This isn't where she went to sleep.

Yawn. "Hi, Dream Ky."

"I don't think I'm - oh, you think you're dreaming."

"Yeah?"

"Okay, well, I don't think I'm dreaming so I don't think you are either, so don't do anything weird on account of thinking that." She gets up to explore the room.

If she tries the doors, one of them is locked, and the other unlocked. The walls have patterned wallpaper and the furniture has brocaded upholstery. The small curtains — currently opened — is similar. Red and black are the dominant colors in the decorations with gold and white being secondary. 

On the part of the shelf with the incense holder, there's an assortment of bottles, herbs, and candles.

She can sense some of the titles of the books. Atlas of the Solar System. Medicinal Chemistry, Fourth Edition. Properties of Carrier Media and Fixatives. A lot of them seem to revolve around chemistry, fragrances, history, places, or medicine. It's almost all non-fiction.

If she reads the paperwork, many of them begin with To His Imperial Majesty Hugo, Director of the Cielos consortium, Keeper of the Imperial Formulary, Warden of the Routes of Xiedos. or a variation thereof. The majority of them are expense reports and accounting records presented in neat tables with explanations at the bottom. Some are requests or proposals or updates: one concerning a botanical garden on Xiedos, one about a crop failure in Sirmegunda. There's also an unopened envelope from a Roberta Campurriana with the warm, nutty scent of tonka bean. On the other tray are similar papers, but they have a woody, ambery scent.

The drawers of the desk have stationery: pens, ink, wax seals and candles, so on and so forth. Some of them are locked.

"Iskander, can you read these things?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, first of all, that's not normal in dreams."

"What if a dream figment was like, ah, you can see the color blue, that's not normal in dreams."

"Fair enough but also this is not Scythian."

"See, this is a way where my guess makes more sense, not less."

"You have a point and you're so annoying about it." She peeps through the unlocked door, carefully, in case it's just a long drop with more clouds out there.

It's a corridor! With the same color scheme and aesthetic. No one else is visible.

The locked door opens-

-there's a man in a oxblood waistcoat and jacket and black breeches, standing halfway in the other room and halfway in the study.

"I didn't know I would be assassinated so soon," he says calmly.

"I beg your pardon. We have no idea how we got here. - he has an idea but it's that he's dreaming. We don't know who you are, let alone want you assassinated."

His face changes from careful neutrality to something else. Concern? He's staying in his position between the rooms.

"Did my gr— did Madame Coconut put you up to this? Did she talk to you?"

"I don't know who that is either."

"Huh. Did you talk to any other fairies?"

What are Kybele and Iskander wearing? Are they holding anything — do they have weapons?

Neither of them is holding anything and they are in what look like they might be sleep clothes - simple, no shoes. (Kybele is sort of acting armed, but her hands are empty.)

"I don't know what a fairy is."

How do you not know what a fairy is.

His eyes flick to the door.

The door flings open forcefully. There's an odd-looking woman at the door, with a painted face, reminiscent of a porcelain doll. She has a crown of flowers and loose, gauzy turquoise robes, moving and fluttering in the air in a way that defies gravity. The room fills with the strong, bright fragrance of ylang-ylang and roses. It grabs the attention. She has a sheathed rapier by her hip.

"Good morning!" she says cheerfully. "Is something wrong?"

"Good morning, Madame Coconut. We have visitors."

"Good morning, visitors!"

"...good morning."