Chapter Text
Prologue
It’s the last day of September, and the promise of autumn is folding over itself like a quilt, familiar and cool.
Dr. Rose Golding’s week is off to an excellent start at the beginning of an already excellent semester, and she knows it's rolling off her in beams of sunshine. The cashier at the Tesco looked almost alarmed as she’d thanked them for her receipt and flounced out the door, bags in hand. She can’t help it. And it’s only Tuesday!
She reaches her flat and tosses phone and keys into their little bowl by the door, kicks off her shoes, sets down groceries, and sings Ella Fitzgerald as she twirls her way down the hall to her bedroom to set her satchel down.
She’s just set it on her dresser, and is half-way through the second verse of ‘Makin’ Whoopee’ when a flicker of shadow catches her eye in the mirror and she whirls with a gasp-
Just in time to be scooped up, pressed to the dresser, and kissed senseless.
Hob giggles with abandon into her lover’s lips, and Dream of the Endless hums in satisfaction, in relief, continuing on his merry way over Hob’s cheek and throat, burrowing his face in her collar.
“Mother Mary’s tits, love!” Hob chides, utterly empty of any ire, and tugs a lock of raven hair in an attempt at reprimand. “Nearly scared the immortal right out of me,”
Dream presses a kiss to her mouth once more, utterly unrepentant. He grins like he knows Hob has already forgiven him. It’s true, but he doesn’t have to be smug about it, the ponce.
“Beloved,” he purrs in greeting. Hob’s smile is a blinding delight, and she winds her arms around his neck.
“Hello, duck,” she whispers.
They hold each other for a moment in which the rest of the world ceases to exist. She had missed him. Every moment that he has been away these past few weeks kept scratching and poking at the still-raw wound that was his disappearance after 1889.
Time had rolled on, and he had not appeared. Did not even send Jessamy with word. The world burned under gunfire, mustard gas, and hydrogen bombs, and Hob witnessed it all alone. Bore the stories, the lives lost, alone. Humanity spun worlds out of circuit boards and chains of number code. Still he did not appear. The Dreaming remained shut and silent, her prayers to the dreamstone she wore at every moment nothing but desperate whispers falling on a cold, lifeless jewel.
And then he'd appeared in the New Inn like one more ghost coming to haunt her, and she had felt more than seen the change in him. The hollowness that had not been there before. It had a very long hundred years. But the thirty-odd ones that had followed, when he had missed their appointment, the one they had honored as a sort of anniversary, that had been what Hob imagined the Devil might craft as her own personal hell. She'd held out hope, right until midnight of June seventh, 1989, that he had simply been tangled up in whatever kept cosmic eldritch concepts on a busy schedule. That he was, in fact, coming back to her. One hundred years of shattered hope had hit her, and she had only dragged herself back out of that pit by the skin of her teeth.
So of course, in the moment, she'd been a bit busy rearranging her entire world again, wrestling with the realization with he had not been some vivid figment of her wild, hopeful imagination for 600 years. And he had just shown up and tried to greet her, call her 'beloved', as though he'd just been late coming back from the grocer.
Hob had raged. Bellowed, screamed, even struck, as she never had in her life. She'd collapsed sobbing into his arms and asked, wailed, why he had abandoned her, why he had left her like everyone else always did. What had she gotten wrong? What had she misunderstood?
The discovery that his absence had not been voluntary, that he had been captive under the earth, in glass and iron, not 300 miles from her that entire time...
Hob loved life. Loved humanity in its myriad of virtues and flaws.
She had been ready to raze the entire bloody island and salt the ashes for good measure.
She'd settled for seeing Fawney Rig reduced to kindling.
But he is back. She reminds herself of this very firmly with another indulgent kiss. He is in her arms again, and that is where he will stay until the bloody sun winks out and Death is locking up the universe behind her and leads Hob to wherever Dream will be waiting for her.
Hob sighs, shaking off those maudlin thoughts, and taps Dream’s shoulders. He obligingly lets her off the dresser, but sticks close as she moves around the room, changing into sweats and thick socks.
"How’s the Dreaming? Lucienne and Matthew and everyone?" she asks.
"They are well. Lucienne sends her warmest regards," he informs her. Hob coos. That's practically a string of heart emojis coming from the Librarian.
"I'll have to see them properly soon. I know you don't want me traipsing about just yet," she allows, holding a palm up to his impending objection; she knows he is still repairing the damage his absence and then the Vortex had wrought, and that his heart will not be at true rest until he has accomplished this. Plus, he's a proud creature, her lover. She knows he wants her first lucid return to his realm to be perfect. "But I miss them. You let me know when and I'll be right there," she promises, taking his hand as she heads to the kitchen to put on the kettle.
