Sarah, Samuel, Arle, and Ceciliate stood at the edge of Aureum. A vast plain of yellow dirt spread out in all directions. The sky tinted slightly yellow above, becoming progressively more yellow farther away. Large glowing balls of light spotted the view of the land.
“This is the yellow land,” Ceciliate explained. “Those glows are dreams. Each continent has dreams from a different plant. Situated as a central connecting point between all six continents, Aureum is the one place on our planet where there are no dreams. It is theorized that the dreams of Aureumi take place on the six planets, but our dreams are always vaguely remembered upon waking.”
She continued. “Within the yellow land, you may encounter my brother’s group. They have the red jewel, and with it the power to control dreams. It would be best not to cross their path. I shall remain home. If either scouting party returns, my home will be open to them.” Ceciliate bid the trio a farewell. She turned back to Aureum, walked away from the small group.
After Arle was certain Ceciliate was far enough away, she huddled Sarah and Samuel close to her. “Here’s the plan. After Cecilia is out of sight, you two will use the jewels. My sister will probably know where you are, but you should be able to find her, too. If the yellow jewel is here, it should be easier to find than when you tried from the green land.”
A short wait later, Sarah and Samuel transformed. They checked the feel of their jewels, able to feel the two respond to one another. Another, distant, pulse came from deep into the yellow land.
Elsewhere, Piñole lead Bernard and Alfalfa through a museum. Alfalfa kept an eye on Piñole’s red hair. Bernard noticed this, and questioned Alfalfa on it. “Are you intrigued by the princess?” he asked, speaking in the Aureumi language.
“I intended no disrespect. I merely thought of the Lucid Dreamers on the green land. They changed their name when they became Lucid Dreamers. They used names like Shamrock and Clover.”
“Bernard, your slave is speaking in my presence. He’s here in case we need manual labor, or someone to be chased. I suppose he might have a point, however. It’s something special for me to have this power. My hair, my eyes, even my clothes are red as the jewel’s power flows through. I can do anything and everything, if only I so much as desire it. I am beyond my position as a mere princess of the Alsike kingdom. Speak, slave. Tell me more about these Lucid Dreamers.”
“The boy referred to the girl as a ‘magical girl‘. He called the jewels ‘magic jewels‘. Using these jewels, the boy, certainly known as a ‘magical boy‘, travels the land, pulling rabbits from hats and finding specific cards from a deck of 52 different cards. He also escapes from water-filled locked trunks, and makes elephants disappear.”
“What’s an elephant?” Piñole asked him.
“The answer to that question, my princess, lies in the pieces of the word. The eleph- prefix means ‘really, really big’. The ant part refers to a small insect known to travel in huge armies, ruining picnics all around the Earth. On a continent called Africa, it’s prohibited to have a picnic within 50 miles of a city, for fear an army of elephants will stampede the city flat to go to the picnic.”
“And why do elephants congregate at picnics?” Piñole asked. “Oh, never mind that! Tell me more about their names.”
“Of course, my princess. When Princess Arle used the green jewel, she was called ‘Clover’, the name otherwise reserved for the Lucid Dreamer girl. A clover is a type of plant. As we see back in Aureum and in dreams from other planets, plants are green. It’s because of this ‘green’ connection that the bearer of the green jewel is called ‘Clover’.”
“Green for clover, you say? Very well. I choose the English word Crimson as my new name whenever I’m a Lucid Dreamer, a ‘magical girl‘.”
“Fine, fine,” Bernard said. “So we’ll call you Crimson now. Do you know where that yellow jewel is, yet?”
“If you spoke like that to me in front of my parents, your whole family would be slave right now,” Crimson pointed out. She pressed the tips of her fingers to the jewel on front of the tiara on her forehead. “I feel… I can’t find the yellow jewel.”
“You lost it? You mean we’re walking aimlessly now?” Bernard raised his arms into the air. “Another five years! That’s how long we’ll be going through dreams to get this jewel!”
“It isn’t like that,” Crimson said to him. “There are two active jewels approaching us. They’re overpowering the inactive yellow jewel. I’ll hold off these you. I want you and your slave to find me that yellow jewel.”
Crimson left the two, and headed to the entrance of the museum. There, she sat at the front desk. She watched as Clover, Shamrock, and Arle appeared in front of the doorway, inside the building. “Welcome to the museum,” she greeted in English, from behind the counter.
“Piñole!” Arle called out, surprised to see her sister there.
“It’s Crimson now, Arle. I’ve become a magical girl, just like your friends there. We already have the yellow jewel, so you can come back to my side. The yellow jewel is yours, but you’ll first have to bring me the green and blue jewels. Come now, be a good little girl and collect those jewels for me.”
“It was all a trap,” Shamrock told Clover, gritting his teeth. “I should have known, since they’re sisters.”
“No, it isn’t like that,” Arle said. “Please, you have to believe me. I didn’t know anything about this.”
“I believe you,” Clover said.
