The Waking Dreamer by J. E. Alexander Page B

lying on a plush bed in a massive room whose ceiling and walls were made of glass like an enormous greenhouse. He could see snow-crowned mountains carpeted in fields of thick evergreens filled the horizon. A stone walkway wound through the room whose floor was soft, red earth. Surrounding him were broad tufts of bamboo stalks, dark taro pads, and the soaring green and purple leaves of immense banana trees. Waist-high shrubs of wild, erratic palms and fragrant, feathery ginger blossoms lined a whispering creek encircling the bed. Several large, worn boulders accenting the path were home to heart-shaped fronds whose masses of twisting, exposed roots climbed the rocks, upon which sat several people in hushed conversation. And in the distance, Emmett saw a young woman in a diaphanous white gown and waist-length black hair dancing around by herself, her body encircled by a swarm of bees that seemed to elicit her gleeful smile.
    Emmett tried to force himself up on his elbows, a dull tingling of a thousand pinpricks racing throughout his limbs. He felt an immense nausea in his stomach, wincing as his dry throat cried back at his own coughing. He forced himself to swallow what felt like broken glass.
    “You’ll want to take it a bit easy, then.” Emmett saw a young man sitting relaxed in a chair opposite the bed with one leg crossed over the other, composed in his gray pinstripe slacks and fitted black turtleneck. His mind stumbled over the chaos of returning memories before registering the face.
    “What the hell did you slip me?”
    “I didn’t slip you anything. Mind you, I kept you asleep for the last three days while we drove back, but Amala thought it would be easier. Here,” he said, offering water.
    Emmett felt too sick to protest, and he accepted it sitting back against the cushions. He groaned and squeezed his eyes shut as he drank and was rewarded with hysterical coughing.
    “Three days?” Emmett asked, bracing against the discomfort. The coughing seemed to jar his memory, and tumbling out of the coalescing fog were dueling shadows: one of a white-skulled creature, the other a graceful woman who moved like flowing water.
    “After this much time we’ll obviously want to feed you. I’m feeling rather peckish myself. You might want to use the loo first, though.” Keiran pointed at an open door behind Emmett where he could see a bathroom’s sink and shower built from granite.
    Emmett felt the telltale exigency and tumbled through the open door. It was a moment later when modesty resurfaced and he closed the door with the back of his foot, Keiran having turned away. When the door opened several minutes later revealing a beleaguered Emmett holding his stomach, Keiran stood up from his chair.
    “I had your jumper washed,” Keiran said, motioning to Emmett’s hoodie, which was draped over the chair opposite the bed. “It is wicked cold here in Oregon,” he added, handing Emmett a long, wooly scarf, which Emmett brought around the back of his neck but left untied in the front.
    “Oregon?” Emmett scoffed, his mind still struggling to reconcile his surreal environment.
    “Answers for all your questions. With food. Promise,” Keiran smiled, motioning to another door at the end of the stone walkway. The door was built directly into a sheer wall of rock buttressing the glass walls, as if the structure were constructed alongside and within a mountain.
    Keiran walked over and opened the door. Whether it was Emmett’s hunger or confusion, he followed. They were in a smaller room. A central fireplace ensconced in tan-colored rock dominated the room, with a variety of floor rugs, thick body pillows of various colors, and low cushions surrounding it. Pottery as tall as Emmett featured wildly arranged and organically out-of-order floral arrangements. They were not the sort of trimmed bouquets found in a hospital, but rather were celebrations of living, unrestrained color.
    “Who have we got here? An angel on the road,