Chapter 40 - The First Devoured Dream

The gate of blue lightning opened without violence, no rumble, no tremor, just a vertical line, woven with inverted lightning, gliding into the darkness like a blade of memory. Saphira entered alone her bare feet floated a few centimeters above the ground, but each step left a trace of blue electricity in the void behind her, the blue tower watched, silent, no murmur, no doll, for this journey could not be shared. In her hand, the pure lightning key slowly oscillated, reacting to the layers of reality she crossed. It was not a key to open material doors it was an offering, meant to probe the extinguished dreams, those that no longer beat, those that Nekridhal devours the first landscapes were familiar, but twisted: corridors of misty wool, woven with forgotten dream memories trees sketched but never finished libraries full of books that were never written then came the mirrors, living mirrors they did not reflect her face they showed her flaws a small Saphira, curled up in the shadow, clutching a doll to her heart, her lips endlessly murmuring the same phrase.

—"I'm too soft i'm useless."

Saphira let the image pass without stopping.

—"I'm not afraid," she whispered.

But her fingers trembled no matter that she was queen, this ancient truth still bit her skin then the light almost completely disappeared she emerged onto a suspended plain, a frozen world. a village slept there, built of simple dreams wooden cabins, sugary fences, honey streams but everything was static there not a breath, not a rustle even the wind seemed held back the trees raised their branches to the gray sky, stuck in a final prayer the cloud horses, the mist foxes, the ink birds slept a heavy sleep, a dreamless sleep.

Saphira advanced the houses gave off a humid, too-sweet warmth, like a dream about to break in one, she found a mother, frozen in the act of tucking in, and a child he lay there, eyes open, empty.

—"He's not dead," she murmured, "but he no longer dreams he waits without understanding what he waits for."

A mirror, in a corner of the room, was broken five shards, five shards like silences on one of them, engraved with invisible writing Nekridhal was here below the name, a dry sentence, like an equation no more dreams, no more fears, no more silence, no more me. Saphira's breath froze. It wasn't a physical cold it was the void the kind of void you feel when there's nothing left to save she knelt by the bed hand on the child's forehead, she felt the absence he wasn't possessed, not hurt, just emptied she closed her eyes she remembered her own sleepless nights, the anguish in her too-large bed, the silent desire for an invisible being to tell her.

—"You can still dream, even if it hurts."

A blue tear slowly rolled down her cheek. It fell, and where it touched the ground, a small glow lit up a silent, soft doll, woven from light and compassion the doll leaned over the child, brought its lips to his ear, and murmured.

Nothing, then a blink, the child inhaled and finally fell truly asleep around him, the world stirred a leaf fell from a tree the wind began to dance again a dream bee traced a circle in the air the village was awakening but elsewhere, in a mist that no reality could bear, an eye opened Nekridhal, the soul thief, the son of wrath, the god born of a blue goddess's anger. he observed.

—"She enters, she undoes my silences she believes that love is enough."

In his hand, he held a dream, an old, crumpled adult dream a dream of reconciliation, of forgiveness perhaps that of a father, a friend, a brother he squeezed it, and the dream burned silently until it disappeared. Saphira, standing before the house, stared at the sky her eyes, blue as the auroras of the void, vibrated with a new gravity.

—"I know what you're doing i understand why you steal you believe that oblivion is peace."

She took a step forward.

—"But you've forgotten one thing."

Her voice, soft and cold, split the air.

—"You can't erase a mother… who has decided to love even her mistake."

She gripped her pure lightning key the blue lightning gate opened again she was advancing towards a new world towards a new truth and she, Saphira Noctielle, queen of dolls, goddess of blue lightning and dream worlds, was ready.

End of Chapter 40 — The First Devoured Dream