CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
-[ What It Means To Dream ]-
"Your precious King of Dreams lacks empathy"
FLOATING THROUGH THE DREAMS OF HER FRIENDS, ROSE SLOWLY BEGAN TO LEARN MORE AND MORE ABOUT HER POWERS. She was beginning to move more efficiently through the Dreaming, transferring herself along with Morpheus and Azrail through the array of dreams being naturally drawn to her.
Even the Grim Reaper was coming to understand dreams a little more. For a being who had never seen the purpose of sleep or the dreams that would plague your mind when you fell asleep, she never gave it a second thought. But, seeing them unfold, she grew to watch from a new perspective. One that was seeing dreams as a necessity to the human mind, a way for them to relax and feel at peace in a world of their own creation.
Morpheus pulled her through the newest gateway, finding themselves to be stood on a quiet street, the air still and abandoned of life. Azrail spared a glance to Morpheus, who was more concerned with Rose. The grasp upon her hand didn't ease. A small home stood silently in front of them, roof drained of colour and brick walls greying with age.
"You know this place?" Morpheus observed.
Rose turned the missing poster to Morpheus and Azrail, showing a large grin. "That was our house growing up. Look." She rattled the piece of paper, gesturing to the large photograph and the house positioned behind the young Jed and Rose Walker.
"Hm, impressive," Azrail remarked, finally feeling Morpheus lift his grip upon her cold hand. She missed warmth that seemed to radiate out of his palm.
The Dream King nodded with affirmation. "You've done it. You've found your brother's dream." But despite the pride, his expression turned grim and the scenery became suddenly very tense with the very air around then tightening. "Now, we find Gault."
"Okay," Azrail nodded along sarcastically. "And, do tell, how do we do that?"
A gust of ash and sand slipped into the tense air. The sand contorted around the three and formed a sudden vortex ahead of them. Morpheus extended an arm in front of Azrail protectively despite the Grim Reaper's purpose of being there being to defend the Dream King.
Azrail didn't necessarily hate the protective hold, but when the sand clear and the dust settled, confused was an understatement. Taken aback, she lowered her scythe and tilted her head.
"Halt, King of Nightmares, or I'll send you all to Dreamland," Jed threatened cautiously to the three. Wearing a very comic book-like costume, a large sand timer hung from his neck and a cheap red mask was secured over his eyes. The outfit wasn't very pleasing either, reminding Azrail of some of the lesser known heroes she had seen Maeve interact with whilst she spent time with her sister on Earth.
"Jed?" Rose remarked in surprise, and the mere mention of his name made the boy's stance falter.
Shaking off the surprise, Jed glare at Dream. "I am the Guardian of Sleepers," he corrected his older sister. "I am Lord of the Dream Domain. I am the Sandman."
Azrail snickered and Morpheus smirked. "You are the Sandman?" Dream clarified in both bewilderment and amusement. "Is that what she told you?" He took a slow step forward, unfazed by Jed's defensive stance as he prepared to take on the guy he saw only as a super villain. "Where is she? Your master."
"Stay back," Jed warned.
"Jed, we're not here to hurt you," Rose tried to reason with her brother. For a moment, a flash of recognition faded across the masked eyes of Jed when Gault stepped out of seemingly thin air.
Azrail's scythe glistened and her eyes narrowed towards the false form Gault held.
"It's me you want. Not him," Gault tried to reason with Dream. She sounded almost empathetic, disappointed and saddened by the end of her little escapade.
"Oh, my god. Mum?" Rose exclaimed.
Azrail's eyebrow quirked. "Mum?" she repeated bluntly.
"No," Morpheus interjected, catching Rose's arm before she could approach the nightmare. "That is not your mother, Rose."
The mention of the girl's name sparked something within Jed. He moved past Gault, tearing his mask from his face as his eyes widened. "Rose?" he called. "Is that you?"
Rose exhaled a trembling breath and nodded. Extending her arms, Jed hurried into the arms of his sister, holding onto her tightly. "I've been looking for you everywhere," Rose stated, cupping her brother's face between her cold hands as if thinking he'd disappear the moment she turned away.
"Mum, it's Rose!" Jed said, glancing back at Gault whom watched with tears stinging her eyes. "She's all grown up."
"That's not your mother, kid," Azrail spoke softly, watching Morpheus remove the illusion with a simple wave of his hand. Stood in the place of Rose and Jed's mother was a figure taking on a more feminine look but lacked any other characteristics other then the body type. Her skin was dark with a cascading shade of colours that reflected that of the cosmo forever moving across her skin. Her sharp glare never lifted from Morpheus.
