#saint morpheus in stained glass

[landwriter]

“You would so devote yourself to love? To me?” asked Dream. “You’ll find I’m a very stubborn man,” said Hob. “I once waited a century at a time just to meet with a friend.”

[deicidis]

Come Wander With Me

Morpheus x f!reader

Status: Completed one-shot, requested by anon 

Wordcount: 5.1K 

Warnings: light smut, religious trauma

Summary:  Morpheus finds the reincarnation of his former wife in the house of god. He tries to find out whether they could be each other again.

—

He came from the sunset

He came from the sea

He came from my sorrow

And can love only me

—

In that cool evening, when he sits in the park he frequents with his sister, The first sight of her binds his chest in a shrinking rope. 

Her laughter is the same tune from centuries ago. Millenniums. A familiar smile plasters on her face, laughing along with children, small fingers grasping her calf-length skirt, begging to go home. A silver cross hangs on her chest, winking under the sun. 

He is rooted to where he sits. Fear made him so. If he so much as blinked, twitch a finger, let out his tears, she could be taken from him and it all would just be an illusion. 

She walked away with a toddler on her arm and a boy no more than 7 hanging on to her hand. 

—

She dreams of a silver cage with a restless serpent trapped inside. She dreams she lays bare inside that cage, voiceless and decaying inwards. 

Morpheus is the king of dreams. Every creature that sleeps he knows them all. But this, watching her dreams, quenching his thirst with slivers of imagery feels like a violation because she bears the face of his long-deceased mortal wife taken too soon by his sister. Some ages ago when mankind’s hubris offended god that he decided to converge their speech in other variations. 

The curse of the endless is that every aspect of themselves is also endless. His contempt is everlasting, his rage stretches for centuries. His love eternal. Nada, Calliope, Kilalla, (y/n). Each of them unequivocally holds a part of him. But his dear (y/n)... half of his being, the only one who could take him completely has gone. Her shadow is the only part he has of her, carved on the marrow and the spine of the dreaming. 

If he could take the chance to recover what was…

He rises from his throne and sets himself to where she dwells

  —

The convent she lives in is on the same grounds as the church. A small one that had only been thrice renovated despite being 3 centuries old. 

He pushes through the double-lidded door, and he finds her figure in a black habit lighting a prayer candle before a stained glass that depicts a saint on the wall to his right.

He steadies his heart. Swallows the heaviness in his throat. His feet carry him to approach her. 

“Will you tell me about this saint, sister…” He trails his voice in hope that she would catch his meaning. 

He sees her hesitation. 

“(Y/n).” her voice throws him to his days as a husband, and he feels slightly lightheaded. The ground feels unsteady under his feet. 

Even her name is the same. 

“Saint Anthony of Padua.” She shifts her gaze to the stained glass. Her face glows with light refractions in arrays of blue, red and purple. 

“Patron saint of lost items, lost people, lost causes and souls.” she continues. 

Morpheus silently clears his throat. 

“Should one pray to this saint, will my lost one be returned to me?”

“If God wills it.” Her voice is low and quiet. If he was a mortal being he would not hear it. But he hears her clear as day. The growing strands of her hair and her decaying cells if he wants to. 

There is nothing more to say. The truth is he doesn’t know what to say. 

She walks away from the room and he merely watches her. 

Morpheus takes an unlit candle, burns the twine in the fire she lit moments ago. 

—

He comes to pray beside her before the saint the next day. The next, and then the next. He attends Sunday mass and shed his coat in the summer to blend in with the congregation.

He still doesn’t know how to properly make conversation with her for she doesn’t seem to have the inclination to make small talk with him either. She seems to be—understandably—wary of new people. 

He really can’t just say hello, you are the carbon copy of my dead wife and I want to get to know you.

All he manages to say is formal pleasantries that she meets with polite nods or few syllable answers. Then she returns to pray before the Saint. 

He finally summons the fates and asks if she is truly her wife in some form of rebirth he doesn’t understand, and the fates confirm that she is the direct descendant of the same family tree. She might be her very own reincarnation, but that answer would cost him a higher price to pay. 

“What is it that you gain by putting her in my path?” sometimes the thought of her pierces him a little too hard, unbalances his breathing. The fates are cruel creatures he knows of this, but to play with his dearest one like this—

“Dream, you speak as if your brother is not Destiny itself.” The maiden wears a coy smile. 

—

When he visits the church again (y/n) is not to be found. He asks Sister Siobhan—the matronly old woman who always greets him kindly—and informed him that she had fallen ill. A sudden fever struck her and she resides in her room

“Would it be alright to pass her my well wishes?”

Sister Siobhan hums as she rests her arm on the tip of her broom.

“What do you have in mind?”

He sends her large bouquets of flowers and some sweets she might like with a get-well-soon card. Then he visits her dream that night. 

Trapped bare in the cage with a sleeping Serpent, (y/n) lays on its scales. Her hand rests on her stomach. Her breathing rags. 

As if she understands his presence is not conjured from her subconscious, her eyes are probing him, wrings his inside with little thrill, the eyes that used to bloom flowers in the Dreaming in its image. 

“What are you doing here?” she rasps. Morpheus has no words to answer that question. 

—

He waits for 3 days until he visits her again. Relieved when she sees her figure praying in front of Saint Anthony. 

“Thank you for the gifts. You didn’t have to do that.” She says when they’re standing side by side.

“I do.”  

“For what? You barely know me.” her brows crease slightly.

“I… would like to get to know you.”

