Thank you for reading. This is my first story posted on FFnet. I promise to update soon.
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha or any variant thereof. Inuyasha is owned by Rumiko Takahashi.
Warning: This story has been rated with the possibility of citrus-y happenings in later chapters. I don't know at this point if it's going to happen or not. Thought I would be safe.
Chapter 1 – What the Dawn Brings
Kouga loped over the rise and stopped just within the treeline, the shrouded sun bringing up the rear. The rest of the pack stopped a few paces behind, red tongues lolling and sides heaving in the light mist of dawn. A faint scent touched their noses and every muzzle lifted to test the breeze. The fog seethed with the smallest hint of something new, foreign.
Kouga's lips lifted in a delicate snarl.
"Dogs."
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Kagome, lost in thought, and as usual pushing her bicycle along behind Inuyasha, suddenly stopped and turned to the east where the sun was barely a hand's breadth above the shoulders of the mountain range. Shippou, clinging to her shoulder in his customary fashion, turned with her to look eastward. His small paw waved in front of her eyes, a look of confusion crossing his tiny face.
"Kagome, you okay?" he asked, his paw waving frantically as concern pulled at the corners of his eyes.
"I sense Shikon shards. At least two, and very close." Kagome raised her hand to point into the east. "That way!"
"Ha!" Inuyasha grunted as he cracked his knuckles, his long fingers curling into iron fists. His long silvery hair brushed against Kagome's shoulder like a memory as he flashed past her, his strides lengthening until he was leaping thirty feet at a stretch. Within minutes he was a rapidly diminishing crimson and silver mote, visible only in flashes between the thin and ancient trees. Kagome heard a heavy sigh to her right and Sango was there, pulling her long ebony hair into a tail in preparation for the coming skirmish.
"Come on, Kagome. You can leave your bike here in the brush and ride Kilala with us." Sango gestured to Kilala, who had already grown to her full size, her white fangs bared in a half-snarl. Shippou was already perched between Kilala's fluffy ears. Kilala tossed her massive head, sending Shippou tumbling back onto her shoulder blades.
"Yeah, come on, Kagome! Let's go get those demons!" Shippou yelled enthusiastically, trying to right himself in his voluminous hakama. Sango sprang to Kilala's back, Hiraikotsu hanging from its strap across her shoulder. Kagome sighed to herself--she suddenly felt very tired--and walked her bike behind a stand of bushes, covering it as best she could. She strung her bow and gathered up her quiver and backpack, then heaved herself onto Kilala's broad back. The cat-demon sprang into the air, gouts of flame pulsing orange around her paws. In moments, they were hot on Inuyasha's impulsive trail.
At that moment, Miroku crested the hill behind them. He had stopped to watch a few village girls working in the rice paddies.
"Hey!" Miroku yelled from the ground, shaking his staff to attract attention. "What about me!"
"Sorry, Miroku!" Shippou yelled down to him. "Catch up quick, okay!" And with that they were off, the plumes of Kilala's tails only just visible between the treetops.
Miroku grunted in irritation, lowering his staff to the packed earth of the road. He glanced around for a moment, and then drew a small whistle from beneath his robes. He looked at it as if it were going to bite him, then sighed and put it to his lips, blowing a thin tune.
"I really didn't want to have to do this." Miroku sighed again as he put the whistle away. Moments later, a large shape crested the tops of the trees. It was bright orange, and shaped not unlike a squash.
"Hachi! Get your cowardly tail down here and pick me up!"
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Inuyasha skidded to a halt in a forest clearing, knocking the heads from several wildflowers as he passed. He tested the breeze as he began a slow circuit of the clearing, condensation settling in his pale hair where he parted the mists like a razor. The forming dampness trailed from his hair and flicked from his ears with every sensitive twitch, the drops pattering on the blades of velvety grass beneath his feet. His haori was already damp and he was thoroughly annoyed. Already he was losing the strange scent he had tracked and having outrun the rest of his group he had no way of finding the shards.
