Last Chance
Part I
"You cannot walk any more - and yesterday, yesterday, you moved so slowly - "
He looked down at her, and his gaze was almost accusatory.
"You - you are dying."
At Sesshomaru's feet, pale, grey-streaked, faintly wrinkled, Rin nodded. It was difficult for her. She had been with him for thirty seven years, but now...
"Yes, Sesshomaru-sama. I think this is true."
He stared down at her, and his face was a comfort, as proud and cold as it had always been; his eyes were fierce, and there was anger in them. That, she could not bear. She could not die with him angry at her!
"Sesshomaru-sama, I am sorry. I do not mean to keep you here, your business is surely important - "
"Rin, be quiet now."
She was immediately, perfectly silent. She heard the grass rustle and his feet walking away from her; tears filled up her eyes and ran down her temples into her hair, the seashell curves of her ears. She could hear his voice, lower than she had ever heard it, so low she could not hear the words - but she heard Jaken's indignant squawk.
That much was the same as always; it comforted her. Yes...it was comforting, to think that he would never change; that he was as eternal, as unmoving as the earth beneath her feet - that he would be walking these fields in the endless, fathomless eons beyond her death....
"Rin, can you sit up?"
If she had had the strength, she would have been startled. She had been...dreaming? Yes. And he had not left her; of course, he would not. She did not want to disappoint him, but neither could she deceive.
"I am sorry, Sesshomaru-sama. I cannot."
She was completely unprepared when he lifted her, and carried her a short distance away. She turned her head and there was flickering warmth; she heard Ah-Un in the distance, and then felt the wind wash across her and scatter sparks out of the fire as the dragon took flight.
Sesshomaru carried her as lightly and easily as he had almost forty years before, when she had been a tiny child. He sat with her, and cradled her very delicately, close to the fire.
"I have sent Jaken to procure food and coverings for you. What medicine do you need, Rin?"
She blinked at him, took a deep, slow breath.
"I am not ill, Sesshomaru-sama."
Beneath the shadows in his eyes, where she had seen anger, she now saw confusion.
"But you are dying."
"Sesshomaru-sama, I am old."
"Old - "
"Yes, Sesshomaru-sama. More than forty, I think. More than forty- five."
"That is - that is - "
She was faintly surprised that he seemed so lost for words; he had known, must have known, that one day this would happen - but a moment's reflection made her understand.
"It is not much time at all. I know. I am sorry, Sesshomaru-sama."
"I told them they could not have you. Why would they think that has changed because of this little time?"
"Sesshomaru-sama?"
She questioned him faintly but he was staring silently into the fire and did not explain. She might have asked him one more time, but the crackle of the blaze beside them was soothing and the warmth of his arms was something she had never thought to know.
When she had fallen asleep, Sesshomaru turned his attention from the fire to her features, tracing all the little lines there with his eyes, trying to trace back the time that had passed...so little time, for him. And was this a human lifespan, was this the result of so much toil, so much effort?
Tragedy!
There was a painful tightness in his chest; it was worse the deeper he breathed. He knew it was because Rin was dying, and he did not like it.
And what, then, will it be like when she is gone?
Before his thoughts could formulate a single consequence, a single possibility, he had tightened his will with denial. As he had a hundred, a thousand times before, Sesshomaru decided it - Rin would not die. Let how and why sleep now, as she slept; uneasy questions in an uneasy rest.
Sesshomaru returned his attention to the fire, and did not notice his breathing slowing to match the rhythm of her breath, as if to keep track, to make sure that her living presence did not leave him in the night.
A memory came to him, fleeting as a spring breeze, and then stuck.
Once, when she was still a girl, she had asked him if he would remember her after she had died; he had not answered, but as the night fled quickly past him and he sat in quiet contemplation, he saw now in vivid imprint the meaning and the consequence of her question.
Forget?
No, he would not forget, never; he would remember in agonizing detail, every moment - from the first to the last -
There will not be a last.
As if the night itself held the promise of death, he stared out into it, coldly facing the dark, daring it to come, here, now, and fight him; he would not be defeated.
He had fought it before, and won - he had been to the depths of hell, and he had returned with her. Because she was his, and he had not yet decided to let her go; she belonged to him, body and soul.
"Sesshomaru-sama..."
He heard her murmur, and looked down at her, but she was still sleeping. He was pleased to know that even in her dreams, she was with him. She turned a little, rustled in his grasp; the paleness of her skin disturbed him. There was suddenly a wrinkle in Rin's sleeping forehead, a speeding murmur of disquiet in her heartbeat, and he leaned close to her, spoke softly.
"Rin."
The word was enough to calm her, to drive away the old nightmare, but he said it again for its own sake, for his sake.
"Rin..."
Before the night was over, Jaken returned and Sesshomaru glared him into complete and utter silence before he could make a single loud movement - before he could say a word about Rin, or her current position. Tenderly, with a certain awkwardness, Sesshomaru tucked the covers Jaken had brought around Rin, and felt her press closer to his chest.
He was glad that she wanted the heat of his body, that she was so eager to be close to him, so unafraid.
What a strange thing - to find it pleasant, this holding of her. Why didn't I do this...before?
In the faint purple light of dawn, Sesshomaru sat still and alone and contemplated for the first time the real question of Why - why, for thirty-seven years, he had allowed a human to follow him - a human who had been a girl, who had become a woman, who was now dying in his arms.
He had denied it, was still denying it, would deny it until the last, unalterable breath fled her body...
But he knew it was true.
She had not been able to stand at sundown; it was almost morning now, and a golden glow was rising in her skin, giving her the flush of her youthful beauty.
