#string of fate

i have more doodles where that came from! but it makes more sense to post related ones together... so, to be continued. (i don't really do long projects [i get stressed], so it will likely be some non-linear storytelling throughout doodles.)

i am excited to post the next batch though, so have this (out of context) panel for now 😭

oh red string au, I love you so 😩 details are below. and I ramble. this has made this post very long. apology apology

there are multiple versions of a red string au but this is mine (so we are on the same page here):

people are born without strings, and get theirs when they are in proximity to their soulmate AND cross paths. think like bumping into each other on the street, sitting next to them at a concert, your waiter at a restaurant, new coworker, etc.

some people don't have a soulmate 🤷 it's rare, but not that rare that people believe it never happens. it's socially acceptable to believe that, if you reach a certain age, you may just not have one. but people find their soulmate at any age. it's just one of those things where the belief depends on the person.

people can also be tied to multiple individuals. #yeah

soulmate doesn't necessarily mean sexual or even romantic attraction. tis but a soul tie. two souls who were meant to be together. don't think ab it too hard. red string au storylines are super cute and I love them, but sometimes don't have a lot of complexity or nuance. just because two people "get tied" doesn't mean they're like, going to get married or something. what happens between two people after they get tied solely depends on those two people. it really varies. red string of fate au in 2026 means it's gonna be woke. happy pride month✋️

ALL THAT BEING SAID; we get into the plot of this being a PHM au...

grace not being tied, never getting tied. being surrounded by many people in the professional world who are all tied. always experiencing a slight othering because of it. nothing explicit, but just enough to be there. "making peace" with it, choosing to believe that maybe he's just one of those people that doesn't have one🙁 and that's fine! he knows that if he actually is, then it's perfectly normal. but he tries not to think about. ever. jokes that he is, instead, "tied to his work"

ironically, his fate WAS tied to his work though. this is where petrova line = red string of fate comes into play. Dr. "I'm soul-tied to my work" grace, pointing at the astrophage in a petri dish, then staring down into a dark xenonite tunnel protruding from the ship blocking the petrova line. screaming in shock as his red string appears, tying him to someone at the other end. (guess who!)

stratt's actions become more cruel, essentially dooming him (from the eyes of everyone on earth) to a life of never finding a potential soulmate. (though grace chose to believe that he might just be a person without one, there was always a chance he just hadn't found them yet. stratt took away his choice to do so.)

so. eridians can't see color. and because the string isn't a physical object with any mass or weight, it's just a force. i'd like to think this au is kind of just our society but everyone has a sixth sense to see the string of fate; like eridians discovering humans can see light. just another extra sense. ANYWAY, rocky can't see the string! he doesn't see that him and grace or tied, or have any idea about this aspect of human culture (or any, for that matter).

what's interesting though is that the red string also occurs for eridians, they just can't "see" it! i'd like to think that once grace is settled and situated on erid, he gets bombarded with questions and requests from eridians to tell them if they are tied with a "soulmate" according to human culture.

if you saw the other post, you may be thinking, "but bay you said grockdrian!" and you would be right. adrian is not pictured in this one (because this is the beginning) but they will be! qpr grockdrian domestic life on erid is a whole other thing. it's happening though. i said so.

bonus if you got through all of that:

NO IDEA why i'm locked in so hard. please actually ask me questions if you have any though. lowk i #needthat. honestly this post is so long... maybe i need to go outside actually holy shit 😭

The first ‘date’ had gone remarkably better than he had allowed himself to imagine. Your connection was instantaneous and undeniable, your company something he never had to overanalyze or overthink. Though it has only been two days since he saw you last, they have felt like weeks spent away from you.

He spots you at the same time you spot him, and he cannot help but smile slightly at the grin you sport when you do. 

“Hi,” you greet, though such a greeting is not nearly as sweet as the kiss you quickly bestow upon him as well. The temptation to pull you to him is almost too overwhelming, but he is acutely aware of the current public location, and he resigns himself to simply trying to steal a few more moments of your lips against his. 

“Hello. How has your weekend been?” Conversation is not necessarily easy for him, but he is trying, and the pleased raise of your brows makes it worth it.

