Loki and Hermione: I Had to See You

Chapter 9 - Mountain Range

Hermione

After lunch, Loki and Hermione walked back to the stables, and they each mounted a horse; Hermione chose a milk-chocolate brown colored horse and Loki rode his usual black one. They rode north through the mountain range, and Loki gave Hermione a small pouch before-hand. Hermione picked up 8 crystals and 9 nuggets of metal, putting them in the pouch. They rode to the near top of one of the mountains, and Hermione took another picture.

They rode through the mountain range for awhile until they reached a waterfall. They tethered their horses to a few trees, and sat at the water's edge. Hermione took another picture of the waters. The water was warm, shallow, crystal clear, and saltwater. There were multiple colors of coral and tropical fish at the bottom.

"You can pull the coral out of the water if you want," Loki said.

Hermione took off her coat, rolled up her right sleeve, and dipped her hand in the water. She grabbed a hard, pink coral, and pulled it out of the water. The coral slowly darkened in color.

"Why is it changing color?" Hermione asked.

"This piece is a type called skaperegull coral, if it is pulled out of water it will change color. Flip it upside down."

Hermione flipped it over and saw a soft spot on the bottom. Loki reached over, and dug three fingers into the spot, fishing around for a minute, and pulled something out. Hermione flipped it back over, and carefully put the coral back in its original spot.

Loki cleaned the lump off in the water, and lifted it back out of the water. It was a small, peanut-sized nugget of something pink, and he put it in Hermione's hand.

"It's called gullrosa, a type of gold. Each coral produces it's own color, one nugget a month," Loki explained, as he proceeded to pull out each coral, and give Hermione a different color of gold. By the end, she had gullblågrønn, gullrødt, gullgult, gullhvitt, gullsvart, and a few others. He then handed Hermione a small pouch to put her golds in. She put the golds in the pouch.

"Pick up a soft coral," Loki instructed. Hermione picked up a teal piece. It felt hard underwater, but when she pulled it above-water, it was squishy.

"Why is it hard underwater, but squishy above?"

"Its a shape-shifting coral called skaperediamant," he explained putting his hand in the middle of the coral, and pulled out a teal, peanut-sized crystal. He handed Hermione the crystal, and put the coral back in the water.

"So these produce crystals?" she asked.

"Diamonds," he corrected. "This one's diamantblågrønn." He then pulled out each coral, and handed Hermione a different color of diamond. She had diamantrødt, diamantgult, diamantrosa, and a few others. She put them in the same pouch.

"Now some of these fish," Loki explained, moving her hand near the base of the water. "Have silvers in it," and he put his hand in the water, and quickly grabbed a blue fish. He quickly lifted it over her hand, and the fish spat out a silver and teal marbled nugget of silver. He then put the fish back in the water. "That's probably the only one in this water."

"Fascinating," she complemented. Asgardian anything seemed more interesting than on Earth. She looked up into the waterfall. It was a beautiful light pale blue, with a greenish undertone. The water was cascading down a mountain of dark stones, then slowly opened into the pond. Another thin river left the pond and weaved through the mountains, and thickened the further it went. The stones surrounding the waterfall were covered in a palm-tree green moss.

She pulled down her sleeve, put on her coat, they got up and back to their horses, and they rode through the mountains west into a forest. The trees were all various heights, from a few feet to a few dozen feet. Other than that, the forest was very similar to Earth forests. She still took a couple of pictures.