Dream nods, in thanks and acquiescence. "I shall do so. They miss you as well," he adds. She leans into his neck, pouring her affection into him. He presses into her hair, soaking in her the sunshine glow of her touch, the well of its long absence not quite yet replenished.
She sighs, contenting herself with this (for now), and sets about the ritual of making two cups of tea. She pulls out a sleeve of biscuits, knowing Dream will eat at least half, and act as if he is obliging her instead of indulging his honestly impressive sweet tooth.
As the tea strains, she leans against the counter and faces him again.
"Seriously. How's it all going?" she asks, gently. Dream's head swings up to attention, returning from wherever his thoughts had sent him. His mouth twitches, and he avoids her eyes - a dooming tell.
Hob tilts her head to catch his gaze once more. Her brows arch up pleadingly. Dream sighs.
"Lucienne completed a census of the Dreaming. Fiddler's Green and Gault are returned, and safe. The Corinthian was...dealt with," he surmises, face carefully smooth. Hob fights down a shiver. She had only met the eldest and most dangerous of the Arcana once, in the time between her first lucid trip to the Dreaming, and when it had been shut to all dreamers. He had been....well.
Hob couldn't honestly say she would grieve his absence.
"But there are still a number of dreamthings and nightmares missing. The youngest of them, the most fragile, they...they deteriorated back into dreamstuff,” Dream’s face is a rictus of grief as he admits this; Hob’s heart aches for him. The dreamthings aren’t just his subjects and creations - they are practically his children. “But some are roaming the Waking. The dreamthings are trickling back steadily," he says, and the relief at this fact is evident, as is his frustration at the next. "But the nightmares are more resistant, as can be their nature. Some have returned willingly, some are bucking my summons. Others are hiding. As creatures of the Dreaming, they can duck in and out of the minds of dreamers, and that makes them harder to track. I shall have to find them as I did the Corinthian, and that will take some time," the words almost shred themselves as they are dragged from between his teeth.
Hob frowns, but is unsure what counsel or comfort she can offer, besides, well. Herself. She extends her hand, and Dream takes it without hesitation. He flows into her arms and she smooths her hands over his hair.
"Patience, love," she bids, "I know you're more than a god and you contain multitudes, your purpose is your function. All that. But you are just one being. And," she emphasizes, tapping a finger to his nose. He twitches adorably and she smiles. "You are not alone. So do not shoulder this alone. You have me and Lucienne, Matthew, your sister. I know there's not much I can do, physically or otherwise, but if there is, I'm here. Anytime, for anything," she reminds him, her constant vow since 1815.
Dream's smile is as soft and fleeting as dew, but sincere. "You are truly more than I could ever deserve, Rosalyn Gadling," he murmurs, sweeping back her chin-length hair to rest his hand over her neck, and the chain where his dreamstone hangs, as faithful as Hob herself.
Hob chuckles and shrugs.
"I don't know what punishment I'm helping you serve, but I'll take it," she chirps, grinning as this bit of cheek makes him grumble and pull her forward to the lightning and jasmine shelter of his mouth. All according to plan.
He eventually allows her to escape, if only to breathe so she won't pass out (it's happened before).
She fixes their tea and they retreat to the couch, the evening starting to creep in through the windows. Dream pauses in the midst of a biscuit, and looks up at her as she pulls up a stack of grading she's working through.
"Forgive me, beloved. I have been remiss in asking after you. Are you well?"
Hob blinks, pausing as she takes up her mug, but she bites her lip, eyes twinkling with sundrops as she remembers she has news. “Well. Very well in fact,” she chirps, crossing her legs under herself. Dream smiles as he recognizes an impending story and settles into the couch.
“Tell me,” he bids, and Hob gives an adorable little squeal and wiggles in place before launching.
“So get this, right? We were called into a meeting, me and some of my colleagues, and apparently the National Trust is requesting a team of experts to come help them identify a whole crate of items! They just recovered it in Cornwall, in some bloke’s storage locker, of all places! They said there’s documents, letters, personal items, whole ledgers of household accounts!” her voice climbs steadily higher. “And then this man goes, ‘Oh, and we’ll need your best conservationist and restorationist, because we have at least two portraits as well’!” Hob's voice trembles with academic ecstasy. Dream’s answering smile matches pitch, knowing his lover’s particular fondness for these sorts of momentous occasions. Hob was a medieval historian, after all, and though her Ph.D was in manuscripts and literature specifically, she had a masters in Historical Art Conservation and Restoration. History and its recording, its stories, were her passion and pride - but the resuscitation of its art was her joy.