“Very nice! And yours?”

This time, he is prepared for your inquiry into his well-being. “Busy, but not unpleasantly so.”

“Good!”

You begin to lead the way into the shop, only to be stopped the moment you open the door to find a patron in the entrance, evidently waiting to order. A further glance inside reveals that it is extraordinarily busy today, far more than when he last joined you here. While you study the crowd, attempting to discern whether there are any open seats, Morpheus takes a couple of wary steps back.

Being in the Waking is one thing. Being in close confinement with mortals, who had imprisoned and mistreated him for so long, is a whole other matter. 

He can handle the New Inn, with a secluded table perpetually reserved for him by his dearest friend, which makes the rest of the busy pub seem far away from their meetings. The British Museum, too, was doable; surrounded by works that had their beginnings in his realm, with his soulmate by his side, was enough to erase the discomfort of the scattered groups of people they spent the evening weaving around.

But this shop, with its large glass windows (glass that one can easily watch their face grow more and more dejected over a span of a hundred years, glass which carries on it the stains of a friend slain in the midst of their efforts to free their lord) and packed to the gills with humans? There are things not even the Endless can bear, and today, this is one of them.

Morpheus does not realize that you have been watching him until you speak. “How does a walk through the park sound?” you suggest.

He lets out a breath he was not aware he was holding. “Lovely.”

Such trivial matters as traffic escape him as he attempts to put distance between himself and his painful memories, paying no heed to his surroundings as he prepares to cross the road. Your hand around his arm is the life preserver he needs to pull him from his thoughts, both mentally and, as he’s jerked backwards and out of the path of a moving vehicle, physically.

“Watch out!” you warn. A car honks angrily as it passes, the driver inside yelling and gesticulating, irate at Morpheus’s carelessness. “Are you alright?”

Vivid visions of injury and pain come to the surface of your mind, loud enough that Morpheus is assailed with them without actively looking for them. You scan him up and down with wide eyes, worried that your eyes are betraying you and that he might actually be grievously injured. Just as you did for him moments ago, he takes your own hand, keeping you here with him rather than lost in the gruesome scenarios your mind is conjuring.

“I am fine. No harm has come to me,” he assures, feeling how you squeeze his hand to assure yourself of such.

You nod, your concern melting to irritation when you finally trust that he is not injured.

 “Do you have a secret death wish that I should know about before this goes any further?” you ask, scowling.

Not in the way that you are thinking, though he has found himself wishing to see Death more often these days. “No. Only my most humble and sincere apologies for scaring you in such a manner.”

You appraise him for a long moment, as though weighing the validity of such an apology. “Apology accepted, so long as you don’t scare me like that again.”

There is something in the way that you watch him that makes Morpheus think that perhaps you are playing up how upset you are, and he makes a calculated gamble by bowing his head in remorse, keeping his eyes on you the entire time as he pledges, “I shall do my best.”

A beat as he waits for your reaction, to see if his hunch was correct. Then, you smile despite biting your lip to try and stop yourself from doing so, and the sun’s rays shine a little brighter upon you both. “You still want to go for a walk, or is there a bridge you’re feeling inclined to jump off of instead?” you tease.

This is flirting, then, he realizes as you lead him hand-in-hand across the street—following traffic rules, of course. It has been so long since he participated in such an activity that it has undergone immense changes, as things are wont to do as they shift and adjust throughout the years, becoming almost unrecognizable. The last time he even considered doing something such as flirting, there was little to no teasing and sarcasm; rather, it was complimentary, dressed in flowery language and proper rules of society. It was rigid, expected, and a little boring. He believes that he actually prefers this modern form of flirting.

You release his hand, but not touching you at this juncture of your courtship simply will not do, and Morpheus, deciding that it is his turn to flirt, extends his arm for you to take. Slowly, you do just this, your body pressing against his and sending electricity through the neurons this human-shaped body manifests in the Waking.

“You’re quite the gentleman, you know that?” you say, gazing at him through your lashes.

An amendment to his previous observation: more specifically, he prefers flirting with you.

