Calliope - In The Arms Of Morpheus

Chapter 16

Skoni wake up from strange dream with glittery fly-horse. Skoni like fly-horse, but also love Dream-Lord. Best sleep on his boots.
Skoni lonely. Dream-Lord gone. Left alone on throne.
Dream-lord love Skoni. Let him do reigning while he gone. Make him little nightmare-lord.
Skoni reign Dreaming.
...
Reign!!!
...
Skoni bored. What play?
Oh! New door! Look!
Let's see...
New bedroom, very dark.
Scary?!
Bed with new girl. New girl sleep.
Fireplace hot.
Oh! Smell friend!
Cienne in seat. Best sleep in Cienne lap! But very high.
Haaaahhhh-hop!
Did-It! Cuddle on Cienne lap!
Soooo coooomfyyyyy....
"Ha-haaaaaa-"
Cienne stir? Wake?
"...haaaaaaaa-chufff!!!"
Cienne wake!
"Skoni! You're all dusty. Ha-ha-haaaaaa-chuf!"
Sorry Cienne... didn't wanna wake.
"Let's get you cleaned up, you little Bugger, so we can have a proper sneeze-free cuddle, shall we?"
Yeeeees! Skoni play in water with Cienne!

****

Maybe Lucienne had woken, but Calliope was still in her dream. Pushing her guilt aside for the sake of helping Oneiros, Calliope took Erato's book, sat on the reading bench and opened a random page.

Erato entered the sacred bath for the ritual cleansing before her initiation, already awaited by her sister Polihymnia. When entering the sacred waters naked, her sister asked her the first of the custom questions: "Are you willing to forsake your mortality for the sake of humankind?"
The girl answered the custom "Yes."
"Are you willing, to inspire and create only to advance culture, education and research, truth, peace and happiness?"
When she agreed, she was asked the third ritual question: "Have you already been made a woman?"
Erato laughed and answered, "sure, dear Sister. You know me, after all. Sappho was-"
She was interrupted by her older sibling. "Very well. We can skip then that part of the ceremony. You are fit to become a proper Muse." She proceeded to anoint her sibling into immortality.

Calliope let the book sink. Made a woman.
It was a prerequisite.
Skip that part of the ceremony...
She did not have to let a man do unimaginable things to her, if she already had been with a man of her choosing.
There was only one being in the entire universe she would let do such things. If he refused, she would rather not be an immortal muse.

