Keith was held from all sides. Hands even reached the bed and the wall to stabilize the process. He wailed as much as he could, unable to fight against Show's gigantic strength. On the bed just above him, another child wasn't sleeping. He could become the witness of Keith's pain, but he knew something abnormal was happening in his room, therefore he chose to not look behind him, as the pitch black strands of darkness crawled on the sides of his pillow millimeter by millimeter.
Keith bled. The shadow opened its maw to lick every bit of it in order to not leave any stain. Once the procedure done, he entered the wound to close it from the inside. He held both sides of the wound together until it healed, like he did with Keith's head.
The coin was stuck under the kid's ribcage, where the cartilage was soft. The thin layer of muscle made it impossible for it to touch the stomach.
In the morning, nothing had changed. While Keith questioned himself about the experiment's purpose, everyone had yet to notice the missing treasure.
He touched his upper belly, but the tissue was tightly stitched and only the swelling of a scratch remained.
'What did you expect to happen? At least we have the coin in a well hidden place, but it'll hurt like hell to extract!' He thought, knowing that for object not going through his digestive system, things wouldn't be naturally ejected from his body.
'I wanted to see if it was possible to see another ghost, like Randi was. It either won't work or an ingredient is missing. I just have to figure what's going wrong.' Said the curse expert. He first thought about Keith's blood in which the curio's stone bathed daily. But because nothing happened, it had to be something else.
The kid was in the middle of the cave, discussing with other children when a hand came from the inside of his mouth to brush his tongue from bottom to top. His sudden nausea and queasiness were almost expelled from the boy's body with a puke. He rushed to the hole they used as a toilet only to have his wound reopened.
Show brushed the skull coin with the saliva he had collected.
The acid on it attacked the kid's skin, it stopped after the slim layer of fat it laid in.
The burning sensation lasted five minutes during which Keith panted heavily.
Nothing. Nothing changed. Besides the three people that gathered around the door and the pain from the wound, everything remained the same.
"Are you okay? Is it because of the food?" asked Evander.
"No, the food was perfect. It's nothing don't worry." Keith answered, he heaved a sigh once the attention on him lessened.
In the corner of his eye, he spotted the silhouette again.
This time, it did not hide behind a support, instead it walked in the middle of the room as if it was his. It was a man in his forties. He had wet hair down to his neck, brushed backwards. His nose was pointy and his right ear was not intact, as if the top of it had been cut off.
His clothes were covered in dirt and their thickness covered most of the man's corpulence, yet when he walked, everything he wore seemed to float along his body.
He advanced slowly toward the plank where the coin had been exposed until now and suddenly, his stupefaction could be read on his face. The man's two eyes, now locking onto every faces wouldn't blink once. He was obviously looking for someone. He punched on the plank where the coin once stood, the sudden noise made few jump. The ruckus aggravated when someone understood the coin was gone as more came into the room.
Soon, everybody was in the room but Maverick.
Keith noticed how abnormal the man was when someone passed through him. The man's body distorted and reformed the next instant. When his eyes met Keith's, the sole person paying attention to him, and the anger emanating from his eyes vanished. The kid was wide eyed, what kind of trickery did he just see? He could feel Show's coldness pulsating under his shirt to urge him to do something. Move? Speak? No idea.
The man's lips moved without a sound for an instant, he put his hand to his forehead as if fever blurred his thoughts. "What's the meaning of all this?" He managed to ask. No one paid attention.
There was no greed in the kid's eyes. Were those even eyes? Nothing reflected in it! Not the golden shine he was looking for nor the greediness he pursued. Where was the treasure he came for? Not even a shine to spot and yet his senses tickled him to go for the kid with the green eyes.
He walked toward Keith who had not moved, he passed next to every kids as if nothing could reach him. His posture made him look taller than he was, nearly reaching 190 centimeters. He spoke.
"Why did you steal the coin if it's not to feed your greed? Is it not cupidity? Do you have kleptomania or something? I am not supposed to haunt lost souls for such petty things! The captain is going to be mad if you don't return it quick! Put it place on the place it belongs at once!" He said. It was obviously not the first time he was dealing with a young thief.
To others, Keith stared in front of him, his funny attitude was disregarded as most thought he was a little sick.
"Are you looking at me or...?" Asked the man, he moved his head around to check how good he was being watched, yet no matter where he moved, the kid looked at him in the eyes.
Keith nodded. "Yes, you are very strange." He said, his words were hard to hear under the commotion, and his sentence had no sharp words, yet it shocked the old man.
Ardi. A pirate whom life had stopped five hundred years ago, got an answer from someone else than his crew. He never lost hearing, he heard everyone's conspiracies and stories for centuries, be it a couple's dispute or the mockery from a crewmember. Never in his death had he felt so good. The slightly hoarse voice from the child who stole the coin of greed felt like a gentle medley.
It took him several seconds to understand how funny it was to start a conversation with someone new. His daily job as a treasure keeper had variations indeed. Each time he pursued a thief, he would provoke either the return of the coin or the person's death. In this specific house, many children had gone missing, it happened once and twice a year. No one bothered looking for the ones disappearing because of the city's nature. Crime crawled evenly day and night.
Ardi had strict instructions, return the coin to his rightful owner. No matter the cost, no matter the time it takes. Eternity sure is long. After slaying hundred of lives during their lifetime, most of the crew were bound to the wealth they had accumulated.
In the ghost's grey world, only gold shone to help them seek their goal. But today, the man did his best to not jump for joy. The shiver that climbed up his spine made him nervous, as if the kid could vanish in front of him. Keith had become something more precious than his tarnished fortune.
He was frightened. Not because he was scared. Because he didn't know what to do, he was excited!
'What in the seven seas is happening! By the Bermuda triangle, this can't be possible!' He thought. For most of his existence, he thought he had lost sight. At least for other people, the slow acceptance of himself, being invisible and non-existent to others broke his soul long ago. But now he could feel the wind. He could rejoice of his new shiny pearl.
Once he regained his composure, he managed to speak again. Poking his arm to check if he could feel pain anew too, he approached the kid as well.
"I'm Ardi! One of Gentius' subordinates! What's your name young one?"
"I'm Greenie." He said, not paying attention to the panic behind them. Around the place where stood the cursed object, people begun to point at each others. Maybe they would get more to eat if their words held enough truth.
Gentius' name didn't rung a bell to the kid who hadn't listened to the full story Evander bothered repeating weekly. Yet it was the most famous name of the city.
It was a king in his youth. He came from a far away kingdom and conquered the seas with a huge fleet. He abandoned his country to keep all the gold he gathered for himself. His avarice drove his last ship to the city, as it did for many of his pursuer who battled until every head fell on the ground.
"Mind to follow me outside Greenie? I have to introduce you to my friends! They'll be happy to meet someone with a sight as good as yours! Maybe they'll be kind enough to make you one of those coin owners, we'd pay you a visit more often! By the way, where did you put it?" He asked, kneeling next to him. His tone was soft and even though he had many scars twisting his face, he looked plain.
Keith lifted his shirt and pointed as his horizontal wound, making the man lift his eyebrows.
"Bahaha!" He sneered loudly. "So bold! Come outside once the night falls, I'll be waiting for you next to the so called secret doors your boss uses. They're going to love you!" He said while waving his hand and passing through a wall.
'Pull your shirt back kid, before anyone sees you.'
The agitation was still high and soon, the kids begun to brawl.
Evander knew he needed more than his voice to calm them down and joined the fight, using less than half his full strength.
Keith was still in his reverie when a punch landed in his nose.