#delight sandman

[writing-for-life]

A Sacred Garden: Death & Delight—Michael Zulli

Oh… was the first thing I thought when I found this. I need your help, fellow art aficionados…

I am not entirely sure if the title should be “A Wicked Garden” or “A Sacred Garden” (I find the latter more likely because of the symbolism, plus a gallery also has it listed as that), because it is listed as both.

But what on earth are we looking at here?!

Because Death is tied up. I immediately had to think of Jesus on the cross here (not least because Delight’s positioning reminds me of many paintings of the crucifixion and both Maries, but naturally also because of how Death is positioned).

And the flower floating above Delight’s hand is a rose, like in so many of Zulli’s paintings (they often stand for love and passion, but especially with Death, he often uses them for grief and mourning. They don’t have a specific colour here—if they were blue or red, it would be easier to figure out what they stand for. Also, I have to think of swirling things the way the rose is floating 🍥).

But what is going on here? Who tied Death to the tree? And what with all the skulls? Are they symbolic for Delight dying/changing to Delirium?

And is this some sort of altar (the thing Delight is holding on to with her right, with the jug on the left and the ram’s skull on the right)? Who’s the sacrificial lamb here? Is she bargaining for more time as Delight?

Another connotation is that of St. Sebastian, in many depictions tied to a tree, although that’s less straightforward. People used to pray to St. Sebastian for protection against the plague, which could also make sense in this context (mental plague rather than bubonic—again, is there some bargaining going on here?). I’m honestly so confused…

Or could we actually turn this on its head, and it’s not about Delight turning into Delirium at all—at least not at this point. What if it’s actually about Death, and how she relates to her function, and her own struggles? I’ll just leave that question sitting there...

Zulli painted a Triptych of Death and Delight roundabout the same time which makes me think that could be also be an option, or at least that they are both affecting each other:

The individual paintings are called “She rides a pale horse”, “Sisters” and “Eternal Spring.” Here, the roses are actually coming out of Delight’s hair, and they’re red. And her hair is beginning to dissolve in the last one.

Edit to quickly remind everyone of this reference to the falling blossoms in her domain in Brief Lives:

This takes me in all different directions, and it’s immensely confusing.

Death as the saviour makes sense (well, sometimes I guess). But is Delight looking for salvation? Did she want to die? Is that what turned her into Delirium? Is it symbolic for the loss of innocence and understanding that this is what comes for all of us? Or is it also about Death?

“Oh” indeed…

Tagging @tickldpnk8 @windsweptinred without pressure—and everyone else who’d like to have a go at this one.

[ihatecoconut]

Canpes

Also on AO3!

kind of based on @softest-punk hobsbandverse

The only information Hob gets from Destiny is that whoever is accompanying him to the event will be waiting in the passenger seat of his car. There’s a certain petulant tone to Destiny’s voice that suggests it is not going to be him.

Delirium is waiting when he climbs in the driver’s side, dressed appropriately in a pretty pink dress and with the colours in her hair faded to a more respectable level – i.e., they won’t burn out anyone’s retinas. She beams when she sees him.

“Hi Hob!”

He laughs, “Hey Del, you were destined to accompany me?”

She leans in, close, like she’s imparting a secret. “There was a fight.” She tells him. “’twas funny, everyone was stood in their galleries and yelling at the other sigils.”

That does sound funny, actually, Hob can imagine them all getting increasingly irate at each other over something as simple as who gets to come with him to an admittedly boring faculty party.

She giggles suddenly and leans in even closer, pressing their noses together. “Even Death and Destiny.”

“And you?”

She scrunches her nose up. “I would have if I had had an opp… opp…”

“Opportunity?”

“Yes! Opportunity. Destiny kept speaking when I wanted to.”

Hob laughs again. “Didn’t he already know it was going to be you?”

“He wanted to change it.” She settles back in her seat and lets him start the car. “He only said it was me when he lost.”

It warms something in him to know that they were all so determined to be with him, even to the point of trying to change the Book.

“Good to know.”

 They pull into the carpark and Hob is not surprised to see that there is already a reasonable number of cars present. The event did technically start almost half an hour ago.

“Alright.” He turns the engine off and turns to face Delirium. “You ready to schmooze?”

Her face screws up. “Schmooze.”

“Yeah. Don’t repeat that in front of anyone, yeah?”

