Chapter 1

We've been hunting Naroku for about a year and a half but still nothing has changed, except me. I never knew the world was so cruel. Now, as I think back on how I use to be, I laugh at how utterly naive I was.

I use to trust anyone I came across unless the first thinn they did was try to kill me, of course. But after a year and a half you begin to respect those that try to kill you first. At least then, you know that they are your enemies.

It's the ones you hold closest to your heart that you should really be looking out for.

You never know when they're just going to stab you in the chest.....

I've woken up in the middle of the night again, and again Inuyasha is missing. But I don't go looking for him this time. I know where he has run off to.

I don't feel like arguing with him tonight. I don't feel like listening to his lies on yet another beautiful night.

I look up up at the dark, moonless sky and it's then that I decide, 'Inuyasha, will not ruin this beautiful night.'

I refuse to let it be another painful memory. Getting up though, I notice that Sango had also woken up and had been watching me with a knowing look.

"I'm sorry, Kagome." My blood-sister says, with tearfilled eye's.

I smiled towards her as I got dressed, "Don't be sorry for me, sister. Be sorry that our dear friend has fallen for his death."

She smiles, sadly, "You sound like Miroku."

"Really?!"

She nods and I grin at her as I bend down to grab my bow and arrows, "Well, then I guess he is beginning to wear off on me."

Silently, we both laugh at the pure idiocy of the possibility.

Our laughter dies down and i begin to leave the warm campsite.

She grabs my hand as i pass by her. I look down at her, pleading eye's, "You will come back, won't you?"

This time though, I don't smile, I sigh and say, "Of course, I will. We still have jewel shards to look for and I would never leave you guys to deal with him, on your own."

She smiles again ande I'm finally free to leave my pain behind.

I walk through the dark forest, using the trees to feel my way through.

Occasionally the vines and roots of the trees would catch my barely visible feet and the leaves that cluttered the forest floor, would break my fall. To tell the truth, I did't know where I was going and for the first time, I didn't care. I was blindly walking, tripping over fallen limbs, and barely noticing that the trees were beginning to thin.

I did however, notice the sound of a waterfall nearby.

I smile, lightly, as I feel the spray of wateras it hits the rocks, close to where I am standing.

Sighing, I walk closer to the waterfall, feeling my way around it. By now my clothe's are drenched with the water from the river above me.

Shivering slightly, I feel the cool entrance to a cave and keeping my hand to the wall, I follow it deep into the cave.

Too late, I realize that I am not alone in the dark cave.