wizards-in-dreamland

[wizards-in-dreamland]

The Spiral City of Zimdazaar

The Dream Atlas, Pt. 6 So you know of the Sands of Nane, that place of longing and the lost; where the sleeping surrender their every treasure, in time. But do you know of the City at its center? The abode of His Grace- the monarch of all Dream- the Sandman? Traverse the Hollow Markets with me, my friend. Don't touch the faery fruit. Read on, if you must. Don't get lost. I mean it. Please. I don't think I could stand it if another got lost.

The red sands give way to gold, the gold give way to silver, the silver give way to bright, mind-shattering pink- a pink beyond color, the pink of your fondest forgotten thing, of the time before birth. Don't weep, for the tears will come away syrupy and crystal-clear. Don't laugh, or you will make yourself deaf. Don't look at the monument of rose-quartz on the highest spire of the distant palace. The gates into Zimdazaar are, as everything within the city, coiled tightly. Wrought gold the color of strawberries twines around itself as though alive. You must speak your most loathsome secret to enter, they say; such burdens are contraband, and the Mares would be on you in a fraction of an instant. Think very deeply before you let it go, in a breath like smoke and charcoal. It comes up shakily, tearing at the lungs and gums, burning your throat and tongue with spite and shame. The Game is begun. The Mares stand with ivory eyes locked upon you. They will weigh your guilt, pure and rotten and whole, on a silver scale, and you will stand upon the other side. Which is heavier, friend? Your mind, or the thoughts you banished from it? Your body, or the urges that you imprisoned between your skin and bone? Your soul, or the forgiveness you could not bear to give from it? You, or all that you would not become? And if you pass, if you weigh less than the deeds you have lost- even if such a thing were possible, for a dreamer (but it is! It is! For I have done it, I have, believe me!)- you will be admitted to the Hollow Markets. The gossamer curtains below pitch and shiver like a vast fluttering eyelid, but the Mares promise that you are light enough. And you are.

You wander to and fro across the wide bolts of cloth, thinner than a hair in some places, and you do not fall, you cannot. (Light as a feather! Lighter! Lighter still!) And here you are in the only truly empty halls of Dream. Though there are stalls and signs and wares, shops and tools and all of the trappings of market, the only breath that stirs this place is your own. Come, now, away from that. I've warned you against the fruit. Best to stay away from the jewels, too- the difference is all too slim, when you're asleep. Do you hear that- one unbroken note. Do you know how long they've been singing that same note? So long! Hundreds! Thousands! Of what? Doesn't matter. That song, lovelier than a lark, has been sung since Dream began, and will die when the last withered Dreamer shudders to death peacefully in its embrace. (Follow it, fool! Follow it, for it's your only way out! What are you doing here still, among the markets? I told you they were hollow! Hollow! Worthless! Mere glamours! GO! FIND THE CHOIR, OR BE SUNG TO YOUR GRAVE! Don't listen to the storyteller, listen to ME!)

You're running. Running, running, running, across endless bolts of fabric strung between endless rickety reeds, up through spirals like the shell of a nautilus. The beached dream of a whale, it seems, strung taut and dry and crackling in the parched sands. From up here, you can see all of Nane! You can see the Mist that surrounds us all, stretching off for meaningless miles in every direction that is and is not. You can see beyond, even... (NO NO YOU CAN NOT YOU NEVER WILL FOR NOD DOES NOT PERMIT SUCH THINGS FOR THAT IS A PRIVILEGE OF GODS ALONE AND YOU ARE NO GOD AND I AM NO GOD AND EVEN NOD IS NO--) You keep listening to the blaspheming voice in your mind. (NO THE SONG THE SONG OF THE WISHING-CHOIR YOU HEAR THEM YOU HEAR THEM STILL NOT ME NEVER THIS IS NOT THE WAY)

A hand falls on your shoulder. It is warm, it is waxy, it is brown. And it guides you gently into the Palace. There is a statuary garden. Trees with silver trunks drop leaves onto the ground. They are ash by the time they reach it. The busts are lined up to either side of the walkway. They all have their eyes closed in sleep, their mouths open in song. You look up into the face of your guide. He has a lined face, ash-dusted skin- and his eyes have been sewn shut with a thread of spider-silk. He does not see you look. But he knows you do. "If these ever open, you will never again close your own. Nobody will," he chuckles, a bit sadly, "can you imagine that? No more naps in a sunbeam. No more exhaustion at the end of a days' work. And no more Dream." You realize. You kneel. You beg his pardon, weeping tears like clotted amber. They rattle to the ground around you. "Oh, come now, that's not your wish? The pardon of a sleepwalking old fool? No, no, child. What is it really?" And you look up. You see the kindness in his smile. You see the ash on his robe. You feel a deep sorrow, for this man, this old, old man who has dreamt along with you for all your life, only so that you could know the story behind his eyes. You tell him what you lost. As I did. As we all will. He smiles. He nods- it's how he got his name, they say. Only one question remains. Will you wake to a dream come true?