She nods, incredibly serious, and Hob just has enough time to think that he might want to rephrase that to explain that while it was a joke, he also doesn’t want her referring to it as schmoozing in front of anyone, when her face breaks out in a brilliant and mischievous smile.

He grins back, holds up a fist. “Let’s do this?”

Del hits it with her own. “Do this.”

The Dean sweeps over as soon as the two of them enter, taking in Delirium – undeniably a child – with not a small amount of trepidation.

“Rob!” She says, somehow managing to incorporate both an exclamation mark and an ellipsis into her voice. “Who is this?”

He wraps an arm around Delirium’s shoulders. “Uh, this is Del, my partners’ sibling.”

“They’re busy.” Del offers, polite and reasonable. Hob wonders who gave her instructions on how to act.

The Dean’s face clears slightly, not completely, because Hob loves to keep people guessing on how many partners he actually has, and this does not at all clear anything up for her. ‘They’ could be one, or two, or in this case actually seven, but she doesn’t know that. “Oh, well it was so nice of you to join us instead.”

Del nods, seriously. “We could not let him face you alone.”

Hob manages to restrain the shocked laugh down to a snort. That is almost certainly something he said to Dream, about not wanting to face the faculty alone when everyone else would be with their partners. “She means because no one else will be.”

“Oh!” The Dean laughs as well. “I’ll introduce you to my husband at some point,” she waves a hand vaguely across the room, “unfortunately he has been drawn into a different conversation.”

“Ah, well, there’s no rush, right? We’ve got all evening.”

Del nods again, serious. “And if that falls through there is always the rest of your lives.”

The Dean cups a hand over her mouth, apparently already getting used to Del’s particular chain of thought. “Very true. It was nice to meet you.”

“You also.”

She wanders off again, probably to greet someone else, leaving the two of them hovering by the doorway and looking out across the room. Hob wonders if Delirium is going to whisper the weird hallucinations and beliefs of the people present, the same way Dream tells him their night time fantasies and Desire lets him know their waking ones.

Instead, she tugs on his arm excitedly. “Look, Hob, canapes!”

He lets her pull him over to the ‘buffet’ an admittedly poor selection of tiny foods, and watches her try one of each, accepting every time she pushes one, she particularly likes on him. It’s a new way to experience these sorts of events and he thinks that maybe that’s the point, maybe that’s why the Book decided she would be the one to accompany him.

Del bops him on the nose, pulling him out of his musings. “Thinking?”

“Yup. ‘bout you.”

She beams at him and holds up a tiny eclair. He opens his mouth and lets her stick it in, chewing obediently when she pulls her fingers back and stares expectantly.

“’s good.”

“Death says ones from France are better.”

“We’ll have to go to France sometime then.” Hob replies without really thinking about it.

The hopeful way she looks up at him in response almost breaks his heart. “Really?”

“Of course.”

He thinks she might be about to say something else, but his office neighbour appears beside them before she can.

“Rob! And who might this be?”

Del wipes her hand on her dress before offering it to Ally and Hob winces internally. Money he might have, but the dress she (or someone else) has conjured up looks incredibly expensive.

“I am Del.”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Del, I’m Ally.” Ally shoots him an amused look out the corner of her eye.

“Yes,” Del says very seriously, “of medieval literature.”

The amused look becomes impressed, “Yup, you heard about me?”

Hob is very certain that he doesn’t talk about work when he hangs out with Del, which means that she must have gained this information from one of her siblings, and she’d confirmed earlier that they had literally argued over who got to accompany him, but this means that they talk about him when he’s not there. It settles something in his chest that worries sometimes they are all just humouring him.

“Lots.” Del agrees. “Hob is very fond of you.”

She softens visibly, “Well, I’m quite fond of him also.”

At the other end of the table, a waiter lays down a tray of new things and, rather than responding, Del lights up excitedly and scurries off to try one, leaving Hob to face Ally.

“Thought you were bringing one of the undefined number of partners. That’s a child.”

“I know.” Hob replies, because he does. And, sure, Del might technically be eons older than him, but she has the mind of a child – Destiny had described her as ‘not quite broken, almost shattered’ once. “She’s their sibling.”

“Which one’s?”

“Uh, all of them?”

Ally visibly processes this information. “I’m sorry.” She says in a voice that is anything but. “The undefined number of mysterious partners are… all siblings?”

“I think they have a shared calendar.”

