This dreaming, Iana's story, #17

(Since I'm having to break this next part up, I didn't realize it was going to be its open chapter, I'll post Iana's story more often. To read about how Iana got into this situation go here; read on to see what happens to her next.)

This Dreaming, Iana's Story 17

Even though I do not walk the gardens very often, not as my sister Joli does. It was unthinkable I could get lost within them. I dismissed the idea. Carelessness. My mind a bit distracted. That was all. It couldn't take that long to get to Aunt Rosemary's. So I kept to the path.

Perhaps it turned more than I remembered. I still felt certain I'd see Rosemary's glass house just around the next turn, just beyond the long needle pines. Just around here. Her house should be there, just beyond the leafy brown corpse trees, and the row of stone flowerbeds, but it wasn't.

Ridiculous, I scolded myself. I must have turned myself around. I couldn't truly be lost in here, of all places. I told myself I could easily retrace my steps and I'd be back at the staircase at the bottom of the silent tower. I didn't turn though. I had no desire to walk back, only to have to come all this way again. All this way! It wasn't that far. The gardens were not especially large. Not as they seemed today. I hurried on. I kept walking through this dreaming.

I didn't remember there was so much green here. Spring had arrived overnight it seemed. Were the trees always this large? I rested my hand on a trunk of a spruce, pressing my fingertips onto its rough bark to feel it, really feel it. Its branches stretched up and up, elongated high above me to a canopy of branches and new leaves, a bright green. They rustled. The tree felt warm to my touch, as if I could feel inside to its newly awakened spirit. There was a sound, a humming I felt through my fingers. I could still hear it as I drew my hand back. Hear, wasn't quite the word for it. Rather I felt it, this thrumming inside me, rising from the soft earth through my leather shoes.

I found myself surrounded by these spruces with bright leaves and pines so thick and heavy with needles. I'd never seen them so tall, so green, or glowing. They pulsed. A warm golden light diffused around each branch, each leaf and every tiny individual needle. The details bright around me.

The stone path I walked gave way to a soft green grass, almost sponge-like, and springy as a feather mattress. This dreaming, if I may call it that, for I was never really asleep during all this, I swear I was awake as I am now when I write this down in my journal, this dreaming took me deeper in the garden. If I was lost I knew I shouldn't wander deeper, part of me reasoned, yet the other part of me laughed at the idea of staying put. For one thing I couldn't be lost here in the gardens. If I called out, surely Aunt Rosemary would hear me. There was no reason to alarm her, so I didn't.

The tree trunks grew wider than I'd ever seen, taller than should be. The gray sky was no longer visible above, just the canopy of trees branches hung there. Soon the air felt heavier around me and suddenly the sound of the wind was missing. I came from between the trees to a small space. A warm red glow within it, small as a fire of burning embers. Only it wasn't a fire. It was a flower, a rose bush. The most beautiful I've ever seen.


to be continued . . .