A Hope for Rauri Ch. 04

***More than anything now perhaps, Wesley wants to know just WTF is really going on.

Oh, and to maybe clear up a little confusion, "Bean Sith" is perhaps better pronounced as "Beyan She".

Anglicized, it's "Banshee".

There. All done. :)

0_o

***

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Shauna was on her front, a naked woman lying on top of a naked man like she'd never seen in her life before. She sought for comparisons as they traded kisses there in the bed, and the only one ...

The only one which stayed with her was patently ridiculous.

Try as she might, she could only think of Bam-Bam Rubble, a cartoon character all grown up and in the fine flesh here in the bed with her tonight. He was blonde, blue-eyed and gorgeous to her like this. And he was the sexiest man on the planet in her opinion. She just couldn't get the image out ...of her ... mind.

She began to chuckle right through a kiss and he asked her about it.

"May I call you Sam?" she smiled down at him as she kissed his nose, "I was thinking about a proper name and 'Awesome' just won't do for a first name -- though it is the truth."

He nodded, "From you, it pleases me."

He inhaled and let it out, still smiling, "So then for you, I am Sam. There are none in this land who call me by that name, though there are a very few in Eire."

She felt one of his hands as it played with her bottom, and she also felt the way that he was hardening underneath her. She smiled again, "I can give you another look at the other side of me, if you think that you would like it like that."

He nodded, and she wondered how he could do that, almost ripping her heart clean off it's hinges there in her chest with only his soft little smile.

So, for him as well as herself, she admitted, she shifted the other way once more and in a moment, she was the female werewolf sitting astride him as she lifted herself a little and guided them together again.

With it done, she looked at him and as stupid as it seemed, Shauna could have cried out in joy as she saw in one look and she absolutely knew that she was the female who had the same effect on his heart as he had on hers.

In point of fact, and unknown to her, she was incorrect.

She began to move on him, rocking her hips as she smiled down at that face.

This was something that she and Wesley never did. They were both either human or they weren't when they fucked. It had always been that way, too. For one reason or another, they just didn't like the way that things lined up when they mixed their shapes.

But Shauna really liked it now, just as her beautiful blonde there did.

She raised her arms above her head, almost dancing in her slow and sensuous way for him. She wanted to moan for him again, but then it was decided by him and what he did. The sounds escaped her throat as she felt his human hands and fingers begin to trace over her, teasing her nipples and breasts, playing with her tail, sliding down over her belly to toy with her lips just a little in the nicest way that she'd ever felt.

He sat up then, holding her and she was able to grab at a pillow to try to place it on top of the other one and with him like that, she placed her arm around his thick neck and ...

They could trade kisses and best of all, they could look deep into each other's eyes -- a man and a she-wolf bitch giving to each other equally. He looked as surprised as she felt and guessed that she must have looked, but then she felt her passion rising in her just as she felt his rising to meet it.

She hung on then and opened her mouth wide, needing to feel first his kiss and then how wonderful it felt to place her mouth over his as she teased his tongue. He gasped and it seemed to spur him somehow.

Shauna found herself bouncing on him from his motions as he cried out a little while she moaned into his mouth and they came very close together a few moments later. It had taken a lot, but she'd managed to suppress the need to throw her head back and almost bay for him as he filled her.

Shauna collapsed against him and it toppled Sam. They chuckled a little weakly as she rode him down to lie on him again.

"Oh, that was good," she smiled as she kissed his throat, "and quite a ride for a while there, Bam-Bam Sam."

He didn't get it, not having the reference and it caused Shauna to laugh in delight.

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They met for an early breakfast the following morning, both of them noticing the tiredness of the other, so it was a while and one coffee at least before either one dared to begin.

As they drove off toward Loudon Hill, they were both surprised as they compared notes.

"Well," Shauna said, trying not to grin now that she was fully functional, "at least I got laid."

