Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There is sorrow. There is grief. And then there is reality cracking like glass around him, spiderweb fractures climbing through empty air, as pale fingers stained red grasp at a body that no longer breathes. He has grieved before — he knows the air-stealing, heart-wrenching terror of it. But this…

This is silent.

There is no screaming. There is no desperate, broken cries for his sister to return what she has stole. There is no broken, heaving, aching sobs that everyone in the Dreaming can hear.

There is just him now.

It is strange, how grief does that. How it takes the vast, infinite world and burns it down to just him, just her. He can feel everyone else. Lucienne, Jessamy, Fiddler’s Green. Only, he cannot feel her and that is both an emptiness and a weight.

He did this.

His hands are shaking, his fingers slipping on the still-wet crimson that has become her latest dress. His entire body is shaking, so violently he can hardly see straight. He is somehow on his knees now, hands hovering over her. How can he help? How can he ease her pain? ( She is gone. There is no pain , some logical part of him whispers.)

No. No, she was in pain, and she probably cried for him. She probably wished he would come. And he did. He always did. But just too late now. Minutes? Hours? Reality is a construct here, as easily changed as the flick of an hand. Warm and wet blood means nothing. She was in pain. That was all that mattered. And he was not here to help her.

A gentle brush of the hair from her forehead, careful not to leave a streak of her own blood. A strained smile, eyes that never quite meet hers, tears that drip onto her face. It is okay, he whispers. You are safe now. I have you. There is no more pain, my love. He has her now. He will protect her. He will let her rest.

She is light in his arms. Far too light. But then, it was always easy to carry her. And besides, he is Endless. Carrying his queen is nothing. Something. Something like a funeral procession, across the sands of the realm. His footprints are swept away by the wind on the dunes. He could easily transport them back, be back in their chambers in the blink of an eye.

But he failed her.

This is his penance, he thinks. His punishment. To be the one holding her, to feel each step back to the castle, to see just how far away from home she was . And oh… oh, it is so far. Too far.

He does not know why she was out here, all alone, at this hour.

Perhaps he would have if he hadn’t ignored her earlier this evening.

She asked for help.

He said no.

He is helping now, at least. (Too little, too late.)

He does not acknowledge his sister beside him, silver glinting in the moonlight that he now despises. His eyes stay ahead, on the spire of the castle that grows a fraction bigger each section.

“Dream,” Death whispers, and it is like she has struck him. “You don’t have to carry her all this way, you know.”

His jaw twitches.

“I do. I must.”

“She is gone now. That… is not her.”

“She is the queen. I will not leave my queen out in the desert like some commoner.”

Death is in front of him now, telling him to stop. Imploring him, almost.

The castle grows bigger.

Then it stops.

“Let me speak with her,” he breathes and it is like he is choking on mere noises. Sounds. Like they have become physical and are trying to choke him. “Please, my sister. I must…” His voice cracks and he is too lost in his own grief to care. “I must see her.”

“You know the rules. I cannot do that. You would have to seek her out yourself.”

“Please,” he tries again through cracking lips. “You do not understand. I was… dismissive, earlier. I told her no. She is… She is here because of me. I have to apologize.”

Death crouches down, because he is on his knees again, begging her to grant him this one favor. “Brother, I cannot. I can only give you advice on where to look.”

Where to look.

Where to find… her.

Where to find his wife.

Grief is a strange thing. It starts out so small, and builds and builds until one is drowning. It is like a sea, calm and then violent. Quiet, and then screaming.

He is sobbing now, back in his chambers. She lays nearby, eyes closed. He has changed her into something better, into her favorite clothes. Has given her a bouquet of her favorite flowers, wall-crawling jasmine-lilies. He has combed her hair, washed the blood from her hands.

From his own.

He would not let anyone else touch her.

It is not his penance, but his honor, as her husband. He will do everything himself. But tonight, he is not a king grieving a queen.

He grieves the woman he loved.

Tomorrow, there will be a funeral. An announcement. Maybe. He’s not sure anymore.

Tonight, there will be just him and the grief that threatens to put him in the river beside her. And perhaps, Morpheus thinks, that would not he such a bad thing. Perhaps, now, that is the only place he belongs — beside her on a boat, draped in black, sent off to eternity unknown.

He does not go. He watches her, sees her drift away, feels his siblings try to say anything that will ease some part of the pain, but it does not.

No, he does not go with her.

But every day since, he wishes he did.

Chapter Text

Lucid dreamers are not common but not rare. There are a dozen hundred every few centuries, people who gain consciousness in their dreams and know they are dreaming. Non-lucid dreamers can even have their lucid moments, wonder widening their eyes as they realize an entire world is at their fingertips and there is no such thing as impossible here.

He has always had a soft spot for them, he muses, for they are people whose minds dream up stories and worlds so vivid in the waking realm that they carry into the Dreaming, and thus, their consciousness follows. To be someone with a love for wonder so powerful it grants the ability to know they are in a dream and to take advantage of that… well, the King of Dreams holds that kind of dreamer closer to his heart than most.

He won’t show himself, but he will visit their dreams often. He likes to watch the worlds they build, to see what can happen when one had their full potential unlocked. Entire miniature universes have bloomed like a flower in the garden of the Dreaming, making it all the more beautiful for those who come after. Knights with hidden pasts and pirates with hearts of gold and true loves all run free here.

Then there are the lucid dreamers who are so powerful they only manifest once an eon. Like a vortex, they can cross into others’ dreams, and they know they are dreaming. But instead of destruction, instead of bringing down walls and threatening the very fabric of his realm, this kind of lucid dreamer brings life so strong it lasts long after they have gone. And the life they create does not just stay with them, but becomes a resident of the Dreaming as though created by Morpheus himself.