She laughs. He swallows, it reminded him that laughter used to linger in his throne room, his library, his chamber… 

“I am married to god, Morpheus. My spouse is a jealous man.”

“I- enjoy your company. As a friend nothing more.” Morpheus doesn’t know whether his words are true. What it is he hoped to unearth within her. The soul of his former wife, a memory he hoped she’d remember, it all seems foolish but he had to try. 

 I want to know whether my wife is inside. 

“It’s funny, I saw you in my dream a couple of days ago. It feels… it feels like we’ve known each other for a long time.” 

Her words slightly tremble his hands.

“Perhaps an age ago we did.” he manage to say. 

“Perhaps.”

—

The life of a nun is bound by Christ, it requires her to be away from worldly endeavours. Morpheus know and understand this, he becomes patient with this fact. (y/n) doesn’t go outside much except for taking the orphan kids to the park or helping in the soup kitchen. He meets her on both occasions apart from visiting the church. 

“What do you do, Morpheus?” (y/n) asks after she swallowed a slice of Tangerine they currently share. The peel settles at the bottom of her net bag, along with 2 bottles of water for the orphan children after they stopped playing.

He ponders for a moment. 

“I’m a creator.” he takes another slice of Tangerine. 

“What do you create?”

“Everything.”

She chuckles at the ambiguity of his answer. 

“That’s a little vague.”

“One day I promise I will show them to you.” he gives her the last slice of the fruit. She puts it in her mouth, smiling. 

“Alright, I’ll be waiting.”

  —

What traces left of his wife he found is merely in her physical appearance, name and gestures the mortal eyes can easily be missed. Where his wife was an exploding cacophony of exuberance, (y/n) is quiet and talks as gently as winds of spring. 

He finds himself sinking deeper into her when she sits beside him watching the children play. A content look graced her lovely face. When her wilful kindness and her sense of duty come to act to help those who need help. When her patient voice would always come to her little orphan kids, to the needy. Her endless devotion to them. He can’t help but stand beside her to ladle soup into the bowls with her. He tries to wear the same warm smile just like her for the people who say thanks after each bowl. 

“There’s not much to know, this is all i am.” she says one afternoon when he walks her back to the convent from the Soup Kitchen.

“What you are is extraordinary, all of you.” he replies. He notes the little bashful smile she tries to contain. 

When they say their goodbyes at the gate of the church, Sister Siobhan stands at the doorstep, she gives him a knowing smile and look. 

Morpheus hides his own bashful smile as he walks away. 

—

“Why do you become a nun?” Morpheus asks at one point. Sitting beside her in the afternoon watching over the children play. Her leg crosses on top of the other. 

“I have a very religious family. I’m just following their footsteps.” she says quietly, in the tone only he could hear. 

“Do you believe in him?”

“God?”

He nods.

“i- hope he doesn’t.”

He waits for her to continue.

“I have many friends that would… that would…”

She trails, her eyes darting around the park. 

“He made parts of them that he rejects in his book. I almost hate him that way.” she finally says. 

“I understand. He can be fickle and obtuse.” 

“You made it sound like he owes you money.”

A smile creeps on Morpheus' face.

“Do you?” she returns. 

“No. He exists, but he is not of my belief.”

“And how do you know he exists?”

Morpheus turns his body towards her, drinking in the beauty of her eyes.

“Because he owes me money but lives in a mansion somewhere in Las Vegas.”

Gentle laugh breeze from her lips like winds of spring. Morpheus’s heart quickened slightly. The featherlike tingles on his stomach are something entirely new, relentless. 

—

Every week he looks forward to meeting her. There is not a second that passes that she stopped lingering in the crevices of his mind. A month turns into three, then six, and a year they develop a kinship with one another.

Her, this new form of his long-deceased wife that is in fact an entirely different being, eclipsed what he tried to find. Puts him to shame for his false pretences. 

He realised at one point when they prayed before the saint, when the refraction of light landed soft on her face, altogether he stopped looking for something that doesn’t exist. He chose to cherish her as a friend, her irreplaceable presence that comforts him in their routine. Her dearest (y/n). 

But lately, when he meets her, her eyes are sunken ever slightly. Her silence seems to be that of wariness instead of contentment. 

“You are troubled, (y/n).” he nudged her knee with his knuckle as they sit in the park again once they take the children home. An unusual request from her. 

Only her silence meets his observation.

“Are you alright?”

She focuses her eyes on the horizon instead of answering his question. 

“You can tell me anything.”

“I’m fine.” she snaps at him. Morpheus closes his mouth. Fall silent in resignation. But as moments pass he can feel her agitation, see her thumb digging into her palm. Notice the film over her eyes, an indescribable sort of anguish. 

“I’m sorry.” she sighs.

“Don’t be.” Morpheus assures her.

I used to…” she breathed. Hesitating for a moment. 

“I used to teach at the elementary few years ago. I remember that it was hard work, and the hours are long. But I never felt that sense of purpose in my entire life. It was all I wanted to be.”

She says quietly. Morpheus waits for her to continue.

“And I fell in love, you know, with one of the teachers there. She’s brilliant. And kind. She has a way that makes your insides just- melt into mush. I had the best summer holiday with her before my father found out.”

There is a yearning smile. Morpheus notes the tears gathered in her eyes. 

“He is a bigot and wealthy. There are no more dangerous traits than those combined in mankind.” she says then laugh bitterly.

“You took your vow unwillingly.” The realisation hits him.

“All because I love men and women equally.” she mutters bitterly.