Morpheus knows, of course, that he is what would be considered a classic gentleman, but enjoys hearing that his actions are leaving quite the favorable impression on you. Rather than answer, he instead begins walking with you down the sidewalks of the park, enjoying the ambiance and your presence.

“What’s your favorite part about what you do?” you ask, breaking the silence. The question is a curious one, and Morpheus looks at you in surprise. “What? You know lots of things about me, but I know so little about you. Why are you so passionate about stories?”

He has to think for a moment, once more balancing between wanting to tell you the truth and having unintentionally hidden the true nature of his being from you, with no clear idea how to rectify such an omission in a way that does not leave you upset (although he is not overly familiar with mortals and how they function, he does, at least, know that learning something of the magnitude of what an Endless is, and thus undoing everything that one once thought as false, is not something that will usually go over easily).

Once more, he considers simply telling you the truth right here, in this moment. But to do so here, in such a public place, would be a disservice to both of you. You deserve to be told of his true nature with tact, with care. This confession cannot and should not be something carelessly blurted out.

“I see the true reflection of humanity, in a way that few others do,” he says truthfully. “Their hopes, their fears, what drives them, what makes them who they are. I am trusted to watch over these feelings, to care for them, and find a way for people to process them. I enjoy creating scenarios that enable them to do so. It is…almost sacred, in a way, the relationship I share with people. A gift that I have only recently been reminded of.”

“Why only recently?” you question, always perceptive.

“I was forced to take some time away, and it has made me cherish what I do all the more.”

“That’s great that you care so much about your work.”

“I am learning that there is much that I care about now.”

“Like?”

Seeing an opportunity, he chooses once more to engage in flirting. “Robert Gadling.”

You laugh loudly, the sound warming him from the inside. “How could you not? He’s an easy guy to care about.”

“My sister,” he continues with his list.

“Naturally.”

“And you.”

Your eyes sparkle like starlight as you grin, a stunning sight. “Is that like a ranked list, or—”

It is his turn to kiss you, the action cutting your words off and replacing them with a pleased hum as you accept his lips against yours.

“I like it when you do that,” you admit when he pulls away.

“When I kiss you?” he asks, feigning ignorance. 

Though he already knew to what you were referring, your flustered nod is the reaction he was hoping for when he asked you to clarify.

“Then I shall endeavor to do more of it.” To prove his words as true, he kisses you again. “Much more.” Another kiss. “Provided you have no objections, of course.”

You look at him, dazed. “Nope, no objections here.” Heedless of the time of day or the location, you kiss him yet again—an action that is quickly becoming one of his favorites.

Yes, these days, there is much to enjoy about the Waking.

•••

As is often the case these days, you remain on Morpheus’s mind long after he has begrudgingly parted from you and returned to the Dreaming—more specifically, the issue of how he has unintentionally obscured his true nature from you, and how to rectify this situation. Such a problem requires careful, uninterrupted thought. His throne room is not an option, nor is the library; his most trusted advisors can easily locate him and trouble him with matters concerning the realm. There is one place that has, for the most part, been established as ‘off-limits’, which is how he finds himself in his personal gardens, staring at the stone bench where he once consoled you, where he kissed your delicate hand, where he decided that he was waiting no longer to pursue you.

Perhaps he should have informed you of the truth of the fate that was to be yours when he first knew that you were now and forevermore linked to him. Divulging this secret to you when you showed him to Hob’s office, before you rushed out of the room to your next class, would likely have been the honorable thing to do. It would, at the very least, have made courting you much simpler.

But would you have acted around him the way that you currently do if you knew who he was, his status in the universe? Would your jokes have come as easily? Would your smiles be so freely given, would you remain as at ease around him as you are now? Would there be an awkwardness in the way that you treated him, his titles removing any pretense of equality between you?

Despite the situation that he has created by withholding from you who, and what, exactly he is, he would not change how you have come to care for one another. He has enjoyed being seen by you as simply a mortal man, has enjoyed having to work to woo you. Your feelings for him have developed naturally, without the knowledge of a soul bond looming over you. He has fallen in love with you: human, endearing, and completely authentic.

