Emerald seems to have fallen into a strange world.  She has landed delicately on her feet. The bright light disappears behind her.  It is a beautiful warm summer sunny day, and the sound of birds and the scent of wild flowers fill the air.  Emerald hears the sound of a babbling brook somewhere in the distance.  As she looks around she see, other bright lights appear with people stepping out of them.

  She is in a town square.  In the center of the square is a huge old oak tree.  It has a park like setting with a few stone benches placed around the base of the tree. There is several small picnic areas scattered around the green.

 To one side there appears to be a meeting hall.  It is a large two-story building made of roughly hewn stone with a thatched roof, with unique stained glass windows of dragons and Knights inserted into the walls along the top floor.  A heavy wooden door covers the entrance to the building, narrow shuttered Windows flanks the door.  There are pillars holding up a shady porch that are carved into beautiful dragons and a row of wooden chairs lined up along the front wall under the porch roof that is also thatched. A large wisteria is growing over one side of the porch. It’s fragrant tendrils of purple flowers cascading down the edge of the porch roof.

  On the second side of the square there is a row of shops. The shops have signs hanging from wrought iron hangers, with wooden panels, with names like Hard Hammer Blacksmith, Days Armory and Lady Goldstars Ladies apparel are burned into the wood. The shops are linked together with a common wall between them, with the blacksmith shop and stable on one end.  She notices a women apparel shop on the other end.  In front of the shops there is a wide wooden walkway big enough for two people to walk abreast.  Next to the dress shop there is a small farmers market with carts of fresh fruits and vegetables.  There is also an area in the marketplace where there are peddlers with fine rugs and bolts of fabric, the myriad of colors blending to form a festive appearance.

  The third side is a rustic looking Tavern. This two-story building is made of rough cut clapboards, cedar shake roof.  Large leaded glass window etched with a large bear on the windows on either side of the heavy wooden door.  There is a arched sigh over the door hung by heavy chains from ornate wood carved brackets with the letters done in a wood inlay spelling out THE BEARS TAVERN AND INN.  The upper story has smaller windows with what appears to be wooden shutters on the inside of the windows.

 On the fourth side is a playing field of some sort, it is flat area with grass growing across it and bleachers on both ends and a series of benches on the sides.  There is a wooded area just beyond the field made up of hardwood trees and climbing flowering vines.

 Bordering the square is a cobblestone road running along the front of the buildings and the playing field.   With two roads intersecting the road bordering the square.  One going out to the north along the shops and the other to the south near the playing field.
 

  Emerald looks around and sees small groups of people standing around the huge oak tree in the center of the square. There is a few couples and what appeared to be family units sitting here and there scattered around the picnic areas.  The group seems to be made up of humans, dwarves, and elves with a few large sprite like creatures. The atmosphere seems to be lighthearted and almost jovial.

 Emerald looks down at herself and appears to have changed into one of the large sprite creatures with wings. Her waist length golden hair shimmering in the sunlight, soft skin is white as alabaster with a peach tint to it, eyes greener than the finest emerald. By no stretch of the imagination one would considered her to be beautiful.  She is wearing a long light blue nearly white, silk flowing gown, that drapes softly on her. It enhances her supple feminine form. Tied across her shoulder with a gold satin cord is a royal blue velvet cape with deep amethyst purple silk lining. In one of the pockets she finds the small silver flute with oriental engraving on it, that her father had given to her before her first concert. Upon her dainty feet are satin slippers that match her dress.   She has large gossamer opalescent butterfly wings that can be lay flat down her back.  She opens them and tests them to get the feel for her new wings. She smiles at the unusual sensation of being lifted off the ground.
 Emerald looks around at this strange New World she has entered and is greeted by a soft-spoken young male Elf.  The first thing she notices about him is his bright deep blue eyes, reminding her of the color of a deep mountain lake she once saw.  He is considerably taller than she is and has sharp facial features, shoulder length light brown hair. He is wearing a bright yellow and red silk jerkin and indigo blue denim pants he has high brown leather boots.  Around his waist is a leather belt with a pouch hanging from it.  Draped across his shoulder is a dark midnight blue cloak lined with gold silk.  "Hello my name is Zephyr from the Alpine valley, I see you are new to this land." Zephyr says softly.  Emerald responds with a timid nod, "yes, I am, could you tell me where am I?" Looking around hesitantly at her new surroundings, she smiles softly.  Zephyr smiles cheerfully, "You are in Sunningvale, if you need anything please let me know I will be happy to show you around."  Gesturing with his hand he points out the main areas of the town, Zephyr explains, "right now you are at what most call start when you first log on this is where you will start off." Emerald looks at him puzzled but doesn’t say anything for she doesn’t remember ever logging on.  Smiling lightly and nodding at his explanations of the different places he asks, "would you like me to give you a tour of the different places in the land."  She agrees happily to the tour of the land.

