A disclaimer : I do not own Inuyasha
A note of gratitude : None of this would be possible without my fantastic beta (the lovely and talented Deathangel113) and viewers like you.
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23 Years Earlier
Princess Izayoi stood unseeing on the cliffs and felt the patches of the Greek sunlight bravely poking through the clouds counteract the spray of the water occasionally reaching her legs. Salty winds whipped around her loose-fitting chiton and tangled her long, dark curls. Tomorrow she would have to change from the high cut silks of her girlhood to the longer, ankle-length clothing of a woman of maturity.
Unlike all the other girls of her city-state, Izayoi was not excited for this transition. She knew that as the princess of her lands, it was her responsibility to marry whomever her father chose for her. And her father had indeed chosen well for her - she was to be married to a suitor who was not only acceptable for her rank, but had also brightened their exchanges with examples of his kindness.
As his most beloved child, he would part with her "for nothing less than the best," her father had informed her last week with a wink.
Izayoi only managed a weak smile in response, but her father, drunk on the fine wine and the celebrations of his success hadn't noticed her lack of enthusiasm. It was useless to debate the issue with him, as Izayoi knew only too well. She had already thought everything to divert her inevitable fate, from running away to pretending to be too picky in choice of suitor. Her father had laughingly disregarded her latest suggestion to serve in the temple of Artemis for a year as the Athenian girls often do.
"You want to be a she-bear? Ahahaha! You would be more like a she-deer!" he laughed.
Her brothers took up his laughter let it spill out to fill the room until even the servants were laughing at the thought.
Embarrassment rang in her ears as loudly as their laughter. Not for the first time that year, she cursed her meekness that was the reason for her lack of follow-through in almost all of her plans. She really was just like the shy does of the forests: not only did she have wide, dark eyes, but she was also curious, docile and happiest when free to roam on her own terms.
Izayoi sighed, a sound carried away by the wind and substituted for the crashing of the waves below her. She could only follow compliantly as instructed now, as a princess ought to do.
It wasn't that she didn't like Amphitryon – he was a fine example of typical Grecian men, with his cropped dark hair and brown eyes set into a relatively handsome face of light olive complexion. He was skilled enough in all of the typical male past times and still held the strength of youth in spite of his middle age.
"And he has always been so kind to me," Izayoi rationalized to herself and the steep cliffs. But she knew it wasn't the issue of her suitor that had her so unwilling to marry.
Even as she tried talking herself into accepting her future, she knew how unhappy she would be under the command of a husband. As a young girl of status and wealth, Izayoi had been free to do as she pleased. She would run through the woods of her small city-state Tiryns as carefree as Artemis herself. Now she would be substituting her love of independence for a space at foreign hearth, tending to a new home and raising children to whom she would transfer her freedom of responsibility. Izayoi again silently thanked her own mother for all of her sacrifice that had previously gone unnoticed until the princess's unwilling and upcoming nuptials had been brought forward.
A particularly aggressive wave ground into the rocks below as though it had absorbed all of Izayoi's frustrations and also wished for an escape. The spray flew up the cliff to cover Izayoi and she finally opened her eyes in surprise.
"Oh!" Izayoi exclaimed in a panic. "The sun is so low! Where has the day gone?"
She bent to gather the assortment of wooden and cloth objects that lay strewn about the ground where she had carelessly dropped them in favor of lamentation to the tolerant ears of nature. The toys of her childhood were few in number for one so privileged, but Izayoi had always preferred her imagination to physical personifications of adventures.
Dolls spilling over her clutches, Izayoi turned for one last gaze out towards the bay, knowing that it would be her last as a free woman. She turned her face from the spray and morosely continued on the rocky path through the forest to the temple of Artemis.
As King Electryon's favorite child, Izayoi had accompanied him to the larger and more profitable city-states when he had gone to sell their livestock at the more lucrative market. She had seen the imposing-looking creations of white marble that were more acceptable homes for the gods and goddesses. The stonework had been either carefully carved to show the tales of the deity who was accessible inside or had been polished to be as flawlessly smooth as the silks worn by the priestesses. And the people! There were so many people, come to worship or ask for assistance. The smells of burning meat and incense drifted through the cold but beautiful halls to the streets where it would clash with the smell of unwashed bodies and livestock remains. The clear divide between the masses and the divinity was as distinct as the divide between her and her father and the rest of the population.
Izayoi had been uncomfortable with these palaces. She thought that the goddess Artemis would probably prefer the simple construction of the temple in her kingdom. It was secluded deep in the woods with simple stone walls, but the interior contained a vast amount of offerings and a fire always tended by a priestess.
Izayoi walked towards the stone alter, nodding kindly to the old priestess who bustled around to the front of the temple so that the princess's prayers would remain between her and the goddess. Izayoi knelt at the simple stone table and gazed into the fire behind it. She watched the flames dancing for a bit, attempting to clear her mind of everything but her prayers to the young goddess of virgin girls.
