Notes: So this is long enough to hopefully make up for the really short chapter last time. I really appreciate the help I got with Miroku's character, and I have attempted to incorporate your suggestions into this. It was (correctly) pointed out to me byKayla M. Tellers that he was a bit too pervy to be working in a school, so I've toned him down a bit. I've also made him a touch craftier, and highly educated (thanks RenEmma!), and adaptable enough to keep Kagome on her toes.
Thanks as well to everyone who reviewed, your feedback is much appreciated.
Oh, and I went a bit quote happy in this one. A full list of quotations is at the bottom.
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Part IV: Polemics
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門前の小僧習わぬ経を読む。
Mon zen no kozō narawanu kyō o yomu.
An apprentice near a temple will recite the scriptures untaught.
— Japanese Proverb
--
This was definitely not what she had expected. Not that she'd known what to expect, really. But she'd certainly imagined that it would involve a little bit more lecturing and a little less… games.
"What I propose," he'd said gaily, twirling his pen in his left hand. "Is a fair trade. Equivalent exchange, if you will. I'll answer your questions honestly, and to the best of my ability, if you'll answer mine. Every question you answer earns you a question that you may ask me. If you choose not to answer, I may ask a second question, and vice versa."
"What's the catch?" had been her first question. She hadn't believed him when he'd replied quickly, "no catch."
"Only that you must answer truthfully, or not answer at all," he elucidated finally.
It was probably a bad idea. But she could always refuse to answer, couldn't she? It didn't occur to her that a non-answered question might very well say more about her than an answered one.
"All right." As soon as she'd said it something had shifted in his eyes, a quick flicker of triumph, and then it was gone. She'd seen it though, and she knew. He was obviously highly adept at hiding his true thoughts — stashing everything behind his flippant front, belying his true cunning which lay beneath. Dangerous.
Only this time there were no warnings. No textbooks. No terror based solely on principle. Yet, he was. He was highly dangerous. He couldn't tear her to pieces with his hands; he lacked the sheer brute strength that was so often associated with demons. But he could likely destroy her none-the-less. Her thoughts and feelings were no less a vulnerability than her lack of claws or fangs.
She was suddenly uncomfortably aware that she was playing a game of verbal chess with an expert.
"I'll start, shall I?" he said casually.
"Does that count as a question?" she asked quickly. He smiled widely. "Yes. You may answer it if you so choose, or decline to answer."
"You may start," she said magnanimously.
"Excellent," he said. "And for answering your question I receive an additional question that I may ask you. You, for answering me, also receive a question. That leaves me with two, and you with one." He flashed her another grin. "I shall begin. What made you decide to write an essay about demons?"
The question took a moment to register, she was too busy being furious with him for having snagged an extra question out of her. That was something that would not be happening again. "Curiosity," she said simply, when she finally realised that he was waiting for an answer. "My turn."
She paused for a moment, considering what question would be best to ask. "Are you going to tell me that what I did was wrong?"
"An interesting question," he said, placing a hand on his chin thoughtfully. "No. I'll leave that up to you to decide."
Her eyebrows raised at that. I suppose you'll have to convince me, he'd said. Perhaps he was trying to do the same? This game, despite its frivolous pretence was an argument carefully designed to get her to change her mind.
Crafty, she thought. Very crafty. But two can play at that game.
"What prompted such unusual curiosity?" he asked mildly, his eyes watching her face for the slightest reaction. She wondered briefly how much she'd already given away.
"Nothing. 'Curiosity has its own reason for existence'."
His eyebrow raised. "Wilde?"
"Einstein. I believe I am now entitled to a second question. What do you think of the premise of my essay, and what conclusions has it lead you to draw about me?"
He laughed suddenly at that. "Well played," he conceded, still grinning. "I think that your essay was well-thought out, and well-organised. However the premise, despite being well presented, was based on ignorance and inexperience. From that, I believe that you are also very young, and idealistic. You have an obvious and highly developed intellect, but that intelligence has yet to grow into wisdom."
She bit back a retort, and simply glowered. He looked amused by her obvious displeasure at his words. "What did you think of your essay's premise, and what conclusions have you drawn about me based on our conversation so far?"
"That's two questions," she ground out.
"I had one in reserve from the beginning."
Her eye twitched angrily. Jerk, she thought furiously. "You may decline to answer if you wish," he said imperiously.
"I think that the premise of my essay was highly radical, and socially unacceptable. I think you hide your own ignorance under your experience. 'If you understand everything, you must be misinformed'," she said surlily.