This charade can go on no longer, he decides. Your next ‘date’, at the following weekend’s Christmas markets, he will take you somewhere secluded and share with you who he is and the nature of your bond. He anticipates you being upset by the subterfuge, which he could not begrudge you for. He simply hopes that you will understand why he chose to approach this in such a manner, and that you will continue to treat him as you always have, to understand that the version of himself that he has presented to you is him, minus the knowledge of his function.

A gasp pulls him out of his thoughts, and he looks away from the bench he has been staring blankly at to see Nuala, standing near a break in the hedges and looking embarrassed at walking in on a private moment.

“Apologies, my lord.” She bows her head. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

“Is something the matter, Lady Nuala?” Morpheus asks, believing that Lucienne has sent her to fetch him.

“Not at all! I just—it’s—” She flushes pink as she stumbles over her words. “I often use this garden as a thoroughfare to my own. I did not realize that it was yours.”

“You have a garden?”

“Mervyn helped me set it up. One of the few things I enjoyed doing back home, and when Lucienne encouraged me to keep up my passions here, I decided to attempt to recreate my garden.”

Love has, it seems, made him forego the diligent eye he usually keeps on his realm. He had only briefly checked in with Nuala about her new life within the first few weeks of her tenure here; an error he intends to rectify. “You are enjoying living here, then?”

“Oh, very much so. Everybody is so kind, and there is always something for me to do. I like being busy, being…useful.”

“The other members of the staff speak very highly of you.”

“They do?” she asks softly, as though she is unsure that the truth is being spoken.

He nods. “We are all glad to have you as part of the Dreaming.”

“Thank you, my lord.” She takes full stock of him. “Have you just returned from the Waking?”

“Has the mortal clothing given it away?” he asks lightly.

“Only to the trained eye,” she jests. “Has the courting of your soulmate been going well?”

“Very well. I am…” A whole host of words to describe how he is feeling comes to mind, none of them seeming to quite encompass all that this is to him. “Besotted.”

She nods contemplatively, and for a moment, Morpheus believes that she will wish him well before continuing on her way. After a moment’s thought, her eyes meet his once more. “If this is too personal a question, then feel free to tell me so, but I want to know: what is it like to meet one’s soulmate? I have never been able to get a straight answer from any of my own kind, which is to be expected.”

Love is changing him in many ways. Where he once would have shied away from such a question, now, he knows exactly the answer. “We are magical beings, you and I. Acts that we consider regular are wonders to those who have never seen such magic in their lives. There is little that can surprise us, little that can catch us in our tracks. Meeting my soulmate, I now understand how that would feel. It is…pure magic, every time we are together. I find myself in frequent awe of how fortune has chosen to smile upon me, after so long being spent in its ire.”

“That is lovely.” Nuala smiles, but the action is tinged with melancholy, with…longing. “I should leave you to your pondering, you looked very deep in thought when I interrupted.”

“Regardless of the circumstances that brought you to this realm,” Morpheus begins before she can duck through the hedges, “you are not trapped here. If you ever wanted to leave, to carve out your own life and find your own soulmate, I would not stop you.”

“I have a home here, which is more than I could ever say of Faerie. Right now, I am happy with where I am.”

“The Dreaming shall always be your home.”

Her eyes glisten, and she blinks rapidly in an attempt to clear them. “Thank you, my lord.”

“If you would permit me, I would like to see your garden,” Morpheus pivots. This vulnerability he has engaged in has been more than enough for one day.

“You would?”

“Your kind’s botanical skills are renowned across the worlds. Perhaps you could teach Mervyn a thing or two.”

She laughs, the tinkling of bells, as she begins to lead the way. “Do not let him hear you say that. I fear projects will never get done if you do.”

Morpheus smiles to himself as he thinks about how luck has finally turned his way in multiple areas of his life—in this case, with those he surrounds himself with in the Dreaming—before following to see how the newest member of his household has been making her mark on her new home.

•••

The Fates have been exceptionally kind to Morpheus as of late. He has had positive interactions with almost all of his siblings; those he holds in high regard are making it clear why he does so, and, of course, he is falling in love. Fortune is smiling upon him, and he finds himself…happy.

