A/N: Okay, working this story, especially in the beginning, is difficult! I took notes on Inuyasha: Swords of an Honorable Ruler some time ago, so I have those, but the movie is not that fresh in my mind. Those notes include: humans know about Inutaisho (IT). He's coming. Takemaru Osetsuna? IT—"Not long for this world." Izayoi says "Run."Hiding true desire? Takemaru calls her on it. Takemaru loves her. IT "stole her away." So'Unga, eras of slaughter. IT died 200 years ago—Inuyasha is 150 years old?? Sess knew Takemaru. Sess wanted to defeat his own father.

Anything missing in there? Inaccurate? Cuz those are the notes I'm going with. I also have rough timelines for panthers: 50 years ago Sess fought them alone. Something like 500 years ago IT fought them alone. (Thus the guess here is that Sess is less than 500 years old, or just barely 500, since he wouldn't fight as a baby obviously). Open ended questions for me to play with: What's IT's real name? Where did he come from? Who was Sessmom? Where did she come from? Who was Izayoi exactly? And Takemaru? Where did they come from? How did IT meet Izayoi and how did they go about getting down and making our famous hanyou? What did Sessmom think about this?

On top of that there's also my own continuity notes. For new readers, disregard most of this as they will all be new to you! These are notes about my own original characters. This story is tied with With Our Arms Wide Open, Runaway, Return, etc. Somewhere I think I theorized about Sess's age, but I cannot find it in my own writing and it's not in my notes. Ugh. I placed Shimofuri (With Our Arms Wide Open, Runaway, and Return) at about 200 years. His mother was about 600 when she died (Remember Taikokajin? From With Our Arms Wide Open). For those of you familiar with my stories, you have seen Shiroihana/Sessmom before! (Innocence, and Return). How old is she? I have a guestimate. Hopefully everything fits.

As I have everything planned, all the variable questions are answered. I've always found Sess's brief scene with his father at the end of the third movie spectacular and inspirational and amazing. THIS story will show a plausible explanation for how he acts there, and why he does. It's less about Inutaisho and more about Sessmom, Izayoi, and Sesshomaru.

Ultimately I decided to do it in a mix. Each chapter will open with a section of first person, to give a feel for each voice, each view of Inutaisho. Then the main plot will be in third person because most of the time my third person is easier for me and comes out a little more impressive (I think). Right now I am planning on breaking the story into 3-4 parts. The first chapters are Shiroihana/Sessmom's. She reveals where she came from and where IT came from. His past, her past, their meeting. Sesshomaru's conception. The majority of the union of the Western Lands and Sess's earlier youth. Part 2 is Izayoi's story. How she met IT. How Takemaru fits in here. How Inuyasha was conceived. Her pregnancy and how she came to be where she was when we saw her in the beginning of the third movie. Part 3 is Sesshomaru's tale. How did IT's son react to his father's infidelity? How did Sessmom react? How did Inuyasha and Izayoi survive the wrath of these immortals? How did that opening scene between Sess and his dad come about? What's really going on there? Sess reveals all. Then I may include a short part 4 just to sum it up if necessary, told by each of the narrators after IT's death. Anyway, that's the plan.

Disclaimer: I do not own the original characters.


"The past is never dead. It's not even past." –William Faulkner


Part 1: Shiroihana

I broke with tradition. I severed the line of the Queens and defied my mother, and her mother before her. I did not set out to be revolutionary, but as powerful as I am, Fate has had its way within my life as much as any mortal's.

I was born in a chain of islands that mortal humans have named Japan. Nippon. I did not name these lands, and I did not think of them as a unified area, but in my long lifetime I have helped forge parts of them together. Perhaps the term "Western Lands" is familiar to you? If that is the case, you may also have heard of a creature sometimes called Inutaisho. You believe, as almost all do, that he is responsible for uniting the Western Lands, for fighting terrible monsters, for loving helpless humans.

You would be surprised to know that much of this is untrue. That leader, humans call him demon, youkai, inuyoukai, the Dog General, could never have accomplished what he did if it were not for my involvement. But, like many females, human and youkai alike, I am relegated to shadow and doubt. A woman is forbidden to wield power in the human world, but I am not human and I have wielded power equal or above what many men around me have, and even when a man has been above me, I am clever enough that he will do what I want without my even asking. If Inutaisho was the Dog General, or even a Dog King as he was once called on the mainland, than I was the Queen Bitch. And for as great and awe-inspiring as Inutaisho was, I am the one who has outlived him. I was the one who outsmarted him and took the ultimate revenge for his betrayal, his dishonor and shame.

It was I who sent the Dog General to his death.

You did not come here for my story; you are here to learn of Inutaisho. I am not arrogant enough to believe that you have any interest in me, but you must realize that to understand his story and where he came from, you must first hear my tale. I do not offer this story to ask for sympathy or to explain myself. I have no need or desire for your empathy. You are nothing but a weak, short-lived mortal and I will outlive you. What do I care of your opinion for me or my actions? I am not the Goddess-Queen of my maternal ancestors, exuding compassion and respect even for underlings such as yourself. Instead imagine me as a male-spirit embodied in a female form.

