#medievalpeasantdreambf

[medievalpeasantdreambf]

Selkie!Dream

For a while Hob Gadling falls under the assumption his friend, the Stranger, is some sort of sea-related divinity.

Hob would have quite a few arguments in support of the theory, if anybody were to ask. With his black hair and unearthly pale complexion, the Stranger looks the part of a Brittany-coast ghost.

He’s wealthy and powerful, clearly the lord of some realm, but takes no interest in fighting over land. He’s clearly ancient, and inhuman. He has the powers to preserve (Hob’s still here, isn’t he?), but they seem arbitrary, like he can’t preserve everything he might wish to- or why would he have looked so empathetic when Hob told him of Rovyn’s death? He can use a pouch of some fine earthen powder, salt or sand, to bring old memories up from the depths… His hair floats as if free from gravity, or hangs, solid black and silky as if soaked… Clearly he’s some kind of sea-being.

Hob refines his guesses over time. Every time the man meets him, he’s wearing a long black robe or coat. No matter its material, it looks as soft as fur, as smooth as skin, and fits his stranger more perfectly than even the best tailors could manage. When the Stranger storms out on him in 1889, he leaves behind his hat, marching unconcerned into the downpour. Hob takes it home, drunkenly thinking of- what, hanging on to it for him? When he wakes in the morning, his window is open, and the hat is gone. Even though his- the Stranger had been in here, he hadn’t broken their hundred-years meetings contract: Hob hadn’t stirred from sleep even once that night.

Ultimately, after hearing the man-creature speak with reverence of the prized garment, ever-changing yet always undeniably the same object as his “Sister’s coat”, Hob’s mind settles on one idea : selkie.

They have a reputation for passing their magical pelt along from one woman to another in the family line. Hob is not too troubled by this last detail, as regardless of what human folklore actually knows of selkies, there are already far more surprising matters in their relationship than his friend’s gender.

Come 2022, Dream has explained nothing but follows Hob back to Hob’s place and hangs up his coat.

Hob is deeply moved by the action as he knows how awful it would be for this immense source of power to be stolen. Dream agrees it would be a terrible thing for him to lose the item for being reunited with it brings him so much comfort and he cannot bear the thought of losing this essential part of himself again.

To Dream, it is indeed a gesture of immense trust after the torments he went through last century but not the one Hob thinks it is.

Dream knew his friend’s growing respect and even affection for the coat, he’d noticed and let Hob fold it. Out of sight, he admired the immense care put into gently shaping his belonging into a clean square before petting the fur that still carried the warmth of his body. He kept staring as Hob lifted the pelt to his face, against his closed eyelids and studied him breathing in the familiar smell of his Stranger.

Dream couldn’t help his surprise the day he was standing by the doorframe, wishing his friend a good night when Hob had helpfully straightened the pelt as it was directly laid over his shoulders. If gesture felt like a caress on his naked skin, Dream found out he didn’t mind it so much.

And if some times later Hob discovered Dream’s kisses felt of ocean salt, it turned out he didn’t it mind so much either.

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[medievalpeasantdreambf]

Once the Stranger denies being any creature Hob knows to ask about… Hob is left to believe him to be a immortal human, like himself. A powerful mage able to generously extend his gift to him, but nothing he’d be comfortable thinking of as more than a simple human.

The realization only properly hits him after going through the nightmare of his trial for witchcraft. That’s when he thinks an appointment every 100 years would not only give him time to experience enough to entertain him over pints but time for a man as peculiar as him to get forgotten… How careful! Does the man treat all of his neverending existence with the same discretion? Probably with the way Hob couldn’t get even a name out of the bloke in X centuries. Or well in the four evenings they’ve spent together. Well Hob could really learn a thing or two from him. Never too old as they say. He didn’t plan on sticking around anyway. As soon as he’s got the finances… ciao.

Death is surprised and confused to discover Dream puts work in perduring this assumption. She was hoping for maybe some discretion but this exceeds all expectations.

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[medievalpeasantdreambf]

Hello everybody, You may not have noticed this blog’s inactivity for the past year but I still regret it. This blog was initially created by my dear friend and I to document our many Sandman headcanons and share them with the world together. It is with great sadness I must announce his passing last year.

As uneasy as I am with the news we’ve all heard, the Sandman remains something my friend deeply loved and I have been honoured he decided to take me along on this journey.

We had a ton of ideas and drafts in progress and I genuinely hope I can eventually post them here for him. One of them was mostly his project, his baby… I want to make it into something worthy of his memory.

I miss him very much, we had so much left to create.

[medievalpeasantdreambf]

Another take on their meeting

They didn’t initially come here for Hob Gadling, she only brought her brother Dream to the White Horse to show him there’s good in human company.

Yet barely a minute into the demonstration, this man next table starts shouting vulgarities about her, insulting her and calling her stupid.

And she gets it, okay. It is only human, this impulse to try and appear bigger than one’s fear of mortality and all that jazz… Yet it still gets to her, and it hurts.

Now, neither innocent of such rudeness nor always the gentleman, Dream’s furious sneer suggests an impulse for violence. Typical… The vengeful god number is getting a bit old… Truthfully at this point she just wants out of here. The party’s clearly over and their people-watching afternoon definitely ruined.

In the eternity of a shared sigh and a disappointed half-smile frankly closer to a frown, it is shared implicitely or maybe telepathically, the way only gods or siblings communicate, that now Dream shall be the one who has to deal with the drunk in his beloved sister’s stead because he’s kind like that.

And really he’s lucky she doesn’t simply take him away right here and then (and let the head of his corpse fall right into the bowl of soup in front of him before his rowdy friends’ eyes) or worse just gives up on collecting his mortal soul altogether and chose to abandon him to wander time until long after everything stops and the world of humans, the universe and even the Endless have met an end of their own. How would that look like, really. Don’t fuck with Death - He really is lucky!

So whatever, it’s all up to him now and Dream will be happy to inform her about it whenever he will be in better disposition to meet her… Fast forward, Dream has fallen hard for their test subject. Girl, what the fuck!

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