His first mistake, of course, is assuming that it would remain that way. That, since things are going right, nothing can go wrong. He is in the far reaches of the Dreaming, examining some of the newer repairs done on a rarely-used skerry, when a shriek of his name pierces his ears. It would be fruitless to search for anybody in the vicinity, for he knows that this call did not come from his realm. No, the voice, unmistakably yours, is coming from the Waking. Though there is no earthly way for you to know how to summon him—to know to write his name down and speak it aloud—you have…and you are terrified.

This is not the imagined danger of the nightmare you had in the Dreaming, where there was nothing to truly harm you but your own mind. Now, you are in actual, physical danger, in a realm where such danger can spell deadly consequences, and you have called him in your time of need.

In a mere second, he has left the Dreaming behind and come to you in the Waking. He finds himself in a long hallway, watching Loki and Puck terrorize you. The former is not a surprise (merely a disappointment), though the latter most definitely is. Loki’s hand squeezes your upper arm, his other raised in the air as though he intends to spirit you away from this location—which he likely does. Though you cower before him, your eyes remain fixed on him, intending to face your assumed fate with honor. The sight leaves him incandescent with rage, and he can control himself no longer. When a crash of thunder echoes loudly through the room, the lights cutting out as it does, all three sets of eyes go to him.

“Enough.” Voices layer over each other, and he realizes that, in his anger, he has become something incorporeal.

Puck, the only one of the duo with any sense, immediately steps backward. Loki, brazen as always, looks at him and smiles. “My Lord Shaper. Fancy seeing you he—!”

One of his shadows cuts the trickster god off, grabbing him around the throat and pulling him away from you. For a moment, Morpheus enjoys watching as Loki struggles against the vice that has tightened around his neck. Then he disappears, reappearing as his normal self in front of you.

He glances behind to look at you, to confirm that you are safe, and meets your eyes— bright with fear and shock, but seemingly unharmed. A moment of confirmation is all that he allows himself before turning once more to the problem at hand.

“You dare, when I have been nothing but gracious to you, freeing you from your prison and creating a dream version of yourself to take your place in your prison, to transgress against me in such a manner?” He can hear the way his voice shakes from anger, and he has to take conscious breaths to keep himself from ripping the room apart. “To attempt to harm whom I care most for in this, and every, universe?”

“We weren’t actually going to harm the mortal; we’re not that dumb.” Loki rolls his eyes at the thought, the motion incensing Morpheus even more.

“Tell me, then, what were you planning to do?” He has a good idea of it already, but wants confirmation before he makes his next move.

“Little hard to do that when you’re choking me!”

He releases Loki with barely a move of his hand, watching apathetically as the god coughs in front of him. When he rises once more, he has his signature smirk on his face—a smirk that Morpheus hopes to permanently remove. “We were only going to keep the human company while you decided whether the well-being of your soulmate was a fair trade for…releasing me from our little deal.”

That’s what this is about, then? He cannot handle following the terms of a deal that was fairly struck? Then Morpheus shall show him what happens when one reneges on a deal with the Lord of Nightmares. “You want me to release you from our deal? Alright, then. Consider yourself released.”

His smug look deflates just slightly, as though he were hoping for more of a fight. “Well, that was easy.”

“As easy as tricking Thor and me?” Now it is Morpheus’s turn to look smug as the Allfather, summoned easily by another monarch, steps out from the shadows.

Loki’s face falls even more. “Lord Odin! Now it’s a party.” He begins to back away opposite Odin. “Suppose I’ll be going now.”

Thor appears, blocking off the only other path to escape. “No, I don’t believe you will.”

Loki barely gets in an attempt to dodge the God of Thunder before he is hoisted over Thor’s shoulder by the back of his neck and carried down the hallway, coming to a stop in front of Odin.

“Can I kill him?” Thor inquires. Though he would not get a say in the matter, Morpheus agrees with the line of thinking.

Odin, in his wisdom, shakes his head. “His prison beneath the world is worse than death.”

