About A Fair Trade
by BA Tortuga
31 pages
Available file types - html, lit, pdf, prc
Sometimes you find magic in the most unexpected places. That's what Cotton Myer finds out when he discovers a pair of ravens trying to steal his belt buckle and spurs. When the birds turn into men before his very eyes, he knows his little watering hole in the desert is no ordinary pool.
Kaya and Kasa have been collecting treasures a long time, but Cotton is the finest one they've ever seen. Can they learn to trust enough to keep him? Collect Turquoise today!
Sample
Shiny.
There was something shiny down there. Kasa could see it, sparkling in the late afternoon sun. The object was small, maybe small enough for him and Kaya to take it on the wind, if they worked together. Or maybe they could take it on the ground.
They were not that far from home.
He circled, his wings stretched out, the long flight feathers catching the wind, and he cawed at Kaya. Look. Look at the pretty.
Kaya looked and darted down, spiraling too fast. Always greedy. With people, Kaya was the cautious one. But with the sparkles, he was always too quick to rush in. When Kasa settled on the ground, Kaya was already poking at the shiny thing, a pretty piece of metal, like the jewels their people wore about their necks.
Kasa hopped over and pecked at it, his eye drawn again and again to the silver and stone sheen of it. He looked at Kaya and Kaya looked at him, and together they tried to lift it, but it was too heavy. Kaya made a sad sound, poking at it with his beak, and Kasa preened him for a moment, soothing him.
They both hopped back to stare, and there were more sparkly things a little way over. Ooooh. Look at that. He left Kaya and went to perch on a boot, staring intently at the bright little wheel attached to it.
Oh, he could have that, too.
His claw worried at it, and when Kaya fluttered down beside him, Kasa pecked at his brother. No. His prize. His.
Kaya squawked, but left him to it, poking his way back to the big, square shiny thing.
There was no way they would get both back home as they were.
They would have to...
The sunlight glinted on something else, too, in the river. Something less shiny, but just as interesting. Kasa ran at Kaya to keep him away from the sparkly wheel, then fluttered to the riverbank to look at the man.
The wet man.