Then you may glimpse me at my truest, but I make no such promises. You are only mortal after all, and I am the great Lady Shiroihana, the mother of the Western Lands. No one knows me, not even my son. You will be no exception.


Daughter of the Kosetsu

At dawn on the day of her betrothal, Shiroihana did not sleep. She moved through the motions of resting, changing out of her daytime robes in favor of freer, looser nightclothes. She even laid down on her futon in her enormous bedroom in the west wing of Kagetsu palace, but Shiroihana did not sleep.

Her head was full of her mother's drilling, of the practice betrothal ceremony that had taken up much of her day, interrupting the normal flow of lessons that had shaped her life up until the present. Shiroihana had been carefully schooled. She had taken notes for her mother and father to practice calligraphy, studied the genealogies of the inuyoukai clans, and read classic literature from the mainland. More important than these lessons were those that she learned to sculpt her body and her will. They were different from the lessons on war that her brother underwent, though Shiroihana did learn basic strategy in war. It was not her strongpoint. She preferred ceremony, manipulation and treaties. Or alliances by marriage.

At two hundred years old, Shiroihana was fully mature physically and had no regular need for sleep, though the activity was pleasant and she often slept through the nights simply to pass time. This night, however, though she longed to pass the time, sleep was out of reach.

Anxiousness, an emotion that Shiroihana was unaccustomed to, hung over her like morning mist in shadowed hallows. Her mother had reported little about the clan that Shiroihana was betrothed to, only to say that the alliance was favorable because it would bind the lands—which lay side by side—into one unit. At least for a time. The Kosetsu was such a unique land, controlled by ancient tradition, ruled over by inuyoukai Queens, that likely the union would be shaky at best.

Once, long ago, when the islands were still connected to the mainland, all lands had been ruled by women. But now only the Kosetsu lands and Shiroihana's immediate royal family continued the ancient and sacred tradition of female ruling and inheritance. The lands of her intended husband were male-inherited, like all the rest of the world. The Tengai lands were held by a clan called the Okou, fair-haired and golden-eyed, related distantly to Shiroihana's own family.

All this she knew by examining the family genealogies, yet she longed to know more about them and their lands. The dawn could not arrive soon enough.

When the horizon began to change from the darkness and gloom of deep night to the gentle blue of approaching dawn, Shiroihana could wait no longer. She donned a second robe, clean, pristine, and white with a simple sash in black silk and left her room. She woke the maids two hours before they would have risen and gone to fetch her. The maids of their household were strictly other youkai. Monkey and gecko demons were chosen for their passive natures and clever hands. With a few of these servants in tow, Shiroihana bathed and dressed and styled her hair with only slight help from them. She wore her hair long and unrestrained in the style of a maiden, an unmarried girl.

But she was not a girl. She was nothing so deceptively simple, even in her distant, naïve youth.

Footsteps ricocheted on the walls in the hallway outside Shiroihana's large, grandiose bedroom in the west wing of the Kagetsu palace. Shiroihana recognized her father's tread and his aura. She shooed the maids away, setting them to work with changing the linens and washing clothes and dusting about the room. She walked to meet her father in the doorway before he could arrive.

Lord Shinkumaru was tall and lithely built. His eyes were a pale blue-green and his hair the same bright white as his daughter's. Over his cheeks two elegant, straight purple streaks marked his high birth status. At first he regarded Shiroihana with a cold, somber stare, but his expression softened when he spotted the maids busily working near her bed, stripping the sheets.

"My daughter is already practicing at being Queen!" he said, chuckling lightly.

Shiroihana bowed to him slightly. It was not the full bow that most daughters would have offered to their fathers, but Shiroihana, as princess of the Kosetsu, was not bound in the same way to her father as most daughters were. Their relationship was not one of solemnity or deep, quiet respect.

"I was impatient," she admitted.

Shinkumaru's face darkened. His lips curled in a scowl. "Don't be so eager to marry and grow up, Daughter."

"It's not that," Shiroihana said, shaking her head. "I'm not eager. Mother has not told me enough about the Okou. I have the feeling that she doesn't want me to know anything about them—as if there is nothing to be excited about except the alliance, the land that we would gain."

Shinkumaru nodded. His earlier pleasure at seeing her had faded. "It's not for me to second guess the judgments of the Queen." Even though Shinkumaru was husband and mate to Queen Samidare, and father to her two children, he did not have authority in the Kosetsu. Samidare decided what was good for all of them.

"Have the Okou arrived yet?" Shiroihana asked.

Shinkumaru shook his head in the negative. "No, not yet—but it is very early." Something in his usually bright eyes, the cool of blue and green like a springtime meadow, disturbed Shiroihana further, setting her on edge.

"Where is Mother?"

"I left Queen Samidare on the Northern terrace," Shinkumaru told her.

