AN: I want to thank all those that wrote me their condolences. Thank you it means a lot to me any my family.

Guest: Who ever you may be. If you want a response more to your liking, go else where. I also suggest you give an address. You may not like the story, that's fine with me. But if you want answers to why, then I suggest you stick around and read the up coming chapters, as the answers to what you call 'Shite' will be there. I am not changing how my story is coming out for you or anyone. If you have a question ask it, and if I haven't already addressed the issue then I will. I will not say when it will be addressed, only that it will be. Some are even addressed in this chapter and FYI this chapter was written Oct. 09,2014. So have yourself a good day.

Tdaniel: thank you for the review. I don't plan on giving up on this story until it is finished. I hate hanging stories, just like everyone else… that being said… look for updates ever Saturday as that is the day I put aside to post.

Also to those that write stories and post more than one story a week, I salute you… I don't know how you do it, you are awesome individuals that need to be praised. I find that working on one story at a time is very consuming…

Talking

Telepathic talking

Chapter 4

As Kagome walked through the halls of Sesshomaru's palace, she took note of the youkai backing away from her. It was not her intention to frighten them in any way, but with her powers raging it couldn't be helped. She hadn't been this angry in fifty years.

While she was recovering, she had become so angry, her powers raging to the point it was harming her and others, that her family had to place her in a private facility, or more like a monastery, where monks helped those with mental instabilities such as hers. They helped her to quell the rage and anger, they helped her find the peace and control she needed, they gave her the will to live. From that point on she trained, not only her powers, but her body, so that what had happened to her, would never happen again.

As she walked she calmed herself, feeling Kirara transform into her kitten form and jump up onto her shoulder. She wouldn't let any of them make her lose her control again. They weren't worth her ire, they weren't worth anything as far as she was concerned. They were her enemies.

"I'm alright, Kirara. I just need to get away from them." She said to the kitten sitting on her shoulder nuzzling her, further calming her. "I didn't mean to take you away from your friend, but I am glad that you stayed with me. When we have the time, I want to find Shippo. I miss him and I am sure that you do as well."

Kirara meowed her agreement. She had missed the little fox. The only reason she stayed with the Slayer, was her promise to her former master and now that the little miko had returned, she was not going to leave her. She was there the day that they traded the little miko to the enemy, but she had thought that they would go back and get her. That was a mistake that she wouldn't make again.

Finally making her way outside to the courtyard, Kagome noticed that Ah-Un was still waiting for her. She smiled softly at the beast. Walking up to them, she scratched their heads in greeting.

"I thank you for waiting for me, but I can't ask you to come with me. I don't need your master any more angry with me." Kagome said softly, as she removed her belongings from beside the beast. "But can you take us to a hot spring that is nearby?" At Ah-Un's nods, Kagome climbed onto his back. "Thank you, my friends."

It didn't take long for them to reach a hot spring. Kagome surveyed her surroundings, flaring her powers, just enough to make the youkai within the area flee. Turning to the dragon she smiled again, before dismissing him back to palace with the promise of seeing them again in the morning.

After the dragon left Kagome looked down at Kirara. "Stay here and guard camp until I return alright. I'm just going to hunt for dinner for the two of us." She said with a small smile on her face.

When she had finally returned and made sure that her barrier was still in place and their meal consumed and the area cleaned, Kagome turned to the little neko as she cleaned her face and paws from her meal.

"Kirara?" She called softly. "I know that you can understand me, but I would like to do something that will enable me to understand you a lot better."

Kagome watched as Kirara thought about what she was saying, before the kitten climbed into the miko's lap. Kagome smiled down at the kitten form of the fire neko.

"I learned a lot while I was back home. I even tried it on my cat and it worked, but he wasn't nearly as smart as you. I want to try to form a link, between your mind and mine so that we can talk." At that Kirara perked up, her eyes glittering. "I take it you would like that?" She watched as Kirara bobbed her head in the affirmative.