She looks like she wants to say more in response to that, but Del reappears with two of the new canapes and holds one out to each of them. Whatever bone Ally has to pick with this weird arrangement of his apparently has nothing to do with Del because her face softens immediately, and she takes the offered food. Hob does as well.

“There are people over there who want to talk to you,” Del adds, helpfully, “I heard them talking.”

Hob follows her gaze to some more members of the faculty. “Alright, might wanna grab some more snacks, I don’t know how long this is gonna take.”

She nods and bounces off down the table, grabbing a paper plate because they might be in a fancy establishment, but G-d forbid anyone has to do any washing up.

Ally presses a hand to his arm, concern gently written in her eyes. “Rob, I’m not gonna tell you what to do with your life, but… are you sure about this?”

He looks down to where Delirium is weighing up how many of something to put on the plate and can almost imagine Dream peering over her shoulder, nose scrunched up in distaste, Death at his side laughing, the twins whispering about the people present, Destiny watching over them and Destruction watching Hob himself. He blinks and the images vanish.

“Yeah, yeah I’m sure about this.”

[bozoclowncake]

My entire taste in media is "gay people commit murder and are mentally unwell" and i think thats beautiful

[dsudis]

Baking Day (Dragon!Dream/Hob, baking)

Written for @sdbingo for the "Baking" square, which obviously cried out for a dragon AU?

Hob awoke that morning, as he did every morning now, as warm and comfortable as any prince could be in a palace. He smiled to himself and cuddled closer to the warmth given off by the great black dragon Dream, of the Endless line of dragons.

Dream was sufficiently ancient and powerful that he could take other shapes as he chose, including the lordly human form in which Hob had first encountered him. Hob had been in the midst of proclaiming to his friends that sacrificing to the ancient dragons was stupid, and everyone only went along with it because they always had. He would never give tribute nor be sacrificed, he had decided.

He and Dream still debated, occasionally, whether Hob had kept to his decision in the end, after Dream had demanded him and Hob had been delivered to him. Hob would point out that he had neither willingly given up any tribute nor—as he was still alive and looked fair to stay so for a very long time—been sacrificed.

Dream took the view that since he was the dragon in question and had gotten all he wanted from Hob, tribute and sacrifice both could be taken as read—however happily given they had been in the end.

It was a stupid argument, and Hob looked forward to continuing to have it over and over for the next thousand years or so, as the powerful magic which protected Dream's hoard extended to the living beings the dragon counted as his own, and made them nearly as immortal as the dragon himself.

Unfortunately there were some necessities even a dragon's magic could do nothing about; Hob still had to get out of his fine cozy bed and go take a piss in the morning. He stretched and squirmed, considering whether he could steal a little more sleep before he did anything so drastic. He had the black silken coverlet more or less wrapped around him, an absurdly lofty thing filled with goose down or some such, embroidered with an array of tiny silver stars.

He had gone to sleep under it, sharing it with Dream when they had curled up together, Dream being still in his human form then. Dream claimed that, ancient and powerful being that he was, he had no need for anything so ordinary as a good night's sleep, and indeed that he did not sleep, ever, the way that Hob and the other mortal creatures did.

All the same, they had yet to pass a whole night sharing a bed without Dream somehow losing track of himself sufficiently to revert to his natural dragon form. Luckily he always seemed to instinctively move himself as he changed so that he had never yet crushed the bedstead or damaged any of the bedclothes, though he also never let Hob go too far from him.

This morning, Hob found, when he grudgingly opened an eye to examine the situation, they had ended up beside the bed. Dream's great head actually rested on the mattress, as if it were a nice little bolster pillow for him—and it was about the right size for that, grand as it was for a human bed. The rest of Dream's great body coiled around the bedstead, his tail trailing out the bedchamber door.

Hob himself was cradled upon Dream's great forelimbs, which were folded before his chest—the warmest spot of any to lie against Dream, though no part of him was ever chilly. Hob lay tucked close to Dream's heart, though, hoarded more closely than any of his treasures. Even his great ruby he had set aside for the night; only Hob stayed close to him all night long.

Hob braced a hand against the scales of Dream's neck, and tried to slide away.

Dream huffed sleepily and shifted position, using his neck now to hold Hob in place, turning his head so he could look at Hob with one eye open just a slit to reveal blackness and faint gleaming stars.

"Morning, love," Hob said, converting his push against Dream's neck to a petting motion. "Mind if I get up and tend to a few necessities?"