“The sisters are kind enough to let me see you regularly, even sister Siobhan fought with my father for my release. They know that this life… it’s bleeding me dry.” 

Then there is nothing but hollowness in her eyes. All the rage and yearning and restlessness dissipate in a blink. In turn, he feels it tenfold.

“I could give you another.” he offers.

“You don’t know how powerful my father is.” she whispers. 

“I can assure you that would pose no problem for me.” 

“He’ll find me even at the edge of the world.” 

“I’ll make sure he won’t even so much as think of you.”

For a moment she looks hopeful, but the light is doused quickly.

“Leave the convent. Break your vows. You shall not be disturbed by your father.” 

“Please Morpheus. You’re being foolish.” irritation laces her words. 

“Trust me i-”

“Enough. No more, please.” she pleads. 

Desperate, Morpheus uses a last resort as he takes her hand. 

“You dream of a serpent trapped in a silver cage. Tonight you shall dream that she is free.”

“What?”

“Please. Trust me. I shall be with you when you walk away.” 

She contemplates his words, her eyes never leave his. Then she tips her face to the moon. To the horizon in the distance. She mulls over it for almost an hour, Morpheus is there beside her every second. 

—

Morpheus stands at the gate of the Church as he watches the sisters tearfully say their goodbyes to her on the doorstep. (y/n)’s eyes do the same thing, filmy and wet. She wave one last time and blow her kisses. But once she reaches the gates and walks away with him, her tears never fall. The usual cloud over her brows is replaced with something else, something light and easy. 

Hob Gadling is kind enough to let her stay at the New Inn upstairs. She settles there quietly. Resumes her teaching as a private tutor to the children of the parents who frequents the church. Resumes her service in taking the kids to the park and participating in the Soup Kitchen.  

Once they meet at the park again, when the last traces of sunlight sink in the horizon and the sky wear its dark blue, she asks him a long overdue question. 

“What did you do, Morpheus?”

He falls silent. For if he open his mouth, he fears that everything would pour from his lips and the truth would drive her away. The omission of truth lies heavy within him. But he could no longer do such a thing. 

She notes his unnatural silence. Her inquisitive eyes burn his profile as he rests his arms on his knees.

“What are you?” she whispers once more. 

Morpheus straightens his form. Then look her in her eyes.

“There are no words that would suffice to tell you what I truly am. I can only show you.” 

He offers her his hand. She eyes it cautiously, faint crease forms between her brows. But she takes his hand nonetheless.

—

She takes him so readily. Her eyes take in the Dreaming unflinching. Takes his nature without fear as he explains. There is even wonder twinking in her eyes. The part of her mouth in Awe of his Dreaming. Morpheus can’t help but preen under her marvel, never felt more proud of his creation.

Then he saw Lucienne’s bewildered face as he takes (y/n) to his throne room. It must be quite a sight that the ghost of her queen wanders the halls beside him. 

“My lord.” Lucienne greets him. Rigid and strained. 

“Lucienne, this is (y/n). My friend.” Morpheus notice the even widened eyes of the Dreaming’s librarian. 

“Welcome to the dreaming, Lady (y/n).”  Regardless of Lucienne’s bewilderment, she can’t help but give (y/n) a warm smile.

“Please, just (y/n). It’s nice to meet you.”  (y/n) returns Lucienne’s smile.

“Of course, (y/n).” Old habits die hard, Morpheus think of Lucienne. The title was used affectionately. After all, they were as close as any sisters could be when his former wife reigned beside him. He notes something of nostalgia in Lucienne’s eyes. The longing. The daze. Morpheus can imagine Lucienne’s feelings upon it, remembers he’s the one who felt it first. 

“Come, my friend. There is something I want to show you.” Morpheus beckons her to a hallway that leads to his chamber. As they walk through the stretching floor, on the wall to his left are the windows overlooking the sea of the Dreaming. On the wall to his right hangs all manner of paintings from all genres. Tonalism, Realism, Abstract and more. Subjects from still-life, animals, historical, vistas to portraiture. 

Morpheus stops at a portrait wedged between an abstract of Joan Miro and the tonalism artwork of Angel de Cora. He awaits for her response. 

“Who’s- who’s that?” she stumbles upon her words

“My former wife. The queen of the Dreaming.” In the style of Naturalism, he depicts her in draperies of white Muslins surrounded by bushes of her favourite flowers, smiling softly as her hands folded on her lap. He painted the portrait with his own hands, when his longing was too unbearable that he doesn’t know how to relieve that burden. 

“You are the descendant of the same family tree as her. Her name was (y/n).” The truth bursts from him. The guilt weighs too heavily. 

There is only silence. The slight labour of her breathing. She leans on the wall, trying to catch her breath. Morpheus paces to support her but she pushes his hand away.

“I want to go home.” she mutters under her breath. Refusing to look him in the eyes. 

“My friend-”

“Take me home.” She speaks with a finality in her voice. Morpheus understands whatever he would say after that point would be of no use to her well-being. So he nods and grants her wish. He commits her form, her face engulfed by sand as he watches her disappear. Not knowing if she truly lost to him once more.

—

The subjects of the Dreaming know that their king is in a state of agitation. They can feel it in the constant changing of the weather every hour. Some parts of the Dreaming plunges into sandstorm then rain, dry clear skies, drizzles of snow then sandstorm again in no particular order. The sun is quivering from one into three then four, as does the moon. 

Morpheus waits and waits and waits, until the second week passes and she calls his name. He appears outside of her room before she could finish mouthing all three syllables. 

She asks if he would like to accompany him to the park when she opens the door, at the very second of that midnight. 

