Only in Rhy'Din could you possibly find a glorified librarian with enviable stamina, strength, and agility. And only on Rhy'Din could that glorified librarian be regularly knocked on his *ss by a skinny little slip of a born-to-kill girl. As Taylor entered his uncle's - for lack of a better word - office one warm afternoon, he was met by the Slayer, Shen Lei, making her own way out. She looked fresh as a daisy, flashing him one of those not-quite-grins on her way past, and headed out the door, whistling to herself. The reason for her mirth was soon obvious - downstairs, in the training hall, Rufus was lying flat on his back, soaked with sweat, gasping for breath as he gazed dizzily at the ceiling. Another successful training session, it seemed.

"Huh, Lucy Liu kick your *ss again?" Taylor asked with obvious dry humor as he entered his uncle's "office" to find him laid out, flat on his back. He leaned over to offer the older man a hand. "I guess asking you to spar is out of the question. Want me to get you some Excedrin?" he asked as he grabbed hold of Rufus' hand to help him up.

"One of these days," his uncle puffed painfully, "I'm going to make you spar with her. See how cocky you are then." He seized Taylor's outstretched hand and heaved himself to his feet, revealing that he wasn't as exhausted as he first appeared. "Good God, I think she tried to remove my spine through my ears this time." He bent over, hands on his knees, and stretched his back out for a moment before straightening to his full height. "Come on, out with it. You know you won't feel right unless you get to take the piss out of the old man."

Taylor snorted in reply. "I have a rule. No hitting girls. You taught me that one, remember" Unless they're trying to kill you. Then it's okay to make an exception." He frowned a little as his uncle seemed willing to take him up on the challenge so soon after getting his *ss handed to him by a girl. Granted she was a trained and experienced slayer, but that was beside the point. "Actually, I didn't come here to practice. I need to talk to you about something." Or someone.

Rufus nodded, relieved that Taylor wasn't going to jump straight into that suggestion of his. "Well, then," he said, taking a deep breath to finally even out his respiration. "Upstairs. Tea. Unless you'd rather have that godawful muck you call coffee instead. Miranda's not expecting me back for a few hours, you have all the time you need. I hope."

Taylor snickered, amused at his uncle's preference for tea, even after all these years away from his native England. "Can't take the English out of the Englishman, even in Rhy'Din," he remarked with a fond smile on his face. Rufus was the closest thing he'd ever come to a father figure in his life. "I can suffer a cup of tea for your sake."

The older man chuckled, wiping the sweat from his face and neck with a towel as he lead the way back up the stairs and into what had been until fairly recently his own apartment. While the basics were still there, including the vast array of books from his "personal" library, there was no mistaking the fact that Rufus had definitely moved out. "How is life treating you? Busy shifts?" he asked, shucking out of his t-shirt and into a relatively clean shirt on his way to the kitchen.

Taylor remained quiet a moment longer than necessary, knowing his uncle would notice. There was something on his mind, something important, something that couldn't keep any longer. "It's been seven years, Uncle," he said, also knowing that he might understand what that meant.

The silence was enough to remind Rufus of what he should have been asking, but Taylor's quiet comment rammed it home. He sighed, his stance and expression softening as he leaned against the kitchen counter, looking over at his nephew with infinite sympathy and patience. "I know," he said, just as quietly. "It isn't your fault, Taylor. They left virtually no trace for you to follow. Have you found the survivor?"

"I must have missed something," Taylor replied with a frown of his own. All those lives lost. Again. But then Rufus was asking another question, and that was the real point of his visit. "Yes. A girl, this time. You're not gonna believe it, but she's related to your Miranda. A niece, I think, or a cousin. Her name's Kaylee. Do you know her?" Taylor asked from across the room, hands shoved in his jeans pockets for lack of something better to do with them.

