Niamh—Secrets In The Water

	For her nineteenth birthday, Niamh ran away from home.  She had spent half the morning cleaning out her grandmother's stables with a splintery-handled shovel and all she had gotten was a blister.  After she slipped on a patch of piss-soaked straw, and dumped yet another shovelful of muck all over her legs, she lost her temper.  The shovel handle broke when she hurled it against the wall, and she was over the top of the gate and outside before she could think twice.  Saoirse would be angry with her later, but all she wanted now was cold water and someone to talk to.  Ciara had agreed to meet her at their hidden pool in time for lunch and she had a feeling her vixen was already there.
	It wasn't too far to their meeting place, even on foot.  But it was some distance from the main road, and required a fifteen minute detour around a patch of sinkholes and thistles that no sensible rabbit would cross.  From there it was a short trek down a steep hill to a little grove of trees that kept their little secret.  Other people came across it from time to time, but nobody bothered to remember where it was.  There wasn't anything there but shallow water and a few flowers.
	She stopped just outside the circle to get her breath back, and let the pain in her hip fade.  Before she had broken her leg, she had been able to run the whole way and not notice it.  But now she had gotten fat and this disgusted her.  It wasn't her fault she had fallen off the horse or that she hadn't been allowed to move much while it healed.  But she could have refused the chocolates that Ciara kept sneaking in through the window.  Except that it would have hurt the poor vixen's feelings.
	Once the pain in her side subsided she stretched to feel the late-morning sun soak into her muscles.  She yawned, sleepy with the heat and tilted her head up to keep her shoulders loose.  There was a lingering stiffness in her shoulders from the mornings work but even that didn't seem so bad anymore.  After spending so long in bed, it felt good to be able to move again.  When she stepped inside the circle of trees the cool shadows felt as good on her body as the sun and she shut her eyes to smell the flowers that grew here.
	A twig snapped above her.  She looked up in time to see a darker shadow blotting out the sky above her.  Niamh squeaked and threw up her arms to protect herself but too late.  Ciara landed on top of her, knocking her flat and it was only lucky the grounds was so soft here.  Niamh grabbed Ciara around the waist, meaning to push the vixen off, but Ciara just giggled and pushed her back down again.
	Ciara was a little vixen, smaller than any rabbit in town, with violet eyes, large, black-tipped ears and a strange sense of humor.  She was all muscle, though, and she had always been stronger than Niamh, even before Niamh had broken her leg.
	“Good morning, bunny,” she said.
	Niamh slapped her on the hip, and licked her stinging fingers.
	“I wish you’d learn to just say hello, like a normal person,” she said.
Ciara grabbed Niamh's hand, pulled her up and held her close, still grinning and lolling her tongue.  The girl was panting slightly from the heat, and her breath smelled of peppermint.
	“You know your life wouldn’t be nearly as interesting if I didn’t,” she said.
	“It would save me the cost of doing laundry, though.  I just got the grass stains out of these pants.”
	“I'll do them for you.”
	“And have you burn the bottom out of another pair of pants with your ironing?  Soap is cheaper than clothes.  Are we going swimming or not?”
	Inside the circle of trees was a cool, shallow pond.  Ciara had found it during her second summer in Oseille and had brought Niamh to see it.  They had played there as children and still visited from time to time when they wanted privacy.  As soon as they were under the trees, Ciara stripped all of her clothes off, and flung her shirt and pants into the bushes.  Ever since Niamh had known her, Ciara had hated wearing clothes.  Nudity, she’d said, was the natural state.  But the little vixen had the body for it. The only thing Ciara kept on was her necklace, which she never took off.
	Ciara squatted on the bank and splashed  water over herself, pouring it over her head with a cup they kept there for bathing.  Then, dripping, she rose up on her toes and pranced in the mud.  Her fur flashed red and gold in the patches of sunlight that filtered through the branches, and her tail streamed out behind her like a ribbon.  She grinned as she spun closer beckoned for Niamh to join her.
	“Come into the water, bunny, get the mud out of your fur,” she said.
	“In a minute.  When my leg feels better,” said Niamh.  
	It wasn't really much of a lie.  There was always an ache in her hip which never quite  faded.  Mostly, she just wanted to watch Ciara a little longer.  Ciara wasn't a beautiful vixen.  She was scrawny and flat-chested, and her fur was always tangled, no matter how much Niamh combed it for her.  But she carried herself with a certain grace, and she didn’t gave a damn what anyone thought of her.  Better yet, she didn't expect anything of anyone else.  Niamh had fallen in love with her for that.
	Eyes closed, Ciara whirled towards her in an amateurish pirouette.  When the girl was an arm's length away, her foot tangled in the grass and she fell with a yelp.  Niamh managed to catch her, and in the fumble, her hand pressed against Ciara’s left breast.  The heat of embarassment rose in her ears, but she couldn’t stop her fingers closing on the nipple.  It was hard and slick from Ciara's bath, and she rolled it a little in her fingers, marvelling at the feel of it.  Ciara yipped a little when she squeezed to hard, and she remembered to snatch her hand away.
	“I’m sorry,” she said “I didn’t mean that.  I-“
	Ciara put a finger over Niamh’s mouth and they stood still for a moment, looking at each other.  Ciara’s eyes were bright, and she had one ear cocked to the side, but her expression was unreadable.  Just when Niamh thought she might bite her jsut to make her say something, Ciara smiled a little and swished her tail.