"Thank you." They bowed to one another and then Shinkumaru continued on his way down the corridor, heading for Shiroihana's younger brother's room no doubt. Sesshomaru, her little brother, was nearly fifty years younger than she was and still required nightly sleep on a regular basis. He had been slow to mature, according to Samidare. It was troubling—but also encouraging.

Slow maturation in a male inuyoukai always promised incredible youkai power. This would please any parents of an inuyoukai son outside of the Kosetsu. Inside the Kosetsu it was dangerous. It was asking for rebellion.

Strong sons craved power and in the Kosetsu they could not have it.

Shiroihana watched her father's hair, flowing like silken fabric, bright and smooth. Sesshomaru was nearly as tall as their father now, but more heavily built, a powerhouse. He had a cool and calm temperament, in spite of his youth and immature status. He was mature enough to marry and have an increasing desire for sex, but the need for sleep indicated that his youkai strength had not yet reached full capacity. He would be a powerful warrior, a force to be reckoned with, but could Samidare and Shiroihana contain him?

Shiroihana left her room with the door open and walked down the hall. Unlike Shinkumaru and Sesshomaru, Shiroihana had inherited her mother's shorter stature, as well as her white hair, golden eyes, the single maroon coloration on her cheeks, and the crescent moon shape on her forehead, the mark of the Kosetsu. The mark of its rightful heir—and a sign to other youkai and dog demons that she carried a rare and dangerous trait.

Shiroihana was poisonous.

Kagetsu was massive and sprawling. It had been erected atop a mountain in the center of the Kosetsu lands by Shiroihana's ancestors many long centuries ago. In many places the floor was made of stone, carved by the claws of inuyoukai and human carpenters. Some of the newer work on the palace had been by human carpenters, as in the wooden railings that lined the open air terraces that connected the West and East wings of the palace.

Shiroihana found the door to the Northern terrace open. It admitted a hot, steamy air from the summer outside. The sun had risen enough to color the mists blue and orange, but overall this spot on the mountain had always remained misty as a result of the immortal, magical beings that lived atop it. The mists obscured curious human eyes and frightened away uncertain, lost travelers or explorers. Any uninvited guests who found their way to Kagetsu palace were unlikely to reach the great stairway leading up the side of the mountain. Samidare and the great Queens before her had ties to the underworld, to the hidden spirits that prowled the wilderness without purpose or cause. The hill was haunted and the spirits would fall on the unwelcome, frightening them away or slaughtering them.

Shiroihana could not see very far out onto the terrace. She stepped out, sniffing quietly, trying to locate her mother. She walked beside the railing and felt it curiously as she had for years. As a tiny pup she had run with Sesshomaru, clambering on the railings until Shinkumaru or Samidare stopped them. Their young claws had scarred the delicate carvings in the wood, the fanciful characters: dragons, massive dogs with bushy tails, disembodied fox heads with long whiskers, and bipedal warriors in full armor with fierce faces.

"Shiroihana?" a deep, female voice called from the thick, gray mists.

"Mother?" Shiroihana hurried forward until she could see and smell her mother. Samidare was already wearing her ceremonial robes. Her hair was fashioned into lobes and ornaments like chimes made out of silver and gold dangled on either side of her round, serene face. Her skin had been painted, decorated until she had the appearance of a goddess. The humans of the Kosetsu had always whispered that the beings in Kagetsu palace, their rulers and protectors, were Gods. Unreachable, immortal, and beyond comprehension.

"Shiroihana," Samidare said, smiling. Her lower lip had been painted a brilliant crimson like fresh blood. The upper lip was white, pale. Her eyebrows were outlined in glittering gold while her eyes were surrounded by vermillion. "You're awake very early this morning. You are excited?"

Shiroihana hesitated. She took in her mother's huge ceremonial robes. They trailed in a long swathe behind her. Endless fabric in gold, white, and red. She was like the humans' sun goddess, the mighty Amaterasu. Samidare's commitment to the upcoming betrothal was clear. Shiroihana chose to reply to her mother honestly, but with reserve. "I am nervous, Mother."

"There is no reason for it," Samidare murmured. With the gold coloration all around her, the Queen's eyes shone out as if lit from within. "This is a fine match. The Okou have a fine male heir. Your union will greatly expand our lands."

"But my husband will not want his sons to be ruled by his daughters."

Samidare had been resting her pale, long-fingered hands on the wooden railing, absently feeling the carvings as she listened to her daughter speaking. Now she shifted. Her robes rustled and hissed as they moved over the stone floor. Her hair ornaments tinkled musically.

Shiroihana ducked her head, bowing respectfully before the full regalia of her mother and her Queen. Her jaw was clenched; her chest tight, but she made no sign of it. Samidare had trained her to be stoic, to be queenly. This moment was an odd one, a time when Shiroihana questioned her mother. It was a dangerous thing to do. Queens did not tolerate doubt from their offspring. The genealogies had revealed a hidden history behind the Kosetsu that deeply disturbed Shiroihana, one that she was not sure she could keep up herself.