“Clover, how can you say that?” Shamrock waved his arms out, showing off the situation in front of them. “She brought us here when they already have two jewels. Now they’re going to take ours!”
“I didn’t,” Arle started, sniffling, “I didn’t mean for it to happen.” She wiped tears from under her eyes. “I didn’t know Piñole would try to take your jewels like this. She said she wanted us to be friends, so she would know if you were really enemies or not. I know you’re not enemies.” She turned to her sister. “Please, Piñole, they’re not our enemy.”
“Even if you are my kid sister, you will address me as Crimson. This name is a form of respect for my power. If you continue to be disobedient, I will have to send you home, and retrieve the jewels on my own. Now, come to my side.”
Arle looked at Clover and Shamrock. She looked at her older sister, then back at the two. “Sorry. I hafta’ do what Piñole–I mean, Crimson–tells me.” She walked over to her sister, and stood by her side.
“What are you going to do now?” Crimson asked the Clover and Shamrock. “Will you use force to take my jewel from me?”
“Actually, we don’t want your jewel,” Shamrock said.
“We don’t need it,” Clover added. “We have our own.”
“You admit it, then,” Crimson said. She chuckled. “You really are determined to keep those jewels, even though they are not yours.”
“Yes they are to ours. These jewels have been in my family for generations,” Shamrock said back.
“Maybe it was your family generations ago who stole the jewels in the first place,” Crimson suggested.
“Don’t listen to her,” Clover said, looking at Shamrock. “She just wants to make you mad.”
Shamrock looked back at Clover. “I won’t get mad. We should just go look for the yellow jewel.” He held he hand out, and Clover took it in hers. The two walked side-by-side, hold hands, walking toward, then around the front desk.
“You’re not grasping the situation,” Crimson said. She touched the jewel on her tiara, then vanished. She reappeared at the doorway into the museum’s first hall. “I already have the jewel, so there’s no reason for you to go in there.”
“I don’t believe you,” Shamrock said. “You lied and said my jewels aren’t mind, so you probably lied when you said you had the yellow jewel. It’s just like when that one guy tried to delay me and Arle when the other guy went after Clover. You want to distract us. We’re going inside.”
“Let’s try this another way.” Crimson touched the tiara’s jewel again. She closed her mind, and concentrated on the book shelves on either side of the room. The bookshelves shook, and scooted back and forth, the books on the shelves falling over, and to the ground. Crimson opened her eyes, and the books lifted into the air, red glows around them. The books flapped through the air, quickly surrounding the other two jewel holders.
Clover leaned in closer to Shamrock as the books swooped by. Shamrock tightened his hold of Clover’s hand. “It’ll be all right,” Shamrock told her. “Remember what happened in your basement last year, and what it did to the books down there?”
Clover nodded. She placed a hand on her brooch, and Shamrock touched his earrings with the tip of his fingers. As the books repeatedly bumped into the two, a heavy rain of water fell. For a few moments, the two and Crimson were submerged, with Arle standing just outside the heavy shower. When water stopped falling, the books had all hit the floor. They struggled to flap about, but the water in their pages made them too heavy to get off the ground.
Crimson huffed, as she squeezed water out of her side ponytails.
Clover giggled. “I guess even museums have leaky pipes.”
The hall doors opened, Bernard and Alfalfa standing behind them. “We’ve found the yellow jewel,” Bernard said in Aureumi.
“Hand it to me,” Crimson urged, holding a hand out.
Bernard reached his hand out with the yellow jewel held in his grip. He pulled his hand back. “You already have the red jewel. How about letting me keep this one?”
“Are you defying me?” Crimson asked him.
“Whatever.” He reached out with the jewel in his hand, and dropped it into Crimson’s hands. “Not like I care about being a Lucid Dreamer, anyway. I’m just an attendant, after all.”
“We now have the yellow jewel,” Crimson said to the others. “We’ll bow out this time. Come, Arle.” Crimson touched her tiara, and a in red flash of light, she vanished, taking with her Bernard and Arle. Clover, Shamrock, and Alfalfa remained.
“I’ll show you the way back to the green land,” Alfalfa told the two. “I’ll probably be in trouble for guiding you two, but my family’s slave class. It’s not like we can be demoted any lower. The princess left me here, so I may as well be of use to someone.”
“Are you saying Crimson’s a princess?” Clover asked.
“Lady Piñole and Lady Arle are both princesses of the Alsike era,” Alfalfa explained to the two.
“You’re not making this up, are you?” Shamrock asked him. “It wouldn’t be the first time you’ve fibbed.”
“Call it fibbing if you will, but I prefer to call it colorful entertainment. But, not, this is not to entertain. It’s the truth. The two are princesses, and for me it is only an honor to have been before their presence. You’re not from around here, so you probably don’t know how things work here. My family is not supposed to be seen by anyone other than the attendants we work for. It seems things are a little different when heading out across the continents around Aureum, though.” Alfalfa gestured toward the front door. “Let’s go. Doors don’t lead to different dreams like on the green land, so I’ll have to show you the way around the yellow land.”
