SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY I
the weaver
THE DREAMWEAVER
He folds the hours of other people's sleep into cloth, mending nightmares the way a tailor mends a torn sleeve. Every dream he repairs costs him one of his own — and he is running out.
yet unveiled
· I · ✦✦SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY II
the anchor
THE WAKING TETHER
The only person Riku has ever met who does not dream at all. Where she stands, the Loom cannot reach — which makes her either his salvation, or the loose thread that unravels everything.
yet unveiled
· II · ✦✦SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY III
the ferryman
KEEPER OF THE SHALLOWS
Last of the winged ferrymen, he poles the paper boats across the first minute of sleep, carrying everything the waking meant to say and never did. Each secret he accepts costs him one feather — and he accepts them all.
· III ·
✦✦
SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY IV
the whisper
VOICE OF THE THEATRE
He waits in the dark below the stage and breathes forgotten lines to dreamers who lose their place mid-grief. No one remembers engaging him; no performance has ever ended without him.
· IV ·
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SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY V
the archivist
KEEPER OF THE SOMNIUM
Curator of the Somnium Records, a library of every dream ever surrendered. She catalogued the first weavers a century ago — and has spent every night since erasing one particular entry.
yet unveiled
· V · ✦✦SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY VI
the unravelled
LOST PAST THE SELVAGE
Riku's younger sibling, who followed a dream past the last intact thread and did not come back. The Loom still carries a warm strand with their name on it — which should not be possible.
yet unveiled
· VI · ✦✦SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY VII
the loomkeeper
MISTRESS OF THE LOOM
She grants the weaving licences and she revokes them, and about her wrist she wears the first thread ever spun. It is said she has never slept — only supervised.
yet unveiled
· VII · ✦✦SOMNIUM RECORDS · ENTRY VIII
the dark chorus
THOSE WHO WATCH FROM SLEEP
Silhouettes that gather in the theatre at the bottom of every dream, applauding softly at griefs that were never meant to be performed. No one has ever seen one of them wake.
yet unveiled
· VIII · ✦✦Beneath the waking city lies its reflection, stitched from everything the sleepers surrender. Four provinces are charted in the Somnium Records; the rest is selvage and rumour.
Where every sleeping mind in the city braids into a single fabric. Weavers walk its threads barefoot, reading each strand by warmth: joy runs hot, grief runs cold, and secrets do not run at all.
The first minute of any dream, shared by all dreamers like a harbour at dusk. Memories are traded here in paper boats; the ferrymen accept only things you meant to say and never did.
A dark auditorium at the bottom of deep sleep where dreams are performed back to their dreamers, one act at a time. The Audience never boos, never leaves — and never lets a performance end early.
The frayed hem of the Loom, where abandoned dreams unravel into weather. Sleepwalkers wash up here, and weavers are forbidden to follow them past the last intact thread.
“Every city is two cities. You are a citizen of the one you forget by morning.”— SOMNIUM RECORDS, FOLIO 91
Auralis shouldn't exist. A stone fortress raised after the sky fell, where no one is old and no one is young, held by cold weapons and a barrier of blue light. Beyond the walls, scorched earth. Beyond that, an enemy with guns and no interest in mercy.
Eli is its winged general. He heals the wounded, grows flowers from ash, and walks into the sleep of the frightened to build them a place worth believing in. The people of Auralis call it the Garden.
From the slums outside the walls comes a prophet who cannot dream. He has already seen the shape of the future, and he has come to make sure every piece of it arrives on time.
VOLUME ONE · A PROLOGUE & EIGHT CHAPTERS · ✦