Broken Glass - Taekook

DREAM #5

The next thing I know, I'm floating once more in a sea of golden light, held aloft in an unknown space, one I still don't understand even though I've been here before. In my hand, my mirror is shattered, as it was in Hazelpoint. Where the cracks are visible, jagged white lines spread across the entire surface of the glass, like glowing spiderwebs. There's an odd beauty to it, even as I watch the breaks begin to slowly reform themselves. 

Then I realise that every other sense has gone. I'm surrounded by utter silence, I don't register any particular taste or smell, and even the familiar sensation of each breath has disappeared. 

In this odd, forgotten limbo, I'm stuck experiencing nothing at all, except for a vision of what has to be the golden river. There's no sign of anything else in any direction, no matter where I look. Just a deep, dusky yellow light, that splits into differing strands of varying colours as I stare at it, for what feels like infinity. 

I feel no panic, no concern, nothing at all. It's like even my emotions have been stripped to their bare essentials, to the point that all I can feel is a mild curiosity and confusion. And that is still weak, still almost foreign and distant, as if I'm seeing someone else's feelings. My thoughts enter my mind, and then float away again, no idea or concept sticking to me at all. 

Now I understand what my friends said when they told me the golden river wasn't awake here. It is definitely present, I can see it all around me, but everything is entirely still. My own body cannot move, cannot feel. 

I blink, try to focus, catch anything I can, and the faintest sound comes to me. The melody, the song we were singing, playing on repeat, as if muted and behind a closed door. But it grows in volume as my attention becomes focused on it, as every cell in my body seems to listen to the music. 

And the river comes back to life. 

Even as I watch, the strands slowly begin to move again, flowing over each other like currents in the ocean. The changes reveal endless variations in the shades, to the point where I give up on counting them. As the melody becomes louder and louder, it becomes more and more recognisable as the voices of my friends. As my own voice, sending something out into the universe. As the voice of the river itself, sleepily joining in as it rouses itself from a century-long slumber. 

I glance down at the mirror in my hand, and it's whole again. 

Slowly, as if fed through a funnel, my emotions come back. Relief, confusion, concern, the memories of the day I just had. The stories I have to share from the fight at Rushgrove, the crying I remember from beyond the city walls as we approached. The grateful expression of the woman who decided to offer us a place to stay for several nights. The tears in Taehyung's eyes as he desperately fought to save his own brother's life without letting anyone else get hurt. 

My experiences thus far fly through my brain on fast-forward, as if something is flicking through them like a flipbook of some sort, and I'm given the basic glimpse of my first dream. The golden river's original visions of a cruel king, rangy wolves, a desperately starving child being torn to shreds by other prisoners who haven't had a chance to eat in forever. Who've been driven to madness by the sheer torture of being known by someone like that king. 

My days in Hazelpoint come back to me, the faces of Seunghyun and Hyeri as I finally blinked my eyes open for the first time. Taehyung's concerned voice when I woke up from that first dream. Meeting Yoongi, Seokjin, Namjoon, in that tiny little house. The dagger given to me by a desperate village elder who found out who I really was without me understanding it myself. 

My entire life, as I remember it, flashes past. The moment I saw Hoseok's compass tattoos on his wrists. The moment Jimin unfurled his wings for the first time. The valley they created for each other, close to that tower of misery. The crying eyes of that ancient monolith we passed, the bare earth red as blood. 

But then it pauses, and a sadness more ancient than anything I've ever experienced before, comes over me. 

"This world has suffered much, child." 

The visions clear, and suddenly the golden river parts to reveal a humanoid face. eyes closed, in a white space of nothingness. Long, billowing hair reaches down further than I can see, each individual hair a slightly different colour, creating a gradient that covers the entire spectrum of hues. In places, there is a small gap, where shades I must be unable to see take their place amongst the great variety. 

The expression is sympathetic, almost guilty, the face itself a pure gold, and I blink once before realising that the face isn't the only part I can see. 

Beyond the face, wings. Wings that are feathered, each strand of hair a different shade of gold. A feathered chest. Two great and powerful paws, like those of a lion. A pointed tail, which whips about of its own accord for a moment before I see the snake head on the end. A massive body, laying there half-asleep before me. 

A sphinx. 

The eyes open, revealing irises that twirl and change, flickering with every colour of the rainbow, and pitch black pupils that dilate slightly with the change in light. I find myself staring, in awe or fear I can't tell, as the gaze passes over me for a moment before the mouth opens to speak. 

"The world has suffered much, young one." 

My mouth suddenly dry, I somehow muster the courage to speak. "And what would you have me do? Take away the suffering?" 

The face curves into a half-smile, and the hair jostles a little as the head shakes slightly. "The past is the past. Do not try to change it. Merely attempt to influence the future." 
"You brought me here, took away whatever memories I had before now, and told the world I was supposed to come, a century ago. Why me, of all people? Did you create me? Where do I come from?" 

"The past is the past. Use the present, that which you now know. The past will come back to you when it is safe for it to do so. Until then, you must remain blind. Learn Eithyr today, not then. Bring back the values you believe in."

I breathes in, breathes out. The face of this massive sphinx stares down at me, expression calm, and I can't read the emotions behind it. This great intelligence, perhaps just a fraction of the consciousness that makes up the golden river, watches me without words, as if waiting for me to do the right thing. 

"One more question, before I wake up." 

The head tilts. "Yes?" 
"What will happen to my friends? Were they chosen too?" The half-smile grows, the eyes blink, and the answer registers in my mind. 
"But of course. You brought them along, did you not?"