 Zephyr leads her down the road that goes south out of town along the playing field, paved with cobblestones and hedges along the sides broken only by paths that merge with the road.  Zephyr stops at one of the paths and tells her this leads to the land of Dreams.  Curiously she asks him what are Dreams.  Zephyr explains that is where the people of Sunnyvale live when they are here.  They make their own dream with a special editor and language.  He says, "I haven’t quite got the hang of making Dreams yet."   He also tells her that there are people that will be happy to build a Dream for you.  Emerald, intrigued by the thought of Dreams, asks, "is one allowed to visit these Dreams or do they have to be invited."  Zephyr says, "if you want I’ll take you to the Land of Dreams myself."  Emerald smiles softly and says, "please do, it sounds very interesting, where do you go if you don’t have a Dream to stay in."    Zephyr replies, "most use either someone else’s Dream or they stay at the Bear’s Tavern and Inn in the heart of town."

 Looks down the path that he has indicated as the path to the Land of Dreams.  The path is wide enough that they can walk next to each other down it.  It is lined with a row of large Elm trees on each side of the path creating a tunnel effect along the pathway.  Emerald looks down the pathway and then up at Zephyr, smiling to herself and starts down the path.  Zephyr looks down at her and proceeds to walk along side her.

  They don’t walk far before she see a large stone wall with an intricate wrought iron gate that stands wide open.  Emerald stops and looks over at Zephyr, "is this the entrances to the Land of Dreams?" she asks.

   Zephyr stops along side her and nods, "past here is where one can build their Dreams, shall we proceed milady," He says with a smile.  Emerald smiles brightly and shakes her head chuckles, "milady?"  Zephyr chuckles back, "it is just something we say to beautiful women there," then starts through the gate placing his hand lightly against her back.  She looks down the path again.

  Moving along with him down the pathway she sees behind the shady trees low picket fences with pretty little garden gates across the opening.  On the gates are small bronze plaques with names etched in them like, This Dream belongs to Tiron the Beast Master and This Dream belongs to Lady Gwenth of the Lake.  Reading the plaques to herself, "I take it that these are the gates to the dreams?" Emerald inquires to Zephyr as he reaches to open one of the gates.  " Yeah, this one belongs to Tiron he isn’t here right now so I’m sure it will be ok to look around."  Zephyr smiles and bows slightly with a sweeping gesture he holds the gate open for her.

 Emerald smiles, back and steps through the gate into a small English style garden with a fountain in the center with small gravel walkways making the garden into four sections.  Each section has a variety of roses and straw-flowers mixed together making a living bouquet of flowers.  In the far corner is a small house. Zephyr leads the way to the building, "that is the portal to the main part of the Dream."  Emerald lagged behind admiring the garden and hadn’t noticed Zephyr movements towards the little house.  Zephyr waits patiently for her.  She blushes slightly as she realizes he has already move ahead.  Quickly moving up to him, she says softly, "it is amazing how perfect these flowers are.  He must spend hours tending his garden."  It struck her odd there wasn’t any wilted or dead flowers in all the garden that she could see.  Zephyr laughs lightly, "chalk it up to Cyberspace.  Everything is as perfect as you perceive them to be."  Looks back a bit puzzled not fully understanding what he is saying.  Emerald says, "I guess. Lead the way kind Sir," then smiles.
 They walk to the house it looks like a cottage.  The sides are white clapboards with small horizontal sash window with black wooden shutters open on either side of them.  The Door is a solid wooden one with a small window in the top half.  Zephyr opens the door and holds it open for Emerald to step through.