	“You’re much too full of surprises for a rabbit,” she said.
	Ciara pulled Niamh to her and replaced her hand with her mouth.  They kissed for a long time.  Ciara's tongue was soft and tasted of peppermint.
	“As birthday presents go, that beats the hell out of a book,” said Niamh.  
	They kissed again, and she felt Ciara’s hand slip inside her shirt and slide over her breasts, teasing with her nails.  Heat rose in her belly, and she returned to her own explorations.
	“I thought you might like it,” said Ciara.
	They made love in the mud on the bank of the pond.  They were both still a little shy with each other and they were both clumsy and halting.  But Ciara was encouraging and, after a little while, Niamh grew bolder.

	The pond was so shallow at the bank that they could both sit on the bottom without being submerged.  Niamh lay against the bank while Ciara scrubbed the mud out of her fur with a clump of grass.  Neither of them was certain what to say.  They had been close since the day they met, but Niamh had always assumed that was as far as it would ever go.  She didn’t think she was an attractive doe, let alone someone who could excite that kind of passion in her best friend.  She was too fat, her breasts were too big, and her fur was an unexciting brown color.  But Ciara's enthusiasm had changed her mind.
	“I've never seen you trip in your life,” she said.
	“It was easier than asking,” said Ciara.
	The girl drooped her ears a little and concentrated on a stubborn patch of mud on her ankle.  Surprised at her embarassment, Niamh chewed at the tip of a claw.
	“You would have done just fine,” she said.
	When Ciara was finished with her leg Niamh started on her back, where Ciara hadn’t been able to reach.
	“Have you ever wanted to leave?” said Niamh.
	“Ever since I got here.  If I hadn’t had you to get into trouble with, I don't think I would have been able to stand it,” said Ciara.
	Niamh scrubbed harder, scratching at the drying mud with her claws which made Ciara arch her back and squirm with pleasure.
	“I wouldn’t know where to go.  Oseille’s dull but it’s safe.  That’s a lot more than can be said for anywhere else,” said Niamh.
	“I’m sick to death of dull and safe.  All you get here are nosy rabbits who don’t have enough to do,” said Ciara.
	  When Niamh was finished, Ciara sighed and flopped against her, resting her head on Niamhs’s shoulder.  Niamh slipped her arms around Ciara’s midriff and teased the white fur across her stomach, drawing abstract patterns there with her finger.
	 “What about Cearnach?  That sounds like an interesting place,” she said.
	“You don’t want to go there,” said Ciara.
	“Why not?  I’m sure it’s not as bad as some of the stories make out, and you know I’m not afraid of foxes“
	Ciara shook her head and bared her teeth a little.
	“I’ve heard the same stories.  They aren't true, but only because they aren't bad enough,” she said.
	Niamh’s stomach growled, which made Ciara smile again.  Easing out of Niamh’s embrace she stood, a little stiffly, and bent backwards until something popped in her hip.
	“We’ll take on the world tomorrow.  For today, let me buy some lunch for my bunny,” she said.
	Ciara shook the water out of her fur and vanished into the bushes to find her clothes.  Niamh sat for a while longer, feeling too pleasantly tired to move.  She finally stirred when her stomach growled again and got up to find her own clothes.  She had dropped them in the grass where they wouldn’t get wet.
	She winced at the mild stab of pain in her hip when she stood up.  The break hadn’t been clean, and the doctor had said that her leg would probably always hurt.  It wasn’t a long walk to Oseille from the pond, but she was still wary of putting too much stress on her leg.  While she waited for Ciara to come back she sat crosslegged under the tree where they’d met, to rest as much as possible before they started back.
	Ciara came back with a grin on her face, knotting her shirt under her modest breasts to let her fur dry.  When Niamh started to get up, Ciara swatted her with the tips of her fingers.
	“Just wait,” the girl said.  
	Turning back the way she came, Ciara barked something in the vulpine language that Niamh didn't understand.  She was answered by a whinny from the other side of the circle of trees, and Embarr trotted into the clearing.  He circled the pond, tail raised like a flag, and stopped next to Ciara.  She reached up to scratch his ears, and he bumped her shoulder with his muzzle.
	“Does he follow you everywhere?” said Niamh.
	“He sulks if I leave him behind,” said Ciara.
	She scratched Embarr harder, which made him lower his head so she could do it better.  When his head was low enough, she took a double pawful of mane and clucked her tongue at him.  This made him start forward, and she gave a little jump and pulled herself up on his back.  He spun in a little circle while she made herself comfortable, and they stopped next to where Niamh was sitting.
	“You didn’t think I was going to make you walk to Oseille, did you?” she said.
	Niamh got carefully to her feet and wondered if there was any way to make Ciara change her mind.  She didn't mind horses from the ground, but she wasn't sure she was ready to get back on one yet.
	“I don't mind, really.  I need to stretch my legs a little more, you know,” Niamh said.
	“You’ll be okay.  You won’t fall off, I won't let you,” Ciara said.
	“That's what you said the last time,” Niamh said.
	But outside the circle of trees, it was already too hot to breathe, and she wasn't really eager to walk all the way to Oseille.  So when Embarr circle around again, she threw her arms across his back and pulled herself up behind Ciara.