Chapter III.
Accidental Mandates

Avoidance of giving a solid answer to the Emperor's emissaries had been easy, even elegant, for six more years. Yet the browning season after the girls turned twelve brought with it ill tidings. Pigeons flew for several days straight, horsemen ran their steeds till they sweated blood, and demon spies loped across the plains, all bearing the same news. The Emperor, divine son of Heaven, was dead. His daughter could not gain the throne without a council of ministers acting as regent, due to her divine madness—his other children had long died in war or illness.

For a while, there was quiet peace within the East as they observed the funereal rites. The emperor's body was mummified in miasma and then the bones were gently laid to rest in the ancestral sepulchre. A star in the royal stream of celestial bodies was named after him by the princess's decree.

Then, in the Western Dominion, the ensemble that had been sent out immediately after the Emperor's death arrived. Sesshoumaru had known they would come, had known for months that the moment was coming to its crisis. Still, he did not expect it to be quite so small…

The royal emissary, Hosenki, arrived with a retinue of fifteen guards, some of whom doubled as entertainers who put on a puppet show for the girls, some limber, rosy-faced Eastern dancers, a tongueless aide, and a pubescent priest. The latter was a surprise: Sesshoumaru had heard of Miroku the miraculous, a prodigy, but had not thought he would ever step foot outside of the borders of the Emperor—the savant was too precious a resource for the spiritual health of the East.

He had also not expected the little prodigy to be such a skirt-chasing pervert. At merely fifteen, the boy had the charm of someone older and continually made provocative suggestions to Tsubaki (who was, admittedly, also precocious in her behavior). Miroku made every attempt to get closer to Tsubaki, and she, pausing a moment before evading his wandering hand, teased him back, though her coy smiles were obviously practiced.

The little plotter.

Sesshoumaru eased back from his solitary vantage on the citadel walls. Once, when he was a child, the precipitous drop from his seat on the ramparts to the bottom used to frighten him, but that had dissappated with other childish fancies. Now in moments of rest he took in the long and wide view of his capital: the sandstone walls, the curved ceramic eaves, the impish stone watchmen on the corners of his buildings. His was one of the most beautiful cities in the nation—flourishing and healthy as a rich man's babe.

Distantly, he could hear the ringing laughter of the girls, especially that of Kagome's. It had grown apparent in recent years, even though he lacked the sight to truly tell, that she was the best choice for the Miko. His father said nothing to him on this front, permitting Sesshoumaru to reach the same decision which Inutaishou had already reached long ago. The realization rankled—his father, as always, was right.

But nonetheless he hesitated to make it obvious… especially when his half-brother had been deciding to stay in the castle past the summer into the first months of fall. He'd found playmates, apparently, in the girlchildren. Though the others he intermittently teased, the little halfbreed whelp fought tooth and nail with Kagome. Several times Sesshoumaru actually had to step in and physically pry the two apart to prevent any more cuts and bruises from "accidentally" appearing.

What worried him was not that they displayed animosity to each other, but that their behavior reminded him so very much of lion cubs fighting—nipping at each other in a fight to establish dominance… and respect. Already Inuyasha loved to chatter about Kagome to his tutors and servants, and would even sometimes talk about her to Sesshoumaru.

He wasn't sure what exactly to make of this camaraderie… but he didn't like it.

A cry came up loudly from the area where the girls played, and corresponding screams and yells chased the wail. Something had happened to Inuyasha, he thought, recognizing the timbre of the first cry. He slid down the vertical wall, slowing his free descent by creating friction down with his robes on the inside ramparts. Distantly curious, he sprinted to the site of the chaos.

The nursemaids, guards, and girls were gathered in a loose circle around an impressive pit in the middle of Sesshoumaru's peach grove. The last of the fruit piled in low baskets around the trees, abandoned by their harvesters. Jaken was furious, somewhere in the crowd, occasionally screeching.

He shouldered through, coming at last to the inner circle—where he saw his brother, twitching, face down in the middle of the crater, making little puppyish whines.

"What happened?" he demanded, grasping Inuyasha by the back of his neck and pulling him none-too-gently to his feet. His half-brother glared at Kagome, who, in response, turned her nose up and away. Kagura quietly tittered.

The story burst out on all fronts, tumbling over itself as witnesses wrote and revised their accounts.