Queens often killed unfaithful, uncooperative children. Power hungry sons or husbands, daughters who desired love or knowledge over their place as Queen. Samidare had had two brothers before she had become Queen. Shiroihana's grandmother had had one killed when he challenged Samidare's right to rule as tradition dictated. The other brother had been sent away, married off carelessly and disowned. Two uncles, gone, banished or killed. And more and more, Shiroihana thought of her brother Sesshomaru with apprehension and suspicion. Her heart was tormented by her memories of their shared puphood. The laughter, the wrestling, the learning. Could she agree with Samidare if the Queen ordered Sesshomaru's death?

"I was mistaken," Samidare said, sighing.

Shiroihana lifted her head, confused though she did not reveal the expression on her face. "Mother?"

Samidare took a step forward and reached out, caressing her daughter's cheek with one hand. "I saw you here so early, and I thought I was seeing a girl eager to learn the secrets between male and female. Instead I was seeing a woman, a young queen. You need not trouble yourself with these thoughts just yet. You will not be married this year."

"But why should I put it off?" Shiroihana asked. "The world does not approve of us. I will have to contend with it my entire life. That was what my Queen taught me from birth."

Samidare withdrew her hand. Her golden eyes had hardened, narrowing. It was a change from Mother to Queen. "You're right, Shiroihana. I have raised a fine young queen with a mind as sharp as any man's. It's true, no man from beyond the Kosetsu agrees with our way of life, but you must never allow yourself to doubt our tradition. As Queen your hardest challenge will not be ruling, but maintaining the balance. Our family is the only one that remembers the female spirit and counteracts the destruction of the male spirit. Though all the other lands disregard their daughters, the Kosetsu never will. You must never relinquish this or we will all surely face disaster. The male spirit is ruled by chaos and violence. You must never relinquish your power to a man. Not to your husband, not to your sons."

This was a meaningless speech that Shiroihana had heard her entire life, but now it disturbed her, more than her upcoming betrothal and marriage, more than the prospect of becoming Queen and facing the challenge that Samidare spoke of. She noted how Samidare had not said Not to your brother. Was it on Samidare's mind too?

Shiroihana buried the concern, reassuring herself before her mother could see it. Sesshomaru has never been displeased with his position. He is content. He will stay content.

Instead she focused on the betrothal, on her future husband. "How am I to force my husband to give up his male heirs? Or will our two lands pass independently?"

Samidare tipped her head, perplexed at her daughter's question. "What do you mean, independently?"

"I mean the Tengai lands will pass to my sons, and the Kosetsu to my true heir. My daughter."

Samidare frowned, a small and brief expression but meaningful. Her white teeth gleamed when she smiled a moment later. "Shiroihana—the goal of this alliance is to expand our domains and unite them under our traditions. Under our family. We are more powerful than the Okou clan. They are few and bookish. You are marrying their only proper heir and you will easily overpower him. He will give you children and you may do as you see fit. Give small sections of the Tengai to your sons…" She narrowed her eyes. "Or to Sesshomaru."

Shiroihana nodded, suddenly understanding. She bowed, overwhelmed and abruptly feeling as if she had lost fifty pounds from some invisible weight about her shoulders. "Thank you, my Queen." Sesshomaru will remain content. Mother is very wise.

"There is only one counsel I will offer, Daughter," Samidare said, surprising Shiroihana as she rose out of her bow. "Do not have more children than is necessary."

Shiroihana nodded but said, "What if I have no daughters? How can I maintain the balance then?" Shiroihana frowned. "Is there even a balance, Mother, when all the other clans pass their lands to their sons?"

Samidare struck like a snake, pinching Shiroihana's ear. Shiroihana flinched but made no sound. "One pebble set against a hundred others may not make much difference in your eyes, Shiroihana. But it is something, and it is visible. We hold to our tradition because without it we are not the Kosetsu, we are just one of the others. Do you understand?"

Tightly with pain, Shiroihana answered, "Yes, my Queen."

Samidare released her and gazed at her with a cold, distant glare. "You are not dressed properly. The Okou will be here soon. You must appear the proper image of the Princess that you are."

Shiroihana's hands had closed into fists. She hid them behind her back as she bowed. Her ear burned. "Yes, my Queen." Inwardly, she thought You did not answer my question.



The day swelled, growing oppressively hot. Shiroihana returned to the mirror with the monkey demons to reapply her makeup twice before the Okou finally arrived for the ceremony. Sesshomaru was the one who arrived to fetch her. He was somber and dressed in his own luxurious robes. He carried a decorative short sword and wore heavy armor that clanked and clicked metallically.

"Lady Shiroihana is most beautiful," he said in greeting.

Shiroihana had her back to the door. She had been waiting, knelt in front of the mirror. A monkey demon was nodding off behind her. Shiroihana smiled at her brother, watching him in the mirror. "Little Brother is most charming," she purred.

"You will be late," Sesshomaru said. He was not as stoic as Shiroihana, it was not in his training to have the bearing of a true lord. "Queen Samidare will be upset."

