Endless Dream

Three Years - Battery

The Dreaming was beyond peril. The conflict between the lords and the palace was a distant echo of the past. Their short rebellion ended the day that Iris took Nymion's life. The survivors had either thrown themselves into the waters or risked whatever awaited them on the other side as they were spat out into whatever realm the nearest, or they had been picked off by the storms. Now plague and pestilence were the enemies of the state. 

The residents of the palace were afflicted by a rapidly growing disease that caused them to desiccate and turn to sand. Asaras had done her best to keep them comfortable when she and her two sons had become infected with it. By the time she passed, all of her children were already taken by the sickness - the youngest was the last to go, crying out for her mother, who was too weak to hold her hand. Mervyn didn't leave Asaras' side. He stayed even when she took her final breath and dispersed into the pale blue sand. He refused to abandon her, sealing himself inside Iris's old apartments. There was no longer any need for the makeshift infirmary without anyone to save. Lucienne had begged him not to leave them, not to do it, but he told the librarian that he would stand vigil over the piles of sand until Dream returned. 

"When Lord Morpheus comes back, he can bring them all back. I know he will. I just don't want her to wake up alone, some needs to be with her when she wakes up," those were the last words the grouchy groundskeeper said. That was 2 years ago. Iris and Lucienne hadn't heard anything stir outside the door after that.

Iris felt hopeless. They had spent days screaming for Dream, begging for him to come back, to fix what they couldn't. The ring had been smugly quiet since the day on the water. It was punishing Iris, punishing them for resisting its will. It forced them to watch as everyone they tried to save fell sick, denying them its power or archaic knowledge any longer.

There were only Lucienne and Iris left now. Everyone had gone, lost or hiding, it didn't matter. they were the only things left, wandering the empty and derelict halls of the palace like ghosts tethered to a place of unrest. Even the palace's presence was gone.

They were woken in the darkest hours of the night by the sound of an animal fighting for its life. The noise was so loud that Iris felt their eardrums shaking from the vibrations. The palace was caught in a battle for its life against the void. The darkness had been creeping in slowly, leeching the colour and life of The Dreaming, leaving a blank landscape of grey and ash. The paintings on the walls had vanished as had the books, every day more and more getting sucked into the black hole of emptiness. The palace was the last knight at the gates, clad in its shining armour, waiting for the beast to charge. Iris had expected it to win, out of sheer stubbornness and refusal to be taken down. They prayed they were right, just once more. 

The palace railed against the dark, piercing it and lashing out but there was nothing to latch on to, it was empty. The hollowness that swallowed the realm couldn't be halted. It reminded Iris of Lord Edwin in his final moments, a pale flicker of a memory, he tried everything to stay, to hold onto his love but there was nothing to fight, nothing to kill just an endlessly hungry abyss that awaited him. 

The palace fought valiantly but it was useless, the palace looked to Lucienne, its treasured guardian and Iris, the one who it hoped would save it and said a silent, achingly bittersweet farewell. It would protect them for as long as it could. The palace threw them out of the library, sealing them tightly inside the throne room with the last of its essence, giving its soul to the maw of the void. 

Neither of them said a word. Just watched as the abyss sapped the very life out of the palace. 

Cracks in the plaster snaked closer. The wood of the doors rotted and creaked as the rot set in. Without the palace's spirit to maintain it, rooms crumbled, collapsing in on themselves. The pair watch the shelves drop into the void, smashing the floor with such force that it threw dust and ash into the air. The void pressed itself against the final set of doors, consuming the glass, the wood, the pillars and every single scrap of the exterior it could. Iris swore that the abyss stared back at them.