Chapter Two
Sydney felt as if she’d been hit over the head with a sledgehammer. Overcome with confusion, she groggily opened her eyes, and squinted at her surroundings. Where the hell was she? She must have hit her head harder than she thought. Only, she didn’t quite remember hitting her head, though she must have when she passed out by the weird smelling flowers.
She rubbed her eyes, and opened them again in the futile hope that what she was seeing would just go away. She wanted to be back in the forest clearing, where she was when she’d passed out. She wanted back there desperately, because she was no longer in the clearing. She was surrounded by curved wooden walls, and if the idea wasn’t so asinine she would have thought she was inside a large tree.
Slowly, she sat up. She had been reclining on a cushion that felt as though it was stuffed with hard little beans. A rough blanket made of something similar to wool was draped over her legs. She pushed the blanket off as though it were a poisonous viper.
“Where in the hell am I?” She asked aloud, to no one in particular. Her voice echoed around her, and she shivered.
“Think Sydney, think.” She ordered herself.
Okay, so the last thing she remembered were the alien flowers, and dropping to the ground. How did she get from that memory to the inside of this tree house. Tree house, oh God, she almost laughed at the absurdity of the situation. Back to the flowers, they were weird flowers, but what was weird about them? They smelled weird. Perhaps they held natural anesthesia properties. No, maybe they were poison flowers. That was it! She had gotten too close to a cluster of killer flowers, and now she was dead.
“Killer flowers. Jesus Christ.” She mumbled. She had a terrible headache and being inside what appeared to be a hallowed tree was not helping in the slightest.
Suddenly frantic, she began to scan the tree for an exit. She stood up and began a search of the perimeter of the room, feeling along the walls. She found a narrow exit on the opposite wall, and she was just contemplating whether it would be better to be outside of the tree or inside when a head popped into the hole, effectively eliminating her escape route. She jumped back and screamed. Loudly. The echo was horrendous.
“Stop that awful noise!” The creature clapped his hands over his ears and scowled.
“Get away from me!” She screamed. Louder.
“I am eager to see a human. Come here and cease that screeching.” He commanded, folding his golden skinned arms over his chest.
She stopped screaming, but not because the creature told her to. Her throat was too dry to scream for long, and she needed to save her energy to escape the tree house.
“Amazing.” The creature whispered reverently.
“Where am I?” Sydney asked conversationally, trying to keep the fear from her voice.
“Bresghnal.”
“Right. And you are?”
“Jameson O’Riley, at your service.” He bowed gallantly.
“Right. Okay, is this a package deal? Come stay at the Elk Horn Lodge! Stay the night and get a free ticket to crazy town!” She chattered hysterically.
“I am not sure of what you speak.” His brows crinkled together in confusion.
“Ok, what are you?” She asked, feeling less than polite talking to the creature that way, even if he were only a hallucination.
“A man.”
“No. You’re not a man. Trust me, I know men, and you are not a human man.” She trailed off awkwardly.
He raised an eyebrow, and then, “Of course I’m not a human man. I’m the leader of Bresghnal. My people are called Aurumans.”
Sydney didn’t reply at first. Something flashed in her mind, a memory of her mother that replayed in her mind so brightly it hurt. Her mother had told her a story about Aurum people when she was a little girl.
“Gold people.” She murmured to herself.
“Yes. Your people call the language, Latin.” He replied, though she hadn’t been talking to him.
“Where am I?” She asked herself aloud, feeling on the verge of a complete break from sanity.
“No need to shout, lass.” He managed to look disapproving and informative all at once.
“I’ll shout if I damn well want to shout, alright! It’s not everyday I’m abducted and transported into an alien world inside of a goddamned tree!” She shouted.
She glared at the golden man creature resentfully. He was truly, golden, so much so that he nearly glowed. His eyes were a sparkling violet, and his spiky hair was white gold. His body was in the form of a man’s, except for the fact that he was absolute perfection. He was far similar to a marble sculpture than a real man. She had the almost uncontrollable urge to reach out and feel his skin to see for herself if his skin was hard as rock or only looked to be. He looked unnatural, but to her frustration, incredibly desirable as well. He stepped closer to her, and she suppressed the urge to shiver. He wore a simple white linen shirt with pants of the exact same shade. Other than a tiny crown of purple stitched near the neckline of the garment, the shirt was otherwise unadorned.
“You may touch me.” He offered, holding his forearm out to her.
“Excuse me?” She asked, scandalized.
“You would like to ascertain whether I am hard to the touch, am I correct in interpreting this?” He asked curiously.
“What? No. I don’t want to know if you are hard to touch… oh forget it. This conversation is getting us nowhere. Where are we, and what are you?”
“I am certain I have already told you these things. Are you daft, human? I have told you, we are in Bresghnal, and I am an Auruman. I am not as a human man in most ways, but in physical form, I am quite similar.” He paused, apparently waiting for her to question him further.
“What do you mean by ‘human in most ways’?” She asked, becoming more and more irritable the longer the conversation continued.
“My reproductive organs are just as a human male’s, though bigger.” He stated, rather informatively.
“Good Lord! I wasn’t asking about that!” She gasped.
“Not aloud, certainly.” He agreed, good-naturedly.
Sydney blushed furiously, but could not summon up a response. She stood stiffly in front of the Auruman, quite sure that he was no different than any man she’d ever known. This was familiar territory at last, a man bragging about his genitals. Apparently this could be considered a universal truth, that a man no matter his species would be unduly concerned with the size of his penis.
“Ok, first, no more talking about your penis! And secondly, you’re going to start answering my questions and making some damn sense!”
“As you wish.” He allowed.
“So…I feel like I am still alive, but maybe I’m really dead? Is this where you go when you die?” She asked, almost hopefully.
“No, you are very much alive.”
“Fine. I’m alive, but definitely I’m not awake. That’s it!” She yelled triumphantly. “I’m just asleep. I’ll wake up and be back in the clearing. God, I hope I don’t sleep too long. I would hate to wake up back there in the forest in the middle of the night.” She shuddered at the thought of a black bear or mountain lion feasting on her. Despite her new fears of wild animals attacking her slumbering body while her subconscious mind loitered in this crazy golden man world, she felt slightly better. So she was having a weird dream, it was an explanation she could live with.
“You’re not dreaming.” The Auruman informed her in an exasperated tone.
“Sure I am. This isn’t real. It’s all a figment of my imagination.” She argued.
“It seems I will have to prove to you that I am indeed real.”
“Oh? By all means, prove away.” She waved her hand expansively, her fears eased with the belief that she was indeed, dreaming.
He stepped closer to her, and reached for her hand. Boldly, she put her hand into his, expecting to wake up and find herself back in the clearing. Instead, the moment their skin touched she felt a frightening jolt of something she couldn’t explain or understand. Startled, she pulled her hand out of his reach, backing away from him. Touching him had made her feel far too good to be real.
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