I don't usually post three blog entries in a row, but those pesky Library minions are keeping me way too busy. As if I don't have enough to do already.

The subtle waves swept onto the shoreline, lapsing peacefully back upon the ocean from whence they came. The wind was brisk and light, with the most indistinguishable of salty tangs to the air. The sea, such as it was, was slowly and forthrightly climbing onto the shoreline, doing its best to slowly eat away at the footsteps that so marred the sand.

"You think this is such a good idea?" came a whispered call. A gruff grunt and a brusque shrug was all the response that he got.

"Just a little more up ..."

The sheer, striated rock wall that had consistently been around a hundred yards from them took a bend, sharply descending into a mess of boulders as it met with the sea. Beyond it, the two adventurers saw, there was wood.

In the dim light of the waxing moon, and the modicum of light that the stars around it provided, golden points of light twinkled on the sand.

"This is it. That's the shipwreck."

"Looks like it was yesterday ..."

The more ambitious of the two slid down the sand that coated the greatest of the boulders, leaving his own heavy boot prints on the soft and easily scarred sand.

They were gold-diggers, at heart. They couldn't help it; it was in their genes and in their blood. Gold intrigued them and enticed them as few vices could, as addictions that they could not break themselves of.

"Gold!" the taller, more bearded, and slightly denser of the two yelled. As obvious as this was, this only served to excite them further. Fumbling with their crowbars for a few moments, they cracked open chest after chest, uncovering priceless amounts of riches in one after another.

They were like two little boys in a candy store, heaping piles of gold about themselves, garnishing their garish and unrestricted piles with silver, crowns, jewels, and precious minerals. Easily tired, they collapsed onto beds of riches, thinking their goldbrick selves to be set for life, if they figured out how to cash in on this hunch. And how hard could it be? They were quite literally sleeping on gold ...

***

The next morning, the sea had rushed up to the rock wall that it, so long ago, had hewn. Seagulls flew over, rushing down only occasionally to eat something.

Far above, where the last bits of sand ran out and the lushness of trees began, bits of rotted wood floated away, small coins coming with it.

Treasure, such as it was, was theirs forever, down where no one would ever reach again.