They sit in silence. Barely illuminated by the white light with a tinge of pale blue from the lamppost in the distance. Neither knows how to start the conversation, Morpheus more than her. 

“What are you doing here Morpheus?”

He recognises her allusion. What is your intention with me?

“Do you wish me to be her?” there is a hint of fear in her voice.

“No, (y/n). I do not.” he muster earnestness as best as he can. 

“Do you pity me?”

“No. never that.”

“What are we doing Morpheus?” she whispers.

He falls silent.

“It’s true I approached you because you bear my former wife’s face. But I found myself comforted merely by your presence. I found myself thinking of who you are constantly, not who you’re supposed to be. I can assure you that you are far from what she was.” He says, his throat heavy.

She nods. Recognise the sincerity in his voice. Her quiet exhale sound that of relief. Then she takes his hand, he tangles his fingers around hers as he counts her tears dripping one by one. His own heart aches at the sight of it. 

“Thank you. For everything.” she whispers once more. His grip bound tighter. His whole being sinking into the pools of her irises. 

—

In no time, her list of students is growing, her lives are busier. Bountiful. Her smiles and laughs are lighter and airy. In several months she moves out of the Inn and lives in her own apartment she rents. And Morpheus is in every step she takes, admires how smart and sharp she is, how it is in her nature to be kind and gentle. How dear she becomes to his heart that it almost hurts. 

He would always be there whenever she needs him in any way, even so far the only thing she asks is nothing but his company, he would always give her more. Inspire her with the sweetest dreams. 

He frequents her apartment with all sorts of gifts. He’d bring her favourite flowers, her favourite takeout, books she might like, his own favourites, and her preferred brand of wine. 

This time he brought her a necklace forged from the stone of fiddler’s green that bears the same colour as her eyes. The stone is no bigger than her fingernail but she claims she never seen a stone so beautiful and otherworldly. So stupefying when a direct light hits it. She conveys her thanks and sheepishly turns on her back to let him clasp the necklace around her skin. His breath brushes her nape, he hears her heart beating erratically. The hairs on her arms stretching on ends. 

Now the jewellery dangles between her collarbones. 

He wishes his fingers could linger on her skin a little bit more.

“Pasta or Roast chicken?” she flutters away to the kitchen with his answer, her necklace winking under the afternoon sunset filtering through her apartment’s windows. 

Morpheus can’t help his own smile, strangely feeling mortal-like in their routine. He cherishes their routine.

—

  “This sounds like the bowels of Tartarus.” Morpheus says as he listens to one of her favourite records playing on the turntable, an Oratorio sung in Baritone integrated with gentle synths and Cellos, composed by a recently deceased composer that makes her cry the whole day when it happened. She lets him comfort her that day. 

“No fucking way, the Pantheons are real?” 

“Not just them, The Vanirs, Aesirs and their kind, the Sumerian gods and all.”

“Wow…”

He can’t help his smile spreading as he watches her eyes, drooping lovely by the wine they currently share on the dining table side by side. The cores from eaten Strawberry Apple stacked on the bowl. 

“So… he’s real too?”

“Unfortunately.” Morpheus sip the wine from his glass. 

“Fuck. I just know I’m going straight to hell.”

“No. I’ll not let that happen.” Morpheus says it earnestly, she chuckles and gives him a lazy grin.

“The perk of befriending a god, huh?”

His smile grows wider. 

“I’m not a god.”

“To me you are.”

He pauses. His heart picks up slightly at the words. Feel the heat creeping to his neck.

“You’ve done more for me than he ever did.” she continues. Her fingers search for his, memorising the texture of his nail with the pad of her finger. 

“Do you worship me?” Morpheus leans inch by inch. Brushes her hairline. Twirl the necklace between her collarbones. 

“I know you heard my prayers.” she gravitates forward towards him. 

“I do.” 

(y/n) tilts her head to the side, drinking in his features. He recalls her prayers whispered quietly at midnight. The words trembled his hands on that night. Burns his chest with euphoria. 

“Your prayers, your recent dreams, I witnessed it.” he almost says breathlessly. Heat pools in his stomach. 

“Does it reflect your desire?”

“Yes.” she whispers. Her own voice strangles by desire’s hands. 

He watches the expansion of her pupils. Hears her heartbeat pace quickly when he focuses on it. 

“You will have me?” he asks. 

“Yes.” she licks her lips. 

“I am wholly yours.” he claims when their faces are close enough they could count each other's eyelashes. He brush away the one that fell on her cheek, then caress her jaw with his fingers. She leans into his touch, into his warmth. Her hands fists on his chest as she presses her lips to his cheeks. 

Morpheus sighs in pleasure. A thrill of shiver runs along his spine, his hand circling her back as the other takes her jaws to kiss her on the lips. She kisses him hard enough to turn him inside out, to make her a god if she asks for it. 

That night, every being that sleeps dreams of her glistening skin against his, of her lips chanting his name. Her eyes and her satiated sighs. Her tears of pleasure. Morpheus swallows everything he could. 

—

“Hello little brother.” Death's warm voice calls to him. He turns from the waterfall and meets her warm smile as she opens her arms to receive him, Morpheus return her gesture. 

“It’s been quite some time since you summon me to your realm.” She says as she takes in the beauty of Fiddler’s green.

Morpheus stays silent because she knows the answer to that statement. The last time she was here, Death took the queen of the Dreaming. And the dispute after that, the calamity he wrought after their fight can be felt even upon the waking world. 

