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IN THE MOUNTAINS OF FIRE
Volume 1: Welcome to the Charadoc! Chapter 5 DREAM NOTES
I
dreamed of the maid's quarters, but I don’t recall what I did there. Still, I used the setting and inserted the
thoughts of the person occupying it. And of course I knew from other dreams
what the uniform of a maid would look like. I dreamed the view
from Jonathan’s balcony vividly in a couple of flash-dreams, both happening at
my desk when I worked as a medical transcriber in the 1990's, with that
disorienting sense of feeling about to fall through the scenery. Finally I visited the balcony on a third
occasion in my own bed at home, and at last the dream had a chance to finish
itself, in the nightmarish way related as Deirdre's dream. I dreamed, also in
the 1990's, of Jonathan sorting through books and washing up from water in a
pitcher. Putting that dream together
with the one of Deirdre’s bath, I wondered why she’d get piped-in water but he
wouldn’t? I almost dismissed this as a
discrepancy. Then I suddenly developed
this passion for learning everything I could about putting together an
ecological house. In the process I
learned that a plumbing system adequate for a small community would fail to
reach higher stories if that community expanded and nobody laid wider
pipes. And considering the meritocracy,
they would not “waste” tax dollars on improving plumbing infrastructure so long
as they had servants to haul water upstairs.
This almost thrown-away detail had relevance, saying volumes about the
society, and explaining a mystery in another dream. I distinctly
remember the embarrassing lecture on finger-licking in the second dream. As Jonathan remembers, Deirdre’s last mission
happened in Camelot, a tiny country in Novatierre’s equivalent of the
Himalayas, founded by English colonists and optimistically named. A quick dart-in-dart-out job; I do not yet
have enough dreams to fill it out completely.
Although her part of the story did have an Arthurian flavor (rescuing
and hiding a young heir to the throne) dreams about the boy’s later life in his
teens diverge sharply from the legend in a rather tragic twist. I have not (so far) dreamed of him any older,
but I hope he did live longer. I have more notes
on the revolution in Duerlongh, a mission also involving Merrill, Zanne, and Don. I might make that the next novel or serial,
unless something else grabs my attention more. I made up Deirdre
playing with the jewel puzzle, as well as the musings of Soskia's niece. I researched the preparations going on around
her. But, as I said, I gave her my own dream. I invented the
attentions of the maids. I dreamed of
the alteration in Deirdre's appearance in the coming party-dream, and so wrote
of how she got that way, and used the opportunity to fill in something of
Charadocian customs and tastes.
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