The Key Between Stranger Realms - Day Two

On this ordinary morning, after gulping an ice-cold cup of energy, I spot a cautious stranger waiting to cross the street with his best friend: a short-haired dog with stripes on her coat and a gaping grin that could earn a pup-cup from the generous barista around the corner.

Her owner wears his hair short too. There’s the printwork of a golden medallion on his t-shirt. With the acknowledging nod, friendly wave, I discover his secret life: a runaway king desperate to clear his name, his loyal tigress accompanying.

“Where were you?” he questions.

We are journeying through a forest on an overgrown path.

“Pardon, what do you mean?” I ask, my gaze pulled to the medallion hanging around his neck.

“The Oracle was honest. You are not all here,” he observes.

“Wait,” I pause, looking at my feet to ensure they are not melting through the earth. “Did I actually disappear?”

I keep staring downward: leathercraft riding boots. Where the hell is my horse?

“Body? Nay. Mind? Yes,” he explains, brushing a leaf off his velveteen hair.

I lift my hand to caress the top of his head then stop. What am I doing? This is a stranger, passerby. I do not know him … Or do I?

He catches my hand.

“It grows softer each day,” he says, placing my palm where his crown should be and brushing it across.

Feels like a stingray at the aquarium. No, not here: the other realm. When will I begin to understand the difference?

“What in the strangest realm is that?” the king asks.

As we approach what seems to be a spring in the distance, his tigress sprints toward the fresh water.

“Tamri, halt!” the king orders and draws his sword.

I reach for my waist, unfamiliar with my gear in this place: a lyre. Great. Unarmed, I approach carefully beside the king to observe what oddity he has discovered. Floating just beneath the surface of the pond, like a giant lily pad, is a sleeping stingray.

“We call them sea pancakes,” I sigh, rolling my eyes.

I am certain this is the Universe’s version of a joke.

“I am perplexed … What is a pancake?” he asks, his eyebrows crammed together in confusion.

“It is a flattened cake, topped with honey and butter,” I explain.

“Yummy!” Tamri yells.

I am utterly terrified, yet, also unsurprised that she can speak.

“Ah … I am still confounded,” the king says.

“Why?” I ask, craning my neck to guess, tail to nose, the Majestic Tamri’s length: eight feet, maybe?

“If it hails from the sea, why is it here?” he questions.

“I fear this is entirely my doing,” I admit.

***

Hello, wanderer!

Day Three can be found here:

xoxo,

for now,

-your friend lost in thought