Glittering Gold | ONC 2024

Chapter 12: Three Wishes Granted

CONTENT WARNING

This chapter contains themes of death and profanity that may not be suitable for a very young audience.

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Danilo stared at the bright treasure inside the chest. A bubble of laughter escaped his lungs. "Ha! I'm rich!" he said, reaching out to touch a rock.

They were raw and unrefined. Nuggets dusted with bits of other metal. But it was what it was--gold.

"Dulnuan," he called, looking over his shoulder at the open door that led out of the room.

Remembering she wasn't there, his heart dropped, and a wonder began in his mind.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "No, she wouldn't trick me. She promised she'd return, and we'd find the gold." So then, why was the gold hidden under her bed? Did she not know? Was she using it as leverage? Did she not trust him?

Suspicions emerged from his head. But he trusted her. He came into this realm to help her--to save her. And what they shared the night before was undoubtedly love. He loved her, and she loved him.

Danilo pulled the chest out of the room. Scraping the bamboo floors and nearly breaking a hole because of its weight. Leaving it at the center of the room filled with trinkets, he left it open and sat beside it, facing the front door and waiting for Dulnuan to return.

"She promised," he told himself, and a reassured feeling sat in his stomach. All he had to do was wait. She would come back.

Hours passed. He didn't know how long. The sky outside never changed.

He'd get up and look outside the door to find no one. A frown would mask his face. He was alone.

He'd stare at the chest filled with gold. A smile would play on his lips. He was rich.

After a long period of waiting, something around him changed. It was neither the light nor the temperature. It was something that cannot be put into words. It was what broke the barriers between worlds, what created a terrorizing knot in the pit of his stomach, what slid under his skin and made all his tiny hairs rise.

"Danilo?"

He looked up and saw Dulnuan in the frame of the door. He grinned. "You're back." Standing, he kept his eyes on her and lingered on her attire--plain white shirt and tight-fitting jeans. "You look... hot," he said, staring at how everything shaped her body.

Dulnuan smiled, a tint of red forming on her face. "Thank you." She glanced behind him and saw the chest of gold on the floor.

Danilo looked over his shoulder. "I hope you don't mind. I found it under the bed," he said, turning back to her, hoping she wouldn't get mad.

She shook her head. "It is yours, Danilo. It is all yours. It is your reward for making me very happy."

Danilo grinned again, blessed with pride at her approval. "So, did it work? Did you get your body back?" He reached out to touch her face, but his hand passed through.

"Yes, it worked," she answered.

"What?" He frowned, trying again to seize her, but he felt nothing but air. "What's going on? Aren't you here?"

Dulnuan's eyes curved upward in the saddest manner he'd seen from her. "You are not here, Danilo."

"What?"

"I am in the land of the living, and you are on the other side."

"Well, come here." He gestured, anger coming from his tone.