Loki attempts to get in one last quip, but Thor shakes him harshly before marching down the hallway and back, presumably, to Asgard.

Then, Odin turns to him.

“Despite you freeing Loki, there is no grudge between us, Dreamweaver. You and yours,” he looks to you, frozen in place save for your eyes, darting between him and Morpheus, “are always welcome in my hall.”

Morpheus nods respectfully. “Thank you, Lord Odin, for your help and understanding.”

Though Morpheus would like to turn his attention to you once Odin leaves as well, there is still one more matter at hand—and he is currently trying to sneak out of the bookshelves unnoticed.

“And you, Puck?” Morpheus turns and cages the fae in, taking delight in the audible noise of fright he makes. “Shall I inform Queen Titania of your involvement in this egregious offense against the sovereign of a realm which Faerie is allied to?”

Even though he grimaces at the thought, Puck still laughs uncomfortably. “No—no, my lord. No need for that. In fact, I was thinking it might be nice to spend some time at home; it has been a while.”

“Do that,” Morpheus advises, allowing pits of stars to replace his typical Waking eyes.

Puck nods harshly as he skirts past Morpheus, looking at you once more (he should have the trickster’s eyes for that) before disappearing back to his realm as well.

Devoid of most of the preternatural power that had previously occupied the room, the lights in the basement flicker on, one by one. Just as he turns to assess your condition, you crumple to the floor with a whimper.

“What…the hell was that?” you choke out, gasping for air. A hand goes to your chest, and you rub your sternum as you try to regulate your loud, uneven breathing. Your face, ashen and suddenly devoid of the blood it previously carried in abundance, carries on it an expression of bewilderment that he has never seen you wear.

This reaction is extremely alarming, to say the least. He has never seen anybody act this way unless they are grievously injured, and such experience sends Morpheus to his knees to check you over. “Are you well?”

“Yeah, just—” groaning, you bury your head in your hands, “just give me a second to process everything that just happened.”

You are not injured, then, simply…struggling with the reality of what you have just experienced. Though Morpheus longs to touch you, to comfort you, your reaction is understandable, and he waits patiently for you to gather yourself and your thoughts.

“Loki, Odin, and Thor…like the Norse mythology?” You ask after multiple minutes have passed.

An expected question. “Yes.”

“And Puck is a…faerie?” You sound less sure of this terminology. Modern humans must be more familiar with the heroic lore of the gods, rather than the spun-sugar tales of the fae.

“You may be familiar with him from A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” he supplies.

“Who—what are you?”

The question that Morpheus has long dreaded, the question that he has actively avoided while he tried to find the right time to tell you, is asked with dread instead of wonder, of curiosity. His obsession with getting things right is, it seems, once more his hubris. Since he could not decide how best to bring this matter up, it has been decided for him, in a way he never wanted it to be presented.

There are no platitudes he can give, no way to dress the truth up neatly. What you deserve is the real, raw truth, and the truth he shall give.

“I am known by many names and titles, but my first name, my chief name, is Dream of the Endless. I am the king of dreams and nightmares, one of seven anthropomorphic personifications of powerful natural forces—mine being the act of dreaming. I have existed since the first creature was capable of dreaming, and I shall exist until the last ceases to dream.”

You fire your next question so quickly, desperate to learn the total truth, that Morpheus almost thinks you have not properly heard him. “And Loki calling me your soulmate?”

“...Would be because you are my soulmate. We are fated to be together, to…love one another. True love. It is not a rare phenomenon for most other species, though I am the first of my kind to find mine.”

Tremors begin to wrack your body—not at all the reaction he was anticipating when he envisioned telling you of your bond. “When did you know?”

“That night we first met at the New Inn, when you winked at me so that I might become aware of the joke you were sharing with Robert Gadling.” This memory is so dear to him that he cannot help but smile slightly as he recalls it, though your sharp intake of breath has him on guard.

This seems to be the end of your current line of questioning, and silence takes over the room once more. Morpheus watches you with bated breath, waiting for any sort of reaction from you. You have always surprised him—down to your mere existence—and he is unsure of what to expect from you. Will you thank him for saving you? Profess your love for him? Perhaps you will be frightened by what you have learned, but still flattered at the fate that has been set before you?

