This tale is appropriate to come so soon after I watched Dune 2. Soft Places, the second part of The Sandman's Convergence series and Issue 39, is set primarily in the vast desert of Lop in Mongolia. In Dune, the desert is as much a character as poor, hapless Marco, who is lost in the shifting sands at an earlier point in his journey to becoming the famous Marco Polo.
We begin our tale in 1273, looking down at a bewildered young man of Genoa, the desert swirling around us thanks to John Watkin's superb artwork. He is lost in a sandstorm, confused by the raspy bellow of the wind and assailed by sandblasting at his skin. He thinks he hears voices, perhaps from those of the caravan he has lost. His father and uncle are calling for him, and in his confusion, he stumbles across the dunes, trying to find his way back to them.
He finds nothing as he blindly wanders deeper into the maelstrom of sand and brittle wind and realises too late that this desert can devour him whole. Panicked, he can do nothing but go on until finally, the storm reaches a crescendo, and there is only black, comforting sleep.
The young man wakes up face down in the desert, his eyes irritated by the sand. The situation reminds him of a story told by his mother, of a magic man dressed in a cloak of rainbow colours carrying a pouch of sand. The sand he dusts your eyes with takes you to Dream Land, explaining the graininess of one's eyes when awake. It's a lovely memory, one as I author this, use myself when I wake up from a particularly vivid dream. All of us Gaiman fans do.
Despite his dilemma, the young man sees something in the sands that might be a pattern but cannot grasp how it might help him and thus continues onward without direction. When he hears singing, he wonders if it's his mind playing tricks on him, although we who watch him ponder this know better. We know the songs, but they are not from Marco's time. He drinks water from a canteen, hoping to clear his head, but the voices are from an orchestra of discordant tunes from different eras.
When he hears his name called, Marco rushes over the dunes, convinced it is his father. Except it isn't. The man calling out to him is a stranger who quickly questions what Marco is doing in this barren wilderness. Marco explains his plight and asks the same of his new companion. The man reveals he has no people, and the last thing he remembered was being in a cell in Genoa. He was calling out to Marco, not to the young man before him, but to his cellmate, Marco Millions. The historians among us might recognise this as one of Marco Polo's nicknames, Marco Milione, because Marco would often describe Kublai Khan's riches in the millions.
The stranger asks Marco where they are, and Marco reveals their location as the Desert of Lop. Before he can say anything further, the stranger launches into a recital about the recollections of a lost traveller in the vast, empty desert who hears voices leading him further astray. Spirits marched through the storms about to converge, using fear to drive wanderers further into the desert. Not even the light of day offers relief as these mirages gallop across the dunes on unseen horses while the wind whistles songs of clamour and percussion. To avoid being taken in by these desert tricks, caravans tie bells on their mounts to keep the company together.
The stranger reveals that he, Rustichello of Pisa, has just related, word for word, the account of his cellmate Marco Polo. (Side note - Rustichello da Pisa was an Italian writer who shared a cell with Marco Polo for a few years during the Venice-Genoa War). When the young man tells Rustichello that he is Marco, the writer is convinced Marco is a figment of his dreams. While Marco does not believe this, Rustichello isn't dissuaded and decides that since this is a dream, they should find someplace comfortable to sit and wait for awakening. Hopefully, there are women since smuggling Genoa ladies of the night into a cell is not satisfying.
They spot a fire, and Marco is convinced they've found his father's caravan. However, when he and Rustichello reach the source of the flames, there is no caravan. Instead, we find a member of the Dreaming I was personally thrilled to see, greeting the dreamers with his usual warmth and welcome. Gilbert, or Fiddlers Green, invites the stranger to join him at the fire, warning that it gets cold in the soft places.
Marco immediately asks Gilbert if he has seen Marco's father and uncle, Nicolo and Maffeo Polo, but Gilbert has not, revealing that he only comes to the soft places for peace and quiet. Rustichello is more interested in learning if Gilbert has any wine, which the dream is happy to share with his guests. Gilbert invites them to partake of a red Beaujolais and a sweet tokay while they entertain each other with stories and wait to see if anyone else joins them.
When Marco asks if he is a dream, Gilbert admits it without hesitation and presents them with wine. Rustichello asks if any women are coming, to which Gilbert gives an irritated 'Hoom' because he's trying to get away from all that. He reveals that as Fiddlers Green, a couple has been visiting him frequently, and he's rather tired of the meaningful gazes and the sweet whisperings of nothing. Not that he's against love or women. He's just done with it for the night.
When Marco introduces himself, Gilbert's suspicions are confirmed. Marco explains that when he was four, war broke out while his father and uncle were travelling in Constantinople. To avoid becoming caught in between warring parties, the caravan opted to travel to the uncharted territory of the east, eventually arriving at the Court of Kublai Khan.
Typically, the Italians tried to bring Christianity to the so-called heathens, imagining what grand things could happen if the Far East was converted. While Khan remained unmoved by Christianity, he didn't feel the threat of the new religion. Besides, the priests who served him had powers even he feared. His palace is free of storms, and food and drink are brought to him by flight, ensuring it is never touched by other hands or spilled. He challenges the Polos to return to their Pope with the request of a hundred priests who could produce the miracles of those who serve the Buddha. By the time the Polos returned home, the old Pope had died and the new one couldn't muster even one miracle worker, let alone a hundred.