As Wes nodded, she looked out at the countryside, "I just wonder if I've also got a new boyfriend. Look, Wes, - "

"It's ok," he smiled, "I hope very much that's what it is and if not, then that's what I really hope that it turns into for you Shauna. I mean, look at us. We've been together on and off for so freaking long and we've always said that if one of us finds somebody that it won't change our friendship.

I love you, Shauna. I always have and you know it. So many times over the years, I've wanted to give up and just accept what we've always had between us and go from there. But we both know ..."

Shauna nodded, "I know, Baby. I've been the same. We've always been the same, you and me. So many times, I've wanted to come to you and just say 'What the hell, let's just do this thing and make it permanent between us'. But there's always this one thing -- like a little scrap of something in my head or my heart or something, just like it's in you."

She sighed, "Well, whatever this is that I seem to have with Sam, I'm not going to lose sight of my best friend. I want you to at least get to know that girl enough to be able to figure out if there's something there -- other than a lonely banshee.

So you say that she can actually speak?"

He nodded, "Yeah, though I have to try to remember the way that people spoke more then, since it's different. Her name is Rory -- well, it was her nickname to her father, really. She does seem to be able to get what I mean easily enough."

He moved a little, trying to stay limber as he drove, "She's still the object of the search for us, any way that you slice it, but now I've got another thing in my head and it's bugging the hell out of me."

Shauna looked over, "How do you mean?"

He shrugged, "I keep thinking about an old Doobie Brothers song about a guy who thinks he has something with a girl, when really, there was nothing there at all. It was called 'What a fool believes'. I'm a little scared that I might be like that. I mean, I only spoke to her once way back then and I just felt something. It's still there, Shauna. I still feel that way after last night and it's even stronger."

He shook his head and frowned, "We're not here for me to find out if I'm an idiot. I figured out that I was a long time ago. We're here to find her and then find out what Cleena wants us to do about it."

He said nothing after that.

Shauna fell silent as well, though she reached over to hold his hand.

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They saw Cleena waiting for them some distance from the car park when they arrived. "I hope that you're ready to go on a little bit of a hike today," she said.

She turned and began to walk as soon as she'd seen them both nod, though she slowed enough to allow them to catch up with her.

"Where are we going?" Wes asked.

When she turned her head, they saw that she wasn't wearing the sort of severe expression that they thought that they'd heard in her voice. She just sounded tired and a little regretful.

"We're going to find our weeper," she said, "I'm going to lead you over a fairly large part of Scotland in a single day and sometime in it, I'm going to have to make something of an admission to you."

"How do you mean?" Shauna asked.

But the smile turned a little sad then and Cleena said only, "Not just yet, Shauna dear. I'll need to work up to it and that will take a little while. Please allow an old woman to work up steam at her own rate. Just know that your fee is real and you will have it. I just need to come to be in a better place within myself for it -- and that will take some walking."

She said nothing more and Shauna exchanged curious glances with Wes as they went. At last, they came to the remains of the little croft under the trees.

"This was once known as Backhill farm," Cleena said, "and that is because it lies as it does on the back of Loudon hill."

She looked at Wesley then, "This is the place where you first saw and met a young woman long ago."

He nodded and she spoke again, "Please, Wesley, don't ask me how or why I know that. You'll have the answer to that and more in just a little time."

She turned to walk off around the base of the hill and they walked after her until they came to another dark grove on the other side.

"This was once known as Underhill Farm, since, ... well, since it's under the hill, quite obviously. There has been no one living in either one for a long time. This one was abandoned more recently, some time early in the last century. Well, at least by humans. We've always been here."

They both looked at her and then she smiled, "It will also be our gateway for the rest of today." She held her hand out in the direction of the ruin and they stared -- since it didn't look like one now. If anything, it looked as though it might have been left behind only the previous week. Cleena turned to lead them toward it.

Shauna was almost bursting, wanting to know how, ... who ... what, ... the hell was going on here, but Cleena just opened the door and led them inside.

The air was warm from the fire there in the hearth -- which they'd seen wasn't smoking at all from the outside when they'd seen the place from there, and it smelled like what was in the pot over the fire was a wondrous stew of some kind with plenty of meat and hearty vegetables to it. But that wasn't what caught their attention after they'd seen it.

