Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon slipped into the cabin with a key Cian had made available for her use. It was just past midnight and the house was quiet and dark. She didn't worry about startling him awake; he would catch her scent before wondering if she was an intruder. She set her backpack by the door and kicked off her unlaced boots. The rest of her clothes -- jeans, a thermal shirt, and a navy zippered hoody -- she left on. The hallway to his room was dim but her eyes adjusted as she made her way there.

She just needed to see him, needed to kiss him, before she left town and dealt with her problem. The problem of Duncan. Nothing in life could move forward without resolving, severing this piece of her past.

Her knee compressed the mattress. "Hey. Are you awake?"


Thread: open to Cian

Comments

Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

"Aye," he replied, sleep husking his voice. His arms reached out and found her, feeling the fabric of her clothing, which brought some puzzlement to his face. "Y' feelin' th' cold?" he asked, shifting till he was half sitting, back against the bedhead. One hand took hers and rested on her thigh.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

“No.” Rhiannon ran her thumb across his knuckles, the work-roughened skin of his hands warm to her cool. She smiled. “Okay, maybe a little.” She had ridden with the car windows down, letting the fresh air tangle her hair and bring goose bumps to her arms. Now she was wide awake, but the urge to wrap up in the cocoon of his bed and procrastinate for a few hours, or even days, was powerful. “Sorry about waking you up, but I might be out of town a few days. I didn’t want to leave a message on your machine.”

In the dark it was hard to make out his features. The bluish light illuminated the planes of his forehead and nose, the wayward tufts of his hair, but she couldn't see his eyes or his mouth. Rhiannon reached out and found Cian's lips with her fingertips.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

With his free hand he reached up and took a hold of her fingers, pressing a kiss to the tips before drawing her hand to cradle his cheek. He could feel the cool of her skin against his face and it helped clear the last of the cobwebs of the deep sleep he'd been in.

"A few days," he repeated, his eyesight not as hindered as others in the dimness of the night. "Gotta plan?"

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

“Something like that.” It surprised her how the tenderness he displayed didn’t freak her out. If another man had done it, Rhiannon might have rolled her eyes or felt her stomach clench up in something like fear. Why he was different, she didn’t understand. She said, “I think I know someone who can help me find him. Once we figure out where he is, I’ll decide what to do.”

Gently, she loosed her fingers from his cheek and ran them down his neck and shoulder.

“Don’t worry. I’ll come back in one piece.”

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

He wasn't sure how he felt about her leaving without him, but he also wasn't about to question her decisions, though when it came to this Duncan character he wasn't so sure. If what they'd managed to find out was right, he'd managed to get to her once, and maybe even twice, and both times could have been fatal. It was either luck on her part, or planning on his, and Cian wasn't happy about the idea of her taking him on without backup.

"You'll find him," he said with quiet confidence. "'nd when y' do y'll let me know?" he added, a suggestion, a concession. He knew he could feel what she was feeling, or experiencing, when it was intense emotions or physical trauma, but it didn't act like a homing signal. If he didn't know where she was there was little he could do other than know there was something wrong and nothing he could do about it.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon wanted to say ‘yes’, but doing so was a promise, one she wasn’t sure she could keep. If she found herself suddenly within striking distance of him, there was no way she’d back off to call in reinforcements and risk losing track of him. “He’s only dangerous in hiding. I can't let him get the drop on me again.”

Underneath her anger, Rhiannon thought it was pathetic, an act of cowardice, for a watcher to pay a vampire do his dirty work. Duncan had taught her, shaped her, sparred with her, condescended to her, and now he refused to face her, choosing to work through others to get his point across. No, she wasn’t scared to look him in the eye; Rhiannon knew that he was afraid of her.

“But I promise you," she squeezed his fingers, "I won’t take on more than I can handle. And I need you to help me find Katherine. I'm not shutting you out.” She moved closer on the bed and curled a hand behind his neck, kneading and scratching.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

He could feel the edges of the anger, and disgust she held for her former Watcher, and Cian reached out and drew her onto his lap, his right arm around her waist, his left hand resting on her hip.

"I don't think that," he told her, pressing a kiss to her temple before continuing. "J'st I know how hard it c'n be t' get used t' havin' someone at y' back." He'd been told this himself, once before, and he could still remember the look on the face that had told him just that.