Dream grumbled, low enough to gently vibrate Hob where he was held so closely; some mornings Hob would quite enjoy that—and would have several ideas for how to continue the play—but this morning it only made him more aware that he really needed to get up and get to the privy.

"No, Dream, I really need to this time," Hob said, keeping his voice gentle but leaving no humor in it to be misinterpreted.

Dream sighed, but lifted his neck and head enough to free Hob, angling the leg he was mostly lying on to give him a gentle step down to the floor. Hob took it, divesting himself of the coverlet as he hurried over to the privy—here in Dream's aerie, it was contained in a little room carved out of the same stone as the main chambers they lived in. Hob wasn't sure whether it was some property of the stone and the way the wind moved among the mountain spires, or a discreet use of magic that made the smell of the room so unobjectionable, but he appreciated it all over again every morning. He washed up in the basin of spelled water—always warm, always perfectly clean—and slipped back out to find Dream again.

His beloved stood by the bed, just settling the coverlet into place over it, his pale-skinned human form wrapped in a black velvet robe. Hob had a matching one in a particular green-brown shade that Dream insisted was especially flattering to him; Hob just knew it was warm and softer than anything he'd ever touched in his old life. He shrugged it on, and Dream was there before he could get it closed to fasten up the ties exactly as he liked them—he had a way of making all the little bows hang prettily that Hob could not possibly imitate.

When that was all taken care of, Dream tilted his head in the way that meant he was presenting himself to be kissed, and Hob duly kissed him, curling a gentle hand around the back of his neck and keeping it mostly sweet. Dream had just made up the bed, after all, and Hob hadn't had his breakfast yet.

He broke off the kiss just as his stomach growled audibly, and Dream's expression shifted rapidly from bereft to stern. "How many times have I told you not to starve yourself?"

"Almost as many times as I've explained that humans just get hungry several times a day," Hob returned, planting one more quick kiss on Dream's lips before stepping around him and heading off to the outer room. This was a space twice the size of any cottage in Hob's village, which contained the larder and a table to sit at while eating, as well as softer chairs and couches for lazing about, which was Dream's preferred activity for most of every day.

Hob fetched himself some cold ham and the last half of a loaf of bread, and Dream followed him to the table with a jug of water and an apricot and a plum—he was very insistent about Hob eating fruit or greens at every meal, and had finally accepted that greens were not to be contemplated before noon.

Dream used a fine little knife with a gold-chased handle to cut the fruit into slices, which he fed to Hob one at a time, lifting each to his lips whenever Hob paused between rather less tidy bites of the ham and bread.

Hob waited until he was nibbling the last crust—and Dream was licking the last of the apricot juice from his fingers—before he said, "Dream, love. Do you know what day it is?"

Dream gave him a baleful look. "Fritterday? Mugsday?"

"I like those," Hob said cheerfully, not allowing himself to be drawn into another discussion of the fact that before Hob's coming Dream had been far too dragonly and superior for such things as days of the week. He had slept through whole seasons—whole years, sometimes, back then, and now that he had Hob to look after he was cruelly compelled to spend some part of every single day awake and moving about. "We should put those on our calendar. But no, it's Tuesday, actually. Do you know what Tuesday is?"

Dream squinted at him suspiciously.

"I'll give you a hint," Hob said, and spread his empty hands. "There's not a bit of bread in the house."

Dream let out a great, aggrieved sigh and then pointed one black-nailed finger at Hob. "You got me out of bed under false pretenses."

"That's right!" Hob said brightly, leaning across the table to give Dream's scowling face a kiss. "It's baking day! Five loaves for me, and cakes for you, and a few batches of seedy rolls..."

"I do not require," Dream informed him stiffly, "cakes."

"Oh, right, must have been me ate all of those, I just forgot," Hob said, standing up to gather up his baking supplies. "I do love cakes. Could you hot up the oven, darling? I thought I'd make a few batches of biscuits to take round to Lucienne and Mervyn and Abel and so on."

"Cain will eat them all," Dream grumbled, but he moved away from the table and went to kneel before the oven. He glanced back to make sure Hob was at a safe distance, and that the larder door was closed and Hob hadn't scooped out any flour yet. Hob raised his spotless hands to show he hadn't; he'd learned that lesson very well when Dream demonstrated why it mattered.