"Ah, proverbs. There are few things quite as excellent as a good proverb. However," he said, raising a single finger warningly. "since you seem fond of Einstein, 'the only source of knowledge is experience'."
"'The reverse side also has a reverse side'," she replied. "And 'a frog in a well does not know the great sea'. Experience can blind you just as easily as it can open your eyes."
Something subtle changed in his expression, and his eyebrow raised fractionally. He gave her a calculating look now, something guarded passing over his countenance. He frowned slightly. "I believe it is your turn."
"Do you believe that I am wrong simply because of my age?" The question came out sounding far harsher than she had intended, but there was no retracting it now.
"To a certain extent," he replied.
"To what extent?" she asked quickly.
A ghost of a smile flitted quickly across his face. "Penalty question. I decline to answer that. I do, however, get an extra question, as you asked one out of turn."
She frowned, mentally kicking herself for making such a silly mistake.
"I have two questions, but I shall ask them one at a time. First," he paused momentarily for affect, making Kagome want to roll her eyes. "You wrote a bit about fear in your essay, but I'd like you to explain your hypothesis to me further. What reason do we have for putting aside our natural and justifiable fear of demons in order to give them 'acceptance'?"
"I don't believe we should cast aside fear," she replied. "Fear is useful. But I do believe that we should conquer our fear of the unknown." She smiled and added, "'only in overcoming fear and facing the unknown with dignity and honour can true strength be found'." In a strange way she found quoting Sesshoumaru's theories on fear to the man who was, in his own way, deeply determined to prove that demons were highly dangerous, and, likely, completely terrified of Sesshoumaru and all that he represented, appealingly ironic.
"How do you propose to go about doing this?" he said mildly, though she got the distinct impression that he was now only humouring her.
"By not making our character judgements based solely upon the presupposed framework laid down by society. We don't assume people, by their nature, are evil. Neither should we assume that demons by their nature are also evil. Character judgements are exactly that, judgements of character. In order to pass judgement on a character, we must first get to know it."
"And if getting to know it costs us our lives?"
She smirked. "Penalty question." He blinked, and his eyebrows shot to his hairline. She felt a sense of triumph at having caught him so off-guard. "Common sense is hardly to be discounted. We would not try and befriend a mass murderer simply because they are human. Judgements can be made based upon actions as well as words."
Her smirk widened, and she added. "I believe, if I've counted correctly, that I now have three questions."
He nodded, conceding the point gracefully. "That is twice you have outplayed me," he remarked casually. "Which is twice more than usual. You are more intriguing than I had first thought."
Her eyes narrowed, and immediately she went on the defensive. However, his eyes, this time, remained affixed appropriately on her face, and did not stray any lower. If he had noticed and interpreted her reaction, he gave no sign.
"Did my essay frighten you?"
He smiled. "Yes."
"Do I frighten you?"
"Yes."
She nodded. "Why?"
Slowly, he answered, "you are unpredictable, and incomprehensible. A strange mixture of naiveté and wisdom that I did not expect. I was aware that your essay was well thought out, but I had assumed it was merely an excellently executed joke." He paused for a moment, his eyes searching her own for something. Then he asked cautiously, as if he, himself, almost feared the question, "have you ever met a demon?"
Her heart stopped beating briefly, before picking up with a vigourous, pounding rhythm that threatened to break out of her chest. She desperately tried to school her expression, and quell the wave of fear that had risen at his question.
Oddly enough, she wasn't quite sure what it was that she was so afraid of.
She gulped and said. "I think I've had enough of this. May I go?"
He nodded briskly, suddenly seeming far more serious and imposing than he had before. "Yes."
She collected her things and left, making a quick b-line for the door. As her hand touched the doorknob he spoke. "Higurashi-san." She paused, and turned.
"I will see you next week at the same time." She nodded. "And," he grinned suddenly, the action making him appear far younger than he was. "You will still owe me two answers. I shall use the time to come up with adequate questions."
She nodded again, and stepped out into the hall. As soon as the door latched behind her she started running and didn't stop until she got home.
--
"How was school?" her father asked as he passed the rice bowl over the dinner table.
Was that ever a loaded question. When had dinners at her house become such a trying affair?
"Fine."
"How was your meeting with the school's counsellor?" he asked, his attempt at nonchalance not fooling anyone present. Well, except, perhaps, her grandfather. Though Kagome suspected that her grandfather picked up on far more things than people gave him credit for.
"Fine."
"What did you two talk about?" her father asked, passing the teapot over to Souta forcefully, causing the tea inside to slosh wildly and Souta to take a nervous skitter back from the table.
"Stuff."