Concentrating her powers and what she wished to accomplish, Kagome touched the diamond mark on Kirara's forehead, then touched the shattered jewel upon her own, while chanting a small incantation. For a moment Kirara was overwhelmed with warmth and love that the miko held towards her, that she actually felt a tear slide down her fur covered face.

"Try talking to me and lets see what type of communication I receive."

"Miko." Kagome smiled as she received the distinctly feminine voice, the same tone as Kirara's meow's.

"Yes, it worked." Kagome said happily. "Can you hear me as well?" Kagome asked as she thought back to the neko.

"Yes."

"Good. Now we can talk, without others knowing it. Don't worry, I won't invade your thoughts. The link is just so that we can communicate. I do have one question for you. Do you have any idea where I might be able to find Shippo?"

"No. After the others traded you, he was so angry and hurt, he left and I haven't seen him since. Kohaku also left with him. They were both so angry. I wish to apologize to you for my part in what happened to you so long ago. If I would have known that they wouldn't return for you, I would have fought them." Kirara said sadly.

"Don't worry, I understand the position you were in. We'll find them both. I'll ask Sesshomaru about them, when the others aren't around."

"You will tell this One, what has caused such a change in the miko." Sesshomaru ordered his brother and companions.

"Why should we tell you anything." InuYasha said still, rubbing his sore throat, the burns were very slow at healing, Kagome had gripped him harder than he thought possible for a human onna and with the small leak of her powers, she burned him pretty good.

"It would not be difficult to find the answers."

"We traded Kagome and the Jewel to Naraku, for things we all wanted."

"Shut up, Sango!" InuYasha yelled.

"No! What we did was wrong InuYasha. We have never talked about it. How could we have been so stupid. She was our friend and we just handed her over, for what. Our greatest desires and wishes. Our selfish wants. We condemned an innocent girl to what?" Sango yelled, until she became too choked with tears to be able to speak, as her tears ran down her face.

"What did you all receive in return." Sesshomaru was getting pissed, he didn't like the sounds of any of this. He knew that the miko had loved them and was beyond loyal and caring. Even he, himself had been intrigued with the little miko.

"When Kagome had gone home, we received an offer from Naraku. We were all tired of the constant fighting. Kagura came and stated the offer, InuYasha full youkai, Kikyou returned, Sango's brother and my Wind Tunnel in exchange for Kagome and the Jewel. We took the offer.

InuYasha turned full youkai, Kikyou was returned as an inu, losing her miko powers, Sango got her brother back, I got the Wind Tunnel curse removed." Miroku spoke meekly, the guilt and shame evident in his voice and posture, while tears streamed down his wife's face.

"How was it possible, for you to turn into a full youkai without your beast taking control. How was it possible for a former dead priestess to be returned to the living, as well as an inu. How was it possible for that particular curse be removed, without killing the creator as it was designed to do, as it was tied to his life. How is it possible for you all to be alive and yet you question the miko. Why would any of you trade someone that was so loyal to you, that she has risked her life for your own. She tended your wounds. She cared for you.

"Yet when this One asked, you had stated that the changes, were a gift from the Kami. So, how exactly was all of this possible." He demanded, he was quickly losing his patients and temper.

If he had known what they had done those long years ago, he would have never accepted InuYasha into the pack. He was under the mistaken impression, that everything that was told to him was truth. InuYasha had come to him after Naraku was gone and told him that the miko had perished, honorably and that he was now a full youkai by the grace of the Kami and had taken a mate. Leaving him honor bound to accept InuYasha into the family, even against his own mother's wishes. Now he regretted that decision and couldn't take back, what he had given. His honor had been ruined once again by his dishonorable half-brother. He couldn't kill him, unless he was given just cause and with the act being so long ago, InuYasha had tied his hands.

"We don't know. We believe Naraku used the Jewel..." Miroku tried to explain to his limited ability and knowledge.

"Fools." He spat, his disgust with his half-brother reached new bounds. How could they be so foolish. He turned walking out of the room leaving them behind, but still within hearing range, as he heard his half-brother's reply. He needed to get away, before he killed them all.

"Who are you calling fools? We all got what we wanted." InuYasha shouted, in an attempt to justify what they did.

