Not Bad For A Day's Work

Fairy powers manifested around the time they turned thirty but what they looked like when they were born always matched what they would be. For example, Flora's hair was green and made of vines and she had skin the color of tree bark.

Ruby's case was so bizarre that her parents had no idea what her powers would end up being until they appeared on her thirtieth birthday. She had been out digging holes in the backyard, loving the dirt as all earth fairies do, when the earth began to shake.

Her parents felt it and came out to see what was wrong immediately only to find their daughter buried under a mountain of jewels. It took a while to dig her out and realize what happened.

Simply by sitting on the ground, Ruby had summoned every jewel beneath the earth for miles. Buried treasure…jewels in mines…natural mineral deposits. She had control over any stone that came from the earth.

She couldn't do pearls because those were grown inside clams. That was outside her jurisdiction but everything else was fair game.

It took her years to realize the full extent of her power. Not only could she summon existing jewels from wherever they were, she could create them in her hands  if she had the building blocks they were made of at her disposal.

Ruby had the power to manipulate metal too so she could make jewelry using the precious stones she collected. She wasn't very good at that part yet and could only do simple chain pendants and such but she would get it down with practice.

She didn't like practicing in front of other people. That was what landed her in this mess in the first place.

Flora hadn't meant to get her in trouble. She had stumbled across Ruby practicing her jewelry creation a few years ago and thought it was so cool she had to tell her parents. She wailed apologetically afterwards once her parents realized the implications of what she could do.

They got a couple of her pieces appraised and were shocked to discover how valuable they were. Worth thousands of dollars each.

Flint and Lily encouraged her to keep practicing and refining her skills. Eventually she figured out what they wanted. A multimillion dollar stone. That wouldn't be happening any time soon.

But thousands of dollars was nothing to sneeze at. They were simply greedy. Ruby could get by perfectly fine with her ability as long as she did it the smart way. Hence her disguise. Jewelry appraisers and trustworthy pawn brokers were more likely to trust a classy old man than a casual young woman.

She tried to think about how much she would need to pay for all the castle's repairs. Pawning everything all at once wouldn't work either.

Humans were suspicious creatures by nature; they would think she had stolen them. It had happened before and she had to hightail it out of the pawn shop. To make this work, she would need to sell only a few stones a day using different disguises for a while.

Ruby would be grounded for about three weeks anyway. That would be more than enough time to sell gems and jewelry off and get a good start on castle renovations. Then she would be free as a bird to go wherever she pleased.

She wasn't entirely sure where she would want to go though. She had never really been accepted anywhere when she wasn't wearing her glamour. Even around her own family, she wore it 24/7. Her wings were allowed to be free occasionally but not often.

Ruby snapped herself out of those thoughts. She needed to focus. It was time to get to work.

She ended up making a pair of diamond and ruby earrings and a sapphire bracelet. Simple enough for Day 1. She knew a good jeweler in town too who would be able to appraise these for her. As long as Flint and Lily didn't catch her, she would be golden.

They might be checking jewelry stores and pawn shops, knowing her power, but they also might be operating under the assumption she had gotten very far away from here since they didn't know about her wing.

Her glamour should be secure but one thing she couldn't do was hide her wings' existence. The glamour showed people what the caster wanted them to see but couldn't physically change characteristics.

Ruby's pointy ears, long curls, and wings were still there underneath the disguise. If a fellow fairy bumped into her back, they would know she was wearing a glamour for sure. She would have to be very, very careful.

She had done this before. If she kept up her carefully crafted rich man persona, she would be fine. Confidence was key in these sorts of situations.

Thankfully, Ruby was able to complete the transaction without any difficulties. The earrings got her $6,500 and the bracelet yielded $4,300. Not bad for a day's work. Her skill was getting a little better.

She thanked the appraiser and changed her glamour again so she looked like an elf when she went to the fairy cleaning service run by her acquaintances Wendy and Breeze Gale. She couldn't slip up and let them know she was there; they might tip off her aunt and uncle.

Today was seriously her lucky day. They fell for it and agreed to meet her at a certain spot in the woods later in the day so she could bring them through the barrier.

She figured she should have the extermination taken care of before bothering to get things cleaned though. The Gales' place was closer than the werewolf extermination agency she knew of.

They were eager at the prospect of killing something bigger than insects for once and followed her out to the woods eagerly. She had to go inside the barrier and pull them through for it to work—she had read about blood barriers before—but that was easy enough to do.

"We should be done in about an hour, ma'am," Andrew Wolverton said politely before leading his gang of eager and unruly subordinates into the castle.

Ruby wondered briefly if she should have warned them there was a vampire inside who might get cranky if he was woken up. But Ash had told her to do whatever while he was asleep. It should be okay, right?