"Kagome," her mother said reprovingly. As her father stuck his chopsticks ferociously into his rice and growled, "what sort of stuff?"
"He asked me about my essay," she said, shovelling her mouth full of rice and chewing with exaggerated movements.
"What did you say?"
She gestured at her stuffed mouth and continued chewing far longer than was strictly necessary. Finally, she gave up and swallowed. "That it was a socially unacceptable thing to have done."
Her father's eyes narrowed. "What did he say?"
"That I was ignorant and inexperienced."
"Hmm," he said, sitting back and looking at her appraisingly. "Perhaps this will be worthwhile."
Kagome grit her teeth and tried hard to pretend her father hadn't just blatantly insulted her. Her mother gave her a sympathetic look over the tuna and returned to her food.
--
"I met with my counsellor today," she said, as she twirled a dead leaf between her finger and thumb.
The taiyoukai gave no indication that he had heard her comment, but she continued on anyway.
"He reminded me of you," she added, tossing the leaf aside and picking up another.
She thought she heard a faint snort come from the taiyoukai in question, and she waited patiently for him to take the bait. After a moment he gave in.
"How so?"
Mentally, she smirked. Perhaps all those mind games with Miroku-sama had been good for something after all. "He was extremely clever, and highly intelligent. And a good conversationalist, though he seemed a bit eristic."
After a moment she added, "and he is nearly as dangerous as you, in his own way."
"I wasn't aware that you considered me dangerous at all," he remarked, though there was an odd tone to his voice that she couldn't quite place.
"I'm well aware that you are easily capable of killing me, and destroying me." Absurdly, she smiled. "Both of which would likely end badly, for me, by the way, so the fact that you haven't yet done so is much appreciated."
"Are death and destruction not the same thing?"
She twirled the leaf between her fingers again, delighting in the way the yellows, reds and browns mixed as it spun. "There are worse things than death," she said softly.
"Hn," he replied enigmatically.
She tossed the leaf aside and collapsed backwards into the dirt, laying spread-eagled and looking up at the sky. The ends of his hair brushed her fingertips lightly, sending strange tingles up her arm. As casually as she could she inched her arm away from him, and placed it on her stomach.
He remained perfectly still. She was beginning to suspect he did that a lot.
"I don't really know what to think about him," she said finally. "I think he's interesting. But I don't really like him. He's too conniving. And a touch creepy."
His eyebrows lowered slightly in a small frown. "Creepy?"
"Mmm," she said. "He made me feel uncomfortable. At least, at first."
The frown became more pronounced, but Sesshoumaru said nothing. In fact, she mused as she waited, it was beginning to look like he wasn't going to say anything else at all, and was instead going to simply sit there and brood.
She stared up at the night sky, and traced over the patterns of the constellations with her finger. The rustling of the leaves was oddly comforting, but it was slightly cold. She began to wish she'd brought a blanket.
"What did he say to you?"
She dropped her hand abruptly, and it landed with a thump on her stomach. "Umm," she said stupidly. "That I was ignorant and young. And wrong."
"He mistakes ignorance for naiveté, and youth for idiocy," he said shortly.
"Oh, he used naiveté too," Kagome said.
"He is not incorrect."
She snorted. "Not you too."
He raised an eyebrow and looked at her disdainfully.
"Sorry," she said, meekly. He nodded once and resumed staring off into space.
"You are still dangerously heedless," he said suddenly. "And far too trusting." He frowned, and stood. "Come," he said imperiously, and began walking off.
She blinked once in surprise, before scrambling madly to her feet and rushing after him. "Where are we going?" she asked, breathless with excitement and anticipation.
He glanced at her briefly before quickening his step, forcing her to jog to keep up. Suddenly he stopped so abruptly that she nearly ran into him, and turned. He looked her up and down once and seemed to come to a decision. "Hold on," he said ominously, as snaked one arm around her and pulled her flush up against him.
Holy crap, she thought fairly incoherently as she latched blindly onto his shirt. Her face was buried in his shoulder, and she was curled up against his side, with his arm around her back. And he was so warm. Unnaturally warm. She wondered if it was a demon thing. And he smelt masculine. It was the same smell that she'd savoured for so long when she was younger, though it was slightly different than she remembered. For one, it was certainly stronger. And… warmer, if it was possible for a smell to be warm.
She felt something gathering at her feet, a strange build-up of power that had her senses thrumming with alarm. Looking down she noticed a cloud forming at her feet. She frowned in puzzlement and said, "what?"
And then she was rising up and up, clinging frantically to him as they shot into the air and biting back a scream of terror. "You can fly?" she asked incredulously, unconsciously throwing her arms around his neck and clinging desperately to him.