****

The visit to Erato's dream had been a success for Morpheus. After diving into the sea of dreams, he had found her, in the middle of a very graphic dream about Sappho. Direct, as she was, she had told her lover, step by step, how to bring bliss upon her. The perfect guide through a woman's fulfillment, and an essential information on how to create the perfect dream. Desire was not the best guide to fulfillment. It seemed that unfulfilled desire rather was.
But now it was time to tell his muse a few harsh truths. She deserved to know, what she was getting herself into. This would stop her from wanting him, and protect her from his wrath, deadly enhanced by the imbalance of powers between the two of them.
Morpheus stepped into the reading nook, where Calliope sat in the golden sunlight of her dream, wearing that beautiful dress again, her nose buried in Erato's book.
"Greetings, Calliope."
She jumped and pushed the book under her dress. "Greetings, Lord Oneiros. Lucienne had been so kind, as to show me around and give me those..." she took the glasses from her nose and blushed "...uh, translating glasses."
Morpheus tried to ignore another obnoxious smile cramping his face and sat beside her. "Translating glasses. This is a thing someone needs to inspire into humankind."
Calliope blushed even more.
"It saddens me to hear, that you are still weak and unable to leave your bed. Would you like to join me for dinner in your dreams, instead?"
Now, her cheeks were crimson red.
"I'd love to."
Her wide eyes bore into his, making him clench his fingers, to prevent himself from pulling her into his arms and kiss her. How were humans even able to go about their daily lives, if they felt that way about their spouses all the time? This must be painful!
"Let me just put away my book." She rose, hiding the book's title with her hand, before carefully placing it back in the shelf. "I need to tell my sisters about books. Something they will surely look forward to." Excitement shining in her eyes, she grabbed his hand and pulled him to the stairs. "I could spend all day in here and never get bored. And they're so practical to read and carry! I bet you could even walk and read at the same time!..."
From where she held him, when she pulled him down the winding staircase, a hot trail of connection shot up his arm, across his chest, right into his heart. First, it was warm, but then it beat, pulsating, making blood rush though his ears, and sending bolts of painful awareness into his groin. Just by the touch of her hands.
Morpheus waved at the large double doors to his throne room to open, and manifested an assortment of Greek food and wine on the dinner table.
"Oneiros! This is wonderful! I am so hungry, and the sand-witch was not quite enough!" Calliope let go of his hand and bounced toward the table. Then she stopped abruptly and clasped her hands behind her back, ogling the food.
Morpheus chuckled, folding his hands, to get rid of the feeling of emptiness. "Sit, sweet Calliope, and help yourself. It's all yours to enjoy."
She sat at the other side of the table, facing his seat, which presided the long table on the other side. Morpheus manifested wine in her glass, while she loaded her plate with cucumbers in olive oil, honey-drenched dates, feta-cheese, figs, glazed carrots and bread.
His body feeling weirdly restless, he sat on his seat, and clasped his empty hands in front of him, to enjoy the view of her slipping a glistening date into her mouth and then chewing with closed eyes. She swallowed, then wrinkled her brow.
It had been a bad idea to watch her eat.
"Would you like me to manifest something else to eat?"
"No! Sorry if I gave you the impression this was not good enough. These are all my favorite foods. I just never realized that one could not taste in their dreams..." She looked saddened.
"I am sorry." And painfully agitated from seeing her slip a date between her lips.
"Don't be." She beamed at him. "I'll look forward to enjoying food when I'm awake. I have nothing to complain about. After all, it is you I have to thank, Lord Oneiros, for still being alive and able to eat at all."
A warm bubble of feelings gathered in the pit of his stomach.
Comfortable silence spread between them. Now was the perfect time to tell her, but he did not want to spoil the moment.
"Oneiros?" Her deep brown eyes looked at him over the the table. "Can I ask you a very personal question?"
"Please ask. Then I will decide if I can answer it."
"Fair enough." Calliope blushed a little, and clasped her hands on the table. "When we first met at the spring of the Hippocrene, I made you a, maybe foolish, offer..." She wrung her hands, lowering her gaze. "I need to know," she inhaled, her face a mask of determination, "am I not beautiful enough?"
Morpheus' chest hurt while he dug his nails into his palms, to keep all those annoying emotions at bay. He inhaled to steady his voice.
"You, dear Calliope, are the most beautiful woman, I have ever seen." His voice sounded hoarse and his eyes watered from the effort to stay calm. His body held now so many emotions, it was about to burst and scream. "There is a rule..." Morpheus manifested a goblet of wine for himself and drank, in the hopes, that it would affect his far too corporeal body.
He cleared his throat. "There is a rule that prohibits Endless to procreate with humans."
With the wine, he could, at least, breathe again properly. Morpheus drank more.
"Who made that rule?" Her eyes looked at him, wide, her lush lips parted.
"It just is. Believe me, I exist longer than humanity. I have seen populations come into existence, and worlds collide. Me, falling for anyone, will lead to certain disaster."
"How do you know?"
He drank another fortifying gulp of wine from his ever-filling cup.
"I once fell in love with a human Queen. Nada and I, we had just one night, under the African sky, protected by the covers of my coat." A tear slipped down his cheek, and he let it fall. "The furies punished her, by scorching her people with balls of fire. She chose to leave me and jumped a high cliff to die, and I turned into a monster."
"How?" Calliope, too, had wet eyes.
"I became angry. I lost control. I hated her so much, for refusing to continue existing in the Dreaming, that she chose death over me, that I imprisoned her in hell."
A tear slipped down Calliope's cheek, but he needed to finish this. She needed to know. At least, the wine was working, making him light-headed and the emotions more controllable. The urge to scream was gone.
"I incarcerated her in the outskirts of hell, to prevent her from fully dyeing." His voice was still hoarse, though.
"Is she still there?" Calliope whispered.
"Yes." His stomach knotted and the pain in his chest spread through his entire body. More tears ran down his cheeks. "Not long ago, on my visit to Hell, I passed her tower." His voice had become a husky whisper. "I offered, again, to take her to the Dreaming."
"What did she say?"
"She declined, and told me that she still hoped to be let free, one day." Calliope needed to know the atrocities he was capable of. The power he wielded, she seemed to ignore. Morpheus was too dangerous for her.
Her mouth was open and she stared at him. "Hope." Another tear slipped down her cheek. "Hope in Hell. Like the rose..."
Like the rose. He had never really understood that book, until now.
Calliope jumped from her seat, ran over to his throne and took his hand, clutching it to her chest. "Oh Oneiros! Don't you see?"
What? That he was a monster, and no one should trust him with their hearts?
"Hope!" Her wide eyes gleamed. "If you still love her, she will forgive you. You'll only have to ask!"
Did he still love Nada? No. Morpheus kept her in the outskirts of hell, because he was obviously a monster.
A monster, with a hurt pride.

(If you want to find out how forgiveness leads to a compormise, vote for this chapter and then read on.)