Shiroihana gazed one last time at herself in the mirror. Her hair had been put up partly, but it also flowed long down her back and over her shoulders in a white waterfall. Long hair was the style worn by an unmarried maiden, but having it up marked nobility. Like Samidare, Shiroihana had adorned her face with white paste, but unlike her Shiroihana's was not red but pink or blue. Red was the color of blood, of heat, of sex and experience. Shiroihana was none of those things as an unmarried princess.

She rose to her feet and the monkey shuffled out of the way with a hoot. Her hair decorations tinkled like flowing water. As she passed out into the hall, Sesshomaru bowed deeply to her.

"Stop," Shiroihana ordered. "I'm not Queen."

Sesshomaru was silent. They did not walk side by side, but with Shiroihana leading the way. They passed through an open terrace on their way to the East wing of the palace. The air was moist and thick. Shiroihana cringed inwardly, aware that her makeup would already be suffering.

They reached the snowflake room. It was blindingly white, decorated with snowflakes and dark silhouettes of trees against a winter blizzard. Sesshomaru slid the door open to the audience room and stepped inside. He moved to sit beside Shinkumaru. In most ceremonies or audiences with important guests, a family would organize itself around its fathers, husbands, and sons. In the Kagetsu palace the Queen always took the place of honor, sitting upfront atop the small raised platform, overlooking her guests like an empress. Like the goddess she was.

A monkey youkai who worked as an announcer and scribe for Samidare and Shinkumaru, called out Sesshomaru's name and title as he sat down. Shiroihana's keen ears heard the whisper of fabric as the representatives of the Okou clan bowed to her brother. Shiroihana could not see any of them, but already she could smell them. Thin, flowery scents with underlying sour sweat beneath. She immediately disliked it, but pushed the reaction from her mind. The alliance made perfect sense for the Kosetsu, and it would give Sesshomaru the lands he deserved.

The announcer called, "Lady Shiroihana, Princess of the Kosetsu."

Shiroihana stepped forward through the open door and into the brightness of the snowflake room. She knelt just behind her mother and to one side. Her position in the room was one of greater honor than either Shinkumaru or Sesshomaru. Both her father and her brother sat further back than she did, further away from their guests and from Samidare.

Shiroihana kept her eyes averted from their guests while they bowed. Their clothing rustled, their hair murmured, and in one of the elders, sitting at the far back, a back cracked. Though they had barely seen her, Shiroihana felt a strange intensity in the room. It was distressing and intoxicating at once. She felt they saw her with curiosity and awe, as if she were something different and unknowable to them.

Their guests at last lifted their heads. Shiroihana stared into her lap, admiring the detail of the embroidery in her sleeves. Her face was hot, probably blushing. She thought of the makeup paling her face artificially and drew a silent but very deep breath to calm her nerves. She had never been outside the Kosetsu before, and had never seen but a handful of other inuyoukai. She had sat in with her mother before, acting as a scribe when she was younger, but in those audiences the guests paid her no mind. Now she was the focus of the entire room.

"Daughter," Samidare said, cuing her.

Shiroihana looked up and blinked once, recalling her role in the ceremony with a jolt. "Welcome," she addressed the Okou. "Welcome honored guests the Kagetsu palace and to the Kosetsu."

As she spoke, Shiroihana took them in quickly. There were four of them, all male and all with white hair. The two in the back were elders, likely grandfathers or great uncles. The two that sat nearer to the platform were younger. One was dark and stiff. His face had been scarred. There were no marks on his cheeks. At first Shiroihana thought he was the youth's—her betrothed's—father, but when she noted the absence of markings, she realized he was a bodyguard. The youth sitting closest to the platform was small, unimpressive, and diminutive. Shiroihana wanted to laugh at him and at the betrothal the longer she stared at him, as if this was all a clever ruse, a practical joke by Samidare. Was he old enough to be contemplating marriage?

One of the elder inuyoukai spoke up. "We have come bearing gifts for the beautiful Lady Shiroihana and her honorable mother Lady Samidare." He motioned and the inuyoukai elder beside him shifted and came forward with a lacquered box. He placed it next to the youth, Shiroihana's intended future husband.

The young inuyoukai—still more of a boy than a man at an age of a hundred years by Shiroihana's estimate—grabbed the beautiful lacquered chest, heaving it up with an inelegant grunt of effort. Shiroihana shifted minutely in her position and tried to look away.

Her betrothed took two steps forward and extended the box in unsteady hands, placing it on the platform just in front of Samidare. He let out a long breath and then said, "Please accept these gifts on behalf of the Okou clan and our lands, the great Tengai, Lady Shiroihana, Queen Samidare. And on behalf of myself, Lord Machitekishi."

His name meant something like genuine intellectual extravagance. And, looking at his scrawny limbs, and the lack of a sword at his waist, Shiroihana felt his name was accurate.

As he lifted his head, Shiroihana had a full view of his face. His features were soft and handsome, but somehow they did not fit him. It was as if he had been soldered together from different molds, like a maple tree with pine needles as leaves, or a cherry tree that bore plums as fruit. His eyes were the same gold as Shiroihana and Samidare's. The clans were related distantly, but how exactly Shiroihana had forgotten. Golden eyes were oddly rare in the bloodlines, as was white or blond hair.

