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Death was waiting for Dream when he left the New Inn. Though he had arrived to meet Hob in the early afternoon, it was now late in the evening. Hob waited at the front for a cab, looking down blearily at his mobile when Dream chose to vanish from his sight. Another hundred years.
Or perhaps not.
Dream paused at the sight of his sister. Her full lips quirked in a smile, too clever by half, as if she knew a secret. One about him and, apparently, an amusing one.
“Dare I ask?” Dream said, dryly.
“Oh, it’s nothing. I’m just glad to see you two are still getting on.”
“Indeed. Even after all this time.”
“They say for the best of friends, meeting again after a long absence feels as if no time has passed at all,” Death said in a sing-song.
“You seem quite pleased with yourself.”
“I am only happy at your happiness, brother,” she said, innocent. Far too innocent.
“As was your design all along?”
Death placed a hand over her heart, scandalized. “Dream! Do you truly think me so conniving?”
“Conniving? No. But purposeful? Unyielding? Impossible to distract from your goal, no matter how long it might take to reach? Yes. Proverbially, in fact.”
Death hung her head and put up her hands in surrender. “Guilty.”
“My only question is, why? What is the goal you hoped to achieve by bringing me to that tavern centuries ago?" Genuine curiosity colored his words and he made no attempt to hide it. It was hard to be angry at his sister’s pursuit of his happiness, as mysterious as her chosen method may be. Once, he might have flown into a rage at her impudence, or vanished back to his realm at the sight of the playfulness in the turn of her lips, seeing only an insult. Not any longer. There were far worse things than his sister’s teasing after a century in a cage.
“Are you going to see him again?” Death said.
“Perhaps.”
“In a hundred years?”
“… Perhaps sooner.”
Death inclined her head as if his words only confirmed what she already knew. “Took you two long enough. All right then, in that case I’ll bite. Follow me.”
He did as she bade when she waved him along. He was, admittedly, intrigued, and though Death had never been cruel to him, the siblings of the Endless did enjoy their games and mysteries. He was not one to pass up what appeared to be a moment of rare candor on his sister’s part. A long-sought answer to a question that lingered at the back of his mind whenever the century-long wait for his appointment with the mortal Hob Gadling approached.
His sister stepped forward, slipping between the molecules that separated this realm from hers, and he followed her, into the void of Death’s realm. There, a galaxy blossomed before his eyes. His sister stood on nothingness, but around her, filling the air, were brilliant points of light. A million, a billion, more, stretching out into infinity.
“Do you see them, Dream?” Death said, gesturing to the floating lights, each a perfect globe of color like a Christmas bulb, floating in the darkness. Some shone brighter than others, others weaker. She threaded a path between them, gesturing for him to follow.
“You asked me: why Hob Gadling?” Death mused. As she passed, her fingers brushed a globe here, one there. At her touch, the light shuddered dark, then flared bright. A brush with Death, Dream thought. Lives shrinking from her touch only to redouble their spark, as if at the reminder of their own finite time.
Dream followed his sister further into her realm until the globes of light surrounded them, encompassed them on all sides. A million lights, a million colors. Yet when he looked closer he saw they were not constant. Here and there the lights flickered and went dark. If he watched closely, he fancied he saw new lights sparking into existence.
“I have seen you face so much suffering, dear brother. Some may say you are cold, that your power has left you detached from pain, but I know that isn’t true. It’s not that you feel nothing. You feel everything deeply. Sometimes too deeply. I have watched your own heart chip away at you over the eons,” Death said. She paused, her dark gaze flicking back over her shoulder, choosing her words. “When I… when I met Orpheus, your son, I feared that the pain of living would finally become too much for you. That I would lose you forever.”
She turned back to the path, offering him the privacy of his grief. He knew it must show on his face, even now, at the mention of his child’s name. “I was wrong then, thankfully. You were stronger than your grief. But I saw the cost. For centuries, your light was dimmed. Yes, even you, brother, are here among my collection. Every light a soul and yours was so terribly close to going out. Barely more than an ember.”
A globe danced at the end of her fingertips, black as a tear in space, glowing with a faint corona of white light. Deep within its depths, there was a glimmer as if of distant stars. As her fingertips caressed the glow, Dream felt a shudder in his being, his breath hitching as his life force guttered like a candle in a breeze.
Death released his life and passed on.
“I do not require your assistance,” Dream said once the breath returned to his lungs.
“You did not ask for it,” Death corrected. “But you shouldn’t have to ask. Dream, you are my baby brother. I love you. It would break my heart to lose you.”
“I know,” Dream said patiently. “And I love you, sister. But this does not answer my question.”
“Why Hob Gadling?” Death replied, amusement warming her voice. “I should think by now you would be able to see.”
Dream looked forward. His sister was framed in light, casting the black shadow of her silhouette over him. But what he had taken for the heart of the collection of glowing lives was not a tightly gathered cluster, but a single light. Even as Death reached her hand out to it, it was as if the light itself repelled her touch. Her fingers were lost in the glow.
“What is that? A god?” Dream murmured. It must be, for what else could shine with such light except for the divine, or some other otherworldly creature, ancient and all-powerful, with endless potency to spare? What else could create this miniature sun in a field of stars?
“Life, all life, shines here,” Death said. “There is no life that is greater or lesser than another. A god that wishes to die would be no more than a spark. A single flower that strives between the cracks of a sidewalk to reach the sun would blaze bright. Do you understand?”
Dream’s eyes widened. He stared into the heart of the supernova at Death’s fingertips. “So that is…”
“Our very own Hob Gadling."