[wizards-in-dreamland]

The Underbath

The Dream Atlas, pt. 5

Dream is a strange land at the best of times, it goes without saying; but certain places are so bizarre in construction that one cannot but shrug their shoulders in hopeless confusion. The Underbath is one of those places; a haunting labyrinth of bathroom stalls, many layers thick, many miles deep. Read on, if you must. Don't get lost.

(long post under the cut)

The Dreamlands are a place of variety, of laws bent and unbent and re-shaped until unrecognizable. You might walk from the slopes of Mt. Thorne into the salt flats at Cathad, but upon turning around see only the marshlands of Gybon stretching away behind you. In turning back towards your destination- lo! You have found yourself in the Sands of Nane, lost and desperate. Nothing is permanent; not even location. Why is it then, that there is one reliable feature of every place in Dream? Always tucked away in the corner of your vision- is that a door? Why, so it is. Where does this go--? Oh. Nowhere, really. Just a bathroom- and a dingy one at that. A stainless steel basin, a standing shower with a suspicious amount of caulk, a urinal, and around the corner... the same thing. Another urinal, another basin, another grimy showerhead, another corner. Keep going. You turn the corner one, two three, four, five times- that shouldn't be possible. You should be right where you started, but the door is gone- in its place, an arch of hideous pebbled tile, and through that- infinity. Welcome to the Underbath, a nation in its own right, composed entirely of public bath-houses and restrooms. Miles and miles of labyrinthine hallway, lined on one side with stalls, on the other with basins and mirrors. Don't look in the mirrors. Never look in the mirrors of Dream. That way madness lies.

The stalls begin to change as you move on- older now, with chains instead of levers on the toilets, antiquated faucets. There are people here, even Denizens; though they are scattered, and few of them will speak to a Topsider. They do what all civilised folk do in public restrooms- pointedly avoid eye contact and wash their hands vigorously before moving along. Do they live here? They must. Clothing, as sturdy or intricate as yours or mine, sewn of toilet paper and dental floss. The more fortunate among them have real cloth, traded by an enterprising Topsider for marble or mirror-glass. Onward, onward. No tiles now, and the fixtures are all broken. But steam rises from below. Not quite enough to create a Mist, by which you might leave this place- but close. Down, down, past marble pillars and abandoned saunas. Reeking men wrapped head-to-toe in tissue try to sell you lost goldfish, twisted metal, bits of hardware, questionably sourced fuel and fertilizer. They grin upon hearing your wish to leave, and direct you to the Temple. What passes for a Temple, down here among the forgotten filth of the world? Through a sauna door, you can hear laughter. Dancers in the searing fog beckon you onward, and when you emerge, scorched and red and drenched with steam and sweat, you fall at the feet of a huge satyr. Ikelios, King of the Underbath. His revels on this, the lowest level, are indescribable; Denizens and Dreamers alike put aside their differences and enjoy rose-scented waters, whirling hot tubs, misty nymphs bearing golden pitchers and just as swiftly fading into steam. That steam gathers, thickens, almost clots. It's suffocating; it's too hot.

The satyr's laughter- is it merry or cruel? Why are you here? What were you seeking to cleanse yourself of? Is it deceit? Lust? Hatred? Terror? No matter. Breath leaves you. Light leaves you. You are falling, falling- and now you awaken, in bed, drenched in the self-same sweat of the Bath. Don't look in the mirror; you won't like you see.

[wizards-in-dreamland]

