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Dream’s leg hung from the stone wall, the other hiked up to support his folded arm. He gazed down at the rubble at the foot of the wall in pensive quiet. Johanna Constantine’s dark, knowing gaze lingered in his mind.
Take care of him, Matthew. He needs it.
He didn’t understand what she had meant by that. He was Endless, and though he had been missing parts of himself, tremendous power had always remained at his fingertips. The Lord of Dreams and Nightmares did not need to be taken care of.
“Do you always do that?”
Dream lifted his brooding gaze to the center of the throne room, where Matthew had flown down from the damaged roof. He carefully hopped over the pieces of broken stone that littered the floor.
“I do not know what you are talking about,” said Dream as he watched the raven approach.
“This,” said Matthew, waving his wings in the general direction of the wall he was sitting on. “The whole ‘sitting alone quietly for hours’ thing. Lucienne told me you liked coming here, but, I mean… Aren’t you bored?”
“No.”
“So you like meditating.”
“Perhaps.”
Matthew cocked his head this way and that, surveying their surroundings. “You’re not gonna rebuild this place now that you’ve got all your powers back?”
Dream tipped his face up to the shifting skies of starlit dust and milky smog.
“I thought I would want to do it,” he conceded in a low voice.
Matthew’s wings flapped, and he landed on the wall next to Dream’s boot. “But you don’t want to, in the end?”
“It is not that I do not want to.”
“Then what?”
Dream didn’t answer. Instead, he looked back down at the raven and asked: “Do you know why Constantine told you what she told you?”
Matthew’s bright, beady eye focused on him. “What? About taking care of you?”
“Yes.”
“Does it bother you?”
“I do not appreciate being seen as weak, neither by mortals, nor by any other being.”
The raven ruffled his feathers. “She didn’t say that.”
“No, but I could see it in her eyes. It was some sort of compassion unlike any other Constantine has ever shown me.” Dream stared down at his clenched fist in his lap. “Compassion is only shown when one believes the other has experienced hardship, and hardship often weakens.”
“I think you may be reading too much into this, Boss.”
“Lucienne, too. She did not trust me. She saw me in my diminished state, and she went against my instructions and sent you.”
“Yeah, I remember. Boy, were you happy to see me,” sarcastically said Matthew. “She was right to do it, though, wasn’t she?”
“It is not the action that is the problem, it is the reason. I did not need your help then, Matthew, nor do I need it now. I do not need you or anyone else to take care of me. I do not understand why everyone who crosses paths with me seems to think otherwise.”
“Oh. It’s really bothering you, huh Boss,” observed Matthew.
Dream didn’t answer.
“Not that I’m ignoring all the stuff you just said about not being weak, because you definitely aren’t, but I think you deserve to have someone by your side to look out for you after getting locked up in some crummy bastard’s basement for a hundred years.”
After a beat, Dream murmured: “A hundred and five years.”
Matthew glanced up at him, dipped his head. “Right. A hundred and five. Seriously, that‘d mess anyone up. No offense, Boss, but I think Johanna and Lucienne might both be right somewhat.” He hopped around to face him. “I mean, look at us. We make a great team. I know you secretly really enjoy my company, deep, deep down.”
Dream looked away. He preferred not to show how he felt about that just yet.
“Jokes aside… I don’t think you really want to be left completely alone. My gut tells me you’ve had enough of that. So, yeah, I agree with them that it’s probably best if I stick around,” concluded the raven.
Dream gazed down at the rubble for a long time. Then, he quietly admitted: “There is a reason why I have not rebuilt the palace yet, Matthew.”
Matthew straightened, angling his beak to the side. “Yeah? Why’s that?”
“I tried once before, after my captivity had come to an end, upon finally returning to the Dreaming. Lucienne was there to see me fail.”
After a brief silence, Matthew said: “Okay. But that was before we met, right? That was before you had your tools. You weren’t exactly at peak capacity.”
“I had not taken the time to rest,” agreed Dream.
“So if you’re feeling better, what’s stopping you from doing it now?”
Dream gazed into the raven’s intelligent eye.
“Fear,” he quietly admitted. “I am afraid to fail again.”
“You’re not going to fail,” Matthew immediately said.
“I know,” murmured Dream. “Yet, the fear remains.”
“Hey, hey.” Matthew hopped closer, past Dream’s boot, and stopped next to his knee. “Listen. You beat the literal Devil. Lucifer freaking Morningstar lost to you. At this point, you’re eating fear for breakfast.”
Dream stared at him. Matthew blinked, cocked his head the other way.
“Okay, look. I get what you’re saying. This place is part of you, right? You’re the Dreaming, the Dreaming is you. You don’t feel the same after what you went through, so rebuilding it is probably gonna feel just as hard as rebuilding yourself. No one said it was gonna be easy. But I think you can afford a few unsuccessful attempts, because in the end, knowing you, the Palace is gonna end up looking great anyway.”
Dream lowered his gaze and turned Matthew’s words around in his head for a few seconds.
“...Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I should at least try.”
Matthew cawed proudly. “Oh, you know I’m right.”
Dream’s lips curled in a faint smile, and he unfurled his body from his perch in one smooth, measured movement.
“Thank you, Matthew.”