“What did you do to him?” Dream took a step toward the light, hand outstretched without thinking. The blazing light played along his fingers, reflecting white on his pale skin to the point of translucence. And yet, he felt warmed by its glow, the sensation somehow familiar. The same as he’d felt not an hour before, seated across from his friend at the New Inn.
“Me? I did nothing. That’s just Hob.” Death shrugged. “Though, to be honest, it was quite a shock when I first noticed him. Not every day you see a will to live like that one.”
“You knew where to find him. In that tavern, when you took me there in 1389.” Dream’s eyes narrowed.
“I know where to find everyone,” Death reminded him. “But yes. It was a bit of a longshot but I hoped that if anyone could help my baby brother remember what it was like to burn bright, it would be the owner of a light like this.”
“But how is this possible? It cannot be natural,” Dream observed. His fingers brushed the edge of the aura surrounding the globe. Yet where Death’s touch had caused the lights to flicker, this light seemed to sigh and reach for him, caressing his skin.
“I told you, no life is greater or lesser here. There is no difference between a god or a blade of grass, except for how bright they burn, for how hard they yearn to blaze,” Death paused. Sobered. “You scared me, Dream. After Orpheus. To see how very close you were to burning out forever and yet there was nothing I could do. I saw that shadow return after your imprisonment, back when I found you in the park. I know we are not always the best of siblings to one another but I hoped that, even if I could not rekindle you, perhaps there was someone who could.”
Dream’s lips pursed and he followed her gaze into the heart of that sun. Beautiful. Who would have known that such a light could blaze in a grubby tavern, on a rain-soaked island during a century of plague, famine, and death so terrible that humans believed it was the end of the world?
“But it does not matter how bright the mortals blaze. It is you who collects them when their time comes, regardless.” Dream nodded to the star that hung between them. “Whether a flower or a man, Hob Gadling could burn as bright as he wished and it would mean nothing. Not if tomorrow you decided our game was over and came for him.”
Why did the thought cause such a twist of panic in his heart? He spoke only the truth. That was why it was dangerous for the Endless to care for mortals. That was why, even after all these centuries, he’d held Hob at a distance. A mere curiosity. A game. It was why it hurt so much to hear from this man, who was in truth his oldest friend, that he named himself as such to Dream. For that, Dream had not been able to forgive Hob, calling attention to what could never be spoken without bringing calamity.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Death shrugged. “Honestly, I haven’t even thought to try. I’m not sure I could collect him even if I wanted to. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Hob Gadling had become truly immortal on his own terms, by sheer force of stubbornness.”
Immortal.
Dream stared, stunned, between his sister and the white-hot heart of the life force before him. Immortal, by sheer force of stubbornness alone. How fitting. But more importantly, not mortal at all. Not doomed should his life path cross that of one of the Endless.
He started at Death’s hand patting his shoulder and coming to rest there, warm through the fabric of his dark coat. “I only bring it up in case you were worried. You know, assuming there’s anything to worry about.” She winked. “Consider this my blessing.”
And with that, the darkness vanished, and with it the field of stars. Dream’s vision blinked black in the afterglow of that blazing sun.
When his sight cleared, Death was gone as well. Dream stood alone outside the New Inn. It was late, and the last of the lights in the tavern blinked out one by one. A soft rain began to fall.
A week later, Dream sat down at their table in the New Inn. He had appeared there suddenly, and he was waiting for Hob to look up from his book and notice he was there.
It was quite gratifying when he finally did so.
“Shit!” Hob exclaimed, his knee banging into the table as he started half out of his chair, spilling a splash of his beer over the side of his glass. “When did you get here?”
“Just now,” Dream said pleasantly.
Hob gaped and then recovered himself. “I half expected you not to show. Figured some habits are hard to break, the whole once a century thing.”
“I could leave if you like.”
“No!” Hob coughed and cleared his throat, embarrassed at his outburst. He added in a more measured tone, “No, I… think this might be a nice change of pace. The modern age, eh? You can have a thousand friends on the internet and not ever see a single one in person. It’s brilliant, honestly, it is, but, you know, a bit isolating at times. It’s nice to actually see a familiar face.”
Hob took a hasty sip of his beer, face scrunching at his own words as if he already wished he could take them back.
“Have you grown lonely, Robert Gadling?” Dream said. Teased, really, for he felt he already knew the answer. Hob was already recoiling, beer frothing on his upper lip in his speed to protest Dream’s words. “I forgot to ask last week, with so much to discuss in my absence, but I suppose it is tradition now. After these past one hundred years—”
“One-hundred thirty-three,” Hob corrected.
“One-hundred thirty-three,” Dream agreed, “Do you still wish to live?”
More than once, the answer had baffled Dream. Especially when, at the depths of starvation and ill fortune, Hob had so roundly rejected the very thought of ending it all. Once, he had been angry to be so wrong.
Now, the answer filled Dream with warmth. With… hope.
Hob smiled, wide and mischievous, and shook his head. “And what's my other option, give it all up? Go gently into that good night? Nah. I’m afraid I’ve got better things to do. Like go down to the pub every week to meet with my…with my very good friend.”
There was still a flicker there, though, a twinge in Hob’s cheek, as if flinching from a memory. His dark eyes glanced up, searching Dream’s for an answer. For confirmation.
Dream reached out and covered Hob’s hand with his own. He felt the heat again, the pulsing light of Hob’s life reaching out to warm him. “Truly, is there anything better in this life?”
“Y’know, I’ve been around the block a few times, and I think can say with some authority that there really isn’t,” Hob grinned and squeezed Dream’s hand in return.