"Want y' t' remember y' don' 'ave t' do it on y' own." He huffed a soft laugh, before adding, "even though y' can."

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

The breath left her lungs abruptly when he pulled her onto his thighs. She forgot sometimes how strong he was, and how slight her weight must seem to Cian. She could pretend to be as fragile on the outside as she was starting to feel inside.

“I’ve never felt less alone in my life.”

Rhiannon smothered her face in the crook of his neck, craving privacy for the insane thing she was about to blurt out.

“I catch myself wishing that I was like you. Not that your path was easy, I know it was violent and painful and hard, and I never wanted to be anything but a slayer, but I get so tired of owing them, of worrying they’ll take it away from me, that I actually… I daydream about giving it back by choice. But then I’d be nothing.”

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

"Y' owe 'em nothin', Rhiannon," he said, frowning, and lips narrowing after he'd said it. It was getting more difficult for him to understand this thing called the Council of Watchers, to see how they could possibly believe they were doing a decent job of their self-appointed, from what he could gather, role in a Slayer's life. From what he had learned from Rhiannon there was no say on the girls' part as to whether they wanted to be 'gifted', it was just done. So for someone to be able to hold that over them, to threaten them with changing who they were, what they could do, and destroy their core, to him it was akin to killing them.

And he had a problem with that.

"And y'd never be nothin'," he told her. He pressed another kiss to her temple before tucking a finger beneath her chin, tilting it up till he could see her face, look her in the eyes. "Ever."

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

“You didn’t know me then.”

Would a man like Cian have looked twice at that girl, skinny and dour, a loitering presence in all the wrong places, her aloofness matched only by a deep-seated ache to be more? Would he have wanted a girl who couldn’t run like the wind, who couldn’t climb or fight and, worse, would she have given him the time of day or been smug just to create space between them?

Rhiannon knew that he was attracted to her confidence, her otherness, and those qualities rode on the outcome of the situation with Duncan and, fuck, first she’d bled on him and now had questioned her worth in front of him. Her ability to keep him! And why was that what ate at her, why was that the nothingness she was afraid of?

It wasn’t like her. It was humiliating. Goddamn.

Rhiannon shook herself for saying it, took a breath. “Forget it.” With an insistent nudge, she knocked the circular frame of his arms off her waist and turned to straddle him, hands holding his head in place. “Forget all of it,” she said.

Her teeth captured his lip and bit.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

His hands flew up to her waist as she bit him and his breath hissed between his teeth. He wasn't about to forget anything about her, and he gripped her waist, tempted to roll them over, but instead kept them there. "Not bloody likely!"

Again he could feel a roller-coaster ride of emotions washing through him and he knew they weren't his own. He slid his hands up to cradle her face, then pushed his fingers back into her hair, pulling her mouth to his and kissing her hard.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Her mouth pressed back until it hurt, teeth gnashing against the soft flesh of her lips. As his spine straightened, Rhiannon forced her arm into the space between Cian and the headboard, reaching, flattening, nails engaging, dragging up and down the length of his back. She thought of the first time they kissed, how they shoved aside their clothes and fucked and his shoulders scraped on that rough wall and he didn’t stop or care, and how on so many times afterward, they could barely eke out a hello before they did it again.

He made everything feel urgent and necessary, still.

“Make that sound for me.” Her mouth went to his ear. “I want to hear it.” Her left hand roamed into the heated darkness between his body and her jeans. Rhiannon raised herself up and fitted her palm to him. “Right here, isn’t it?”

She knew she was erratic, wildly in need, that what she wanted kept changing. Was it to leave? To talk? To fool around? To work herself into slick, sated exhaustion on him before she went into the lion's den?

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Her hand on him made his breath catch for a moment, then his hands slid down to her waist again, fingers moving in till they found the fastenings of her jeans and started to undo them. As her words were breathed across his ear his eyes glittered, green flecked with gold, and a low growl rumbled in his chest as his teeth closed on her ear lobe.

