10 Secrets Of Neil Gaiman’s Death Of The Endless
2. Dream’s Captors Were Trying To Capture Death
In 1916, magician and occultist Roderick Burgess directed his cult to perform a rite to capture the personification of Death. Burgess did this in the hope that he might force Death to grant him immortality. They captured her brother Dream instead, who was weakened from a battle on the edge of reality. They stole Dream’s clothes, his bag of sand, his ruby, and his helm of power and encased him in a glass cage.
For 70 years, Burgess threatened Dream to get his immortality while the world was overrun with an epidemic of sleeping sickness. The elder Burgess eventually died and his son Alex took over. The cult had long since dissolved and become a few paid helpers and hangers-on. Someone made a mistake, broke the binding spell and Dream was free. Dream cursed Alex with never-ending nightmares and returned to find his realm in disarray.
As devastating as Dream’s capture was for the world, it would have been infinitely worse if he had succeeded in capturing Death. At the beginning of time, she stopped doing her job and no one died. The world quickly fell into chaos and Death had to be begged to return to her duties, but it made her hard and cold inside.