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It was storming thunderously outside the castle. Hob stayed back away from the windows.
As he climbed the steps to Morpheus’ quarters, he worried. The castle walls were plain, no tapestries, no paintings, nothing extraneous.
“Morpheus?” He asked, announcing his presence in the room as he pushed open the door. The study was dark and empty, utterly freezing.
The balcony doors were open, and the rain had made half the room damp. Morpheus was out there, leaning against the stone railing.
Hob hurried over, “Morpheus,” he said, grabbing the man’s arm and trying to pull him out of the storm. He was freezing.
Morpheus looked at him, gaze unfocused and dark eyes outlined in darker circles. Hob knew in that instant that Morpheus had been running himself into the ground since he last saw him. The ragged, desperate breaths didn’t help.
The hand Hob grabbed was shaking, barely any movement, but it was shaking. Morpheus was the lord of dreams, he did not shake. At least, he hadn’t. He was sopping wet like he’d just stepped from the shower fully dressed.
“Come in, okay,” Hob whispered, not quite begging but something close.
Morpheus’ eyes seemed to lock onto his. When Hob pulled, Morpheus went, following him away from the torrential downpour and back into the palace.
They were barely inside the study again, barely had the doors closed behind them when Morpheus sank to the ground. Hob sank with him, following him down, enveloping him in his arms as he hiccoughed roughly.
“It’s too much,” Morpheus rasped out in between breaths. At that, Hob tried to pull back, and give him some space, but shaking hands held him close.
“It’s okay, you’re okay,” he rambled, holding Morpheus’ hand flat against his chest. He took exaggerated breaths, pacing them in a way he hoped Morpheus would match. He was shaking his head as if he were attempting to shake off whatever bad memory he was in.
The man was openly sobbing, drawing his knees up closer to his chest.
Eventually, Morpheus became quieter, something in the vicinity of calm.
“Come on, you’re freezing,” Hob said softly, standing and pulling, dragging Morpheus up with him.
Morpheus went, rising to two feet unsteadily, holding onto Hob’s hand like a lifeline.
Hob knew Morpheus’ room had a hearth, and he hoped it was lit. He knew his way around this world well enough, but the minutiae of the rules still escaped him. He was dreaming, and he dreamed the fireplace would be lit.
Maybe it was Morpheus. Maybe Hob had dreamt right. But as he shuffled Morpheus into his bedroom, a bright, warm fireplace greeted them.
He pushed Morpheus down to sit in front of the fireplace, and if the great lord were bothered by sitting on the floor, he had the grace not to show it. Hob followed him down, tugging down the shoulders of Morpheus’ coat, sopping wet and still dripping water onto the floor.
“Is the rain you, then?”
Morpheus barely looked at him, but he shot him a glare. “Not intentionally,”
Hob hummed something like an agreement as he stretched to pull a blanket from the couch behind them. He knew Morpheus was the center of the Dreaming, this world turned around him. How the ins and outs of Morpheus’ thoughts and feelings affected this realm, however, was still lost to him. It seemed lost to Morpheus, as well. The man seemed almost frustrated at the Dreaming, frustrated at everything. Hob tried not to be a frustration.
The way Morpheus was looking at him, though, told him he was failing.
Hob was reaching up around Morpheus’ shoulders with the blanket, because he was freezing, and Morpheus flinched, batting his arms away quickly.
“I don’t need this,” the lord said, petulant as a child.
Hob let his hands fall to his lap, blanket pooling on the floor. “You’re freezing, love,”
Between one blink and the next, Morpheus was dry, black hair styled as wildly as usual. Hob really, well and truly really, had to hold back from rolling his eyes.
“I’m fine,” he bit out.
“You were panicking a minute ago,”
“And I’m fine,” Morpheus said, refusing to look at Hob for anything longer than a quick, sideways glance, staring at the fireplace.
“You look exhausted, Morpheus, you—“ and another blink, and Morpheus’s sunken eyes looked refreshed, his eyes looked brighter, and Hob wanted to scream. And also cry. “What the fuck, why— why are you hiding this from me?”
“The Dreaming is still a disaster, I don’t have time to—“
He couldn’t stop the eye roll then. “Oh, fuck off, you’re not in any state to build anything, let alone a world,”
Morpheus was silent, eerily silent that only came from a being that didn’t breathe, a being whose every atom was perfectly at rest.
“You forget yourself, Hob,” he finally said icily. “It’s time for you to wake,”
Hob woke with a start, half a reply his tongue, something viciously incredulous, because what the fuck.
“Morpheus!” He shouted, though it did little good. There was no swirl of sand in the corner of the room, not even any pecking at the window from his raven.
That night, Hob slept, and he did not dream.
He didn’t dream the next four nights, either. Morpheus was sulking or what-the-fuck-ever, Hob didn’t give that much of a shit, but Morpheus was doing it alone. Some wretched self-inflicted punishment for, what? Being held hostage for a century? The man was brilliant sometimes, but most of the time he was a fucking idiot.