"We both missed something, if there was even something to miss," Rufus told him firmly, refusing to let Taylor blame himself for this latest crop of gruesome and entirely unnecessary deaths. And then his nephew dropped a minor atomic bomb into the conversation. "Bloody hell." Rufus twisted, dropping heavily onto the nearest stool at the counter, one hand rising to rub his forehead. He'd not met the girl himself, but the Grangers seemed to consider her the lightest part of them, a mini-Miranda in some ways. "No, I've not met her," he said finally, shaking his head. "There's been some concern that she hadn't been calling home recently, but I never thought ....Damn it, I should have tied things together!"

It was Taylor's turn to do the comforting, it seemed, knowing it wasn't his uncle's fault. It wasn't anyone's fault really, except for those responsible. "How could you have known" No one could have known. I don't know why they picked her. We may never know how they choose their victims, but I can't let this happen again. We can't let this happen again," Taylor added vehemently. The hatred he felt toward his and Kaylee's tormentors was hard to hide, etched on his face, in the hard, angry look in his eyes.

Rufus ground his teeth, but kept his anger in for the sake of the young man who was already simmering with an awful lot of unexpressed rage. "You're right, we can't," he agreed. "I'll get back to the books; I had a new shipment in last week, perhaps there is something new in there. Ideally, though, we could do with getting access to the location they used this time. Who knows what we could pick up from there?" He sighed, rubbing a hand through his hair, tea forgotten. "How is she doing?"

Taylor shrugged his shoulders and dropped heavily onto a stool. Now that the discussion had turned to Kaylee, all the anger went out of him. There were several ways he could answer that, but honesty was the best policy, no matter how difficult it might be. "To be honest, she's a mess, which is encouraging really. I'd be worried if she wasn't a mess, all things considered. She's been staying with me. She doesn't want to go home. Not yet, anyway. I think she's afraid what her family will think."

"Nothing good has happened in my life in seven years, Uncle," Taylor pointed out sadly. There wasn't exactly true, but it was close. His life had consisted mostly of work and research and training. He'd had little time for much else, and hadn't even met Bethany yet - his own flesh and blood. "I want a life like everyone else. Why is that so much to ask?" It was the first time in seven years Taylor had expressed a wish such as this. Maybe there was hope for him yet.

"I beg to differ." For the first time, Rufus smiled, moving away to sit once again. "I see something very good happening right now. For seven years, you've been a completely closed book. You haven't trusted anyone, or allowed anyone to see you falter. And now you're opening yourself up to someone who needs to see it, who needs to know she isn't alone. Someone who, I understand, needs to feel loved as much as she needs to love in return. How is that not a good thing, Taylor?"

"It's not a good thing because..." Taylor trailed off, unsure how to answer that. Because why' Because he was afraid of getting hurt or because he was afraid of hurting someone else? Or was it something else? It was true. He hadn't let anyone get close in seven years - no one but Rufus, not until now. "What if she doesn't like what she sees" What if she finds out I'm not who she thought I was" I haven't told her everything yet. I haven't told her how obsessed I am with this-this whole vengeance thing. I want it to be over. I want to move on with my life, but I'm scared, Uncle. It's all that's kept me going the last few years, knowing that someday I'm gonna find them and stop them, even if it takes my whole life. But when happens then" I don't remember how to live a normal life anymore."

Rufus sighed, eying his nephew with a certain amount of resignation. "What, exactly, is normal, Taylor?" he asked, making a point he hoped the younger man would get without having it hammered through his skull the hard way. "Do I have normal" I don't think I do. But I am happy with what I have. Don't aim for something that doesn't exist. So long as you are happy with where you are and who you are with, that is all that matters. Normal can take a running jump."