"Damn!" he swore, sinking to the ground with a growl of irritation lodged deep in his chest. Inuyasha never caught the scent of wolves behind him, as they had maneuvered with the wind to keep their scent from him, and none had crossed into the clearing. Fifteen pairs of golden eyes regarded the inu hanyou along with a single pair of eyes the color of the summer sky beneath a fringe of jet black hair. A red tongue slid between a pair of sculpted lips, just before those lips rose in a cruel smile, exposing a mouthful of pearly, sharp teeth.
The newcomer tested the wind again in all directions, the morning breezes tickling his ears and nose and causing them to twitch in a way Kouga thought very amusing. Kouga watched as the hanyou—for what else could he be with those absurd, albeit fetching ears---flapped his crossed legs in vexation while conflicting scents invaded his sensitive nose.
Kouga knew what the golden-eyed hanyou was detecting. All his senses now told him that there were many wolves encircling this clearing, but he could not tell how many or precisely where they were due to the fact that Kouga had instructed the wolves to move silently around the clearing at varying intervals.
Kouga crouched, stifling a giggle as the hanyou suddenly flipped up onto his hands and knees and began to sniff the ground in earnest. Suddenly, the dog-boy threw back his head and growled at the sky.
"Kagome!" he yelled, at the top of his lungs to an otherwise ignorant morning sunrise.
What kind of stupid name is Kagome Kouga wondered, flipping an errant strand of silky hair out of the way. Stupid halfbreed probably hangs out with a bunch of humans! Real dog demons wouldn't be caught dead around him.
Suddenly a large cream-and-sable shape, larger than one of the horses the humans used, burst over the treetops in a flurry of unnatural flame. Astride its back sat two human females and what appeared to be a fox-demon kit. One female was dressed as a demon slayer, her hair caught back in a tail as long and luxuriant as Kouga's own. The other was strangely dressed, in a scandalous skirt, much to short to be worn by any human female Kouga had seen. She carried a bow over one shoulder and a quiver bristling with well-made arrows, so she must have been some sort of priestess. In a skirt that short? A priestess of what? Kouga thought.
She must also have been this Kagome the halfbreed was yelling for, because she was just then railing at him while he stood there with his nose in the air and his hands tucked into the sleeves of his ridiculous red haori. The demon slayer moved off to inspect the rest of the treeline. The kit stayed close to the cat-demon, and fixed the hanyou and the human girl with a worried stare. The hanyou's gaze shifted to the demon slayer as she neared the trees.
"Sango, be careful. There are wolves here, but I can't sniff how many."
"But I sense a demonic aura," the one called Sango protested.
"Wolf demons," the hanyou clarified, turning to look over his left shoulder at the sheltering, silent trees. The white-haired dog-boy put his hand to the hilt of his crusty, outdated sword and stepped towards the treeline. The huge cat-demon moved toward the trees at an angle. It was just a matter of time before the hanyou and his humans got close enough to begin seeing or sensing individual wolves, so Kouga figured the time was right to quit playing and have some real fun. She adjusted her breast-plate over her chest, cracked her cruelly-taloned fingers, and strode out into the burgeoning sunlight.
"Hey, Dog-breath!" she yelled, stopping in a cocky stance that belied her years. This was not a demon that had seen only a few battles. This was a warrior, used to winning.
The assembled group turned to stare as the treeline melted into the forms of at least a dozen slavering wolves. Their red tongues lolled patiently. Here and there one flicked up to lick a muzzle damp with anticipation. One young one, barely out of his first hunt, whined anxiously, sensing it was time to begin the chase. The hanyou and the humans stopped in their tracks, hands flying to weapons and taking up defensive stances. Oh no, they did not like these odds and Kouga could sense it. The last of the mist burned away in the space of a few heartbeats while the pack regarded their prey, and the prey regarded her pack. Now was the time to break the tension.
"Wanna play?"