When you finally do lift your head and begin to stand, Morpheus ensures that his movements are quicker than yours, that he may offer you aid in standing (you did, after all, call him a gentleman). Instead of taking his hand, you merely push it away as you rise under your own power. For a being who does not typically experience human emotions, your action, so reminiscent of another lover who proceeded to rebuff his affections, has unease rising within him.

You refuse to even look at him as you traverse the library back to the ground floor, hurrying across the open room to a table filled with personal belongings—presumably yours. He tries to figure out what you are doing as you start gathering books, papers, and writing utensils. Clearly, you intend to leave. But to where?

“Where are you going?” he finally asks, breaking the tenuous silence.

“Away from you, from,” you gesture vaguely around you, “this.”

Frightened, then. He must proceed with caution. “You are upset?”

“Oh, I’m not upset.” Morpheus relaxes prematurely. “I’m furious right now.”

You turn to face him before he can say or do anything, your glossy eyes and flustered expression tearing at him. He has done this to you. He has elicited a reaction from you that he never wanted to see.

“You’ve lied to me from the moment we met! About everything—who you are, what you do, what I am to you.” You are speaking truthfully, of course, but to be forced to bear witness to such truths is brutally revealing the worst parts of himself. “And now I find out that I don’t get a choice in anything. That my fate has already been decided for me, and that’s that. Are my feelings even mine, or am I forced to feel the way that I do for you?”

“Of course, your feelings are yours,” he assures you, wanting to rid you of the notion entirely.

He has restrained himself from trying to comfort you long enough and intends to rectify that immediately. When he steps in your direction, however, you hurriedly backpedal from him, and the unease within him grows to what must be akin to human anxiety. “Are they? Because my understanding of this is that I would have felt this way for you even if I tried my hardest to ignore you or not like you.”

“I deliberately chose not to approach you as a soulmate might approach theirs of their own kind, so that you could come to care for me naturally.”

“So you deliberately hid all of this.”

“I meant to tell you,” he insists, imploring you to believe his words. “I simply could not figure out how.”

You scoff loudly, shaking your head in disbelief. “Well, this way of finding out went really well, didn’t it?”

There is nothing he can say in defense of this, and he is left trying to figure out how to salvage the mess that this reveal has turned into as you angrily look back at your belongings and begin shoving them all into your bag. All that he can think is to say your name, to hope that you will turn around, and simply let him explain himself.

When you do turn around, you radiate every ounce of the anger you told him you are feeling. “You broke your promise. You promised you wouldn’t scare me again, but this? These secrets, this whole other life, this fate? It scares me, Morpheus. I almost got kidnapped by a literal god and a faerie because you couldn’t be bothered to tell me the truth. I could have gotten hurt, or—or god forbid, killed! Because of you.”

Your words hurt so much more than any physical pain he has ever been through. A century spent prisoner, refusing to talk or move or breathe while being kept humiliatingly displayed in a glass ball for all to see and mock, is bearable compared to what he fears this confrontation is about to become. He will gladly let you berate him for hours, days, weeks, if it means that you will forgive him for his egregious transgressions against you.

Slinging your bag over your shoulder, you tuck two books under the opposite arm and begin to march towards the main doors of the library. When you place the books on the circulation desk next to a sleeping librarian, you study the figure as though seeing them for the first time.

“Why won’t anybody wake up?” you lament.

Morpheus almost does not want to answer, predicting your undesirable reaction, but knows that he has no choice. “It appears Puck put them to sleep using faerie dust.”

Sure enough, you laugh, loud and bordering on manic, the sound echoing to the ceiling. “Oh! Fucking faerie dust. Of course! My bad.”

As a being who cannot experience his own dreams and nightmares that he creates and oversees, Morpheus has often found himself wondering what dreamers are feeling when they are in the throes of sleep. Right now, he is certain that he is living the worst nightmare that he could not even bear to think up for himself, a nightmare he wants desperately to wake from.

