Dream Catcher, Heart Listener - Page 6

“I.  .  .I don’t feel well,” she breathed as a dizziness gripped her and she tumbled as he brought them to a halt, as her breath suddenly staggered with her feet. “Please, I.  .  .I need to get away, get some fresh air for a bit...”
 
She started to walk away, but a hand on her arm restrained her, firm yet gentle; she felt a concern radiating from that arm.
 
“I’ll be okay,” she assured, then wrenched away, hurrying from him. She had to get away from that song, that awful song that pierced her with fear and held over her an unexplainable control which caused her to fear even more.
 
She slipped into the woods, away from the festival, away from the source of that terrible, dissonant pounding, that eerie cacophony of melody and harmony. But she could not get away, even though she ventured further and further from the source. As she raced, tripping, stumbling, glancing frantically over her shoulders as she felt the darkness first behind her, then beside her, then before her, glancing even though she could not see, she realized, only too late, that the dark presence from which that song emanated surrounded her on all sides, that in drawing into the woods she drew closer to it, drawn on by it, and yet, though she knew this, though the fear of it drove her all the more frantically into terror, the further she ran, though she wanted to turn back more and more, the more consumed by that magnetic force she became, unable to turn back, stumbling upon her own feet as they tried vainly to resist. She screamed, knowing it would do no good. The music only grew louder, enveloping her every fiber until there was only it, and the fear that it drowned her in, making her want to go on, forcing her forth though at the same time she wanted only to turn back, to no longer feel its chill.
 
She emerged from the woods, sprinting upward; a chilled wind ruffled her fur, accenting the fear that the dark presence laid upon her with its cold fingers that had gripped her hands, her ankles and now both pulled and pushed her up the incline, as if overeager to complete its task; the song culminated in a deafening volume and terror, and she recognized the instruments for what they were. Chimes. Chimes like one might hear in a child’s music box, chimes like those that might lull a child to sleep, into some peaceful, blissful state. 
 
Their rhythm intensified into a more frenzied, irregular beating, the melody screeching wild, high notes like the laugh of some crazed, excited hyena, and she knew, even as she moved upward, she knew without seeing that she was being dragged to the edge of the seaside cliff.
“MICHAELA!”
As her foot stepped off the cliff’s edge, she suddenly felt strong arms hefting her in the air about her waist; she felt her limbs flailing madly, kicking him, hitting him, screaming wildly at him, felt her body out of control as the chimes commanded her to do everything in her power to resist this man who dared to thwart their authoritative call.
 
But, suddenly, she heard another song, faintly at first, only a dull thudding, but gradually it morphed into elegant melody; rich, calm, yet pleading harmony, an almost crying harmony, and she struggled less, her body falling limp as her mind and heart was seized, forced, though gladly, into the comfort of that new song which soon drowned out the first until she could feel once more, could feel in control of her own body, and she felt arms holding her close to a beating heart inside a firm, softly furry chest, and she knew the touch was his, that he held her.
 
She listened to the song, its gently comforting strains, his soft breathing synchronized with its rhythm which all the more soothed her until her breathing too steadied.
 
“Are you alright now?” he breathed.
 
“Yes,” she whispered, snuggling closer to his chest. “Yes, I’m fine now, everything’s fine...”
 
She realized then that her eyes were closed, and, opening them, she saw the luscious trees, the gently glittering flowers, the fanciful, pure light that seemed to radiate all around her, and she could see tufts of soft, gray-white fur upon the chest she was hugged close to, and she smiled. He had rescued her into a dream.
 
“Can you stand?” he asked.
 
“Yes.” She longed to stay in his arms, but she could not lie to him.
 
He set her down, holding her a few moments before releasing her to make sure her feet were steady enough, and then, as she stood, she looked up and gasped, staring. He stood before her, unveiled, the light no longer concealing his true form, his face, his fluffy grey-white fur, glistening like silver in the purity of the glow of everything, his eyes that shone golden like the liquid sun she’d only ever dreamed about; his chest was thick with the luscious, warm, majestically illuminated fur, as were his head, his arms, and his feet which stuck out beneath the hem of his dark blue pants. He stood like both a guardian angel and a superhero and a most impossible man of her dreams all at once before her.
 
“Yes, we’re still in a dream, and yet, we are not,” he said, guessing her thoughts; she closed her eyes as he caressed her cheek, but only for a moment, lest the vision of him vanish from her. “I did just save you, and I do stand before you, but only through the dreams can we see each other, and I thought, at last, especially since I know how much you’ve been wanting it—”
 
“It was you,” she breathed, “you who danced with me all night, you who saved me, you who sent me the dreams—all the same person, all you.”
 
He nodded, eyes glittering tenderly at her; something in their golden hue shone so powerfully that if she were a stranger, she might have felt daunted, at unease. But their liquid gold only filled her with a warmth, their strength filling her with a strength of her own as she asked, still gazing in wonder, “Will you tell me your name now?”
 
He smiled, though a sadness touched those golden eyes. “I may as well, now we’ve met. My name is Dominique.”
 
“It’s a beautiful name,” she said.
 
“Beautiful,” he said, the suns of his eyes gleaming.