Inuyasha had been leaping from tree to tree in imitation of a monkey, kept aloft by the breeze which Kagura called up to convey him. Though the boy had kept calling her name, Kagome had not paid attention: instead, she had been working on stringing a necklace of black pierced stones and fangs with Kaede, a piece of magic which the two had spontaneously created between them. Finally, the little boy, tired of being ignored, swept in between the two girls and snatched the newly-finished necklace from their fingers.

Tsubaki had been flirting per usual with Miroku under one of the trees, passing bites of peaches to each other.

Slipping on the necklace to free up his hands, Inuyasha dove from tree to tree in triumph as the two girls ran after him, incensed. Kagome, frustrated as he ignored her calls in turn, finally reached her wits end and shouted: "Osuwari!"

And Inuyasha, pulled by the necklace, sat.

Or rather fell.

The burden of punishment fell on the lord of the castle. Sesshoumaru upbraided his fool of a relation first, then the miko children. He despised how petty his role made him. He even had to place judgment on the stupid power-toyings of children; yet giving authority over the mikos and his brother to anyone else was far too dangerous. At least Inuyasha was leaving in three days to go back to his parents in their retreat in the mountains. Peace may return to the citadel.

Sesshoumaru saw Hosenki smile over the shoulders of the nursemaids. Or perhaps not.

"Now take this off," he said, gesturing to the necklace. Jaken rushed forward, grabbed hold of the necklace, and pulled; Inuyasha gagged as the beads dug into his through. "I'll do it," the boy snarled, wresting it back from Jaken. He attempted to lift it over his head and was rewarded with an electric shock that vibrated his hands and set his teeth on edge.

Sesshoumaru's lips thinned. "Kagome, remove it."

Kagome obliged, then flinched away from the necklace before the task was finished. It had started to glow hot to the touch. "I can't."

"She's laid a geis on the boy." Miroku emerged from the crowd to closely inspect the necklace, mellow, even relaxed. "It can't be removed without great harm coming to both Kagome and Inuyasha."

A whimper escaped Kagome, who visibly shrunk as all the attention fell onto her. Her eyes pointed toward her feet, she said in a wobbling voice, "I didn't mean to. I'm sorry, Lord Sesshoumaru, I didn't mean to."

A geis? On his brother? A member of the royal family, no matter how much a misfit, embroiled in a magic spell—ensorcelled to another? Sesshoumaru bared his canines.

"It's not your fault," cut in Miroku, laying a gentle hand on Kagome's shoulder. "You didn't know what you and Kaede were making, did you? You thought you were making a sparkling necklace of power. Inuyasha's the one who put on the necklace."

The boy muttered something to his valet and nanny, Myouga.

"Is the necklace dangerous?"

"No, the largest extent of its curse has already occurred: whenever Kagome wants Inuyasha to sit, he'll have to sit. It won't interfere with him, otherwise—it'll grow as he grows, remaining otherwise an inanimate object. But since he can't take it off, the geis will become a part of him."

"Isn't there any way to lift the geis?" Myouga asked, stone-faced. Sesshoumaru could imagine his audience in the mountains with Inutaishio, and took a strange sort of pleasure in it, even knowing that the paternal blame would eventually fall on his own shoulders.

Miroku inspected the necklace. "It's the basic curse, so the basic cure: true love's first kiss."

The expression of horror on Inuyasha's face was enough to clear the tension. The crowd rippled with laughter. The boy was not in immediate danger of never finding his true love. Sesshoumaru even managed a smirk. All things considered, the geis was harmless enough—as long as he separated the two, cursed and cursemaker.

"Inuyasha, you're going home tomorrow morning. From now on you will stay with Father all year—to prevent you from getting into more trouble of this sort." Sesshoumaru's bristling silenced any protests from the agitated crowd. "You are clearly not ready for the freedom of the citadel. Everyone—back to your tasks. Kagome—watch your spells."

The crowd dispersed, unwillingly, like molasses spreading.

Sesshoumaru had expected his brother to protest, but he had not. Instead, Inuyasha gritted his teeth and threw out his chest. "'Night, Lord Brother," he muttered, stomping away, a hand wrapped around his painful burden.

The whole thing would be entertaining, Sesshoumaru mused as he retreated to his chambers, were it to remain within the walls of the citadel. But news would spread, as it always did, and traitors prick their ears. For Kagome to become the Miko meant that, if the geis on Inuyasha could be expanded, Inuyasha would prove a easy pawn to manipulate for the western throne... all the more reason to prefer Sesshoumaru's half-brother to him.

Perhaps it was time to seriously consider wedding the mad princess.

