“May I?”
I handed over the length of time polished stone. As long as my hand and slightly thicker than the same, the gem would be a museum piece if I was awake. Ke looked over the gem carefully.
“You know this does exist physically.”
“Gems of that size are a playthings of the rich and the cruel. Not to mention the shape of the stone makes it fragile. If I sneezed while holding it, the jerk would snap it in two.”
Ke handed it back. The cold gem warmed in anticipation of my renewed touch.
“What about [alternative gemstone]?”
“Same size or same shape?”
“Yes.”
“Any solid piece of that size, even if it is potch quality, is going to cost too damn much. And again, it’s long and thin. Fragile. Now, the same shape but much smaller… that’s possible. In either stone. Just depends on cost and source.”
Ke watched me smooth my hands over the piece. Aeons of handling has polished the chip. I wonder if my previous incarnations had also handled this stone and how many that follow would do the same.
“So, why haven’t you bought one?”
“Because I’m not going to plasticize this. I know what the stone represents to me this time, and I know the costs of obtaining a physical representation is going to be more than just my disposable income. I’m not in a position where having the physical thing would make sense for the things that I do. I have it here in the Dreaming. And that’s enough for what it does.”
Shimmering rainbows flared from the suddenly semi-opaque stone. Ke and I watched the activity. Ke, with amusement. Me, with unconscious understanding of what I was reading from the stone.
“And if somehow, some way, a physical representation of that stone winds up in your possession?”
I glared at kir. “Depends on the circumstances. And it would not replace the stone I have here. It would be a reminder of this one. Much like the connection between my green jasper bauble and the Green Stone it reminds me of. I don’t need the physical to touch the ephemeral. This time, anyway.” I turned the spiritual stone over. Pulses of light comforted me. “Besides. It touched me first. I’m not the one controlling this train.”
Ke stood and stretched with a strange smirk on kir face.
“As if you ever were.”
Before I could shout my rebuttals, ke left me and the dream ended.