This kind of lucid dreamer possesses power rival to his own.

”You are not of my creations,” he says evenly to the man in his throne room, his eyes like miniature stars glittering in the gathering darkness. “Yet you speak and act on your own accord, without the need for your dreamer’s presence.”

The man bows his head, supplication written in every bone of his body. A strange creation loyal to the king he somehow yet knows. “Indeed, my lord. I came to offer my services to you within the palace. My dreamer has no need for me right now. She has moved onto other worlds.”

The man is strikingly similar to the king — ebony hair windswept against his forehead, eyes glinting with eerie brightness, skin so pale the moonlight glows on it. But he is not Morpheus. It is as if someone tried to draw Morpheus from memory but could not quite remember what he looked like, only what he… felt like.

”I have no open positions right now,” he murmurs, stepping down the dais. Footsteps echo as he paces around the man, his head tilted just a little. “But I would indulge in the question of who your dreamer is and how you come to be… independent.”

The dream shrugs a little — not in a dismissive or rude way, but rather as if he really does not know. “I was created like this. My dreamer, she said made me from a memory she is trying to catch. She seemed frustrated but told me it was not my fault that I was not what she was searching for. We spoke a little and then she sent me away. I heard someone say your palace may have jobs and I thought I seemed so specific to her that I may not be of help in another’s dreams, so I came here.”

His heart, rusted and ancient and weary, stops for the briefest of seconds. He knows what this means. “And where did you last see your dreamer?”

”By the shores of the Unspoken Sea, near Lover’s Summit. The last I saw of her, she was standing in the tides gathering something, but what it was I do not know.”

The Unspoken Sea. The Shores of Persevering Grief.

Lover’s Summit.

Places only few would know to find on purpose, and fewer still would seek out willingly. His fingers, forever by his side, twitch at the names. He himself has not visited in centuries. He is not pleased to be returning, not after last time. He swallows, already resigned to what his next journey will be. “Thank you… Do you have a name? Has she given you one?”

The dream shook his head with a frown. “No, but I heard her say Moros before I left. Perhaps that is what she called me?”

Moros.

Strange.

”Well, thank you, Moros, for your service. You are free to reside in the Dreaming as a resident, under my protection,” he says softly. “Now go. Take your leave of the palace.” He does not bother to watch the dream leave, his eyes fixed on a point somewhere far beyond his window.

”Lucienne,” he calls after a moment. “I will be taking a trip.”

The Shores of Persevering Grief are as forlorn as ever. Black sand is littered with every mortal grief ever conceived. Further down the shore, he sees a new grief wash up, only to be dashed against the imposing rocks. The dream shatters into a thousand pieces of glass, all burying themselves into the sand with screams.

It is not a place of peace. It is where people come to mourn what they cannot find even in dreams. And it is not a place one seeks out, but rather, it finds those who need it most.

Lover’s Summit arches above his head, a jagged cliff edge that teeters precariously over the tides, always threatening to crumble away for good. He remembers when it was beautiful, and full of night-blooming jasmine lilies. Now, those flowers are withered and decaying, and only weeds grow on the rocks.

He looks. His eyes flit about. There is no movement save the tides, but there is… something. A strange presence, lingering. Whoever has left it is long gone, but the forms molded by their hands… not quite so.

He draws nearer the broken, half-done vague form of a man laying on the beach. His edges shimmer like a fading star, but it is clear he had a torso and a neck, and once upon a time, a face. His hand occasionally twitches. But now, his face is crumbling, his lips moving in a noiseless prayer to the dreamer who has long since left. Morpheus finds himself crouching beside the form, some small part of him feeling sorrow for the half-formed dream’s plight. It looks to be in agony. If the lucid dreamer meant to cause pain, then she is very cruel.

With two gentle fingers, as if a father is lulling his child to sleep, he touches the other’s forehead. Rest now, little dream. Be free from this form.

The prayer ceases to be prayed. The hands stop moving. One last sigh and the chest is stilled forever. Morpheus stands, taking a step back as he watches the beach begin to reclaim what is truly hers. In just minutes, the dream has decayed, leaving behind nothing but stark-white bones not quite human and not quite god. Something in-between, an ungrasped idea given form too soon. Humans are often content with unfinished dreams because they know they rarely ever get to see the end. But this is the work of someone looking to an ending that may not even exist. Is it faith? Is it fear? He does not know. And because of that alone, he is deeply curious.

He leans down again. Bones hold the secrets the mind does not want to remember. It also retains the fingerprints of its creator. He picks a piece of the rib cage. “Show me who made you,” he whispers, and the bone gives up its secrets. A name, etched into the ivory-like material. An impossible name. One that has not been spoken aloud for eons.

He drops the bone as if burned. A noise like he has been stabbed escapes his lips. His eyes, wide and dark and twin pinpoints of stars in the night, glare at the name. At the impossible truth taunting him. “No,” he snarls. “You lie. Another name. The true name. Give it to me!”

The carvings deepen. The name begins to weep blood and ash, the white discolored by crimson and black, cracking under the force of its king’s disbelief and rage. The beach cries under his feet. The tides scream at him. 

She is dead. He carried her home. He arranged her funeral. His realm mourned her for thousands of years. He mourned her for twice as long. He picked her funeral flowers himself, dressed her himself. His private gardens hold a statue painstakingly carved by his hands in homage to a memory he can never let go of. (His hands never move quite so erratically as they do when he grieves. Hands made for love bear the weight of loss instead.) He knows what he saw.

But bones do not lie.

What is dead has returned to his realm.