The marks on this youth's face were deep blue and oddly jagged, like lightening. Yet it was the only thing on him that whispered of physical power. Shiroihana admired the lacquered box for a moment to appear friendly, but she did not smile. No clear-headed, strong inuyoukai woman knowingly marries and mates with a weak-bodied male. It only produced weak pups.

The ceremony ended swiftly, much to Shiroihana's relief. The wedding was arranged for spring the following year. In the intervening time Shiroihana was charged with the task of writing to Machitekishi to get to know him a little more. In the fall, before winter snows made traveling difficult and unpleasant, Machitekishi and his grandfather would come as guests of the Kosetsu. Shiroihana and Machitekishi would further spend time together during meals and for some games and other entertainment.

Dutifully, Shiroihana took on this task, but she thought always with revulsion about her future marriage. She considered asking her mother to reconsider—surely Samidare was debasing her daughter and her bloodline by arranging the marriage with such a weak, scrawny specimen of that violent, chaotic male spirit—but then Shiroihana thought of her younger brother and restrained her disgust. The marriage was solid in every reasonable way aside from the physical factor.

Perfection was impossible, but the arrangement was close. Shiroihana tried to force herself to accept the betrothal by getting to know Machitekishi. She poured herself into the letters, but found them difficult to write. She constantly destroyed them and started afresh, dissatisfied with what she had said or the tone of her letter. She had no idea how to relate to Machitekishi, or to any inuyoukai outside of her own family. When she asked her mother's advice, Samidare smiled indulgently and told her to report something interesting and knowledgeable.

"Discuss a poem you have read, or an herb you have researched, or perhaps mythology. Tell him the legend of the Kosetsu."

Shiroihana tried to do exactly as her mother advised, but hated the result. Finally she pretended that she was writing the letter to her father or her brother. Words flowed out of her, different from all the other letters. Gentle, genuine, and affectionate. She wrote about the passage of time, the formation of the clouds and mists around Kagetsu, and then of her uncertainty with the future, of her difficulty in seeing herself as Queen, of her fear of failure.

She nearly burned the letter when she had finished, deciding it was too open, too emotional. It was not befitting a cold, somber Queen of the Kosetsu. But was that what Machitekishi expected of her? Or was it right for her to present herself as open, vulnerable, and unconditionally trusting? She knew enough of the outside world to understand that most women, human or not, were expected by society to be demure, soft-spoken, unassuming, and easily dominated.

Before she could doubt herself further, Shiroihana sent the letter. The reply was a long time in coming and she agonized over it, dreaming about Machitekishi opening the letter and laughing, reading her fine script back to the elder inuyoukai men of his clan as they mocked her. Some Queen! Machitekishi, you will be the best thing that has happened to her!

When the letter returned it was written in a delicate, spidery hand, and it ignored all of what she had said. Machitekishi wrote a poem, several haikus in fact. Shiroihana interpreted emotion from them, but also suspected he was condescending to her, refusing to open to her in the same way she had to him. Instead he presented pretty words in a controlled structure, praising her beauty and her gentle heart. Gentle heart?

Samidare questioned her daughter about the letter and for the first time in her life, Shiroihana lied.

"I am enjoying Lord Machitekishi's correspondence. He is very intelligent and witty. He makes me laugh. He writes very smooth and beautiful poems."

Samidare smiled. "Good. That sounds like excellent news. I was worried that he would mention the panthers from the south and frighten you."

Shiroihana could not stop the deep frown that flashed over her face. "Panthers?"

Mother and daughter were sitting in the library at the Kagetsu, examining old documents and maps, discussing their lands. It was a history lesson, one of hundreds that Shiroihana had endured from about age five onward. They drank rice wine, chilled by ice that had been stored in a padded, underground room dug beneath the palace into the side of the mountain. It was kept cold by the combination of the specific room, under the ground, and by magic spells cast there by a Shinto priest long ago.

Samidare sighed and tapped her cup with her clawed fingers. "The panther demons have come out from hiding. They have threatened the Kosetsu and the Tengai lands before, but that was long ago."

"We didn't fight in that war," Shiroihana said, recalling another history lesson some years ago.

"Two hundred years ago, just before you were born," Samidare said, "I had just become Queen. The panthers invaded to the far south. Their numbers swelled. They were bent on conquering all of the islands. The Okou are dying off because most of their men—and many of their women—were killed two centuries ago. That is why they have only Machitekishi to offer in marriage now. when I was young there were many of them, and some of them were very handsome. If not for the war and so many lost I would have married one of them certainly. But my destiny lied in the Middle Lands and with your father."

