Disclaimer: I do no own Inuyasha or any of Rumiko Takahashi's characters. But Emi is my own.

Summary: Before the time of Naraku's trickery. A half demon young woman befriends and makes Inuyasha and Kikyou her family. Emi learns to hate again once she sees the human woman she grew to love pin Inuyasha to his tree forever. She leaves and succumbs to the violent demon blood that courses through her. After Inuyasha is set free from the tree by Kagome, and the usual gang has been together for quite some time, they stumble upon an adult Emi. Her hands are blood-stained and Kagome is in her sights.

Introduction

Kikyou ran her fingers through Emi's hair, finding no knots or tangles. She had to make a slow and long sweep to reach the ends; Emi's hair ran down to the small of her back. The color was like a clouded sky on the night of the new moon. The clouds shrouded the stars and so all there was above was a vast black expanse of nothing. Kikyou had never seen such an intense black; she was almost hypnotized as she played with the silken tresses.

Emi opened her eyes to Kikyou's empty expression, "Kikyou." There was the smallest trace of urgency in the way she uttered the priestess's name. She wished Kikyou wouldn't use that gone expression; it looked as if she were dead. It was that urgency in Emi's voice that brought Kikyou back to the small one-room hut and away from thoughts of colors like a black sky. A warm smile traced her lips at Emi's gaze.

"It's late. Kaede already sleeps," Kikyou spoke quietly and they both glanced at the young girl who slept soundly on her mat. Emi nodded, no longer hesitant in leaving Kikyou's side. The older woman was always there when Emi went to look for her. Plus, Inuyasha was waiting for her and she found the same security in the half demon as much as in the priestess.

"Good night," Emi rose swiftly and left Kikyou's hut without making a sound. She didn't waste any time in walking; she met Inuyasha in their usual tree not even two minutes of leaving Kikyou. His eyes were closed as she leaped to the wide branch where they slept. The trunk where Inuyasha's back rested was hollowed out from years and years of Inuyasha's use - from either sleeping at night or resting during the day. She broke the still air around him when she landed not three feet away from his crossed legs; her scent, as well as Kikyou's, circled him. The half-demon opened his eyes and smiled at her in greeting. Emi stretched on her stomach, crossed her arms and rested her chin on them. She stared expectantly at him.

"I don't feel like talkin'," Inuyasha chuckled, closing his eyes again. "I did errands for Kikyou and I'm tired." Emi sighed, flipping onto her back and stared at the branches above them.

It had only been a year since Emi found Inuyasha and Kikyou; or rather since they found her. In appearance she hadn't changed very much, besides perhaps the way she smiled more often and she didn't look at every human being with hate anymore. She had glared at Kikyou with that same loathing. It wasn't so confusing to Inuyasha and Kikyou as to why she hated humans so much, after they had taken her in and she decided she trusted them enough to tell them her story.

Emi was a half-demon. Panther blood as well as human blood coursed through her veins and made her who she was. She hadn't always hated humans; her father was a full-blooded human. He was the only kind being she had known besides her new family. Many miles south of Kikyou's village was where Emi had lived with her father. He was an outcast - Emi was young when she realized the cause of his ridiculed lifestyle. She was a blasphemy and her mother a demon from the hottest pits of hell; a seductress who stayed long enough to conceive and then leave a wailing infant in the grief-stricken arms of her father. Emi almost didn't survive. Her father had to pay in what little belongings he had to the nursing women of the village to give him breast milk to sustain her.

As much as he was sneered and scoffed at, he was the very thing that kept the villagers from taking a blunt farmer's tool and doing away with his bastard child.

As soon as Emi learned to walk and speak full sentences - which wasn't very old - she was subjected to the same treatment as her father. Whenever she went into town she came home with a bloodied lip or knees from being shoved to the ground. For years the same behavior occurred and deep inside of herself Emi felt a quiet but strengthening beast awakening and snarling as every word lashed over her body like a whip. Once she grew into a young woman she didn't allow the children her age, and occasionally the drunk adults, to smack her around as they saw fit. Her retaliations only made the people hate her more. When her father died the village people decided it was high time they disposed of her.

She walked away from the massacre with painful memories, but none of the blood on her skin and clothing was her own.

She broke from her thoughts as she felt Inuyasha's warm fingertips brush across her cheeks. She had been crying and hadn't realized.

"Memories," she explained with one word, shrugging her shoulders once she sat up and faced him.

"Me, too."

She never had to say too much and he still understood. They were very much alike. Half demons, troubled youths, numerous hardships. And they loved each other.

It was rather short, so that's why I made it an introduction. My writing style is a bit amateur, I will honestly say, but I enjoyed writing it all the same. I hope you enjoy it as well! I apologize if there were any spelling or grammar errors I overlooked.

More to come in the next installment: Chapter One - Back Again

Thank you for reading, and I hope you continue. Yours Truly, Gloodin.