Then Dream turned back to face the big oven and blew into it—not just breath, for despite his present shape he was not just a man. He blew fire, just as his great dragon form could, a tiny white-hot stream that made the air ripple like water all around Dream. Hob could feel the warmth of it even from here, as though he were basking in the summer sun. He smiled fondly while Dream cut off the stream of fire and glowered into the oven.

He breathed a few more little gouts of flame, gave the oven another long careful look, and then gestured Hob to come and join him.

"Be careful," he said as Hob approached. "It is very hot."

Hob didn't bother to point out that he could feel that—it was properly hot standing in front of the open oven door, to the point of being uncomfortable, like standing too close to a bonfire on a hot summer night. He came as he was bidden and stood just behind Dream to peer in, letting Dream quietly fret over the possibility that Hob might reach in and touch the heated oven—as if he would, when he could see every surface of the inside of it glowing with heat.

Never mind the stray little burns he had collected here and there, putting things into the oven or taking them out—they were tiny and did not signify, no matter how Dream fussed over them. Dream had pointed out at great length, the first time, how his own fire would never, never hurt Hob, for it was an extension of himself—but once he used his flame on the stone of the oven, it was simply very hot stone which cared nothing for Hob and would burn him to the bone if it got the chance.

Dream hadn't worked out a way to bake bread (or cakes) without the oven, though, so Hob still got his way every week.

"That looks beautiful," Hob told him, and felt pleased with himself for being able to see the colors it glowed and know what they meant, after months of practice. "That should be ready for the bread by the time it's risen, and then we'll do the cakes and rolls and biscuits."

The whole room was cozily warm, even when Dream shut the oven door on the greatest part of the heat; the bread would rise well, despite the autumn chill of the air outside.

"Right, let's get to work, then," Hob said, and headed for the larder.

"I do not see why I should," Dream muttered behind him, and Hob just smiled and ducked into the larder, hanging his robe up on the hook in there and changing it for a long linen smock—and linen braies for underneath, because he never could feel right about baking with nothing properly covering his privates. Dream joined him a moment later—in his own black linen smock with absolutely nothing underneath, and short enough to show his slightly knobby knees and the hairless length of his shins and ankles, as smooth in skin as in scales.

"Did you miss me so soon?" Hob asked, grinning as he tied off his braies.

Dream didn't deign to answer him, just took the lid off the flour barrel and began scooping flour into the biggest of the wooden bowls. Hob collected the starter, the saltcellar, and the endless jug of tepid water, and followed him back out to the worktable nearest the oven.

Hob set to work making bread dough; Dream helped him with the kneading and did not actually complain about it, though he was unusually quick to notice a raven at the window, and whistled the spell that opened the window to admit her. Jessamy tumbled through accompanied by a welcome gust of cool wind from outside, and lighted daintily on the corner of the table, away from any danger of being splattered with flour.

"What news?" Dream asked, though without slackening the pace of his kneading. His solemn tone contrasted wonderfully with the smear of flour he still hadn't noticed across his cheek. "Is there some matter that requires my attention?"

Hob was sure that Jessamy heard as clearly as he did the hope in Dream's voice, that some crisis in his realm might draw him away from the indignity of bread day.

"Well," Jessamy said. "There could be a requirement. To remind Hob to make plenty of the rolls with seeds."

Dream glared so furiously at Jessamy that a bit of steam escaped his presently human-shaped nose; Hob hid a laugh against his own arm as the bird simply preened and settled herself comfortably on her perch.

"There is also a requirement," Jessamy added. "To keep warm. It gets colder every day out there, you know."

Dream's irritation dropped away immediately into concern. "I did not think the winter troubled you. If it becomes too cold—"

"Tch, no," Jessamy waved her wings dismissively, fearless of Dream as only his ravens were—his ravens and Hob. "There are plenty of warm places to roost among your mountains, boss. Everyone keeps warm, and if we didn't we would tell Lucienne, and she would sort it out."

Dream frowned more pensively now—not angry, but still anxious that he might be somehow neglecting his people. Hob was going to point out to him, eventually, that he was neglecting them a lot less now that he wasn't snoozing his way through whole months and years at a stretch.

He wasn't ever going to tell Dream how many of Dream's subjects had thanked him for keeping Dream from hovering over them day in and day out, as he had used to do at the times when he was awake. Hob was pretty sure between him and Lucienne they were keeping Dream's attention to his people really very reasonable.