"How do you do it, Rufus?" Taylor asked, just barely managing to keep a lid on his emotions, which were running pretty high. "How do you manage a wife and a home and a family and still do what you do?" What Taylor really wanted to know was how he managed to juggle it all and still remain sane. Not only that, but how he managed to keep his private and professional lives separate"

"I found a way." The older man smiled ruefully, shaking his head. "I know that isn't very helpful. What works for me may not work for you. I spent twenty-four years devoting my life to the Council, and then to Lei. I had absolutely nothing else in my life. And then Miri found me again, and I made damn sure she wasn't going to be pushed out of my life a second time. I keep my work, my dangerous side, here. This is where I work with Lei, this is where I do my research, this is where I delve into the supernatural. And I leave it all here when I go home to the woman I love. She is what keeps me sane, Taylor. I've built my world around her, and it seems to work."

"But Miranda isn't part of what you do," Taylor pointed out. "She's separate from it. She's your-your saving grace, so to speak. Kaylee wants revenge as much as I do. Justice. Closure. But I don't want her to get hurt. I need to protect her, just like you protect Miranda." The young man was clearly confused and looking for someone older and wiser to help him sort it all out.

"Kaylee doesn't need protecting, not in the same way Miri does," Rufus tried to explain to him. "I'm not saying don't protect her, but you can't keep her separate, not without hurting her. So I would suggest giving her the means to stand beside you, to support you in the way that you intend to support her. You both need to see it done, when we get to it, or you'll always doubt that it happened. So perhaps you should reconsider your definition of protection, Taylor."

Taylor seemed to digest that a moment. He didn't want that kind of life for Kaylee, but then, he didn't really want that kind of life for himself either. He'd become an EMT because he wanted to help people, not hurt them. He wasn't like Rufus or Lei, and though he understood what they were doing and why, he didn't want to live the rest of his life hunting the things that went bump in the night. He just wanted closure. "I'll talk to her. See what she wants to do." Rufus was right about one thing - Taylor couldn't decide for her; Kaylee had to make her own decision about things, and he would have to support whatever decision she made.

Rufus smiled gently, rising to his feet to cup his hand to Taylor's neck, looking down into the other man's eyes honestly. "Have a little faith," he suggested. "Grangers are a hardy breed. Let her blossom and see where she takes you. You might surprise yourself."

Taylor followed his uncle's movement, unflinching at the fatherly touch he offered and meeting his gaze head on. "I'm trying," he replied solemnly. It had been a long time since he'd had faith in anyone or anything, besides his uncle, and a long time since he'd given anyone his trust.

"And you'll succeed," Rufus assured him. "You're stubborn enough. Just like your mother." His smile turned just a little sad as he thought of his sister, long dead now, but he rallied, turning that sadness easily to pride in the man her son had become. "She would be very proud of you, Taylor. I hope you know that."

Taylor smiled back at his uncle at the mention of his mother, and more so at the thought that she might have been proud of the man he'd become, feeling that old familiar ache in his heart whenever he thought of her. He missed her everyday, more than words could say, but he knew if anyone could relate to that, it was Rufus. "A little ironic me falling for another Granger, don't you think?" he asked with that hint of a smile that showed there might be hope for him yet.

"Shows you've got good taste," his uncle chuckled, patting his shoulder. "Now ....still want that tea, or would you like to come up to the Grove for dinner?" He paused, frowning a little. "Perhaps I should save that invitation for another time, though."

Taylor's eyes widened, startled by the invitation to dinner, quickly agreeing with his uncle that it was a little too soon for that, and not just because of Kaylee. "I'll take you up on the cup of tea, if the offer is still open, but I think I'll pass on dinner for now. Besides, you owe me a story, I think. I want to hear everything I can about Bethany before I meet her."

"She hasn't returned his feelings" Or doesn't she know yet?" Miranda asked, looking for some insight of her own. "This has to end, Rufus. He can't keep living like this and neither can she. They deserve better." She was referring to this hunt of theirs, which she understood the necessity for, but worried that it had gone on far longer than it should. She had seen the effects such a life had on her own husband, and now it was starting to effect both his nephew and her cousin. Though it was no fault of his and she didn't blame him for it, she wanted it to end before someone else got hurt. "God, Kaylee and Taylor" I couldn't have predicted that one if I'd tried." But then, she couldn't have predicted Jason and Bethany either. Desmond and Piper were another story. She was happy to take full credit for that coupling.

