Inside my Mind

Chapter One

Sitting up, I open my eyes and groan as the bright sunlight blinds me.
My heart is still beating fast from the dream I had. Something doesn't feel quite right, and I suddenly realize I'm not in my bed, and I'm certainly not in my pajamas. Instead, I'm sitting in the dirt, surrounded by trees, wearing jeans, a purple blouse, and a light jacket.
Not to mention my entire body aches as if I'd had a crash landing. I slowly move each of my arms, my wrists, my fingers, making sure nothing is broken. I do the same with my legs, my ankles, my toes. I push on my ribs.
I'm sore pretty much everywhere, but I'm okay.
Grimacing, I take off my glasses and examine them in the sunlight. I quickly take the edge of my shirt and wipe off all the accumulated schmutz. I examine them again. No cracks or scratches that I can see.
Putting them back on, I push tangled hair out of my eyes—is it tangled from the wind blowing past?
The flying seemed like a dream more than anything, but was it real? I am in the middle of a bunch of trees that look similar to the ones I saw from the air.
It's not unusual for me to be in a forest—I've camped plenty of times—but it is unusual not to recognize the forest I'm in or remember how I even got here.
But it would also make no sense for the dream to be real. There's no reason I would have been flying. I haven't been in a plane since I was little. I certainly don't have the money to fly anywhere.
So it was a dream. My mind must be subconsciously giving me a story to go with my aches and pains.
But then why do I really hurt all over, where am I, and how did I get here?
The last thing I remember is being in my room. Maybe I decided to go camping somewhere new?
Did I get lost and hit my head? Get amnesia? My head certainly doesn't feel great...
I reach for my back pocket. Maybe my phone can give me a clue. If nothing else, I can call 911, or at least one of my friends to pick me up. Surprisingly, the screen hasn't cracked, just one more thing pointing to the whole thing being a dream. I put my thumb on the button so it can recognize my fingerprint.
No service.
I groan. Wondering if it'll be able to get my location still, I open maps, but it's a no go. I am a dot in the middle of a blank grid.
"Oh, you're awake."
I jump at the voice coming from behind me and swivel around the best I can in the dirt, hiding my phone behind me like I've done something wrong.
It's the face from my dream. So it wasn't a dream.
Unless I'm still dreaming...
I pinch myself. Nothing.
"What were you doing?"
I've never seen a face looked so angry and so concerned at the same time.
I shake my head a little to clear my vision. Something doesn't seem quite right about his silhouette. Although the sun is no longer directly in my eyes, it's still too bright for me to see just right, and maybe hitting my head jostled my eyes or something...
But no. The light is shining right on him, and there are definitely shadows where there shouldn't be.
I focus in on them and gasp, scrambling away as I pinch myself again and again in the same spot.
Does that really work, or is it just another myth? It's certainly not working now.
He curses. "Stop hurting yourself! Calm down. You're okay."
He moves toward me, and I scramble to my feet, throwing my hands up, almost throwing the phone that's still in my hand in the process. "Stay away. I don't know what's going on, so I need you to stay away."
He frowns and takes a step back, holding up his hands as well. "Okay, okay, just tell me what's wrong."
He's looking at me like I'm crazy, like it's me, not him, who has gigantic dragon wings on my back and a tail flickering agitatedly by my leg. Like I'm the one dressed like I'm from the medieval era.
    Maybe I landed on a movie set? That wouldn't explain how he was flying, or why I was falling, but it would at least explain the clothes and maybe the wings—even though they look way too real.
Seeing me staring, he shifts the wings so they're more hidden behind his back, and I wonder why he seems so self conscious of them. If I had wings, I certainly wouldn't try to hide it. Well, I guess I would, because who knows what the government would do with that...
He grimaces briefly, and I realize one of his wings is drooping more than the other.
I take deep breaths as we stand there looking over each other suspiciously.
"I don't know what's going on," I finally say. "The last thing I remember is being in my room."
He frowns. "That's weird, although I suppose it wasn't exactly a smooth landing. Maybe you hit your head. That would explain why you passed out I guess."
"Landing?"
He frowns deeper. "You don't remember anything at all from before?"
I hesitate. I don't want him to tell me what happened before, even though I already know. It makes absolutely no sense, but I know. "I remember falling."
"Do you know why you were falling?"
I search my brain, but dreams rarely give you any frame of reference for the why. I mean, what does it usually matter why you're falling, or why you're running, or why you're kissing that cute guy from biology you've never even talked to?