Fast work was made of removing her jeans, the bedclothes pushed back in the process. The sense of urgency simmered between them, his skin sensitive to the sensation of hers sliding against him, pressing on him. Hhe quickly unzipped the hoody, pushing up her top till he could press against her, one arm pulling her against him as his other hand again pulled her mouth to his. As lips hungrily consumed his chest vibrated with the hunger deep within.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

There was no going back now, even if she’d wanted to, which she didn’t. The heated, velvety tip of him pressed so close, and all it needed was a subtle shift for her body to accept him. Knowing it, blood gathering in such a way that Rhiannon hurt for it, she chose to give them only a few centimeters of closure. The effort to stop was monumental. Her hands sought behind her for his thighs. They squeezed.

“Why should I let you in?”

Rhiannon’s nose bumped his.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Why not? was what slid through his mind, but the words that came out were, "because you want it," and he didn't know where they came from, even as he heard his voice speak them.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

That voice and his cocky assertion did wonderful things. Her heart stuttered and then thudded faster, like a song with too many beats per measure. “You’re so sure,” she whispered. Her legs relaxed, elbows bent, and he was inside. She knew that moment was never going to get old.

“I didn’t come here for this.” Rhiannon shed the sleeves of her jacket and tugged her shirt overhead. A brown cascade of hair obscured her view as it settled around her face and shoulders.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

"Y' don't run in the desert for the moon, but don't mean you don't enjoy its light," he murmured, eyes hooded as he held her hips. There was always something about this moment, when they first 'reconnected' each time, and it was something he relished, savoured, memorised, as it if was the first time, but also better than before.

He leaned back, taking in the sight of her right then, the vision etched into his mind. The pale, luminescence of her skin, the swing of dark hair concealing her features from his eyes, but not her identity. Her scent filled his nostrils and his hands slide up her sides, across her ribs and sternum, till they cupped her breasts. Even as he filled her, she filled his sense in every way in return.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Cian’s hands felt so right: their callouses, their warmth. She arched to get closer, to create friction, her back as pliant as a reed bending in the wind in those first few circles of her hips. In this moment, he could have all of her, anything. The ends of her hair tickled Rhiannon’s lower back. Above her was a dark ceiling, but she’d swear it was speckled with stars.

She returned to him and draped herself against his torso. Mouth, teeth, open at the ball of his shoulder, sucking, biting, threatening to break the surface.

Rhiannon closed her eyes.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

His fingers worked through her hair as her teeth pressed into his skin, the intensity of the pressure enough to make him turn his head, his mouth finding her ear.

"Do it," he growled, his shoulder lifting a little, pushing her.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Her breath fanned across the damp skin. Yes, she would, she’d do it again and again, as often and as hard as he wanted, but first…

“Say please.”

She squeezed him tightly, intensifying pleasure, but slower. All her nerves were singing and it was harder to breathe. Her lungs prickled. He could say ‘please’, he could say ‘now’, he could say ‘Rhiannon’ like a warning, she didn’t care as long as he spoke to her in that gorgeous accent and gravelly tone. Her teeth engaged his shoulder again.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

A low groan of pleasure rumbled up from within him and his hips pressed upward, seeking more. It morphed into a growl as the syllables broke from his throat.

"An bhfuil sé, Rhiannon, marcáil dom mar do chuid féin. Toisc Tá mé."

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Not knowing what it meant but obeying the sound of his need, she let her sharpest teeth bite him hard, and then harder, until finally her tongue tasted of iron; it was a strange, querulous experience to hurt him and know that he wanted it. But he was a Were, and inside of him was an animal that relied on its teeth and claws, and so Rhiannon did what he would not do to her, although if he’d opened his jaws and borne down on her, Rhiannon knew she wouldn’t have stopped him. She was caught up, in love in a way she couldn’t process.

She dipped lower and bit him again, this time on his pectoral muscle. The angle restricted the fluidity of her hips.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Pain was a relative thing. In some instances it signaled danger, in others it was the path to growth, development, improvement, ultimately strength. The pain that seared through Cian's skin was all that and more. It was confirmation, and it was cleansing, a baptism of fire that branded his soul and sealed an already forged bond.

And it was the test of his control. He could feel Siofra and knew what awakened him, but instead of closing that door, keeping the separation that had kept his Were contained, he breathed, and felt a flood of awareness flow through him that he'd never known like this. His already heightened senses were moreso, his skin alive in ways he'd not imagined in this form, and his mind filling like a river beneath an opened floodgate.