Most of this was familiar, but hearing Samidare's more personal account intrigued Shiroihana. She had thought the entirety of the Okou clan to be diminutive weaklings, too young or too old. Now she saw the arrogance of her assumption. Inuyoukai were slow to breed. They had not yet replenished their numbers from so great a loss. Of course they would push the immature, too young Machitekishi to marry as soon as physically possible. And the chance at such a fine match for him…

Shiroihana wrote her next letter to Machitekishi in the same open tone, but now she asked about the panthers, about his clan, burying her disgust in favor of curiosity. The weather was cooling, fall was coming swiftly. Soon she would see Machitekishi and get a second chance to know him. Perhaps, with the possibility of war, Machitekishi would become increasingly warrior-like. Perhaps Shiroihana had judged him too soon.

She sent the letter, eager for a reply.

It never came.


The weather was still warm and it was a month or so before Samidare and Shinkumaru expected messengers to arrive with details of Machitekishi's intended visit. Messengers arrived early, but not with word about the visit. Instead their news was that the Okou clan had been overrun and obliterated. There simply weren't enough of them to stand against even a reduced number of panthers.

Machitekishi was dead. All of the Okou clan was dead.

Shiroihana was in the room when the messengers, foxes that acted as couriers for information passing between the Kosetsu and its neighbors, revealed the news to her parents. At first she felt relief, an emotion that sprung out of her unexpectedly, as she realized that she would not have to marry Machitekishi after all. Then she felt shame for rejoicing at the death of someone who had never really wronged her, and baffled that though she had made such an effort to go through with the marriage, she had always been opposed and unhappy with it—even when she had deluded herself into thinking otherwise. For the first time she realized that if there was one certain thing about herself, it was that she knew what she wanted.

Fate had delivered the answer to her this time, but in its wake were two problems, one new, the other old. The old one was the question of what to do with her younger brother Sesshomaru. With Machitekishi dead and the Tengai lands overrun with panthers, there was no land for her to give to her brother to keep him happy. That led to the new problem: War.

Over the coming weeks refugees spilled into the Kosetsu from the Tengai. They swarmed up the coastline like ants climbing a tree trunk. And as they moved northward, they spread outward, exploring inward, pillaging and conquering. The Kosetsu was their next target.

Queen Samidare took action. Now the men of the Kosetsu found themselves important and highly valued as armies amassed and trained, readying for war in the next spring. The panthers, however, were not the kind to delay as the inuyoukai expected them to. They attacked before the snow had fallen, engaging unready troops and burning villages while stealing food, killing livestock and abducting humans as slaves. The inuyoukai they killed ruthlessly, sparing none.

By the time the snows fell heavy enough to end the fighting for the winter, the Kosetsu was ailing and gravely threatened.

Shiroihana saw little of this, only heard it from fox and inuyoukai messengers, and from her brother and father's letters. Sesshomaru, when he did write, told Shiroihana of the deep thrill that the scent of blood brought, of the satisfaction that filled him when he cleaved a panther demon in two. His letters were thrilling to Shiroihana too. Not only did they reassure her that he was alive, but they allowed her a snatch of freedom, a view of the outside world, and a slice of hope. The news the messengers brought always seemed grim, but with warriors like Sesshomaru on the battlefield and patrolling the boundaries of the Kosetsu, surely they could not lose as the Okou had.

Samidare and Shiroihana were prisoners within their own palace. Samidare became tense and short tempered. She talked to Shiroihana very little. Mother and daughter became somewhat distanced from each other.

When the weather began to warm again, and fighting resumed in earnest almost immediately, with the panthers seeming to never tire and to have unending numbers, Samidare made a difficult decision.

Early one morning a monkey demon summoned Shiroihana to the baths. When she arrived she found her mother inside the tiled room clothed in only a thin robe that did not even have a sash to tie it closed. Samidare was unusually casual. Her hair was long and uncombed, her face completely unpainted. She wore no jewelry.

Shiroihana bowed to her mother in the doorway. "My Queen," she greeted her, formally, in spite of the fact that her mother's current place and dress suggested something intimate and personal. The last time Shiroihana had seen her mother so unguarded was when she had given birth to Sesshomaru. Her earliest memories of Samidare were a mixture of love and formality. Samidare had always been teacher as much as mother.

Now she smiled and gestured at the steaming water. "Let us dispense with all formality."

"Mother?" Shiroihana asked, not bothering to hide her skepticism.

"Bathe with me; we have important things to discuss." Samidare slipped out of her robe and stepped into the pool. Her skin pinked with the heat of the water. To one side a variety of vials and cups had been set out, containing soaps, oils, and shampoos.

The monkey disrobed Shiroihana and she joined her mother cautiously. Samidare was more thickly built than Shiroihana. Partly that was due to the pups she had borne, but also it was genetic. Shiroihana had inherited the more lithe shape of Shinkumaru while Samidare had passed on a thicker build to Sesshomaru.

Samidare poured some of the shampoo from a cup onto her hands. As she rubbed it into her scalp, lathering it, she sighed heavily. "I have come to a difficult decision about this war, Shiroihana."

Shiroihana waited, saying nothing. Her hair had floated up around her, refusing to become easily waterlogged.

"We are going to lose," Samidare said.

