The Prospector's Daughter

I awoke this evening, just as I did every other day. My routine seemed to never vary from the typical: wake, eat, sleep, repeat. Though, the hunger was so much worse today than it normally was. It's been days since I last fed, and months since I last indulged in anything other than the occasional field mouse scrounging around in the mines for food or one of the vultures circling around the town, drawn to the scent of death. None of them have come close lately, they just seem to deride me from the skies, mocking my misery. All the ranches once ran by the townsfolk have long since been desolate and abandoned, so there's nothing in the way of livestock to feed on either. All but very few of the townsfolk themselves had deserted the good old town I call home, Creede, Colorado, though I could never feed on them. They may be from an entirely separate era, but they are still my neighbors, per se. The occasional tourist still strolls through Creede, making it a point to leave with haste when they behold the desolation and emptiness that remains. Those that make it past me, that is. I guess the eerie feeling that seems to surround this place really gets to them. Personally, I don't think it's all that bad considering my lover and I are 100% the cause. It wasn't always this way, of course. There was once a time when I didn't spend my days alone, starving and miserable, begging for something, anything to take me out. Creede used to be a bustling place, full of miners looking for opportunity, business men opening up shops and saloons all over the place. People of all sorts gathered here. When the mines were discovered, our small town nearly tripled in size within a couple years, though that's not when my story here began. My story really began back in 1890. I was a mere 9 years old back then, oh, so many years ago. *** Father and I moved to Creede shortly after Mother had fallen ill and passed away in the night, leaving us to our grief and mourning. The pain was far too much for Father to bear, and insisted we travel at once. He didn't want to sit around and dwell on the constant reminders of Mother sitting in every nook and cranny of the house they'd raised me in. We set off within the week, traveling to a new town we'd just heard of. A man named Nicholas Creede had recently founded a town in the Upper Rio Grande Valley, and Father moved us there as quickly as possible. We were among only 600 folk who resided there. Creede quickly became home to me and I adored it. Father wasn't always a miner, of course. We set off with fishing rods and nets in tow to the new town of Creede. Father was going to be a successful fisherman, and I was to help with the household duties. Even at 9 years old, I was quickly learning how to handle the majority of the household chores with Mother now gone and nobody left to tend to her duties. I learned to cook for Father when he'd come home exhausted from a long day of working, and eventually taught myself to sew so I could fix any of his trousers he'd worn holes in. I cared for the horses, and kept our house clean. Those were never duties I enjoyed, though. I'd always wanted to explore, discover new and exciting things, but that wasn't much of a possibility at the time, and it got me in a lot more trouble than I'd have liked to admit. In essence, I was training to be a mighty fine wife someday, though there was just one problem. Father never took me out on the lake with him, as I was to stay home and do the chores of a woman instead. I wanted nothing more than to be able to go out and work a man's job, to be able to make my own money, pull in fish to sell at the market. It didn't even have to be that, to be honest. I just wanted freedom, independence. I longed to be treated as an equal, rather than a fill-in for Mother. I would become quite bored of the seemingly silly daily tasks I was put up to, severely lacking complaisance, and found myself becoming somewhat of an explorer in my time away from Father, against his requests and orders. *** During the summer of 1892, nearly two years after Father and I had moved to Creede, I stumbled upon some newfound courage, and decided I would go out and have my fun exploring while Father was away at work. I'd start new adventures every day, running off toward the mountains, exploring my innate love for the outdoors as soon as Father would leave for the docks each morning. One day, though, I adventured out too far into the mountains. I spent hours trying to find my way back home, but to no avail. Soon enough, the sun started setting, unwilling to allow me to return home. I was lost and scared, unsure of where to go or what to do. I could no longer see my house and the only source of protection from whatever was lurking in the night that I was able to find was a hidden cave entrance embedded in the side of the mountain. I crawled into the cave's opening, unsure of what else to do. There were predators that ruled the night, and I didn't dare try to find my way home among