What matters in a dream is the feel of it.
"I don't know. Does it matter?"
He screws up his face in exasperation. "Does it matter? You fell from the sky, and you don't think it matters why or how you got there?You don't have wings. You could've died!"
I wince at the easy way he says it. There I have it. I definitely fell from the sky, and it wasn't a dream.
I scramble for something to say. "What happened to your...wing?"
He rolls his eyes. "I saw a girl flying fast toward the ground, and I had to speed up to catch her right before she hit the trees. It wasn't exactly a smooth landing."
"I'm sorry. I didn't realize..." What? What was I planning to say there? I didn't realize I was actually falling? I didn't realize I was putting him in danger? "Just, thank you for saving me. I wish I could say I knew what happened."
He sighs. "Same here."
"I'm sorry you got hurt. If there's anything I can do..." I know there isn't. I don't even know where I am.
His face brightens slightly. "Well, actually, while you were passed out, I had to think a good bit about how I'm going to get out of this situation, now that I can't fly."
I feel a pang of guilt, even though I want to believe it's not really my fault. It's not like I planned to fall out of the sky and have this weird dragon boy catch me. But I urge him on. "Yes?"
"It's based on a few assumptions, but if I'm right, you may be able to help me."
I have no idea what kind of assumptions he could've made while I was passed out on the ground, but I nod at him to continue. This will certainly be interesting.
"Well, since there are quite a few weird things about you—the whole sky thing, your weird bag, your clothes—I thought maybe—"
"My bag and my clothes are not weird."
I actually hadn't had time to figure out what backpack I currently had on my back, but that wasn't the point. He didn't have to go insulting me like that.
"I wasn't trying to offend you. It's just that nobody in Draakston wears that sort of fashion. But that's why I figured you were from somewhere a little more exclusive. Like Valenn?"
He smiles at me hopefully, but I only close my eyes in confusion. Something about the words Draakston and Valenn seemed familiar to me, but I couldn't quite place it. "Valenn?"
"Yes. I know the people in Valenn do very important things, serving our king and all, and I know you must want to get back as quickly as possible. I am also a man of some importance. I'm actually a peacekeeper."
He stands a bit taller when he informs me of this, and I frown. "A peacekeeper?"
"Yes. I myself am on a very important, time sensitive excursion, and I know you have your own things to do, but I thought that perhaps since I did save your life, you'd be willing to help me before you go back."
I frown at the unfamiliar yet familiar words. He seems confident in where I'm from, and it seems unwise to tell him otherwise until I'm sure what's going on. "I'm sorry. I don't understand how you think I can help you."
He shakes his head. "Sorry. I'm getting to that part. You see, despite you not remembering how you got into the air, I thought perhaps it was a transportation gone wrong. That would make sense with you being from Valenn and having no wings and suddenly being in the air. Don't you think?"
I try to follow his reasoning. "You think someone, like, teleported me into the air accidentally?" I shake my head at the ridiculousness of that. I feel like I'm in a play where I haven't rehearsed any of my lines. "Maybe. I can't really confirm anything, since I don't remember."
"Well, you must know of someone who could have transported you, right? You must have a way to contact them in case something went wrong, or for when you needed to get back home, maybe in that bag of yours?" His hands fidget slightly, and I wonder if he'd had trouble restraining himself from rooting through my bag while I was passed out. It makes me want to take a step back, but I don't want to give him the satisfaction. "I thought I might convince you to ask them to transport me somewhere." He smiles confidently at his detective work, and I realize I need to do some detective work of my own before I answer.
Maybe I hit my head, and maybe I'm in shock, but this is definitely not a dream, and I need to figure out how to survive, how to get out of this. These places sound familiar, but not like somewhere real. So maybe they're from a tv show or a book...
I suddenly groan and smack my forehead. Of course! My book. They're from my book. How did it take me this long to realize it?
Well, to be fair to myself, the book doesn't exactly exist yet. It's just a bunch of races, and people, and places, a lot of history, and little bits of plot that haven't come together yet.
Draakston is the capital city of a group of dragon people called drakaarnan. Valenn is where the palace is, where the king resides. Where he keeps the most skilled and powerful people. Many people of magic. And anyone outside of Valenn doesn't usually understand it because they're not allowed inside, and the Valenian people are quite different, not to mention they don't usually venture outside of their coveted home.
So this drakaarnan boy thinks the reason I'm dressed weird, the reason I fell from the sky, is because I'm from an extremely impressive and strange city.