While Kirara was resting beside the miko in her battle form, Kagome felt Sesshomaru's aura coming her way at a steady pace. She felt him stop at her barrier for a moment, before she allowed him entrance. She knew he would want to talk and he knew that she wouldn't talk around her former friends.

He had taken time to calm down after hearing his brother and his companions tell their story and why they traded the gentle miko into the hands of the vile hanyou. He was tempted to kill them all for what they had done, but it was not his place. It was for the miko to decide their punishment.

When the kit first came to him, he had refused to speak at all and when he had mentioned the miko the kit had cried until he had fallen asleep. He never could get an answer out of the boy, even as he grew and trained. When the kit had finally started speaking again, he only begged to be trained, so that someday he would be able to see his 'momma' again and that he wanted revenge on those that had hurt her.

Coming upon Kagome resting with her back to a tree, she looked up at him with that same sad smile on her youthful face.

"I knew that you would come. You may want to sit." She suggested just as softly as before. "This is going to take a while."

Sitting with his back to a tree across the small clearing with a small fire burning in the center, he watched as the miko organized her thoughts.

"I take it you got some information from them?"

"Hn." Was his reply.

"What do you want to know."

"What happened after they traded you?" He knew that he didn't have a right to ask, but he also wanted to make sure that she was up to the task, that she was sent to handle.

"After they traded me, Naraku was in his glory. He brought me back to his compound. As you know, I was weak and pathetic, with no training and no help to come for me, I was at his mercy. He tortured me. He took great pleasure in it. I was there for a month before he decided to rape me. That was when my powers exploded violently. I purified him and everyone of the youkai that were there. I had lost the ability to scream anymore, as the torture ruined my vocal cords. This is as loud as I will ever get. No amount of healing, can heal the damage that was wrought.

After Naraku was gone. I dragged my battered body to the Jewel. I made my wish and was sent home, broken and dying. Naraku poisoned me during the rape and torture. I barely survived and was marked." She noticed the look on the face of the Western Lord. "Not a mating mark. The poison left scars or it could have been the Shikon. I am not sure and it doesn't matter now, it has been so long that I have grown used to them, they are a part of me. A reminder if you will.

"I have spent the last fifty years training, growing, learning. I know many languages and fighting styles. I am no longer weak and pathetic. I refuse to be a damsel in distress any longer. I can do things that would most likely surprise you. I had spent a good twenty years with the monks on the mainland, learning and understanding and finding myself. I have found peace with whom and what I am. I also imagine you are wondering, why I am telling you all of this."

"Hn." Sesshomaru answered in kind. He didn't know what to think. He was amazed at the things she had told him so far. He also wondered about her training. He knew that she was fast, but could she keep up with him, was one of the questions that was on his mind. He was also beyond angry that she had to live through all that has happened to her, let a lone being taken the way that she was by the disgusting construct.

"You are one of the few that I can trust. You have not betrayed me and I doubt that you will. You are far to honorable for something like that. I also need to know if you can help me. I need to find Shippo. I miss him. I was also wondering if Rin was still alive and what has become of her." She didn't know if she should also ask about Kohaku, so she held off until he told her what she needed and wanted.

"They are alive as well as the Slayer boy." He stated and watched as relief washed over the miko's face, and her body visibly relaxed. "I will take you to them after we visit the village tomorrow." He saw worry cross her face. "Worry not miko, I do not intend on bringing the others. The kit and Slayer would surely kill them, but I feel I must warn you. They may come with us to the village. I feel that my half-brother," he spat, he was so disgusted with his brother and the further dishonor the whelp has brought unto him.

"Can you tell me what happened to them after I disappeared?" She asked hope shining brightly in her startling blue eyes. She didn't want to think of the others tagging along with them. It was sure to be an interesting journey.

"The kit found me and with Rin's plea, I allowed him to stay. I had asked what had become of you, he broke. He didn't speak for two years. Once he started talking again, I questioned him, but he refused to answered, citing that he couldn't, but that he needed to become stronger to protect you when he found you or to exact vengeance.

