She relaxed in his warmth when he hugged her just before opening the tent's flap. She didn't know where they were, but she felt relaxed against him. Ileus kissed her temple and said, "Let's give you a nice bath."
Anastasia came out of the tent feeling extremely happy and content that she was back.
And then she saw it.
Shock jolted her mind and she became dumbfounded at the first glimpse of golden and silver. All around her rose tall trees. It was like a shimmery sea of gold, silver and green spanned the area as far as her eye could see. She turned around to see the shimmer of the leaves in the morning rays of the sun. It was such a beautiful sight but her instincts screamed in a warning.
"Where are we?" she asked in a gravelly voice.
"This is Yelgra."
It was impossible for her to peel her gaze from the forest. It was like she had stepped in a wonderland. She had never seen something so mesmerizing. The leaves susurrated as a warm breeze blew making them glitter brilliantly.
Ileus held her hand and tugged her. "You have all the time to wonder about it, Ana," he said. "Right now I want to remove that paint off your body and you are going to tell me what all happened." He had to drag her from there. He helped her sit on Lovac and then in one fine move, he was astride him. Ileus held his reins and they started towards the woods.
"Is the place to bathe very far?" she asked.
"I want to show you something, darling. When you weren't here, I just—" his words trailed off. They rode in silence.
As they rode in the dappled sunlight of the forest, under Lovac's hooves, the dried leaves crunched. They shriveled to a color of brown, leaving a very tiny amount of gold or silver dust beneath them. The ground was strewn with tiny specks of gold dust everywhere. Every time it rained, the dust must have seeped inside. Lovac must have run over something hard because it felt as if his hooves fell on a rockier ground. When she looked down, her heart fell to her stomach. A truck projected from the ground and it looked like solid gold. Except that it wasn't a truck. And there were several such types of projections.
"Is that what I think it is?" she asked as her heart plummeted to her stomach.
"Yes, it is," he replied. "Keep walking Anastasia," he ordered. "This place has a gold mine beneath it. Those who try to steal the gold from here, face the wrath of these trees."
She sucked in a sharp breath.
In order to distract her mind he said, "When you were gone, I used to hunt for you wildly." They came across a small stream. Lovac crossed it and she found that the forest became dense.
She put her hands over his arms and rubbed them, sagging against his chest. "I searched for you like mad everywhere. I felt you for the first time when I was in this cavern." He pulled the reins of the horse and pointed to his left.
When she turned her head, her eyes widened as shivers ran through her body. Right before them was a massive field of wild red blooms that they had seen in the Virgine Falls. Except that over here they were mixed with golden hued flowers, swaying lightly in the warm breeze. It looked spectacular.
"Don't worry," he said when he felt her shiver. "These are not charmed."
Anastasia's lips tugged up. Ileus nudged Lovac to move forward. She continued to gaze at the field of flowers from a distance. "I have never seen golden flowers in my life. They are gorgeous."
"They reminded me of you, Ana," he said and that is why I promised myself that I am going to get you here."
"And how am I associated with these flowers?" she asked.
"Because you are my golden flower."
She turned to him and kissed his lips. "What else did you discover when I wasn't here?"
"A lot of things. My cousin Daryn, was imprisoned by his mother Sedora. I had to go and help him."
"Sedora?" The name rang a bell in her mind. "Oh!"
"What?"
"Sedora was there at my wedding ball. Aed Ruad knows her." Anastasia was shocked to hear about her.
He scoffed. "Birds of a feather flock together."
"How do you know her and why would she imprison her own son?" she asked.
He sighed. "It's a long story, love. In short, his wife Dawn needed my assistance, and so I had gone there too." After a momentary silence he said, "Yelgra forests are next to Ixoviya, which is the kingdom of sorcerers. Sedora was their queen. She hated her daughter-in-law to the extent that she wanted her killed. Dawn is pregnant and when she came here to find her husband, she trapped her. She went on to organize a competition for her to eliminate her."
"Oh my god! That's evil."
"Sedora is pure evil," he replied. "I had to help her with it. There I also met your cousin, Aed Ruad."
She quivered. "What? Is he— is he still there? Here?"
"No, he left. This was a few days back."
Sighing with relief, she asked, "Why was he there?"
"He thought that you were with me. While I was there, he scanned the entire Yelgra to find you, but he couldn't. I thought that you were with him, so I confronted him. We fought… a little… but then we had to stop because Sedora wouldn't allow fights in her castle."
They turned left into dense woods.
"Is Dawn safe now?"
"She is, and they are relaxing. She won the competition and in the end when she thought she would imprison Sedora, the sorceress disappeared with my uncle, Gayle. We don't know where they have gone and it is frustrating!"
"Oh, I am so sorry."
"No darling," he kissed her on her head. "I am sorry that I took all the time in the world to find you." His arms tightened around her waist and he pulled her closer to his chest.
This was what she missed. The way he pulled her closer to him, it astounded her… every time. She wondered if he knew how she felt when he did this to her. On the inside she knew that he was just trying to feel assured that she was close to him. He needed that assurance as much as she needed it.
They rode through the shimmery forest in silence with each having a thousand questions to ask.
They crested a hill and when they descended on the other side, Anastasia saw lilacs and hyacinths growing wildly. Their sweet aroma wafted the air making it magical.
"That's our place," he said. He got down and then helped her dismount. He held her hand and led her inside a small cave.
"And what is here?" she asked.
He didn't reply and just walked her inside. When they came to the end, she yanked her hand from his. He leaned against the wall as she looked around the cavern. The walls were a weathered mix of gold and black and silver stones. Sunlight filtered through the cracks on the ceiling making the place glow. And right in the center was a small pool.
She stared at it greedily. He walked behind her and said in a low husky voice, "You need a good bath."