Gybon, the Land of Poets

The Dream atlas, Pt. 4

Many of the greatest dreamers are Poets; that most doomed of folk, who can barely scratch a living in the Waking, and can never find their home in Dream. But for those that can find no home, it follows that one must be made. This land, though sparse and small, is a haven of solace for the Poets of dream; far from the towers at Iv, where only madness lies. Read on, I invite you. Don't get lost. Somewhere in the grassy eastern plains of dream is a truly unremarkable commune, full of truly unremarkable people. All of them competent in their way- this one gardens, this one knows a fair bit about carpentry, this one knits and sews and darns just enough. They eke out a living here, among the brush, in lopsided tents and shacks, on a greyish plain of perpetually wet grass and ceaselessly drizzling skies. This is Gybon, a place forgotten by the Denizens of dream. No shifting mirror-scape, no doomsaying prophets, not even a shimmer in the air to indicate that you are not in the Waking. But that is not to say it is close by; for if one could walk through a dream, and arrive on the other side, they would wake in Gybon- a place so forgettable that even the owl-scholars at Nane know little of it. But to those who live here, that is the most wondrous thing about Gybon. Here, there is no jealousy; every dreamer is allotted a similar square of land, and similar daily rations (among which, of course, there is always a sheaf of paper and an inkwell). There is no Fear, for nobody truly cares enough about this marshy place to interfere in its business. There is no cruelty, for many of these Poets are veterans in Dream, and have seen the wickedness of the Nightmares time and again. So every day, these folk work and play and eat- but mostly, they write. What else is a poet to do, at this last outpost of their kind? No more travel may be done, for to go any farther East would take you into the Mist, and dissolution. No, it is better to look back on Dream, and to write of what you saw there; undisturbed, preferably. The poets are wary of travelers, sometimes fearing a Denizen has walked into their midst. Proof of goodwill is fairly easy, however; especially if you bring something wonderful to eat. The ink-stained folk will guide you, grinning, to the Pavilion, a rickety platform on which cushions and chairs are arranged around a huge central table. Their cook, a greybeard known to me as Pythagoras (no relation, he insists), will welcome you with a booming voice and accept your offering. When dinner comes, one of the younger poets titters and promises: "Don't worry- gibbon is almost never on the menu." This never fails to rouse a laugh from the table. The poets feast nightly, and the most favored dish is Pythagoras' signature: roast duck on wild rice, coated in a sweet apricot sauce. They mount the platform one by one, to a lectern better-kept than anything else; and they read. Oh, the things they read! Of every imaginable place in dream- the salt flats at Cathad, the red-and-gold Sands of Nane, the twining labyrinth of the Underbath. Of every possible Denizen's beauty: The ephemeral Mist-nymphs in service to the God in Marble, the boyish face of the Thrice-Young King, the impossible hips of the Black Abbey's adherents. Of every song that can be sung here in sleep: the hum of rose-quartz, the wishing choirs at Zimdazaar, and the drizzling mists of Gybon itself.

And when they are done, Pythagoras, the oldest poet, selects one of the poems to go in the Book of Days, the highest honor a Gybonite cane receive. They live and breathe by the written word here, and the Book is a proof of immortal word; some say it was created in a pact between Shakespeare and the Sandman himself, though that is strictly hearsay. And when you leave this place, it will be as though you leave the Waking- the poets will weep and tell you to come back soon, Pythagoras will laugh and wave you on, with misty eyes, and the inky blackness will swallow you as you sleep once more- only to find yourself awake, in your own bed, back on this side of the Dreamlands.

[wizards-in-dreamland]

The Sisterhood of the Folded Rose

(copied over from main blog, with pertinent edits)

The hallowed halls of Dreamland are not like our own churches and ministries. They have not forgotten that All is Holy. And there is much more for them to dedicate themselves to. The denizens of dream are almost all dedicated to a faith, at least nominally. This is one of the oldest- and most macabre. Read on, if you have the nerve. Don't get lost.

The black and twining halls of the Sisterhood are expertly crafted with an elfin quality; they catch at darkness, both of the sight and of the mind, and keep it snared within the Abbey's walls. Grottoes leading off of the entrance hall are ringed with twisted iron spikes which thrum excitedly, and the sound of hungry, elated panting issues from within. Now and then, a deafening scream somewhere between agony and bliss pierces the night.

The Sisterhood is founded on a single principle: that desire is divine, the more debauched, the better. And though the high gothic halls, silver-and-iron fixtures, and delicately sculpted statues are impressive, so too are the adherents of carnal Desire. They are cloaked in deep maroon or black habit, and veils obscure faces from which drip sparkling, heavy piercings. Intricate tattoos of a thousand unclothed bodies snake up their perfect arms, and each carries a small satchel on their enticing hips, which no outsider may gaze into.

Any dreamer who begs entry at the door- and it is begging, on hands and knees, until your palms and shins are scraped and sore and your voice fails through a trickle of escaping blood- will eventually be met by two of these beautiful creatures. And inside the Black Abbey are a thousand rooms, each more decadent than the next, filled with greater and greater scenes of debauchery and hedonism- here a screaming man is whipped by frenzied adherents, until his blood drips gold upon the stone and he collapses, weeping his gratitude into the arms of a gentle-handed initiate. Here a woman stares as fire dances across her skin, searing it slowly into charcoal as she laughs in wonderment. "I always wondered what it would be like if it didn't hurt." Here, a line of dreamers, led by leashes and clothed in pure white linen, eat scraps that fall from a table- above, the diners tear into dribbling chunks of red flesh, redder than anything has a right to be, and suck marrow out of disturbingly familiar bones, wiping their faces and hands with torn scraps of that same linen.