His fingers clutched at her hair, dragging her head up, his eyes bright with awareness, glittering, as a soft growl emanated from his throat. He slowly drew her mouth to his, brushed his lips lightly across hers, a feather-light touch down to her jaw that followed the line of it to her neck as he lightly tugged on her hair, exposing her throat to him.

Now his tongue swiped down the pale, taut skin, lungs inhaling deeply as he continued down across collarbone and chest until he reached one breast. A hand cupped, tongue laved, and teeth lightly tugged on the taut nipple for a moment, before sucking harder, his hands moving down to her hips and thumbs sliding down the crease at the top of her thighs...

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon’s head fall back. Her cries were quiet, hoarse. To do anything else would mean oxygen she simply didn’t have. She clutched his wrists to keep his hands in place, then his elbows, his biceps. Did she beg him not to stop or only think it?

Faster she rocked. She wound her arms around Cian’s head and cradled him to her breasts as the intensity of an oncoming orgasm notched higher. Twice she thought she’d reached it, only to keep straining.

She reached for his face. “Let me see—god—show me.” Because she knew. She sensed a shift or something, a change in the core of Cian and Siofra that left him startled. He was Cian and suddenly more. Was it weird to ask for that? Fuck, she didn’t care. She wanted all of it. He had her permission to do – or be – any… any…

Rhiannon stiffened and spasmed.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Her fingers on his face felt different, and his head tilted back, eyes lifting until they reached her face, her eyes. Twice he'd felt her rise, almost reach that peak of pleasure only for the peak to ascend, and keep her striving. Each moment was etched with a diamond tip, carved into time and never to be forgotten.

When he felt her permission wash through him, he clenched his teeth, pushed the Were aside and reached up to drag her mouth down to his, lips closing on hers as he felt her climax, the pulsing grip of her body on him dragging him willingly over the edge. The fall was freedom, and he felt his release as something different from anything he'd ever experienced before.

And her willingness to take whatever he wanted was the acceptance of things he hadn't even imagined, and still didn't fully understand himself. As their mouths broke contact, their lungs' demands for air forcing the separation, his eyes opened and returned to her face.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon was too sensitive to move. Any slight change in how their bodies fit made her seize up, shivering anew, the nerves between her thighs so keenly awake that it registered as pain. She curled her fingers into his hair. His breath warmed her face. “What just happened?”

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

"I don't know," Cian replied, his breathing still a little heavy and his skin damp with perspiration. He blinked rapidly for a moment, then looked back up at her. "It w' like... " He paused, still trying to find a way to explain what had happened.

"Ev'ry inch o' me was both me, 'n him," he said, "'nd I c'ld... I can... feel him, still, 'nd what he's thinking." He shook his head lightly then added, "it w' like a door opened... no, a window, 'n the shades w' drawn back." He looked up at her again. "F' the first time I know him."

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

She nodded, though it was the vague understanding of a woman who could empathize only. Why it happened was a mystery. Was it the biting? A natural progression of his connection to the animal?

Or a third thing, like what she was wondering –

“Are you okay?” she asked, massaging the base of his neck.

– an idea that she might not be with a boyfriend, or a lover, but a mate?

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Her fingers on his neck, the words she said, their connection, and union at that moment made him shake his head. That wasn't what he'd meant to do, but it's what happened, and he closed his eyes for a long moment, just letting everything settle. Her touch, the movement of her fingers combined to keep him anchored as he felt the aftermath of it all and one thing became very clear to him.

These things, all of them, happened when they were together. The connection, the bond between them was what was triggering the revelations, the intensity of each event equal to the intensity of their union. This had never happened before, and inside his head he felt the restlessness of his Were as he imagined her leaving. It was then he opened his eyes and looked at her again.

"Y' can't go," he told her, "not now, not without us."

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon’s guts twisted. She kissed him and wiped wet hair from his forehead and temples. “I’m coming back, I swear.”

He couldn’t go where she was headed. Nothing would change her mind and convince her to put Cian on that radar. Physically Cian could take care of himself, but there were worse dangers – spiritual ones – and his past was rife with source material to exploit.

“I love you. I’m yours.”

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

He knew she was turning him down, and he wasn't surprised. If there was one thing he knew about her it was her need to protect others. And he didn't understand why she felt the need to protect him, or more to the point, what she was trying to protect him from.