  Smiling she steps into the cottage and is amazed at the size of the room she has entered.  There is a fireplace on one side with a small seating area in front of it.   On the other side is a small kitchen dinning area, with what looks to be a spiral stairway going down in the far corner.  The room is very comfortable looking and well decorated.  "This is very nice by the looks of the outside I wouldn’t have believed you could get this much into it." Emerald states.   Zephyr grins saying cheerfully, "you haven’t seen the main Dream yet. This is only the main entrance to his dream."  He points to the stairway and says, "that is the entrance to the main part.

 Emerald moves to the stairway looking down, she sees a dimly lit spiral stairway.   Emerald gingerly steps down the stairs feeling a bit strange for her the steps seem to be endless.  She poses a moment and looks back over her shoulder senses Zephyr right behind her but cannot see him.  She continues on into the obscurely lit stairway.  A small glow is seen for a small light bulb over a metal door.  She carefully opens the door and steps through it.

 The small winged elf steps into what looks like a stonewalled area.  The sun is bright and almost hurts her eyes after being in the dim light stairway.  There is another metal door on one side and a small table and chairs in the center of the enclosure.   Emerald steps forward and turns to see Zephyr emerging from the metal door behind her.  Zephyr walks quickly around her to the other door and checks to see if it is locked.  The door opens easily.  On the wall next to the opened door is a sign that says, "Number of players here two.  Zephyr, Emerald." Glances curiously at the sigh then up at the young elf at her side.  "I take it that we are the only ones here at the moment?  What is meant by players" she asks.  Zephyr tells her, "yeah, we are the only players and players are what the people of Fantasy Realm are called."  He the bows and graciously offers her to enter the Dream first.

   Emerald smiles and curtseys softly and smiles before moving through the door onto a cobblestone walkway.  The outer wall of the stone enclose is obscured by large trees and heavy brush.  The walkway is big enough for a small cart to be driven down.

  To the right of the path is a grassy area with what looks like pastures. Emerald can hear what sound like large bird, horses and oxen in that direction.  As she stands there a giant bird of prey, the size of a emu runs up to the fence nearest her and screeches at her.  Its wings are tied back so it can’t fly.  Emerald startled jumps and steps into Zephyr.  He smiles and putts a reassuring arm around her.  Zephyr chuckles lightly, "don’t worry the osprey can’t get trough the fence. If it could, I think I can protect you from it."  The fences are made of thick branches crudely woven together to make a barrier.  Emerald laughs at herself and looks up at the handsome elf and moves away partly embarrassed at her reaction.  She looks off to the left of the path.

 To the left is a series of buildings witch appears to be a blacksmith shop, stable, barn, and small forge.  Emerald can hear the sounds of a blacksmith at work.  Curiously she asks, "aren’t we the only ones here?"   Zephyr nods his head yes.  " Then who is making at clinking noise" she asks.  Zephyr looks in the direction of the blacksmith shop, "that is just some sound waves put in with the Dream language I told you about," he says quietly.  Emerald nods, still a bit curiously.  She looks down at the path for a moment then proceeds down it.

  In front of her lays the walkway that ends at the front of a small three-story manor house with a slate roof. The walls made of dressed stone with tall leaded stained glass cathedral style windows on either side of the arched heavy dark door.  There is a small but elegant porch with white marble pillars holding up a slate roof. Growing up the pillars are great Jack Manning clematis vines in full bloom.  The big pink and purple flowers the size of dinner plates. Along the front of the house there is well-tended white and pink Rose of Sharon bushes, the fragrant of the flowers almost overwhelming.

