theanachronistictailor | A dream about a ballroom...

You dream that you are in a large, extravagantly lit ballroom. Despite its elegance and its size, it hosts a paltry number of guests, all masked as you are. A few of them are paired and dancing already, spinning in coordinated circles around its center. When you examine the floor under your feet, you see how the dancers are on set paths. In the center of the floor's mosaic, there is a proud and massive star.

A hand is offered to you. You do not know your companion, and their mask covers their face in its entirety, but the facade itself is that of a maned wolf. Their garb is of the Third City, or maybe the Fifth. Or maybe it's something else entirely, something you have never seen and yet recognize innately. When your fingers finds their shoulder, the fabric is exquisite to the touch, an utter blackness that drinks the light out of the room like an inescapable hole. Their grip on your hip is tight enough to hurt. Your fingers may break as they are squeezed by an elegant glove.

You fall in step with the stranger, onto one of the lines on the floor. The steps are quick. Your feet barely have time to land on the stone. In time it feels like you are not on stone at all, you are walking on air. Walking? Dancing. Flying. Leaping. They're all the same. Your partner glides. You turn in motion. Fire blazes from your trail.

The ballroom is empty now, save you and your masked companion. Has the room been lined with mirrors this whole time?

You find yourself in the many reflections. Here, your mask is a small bird with a curved, sharp beak. There, a snake. This one, a bat. The next, a maned wolf, like your partner.

Malleable still.

The claws on your waist tighten. The full face of the stranger dips. The mouth of its mask finds the side of your throat. Fangs meet flesh. You taste blood.

----

Having Recurring Dreams: The Hungry Silk is increasing...

Nightmares is increasing...

----

The Tailor had pulled out their small collection of prized fabrics from under the narrow bedframe. The worn little piece of luggage had carried what few possessions they'd earned while living under the Widow's roof, but they're privileged enough to say all their belongings would no longer fit so tidily. Now, the box contained those fabrics that might be common to the wealthy and elite, but were to them priceless.

They ran their hands over each one; bombazine and puzzle-damask, aurochs-fur, their one scrap of parabola linen. Already the memory of the texture of that fabric was escaping, but nothing in their collection compared, nothing. What had it been? Softer than silk, maybe closer to fur? But not so coarse. And so dark, like their favorite suit. The first suit they'd had tailored to their measurements that had felt correct.

To pursue this was to risk madness. They recognized this plainly. Already they had spent most of their evening poring over the notes they had, and existing drafts for garments, comparing, laying down sketches no larger than the length of their thumb into the fire-proof notebook that they had stripped of its lace. Several pages had been filled with Correspondence that had been drawn over, or Correspondence reimagined in the third dimension, curves and loops becoming the flowing hems of gowns and cloaks. So much exposure to the language would only damage their mind if it didn't light their hair on fire first.

But the dreams. The dreams. What had that outfit been? A sign? Was that fabric significant? Or were they reading too much into the shape of a nightmare?

If a dream repeats, there is a kernel of truth in it, and it’s better to be aware of what it’s telling you.

They fetch the notes they left the week prior, in their book of plain paper.

Silk. Claws. Light/dark. Water/reflections. Burning.

The repetition is there. What is it telling them?

The Tailor leans back on their haunches and presses their hands to their face. It is too early, or too late, for this. They've work in the morning.

They close the little case and slide it back under the bed.