them, regardless of the fact that I was breaking every rule by being out of the house, and past dark nonetheless. I was cold and alone. The amount of panic that was rattling through my bones was unimaginable, unlike anything else I'd ever experienced. I was beyond terrified, so I huddled in the cave's opening, facing out toward the valley in hopes that someone would come to save me. The likelihood of that happening was quite slim though. Everybody knew better than to be out in the mountains at night, lest the wolves and bears would surely have their way with them. I wrapped my cloak around me, trying as hard as I could to keep the cool night air off my skin as I waited for the sun to return. After what seemed like hours, I felt a presence near the mouth of the cave and looked up to see a man standing in front of me. I wasn't sure in the dim lighting from the moon, but he resembled the town's founder, Nicholas Creede. "Good lords, child. What on Earth are you doing out here in the cold? Don't you know that it's dangerous to be out in the night like this?" I looked up into the man's eyes as he approached, recognizing him as the man I'd assumed he was. He knelt down next to me and took his own cloak off to cover my body and lifted me up into his arms with ease. He showed me empathy when nothing else had. I was appreciative. "Can you talk?" I nodded my head up and down slowly. "You're shaking an awful lot. You must have been out here nearly all night now for you to be chilled down to your bones like this." He pushed my long brown curls aside from my face and held me close, trying to warm me up. "Sir, I'm sorry... I didn't mean to wander off so far." I managed to let the words escape through my chattering teeth as he held me tight, stuttering tremendously. "Don't apologize, Dear Girl. It was a mistake, nothing more will come of it. Do you have a name, Sweetheart?" "Sylvia Colwood, Mister. And you are Nicholas Creede, aren't you?" He nodded his head, letting me know that I was correct. "Well, Miss Sylvia. I don't believe it's very safe for us to venture back to town in the dark like this. I have a torch and you may have my cloak to keep you warm. I was just out here exploring, much like you were, I presume? I'm trying to locate something though, do you think you could be a good girl and assist me? You do seem like an avid adventurer, I think you'd be a perfect fit for the task!" "What are you trying to find, Mr. Creede?" Nicholas laughed briefly. "There is no need to call me Mr. Creede. Nicholas is fine. I heard word of this cave holding precious metals. I thought it'd be appropriate to investigate." I wriggled my way out of his arms and to the cave's floor, eager to explore as I always seemed to be and grasped his hand in mine as he held his torch in the other. "I suppose that's a yes, then, huh?" Nicholas chuckled once more and lit the torch before setting off into the cave with me, hand in hand. One thing you'll soon learn about me is that I absolutely love anything that is unknown to me. Throughout my many years, I've long since discovered most of that which is known to the world, and have very little mystery left in my life. Back when I was a child, though, I couldn't be stopped from venturing off and learning all that I could. There was close to no hesitation when Nicholas asked me to investigate the cave with him, just willingness and excitement despite the cold and my chilled bones. As Nicholas as I ventured farther into the cave, I realized I had never been in one before, and it was quite exhilarating in my eyes. I studied each and every rock formation in awe, noting the rich colors of some of the stones hidden in the dirt walls of the cave. The farther we went, the more interesting rocks their were until we stumbled upon a large vein of what appeared to be silver. "Goodness, Sylvia! We might have just found ourselves a big old money maker here, if there are any other veins like this throughout the caves! Do you know what this is?" He rubbed at the dirt wall, pushing particles of unwanted rock and earth away from the beautiful silver ore. "It's silver, Sylvia!" Nicholas' smile was wide with glee and excitement as he brushed away the Earth covering a few different silver veins as well. "Good Golly, we've found it! We need to get back and spread the word. You'll be a good girl and tell your daddy that he should switch professions, won't you? It'll make your daddy a rich man, and you'll live a great life. I want him to know first, as an act of gratitude for helping me explore this cave." He scooped me up in his arms once again and carried me out to the mouth of the cave once again to be greeted with the rising sun. We hurried back to town at once. *** Why Nicholas went out of his way to help me and to get me back home, I'll never know. That most definitely wasn't the only act of kindness he'd ever shown me, though. Nicholas stayed with me for the majority of my life, but we'll get into that a bit later once you understand my backstory a bit more.