"He doesn't want to hope too much, but he's already invested in her," Rufus sighed softly. "I don't know how she feels, and neither does he. They're sharing a bed, if that helps you at all. As to the other ....the only way it will end is with blood. We need to find these creatures and put an end to their ritualistic behavior once and for all, and to do that, we need Kaylee able to think about it without distressing herself over much. Two months is a little soon, and frankly, I'd rather give Taylor time to trust that his heart isn't going to be broken before I ask them to stand beside Lei and attack."

"Yes, well, that's all fine and dandy, but it has to be finished before another seven years passes. Have you considered a witch?" Miranda asked, hardly believing she was actually suggesting such a thing.

"I would rather keep this in the family, Miri," he told her, quiet but firm. "Those two have been exploited enough by magical types. All I need is the location of the house Kaylee was kept in. Once I have that, there is a relatively simple spell that will identify the creatures and mark a trail to their hibernating site. Then Lei can go in and have herself a neat little massacre."

Miranda chewed at her lip, considering her husband's words. He was the expert, after all, and knew what was best. "How soon does it need to be done before the spell will no longer work?" she asked, curiously, wondering how much of this had been passed along to Taylor. She didn't want to rush Kaylee or cause her any further harm, but it seemed this was all dependent on a girl who might never be able to give them the information they needed.

Rufus stiffened, not really wanting to discuss this with his wife, wanting to keep her safe from the truth of what had really happened, what they wanted to prevent from happening again. But this was her family business as much as his. "Angel, you've heard me talk about the stone tape theory, yes" The theory that a place that has witnessed high emotion holds onto the memory and can replay it?" He sighed, scratching his forehead with a thumbnail. "Forty-two people have been murdered in one house over seven months. One person lived through it all and suffered terrible emotional trauma because of it. That house will replay that memory for me, even if it takes me two hundred years to find it."

"Gods, Rufus. Forty-two people?" Miranda paled again. This was the reason Rufus kept these things from her, she knew. The dark side of his life terrified her and always had, but this wasn't about her - it was about Kaylee and Taylor, two young people they both held very dear. "All right," she relented with a sigh, silently admitting that she knew very little about this business and was happier not knowing, trusting him to handle it his own way, to do what he did best, though she would be there to pick up the pieces, if she had to. "I trust you, Rufus. If anyone can help them, I know you can," she told him, a weak smile on her face, leaning in to brush her lips against his, warmly and affectionately.

He kissed her tenderly, wrapping her in his embrace. He knew that telling her those details might have been a little much, but he thought she needed to know so that she trusted that he was doing the right thing. Holding her close, he brushed another kiss to her temple. "We will see how it goes," he said quietly, "but Kaylee could probably do with someone to talk to. Not about this - she has Taylor for that. No, she'll need someone to talk to about Taylor. I can't think of anyone better suited than you, angel."

Miranda frowned with a sigh. This was really something he should be asking of Kaylee's mother, but Jay had always been more than a little neglectful of her children. Thankfully, Humphrey had not. She went over the list of possible confidantes in her head with Caroline coming to mind at the top of the list, but Caroline was busy with her own family, as well as running GrangerGuild, and Miranda seemed to have assumed the role of family matriarch somehow. "All right," she agreed, wanting to help in any way she could, even if it was just being there to listen. "Maybe we should have them over to dinner sometime. They should really meet Jason and Bethany, too, but I think that should be a separate matter. Maybe I could take her to lunch," she suggested, mulling aloud the possibilities.

