We go to a mall… I'm with some folks.

There is a game happening.

A woman runs it in a shop in the mall. I ask how we can play. She says we are already playing.

Another woman plays: she bets her powerful ability to make unlimited tokens appear on the fact that it will still work. Charms and tokens burst forth in a stream. I look at them. They seem to repeat in theme. Many Bart Simpsons. All pewter, silver, gold little charms. I ask the main woman what determines them. She doesn't answer. Eventually the stream stops… so the woman loses.

I ask her about the game. She says it like a language that has a tense for things that happen in the future. Everything is written. We debate a bit. Then I leave. I realize leaving is part of the game, so she was right.

I'm lucid. Hmm. What to do. Task was clouds, so I break into the sky higher up. OH! "I WANT DRAGONS!" I scream. "DRAGONS!" I yell again, Dragins vs. Dragons. The pronunciation seems to matter, and I see a black flying mass above me. Yesss.

But as it gets closer it looks… not right. A dead, skeleton entity. A lich. Fuck.

Afraid of having a bad time, I barge into the entity with a joyous face, greeting it with kind words. It subdues and slowly over time becomes very motherly and feminine. I ask about dragons and they tell me there is one back on their "barrow hill" so we fly that way, her taking me.

Its fucking amazing. We pass landscape after landscape of fantasy lands, forests, hills, cities, towns, rivers. Cliffsides, mountains. I am in absolute awe. At one point we pass a river city full of iridescent barges. "The fairy barges," the lich woman clarifies.

"What is this place?" I ask, but I already know… I've been here, as a child. "Meris," she says, and the word sends shivers down my skin.

I see her high barrow hill in the darkened landscape and we land on top. She says the dragon is here, but inside the hill and she will be out later. She enters a cave. Her companion is a black wolf who looks awful but is very kind. I am supposed to stay here but I wander and he follows, guiding me. I find another cave entrance, but inside is a carpeted, wood-walled storage room. I find a wood post outside that has a fantasy language and translation. I know if I put in the word DRAGON I will know my Dragon's name. I try, marveling at my lucidity, my control, the detail here, just watching my hands work near the alphabet as I look at the letters. But not all the letters are here, so I only get "QUE".

I sit on the hill overlooking the land and see my bare feet have massive see-through blood blisters where the bruises are. What the? That's so cool but concerning. I lose lucidity as I prod them, wondering if they are safe or if I should pop them.