And now he thinks I can help him because I have friends in high places.
Oh boy.
I finally meet his eyes and see he looks concerned at my reaction. "I don't know. I honestly don't remember."
"I thought you remembered being home?"
"Well yeah, but—"
"But you don't remember someone who could have transported you into the sky?" I'm offended by his skepticism.
"No! I don't. I don't know anybody who can do that!" I want to say more, but I refuse to give him any information he could use against me.
He stares at me, and I can tell he doesn't believe me, but finally, he just says, "Okay. I guess we can't help each other then." He starts walking away, and I scramble after him. I definitely can't lose the only person in the middle of a huge forest. At least, it looked huge from the sky.
"Hey, wait!" I grab his arm, and he jerks it away.
"What?" he spits at me. "I already told you I have a lot of time sensitive, important things to do. I need to go. Now."
"You're just going to leave me here?" I ask, incredulous. "I have no idea where I am, I lost my memory, and you're just going to leave me in a forest that's probably crawling with dangerous creatures." I can only assume. "Are you sure you're a peacekeeper?"
He swivels around, and I almost fall over as I stumble backward in surprise.
"You have no right to question my morality. I don't even know you. There are a lot of important things to be done, and I don't expect someone like you to understand anything about what being a peacekeeper is." He turns back around.
"I know enough to know they wouldn't leave an injured girl lost in the forest to die." I'm not usually one for cutting remarks, but desperation can make me mean.
He turns around yet again, and he's scowling, but his eyes have softened a bit. "I'm not leaving you for dead. I never said you couldn't follow. If you can keep up, you can stay with me until we get to the next town. Just don't expect anything more than that."
I smile for the first time since I woke up, despite still being mad at him. This certainly isn't the best situation, but at least I have a goal now: get out of the forest. Find a town. I feel slightly bad about being rude, but this isn't exactly an ideal situation. I have no idea if I have food or water or a compass (as if that would help here) in my bag. And I have no idea where I'm going. The forest looked huge from the air, and if I go the wrong way, I could be wandering here alone until I die.
I realize he's started moving immediately, and I break into a jog to catch up with him before slowing to a fast walk.
"Hey," I yell, already out of breath. "We never actually introduced ourselves. I'm Alayna."
I almost run into his back as he stops abruptly and sighs. "Blaze. Now can we please stop talking and just walk?"
I nod my head but then realize he isn't looking at me, and he's already started walking again.
I glare at his back and jog after him, but then he stops abruptly again.
I steady my hand against the tree next to me, so I don't run into him. "Hey, what—?"
"There's something written on that tree."
I turn to the left, where Blaze is looking, and I see he's right. There's definitely something written on one of the trees close to us.
Blaze and I move toward the tree together wordlessly.
I gasp when I finally make out the words:

FIND ME QUICKLY
GET BACK HOME
WASTE YOUR TIME
FOREVER ROAM

Somehow I know they're meant for me.
"Well that's...ominous," Blaze says this sarcastically, as if he sees this kind of thing often, but I think it shakes him a little bit, if not as much as it shakes me. "Probably just meant to scare lost travelers."
"But why would they want lost travelers to find them? This message has to be for someone specific..."
For me. I don't want to say it out loud, but somehow I know it's true.
I mean, I've somehow appeared in a strange world just like the one I'd thought up back home, and I don't know how I got here. And I certainly would like to get back home, away from this craziness that makes no sense. I don't understand how I'm here or why, but I want to go. The question is, who do I need to find? Who is "me?"
I realize Blaze has started walking again. Did he even hear my question? I make a face at his back as I unlock my phone, snapping a quick picture of the tree in case it's important later. Then I turn off my phone and slide it back into my pocket. I don't know how long I'll be here, and I should probably try to save the battery.
I continue to glare at his back as I jog again to keep up. The backpack on my back slaps against my back as I run, and I realize I'd totally forgotten about it. I didn't even look inside.
I wish we could stop so I could take an inventory of what I was dropped here with, help me get my bearings.  Maybe it'll give me a clue as to who I'm supposed to find—if that clue was meant for me.
But it seems it'll have to wait. Unfortunately Blaze doesn't seem willing to stop for anything at this point, and he's my only way to civilization.
So I put away terrified thoughts on what's happening and how I'm going to get out of this mess, and I focus on putting one foot in front of the other, trying not to dwell on the ominous words.
FIND ME OR FOREVER ROAM