sakon76

Scenes From the Life and Death of Jackson Overland Frost
Part 5: Dreamweaver
by K. Stonham
first released December 13th, 2012

January, 1711

The night is his kingdom. Well, his and several others'. Once in a while he catches a glimpse of one of Toothiana's fairies speeding off, either coin or tooth in its grasp. The night is the purview of many spirits; but mostly Sanderson spends it alone. Just himself and the wind and the endless light of the dreamsand.

And the children.

Always the children. He loves them, how beautiful their minds are. What detailed, marvelous, happy creations arise when they are touched by his dreamsand! His own imagination cannot compare, and Sanderson has lived a very long time and knows it to be no exaggeration that he has an incredible imagination. Their creations thrill and delight him beyond measure, and so it is that Sanderson (the Sandman, they call him) follows the night around the globe, always looking forward with delight to what new wonders the children will share with him tonight.

His cloud sails now above a winter night-dark forest. It gleams white and black under the Man in the Moon's watch, snow and shadows each in their turn. Ahead, there is the faintest golden gleam of firelight. A village. Sanderson tries to remember when he last visited this place, but cannot. He shrugs. There are children here, he knows that. He can feel their innocent hearts, their clever minds, reaching out, yearning for the depth of dreams his sand brings.

Smiling, he obliges, spinning out golden streams of it to journey to the sleeping children below. He watches the dreamsand drift and swirl, never quite blown by the wind, but not entirely cut off from it, either. It loops in graceful arabesques, dives and swoops like a swan or a dancer, and finally finds its way to each sleeping mind, whether through a window or sneaking in under a door. Relishing the moment, Sanderson waits to see what comes.

...

The euphoria, the delight he usually finds in the dreaming minds... it's simply not there.

Shock and concern show on his face as his cloud dives low, into the village. It's a small place, barely a dozen houses, but each holds at least one child.

And they're all so unhappy.

What has happened, Sanderson wonders, to make them like this? He goes from house to house, strengthening the dreams until little faces ease, their rest becoming deeper, more meaningful. Many of the dreams feature a slender young man, a playmate to all the children. He must be someone beloved in this village, Sanderson thinks, and can't help but smile at the dream of the young man teaching a boy how to snare rabbits.

Repairing the broken dreams takes time, but Sanderson is not his compatriots. He has no particular schedule to keep to. He could spend all night here, if the children needed! But this is a small village, and he estimates his work here will be done in half an hour's time.

He comes to the last house and goes through the window like one of the Man in the Moon's beams. There is one little girl here, curled up on her bed, practically cocooned in blankets. Her bed is near the banked fire; he wonders if she has been sick, or merely hates the cold. The dried tears on her face tug at his heart; she has cried herself to sleep, poor child. He spins out a thread of sand, intending to give her comforting dreams.

It dissipates as soon as it nears her.

Sanderson straightens, surprised. He spins out another, larger, trying again.

This one takes, and the young man he has seen in the dreams of others soon forms above her head. Sanderson smiles.

Then the dream breaks.

He stares. He has never seen dream rejection like this before. He glances at shadows, seeking answers, but finds none. There are no other forces at work in this cabin tonight; why is the dreamsand not working?

Rolling up his sleeves, a look of determination on his face, Sanderson steps forward. His feet nudge against something not quite tucked under her bed. He glances down. Ice skates! No doubt a gift from North; the fine yeti craftsmanship is obvious. Sanderson admires them, then nods and tries for the girl's dream a third time. This time, however, he doesn't let the sand leave his control completely. He spins a baseline fantasy first, something for the girl's mind to embroider on and improve. A fine winter day, with still skies and crisp air. A pond frozen smooth. The joy of new skates....

Her mind takes over as he steps back. The young man appears, smiling and talking to the girl as he kneels to put on his own skates.

The crack of the ice freezes Sanderson. His hands go to his mouth as he watches the dream--no, a memory, this is Toothiana's purview, not his own--play out. The young man's control, his bravery... the girl's rescue.

And the ice giving way beneath his feet.

The girl jolts awake, screaming a name.

Sanderson steps instinctively out of the way as the girl's parents come running. He notices now the second, empty bed in the dark corner of the room. He wishes he hadn't. He has done nothing good here tonight.

The girl is crying, as she must have been for days now. Her body is exhausted, her spirit too. Sanderson feels guilt and sadness gnawing at him. This is nothing he can fix. It is nothing anyone can fix.

Eventually, he pulls out a small bag that he doesn't often use. It holds a sand that is different from the rest. He rises into the air by the head of the bed and gently blows a puff of it at the girl. She blinks, her sobs quieting, then is asleep within minutes. She will not dream this night, or for many to come. But she will rest, and perhaps she will begin to heal. It is the most he can do for her. Sanderson looks at her parents' faces--grief-stricken, careworn--and follows them back to their own bed. He grants them the same mercy, then leaves as silently and unseen as he came.

His heart heavy, he reforms his sand cloud beneath himself and rises into the air, preparing to leave this place.

But something tugs at him. He has missed a sleeper.

This one is to the north of the village, about a mile away. Sanderson is there in no time at all, but... curious. There is no house here. No shelter whatsoever. Even the native people, who are much more accustomed to these woods than the villagers, would not sleep outside on a night like this.

He let the tendril of dreamsand guide him to the sleeper.

It is a young man, no, just a boy, really. He is moon-pale and sleeps beside the frozen lake, ice under his head like a pillow, snow drawn over him like a comforting blanket.

He is not a human, and he is so young, so new that Sanderson can still taste the magic of his making.

Aghast, he turns to look at the Man in the Moon.

Manny, though he watches, gives Sanderson no answers.

Shaken, he turns back to the boy. Dutifully, he spins out a thread of sand. It forms a dream above the snow-child's head, and Sanderson watches to see what this child will dream of.

Beautiful frost motifs appear in the dream, and Sanderson does not miss the fact that as they do, as the boy smiles in his sleep, frost snakes across the lake ice in identical patterns.

The boy knows flight, it seems, for that too is in his dreams. And light and a village--Sanderson recognizes it as the one from which he has just come. He watches, breathless, as the newly-made, full of the joy of his creation, enters the village.

The dream shatters in despair as the first figure walks through him.

Sandy winces. He, too, knows the feeling of being walked through. It is hollowness, and wrongness, and it is the reason he and so many other spirits prefer to stay off the ground.

The boy beneath him, tears frozen on his face, has not learned this habit yet. But he will. In the meantime, though....

The snow-boy cannot be more than a few nights old. He has not yet learned enough of the world to dream of its pleasures. So Sanderson works with what the child will know. He creates a dream of delicate, dancing snow flurries, of playful winds, of the beauty of the frost and the winter and the moon....

The winter-child smiles, burrowing deeper under his blanket of snow.

Sanderson smiles too, bittersweet and sad, and leaves the child dreaming. His cloud rises into the air. He leaves the village of sadness, and the newborn spirit of winter, behind him, as close to happiness, or at least as best content, as he can manage.

He does not know when his path will bring him this way again, but he makes a note for himself to check in now and again on that snow child. The world is a harsh place, even for spirit children, and it is his task to ease that as best he can.

Sailing on into the night, the Sandman continues his work.

*~*~*

Author's Note: I forget to mention, sometimes - this entire series has been edited by my Wonderful Husband. ^_^ And, yes, this is nearly a direct follow-on from the last chapter. The year here is not wrong; until 1752, the new year started in March. Whether or not Sandy realizes that the new-born spirit sleeping in the snow is the same young man from the village who drowned, I do not in fact know. He maybe should... but Jack looks younger while sleeping.