You throw the door open and rush outside, Morpheus easily waking the library’s patrons before following you. It is apparent that you intend to leave, but Morpheus cannot let you do so before finally saying his piece.

“I love you,” Morpheus lays his feelings bare before you, the only thing he can think to do.

Your hands go to hover just above your ears as though you mean to physically block out his words. “Stop! You don’t. You can’t. You don’t even really know me.” When you reluctantly turn to face him, the tears streaming steadily down your face shine in the light from the overhead streetlights.

“I do,” he presses on, frantic now to make you hear him, to make you understand. “Fate may have brought us together, but I love you because I know you. You are—”

A sob rips from your chest as you shake your head emphatically, stopping him before he can continue. Your deep emotional pain is, in turn, causing him pain, and he wants nothing more than to gather you in his arms and tell you how sorry he is that you had to find out in this way.

The way that you watch him, trepidatious, as though you’re looking at a stranger who has harmed you and not at your soulmate, keeps him in place. He will not add to your distress, not when he is the sole cause of it.

“I don’t want to see you again,” you declare, and Morpheus feels his heart shatter. “Not—not for a while. Not until I decide.”

“How long?” he can barely force the words out, dreading your answer.

“I don’t know. A week, a month, a few months.” You do not say it, but he knows that ‘never’ is also a very real, very frightening option.

Never again seeing you…can he even fathom such a bleak future?

“Can you please respect this one wish, since all of my agency has apparently been stripped from me?” you say, having sensed his hesitance. “Let this, at least, be solely my choice.”

He diverts his attention away from the possibility of an unending life without his soulmate (and what he would do to end such a fate) and nods. Though he hates to do so, this is the only way to escape this evening with some semblance of hope intact.

With his confirmation that he will accede to your wishes in hand, you decide that there is nothing left here for you and turn to head down the sidewalk. He calls your name despite knowing just how strong-willed you are, wishing that, just this once, your will will waver.

No matter how much Morpheus imagined it, almost against his will, over the millennia, how often he turned the story over and over within his mind century after century, he could never understand the choices that his son had made on his doomed last adventure. What had made Orpheus venture to the depths of the Underworld for his lost lady love? Why had he begged Hades and Persephone for the chance to retrieve his bride, despite knowing Death and her permanence better than almost anybody? Why, even after winning their favor, had he been unable to follow the parameters they had set? How could he not have trusted that Eurydice would be behind him? 

What possessed him to risk everything to look?

Now, staring at your disappearing figure and silently begging you to look back, Morpheus finally understands. He would go to the ends of the universe to see you once more. He would attempt to cheat his sister’s realm if it meant you would speak to him again. He would give anything, even his own life, for you to look at him one last time. Like father, like son, he supposes bitterly.

It is unclear how long he remains on this sidewalk, still watching the spot where you once stood as though you might reappear and hear him out. Long enough that the disoriented students and staff who once populated the library have all filtered out now, long enough that some maintenance worker has come by to properly turn the building’s lights out and lock it up. They all shot him unnerved glances, made snide comments about how he was ‘taking up the sidewalk,’ but he cares not for these mortals and their petty grievances.

Finally, somebody does come to face him, but it is not who he is hoping for. Matthew comes flying down from the sky, landing harshly in front of him and squawking in alarm.

“There you are, boss, we’ve been looking all over for you! Lucienne was so sure we had another Code Cult on our hands that she was about to—” Matthew stops in his rambling when he properly looks up at Morpheus and sees the uncharacteristic stupefaction on his face. When he speaks again, his voice is softer, almost scared. “Boss? Hey, are you okay? What happened?”

“I…I have been spurned,” he replies in disbelief. His chest feels physically empty, as though it has been hollowed out, and he finds himself unable to properly look away from that empty spot and to his raven.

“By who? By—by your soulmate?”

“I have been spurned,” Morpheus repeats, quieter now as the reality begins to sink in.

Matthew attempts to offer him some sort of comfort, but his words go unheard. There is nothing that can be said now, no solace to be found. Just as improbably as he found you, he has now lost you.

And it is all his own doing.

•••

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