Gilbert mentions only a handful of saints who might serve, Francis of Assisi, who apparently could fly and Joseph of Cupertino, who levitated, but he was after Marco's time.
In the end, only two Dominican priests joined Marco, now sixteen, and his family when they returned to Khan's court. However, the priests had no magic and gave up when they reached Syria, fearful of going further. Since then, the caravan has been travelling, and Marco admits to the cities he's seen. Rustichello interupts, praising Marco for his genius. Marco didn't just describe the cities in terms of trade and land but also their flavour, bringing them to life for his audience. Rustichello knows this because he is documenting Marco's travels so it will be remembered. And so it has.
Marco asks Gilbert if he has food, and after rummaging through his coats, he produces sandwiches with pickles and cheese. Before Marco can dig into this welcome repast, the group is joined by spirits on horseback. The spirits are clearly soldiers of a grand calvary, wandering the dunes for thousands of years in search of the true world. Gilbert cannot help them because this is the business of the Lord Shaper. The host's captain believes that if they leave this realm, they will return to the true world where they might wither like dust or live out the span of their lives. They might even awaken to find their long search nothing more than a night's dream. Determined to learn which of these fates await them, they leave Gilbert and his companions to ride on into the desert, searching.
When the company is gone, Marco asks Gilbert if they are dreams. Gilbert answers they are after a fashion. Rustichello is convinced he is real, and Marco urges Gilbert to reveal where they are. At this point, Gilbert realises that Marco is unaware of their situation. They are in a soft place. Gilbert explains that soft places were more common in the past, but because of explorers like Marco, Hwen T'sang and Ibn Batutta, who charted the length and breadth of the world, solidifying its boundaries in maps and charts, the soft places diminished.
Rustichello asks why Gilbert refers to them in the past, and Gilbert explains that they are seven hundred years dead, existing only in history. At the edges of the Dreaming, time is malleable. In the soft places, time swirls and loops and intersects, allowing reality and dream to commingle. The desert of Lop in Gilbert's day, 1992, is better known as Taklamakan, which is Turkik for 'If you go in, you won't come out again'. It is not the only soft place, though. There is one in Australia, Ireland, the Pacific Islands and a mountain in Arizona.
As Gilbert prepares to leave, he asks the two men if they have ever heard of Fiddler's Green, the paradise on earth that sailors dream of finding. He is disappointed when he learns neither has but makes a point to ensure they remember before he fades into the desert. As Marco and Rustichello bid Gilbert goodbye, Marco wonders where Gilbert went. Rustichello imagines he's returned to the Dreaming as Marco himself will when Rustichello wakes up. Before Marco can protest this, Rustichello vanishes, presumably back into the waking world.
Marco finds himself alone again until he discovers someone behind him.
At first, he thinks this new arrival is another dream until the stranger reveals he isn't. He is Dream. Morpheus immediately explains that he is in no shape to help the young man, having just escaped captivity. Us Constant Readers, will know that Morpheus has just left Alexander Burgess at Wych Cross. Weak and away from the Dreaming for too long, Morpheus is in a poor state, prompting Marco to offer he Dream King the water in his canteen. Morpheus drinks and is grateful for the help.
Marco asks if Morpheus is the lord of this realm, and the Lord Shaper gives him a truthful answer. Marco reveals the meeting with Fiddlers Green and Gilbert's revelation that Morpheus would walk along his paths with a woman. Morpheus briefly wonders who she is but surmises that this could be an event to come or one that has passed long ago. Time is fluid in this place. Morpheus is about to resume his journey home when Marco begs him for help. He doesn't want to remain trapped, and Morpheus reminds him that this is the fate of those who enter a soft place.
But Gilbert told him and Rustichello he would escape and go on to live this life. At this point, Morpheus realises he is talking to Marco Polo. After his time in Wych Cross, Morpheus is also sensitive to being trapped and decides to help Marco, even though it could leave him too weak to reach the Dreaming. Morpheus instructs Marco to hold out his hand before scooping a handful of sand. He releases it into Marco's palm and tells Marco he is fortunate indeed.
As the sand falls, Marco is mesmerised. He sees the grains of sand and imagines patterns everywhere. In the desert, the cities, the sand and the stories, all a glittering cascade falling through his mind. He hears storms muted by distance and flashes of lightning, swearing that he'll never forget any of this, that he's going to take the memory of this place back into the waking world.
Marco wakes up to jingling bells and strong hands hoisting him from the sand. His father, clearly relieved to have found him, is instead struck that his son was only a hundred feet away from them. The night before had been one of bizarre occurrences, with illusions of men on horseback galloping past them. This desert breeds illusions, his father states.
When Marco tries to recount what he learned about patterns, it slips away from him, dissolving like all good dreams do. His father is more concerned with getting Marco ready to travel. They will be leaving within the hour. He also orders Marco to ignore the illusions. These unimportant dreams almost killed him last night. Marco obeys, and the journey continues across the desert.
It's safe to say that Marco remembers enough to be able to tell Rustichello the story, but that's for the history books. I hope you enjoyed Soft Places. Next time, we drop in on Baby Daniel!
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