An altercation that he believed was a betrayal. She took centuries to mend their relationship into what it was. 

“So, what is it Dream?” Death squints slightly under the sun of the Dreaming. 

He remembers last night, when (y/n)’s half asleep from euphoria after their intercourse, his dearest said the words that stir him with complete devotion. That fills his stomach with dread and reminds him of his duty as an Endless. I love you, Morpheus. I would do the unthinkable for you.

“You know what this is about.” he firmly says. 

Death’s mouth twists into a faint grimace. But she nods.

“Promise me, Death. Promise me.”

He sees Death’s throat swallow. 

“What affection you have for me as your brother, promise me this. Do not betray me again.” He rasps. His chest feels the heaviness on that day.

“Please, Morpheus, I did not betray you. It is only the rule that binds, little brother. Our duty” she takes a step towards him. Her hands reach but he pulls back. 

“You owe me.” he whispers. His tears sting the back of his eyes. 

Death's lips are pursed thin. Her gaze remorseful and rue.

Death takes a deep breath. 

“Make her an Endless then. I will help you.”

Her words stun him into silence. A proposal that is painstakingly leviathan in nature he never thought his dutiful big sister would ever offer him. A proposal that is to be made in such a short time and the risk would be insurmountable for both siblings. 

And he couldn’t think of someone more worthy to be an Endless. 

“I will help you before it’s too late. After that, we’re square. Deal?”

He nods. Unable to find his words for a moment.

“Agreed.”

—

“Hi!” She giggles with glee when he circles his arms around her as she’s preparing the ingredients for dinner on the counter of her kitchen. 

“You’re early.” she turns and gives him a chaste kiss on the cheek. 

“I couldn’t wait.” he murmurs as he buries his eyes on her shoulder. 

“I can tell.” She teases. But when he is silent, he takes his face in her hands. Search for his evading eyes. 

“What’s wrong Morpheus?” she gently calls for him. Concern between her brows. 

“There is something I must ask, (y/n).” he says restlessly. 

“Of course.” she replies. 

He takes her to the dining table and sits side by side. He explains what it is to be an Endless. How one of their great weaknesses is bound by the ancient rules that predate even their creation. One of them, the Endless can not fall in love with a mortal and prolong their affiliation, or the Mortal’s downfall would soon follow. 

A tear slips from her eye. 

“You’re leaving me?” she asks, strikingly calm even through her tears. 

“Without the alternative, I must, (y/n).” he caresses her jaw. His own eyes smarting. His chest weighs heavily. 

“And the alternative?”  she takes his other hand to anchor herself down. The numbness in her legs became too much. 

He feels her pulse quickening on her wrist. 

“Understand this. I was blinded by my foolishness, it was not my intention to put you in this precarious position and I assure you I never wanted to jump into your life to just leave-”

“Just say it Morpheus.” she whines. 

“Will you become an Endless?” he blurts. 

She stares at him for a moment as if he grows a second head. Then quickly realises the gravity of his question, the unsaid pleading in his eyes, his inability to beg her because he does not want to pressure her into compliance but his heart—rending eyes, his bright—sharp eyes, the colour of a brewing storm, says it all. She wants to weep for those eyes. 

She takes his face in her hands. Kisses him on the lips. She feels the tension lining his shoulders melt away. His hands slither to grip her waist, washes her body in pleasure. 

“Yes. Make me a god.” she says when she pulls away. 

His wide smile could replace the sun. She realised, in a heartbeat, that she would do anything and everything just so she could see that beautifully divine smile for the rest of her life. Would do the unthinkable for him. Devote her life to her Dream. Devotion and Dream, that is all she needs. Devotion and Dream for eternity until the universe erodes and blinks away. 

—

Taglist: @aurorarevenclaw1927​

[millennialgrandma]

June Wrap Up

Hello, and welcome to triple digit temperatures and oppressive humidity. I did a fair bit of reading this month, a tiny smidgeon of writing, a delightful amount of beta reading, and altogether too much adopting of plunnies.

Things I Wrote

I wrote a little Twitter drabble for my dear friend Cait's birthday, and have since cross-posted to AO3 under the title Indulge Me (dramione, M, 1.1k). If you feel so inclined, I highly recommend checking out the quote retweets of the birthday drabble prompt - several friends with disgusting amounts of talent contributed to the birthday celebration.

Things I Read

Word count this month is going to skew a little higher as we finished DMATMOOBIL, so all those words are being recorded for June. Also...ummm...I read a couple darklina fics this month and uh...I'm intrigued and I don't go there, but maybe I want to go there?

Fiction:

Nonfiction:

Fanfiction:

Complete: (approx. 374.2k)

Benefits with Friends by @indreamsink (dramione, E, 32.2k)

O for Outstanding by @thatblondebitvh (dreomione, E, 10.7k)

Get the Girl by @gloivy (dramione, E, 3.4k)

Group Read: Draco Malfoy and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being in Love by @isthisselfcare (dramione, E, 199.7k)

Unsatisfied by vivian_middlebury (jamione, E, 2.3k)

future problems by elle_reads (darklina, E, 4k)

Lifestyle Change by rubykrishna (dramione, E, 14.3k)

Quarter to Midnight by @megan-p-cook (dramione, E, 4.5k)

Bread and Buttons by Astrangefan (dramione, NR, 2.5k)

The Science of Sex by rockthecasbah18 (dramione, E, 2.7k)

No Distance Left To Run by sarsalvachester (dramione, M, 2.4k)