 Zephyr moves to the front door, "would you like to go in or look around outside a little more?"  Warily she responds, "umm, let’s look around outside a bit more," stepping to the right of the porch.  The elf follows suite and walks with her to the right side of the house.  There is a expanse of green grass with a gazebo covered in climbing roses in the middle of a beautiful formal rose garden.  Emerald steps up the pace and heads for the garden.  As she grows nearer to the roses, she can smell them bring back memories of her grandmother’s roses.  There is some butterflies and honeybees buzzing around the flowers.

 Emerald spies a table set for two in the center of the gazebo.  The table is low and it has two large red pillows with gold braid along the edge.  There is a English china tea set, two cups and saucers and a plate of a variety of home baked cookies.  Smiling she says, "hmm, it looks like Master Tiron is going to return soon."  Zephyr smiles and offers a seat to Emerald, "no he is gone for the day I think he had to go to work," he responds.  "Then why is this table set like this? Surely it isn’t for anyone that walks in?" Emerald replies.  She sits gracefully onto the offered big soft pillows. Watching Zephyr grab the other pillow and setting it next to her, siting in a cross leg position. He smiles and says, "it will always be like this you can eat as many cookies and drink as much tea as you wish and it will be like this when you return . . . this is how Dreams work."  Emerald thinks to herself, this is so amazing I must be in heaven.  As if he can read her thoughts Zephyr replies softly, "it does seem that way at time."  Peers over at him with a expression of aw on her face.  She asks, "can you read my thoughts?’  Zephyr chuckles lightly, ‘ read is the right word for it."  Emerald doesn’t know if she likes the fact he is so cognoscente of her thoughts.  Emerald hears Zephyrs voice in her head, a little startled at this she inquires, "are all residents of these place telepathic?’  He smiles and nods saying, ‘we call it whispers.  To whisper you just type whisper the name of the person then the message."  Emerald is now totally confused by the several of the references the young handsome elf has made, unsure why she keeps this to herself.

 Emerald smiles back and pours two cups of tea to her astonishment the tea was still hot.  She smells it and the scent is that of chamomile.  She sets one cup and saucer in front of Zephyr.  He takes out a silver flask and pours some dark what smells like rum into his tea.  Emerald shakes her head and smiles slightly in amusement putting a couple of sugar cubes in hers then taking a small plate and placing a sugar cookie on it.

   "How long have you been in Fantasy Realm, Zephyr?" she asks as she sips her tea.  He offers her some of his rum, that she declines, and he responds, "about two weeks.  What do you think of the Realm so far?  Oh and by the way what is your name? ," With a knowing wink.  She replies with a little embarrassment at her ill manners, "my name is Emerald.  So far it is a fascinating place."  She takes a delicate bit from the soft sweet cookie.
   A soft gentle breeze drifts through the garden offering within it the sweet scent of the roses. The soft scent of a lake wafts by.  Emerald looks in the direction of that the breeze seems to be coming from.   She can see a small lake in the distance partly blocked from view by a small grove of trees.

 Zephyr finishes his tea and cookie then looks at the beautiful gray elf next to him and curiously asks, "are you ready to look around some more, would you like to see another dream, or go back to Sunnyville?"  Emerald thinks a moment before responding to the question.  "I think maybe we should go back to Sunnyville," she replies.  The tall handsome elf nods and stands offering his hand to help her up.  Emerald takes his hand then stands, "thank you" she says with a small smile.  Zephyr smiles and looks at her dainty hand and kisses it lightly before ushering her out of the gazebo. Emerald blushes lightly at the gallantry of her new friend.  They move back towards the house and the path back to the stone enclosure.  As they walk by the fenced in pasture a group of Osprey run up screeching at them menacingly.  Zephyr moves between them and Emerald and putts his arm around her to give her a sense of security against the evil-tempered bird.  Emerald moves close to Zephyr.

   Moving quickly towards the safety of the stone enclose Emerald stayed close to the handsome elf.  Zephyr deep blue eyes looking brightly at her opens the door to the enclosure for her. Closing it behind him, he moves to the other door leading to the stairway to the little cottage above.  Again he opens the stairway door and she enters it climbing the stairs to the small cottage and the pretty English garden.