“And of course the whole lot of us were vibrating. Practically had to deck Harswell out of the way to get my name down first - a pox on that fucking miser, as if I’d ever let him beat me to that motherlode! Man only puts his back into it if there’s a publishing deal in it for him, and his methods are still living in the fifties!” Hob despairs, Dream nodding along as he recognizes the name of the department head who is, indeed, often a pox himself. Or so he gathers from these anecdotes.
“So, you are to trace the origins of these artifacts?” he asks.
“That’s the idea. We have to go to the archives tomorrow evening to get our mitts on them!” she informs him, reclining now she’s gotten the initial excitement out. Dream wraps his fingers around her ankle and draws her calf into his lap, at ease and rejoicing in doing this, in taking in her presence through his hands and his attention.
Hob hums happily as he massages the muscle. “You must tell me what you find,” he requests.
“Oh,” Hob tsks, waving a hand, “I know this is just my nerdiness talking. It’s probably all much more boring than I’m making it out to be. Who knows if all these things are even from the same place. The odds are astronomical,” she admits.
“It is your profession,” Dream insists, “which you pour your heart and soul into. You care very much about making sure these items, their stories, are preserved for humanity. You breathe new life into the past, Hob, and paint it vividly for your students, that they might learn from its lessons in turn. That is not only worthy of enthusiasm, it is honorable and deserving of high praise,” he says, watching Hob’s eyes steadily widen. “And it brings you joy. Nothing pleases me more than seeing you happy and fulfilled,” his smile crooks further as he adds, “As if that were not enough, you forget I am the Prince of Stories. What should I call you, beloved, if not a storyteller at your core? You not only gain joy and bring wisdom to the world, Hob. You honor me in your craft,”
Hob’s eyes are lined in silver, face slack with tenderness at the praise, wrapped as it is in his sonorous voice. Hob is not vain - she leaves the flouncing and high-nosing to Dream - but if ever she sought approval from anyone in all her life, it was Dream himself. To hear that her lover is proud of her, her work, her accomplishments, that he believes, ardently, that she is giving something back, not only to the world but to him, through what she does...
She huffs a laugh, hands cupped around the mug over her heart. “You do that on purpose,” she grumbles, though she smiles helplessly.
“Do what?” he teases, leaning closer to better soak in her glowing blush. “Spout poetry at the drop of a hat just to make me blush,” she accuses, and said blush deepens as he traces his finger over her cheek.
“I am helpless in the face of such inspiration, dear one,” he purrs, and Hob groans, covering her face with her tea as he trails hungry hands up her thighs. He plucks the mug away and sets it aside, drawing her into his lap effortlessly, and delighting in her answering squeal.
She shakes her head as he turns his face up, demanding and imperious, and she obliges him with a kiss.
“Will you stay the night?” she asks. It is a beckoning purr, breathless as he takes the tender flesh of her wrist between his teeth. He trails kisses to the crook of her elbow and nuzzles into her bicep, and his eyes are molten with flashing novas as he looks up to her.
“Of course,” he rumbles. He continues to her shoulder, her collarbone. “I shall have to be away for a few days to find my wayward creations,” he explains, and kisses away her small pout. “But tonight I am yours, beloved,”
“Mine,” Hob hums, her smile becoming positively carnal as she slides her fingers into his hair to rake her nails over his scalp. It has the same effect it always does, with him melting into her hands, blooming towards her. She takes him in hand and does him honor indeed.
***
Dream leaves in the early morning, the sky still silvery blue, unpainted by the approaching sun, but he says goodbye before he goes. Hob draws him in for one last kiss before he melts into the shadows, trailing her fingers down his chest. He groans, fingers dragging over her bare back, her legs wrapped in the sheets still warm from their bodies, their lovemaking.
He draws on every ounce of his self-control to pull away, and not give into the urge to rejoin her, to hitch her glorious thighs over his shoulders and suffocate himself in her folds. “Hob,” he begs and his lover sighs, resigned but not sorry.
“Be safe,” she pleads, hands clasped around his face. Dream’s eyes are the night sky, the stars at their centers glow with softness. He presses a kiss to her brow, cupping the back of her head tenderly.
“I shall. I love you,” he whispers against her skin.
“As I love you,” she answers, their usual parting. Since he’s come back, he has never left her side without saying it.
When she opens her eyes, he is gone. A dream vanishing with the dawn.