Alt Title: Until It Did
Genre: General/Hurt/Comfort
Characters: Kind of Kagome, Inuyasha, Mrs. Higurashi, and Kaede?, The Bone Eater's Well
Summary: There had been many people to stand by the Bone Eater's Well with burning questions. Most left heartbroken, without answers.
A/N I once read an alphabet prompt based fanfiction (I think it was for Harry Potter?), and I really liked the idea, so here goes nothing! BTW I still need prompts for letters K, M, and U. If you've got prompt, shoot it to me in a review! Anyway, I was just thinking about the Bone Eater's Well for this one, because for whatever reason that's the thing that popped into my head first, and then I thought... Hmm... Yeah, I like this. So, here it is? Lol, I dunno. Read and review please, and please enjoy!
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A
Answer
It was cruel. Truly cruel.
There had been many people to stand by the Bone Eater's Well with burning questions. Most left heartbroken, without answers.
There had been a woman asking why, why, why each of her past three children had died soon after childbirth.
The Well did not answer.
There had been a woman desiring to know whether her lover truly had been killed in battle, his body desecrated and burned.
The Well did not answer.
There had been a boy wishing for his grandfather's health to improve, to save him from illness.
The Well did not answer.
There had been many women who had come to the Bone Eater's Well seeking answers. Some were more memorable, some were far more important.
There had been, for instance, the time when a beautiful young woman - a miko - had come to the Well. The Well was her secret sort of sacred place, a place to think. There, she could talk to the nothingness and the solid presence of the old wood structure. At first, her musings had been, as expected, more to do with her duties as a shrine maiden. She would talk herself into silence about which herbs needed to be found, which children needed healing, which homes needed repairs, which people needed youkai exorcisms.
One day, however, she began asking about love.
Did she love the half demon? Did he love her? Was it possible for a demon to feel love? And what of the Shikon no Tama? Was the hanyou simply acting as though he were falling in love with the young woman in an attempt to reach the Jewel? Or was he truly falling in love with her? And… Was she? These questions persisted, until all at once, they stopped.
The Well did not answer.
Then, there was another young woman, pretty in her own right, but never as beautiful as her sister. This girl wondered aloud to the Well whether there truly was a reason that her sister had died. She asked whether there was some greater plan fate and the gods had in store that had so brutally brought her sister's life to an end, right when her life seemed so promising, and left her one time lover hanging not fifty feet away by an arrow pierced in his chest, imprisoning him in an eternal slumber.
The Well did not answer.
A long time passed where very few women spoke to the Well.
It was quiet.
And then it wasn't.
Suddenly, a strange girl climbed from the Bone Eater's Well, and there was no longer silence. For the first time, there was more than just wondering at the Well. There were arguments, there were fights, there were tears, there were righted wrongs, there were hugs, there were lashings, screamings, laughings, playings. There were promises and reunions.
And then there weren't.
For three years, the Well was only visited, truly, by a solitary soul. Once every three days, silent and brooding. Of course, the visitor occasionally talked to himself, as if to hear his own voice. Sometimes, when he was especially down, and he knew he was alone, he would sob those heartbroken, broken sobs of a man who's lost all hope. Often, he would beg the Well, "Please, open."
The Well did not answer.
Across a world of 500 years, something similar was happening. Another few visitors would approach the Well and ask questions like those of the visitor from 500 years previous. An older woman would ask was fate so cruel as to separate her daughter from the man she loved?
The Well did not answer.
A younger woman, the daughter, would ask the Well, was there a reason to keep her from the man she loved with all her heart? Was there a reason why it had sealed itself, had stopped her passage through times? She wondered aloud whether she was stopped because her mission, her calling, was done, and she was no longer needed. She voiced the idea that perhaps the Well was healing itself from some grievous wound inflicted upon it by the destruction of the Shikon no Tama. And often, she would beg the Well, "Please, open."
And the Well, of course, did not answer.
Until one day, it did.
Glossary:
Miko - a Shinto shrine maiden; "priestess"
Youkai - a demon or spirit
Shikon no Tama - the Sacred Jewel; the Jewel of Four Souls
Hanyou - a half demon/youkai
Currently listening to: The Nights - Avicii