When Hob woke on the fifth day, having slept a perfect eight hours and yet not feeling well-rested at all, things came to a head.
He stared at the sleeping pills, things he kept on hand when the anxiety and dread of nightmares overwhelmed him. He hadn’t even thought of them since Morpheus had returned. He’d had no need of them, nothing could touch him while the Lord of Dreams watched over his rest.
And yet. Morpheus wasn’t letting him in. It couldn’t go on like that, Hob refused to go on like that. Perhaps if he attempted to enter the Dreaming when Morpheus wasn’t paying as much attention. The man had to be overworked, overworking himself, like he’d been the last they spoke.
With a sigh, because what the fuck was he doing, Hob poured out a handful of sleeping pills.
His hand was halfway to his mouth when, “Put those down,”
Hob whipped around, most of the pills flying from his hand, the rest he dropped on the bathroom counter. “Who the fuck do you think you are, you scared the shit out of me, you don’t get to—“
“You’re telling me what I can and cannot do?” Morpheus asked coolly, standing tall and angry by Hob’s toilet.
“You said, you promised that we were in this together,” He said, voice dripping with fury. Morpheus was silent, and Hob was finding he was emboldened by how pissed off he was. “I love you so fucking much, and I refuse to sit by while you kill yourself because you won’t take two fucking seconds to take care of yourself,”
A twitch of Morpheus’ eyebrow was the only indication that he’d heard anything Hob said. “I must fix the Dreaming,”
“Who said everything had to be fixed immediately? If you keep destroying yourself, you won’t be fixing anything,”
Morpheus inhaled quickly, “I’m not weak, I’m their King, I cannot—“
“Morpheus,” he said, like a plea, but it got Morpheus to shut up and finally, finally, look at him. He looked scared shitless. “It’s not weakness to take care of yourself,”
“I can’t do that,” Morpheus said, voice catching.
And something shifted, finally, realization dawning on Hob.
He stepped forward, reaching for Morpheus with both hands, and Morpheus swayed backward at the last second.
“Tell me you’re not punishing yourself for Roderick Burgess,” Hob said, holding Morpheus’ face in his hands.
“I deserve it,” he said, face crumpling as tears fell from his eyes. Morpheus grabbed his elbows, and Hob thought he would be pushed away, but. Morpheus just held onto him.
“You don’t,” Hob said, taking a risk by tilting Morpheus’ head closer, pressing his forehead against his own.
Morpheus was shaking his head, “I’m not worth this, I deserve—“
“You’re worth everything, Morpheus,” Hob said, and Morpheus didn’t even seem to hear him. “A horrible man held you captive, he hurt you, not a second of that was your fault,”
“They would have freed me if my pride hadn’t—“
“Stop, that’s not on you, they had everything over you, and they suffocated you for a century,” Hob spoke against Morpheus’ temple. He didn’t have much more to lose, so he may as well drive home the point, “you didn’t deserve that, duck, not any of it,”
Morpheus smashed his mouth against Hob’s. His lips tasted of salt, and his breathing was all over the place, but he was there, kissing Hob in his embarrassingly small bathroom.
“I’m sorry,” Morpheus whispered in the shared space of breath between them.
Hob loved him so much it was painful sometimes. “You can’t push me away again,”
“I know,” Morpheus said, and his nodding was almost frantic. “What if it doesn’t get better, if I don’t get better at this,”
“You will, and I’ll be there with you for as long as you’ll have me,” because Hob knew the oppressive fear that came with surviving something, that the experience would strangle him forever, keeping him stuck.
Morpheus almost smiled, “If the choice were mine alone, you’d be by my side always,”
“All you have to do is ask,” he said, a promise.
Morpheus stared at him, eyes searching his face for— for something, Hob didn’t know what, but if he knew, he would’ve given it to him in an instant.
He seemed to find it eventually, eyes finally settling on his own, as one of his hands let go of Hob’s arm. Hob feared for a moment, but Morpheus’ hand was back quickly, grabbing hold of Hob’s own. There was something in his hand, Morpheus was pushing something into his hand, and—
“What is this?” Hob asked, staring down. It was a key, black and skeletal, covered in so much rust Hob had half a mind to worry about tetanus.
“Open any lock with this to enter the Dreaming, straight to my chambers,” Morpheus explained, and Hob froze.
Morpheus liked the long, scenic route in all walks of existence. The endless was far more comfortable going slow, and this— a key from the waking world to the Dreaming, a key giving Hob direct, unfettered access to Morpheus— felt decidedly not slow.
“You’re sure?”
Morpheus was nodding before he’d even finished speaking, saying, “You should be able to come and go as you please,”
“Even if you’re being an arse and sulking?” And finally, Morpheus gave him a small smile.
“Even if,” Morpheus allowed. He took a deep, albeit shaky, breath and said, “you’re good for me, and I trust you,” and that. Hob had to kiss him then, because he didn’t know what else to do.
That felt like an admission of epic proportions, Hob was certain he’d never earn anything higher than that for as long as he lived. That felt like— it felt like everything.