Stained Glass and Library Stacks by @one-equaltemper (dramione, E, 18.5k)

never give you peace by @futurerustfuture-dust (darklina, E, 5.7k)

On a Platter by @pia-bartolini (dramione, T, 2.1k)

She's All Yours by @roseharpermaxwell (romione/dramione, E, 3.8k)

Group Read: I'm Never Lonely When I'm With You by @pacific-rimbaud (dramione, M, 5k)

Flat(Mates) by @whimsymanaged (dramione, E, 3.4k)

Going Down? by @mrsren (dramione, E, 5.1k)

Rolling In The Sleep by art_prongs (dramione, E, 1.3k)

Lover's Sleep by art_prongs (dramione, E, 2.1k)

my brother's best friend by @mrsren (dramione, E, 19k)

Ask Me by @eveningstruggle (dramione, T, 1.5k)

The Black Bugatti by @catmintandthyme (dramione, E, 1.3k)

Practical Punishment by rockthecasbah18 (harry/draco/rose, E, 3k)

For Lack of an Extension Charm - or, The One with Meddlers, Pining, and Only One Bed by @they-call-me-megs (theomione, M, 6.6k)

Group Read: Chasing for Keeps by @indreamsink (dramione, E, 5.1k)

Saints and Sinners by @icepower55 (dramione, E, 12k)

WIPs: (approx. 79.1k)

The Curse of 100 by @rosedevents - Chapter 14 - (dramione, E, 2.4k)

Where There's Smoke by @whimsymanaged - Chapters 2 & 3 (dramione, E, 3.5)

The Absolute and Total Defeat of One Draco Malfoy by @saveourskinship - Chapter 13 (dramione, E, 9k)

Probably a Scam by @catmintandthyme - Chapters 10 - 12 (dramione, E, 5.3k)

Bound by @thelashjedi - Chapters 2 & 3 (dramione, E, 12.5k)

IN THE ARMS OF MORPHEUS by calico_writes - Chapter 2 (dramione, E, 1.7k)

Ten out of Ten by morriganmercy - Chapters 1 - 12 (dramione, E, 35.9k)

Season Pass (To This Ass) by @mightbewriting - Chapters 1 - 3 (dramione, E, 8.9k)

Things I'm Currently Reading (Heading into July)

Now that we've finished our group read of DMATMOOBIL, the group read crew over in the RoR have started in on Love and Other Historical Accidents by @pacific-rimbaud. I'm five chapters in and having the goddamn time of my life. I've got a couple other WIPs I need to catch up on, and another couple that I'd like to start. Also telling myself I need to cross off at least two more things from my TBR list this month.

Happy July, friends! May you all stay sufficiently air-conditioned, so that you might avoid having to share the same experience of my nephew on Saturday evening, when he loudly declared, "my bits are stuck to my bits!"

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus, illustrated & bound by @violetequus8.

The sun finally came out here after nearly three weeks! First order of business: getting some much-deserved glamour shots of this gorgeous creature.

I cannot find the language to articulate how much this means to me as a gift and act of creative labour. I only hope it shows through in the pictures instead :')

Rowan has two wonderful process & results posts where you can see the three brilliant other bindings they did of Saint Morpheus, including the incredible illustrations (of which I have been BLESSED with two originals - that photoshoot will come later because I want to make a custom frame for them lol). Thank you, Ro, for a gift I will treasure forever.

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus | Dream/Hob | Chapter 3/4 | 5K | E

“You act like such a princely creature that it would be insufferable, you know, did I not want so badly to worship you,” said Hob, chuckling. “Did I not find you so terribly worthy of worship. But I do. It brought you here, you’ve heard it in my confession, and now you will feel it beneath my mouth, Lord of Dreams.”

He prostrated himself between Dream’s legs, and looked up at him through half-lidded eyes. “And not just upon those fine hands of yours, my Lord. Upon all of you,” he said, and pressed his lips to the tops of Dream’s bare feet.

“All that you have clothed and hidden away from me for centuries,” he said, rubbing his thumbs around the fine bones of Dream’s ankles, before kissing each of them in turn. He stroked his hands up Dream’s bare calves, marveling at their softness. “I will greet each inch,” he said, and laid a kiss upon the inside of Dream’s calf, “as a wife greets her husband returned from sea.”

He kissed down to Dream’s feet again, murmuring lowly.

“As the earth greeted the first sunrise,” he said, and moved up to bite softly into the meat of Dream's other calf. Dream inhaled sharply.

“As an old friend greeting a new lover,” he said, and ran his hands up to Dream’s thighs, giving them a tug that made Dream shift his stance wider still, and having thus punctuated his words, continued, “after long centuries of acquaintance.” [Continued on AO3] or, finally arriving at this scene by @messmonte / @alexxuun

[landwriter]

How do I start this.

Your. Writing. Makes me want to jump through a stain glass window and leave behind a cartoon cutout of only my outline while I plummet to the ground at Mach 15.

The Saint Morpheus fic???

You cannot do this to me. I was raised CATHOLIC YOU CA NN OT DO THIS TO ME

I am usually not one to read smut, especially for “new” ships of characters I don’t really know, but I read Saint Morpheus (and subsequently the rest of your sandman works) right after I got into Sandman and I was cONSUMED. DEVOURED. ABSOLUTELYRUINED.

The characterization??? The dialogue??? The fucking lATIN?!?!?