It was death, with its fingers pressed deep into her soul; death, summoning her life to the surface.
Why?
In the beginning - at that very first moment, it had been an experiment - that was all, merely a test of the power of his father's fang...and how useless, he had found it. How inconvenient, to possess a sword that did only the opposite of what a sword was supposed to do. And in the beginning - at that very first moment, he had not allowed anything; he had walked away...and she had followed.
If she had been garrulous, inquisitive, loud, frightened, scatterbrained, deceitful, irritating - if she had been any one of a thousand things, he would have killed her - at once, without hesitation, merely to be rid of the annoyance.
But she was not. Instead she was silent and utterly obedient, even without being told; she worshipped him, and then respected him, and then loved him; or perhaps, even then, it was all three at once. If he said run, she ran; if he said stop, she stopped - immediately, without question.
And slowly, so slowly, he had begun to order her, to protect her...as if, in some way, she were truly his, a part of him that belonged; as if at birth he had been scattered in pieces and now this piece, this most important piece, was returned to him - Rin.
Even now, thinking back on it with the most effort and concentration he could give to the task, Sesshomaru could not discover the reason, that it had changed. That he had changed. He had risked his own life for her, a human child; he had put his honor in her hands, and when once she had been stolen from him he had accepted the affront as the deadliest of insults - why, why?
He looked down at her, and measured the space of her breathing, the meter of her pulse. Slow, the drawing in of air; slow, the exhale.
Too quickly, the child had become a woman, but nothing had changed. She still stopped mid-step for him; when he walked in places where humans were prevalent, she stayed closer to him than her usual five paces, and he could always sense a tingling of scent from her that was the premonition of fear.
Only twice had he ever seen something uncertain, something human that he did not understand, fill her features; twice, when his brother's woman had given birth, first to a daughter and then to a pair of sons. Strange, the look in her eyes when she had held those children; strange, the look in her eyes, when she had looked at him afterwards.
The sun was creeping closer; the sky had lightened to pale blue and a yellow-touched pink, and still he was no closer to his answer.
Why had proved elusive, slippery and difficult to catch; in his hands for a moment, it seemed to wriggle free with a life of its own, and lose him in the wilderness of his own thoughts. Perhaps it was because once, she had offered him aid - without reason, without fear. Perhaps it was because after a time, he had grown accustomed to her scent. Perhaps it was because his life had disintegrated, day by day, into bored wandering; nothing in front of him, nothing behind.
Until she came.
Perhaps it was because he had been alone for a span of time he did not care to measure, because the taste of everything in his world had begun to lose its savor, because even the rush of battle had no longer been enough to move him. Not even with Inuyasha had he been able to call out the old fire; even hate wears out finally.
So - Why?
He wondered if perhaps it was all of those reasons and at the same time, none of them. Even all together, it did not seem like enough. He could trace his own steps, from the day he had found her right up until this present moment, and none of those steps was enough to explain why, now that she was dying, he, too, felt as if his life was slipping away.
The creeping sunlight spread its first rays over them, and he felt Rin stir weakly in his grasp; even now, as her eyes opened and she saw where she was, she had the grace to blush, to attempt to pull herself away.
"I am...sorry...Sesshomaru-sama."
The effort was almost too much for her. Her eyelids were fluttering rapidly; he could feel her heartbeat pounding faintly in her chest. Her eyes opened momentarily wide, and he felt a spasm shake her body, heard the flailing beat of her heart skip, and skip again, and then fall into a rough parody of its own rhythm.
Eyes wide, Sesshomaru thought that if this was the end, it was now his fault. He should have taught her long ago that there was no shame for him in her presence; no shame, no anger, no darkness in his feelings for her.
My own fault.
Too late, the icy shield of his dangerous pride was cracking, falling apart.
My fault!
"That cannot be the last thing you will say to me, Rin. Rin!"
He felt an incredible effort begin in her fingertips and move through her whole body.
With the end of her strength, the very last threads of her will, she lifted her mouth to his and kissed him. It was momentary; her lips were dry and barely touched him, but there was a lifetime's worth of joy in that kiss, and an equal weight of sorrow. He felt the breath leaving her body under his hands.
Something terrible was beginning to happen inside him; something was being torn -
"Love you, Sesshomaru-sama..."
"Rin -"
He was unexpectedly aware, as if the truth were illuminated in a blazing light, that why was not important at all, that his question was purposeless - that it was who that mattered, who, not why - and his who, his Rin, his Rin, was leaving him. She would not outlast the dawn-glow; he could see it in her face.
Like his pride, his denial shattered without warning.
He knew suddenly that this moment was his last chance, when an hour before he had not been aware of any chance at all. He fought the worst battle of his life in three seconds, against the painful tightness in his own throat.
"Rin - I love you, Rin."
He took a deep breath and found suddenly that his vision was blurry; he looked down at Rin's face and saw drops of water splashing on her forehead and cheeks; vaguely, he wondered when it had started to rain.
"I love you, Rin -"
And as he felt it breaking, leaving him as she was leaving him, he knew what it was that she had been for him, what it really meant that she was his most important piece.
"Rin, if you leave me now you will take away my heart."
She was smiling.
"Rin - Rin!"
She was silent.
"Rin!"
It was a silence that he knew would go on forever. He wanted no part of it.
A/N: .... complete angst, out of nowhere - this little ficlet has been SO LOUD in my head that it's pushed bloodlust and ukime and everything else out! It was going to be a one shot but the difference in mood between the scenes made me think it would work better in parts, so this is not quite finished; the second half will be up later tonight if I get a chance. Please Review!