The flames flickered on but the princess's mind remained as troubled as when she stood before the ocean. Izayoi narrowed her eyes in frustration, allowing a clipped humph to escape her lips. She had been short tempered lately, a sign of the pressures of her upcoming future. While normally containing an infinite amount of patience, Izayoi had recently been finding herself becoming irritated quickly with smaller situations that would not have even crossed her notice otherwise. She had become especially frustrated with herself and her own shortcomings. Every time she had noticed her own failings, she would gather them in her thoughts to torment her consciousness, with the greatest of all of these failures being her inability to stall her marriage.
Izayoi sighed and tore her sights from the flames while also attempting to tear her mind from ideas about leaping into them. She picked up one of her toys she had brought to sacrifice to the goddess and studied it carefully. It was a dog her father had made for her brother Melecio. Izayoi had stolen it because she liked its soft pelt made of white rabbit's skin. When Melecio complained to her father, he just laughed good-humoredly and advised Melecio to keep better watch over his possessions or Hermes might inspire her to steal more of them. The rabbit fur was still discolored from when she had dropped it into the pools at the base of the cliffs when she and her brothers had been looking for strange creatures Poseidon brought to the shallows. The goddess probably wouldn't mind and Izayoi thought that it had brought more love and attachment to the offering.
Carefully laying the soft figure onto the stone table, she lined up its fellows beside it. The firelight threw a warmth on them that made them look more worn, more used, and more loved. Izayoi was filled with sudden and choking fear. How could she part with them? Couldn't they protect her in her new life? The stone temple and the militarily aligned dolls swam into a haze but Izayoi couldn't show any outward signs of unhappiness. She blinked her tears away, wishing she could do the same for her fear. She stared once more into the flames, this time reciting her prayers as a woman moving from virgin girlhood to the embrace of marriage.
As she finished saying the words without feeling, she rested her sights on the fire lit toys only briefly and fleetingly wished that she didn't have to give up her freedom to marriage. Then she rose from the alter and walked out of the temple and into the dark woods without looking back at her childhood.
Izayoi walked as slowly as she could, but no matter how long she lingered in the woods she couldn't avoid eventually ending at the villa. She was in view just as the last rays of the sun died on the horizon but even the slight visibility was enough for one of the guards to announce her presence. Yes, she appreciated their keen eyesight as they were stationed for her protection, but she found her ire peaked quickly as it had been apt to do lately - she had been trying to sneak into the grounds unnoticed. Swallowing her sharp retort to their heralds, the princess strolled into the courtyard with as much dignity as her inner turmoil would allow her so that she would project acceptance with the teasing for her wedding tomorrow she was sure she would find inside.
She was completely wrong. The main room was filled with chaos – all of her brothers were tying leather to their arms and legs or belting weapons around their waists. Everywhere the spray of steel and moving bodies competed for the scant light of the hearth. The song of war preparations could be heard over all of the confusion, with the calls for blood harmonizing with the clang of swords being roughly shoved into sheaves.
"Izayoi! My precious!" King Electryon's voice broke through the melody. "Where have you been, child?"
"Father! What's happened? Why is everyone wearing their battle armor?" Izayoi called back, shouting to make herself heard. Did you disagree with the marriage terms? Are we fighting with my intended? She added silently, but felt pangs of guilt for wishing such misfortune on Amphitryon. He had, after all, done nothing wrong.
"That thieving rascal Taphius! He stole all of the prize cattle!" The king spat at Izayoi as an explanation. "We're going to get revenge!"
Izayoi's heart leapt. She silently sent a thank-you to Artemis for her gift as there was no way she could get married without her father present to perform the necessary sacrifices. Trying not to let the relief show on her face, Izayoi composed an answer that a princess should give under these circumstances.
"Oh father – I wish you and my dear brothers the best for your endeavors and a speedy return so that I may be married as quickly as possible."
"Izayoi, you are always making me laugh, child," he chuckled at her while her face turned from a stone-like blankness to despair. "We don't need everyone to go – I'm only sending the boys. I can still marry you tomorrow, although you'll have to celebrate with your brothers when they get back."
Oh this was much more painful. She had been fleetingly given hope, only to have it stamped out again. Her father strode away from her chuckling, but not without mussing her hair first. She kept her face downturned and followed the hollows between the stones with her eyes as though she could follow them away from this room and its unconstructive chaos, away from this life and its uncontrolled arrangement.
Izayoi remained motionless as the stones she so attentively monitored while the room filled with motion around her. She didn't move when her brothers called to one another for various pieces of armor. She didn't move when the shadows that filled the space in the room grew larger with the hearth dying. And she didn't move when all nine of her brothers ran out the door to the stables, mounted their steeds and ran into the dark towards revenge. Izayoi stayed perfectly still, watching the stonework floors intently, trying not to cry until the very last flames of the hearth whispered out.