"Mum!" Jed cried out. "What did you do to her?" He pushed past Rose, quickly approaching Morpheus when Azrail stepped between them, using the blunt side of her scythe to push him back.
Azrail's brows were permanently furrowed as she remained stunned by the whole scenario. But deep down, even though her instinct told her to take drastic measure and tear Jed's soul out to protect Dream, she knew her sister would despise her if she did such a thing.
Rose pulled her brother away, trying desperately to explain the tough circumstances they found themselves to be in. Like how Gault was the furthest thing from their mother.
"Now, I need you to tell me where you are," Rose pleaded after explaining that their mother was still deceased.
Jed gave her a confused look. "I'm right here," he answered, looking around with a tilted head.
"No, Jeddy, this is a dream," Rose corrected. "When you wake up, where will you be?" When Jed still struggled to understand, she hurriedly pulled up the missing poster, pointing to the scribbled text over the stained page. "Look, did you write this?"
"Uncle Barnaby said he's gonna break every one in my body," Jed panicked suddenly, catching Azrail's attention. The Grim Reaper winced at the pure fear that twisted through the young boy's words, as if this "Uncle Barnaby" was the scariest thing to him.
Rose heard it too, and the worry for her younger brother only bloomed stronger within her chest. "Who's Barnaby?" she asked, still holding onto Jed's shoulders.
"Aunt Clarice won't be able to stop him."
Gault squeezed her eyes shut and swallowed slowly, tears slipping from beneath her eyelids as she felt the young boy's pain flow in waves through the tense atmosphere
"Where are Aunt Clarice and Uncle Barnaby?" Rose hurried to say.
"They're home. They're in Homeland."
"Where is that? Where is Home Land, Jed?"
"Come, Gault. We must go," Morpheus urged with an unwavering expression. His glare never shifted from the dark nightmare who's heart was caught in an ever tightening vice.
Gault couldn't fight with her master's instruction. She took a slow few steps forward and crouched near Jed. "I'm sorry, Sandman," she said tenderly.
"Morpheus, we can't just leave the kid," Azrail tried to reason, hating how her thumping heart was calling for her to intervene. To find the boy herself and reunite him with his family.
Morpheus didn't even spare her as much as a glance. He instead watched the young boy. "It's time to wake up, Jed."
"Wait, no!" Rose cried, but her desperation did nothing to alter the mind of one of the Endless.
Instead, Morpheus bid her a fake and inconsiderate farewell. "Goodbye, Rose Walker."
"Stop! Not yet. Jed, tell me where you are-."
"Rose," Azrail called, pushing past Morpheus' extended arm. She hurried to Rose's side with a few large step, grabbing the girl's arm tightly. The Reaper could feel the Dreaming sleeping away as Dream forcefully woke Jed from his deep slumber. "Tell Maeve everything. She has access to databases you can only imagine and will help you with anything you need. Anything at all."
Under the descending sun, Rose's eyes glimmered with pain and her heart lurched into her throat. "How am I suppose to find her?"
"She's your Guardian Angel, she'll be the if you merely called." Azrail forced her dark lips to rise into a tight smile. Eyes reflective of the night sky refused to assist with the reassurance she wished to give, and instead weighed heavy with the strangling touch of sudden guilt. A feeling Azrail was yet to understand.
Rose vanished suddenly after Azrail finished, and the girl's brother soon followed. The world around the began to change as sand twisted through the tense air and transported them back to the Palace, where the tall murals awaited for their return. Glimmering with the sun piercing through the brightly coloured glass, the intricate design of Gault seemed to darken as if assuring them they had accomplish finding at least one nightmare.
Lucienne was waiting for them. "So?" she urged, looking to Morpheus expectingly. It was as if she could easily sense something was off despite the obvious successes with Gault stood across from her.
"Your precious King of Dreams lacks empathy," Azrail remarked with a dry laugh.
"Empathy?" Morpheus repeated, spitting the word like it made him physically ill to even utter it. "For the humans?" He sharply turned to glare at Azrail who held her ground. "You speak of empathy for the humans as if you don't rip their life from them."
"Do you have any idea what his life is like in the Waking World?" Gault spoke up in support of the Grim Reaper.
Morpheus' disgust continued to boil. "Humans cannot live in dreams," he insisted. "As long as he stayed there, the child had no life nor the chance for one."