"Maybe you could just call her, love," Rufus suggested gently. He knew she wanted to make everything better for Kaylee, but he'd been through this with Taylor. It wouldn't be rushed. "It doesn't have to be for long. Just call her, remind her you're here for her, and suggest that perhaps you could meet her for lunch somewhere, or take lunch to her. She's very wary of shadows and darkness, angel, and will be for a long time. Any outing has to have her home before the shadows lengthen too much."

She nodded again. "Yes, all right. I can do that. Do you think they'd be interested in going to Tommy and Lena's wedding or is it too soon for that?" It wasn't so much that Miranda was trying to push the pair into a social situation that they might not yet be ready for, but she thought it might be good for them to spend a little time on the beach, in the sun and surf. What better way to chase away the shadows that haunted their nights"

"Perhaps they'll stop by, if they know the time and date, and location," her husband mused, not wanting to disappoint her too much. He frowned, realizing that there was something he hadn't told her. "She's not unscathed physically, Miri. She'll have scars for the rest of her life, rows of claw marks on her back and stomach and sides. It will take time for her to be brave enough to enjoy the sun the way she used to."

There was that look of shock on Miranda's face again, but she was glad Rufus had told her. This was something she could help with, and it was better she knew sooner, rather than later. "But not on her face," Miranda said, hoping to God that wasn't the case.

He shook his head. "No, not her face." He considered for a moment. "I can only go by what I know of Taylor's experience, and others, but her face, her neck, her arms, her lower legs, are all unmarked. They wanted her fear and her pain, not her life."

"Jesus, Rufus," she gasped, frowning in sympathy and compassion, but Miranda was never one to dwell on things too long, preferring to find problems to solutions, rather than wallow in them. "There are solutions to that problem. Creative solutions. Kaylee is a lovely girl. I'm sure I could come up with something she'd find attractive and modest that would cover her..." She faltered a moment, before continuing, choosing her words wisely. "Her flaws."

"Well, there's your in, then," Rufus pointed out. "It's a light enough subject that it won't hurt her to talk about, especially since it's your area of expertise, and it naturally leaves an opening for her to confide in you. You, my love, are a genius."

Miranda chuckled, realizing something Rufus did not, but there was no humor in it. "Well, it's not like I can exactly call her up and say, 'Hey, Kaylee, I heard you have scars. Want me to come by and measure you up for a new wardrobe to cover those up"' I mean, really, Rufus."

He chuckled. "You know what I mean, love," he pointed out, poking at her side for a moment. "Taylor will tell her he's spoken to me, and that I'll be speaking to you. There shouldn't be any shock on either side when you get in contact."

She rolled her eyes, wondering if her very handsome, very alpha-male husband had ever heard of a little thing called tact. Fortunately, that was something that came naturally to Miranda. "Alright, I'll call her in a day or two, but I am not going to call her to ask if she needs a fitting!" she told him, poking him back.

"You've lost me with all your techno-babble, angel," he teased, moving to his feet and pulling her up with him. "Enough about sad things and supernatural things for one evening. Let's go home. I have a chocolate mousse in the fridge I've been dying to paint you with and lick it all off. Slowly." He grinned, leaning down to kiss his wife with as much enthusiastic passion as he'd ever shown when he was young.

"Oh, chocolate mousse!" she giggled girlishly as he pulled her to her feet. "Sounds kinky, Rufio," she grinned. "Hit me with your best shot!" She sank into his kiss, as toe-curling as it was, sighing dreamily, like a teenager falling in love all over again.

"Well, come on then." He patted her rear end, ushering her toward the door with a laugh, fully intending to take her mind so entirely off the conversation they had just had that it would not come back to her until tomorrow. Taylor and Kaylee could wait one more night before his darling wife began to quietly scheme and plot. Who knew" Perhaps they were having a frank discussion at this moment, perhaps not. Right now, Rufus didn't care. He had a lover of his own to enjoy.

((Clouds pass by, the blue remains constant. Here's hoping all involved can cling to that!))