He snorted in what she took to be amusement, and she felt his breath ghost across her temple. Oh my…
She gathered the courage to peek around his shoulder and look down, and immediately she rather wished she hadn't. They were up high. And moving quickly. And flying. She was flying. Yes, she'd flown in an airplane before, but that hardly qualified when compared to this.
If he dropped her she would be a human pancake.
At that morbid thought she squeaked in terror and hid her face in his shoulder.
He ignored her, instead his eyes scoured the landscape, watching both for other demons and a suitable place to land.
Only when her feet had touched solid earth again did she dare open her eyes again. As soon as she was sure she was on solid ground, however, she scrambled away from him and promptly fell over, her body shaking in terror.
"You could have warned me," she said accusingly.
He gave her an impassive look.
When her limbs finally stopped shaking, she stood up and brushed the dirt off her pants. "Um, Sesshoumaru?" He turned and looked at her sharply, and she gulped and took an automatic step back. "Um…" she said, swallowing nervously. "Why are we here?"
He glared at her for a terrifyingly long time before replying.
"You require a visual demonstration, and your courtyard does not have sufficient space."
She blinked. "What?" she asked stupidly.
He gave her a condescending look, and stalked to the centre of the large clearing they were in. She began to follow him, but, without turning he said, "stay." She stayed.
When he reached the centre of the clearing, he stopped and turned to face her. For a moment he just stood there, and she was about to ask what exactly was going on when she felt it. All of a sudden the air became electrically charged. The hair at the back of her neck began to stand on end, and all of her senses began screaming at her to run.
The air around him was beginning to swirl. She could feel his power rising, it was almost tangible now. The clearing began to smell like rain, as the currents of air clashed wildly. And everywhere felt like him. His sheer presence was overwhelming, and she fell to her knees, suddenly painfully aware of what exactly it was he felt the need to demonstrate.
She could almost taste it now. With one final pulse of power he seemed to grow suddenly, and where he had previously been standing and gargantuan white dog now stood, a dark blue crescent moon in stark contrast to the white fur displayed proudly on his forehead.
He was magnificent. Where before, in human form, he had been ethereal, here, now unveiled in his true form, he was suddenly brutally corporeal. His true form positively screamed power.
He looked down at her with his red eyes and bared his teeth.
It took nearly all her willpower to not run away, screaming in terror. Instead she stood her ground and gazed, open-mouthed, back at him. Then he took a step forward, and the entire earth shook so badly she nearly fell over.
He ducked his head down so that she was level with his nose, which was nearly as high as she was tall. Ohgodohgodohgodohgod her mind supplied helpfully. Almost uncontrollably she began to walk forward, her hand reached out in front of her.
A strange moment of déjà vu struck her, as the image of her standing in the same position, reaching out to touch his face flashed through her mind. And then she touched the fur at the end of his snout. It was impossibly soft, especially considering the monstrous beast it was attached to. She almost giggled at the very idea of considering Sesshoumaru fluffy, but there really seemed to be no denying it. He, despite being much, much, much, bigger than her, was eminently pet-able.
She ran her fingers though his fur, delighting in the feel. Slowly she made her way up his snout, and traced the magenta markings around his mouth. She wanted to scratch behind his ears, just to see if he'd enjoy it, but she wasn't tall enough.
His eyes watched her impassively, and he allowed her to continue her explorations unhindered.
When she finally stepped back, he stood up abruptly, and changed back into his regular form. The change back seemed highly anticlimactic, especially considering the show he'd put on for his first transformation.
Without a word he grabbed her and shot up into the air, and she clutched onto him with an alarmed squeak.
When they arrived back at the shrine, he all but dropped her onto the ground, and turned brusquely, leaving without so much as a word.
She stood in the courtyard and wondered exactly what it was that she'd done to offend him.
Behind her the door to her house slid open with a bang, and her father strode furiously out into the courtyard. "Would you care to tell us," he said, positively seething with fury, "where exactly you've been?"
She gulped. Oh crap.
--
Quotations used:
"Curiosity has its own reason for existence" - Albert Einstein.
"If you understand everything, you must be misinformed" - Japanese Proverb
"The only source of knowledge is experience" - Albert Einstein
"The reverse side also has a reverse side" - Japanese Proverb
"A frog in a well does not know the great sea" - Japanese Proverb
If you've got the time to let me know what you think of the Miroku of this chapter, that would be much appreciated. Thanks!
Edit: Thanks to Kura-sama who pointed out the typo in this chapter. It should be fixed now, but if you notice anything else, please drop me a line.