Gault's jaw clenched. "The boy is being abused," she emphasised, daring to challenge the Lord of Dream's who held her future in the palm of his hands. "He's suffering."
Morpheus' eyes darkened. "You abused that suffering to build a Dreaming you could rule."
"I don't think she did," Azrail defended the dark nightmare, purposely placing herself between Dream and Gault. "You saw how scared that boy was. That world she created for him was his escape a chance for happiness." Half of her couldn't believe the stuff falling from her mouth. It felt like she was becoming her sister, and Azrail wasn't sure if that concerned her or excited her.
"The humans cannot live in dreams," Morpheus replied with out missing a single beat, stepping off the steep staircase. He came down to Azrail's level. "Whether or not he is being harmed in the Waking World, that is where he belongs. And she preyed on that fear out of her own selfish need."
"I had no wish to rule," Gault hurried to say. "I merely wish to be a Dream and not a Nightmare. To inspire rather than to frighten."
Azrail certainly despised how that attacked her dark heart which was seemingly gaining some life.
"The choice is not yours to make," Morpheus said, holding a tone that tried to declare the conversation to be over. He had moved his gaze from Azrail for a moment to reply to Gault, but as he continued he turned back to the Grim Reaper. "We do not choose to be created. Nor do we choose how we are made."
"But we can change-" Gault tried.
And Morpheus interrupted her. "No. We are, each of us, born with responsibilities." He moved away from Azrail finally, and she released a slow breath. "Even I am not free to choose to be other than I am. Nor is anyone." He glanced at Azrail once more, standing a few steps away from her with a dulled expression. "It is why your sister was banished Heaven refused to hear her explanation and reasoning. She was replaced because we cannot choose who we are in this natural order."
Gault shook her head. "If that were true, why did all the other Dreams and Nightmares choose to leave this place when you had gone away?"
"Not all of us chose to leave and nearly all have returned," Lucienne finally spoke for the first time since the King of Dreams made his grand return. But though she spoke the truth, the purpose for the Dreams and Nightmares returning was not as clear.
"Do you think they came back out of love?" Gault asked sharply, her voice wavering with the weight of her grief and the loss of a life where she was happy. She turned to Dream. "Or because they were afraid of what you would do to them if they did not? Because I'm not afraid."
Morpheus turned to face the nightmare fully, and his eyes blazed with anger at the disrespect shown by Gault. The look the crossed his expression sent a shudder down Azrail's spine, one that tried to drag her away and urge her into the protective hold of her older sister.
"You should be," Morpheus demanded, voice booming like the crack of thunder on a gloomy day. "A Nightmare's purpose is to reveal a dreamer's fears so that they may face them." His shadow suddenly trickled down the stairs, and Azrail hurried out of the silhouette as it reached for Gault. "Perhaps a few thousand years in the darkness will reveal your fears.""
As the shadow grew past Gault, her body began to dissipate into thin air, trickling by like dust in the wind. But even in the face of pure darkness, Gault stood strong and never broke eye contact with Dream of the Endless. "Better that than to make others afraid. Even a Nightmare can dream, my lord." She spoke the formal name disrespectfully.
Closing her eyes and bowing her head, Gault accepted her fate. And whilst watching Morpheus' unwavering expression, Azrail hated to confess that she was undeniably afraid of him.
"You feel her punishment was unjust?" Morpheus spoke through the tense silence.
Azrail refused to look at him, and instead turned to Lucienne. A mere glance proved to her that the librarian shared her opinion and bravely spoke it: "I used to be something else. Before you made me your librarian. We all change, sir. Even you, perhaps. One day."
The Grim Reaper gulped, tightening her fist around her scythe. She sure admired Lucienne's bravery.
"Lucienne, I realise that in my absence, you were compelled to make decisions in my stead and I am grateful to you," Morpheus said strongly, simply brushing his assistance's comment to the side without addressing its significance. "But I am back now. You may return to the library."
Lucienne waited. She waited for him to say it was some twisted joke or that he was mistaken. But as those few strangling seconds passed, she came to understand that he was indeed being serious. She no longer held the significance she once did.
The librarian turned and headed off to return to her rightfully spot at the library.
"Azrail," Morpheus tried by the Grim Reaper shook her head, holding her arm close to her chest when he reached to grab her.
Through the shadows of her large hood, she lifted her head hesitantly. "Don't worry, I was just leaving," she insisted and disappeared into Oblivion, leaving Dream to ponder over how lonely his destiny truly was.