This and the previous chappy were edited by Inashosetai, wonderful unofficial beta


She wakes up at false dawn to the sound of birdsong, and gets to her feet. The fire is out, and Ah-Un is still lying to the side of the clearing. She tries her luck fishing in the pond, but cannot catch anything. After an hour or so, she curses the lack of running water. It was always so easy to see the damn fish when she fishes in a river!

She sighs at her outburst and continues drying off her legs with a cloth. "Jaken-sama," she yells, "are you there?" Jaken often left before she woke up to find something to eat.

She can hear Jaken squawking from the brush, "What is it, you silly girl? Why are you yelling?"

"Did you find anything? The pond if out of fish." She does not have to yell anymore because Jaken's hearing is very good, once you got his attention. She heard a lot of grumbling from his direction. She hopes that he will answer her instead of telling her to…

"I've found some tasty mushrooms."

"Are they the ones that only you can eat, Jaken-sama?"

He sounds slightly guilty, "Yes."

She thinks she can hear something about "picky child" and shakes her head. Jaken-sama never seems to understand that avoiding being violently ill isn't being picky.

Several hours later, Sesshomaru-sama comes back to camp, innocent as a cat…with cream on his whiskers, she thinks.

Though she never dares to ask, Rin always wonders where Sesshomaru-sama goes so mysteriously, and she worries whenever he is late.

This time will be different, she thinks.

"Sesshomaru-sama?"

He turns to look at her, pinning her to the forest floor like an insect on a card. She can't help but smile.

"What were you doing this morning?"

He doesn't answer; instead he says to Jaken, "Let's go."

That day passes like innumerable others, she walks or she rides Ah-Un, she steals from some nearby fields, but mostly she watches Sesshomaru-sama.

Once she went to pick some flowers for him. "Here, Sesshomaru-sama." She said, holding the pink and white blossom. "For you."

He accepts it, which always makes her blush. And then she blushes for blushing in the first place.

Suddenly they come across the body of a gigantic youkai, obviously dead for several days.

"Pheewww." Jaken edges up to the carcass. "What a stench. What do you think did this? Must have been pretty powerful."

Sesshomaru-sama immediately starts running, and Ah-Un follows by taking to the air. Jaken starts squawking and running to catch up. "Wait for me! Waaaaiiiit!" He makes a lunge and catches the end of the stirrup, and Rin pulls him on board.

Whenever he hears the word "powerful" he always takes off at full speed. She thinks, wondering why he always wants to test himself.

They run through the forest, and across a plain, finding the devastation typical of a rampaging youkai.

They reach youkai as it is terrorizing a village, tearing into the houses as though they were made of straw. Sesshomaru-sama brings his hand up in a gesture she is all too familiar with. In an instant the bright green whip snaps into the body of the bull, bringing it's head snapping up from it's feast of human flesh. Rin watches in awe as Sesshomaru-sama dances death around the creature, always one step ahead of it's claws. Only once does it make any contact. In a surprisingly quick slash, it catches him and throws him to the ground, but he springs back up and continues massacring the youkai.

Jaken is trembling. She can feel him shaking as he leans against her stomach, but whether it is fear of the bull youkai, or fear for Sesshomaru-sama, she doesn't know, but it had better not be fear of Sesshomaru-sama, or he is going to get an extra lump on his head.

Jaken jumps down and starts yelling and waving his staff around in circles, which never fails to make her smile; she wonders how he manages not to go flying when he swings. Then she realizes why he has gotten down; the youkai is coming after them. Rin gets off Ah-Un and takes a wild zigzag path to the trees, hoping it won't take a lucky swing. Her hand drops to her dagger, and she draws it, hoping she will not have to use it.