Hob had asked Dream once, how he had ended up with so many people living among the Dreaming Spires, which at first glance were a lot of very uninviting spikes of mountains and didn't improve that much on closer inspection, though the rooms carved into them were quite pleasant and cozy. The land was Dream's, and he stored his hoard here and there among the mountains, but it didn't require that much looking after.

"They are mine," Dream had said. "Given to me, or collected by me. For my hoard. If you had not wished so particularly to stay near to me, you would have gone to live among them, as part of the horde."

Except, Hob had realized, he didn't mean horde, like an unruly band of people. He meant hoard, as in a dragon's treasure: all of his people were treasure, to him.

But Hob was the only one who could get him to help make bread, so he wasn't going to quibble about which was the most treasured. He knew very well.

"That's looking properly kneaded," Hob said, giving him a quick kiss on the cheek. "Let's set it to rise, and we can see what's on hand for making cakes. And seed rolls! And look, Jessamy's here to run messages if we're low on honey or sugar or anything else important."

"Hm," Dream said, patting his dough one last time and covering it with a towel. "Yes. We shall need to examine the contents of the larder carefully. Perhaps for some time."

Hob grinned and led the way, giving his hips a little shake just to make Dream press up against his back. Baking day was really the best day.

[This fic is also on Ao3!]

[auroral-melody]

sandman is a fun show to watch when you're really normal about the comic universe. this was me the whole time

[collect-ivision]

I’m love her

[seiya-starsniper]

When Dreams Become Reality (Dreamling - AO3)

Rating: Mature Status: Incomplete Chapters: 3/8 Words: 11,824/???? Archive Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Additional Tags: Post-Inception, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Inception Fusion, Crossover, Lucid Dreaming, Dreamsharing, pasiv, Trans Ariadne (Inception), Heist, Forging (Inception), Missions Gone Wrong, Hob Gadling accidentally help frees Dream of the Endless, BAMF Hob Gadling, dream suicide of background character, Other Additional Tags to Be Added Summary:

It was supposed to be a simple job. All they had to do was enter Alexander Burgess’s dreams and convince him to go away with his lover Paul and leave behind Fawney Rig for good. Simpler than Inception. Safer than Extraction. Yet when Hob Gadling and Arthur Freeman get inside the head of their mark, they realize that not everything is as it seems. Alexander Burgess is hiding a much darker secret, one that is deeply hidden within the basement not just at Fawney Rig, but also inside of Alex’s mind. And Paul refuses to tell them what it is. Or: What happens when Dream is set free after a hundred years and he discovers that humans have created the technology to infiltrate dreams?

CHAPTER 3 is now up! Come give @five-and-dimes and I some love 💖

[mayhemspreadingguy]

Delight of the Endless

A collab with @magnusbae who came up with the concept and the colors (⁠◕⁠ᴗ⁠◕⁠✿⁠).

[b-plot-butch]

Something that really leapt out at me as I was rereading this issue today is??? This is still a portrait of Delight??? And Destiny doesn’t call her Delight or Delirium, merely addressing her as the “youngest of the Endless.” Oh my god.

I don’t have any coherent thoughts about what this signifies, only that it hurts me in some way.

[lord-morpheus-ravens]

She reached forward and trailed her finger along the shape of her own smile, and then her brother’s; then she pressed her hand firmly over the still faintly-pulsing glow of their once-joined magic and focused inward. “Dream,” she called, double-voiced and echoing, Delirium of today and Delight of yesterday, coming together in the one place outside of time that alone could have preserved She who had been erased from Destiny’s Book. “Dream, where are you? ”

From my Dreamling fic My love will testify (and last through the ages) on Ao3

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

comics Edwin you are very dear to me... he's just a lil guy...

[writing-for-life]

Delirium—Michael Zulli

[ihatecoconut]

Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly [Chapter 5]

Also on AO3

Hob gasps, thrown out of the most vivid dream he had experienced in over a hundred years. The feeling stayed with him, even as he put on the light – everything being too much and not enough and the first time he had ever felt that way. The odd panic that set in was confusingly close to coming down from a drug high.

“Delirium?” He scrambled out of bed, ignoring the way the duvet pooled on the floor. “Delirium? Is that you?”

A faint memory came back to him as he rushed through the apartment, the necklace she always wore, no matter what else changed. Swirls of colour.

He found a loose sheet of paper and several coloured pens before he paused and actually asked himself what he was doing. It probably wouldn’t even work. He put all the pens on the paper together and attempted to draw a swirl.

