Can I help you find the perfect piece, little miss? What is your favorite color?"

"Uhm... uh..."

Growing nervous, she tried to hide her movements while using one hand to point at her own eye and the other very conspicuously over her back where Elua stood watching the interaction. The message was clear enough - a color like her sister’s eyes. Onya started looking down at her own shoes rather than meeting that woman’s smile. She hated when mom and her friends smiled at her like that!

’They always call me precious. I don’t want to be precious, you put precious things away!’

"I have several pieces made with stones in that range. Come around to the back and I will show you."

The ancient cultivator had to suppress a chuckle herself as she nodded fiercely then looked back at her with worry that she had been found out. Seeing the sister that was usually so cheerfully shameless about everything else, she couldn’t imagine why Onya thought she would disapprove. After all, she loved her own eye color - and Qat’s too.

’Maybe I should get something with a brown stone myself, for it would be funny if I somehow imply it was because of our father, to him, and then pull the rug out from under that pride he raises up all by himself.’

The fact that she was also thinking about getting *two* of them - one for representing both him, sincerely, and her sister before quickly hiding her dad’s *real* one somewhere... maybe insetting a ’friendly Crystal’ on her weapon, she considered... wasn’t actually worth mentioning. To anyone. Ever!

When she caught up, the jeweler had already reached beneath a drawer-lined workbench and withdrawn a velvet-lined tray. Upon it was a selection of crystals and stones that held the same bluer-green tones to them that she had used in a number of jewelry pieces for the Goltbred women. Some were set into placeholder mounts to show how they could become rings or pendants, others lay loose to be picked up and examined.

Peridot of a different color and clarity than what she had just been brought was the centerpiece of two of the ready to mount options - almost translucent seafoam green instead of the olive-brown. A small piece of gem-quality jadeite was polished into an ovular cabochon beside it, which Elua immediately decided to purchase for herself (or for Qat).

Beside those, other notable pieces were bright spheres of pale chrysoprase... the milky-opaque chalcedony usually valued for its more vibrant apple-green quality, but half of them she had prepared did have the right mix of nearer-cyan appeal which often meant they held lower nickel content in the quartz mixture. A *notable* chromium content that could arguably make it a different ’type’ of chalcedony, depending on how finely any given society wanted to classify things for the sake of marketing.

There also sat an uncut minty stone, a tsavorite garnet whose interior color the jeweler was sure would have incredible fire to it once worked. Elua intended to buy that too, and was not going to allow her to give it away despite all the stones she brought. Most people preferred the more expensive emerald color greens to the gem, so she had indeed been holding it for the right buyer ever since the end of the Descent - when a needy family sold it to her.

She still paid them much more than it was worth, considering its origin only had a ’grandfather found it’ story that didn’t hold up too well based on what she knew of where this variety was generally mined on the continent. Partly because their village had been ruined thanks to a rampaging Leader-class leading a swarm straight through it. Partly because even suspect stories sometimes turned out to be true. And the right buyer could mean, to her, the person willing to cut her in on a potential new mining site once properly explored.

All that aside, Onya was given a small stool the jeweler used to reach the top shelves so she could more easily see everything laid out on the high table. While she looked, more samples were brought up that were not the color she wanted but were complete pieces - rings, bracelets, necklaces, barrettes, all the usual adornments that a girl might enjoy.

"These are all real pretty."

Both hands hovered over everything, in that way of someone who knew that they were not supposed to touch anything without asking. From experience of having her hands whacked super softly by Aurehl, when she used to grab for the woman’s completed embroideries. Which might be the reason she didn’t like learning to sew now, though she didn’t like learning so many things in the first place!

"They are. You are welcome to examine them, I will wipe them down well."

"Oh. Thank you."

The little girl wasn’t shy this time and picked up the peridot, turning it back and forth in the lantern light. She wasn’t sure she liked the translucent ones as much as the solid opaque colors that seemed more substantial, but the step-cut stone caught the light exquisitely and threw shifting glints onto the velvet below. It looked like a really *adult* piece. After a moment of staring at the different jewelry mounting options she’d been shown, Onya set it back down with care.