"What?" Shiroihana blurted, stopping mid-motion as she stroked her hair, pushing it beneath the water.

"The panthers are too ferocious. Eventually we will be overcome. It may take a decade, but it will happen. Unless we seek more allies." She paused, splashing her hair and her face. Bubbles fell into the water and floated, bouncing on the little waves that the two inuyoukai women made between them. "I have decided I am going to go into the Nanka, the lands north and east of us, in the center of this island. The Middle Lands. There is a new lord there, Koshoshiro. A distant cousin of ours, I'm sure."

All the dog demon clans were distantly related to each other, so Samidare's words were only half-truths. It had been tradition at one place or another within the dog demon clans to greet any stranger as a "cousin." It was almost always a sure bet that inuyoukai with the same hair color were related by some degree. Koshoshiro sounded like a name given to a white or blonde inuyoukai.

"He has recently lost his wife, to childbirth no less."

Shiroihana sensed at once where this was going. "You wish to ally our lands with the Nanka by way of marriage to this Lord Koshoshiro? Will he be interested? What of the child his wife gave him—does it live?"

Samidare's lips moved, curling minorly. "It lives, but it is not the son that Koshoshiro will want to inherit the Nanka. I have sent envoys to contact him and bring all the rumors they hear of him from the Nanka, but the snow is still deep in the passes further north. It may be some time before we hear back from them." She paused and glanced away from her daughter, suddenly appearing older to Shiroihana. "I cannot wait that long."

"Mother?" Shiroihana had ignored the shampoos, oils, perfumes, and soaps. She had no interest in the bath, only in her mother's strange demeanor.

"I will leave the palace to join the battle with your father and Sesshomaru," Samidare revealed. "I will leave you to act in my place as Queen. I will write to you frequently to help with the arrangement, but you will be the one to forge this alliance between Koshoshiro in the Nanka and our Kosetsu."

Shiroihana met her mother's stare solemnly. "I will go to meet with him as soon as the messengers return; as soon as there is word that he may consider the alliance. I will not fail you, Mother."

Samidare laughed and shook her head. She splashed more water onto her face and her hair. "You have already tried to fail me with such a strategy, Shiroihana!"

Baffled and disturbed, Shiroihana lifted her chin, offended by her mother's criticism and unable to avoid showing it.

Samidare leaned backward, resting her shoulders against the green and gold tiles of the bath. "You do not need to be stiff, Daughter. You are not Queen yet, in spite of my charge. You should learn to use others' doubt against them. Then you will be a force to be reckoned with. A Queen is powerful because she is enigmatic, unknowable. Men do not know women's minds; they only imagine arrogantly that they do. In this case you will be vulnerable. You cannot go to Koshoshiro so eagerly. You cannot appear desperate. He will crush you if you show such vulnerability. Queens are not vulnerable."

Shiroihana nodded and ducked her head respectfully. "You are wise, Mother." She hesitated and then drew an unsteady breath. The scents of the bath were rich and worked against her self-control. She risked exposing her uncertainty to her mother—and to her Queen. "I am concerned that I will be foolish in your absence, Mother. I fear I may not be ready for such a role."

"When I was your age I was not ready either. Like Sesshomaru, you have been slow to mature. Your inner powers have not reached their full potential just yet. There are many things you cannot learn without the experience and passage of time, my daughter." She smiled warmly, her golden eyes glowing with pride. "You will do well, and you need not worry. I believe that when the time comes, you will find it flows within your blood. You have the confidence and power to be a marvelous Queen. A better Queen even than me, or my mother. With any luck you will have another hundred years to prepare yourself for being Queen." Her smile faded, vanishing. "However, if something should happen, I wanted to tell you that I have spent much of this winter leaving you written instructions, guidance. Any lessons that I had put off or avoided teaching you."

"Nothing will happen to my Queen," Shiroihana replied, firmly and formally. "Panthers will quail before her sword."

Samidare moved through the water toward her daughter, slowly and gently. The water filled the room with echoing noises, beautiful, musical, and comforting. Samidare wrapped her arms around Shiroihana's naked shoulders and made a deep, calming sound in the back of her throat, almost a purr. Shiroihana at last let the stiffness wash out of her spine, flowing out into the water. She inclined her head to rest it on Samidare's. Her mother's scent, close and intimate, filled her nose, awakening an old and comforting warmth and making Shiroihana drowsy.

They stayed silently together in the bath until the water began to cool, then they parted, reconnected and filled with fondness—but also worry. Samidare left later that same day to join Shinkumaru and Sesshomaru in defending the Kosetsu and avenging the fallen Okou clan. Shiroihana found the Kagetsu palace, the place of her childhood, cold and foreboding.

Her dreams were filled with the premonition of death.


Endnote: Shiroihana young is very different from Shiroihana older! Anyone who's read Return or Innocence knows that! And about her brother…you can already see something bad is going to happen, because she has obviously reused this name. But why? Some of you (though it probably slipped your attention) may have noticed familiar names here: the Nanka. Guess who rules that later?