I want to lock you in a hay bale machine. (Affectionate)

Anyway that fic has consumed me and I ache for the ability to read it for the first time again (I literally had to keep putting the phone down and walking away, my MINIMAL knowledge of Latin and the fucking descriptions of the church got to me)

You are an amazing author even if I can’t put into words the right compliments

Having to put down a story to walk away is truly the highest of compliments, thank you! The Latin was extremely self-indulgent and I am a sucker for devotion and worship and stained glass. Always so delighted to hear from people who also grew up Catholic and for whom I absolutely wrote Saint Morpheus <3

I have a small sequel in the works that features more Top Catholic Hits like self-denial and guilt (and more confession and kneeling because you can never have too much) - I hope you'll love it too!

thanks so much for dropping me a note :) it makes me so happy!!!

[landwriter]

“Kneel,” said Dream, and Hob knelt before him.

Dream pressed his own thumb to his lips and wet it. He took Hob’s chin in the other hand and tilted his face up. “Some do this with ash. To acknowledge death. Mortality. It would not befit you,” he said, and smudged his wet thumb in a sign upon Hob’s forehead. “Now you wear my mark,” he said.

“I have always worn your mark, my Lord,” said Hob.

“Then remember you are mine and to me you shall return,” he said.

an excerpt from my academic!Hob and saint!Dream fever dream story that was meant to be a fun little church smut where they bang against the altar and instead ended up being a dozen different religious allegories for guilt, devotion, and love. then they bang against the altar.

now on ao3

[landwriter]

If they didn’t have centuries of life left yet, neither might’ve tolerated the lingering, but they did. So Hob looked, and Dream let him.

Dream, arms lifted behind his head but still caught up in the sleeves, muscles of his shoulders and chest taut with the stretch of it, every line of him cast in the stony relief of statuary. Dream, marble, but not white, anointed instead in the holy oils of stained glass - cobalt, emerald, goldenrod, ruby. Dream, standing before him as art, but with hair mussed by Hob’s fingers, lips reddened by Hob’s mouth, pink on his thighs and pink on his cheeks from the rasp of Hob’s jeans and Hob’s stubble. Dream, an ancient creature, a story, a vessel, a king, allowing Hob’s marks upon him. Dream, forms and duties innumerable, permitting Hob’s devotion now to temper him all into one, into this. Dream, his lover. Dream, his.

[-Saint Morpheus | 12K | Explicit | Complete]

[landwriter]

ooooh i feel like i'm spinning a very fancy roulette wheel :D

i'm gonna mix it up and ask about *your* current favorite "untitled 1" WIP

<3

spinning the wheel, remembering a WIP I forgot totally to include: not my favourite, but a WIP I owe to you, and one I think you'll like! Saint Morpheus role reversal, where Dream's confession HEAVILY FEATURES themes from my 1889 unsent letter that you brought to life so beautifully! working title is Sharpen Your Knife for obvious reasons

ft. a Dream who wants to be punished for his sins, who will not beg for forgiveness because he thinks he is above begging and below forgiving. Hob who cannot say I find no sin in them but does not want to find no sin, who hears Dream confessing only to the monstrous humanity of hunger and greed that he knows within himself. Hob offering to prove to Dream he is both capable of begging and being forgiven. Dream all coiled up with tense fury and terrible want being slowly and methodically undone. here's a couple very rough-draft bits near the start:

Dream is kneeling before him. His face is a harsh, wild chiaroscuro, shadow and light flickering across it wildly as candles are snuffed by the wind and then relit by unseen hand. His eyes are bled black, swallowing any warmth that dares venture too close, and returning only the barest pinprick white gleam in the centre. He looks like a terrible god, even on his knees, but Hob knows better now. He knows the look of desire. He knows the look of apprehension. Even in candlelight, he knows it near the best.

This is the church of Dream’s design, and it is nothing like Hob’s. It is grey and rough stone, small, and in place of stained glass there are only arrow slits, and outside only darkness. There is no comfort in kneeling here. The altar is a slab of stone, radiating cold, and darkened with stains that murmur, This is not where you honour a sacrifice. It's where you make one. This is not an altar where communion wine is transmuted into the blood of Christ. This is an altar you feed with your own blood. Even dreaming, Hob can almost smell it.

Hob looks back down at Dream, who is staring at him challengingly, daring him to say something. He wouldn’t have, a month ago. He will now. “Bit different than my church, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” says Dream.

“This is how you’d revere me, love?” asks Hob. He’s bemused. He’d sort of been hoping for a bit more idolatry. Bit more golden statues.

“This is how I would confess to you.”

And Hob can understand that, can't he, can understand the urge to kneel on something rough, to confess things in darkness and not jeweled light. There’s things he’s said to Dream that he could only have said late at night, face turned away.

“I suppose we summon the benediction we think we deserve,” he says, and watches, satisfied, as Dream’s jaw clenches a little. Hob gentles a hand along his cheek and the ever-hungry part of him thrills at the way Dream’s face slackens a little at the simple touch. Mine, he thinks. This more-than-a-god is mine, and I am his.

“We will see,” says Dream. The wind howls and the candlelight across his face makes him look nothing like a human. He’s afraid. He’s hesitating.

“Confess,” says Hob. His voice is no thunder, just his, just worn and soft and commanding. But still, Dream focuses his gaze, unblinking, on Hob, and begins to speak.

---

Hob crouches before him, runs a finger from gut to sternum.

“You’d have me take a pound of flesh from you for all these sins,” he says.

Dream shivers reflexively, then raises his chin higher, as if to cover the admission of his want.