"Five years ago Rin, Kohaku and Shippo were placed in a safe village within my lands. Rin and Kohaku mated forty years ago. It is also strange that the two humans have not aged. They also have three young."

Kagome smiled across to the dai-youkai. "A gift."

"Explain."

"I was granted a gift. The Kami or Fate didn't explain, much. They said that for what I have been through.. Was not supposed to happen. They told me that as recompense for the wrongs against one so pure, I was being given a gift.

"From what I can figure is that the betrayal towards me was great enough to gain attention from the Kami or the Fates, whichever maybe be the case, I am grateful." She said with the first true smile that he had seen on her since her return.

"Did you know that they are cursed?" She asked, at seeing the stunned look on his face, she went on. "I noticed it right after I saw them. They are barren. The possible reason for their extended lives may have something to do with the curse. Punishment. A long life, seeing others live, love and have offspring that they would never have, due to their betrayal."

To say he was shocked was an understatement. He was even more glad that he never took the foul wench from his half-brother. He can have her.

"What of your own extended life?"

"Oh that. Well even before all this mess started, I had a feeling I was different, but it didn't really hit home, until about ten years after I returned. My brother aged, where I still looked the same. I'm not sure what caused me to stop aging, but I adapted and I used my time wisely."

They lapsed into silence for awhile, neither wanting to break it, until Kagome made a comment.

"It's so quiet here. Peaceful. No pollution or traffic or overcrowded with humans."

"Hn." He didn't know what to say, to her admittance.

"My world is dying. The balance is gone. Humans rule over the planet, taking what they want and not giving back. Crime is high, people don't care. There are buildings that reach the sky. They are so high that you can't see the tops. The smells are horrible. The noise unbearable. There is approximately over nine billion humans on the planet and not one youkai and I am the only miko to have been born in about five hundred years. There is not enough food or room for that many people. The forests are gone to make way for more people, the cities have grown upwards into the skies. Food is more processed than real. The air more foul than Naraku's miasma." Sesshomaru didn't know what to think or say to everything that Kagome was saying.

She wasn't even looking at him as she spoke in her soft tones, staring at the stars above, the neko sitting quietly, her head in the miko's lap offering comfort to the sadness that was leaking from the miko's aura. "My world will soon cease to exist. I could have stayed and died with my world, but the Kami and Fates have other ideas. Maybe they want me to save your world from becoming like mine."

"Are they not the same world? Only removed by time." Sesshomaru questioned, he had heard that she was from the future, but this was something all together different.

"Actually, no. We live in parallel worlds. I figured that out one day, when another world or city was seen in mine. A seeming floating city, if you will. Some think it was just a mirage, but I don't. I felt something that no else did. I felt life and youkai. I don't know if it was this world or another, but I believe that at first it was because of the Shikon and the God Tree, I was able to traverse a dimensional rip or portal or it could have been the Kami themselves that allowed me to travel. I'm not really sure."

"Was not the Shikon destroyed with your wish?" Sesshomaru asked, he had to know if it would cause further damage to his world.

"After the wish was made, the Shikon fused with my body or more precisely my soul. The soul piece that was stolen from me, never returned and when I thought the Jewel was gone, I found that it actually fused to the spot where my soul was missing a piece. What that means is that I have the souls of those that where once trapped within the Jewel now trapped with in me, stitched if you will.

"It almost destroyed me, as it was, if not for the monks on the mainland. They helped me find peace and to unlock my powers and taught me how to purify my soul. I would greatly appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone. That is my secret."

"So you have gained their powers?" He stated with slight contempt, he hated false powers.

"No. The powers I wield are my own. The souls could be seen as a patch job, a means to fill the empty space within me. My pure soul has purified and cleansed the souls, giving them peace. I tell you these things, because I know of your dislike of false power, that is why you never craved the Jewel like other youkai. That and you are far stronger than any other."

"You are correct." Kagome smiled softly. She watched as Sesshomaru stood, looking in the direction of his home. "I will take my leave miko, rest and meet me in the courtyard at first light."

"Good night, Sesshomaru."