And a bit of annoyance at herself.

"...I would lose this. I run around a lot. I play."

The jeweler nodded at the child. The way a craftsperson would who was taking *anyone’s* concerns entirely seriously. Elua felt a small additional warmth for the other party sprout inside her, for she could analyze the spirit of the other woman and tell that she genuinely intended on treating her sister as a person. As a customer - and not just one of affluent standing that she was trying to rake the most money from.

That was a quiet test of character that even in this peaceful era, not everyone easily passed... or so she had found. And while there was no actual question in her heart before then whether this certain jeweler deserved her patronage and benevolence, it was more satisfying proof that she made a good decision today. Seeing this look on her again, now aimed at someone other than her own young self back when El first showed up to shop here...

"Elua, can you just pick something for me?"

"Oh, why is that?"

"Er. If I have to just put it away somewhere... then I don’t want to choose it myself. That feels sad."

’So it’s okay to put it away if I pick it? What a casually vicious little girl~’

"I see. What if there was a way to have pretty things like these that you did not exactly have to take off as an *extra* step when you were busy being yourself?"

Onya considered this with a scrunching face. If there was a way to do that, why couldn’t she think of it?!

"How do you wear but not take off... are you saying that thing you... I mean, that I should glue some stones to myself like the time-"

"No. Not like that. And never do that to your poor skin again. You just attach it securely to something else that travels with you, but a thing that you would likely already be taking off during your play."

"Like what?"

"Bag charms are not as popular inland, but they are quite fashionable on the eastern and southern coastlines. Or were five years ago."

"An excellent idea, Lady Goltbred. I do have some pieces that could work with that, but what were you thinking?"

The jeweler reached to a different drawer, with great memory of her stock, and produced a small example she’d already made - a decorative drop featuring a little white stone with a silver chain running through it. A locking clip had been added on the top end, designed to attach to the outside of a bag or a belt... similar to the way a smaller form version might hang off of an ear.

She held it up so Onya could see how it worked, and the girl *finally* arrived - despite living in a house with Crystals inset just about everywhere - at the deep realization that such expensive decoration was not exclusively the property of the body (or the furniture/shelves). Running out of the room to grab the white leather rucksack she had placed down by that first table when they came in, she held it up fiercely and then realized late that she lacked the hands now to point.

"I want one for my bag!"

Kicking her foot, in the general direction of the minty chrysoprase on the drawer, it made the brunette watching over her antics chuckle. Of course, the elder sister had been expecting her not to *settle* for the white stone on a white bag, but the speed and execution that showed off her strong desire and opinion was still endearing. The jeweler’s eyes lifted toward the laughing Elua to double check - the child still was a child after all, and their guardian with ultimate say was clearly the sister.

"This design as is, except the stone change? Or should we personalize it further?"

"What do you think, little one?"

"I trust you. Make it even better for me."

Delivered with such casualness, Onya did not yet understand how heavily the first three words might ever land on the reincarnator. Except during times of hiding, when she lived in secrecy that usually didn’t stay all that secret for long (when you never seemed to age)... Uvraneht had spent her life mostly ’trusted’ by people only because of how dangerous she was. That was what relationships between cultivators took the shape of, for her.

But her artisan work for mortals in those ’hiding my cultivation’ times had many genuine moments of pride woven in. So many really did trust her to hand them quality goods and not waste their money and hopes. Elua’s smile as she copied the jeweler’s first design into an illusory blueprint, and began to iterate on it over the representation shining in her hand... was the small sort of ’happy-sad’ complicated one that she didn’t show in public, usually.

"I will, dear. I’ll do my best to make everything better for you."

That included this gift, as well as the reason she was ’kidnapping’ the girl soon in the first place. She had her pride as a sibling on the line. No matter whether her parents fully agreed with the need to do things the way she planned to go about them... or not.