When The Heart Sings

Chapter 47

Darien's POV:

It had been far too long since we could be together without someone watching or listening to us. Probably since the first night in her shed. Had it really only been seven days since that night? It felt like months as I fought to keep her close to me and to defend her from those who wished her ill.

I gazed down at her as she lay in my arms. She didn't even try to shift to the side like she had in the past. The bond had been making more progress or else she wasn't nervous about someone seeing her like this. I couldn't hear the Dranek, so they likely were not close enough to hear us unless we called out loudly.

Serena had been embarrassed about what I might have seen in her dreams, but she wouldn't understand the draw her dreams held for me. I could feel her love for me. It was almost as strong as mine was for her. I lowered my head to rub my cheek against the top of her head. She tried to snuggle closer to me, unknowingly seeking the comfort of her soulmate.

I smiled at that action, although she really couldn't get much closer since she was already lying on me. The attempt spoke volumes though. She relaxed as she simply enjoyed the contact and closeness. I closed my eyes as I too enjoyed the feeling of her body against mine. It just felt so right.

I felt Serena's mind slowly still and descend as she dozed off. The craziness of the last week must have put more stress on her than I had realized. I could feel it on the edges of her mind as sleep claimed her. I was going to have to keep an eye her for a few days to make sure she didn't get too stressed out.

On the edge of sleep, pictures were usually clearer and brighter. This was no exception. Numerous glimpses of myself flashed across her mind, mostly from today and yesterday. Love once more swamped my mind as it overflowed from hers.

A few of Alex appeared, she missed having him around the last couple of days. He had been someone familiar in a sea of strangers in a strange place.

She wasn't homesick, but the constant waves of strange after strange were starting to get to her. A few images of Saphira crossed her mind with trust and curiosity tagging along. I sensed the beginning of a strong friendship building.

Serena's dreams shifted and I could sense the stress in her mind trying to express itself. The mind often did this with nightmares and bad dreams as it tried to cope and work things out. I mentally braced myself, I hadn't seen Serena have a nightmare or bad dream yet.

If her emotions got too strong, it could easily affect the bond as it tried to alert me to possible danger. The bond was unable to differentiate real life from dreams. This was not going to be fun, but at least I had the advantage of eavesdropping on her mind to see those dreams and their probable cause. Besides, I wanted to see if anything was bothering her, and her dreams would likely show me glimpses of it.

Flickers of darkness, cold, and rain. That would be the cargo hold on the ship. More darkness. An image of a scrat jumping at Alex was tinged with horror and fear. Her fear was slowly rising as she ran through a dark forest alone. The bond stirred at her fear and I forced myself to remain relaxed, lest I wake her by tensing up.

Waking her to avoid a nightmare was not going to help her deal with her stress, it would merely delay it. My jaw clenched as I restrained a growl at the huge raptor that started to stalk her in the dim moonlight. A hiss sounded and the scene swirled away into a blackness that held the sound of a thousand wordless voices in song for a few seconds.

A pair of red glowing eyes faced her in the darkness, but I couldn't see what they belonged to. Calmness took over her mind. She wasn't scared of it, whatever it was.

Flickers of other images appeared, the room in the back of her shed. Some flowers. A garden. The greenish sky of this world. My face appeared more and more often amongst the discombobulated random images from both worlds. They got more and more hazy as her mind dropped into a dreamless sleep.

I exhaled slowly. That hadn't been as bad as I had feared. Her stress was mostly what she had gone through, and it would ease in a few days as she recovered from it. Most of the images at the end I hadn't recognized or understood. For most of the images, I could at least determine which ones had belonged on Earth or in this world. A few had me scratching my head though.

I knew next to nothing about plants, and I wasn't sure which ones might have been things she had seen on this planet. I did know one thing though, if she started talking about plants, then I would listen intently just to hear her voice.

In the past, I had next to no interest in plants, so my newfound interest in plants just because Serena liked them was bound to gain some comments from anyone who even halfway knew me.

Serena definitely had me wrapped around her little fingers. My brother would find it hilarious whenever the idiot decided to make an appearance. I knew he was on this planet somewhere.