Picture of something beautiful

Four hours and five wrong turns later, Gerald reached the edge of the Temple Gardens. Breathtaking statues of translucent amber spaced out like a giant chess board extended out before him. Tall, hooded mushrooms as big as trees provided shade; every surface seemed covered in scripture written in Stollick. For the first time in a long while, Gerald felt at home. Cadbury scratched about for bugs.

He was so excited that he forgot himself, and reached out and touched the cool amber. Part of the statue, which was shaped vaguely like a dragon, became clearer, revealing scraps of parchment contained within. Gerald was so excited he barely remembered to lift up the camera and take a shot before the amber became opaque again.

"Hey Dyson, whacha doing?" Ilrica asked as she walked by, carrying a stack of tablets.

Gerald touched the statue again and looked within. "This is part of the fifth scroll. Like, the original fifth scroll written by the hand of Soeck himself."

Ilrica looked much better now. Freshly showered and rested. She saddled up alongside him, nearly knocking him over, and looked at the scroll fragments within.

"Sacred scroll, eh?" she asked, unimpressed.

"Have you ever read them?"

"I skimmed 'em. I thought the movie was better."

Gerald looked around in wonder. "I never thought I'd have the chance to make the pilgrimage here. Chanterelle was the site of one of the original three temples. Some of these blocks were laid down by the earliest Stollicks to achieve enlightenment." Gerald took a step back and pointed at the cobblestone beneath them. "Why, Soeck himself could have stood on this very spot where we are standing."

"If he did, he was standing in poo."

Gerald looked down and realized that he had stepped back into a large dropping. Ilrica laughed as she walked away, while Gerald cleaned off his shoes as best he could against a rock. Cadbury chased a bug into a tree and got her head stuck in a knothole.

After freeing his chicken, Gerald made his way further into the Gardens, savoring the peace he found here. He found a really neat spider that had a metallic blue carapace, and took a couple of shots. Next he found his way to the meditation grounds where a perfect replica of the Sesass Falls from Stollick stood.

The air was moist as Gerald walked up to the roaring wall of water. Here at the base, monks would meditate underneath the pounding current and freezing temperatures, to learn how to find peace amid chaos. They were not in use at the moment, but he figured that was probably due to the festival.

Gerald took a few pictures and briefly contemplated using the falls for a time, but it was already midday, and there was no way he was going to miss the chance to participate in afternoon communal prayers. Cadbury pecked at the water striders on the surface, only to fall in and splash around in panic.

As Gerald walked deeper into the temple grounds, more evidence of the festivities became apparent. Sutra Talismans hung from the trees. Prayer streamers were tied around their trunks. Lines of hanging lanterns had been hung between the rows of greenery, ready to be lit when the sun went down.

He saw one tree that nearly took his breath away. Its branches and leaves had been carefully trimmed and cultivated for what must have been centuries, teasing it to grow into the exact shape of Y'tzuma, the Stolleckian symbol for love. He was so entranced that it didn't even register at first to him that one of his classmates was standing underneath it, engaged in a very heated conversation.

"Did I ask you to worry?" Cha'Rolette said coldly into the window floating before her. "You don't worry, that is not your job. You let me worry."

The man on the other side of the window looked terrified.

"The fact is a lawyer can steal more with a lie than a man can with a gun. I don't need big guns on my side right now, I need big liars, you understand?"

"Yes, Duchess."

Gerald brought up his camera to take a picture.

"Oh, Gerald, I didn't see you there," Cha'Rolette said, waving the window away. "Most of the class is at the temple already. I had some family business to attend to."

Gerald checked the focus on the camera.

"What are you doing?"

Gerald looked up at her. "Oh, hi. I was given a chore by Ms. Stubbs. I'm supposed to take pictures of beauty while we're on the class trip."

"Oh, well say no more." She flicked a freshly showered and styled ringlet over her shoulder and took out her makeup kit. "Just give me a second here to primp myself. Let's see, the sky here is violet, so I better go for a natural olive skin tone. If I go for evening smoky eyes, it'll wash out..."

She tapped a few controls and the little machine went to work, opening up like a crab, little hands and pincers going to work, buffing, spraying, and painting.

Gerald finally readied the shot and took it with a click.

"Hey, I wasn't ready," she complained, her compact still reapplying her lipstick.

"What?"

"Give me that."

Her ringlets glowed and the camera was yanked out of his hand. "What are you doing?"

"I have to delete the picture, of course. I can't be seen half made up like this."

She flipped over the camera and tapped a button

"But I didn't..."

The camera projected a holographic image into the air, a perfect capture of the tree with the sun behind it, light shimmering through its branches, and Cha'Rolette's elbow in one corner.

"What is this?" she demanded. "This is just a picture of some dumb old tree."

"Well, of course. I was told to take pictures of beautiful things."

"What is wrong with you?" She yelled, an invisible force smacking him on the face and sending him spinning to the ground.

"That's the second time today," Gerald groaned as he lay twisted on the ground. Cadbury came up and pecked at his ear.

Cha'Rolette raised up a finger, ready to really lay into him with a long-winded lecture, but her communicator chimed. "Ugh, I'll deal with you later, I have to take this call."

As she walked off to find some privacy, she pulled out her handkerchief just in time to catch a tiny feminine sneeze. A nearby statue lifted up into the air, then came crashing back into place.