They were staring a little at the middle-aged couple in the room. They looked like nothing other than a pair of farm folk, a little stout to be sure from the hard work and the good food. Just a pair of farm folk used to living there.

Well, a pair of farm folk who were fucking fairly happily.

The man's trousers were around his ankles for the most part and the slightly round and happy-looking woman was on the counterboard with her dress high up and her legs very nearly so.

"Good Morning, Hobbs," Cleena said, "Tom and Dotty both. I've just come in with a pair of visitors. Pay us no mind and carry on, please."

The pair looked just a little shocked -- though they didn't stop their fucking for even a second as they dipped their heads as they could. "A fair mornin' te ye, my queen," Tom said with respect.

Dotty echoed him, "We was just rememberin' our time here is all, your Highness. It got us te thinkin' about things and then we just wanted te do as we always did then."

"Well," Cleena laughed as her voice shifted to match theirs, "By all means then. Ye both keep doing it and a fair day to ye both fer it, I'm sure."

She led the astounded pair -- who'd heard the couple's very cheery and polite greetings to them as they'd passed by and returned them on their way to a door on the opposite wall.

What amazed Wes was that Tom said that they remembered him from when he'd come in long ago when the old place was newer.

Oh, aye," Dotty huffed a little, "Why, I was just a wee strip of a maid back then with almost nuthin' fer a chest for my Tom te kiss. We was picked te come here and watch. But Tommy liked ma wee charms so much and he was such a handsome young buck then that I just fell fer him in a minute. I think that he was between my knees a minute after that and before I could say, 'Oy, that's good', well there went ma maidenhead."

She winked at the visitors, "And of course I made bloody certain that he fell fer me, if ye ken what I'm sayin', and we've been a pair ever since.

I remember ye and how we waited while ye looked around and we was so happy te see ye go so we could do a wee bit more of this then."

From Wes' memory of the place, the door led to the outside and the woods there. But they could both see through the opening that it didn't lead there at all. It led to a passageway.

As soon as she'd closed the door behind them, Cleena rolled her eyes and smiled, "They're always doing that every time that I see them. They always have and I guess -- as well as hope -- that they always will. They're the keepers of this gate and for so long, they haven't needed to be here, since no one ever comes through the door which is no longer there to most eyes is it?"

"They said that they knew me from when I came in there before," Wes said in a quiet and wondering tone. "I did walk in once, but there was no one in there, and the hearth looked to me as though it had been cold for weeks."

"They called you Queen," Shauna remarked.

Cleena's voice sounded different suddenly for the slightly lower pitch and the more pronounced Scots accent as she said, "Oh, they were here then. They just had no need to show themselves or that place as anything other than a deserted croft house.

Since we've come this far and are out of the sight of anyone else from the day-to-day mortal world outside, I guess that I can begin to reveal a little more of things to you both."

As she stood before them, she was no longer the middle-aged woman. She stood on long legs and was fairly tall clothed in much finer rainment, and not looking very much like a queen at all, unless perhaps it was one who chose an adventurous lifestyle.

Her garb spoke of a rather more active life lived in a place just a little more, ... wild, it might be said. She appeared to be more ready to walk into the pages of an adventure novel set sometime during the middle ages than a woman who sat on a throne and did queenly things, whatever they might be.

In the blink of an eye, Cleena had gone from middle-aged and lovely to at most, no older than perhaps thirty in her stunningly beautiful appearance. Her hair now was a golden blonde silk and it hung very long down her back and Wes noticed that she had bright green eyes where he was sure that he'd seen brown eyes until now.

Her manner of speech changed even further into something rather more Gaelic sounding as well, though neither he nor Shauna had any trouble understanding her.

Wesley managed to raise her eyebrows as he bowed, "So are you Queen Cliodnha, now?"

Shauna was no dummy, she was only a little shocked, but she recovered instantly and bowed as well. The woman before them looked a little surprised as she nodded.

