1035: Story 1035: Dreambound 1035: Story 1035: Dreambound They say sleep is an escape.
For Dorian Vex, sleep beca a prison.
It started after the storm—when the black rain fell for hours over the orphanage ruins in Briar’s End.
Dorian had found a broken music box among the rubble.
It played a haunting lullaby, off-key and sweet, as if sung by soone drowning.
He took it ho.
That night, he dread of them.
Children with hollow faces, skin like cracked porcelain, limbs stitched at the joints with red thread.
They danced in circles beneath a crescent moon, their mouths opening and closing in silent, aching rhythm.
The music box played from nowhere.
From everywhere.
And at the center of them stood her—the Dreambinder.
Tall.
Pale.
Veiled in gossar shadows.
Her fingers were too long, her eyes stitched shut.
Yet sohow, she saw everything.
“You turned the key,” she whispered through stitched lips.
“Now the dream turns you.”
Dorian awoke with blood under his nails and a music box wound tighter than before.
Each night, he returned.
The children sang.
The moon grew larger.
The dream deeper.
He tried staying awake—coffee, pain, even chains.
But the Dreambinder always found a way.
Soon, waking life unraveled.
Dorian’s reflection no longer matched his movents.
Shadows stayed long after light faded.
He caught glimpses of doll eyes watching from corners.
And the music…
it followed him.
Even in silence.
Desperate, he found the old orphanage caretaker—Mr.
Renfold, blind and broken, living in a rusted trailer.
“You kept the box?” Renfold rasped.
“You damn fool.
That box was her anchor.
Each ti it’s wound, she pulls another soul beneath the veil.”
“How do I stop it?”
“You don’t.
You sever yourself.
You burn the thread.”
Renfold lifted his shirt—his chest was sewn shut with thick black twine.
“I failed.”
Dorian returned ho, heart racing.
The music box sat on the table, lid open, lody warping into laughter.
The children were waiting.
Eyes wide.
Hands outstretched.
“Sleep with us.”
“No more running.”
He slamd it shut.
Silence.
For the first ti in weeks.
But then…
the floor rippled.
Reality blinked.
And he was already asleep.
The Dreambinder stood over him.
“We don’t wake, Dorian,” she murmured.
“We only…
forget.”
Red thread coiled around his arms and legs.
His mouth opened to scream, but music filled his lungs.
The moon cracked like an egg above them.
Black stars bled down.
Dorian reached for his chest.
Inside, the music box key jutted from his heart.
He turned it once.
Twice.
The third ti, he smiled.
Now, he dances with the others.
His eyes sewn.
His grin permanent.
And if you ever hear a lullaby that doesn’t belong, drifting from a closed box or a child’s breathless hum…
Don’t turn the key.
Or you too may find yourself…
Dreambound.
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