“Delirium?”

“That isn’t going to work.”

He looked up to see her sitting opposite him, except, there was something different; her normally coloured hair was a pale blonde, her mismatched eyes were both blue this time and her funky, psychedelic clothing had been replaced by a pink dress.

“Why not?”

She wrinkled her nose up. “I’m not close enough to being Delirium right now.”

Hob nodded slowly, taking in the changes to her person. “So who are you?”

“Delight.” She sighed. “Like I used to be. Why did you call me?”

“I had a dream.” Hob replied, and then paused, realising how menial that sounded in comparison to whatever had happened to Delir- Del.

But she frowned, tilting her head in an invitation for him to go on.

“I haven’t dreamed for years, not properly anyway, they were just faded, like watered down memories mostly if I even dreamed at all, and then today – tonight – I just had a dream and it was like I was experiencing everything all at the same time. I don’t know, like I got all the dreams I should have had in the past hundred years all in one go.”

“Dream is back.” She said, a little surprised, a little wistful. “I wasn’t 100 percent certain, but he must be.”

“Dream?”

“My brother. He’s been missing or something for… well probably as long as you have been missing dreams."

"What happened to him?”

She sighed again, her expression down turning. “I don’t know. I think the others are trying to keep it from me.”

“Why?”

“Because they don’t think I can handle anything anymore. Not after changing to Delirium.” She paused, her eyes filling with tears slightly. “They’re scared of me, of what I could become and what they could become so they think the best solution is to keep me in the dark and tell me nothing.”

“I’m sorry.” Hob said, because that was all he could say.

She smiled at him. “It’s ok.” And then, “your dreams should settle down again once he gets a handle on everything.”

Hob nodded. “Thank you.”

“I have to go.” She told him. “I can’t stay like this for much longer.”

“Wait,”

She raised her eyes to meet his.

“Delight?”

“Yes?”

“What is that word for when being around someone makes you warm and happy?”

She smiled at the floor, obviously seeing straight through what he was doing. “Love?”

“Ah, yes. Delight?”

“Yes?”

He reached out a hand to squeeze her own. “I love you.”

She was at his side in an instant, wrapping her arms around him and burying her head in his shoulder. From that vantage point, he could see the colours seeping back into her hair, starting at the roots. “I love you too.”

And then she was gone, leaving the faint smell of bubble-gum and a sorrow Hob hadn’t known he could feel.

[windsweptinred]

What if: The return of Delight of the Endless

The process has begun, the Fates have had their pound of flesh... Death of the Endless stretches her hand towards her baby brother. Daniel Hall's mortality burns away as the power of Dream of the Endless begins to flow from Morpheus to his successor. But suddenly there is Hob, who throws himself between the siblings. Refuses to let Morpheus go. Begs him to give life a chance, love a chance... To allow joy back into his heart. But if he can't, if he is truly too tired to keep living, then Hob will follow him to the Sunless Lands. Dream has a choice. Take his sisters hand and rest, but rob Hob of the life he treasures so much. Or take a chance, open himself up to the possibility of happiness, trust Hob with his torn and battered heart. Two hands, one Death's , one Hob's are offered, outstretched towards him. He makes a choice...

The transition of power suddenly falters, the power of Dream of the Endless rushes back to Morpheus. Yet it's too late for Daniel, who is no longer mortal, but not yet Endless. There cannot be two Dreams. The universe, desperately tries to right itself. Morpheus has chosen joy over death. Thus Daniel, child of the Dreaming, forever connected to its monarch, is encapsulated in said joy. The cosmos recognises a vacancy long left void... And Daniel Hall, is reborn as Delight of the Endless instead.

[dsudis]

Watching the Rain (Dragon!Dream/Hob)

Another fluffy little slice of life for @seasonaldelightsbingo!

"Oh," Hob said, when they emerged from the depths of Dream's seventh-favorite treasure-cave to see the rain sheeting down, so heavy that the fall of it hid the sight of the next mountain spire in a silvery mist. "Ah. You were right, I see."

Dream hadn't wanted to fly out today, though it was the appointed day for coming and inspecting—and basking in—his seventh-favorite part of his hoard. Hob had thought he was just being lazy as usual, and needed to be coaxed; he had ignored Dream's insistence that he could feel rain coming. The sky had looked blue, and Hob had cheerfully ignored the fact that the weather around the Dreaming Spires was strange and unpredictable, and that he'd been here less than half a year himself and had scarcely begun to learn his way around.