She also looked a tad more imperious and also, there was something else to her -- a very slightly dangerous look in a way that was felt much more than seen. But she did appear to be a little pleased at their recognition.

"Well it is very obvious to me that you both come by your reputations rather honestly if you know my true name," she chuckled, "though I did not try to hide it very much.

So then you must also know what I am."

They both nodded and Wes said, "We just don't know much of anything else."

"Come," the queen smiled, "and I can help with that as we go."

"Where are we going?" Shauna asked.

"To a place a little north from here and a lot less of a walk if we do it this way, Shauna," Cliodnha smiled, "I am bringing you to my hall. Your admirer and lover lives there, though he does not know of your coming there today, and the one which we seek ought to be at least a little nearby as well, I hope."

As they walked, she began to try to explain.

"Brìghde -- the one which you seem to like to call Rauri as her father did -- as do I, it must be said, was a young widow when you first met her, Wesley. Her husband had been killed in the same battle which you were in. I watched, convinced that you men were all mad to want to do the things which I saw to serve a worthless king."

She shrugged a little honestly, "I hope that I do not offend you too much, but to us, most of them were, are, and always will be worthless. It is a very rare thing for us to see one and consider that he -- or she -- is otherwise, though this last one seems to have kept to what a queen must be to her people far more than most.

At any rate, Rauri was a heartbroken widow, something which the human world has never seemed to have a shortage of. Most find ways to deal with their grief and come at last to accept their grievous loss after a time. Then they carry on somehow.

But some, like that one, never can. They grieve on and on until it kills them at last -- whether it is out of not having a care over what they do as they struggle on without their men or even simply -- as in her case -- they starve out of not eating because they don't care anymore to go on living.

I sought her out before that happened, but she was already well on the way to it by that time.

On the day when I spoke to you first, I mentioned a type of Bean Sith called a Bean Nighe, Wesley. I mentioned it again when I met Shauna here at the hotel. More than a tortured one who died in labor, Shauna was correct in her thinking that it was a way for a human woman to become one of the Sith in a sense.

For poor Rauri, I made use of the method to keep her from completing her trip into a very early and unfortunate grave because it saddened me -- and I should mention that overall, it happens so very rarely to one such as I am. It is my place to watch far more than to act in the matters of human lives, though for that one, I acted because I had to.

She has been one of my Bean Siths for a very long time now, though in one way or another, that time must soon end."

She smiled at Wes for a moment, "That is why I sought you out, Wesley.

I know that you and Shauna are accomplished searchers of things. I also knew that you'd met Rauri once a little before I took her.

As well, I knew that in the space of a single heartbeat or two, my poor heartbroken widow had, without even knowing of it, or how, why, or anything else, almost captured the heart of another."

She sighed a little wearily, "I just didn't know it at the time that it happened. It only came to me later after much thought. That poor thing has wandered and wept in her sadness while keening for the deaths of others for all of the time since then, never having the hope in her heart for anything more for herself.

It had been my hope that she would recover after a time, but she has not. However I could not keep her in my view at all times, since I am a little busy myself."

As they'd walked on the way seemed to open up into a large cavern.

"What is this?" Wes asked, "It can't be a mine. There doesn't seem to be any order to it."

"No, it is no mine or earthwork of men. The pathways are ... "

She shrugged, "The only answer that I might make that could mean much is to say that they are magic."

Wes shrugged, "They can't be. I don't believe in magic much."

The queen shrugged, "Believe what you like, Wesley. To us and now you -- for today -- this earth is open and porous enough for us to travel through. To one with no magic or idea of it -- or even enough imagination to try to believe, this is all solid stone."

Walking with Cliodnha, both Shauna and Wesley had noticed doors of all sorts as well as gates and passageways which branched off to either side of them. Where they walked, the passageway was not straight and curved or rose and fell, wandering as it did.

Cliodnha led them to one then which seemed to resemble a dimly glowing portal and she stopped.

"Time for a bit of a brief look outside, I think," she smiled and stepped through with them following.