#2: Sillage-The scent that lingers in the air, the trail left in water, the impression made after something has been there.
It had been hard for Kurama to return to that house, so many (so few...) years later. Creeping through the window, a white shadow in the darkness. All the neighbors asleep, Shiori resting comfortably in the metal drawer of a nearby morgue...
Carefully, silently, he'd shut the drapes and blinds before delicately placing his lampweeds along the baseboards, alerting no one to his presence in that quiet, haunted place. With practiced care and grace he slid across the room, onto her chair, long cold, with the afghan still hanging over the back it. It smelled of lavender water, green tea; the faint perfume of his mother. Rocking the chair slowly, he touched the little table, carefully traced the spine of her book with his claws. Letters written in gold; a bookmark he had braided for her as a child, marking pages he would never finish.
Leaning his head back, he let his white hair smooth along his shoulder, little strands clinging to the fabric of the blanket. The silence was making his stomach hurt...but if he strained his ears, he could swear that, in the hum of the city below, he heard his mother singing that quiet song he never knew the name of.