Now it was raining, a cold heavy downpour, and Dream never flew in the rain.

"I suppose you were also right, and serious, about the thing where you actually can't fly in the rain?" Hob inquired, thinking that he probably should have clarified this point before waving away Dream's insistence that it was going to rain.

"My magic," Dream said, just as he had the first time he'd explained it, "is fire and air. When the sky is filled with an element so inimical to me, my magic could be dangerously weakened." After a pause Dream added, "It is also. Very unpleasant. And distracting. And I do not care to fly with you when I might be distracted by the rain from taking proper care for your safety."

"Ah," Hob said.

Dream had never mentioned that bit before, but it did make sense. Dream's standards for proper care for Hob's safety were a damn sight higher than Hob's had ever been—see, for instance, the night he'd spent slagging off the whole custom of giving tribute and sacrifices to dragons, only to be overheard by said dragons and specially requested as their sacrifice.

It had worked out well for Hob, but it was no great recommendation of his survival skills.

"I suppose we just... stay here a while, then?" Hob asked.

Dream was in his most natural dragon form—convenient for flying and for basking among the gold and gems stored in this cave, but too large to fit all of himself in this entrance space. His hind legs and tail disappeared down the tunnel toward the hoard.

Somehow, even without eyebrows, he was able to give Hob a very effective quelling look. "We shall stay here," Dream agreed. "Until the rain stops."

Hob gestured down the passageway behind them, which Dream was still half in. "Do you want to..."

"I have had my fill, thank you," Dream said. Basking amongst his hoard was like eating, for an ancient dragon like Dream; he drew strength and power from simply being in the presence of his treasures. Which, Hob supposed, meant that spending too long among them might feel like continuing to eat after you were no longer hungry: sometimes a pleasant indulgence, but a bit sickening if it went on too long, especially if you had already decided you were done.

Hob rubbed his stomach, willing it not to growl. They hadn't meant to stay all day here, and hadn't brought any food; Hob hadn't thought it would be necessary.

"There should be a hamper," Dream said, tilting his head back and forth. "Ah, yes. There."

"A... hamper," Hob said, spotting it even as he spoke. A lidded basket, latched shut, was sitting just inside this entrance area to the cave—just far enough back to be safe from the rain.

"You persuaded me to come," Dream said, nudging Hob ever so gently with his great dragon nose. "You could not have persuaded me that the rain would not fall. I knew very well what I did when I brought you here; I told my ravens to prepare accordingly. Go and see."

Hob went, wondering how much supply the ravens could possibly have carried here. When he was kneeling before the basket he heard the strange not-sound and felt the rush of air that meant Dream had changed shape dramatically. He smiled and fiddled with the latch until his beloved was leaning against his back, and his pale bare arms were wrapping around Hob's shoulders.

There was a black robe at the top of the hamper, and Hob passed it directly into Dream's hands; Dream never let go of him or moved away from him, but abruptly the arms wrapped around Hob were wearing black silk. Under that was a fine woolen blanket and a couple of flat cushions, and finally there was a stoppered jug, and a loaf of bread, and a good hard yellow cheese and, inevitably, a bowl of greens, though someone had sprinkled it with seeds and little dried berries, so even that would be pleasant enough to eat.

Dream took the blanket and cushions, and Hob brought along the food and drink to sit where Dream had made a place for them.

They were just inside the mouth of the cave, back a couple of feet from the edge so they wouldn't be splashed by the rain and Dream wouldn't fret too much about Hob falling out. From there they could see the rain's steady falling, and sometimes glimpse the valley this spire faced. The shadows of the nearest spires were just visible, but it didn't seem likely that the rain would let up anytime soon.

Hob nibbled at the bread and cheese and leaned against Dream's side, and Dream curled an arm around him, his warmth making the blanket almost redundant.

"I'm sorry I dragged you out here," Hob said, when they had been sitting in silence a while.

Dream turned and pressed a kiss to his forehead. Barely audible over the rain, he whispered, "I am not."

[This fic is also on Ao3, and so is part 1!]

[10moonymhrivertam]

I feel like there is untapped potential in “Dream collects names like other people do friends” and Hob having sort-of-accidentally nicknamed him for convenience and Dream loving it and integrating it happily into his lore.