Here, there are no consequences. Here, you may beg and be beaten, tear and shatter and laugh with manic glee, find your pleasure as torturer or meal. The Sisterhood provides. The Sisterhood understands. The Sisterhood will give you what you desire, hand-wrapped and perfect and utterly worthless, and then send you back to the Material world with a jolt, covered in cold sweat and the tingling sensation that you have broken some deep and unspoken taboo. And then their hymn will lull you back to sleep, cradled against the soft breast of ignorance, and comforted by the notion that no-one else can ever know what you see in your sleep.

[wizards-in-dreamland]

Aeon, the False City

(copied from main blog, with a few pertinent edits)

The Dreamlands are liminal in the most literal sense of the word. Here is a place which wanders, whose reality cannot be defined. Change is the only doctrine; ever are we between Life and Death, Dark and Light, Sleep and Waking, when we wander Dream. This is a description of a place between the work of Man and Nature. Read on, I invite you. Don't get lost.

No architect made this place. Nothing thinking nor feeling calls the city home. Yes, we walk its greying halls, carpeted in striated mosses. Yes, we peer with curiosity and revulsion at the natural, bioluminescent polyps that so closely resemble lamps. Yes, the brittle stone forms perfectly rectangular openings, of just the right height and width to traverse. But nobody lives here. Nobody ever will.

Aeon is a city drawn from the earth, and it appears identical to any modern urban settlement, albeit empty and abandoned. The truth, however little that means in the Dreamlands, is that the stone made it. It was never built, never lived in, never abandoned, but it is undeniably a city.

Any dreamer who walks its streets will very soon begin to wonder- why, then, do we think we are so special? What good is building a city if the earth may answer with one of its own? What makes us human if not the complexity of our colonies, seen nowhere else, but...

But here. Here, where the fungus stalks blink red and green and yellow to signal trundling isopods to roll forward. Where slitted, niter-caulked grates let rain water run into the slimy subterranean rivers below. Where a colony of howling-bats screech the night-hours from a spire that looks curiously like a clock-tower. Where stiff reeds sprout up through cracks in the rock, twining into thorny fences.

A city with no people; a city with no need for us. A stony, faceless urban hell-scape that seems to somberly declare "You are not special. You are not free. You are simply the means by which the City entered your realm. And as long as the City is there, it owns you."

[wizards-in-dreamland]

The Sands of Nane

(copied over from main blog, with a few pertinent edits) The following is a description of a place I once knew in Dream. There are many places like it; and I have learned to walk among them, though only clumsily for now. If it were my choice, I would say that these are True Dreams; places and events from behind and beyond the veil of sleep that do not change as much as the rest of Dream. Read on, I invite you. Don't get lost.

The first of the Dreamlands is known to me as the Sands of Nane- the elsewhere-place, in which you are never quite where you think you are. Endless dunes of red, gold, and white sand billow across the horizon, seeming almost to drift when you take your eyes away; among the wispy dust-devils that on occasion kick up, anything that has ever been lost rattles and crunches and burrows in the sand.

Baby teeth, toys, money, car keys, forgotten skeletons, decrepit husks of machines, entire cities fallen first beneath the ground and then out of history- the sand does its best to cover it all, and more often than not, fails. The sky ranges from pale grey to deep, mottled purple. Stare into it at the risk of falling up. Mirages dance and laugh, sent by bored or cruel dream-denizens to taunt dreamers.

Lost is not a condition here; it is a way of life. The scaled lizard-folk who scrabble in the sands work side-by-side with the cat-men of the Sandman's Caravan- all with the goal of finding. Cat's-eye marbles, copper dowsing rods, hag-stones and pendulums and the geomantic texts of those twitching owl-scholars in their aviaries are prized tools of any and all of the sifters, guides, and prophets of these plains. They are wary of outsiders, and doubly as wary of those who return after leaving. "To be lost once is to be lost forever. To be found again is to be lost once more."

If you are lucky, you will sit among them for a night. You will help them to break the cobbles of deserted cities, help them to weather the sandstorms that the Nightmares make in their stampede. You will hear tales of heroes whose deeds mean nothing now, drink brand-new bottles of juice, made from extinct fruits. You will be given feathers and rags, and you will hear laughter among the silks, as children play and dancers entice and those who were lost before are fondly remembered.

If you go, you will not be welcomed back. If you stay, your waking self will go mad. Tread these sands cautiously, and forfeit anything you leave behind. Even the memories will fade, with time. Let them. Perhaps one day the Sandman will lift the veil of silk, and you will find that he has saved all that you lost for this day. But that will not be until the Last Sleep claims you, and there is much more to be found before then.