 Emerald waits at the top of the stairs for Zephyr to emerge from the dim stairway.  She smiles softly as he steps into the room.  Zephyr smiles back and moves to the front door and with a sweeping gesture he beckons her out of the cottage and back into the garden.

  In the garden she sees couple of dwarfs, a male and a female walking towards them, laughing lightly as if one of them had said or had done something funny.  The dwarf couple greeted Emerald and Zephyr.  The male bowing to Emerald and the female curtsey to Zephyr.  Emerald and Zephyr responding in the same manner.  The male dwarf introducing themselves to the elves, "Greeting to you milady and milord on this fine day I’m Stout and this is my wife, Grazalla."

 The dwarf named Stout is as his named implies.  He is short with broad shoulders giving him a boxy appearance. Stout has straight course shoulder length black hair partly covered by a helmet and soft puppy dog brown eyes.  His face has a chiseled appearance.  He is wearing leather armory with a chest plate that has engraving of scrolls and roses along the shoulders and neck under it a light brown tunic.  He has a two handed broad sword with a filigreed and Ivory pommel.  Stout has a pair of soft leather high top shoes on and olive green legging. He looks a little gruff but Emerald senses a very kind heart in the interesting fellow.

 Stout’s wife Grazella is also short but has a round figure, she has long black hair done in two long braids, she is wearing a straw hat with wild flowers in it.  Her garment is that of a white cotton sheered at the neck and wrist blouse and a skirt that is beautiful embroidered with multicolored butterflies and large flowers.  A short red cape is tied about her neck. She carries a small nosegay of violets that Stout had given to her. Grazella has in contrast to her husbands gruff demeanor has a very jovial one.  Her smile is like a day in May warm and sunny.

 Zephyr smiles and responds by saying, "good day to you milady Grazalla and Sir Stout.  This is milady Emerald and I’m Zephyr."  Emerald blushes slightly at being called milady and curtseys softly to the dwarves.  She says softly, "hello." Stouts, looks Emerald over smiling at the beauty before him, Grazalla noticing and giving Stout quick kick in the shin then smiles lightly at Emerald.  Zephyr chuckles lightly and puts his arm around Emerald, stating that they were heading back to the village.  Stout frowns at his pretty wife for kicking him and nods, as they depart towards the small cottage in the back of the garden. Stout says, "it was nice meeting you’re both hope to see you again."  Zephyr nods back cheerily reply, "the same here."

  Directing Emerald to the little garden gate and the road back to Sunnyville.  Emerald walks with grace to the gate hearing something over her shoulder causing her to stop and look back, Stouts yelp as his wife kicks him again as he watches admiringly as Emerald walks away.  Emerald smiles back at Stout.

 Looks up at Zephyr and giggles softly.  Zephyr sensing her gaze looks down at her and chuckles, "you are a beautiful sight milady, a male would have to be died not to notice such a radiant sight as yourself."  Emerald blushes, "Why thank you kind sir," she says with a drip and a smiles.

 In no time they are back in the village and the population seemed to have dwindle in the main square to a few couples sitting talking quite together oblivious to their surrounds, kissing and snuggling lightly.  Emerald smiles at Zephyr and looks around noticing the decrease in activity.  She says, "where is everyone?"  Zephyr shrugs and responds softly, "it is getting late most have probably gone to bed about now."  Trying not to stretch and yawn himself, he tells her, "I must be going.  I have classes in the morning."  Emerald nods and smiles softly saying, "thank you for showing me around.  I greatly appreciate it."  Zephyr smiles and takes her small delicate hand in his hand and kisses it softly inquiring, "are you going to be on tomorrow?  I would really like to see you again."  Emerald, not knowing where else she would be nods and says, "yes, I hope to be."  Zephyr smiles brightly and waves his hand summoning a multicolor light portal he says as he steppes into the portal, "fair well my fair maiden till next we meet."  He disappears along with the light portal.