He called Hosenki in to his hearing chamber, a high room flanked by giant painted pillars and shielded with a gold-tiled roof. Sesshoumaru perched sullenly in the high-backed seat inset with rare blue stones that served for a throne, as Hosenki stood, massive shoulders hunched in deference, before him. Miroku and two guards attended the emissary, and Sesshoumaru once again listened to the conditions of the suit.

Marriage in the East and a season's stay in the house of the Princess before returning to the West. An heir—of any gender—and the Northern Wastes will be his by imperial decree. He shall possess the title of Royal Consort, but the power of a full Chancellor, even emperor. But he must take the name of the House of the Emperor, and be as one of their children forever.

In return, gold and silver and rare jewels; his pick of the royal scions to bring to the West; free trade between the lands.

Sesshoumaru held up his hands before Hosenki could enumerate any more benefits. He knew these benefits backwards and forwards—his father and he had gone over them, periodically, and his father had bid him agree to marry.

But if he were the Royal Consort, how much easier the rebels would find the call for a "true" Western son to rule in his Dominion—the lands which were his by primogeniture?

"What does she look like?"

"She's lovely, elegant, graceful, everything a princess ought to be," said Hosenki.

"She's beautiful and intense," said Miroku.

Sesshoumaru fixed his gaze on the impertinent slug of a boy. "And?"

"She babbles about darkness to come and forgets about the country for days at a time. In her lucid moments, she's a brilliant politician. She's elegant. But innocent. The princess was mad even in the crib—would see spirits that weren't there. Spirits I can't see."

"There is no time to dally! Milord, forgive me—but action must be taken immediately. For her sake, if not for yours. There is talk of deposing her among the lower nobles. Her people love her, of course, as they love any beautiful and beneficent monarch, but they would not reject a saner ruler. If you would be this saner ruler, and allow a peaceful transition between the age of the Emperors and the age of the warlords…"

"Royal Consort—that's a name and title I won't accept."

"She is the last of the celestial bodies made mortal—a worthy mate."

A dark-eyed woman like a flower, her hand on his trunk, her breath warming his skin. Sesshoumaru blinked the image away and glanced to the side, where tapestries of his ancestors' accomplishments hung. Why that memory now?

Would he be remembered for marrying into a dying empire? Is that his accomplishment? Saving a people he doesn't know, much less care for?

"I will think on it some more."

"Then let me leave you with a gift of the Empire," said Hosenki, and clapped. The dancers entered, silvery heads bobbing, cheeks artificially blooming. Hosenki and the boy-monk bowed out, leaving the guards to watch over the troupe as they spun and leaped to the court musician's koto. They were each phlegmatically beautiful, and with each careful cartwheel, they came closer to Sesshoumaru's seat. He wondered why Hosenki had thought dancing would help his deliberation—he must know Sesshoumaru was not easily seduced.

But there was one who, as she passed her long sheer sleeves through the air, left an afterscent of faint honeysuckle.

He dismissed them at that, and spent the evening in his pavilion drinking pale tea under a pale moon. What would happen if he didn't marry the princess? That was the question which his father pointedly brought up again and again. It was better to sacrifice a little glory than permit the destabilization of the East. Or so Inutaisho thought. He hated his father's track record.

The dancers were waiting in paper-thin kimonos in his bedroom when he entered. He scoffed at Hosenki's heavy-handedness and once again sent them out—except for the one who smelled like honeysuckle. She waited, eyes cast to the side, as he approached. He leaned close to her face, feeling her tremble under his eyes with fearful anticipation. His long fingers coursed through her silvery hair, down the marks of nobility dotting her temple in parallel purple marks. Lowering his head to her neck, he inhaled. And then pushed her away. The scent wasn't strong enough.

She left, still trembling, on her hands and knees.

The dream returned that night, as he knew it would.

Her fingers were embers against his bark, painfully hot and glowing. Her flowers lain strewn about them, some face down, some propped against his roots. He felt he was stretching out of his form, as if growing out of her embrace into the air. Her dark-lashed eyes closed. She leaned in, and he felt a twisting in her stomach as her lips closed on him, and suddenly his long white hair cascaded around them like drifting strands of silk, no longer tree branches, and his largest tree arms turned to muscle and bone and skin. They fell automatically to snake around her tiny waist; they couldn't get close enough to please him. The wind came as a roar in his ears, whipping their robes around them.

Come find me.

Come find me.

He woke, aroused and disappointed, and summoned the dancer.