Hob raises his eyebrows. “Oh, you’d be so good, wouldn’t you,” he says, finding the rhythm of it like a familiar path beneath his feet. He steps behind Dream, trailing the flogger’s tails over one bare shoulder. “I bet you'd be perfect, my love. Stoic. Quiet.” The white expanse of Dream’s back is like a field after snow, perfect and empty and still. Hob hums thoughtfully and runs his hands over lordly shoulders. “You’d withstand it all, every cruel little tool you’ve brought here. Flail and flogger, switch and paddle. I don’t think you’d cry out even as I blooded you. Such a proud and terrible creature, you are, hmm? Your expression wouldn’t even flicker as I did it, would it?”

“It would not,” says Dream, and Hob knows it to be true.

He’s leaning further into Hob’s touch, wanting, and Hob wraps an arm around his chest, just under his neck, just on the gentle side of possessive, and holds him close. He lays a quick kiss on Dream’s nape, and then nudges up to his ear. Then he whispers, “So I suppose I’ll have to find another way to make you beg instead,” and drops the flogger with a soft thump onto the ground.

[landwriter]

🌹?

“What do you want to be told, hm? That you are a monstrous creature? That you are hideous for these desires you harbour? Is that it, love?”

---

little excerpt from a Saint Morpheus sequel/role reversal but Make It Darker i literally forgot I'd started but was hugely inspired by a gorgeous playlist @wordsinhaled made for me. trading stained glass light and warm wood for cold darkness and old stone, trading hob asking forgiveness for dream thinking himself unworthy of it, and refusing to beg for it, but hungry to perform penance, stoic and needing and still. hob extracting words from him like blood from a stone, hob undoing him with his own hunger and offering dark promises but giving only tenderness. dream genuinely wanting to tell hob his sins and have hob sharpen his knife. hob doing something else instead.

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus is complete! I posted the coda this morning and have just now gone through and made what I am VOWING to be a final round of little mostly little changes. you're not crazy if you reread chapter two and see it's changed sorry lol

It can now be read through all at once like the one-shot smut hymn to stained glass and worship that I'd meant it to be, before I lost all reason and self-control.

I will make a prettier fic post for it later because I'm an absolute dweeb and love that shit, but! Just so you know! It is done. happy sunday!

Entire Work | 12K | Explicit Chapter Four

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus Dream/Hob | 12K | Explicit | Complete

Tags: Getting Together, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, POV Hob Gadling, Conventional Confession & Unconventional Absolution, Creative Consecration Methods, First Kiss, First Time, Grinding, Dirty Talk, Latin, Worship, Hand-Kissing, Oaths & Vows, Church Sex, Art Historian Hob Gadling, Literal Saint Dream of the Endless Hob thought this was how crocuses must feel beneath the sun in early spring: made anew beneath the attentions of a star itself, tended gently by terrible power. Read on AO3

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus | Dream/Hob | Chapter 1/4 - 3K | E

Hob stood alone inside a lovely limestone cathedral. Mass must’ve ended a couple hours ago; maybe the priest had gone off to nap in the rectory between services. It was a napping kind of hour. All the better for Hob to take more notes his seminar, and still be home in time for lunch. Whenever priests came over to engage him in conversation, which was often, because Hob would be wandering around their church staring at stained glass and statuary and looking for all the world like a lost soul, they’d as likely as not manage to gently bring the discussion around from Hob’s research to his mortal soul. It’s not that he didn’t find it lovely and well-meaning of them, but it was truly wasted breath. His mortal soul had remained firmly attached to its earthly vessel for six centuries now, and he had no plans to change that any time soon. Not the sort of thing you said to a man of the cloth, mind, so Hob would just smile affably, and think not of Him but of him: the dark-haired stranger who’d beat The Lord Almighty to the punch and granted Hob eternal life.

[Continued on AO3]

happy sunday, dreamling fandom.

inspired by this gorgeous art from @messmonte / @alexxuun

[landwriter]

me: is it acceptable to include an epigraph before smut? me: never mind actually I'm putting in two

[landwriter]

Saint Morpheus stood before him in front of the altar, so unmoving that he could still have been rendered in glass. Except that the air around him shimmered with the heat of his flaming robe, and Hob’s throat stung with the sharp smell of sulfur dioxide rolling off of him, like a dozen matches had been lit at once. Ruby gleamed like blood at his throat. Halo burned like fire behind his head. Shadows in the church seemed to elongate and stretch themselves toward him to kiss the hem of his robes. His hair flew and snapped about his face like it was caught in a storm, yet Hob could feel no breeze in the heavy air around them.

He looked like something that came to a battlefield when everything was dead. Or something that men would fight and die for. Hob thought he might, if asked.

For as beautiful as he had looked in stained glass, he was real now, of flesh and more. He didn't need his holiness proclaimed through sun-shot symbolism, because the power of it crackled around him, bright and terrible and true. It was easy to forget, sometimes, that saints were rendered holding weapons as often as rosaries, and that for all the static expressions of beatitude painted onto their faces, they were once living men and women who had burned with such a conviction of spirit that they had become martyred or miraculous.

Hob thought This is something I’m not supposed to see, *and *I want to kiss the hem of his robes too, *and *I would follow him anywhere.

worship, fealty, confession, carnal sacrements, and most of all, the divine power of stories.

this fic is almost ready for general consumption! have an excerpt regardless!! first chapter will be up tomorrow morning

now on ao3!

[landwriter]

dear diary,

fic might seem harmless, but yesterday I was describing a first kiss and thought “how crocuses beneath the sun in early spring must feel”

then I missed seeing crocuses around so much that today I went out and bought 80 crocus bulbs

now I need to plant 80 crocus bulbs