I just read your Mortality fic and god it broke my heart, your writing is so good🥲 I'd love to read more about Morpheus raising his son if you could write it
(No pressure of course, don't answer this ask if you don't want to)
(I can write something small. My brain is kinda everywhere so hopefully this is decent!)
Morpheus was familiar with children. He saw their dreams from the time their brains formed and could conjure thought. Dreams of abstract colors and shapes and sounds that had no meaning or connection yet as the proper words and understanding had not come to be for them.
His son's were no different. When the child was growing in his wife's womb, the child dreamed of splashes of white and reds and greens and blacks that swam and morphed with the beat of his mother's heart. While there had been a disconnect for Dream with other children, the fact that this was his son made it fascinating to watch. Sometimes Morpheus would even shape the dream, turning the colors to dark blues and purples and he would paint stars in the boy's mind.
When Orpheus was born, the dreams shifted to his mother's voice and more solid blurs even if the boy did not understand what the objects were. They would move in tune to Calliope's humming or her heart, sometimes fast erratic shifts when the child was anxious.
At first Dream would leave the child be to dream as other's dream, but more often as he grew the dreamlord would pick up the babe and take him to the Dreaming.
He had not objected to Calliope's choice to raise Orpheus in the Waking, had never objected to her wanting to stay apart if that is what she wanted. But having Orpheus in the Dreaming with him filled a small part of him he hadn't realized was empty in the wake of her choice.
So he would take his son and hold him, comfort him and take care of him, as he continued on with his work. It was only fair that he do his part in raising the child, after all. If Calliope would care for him in the Waking, he would care for him in the Dreaming. And so his cloak would wrap around Orpheus's small body, the smoky black tendrils so dark against the paleness of his skin, and Dream would work while holding him.
Orpheus was there when he shaped Dreams and Nightmares along the shores of the Dreaming. As he molded and transformed them, the baby's small hands were reach out as well in mimic. One particular one ended up with a pinched face and the dreamlord left it that way. When he sat in his throne room, the child would rest in one arm and no resident would dare blink at the image of their King holding the small baby or the sound of babbling coming from the throne.
Sometimes when he had to attend to work in the library, Lucienne would stay by his side and hold Orpheus if only to keep him from reaching out and ripping the pages of the book Dream read from. Jessamy would occasionally distract the baby as well if only so Morpheus could concentrate. She learned her lesson not to get too close though after a couple of her feathers were ripped out by small grabby hands.
And as the child grew, Morpheus would pull his son from his own dreams more and more. He would craft toys for him to keep him entertained while he crawled on the floor of the throne room. More than once he had to keep his son from wandering into the shores of Nightmare. Gregory the large gargoyle was tasked then to keep him from doing so and Eve would help soothe the child when he was especially irritate by telling stories in that way mother's do.
Dream was in Fiddler's Green attending to the Major Arcana when Orpheus took his first steps in the Dreaming. The grass parted naturally to ensure the boy wouldn't trip and flowers bloomed in the child's wake as he waddled to his father and finally fell into his waiting arms. Everyone dreamed of joy and love that night as Morpheus decided to forgo work to take his son to all over the Dreaming to see if he would walk to any of the other residents who had taken a shine to him. He only walked to Jessamy and she didn't even mind when the child grabbed her a little too roughly.
Sometimes Calliope would join them in the Dreaming, able to pull herself from her own dreams to go to the palace and see her husband. Not all the time, but often. She would watch in fascination as the usually stoic Endless shaped clouds in animal shapes for their son and held him as he laughed at the small sheep who tickled his nose. Dream's face would brighten, a smile lighting up at the sound of Orpheus' laughter.
It was a smile she hadn't seen directed towards her in years and her heart ached at the sight.
She could see his love for the boy in that smile. In the way sometimes he would forgo his duties to pay attention more to Orpheus. He played with the child, laughed and smiled at him, conjured toys and instruments as he grew older. When their son was restless, she even heard him sing once and had never known him to do so, but the sound made her heart tighten.
Having Orpheus had done what she had hoped. It had renewed the love in Oneiros she had seen fading over the years after their marriage, but she found the love wasn't towards her now. It belonged solely to Orpheus.