And while he trusted her, he had no illusions about the man she was going after. He'd already proven himself to be a coward, and had managed to get to her twice. Cian did not want to learn in some second or third hand gossip, or news report, that he'd done it a third time.

"'nd I'm yours," he returned, shaking his head. "Nothin' and no-one's gonna change that, not even that mongrel bastard." He stared at her for a long moment before adding, "just remember, y' don't have t' do it on y' own."

[rhiannon_lee]

“I don’t have to.” Rhiannon rested her nose alongside Cian’s for a minute. “I need to.” She kissed him again, quickly, and lifted her weight from his legs. The bedroom air was uncomfortably cold as she backed away and felt for her clothes in the rumpled sheets. It was the kind of jolt she needed to get moving. She’d stop by the bathroom to clean herself up, dress, and drive out into the desert.

[cian_oneill]

His lips narrowed, a little with frustration but also with understanding. He'd done the same, all those years ago, and knew that feeling only too well.

He helped her find her clothes, the cool air not as uncomfortable to him, but enough to cause a light smattering of goosebumps where the perspiration still hadn't dried. He swung his legs over the side of the bed, reaching over to the drawer in the nightstand and pulling it open, a small box retrieved before he turned on the lamp there and stood. He took a hold of her shoulder and turned her so they were facing each other, lifting her hand and placing the box in her palm.

"T' help y' on this journey."

[rhiannon_lee]

With clothes draped over her arm, she stopped and let him spin her before escaping into the bathroom. Rhiannon opened the box in the lamplight and found a pendant of lapis lazuli wrapped in copper and suspended from a chain. “This is beautiful.” The color was peacock blue with tiny flecks of gold, and the surface had been polished smooth. In mysticism, most semi-precious gems had meanings and she knew that Cian would’ve given it to her with a specific one in mind. She set the box aside and fastened the clasp behind her neck.

“What’s it for?”

[cian_oneill]

He looked at it, resting against her skin, and felt a small sense of calm come over him. "If y' were t' ask Annie she'd say it's believed to counteract the wiles of the spirits of darkness and procure the aid and favor of the spirits of light and wisdom," he said, a smile curling one corner of his mouth as he remembered her words. "It's also believed t' offer protection, and help f' those seeking the truth."

He brushed his fingertip lightly over the blue surface. He'd also been told lapis was the most powerful of stones and it could help the wearer open a channel of communication. He leaned in a pressed a kiss to her forehead.

[rhiannon_lee]

Her throat thickened. Rhiannon gave him a tight smile. “Thank you.”

The bathroom light was stark and it hurt her eyes. She shut the door and covered them lightly. She gave her pupils time to adjust. The reflection in the mirror made her stare. It was her, Rhiannon as she’d always been, except that her cheeks and neck had flushed pink, her eyes were glassy, and her mouth was swollen. Cian’s fingers had put loose knots in her hair. There was a speck of blood at the corner of her mouth.

To be honest, it reminded her of how she looked after patrol, only that didn’t make her feel like this.

She cleaned up at the sink.

When she emerged, she was dressed again.

“Cian, I’m going,” she called.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

He'd been sitting on the edge of the bed, hands resting either side of him on the mattress. When he heard the door open he stood and walked out to the hallway, stopping in front of her. He reached out and took her hand, placing it on his chest as he looked at her.

"You come home," he said simply.

Re: Midnight Caller

[rhiannon_lee]

"I will."

Rhiannon's thumb moved back and forth.

"He's just a man. And he won't see me coming."

She kissed him and, after a tight squeeze, she pulled her hand free of his. At the door, she stuck her feet in her boots and picked up her backpack. She kept moving until she was outside and shaking her keys free of her pants pocket.

"Don't turn around," she coached herself. In the car she cranked the engine and rolled backwards out of the driveway.

A small black stone rattled in the ash tray.

Re: Midnight Caller

[cian_oneill]

Siofra sat on the deck at the top of the stairs, eyes unblinking as the tail lights disappeared into the dark. The only movement that might give a hint it wasn't in fact a statue was the slightest twitch of his nose. Once the tail lights had disappeared from sight, and the sound of the car's engine had faded even from his hearing, he moved, descending the stairs and crossing the road, heading into the dark of the night desert.