How To Break A Daiyoukai

He sat zazen, his eyes closed, and his mind far away from the present. Whatever this new part of the world was, it was bad for his mind. He was losing control over his actions and words; his body kept slipping, doing and saying things he had explicitly instructed it not to. He could still feel the warmth of her calves from when he had carried the lazy miko over his shoulder and forced her to survey the area with him. Despite his forceful mental commands to himself, his hands had ventured up to her thighs. Luckily, he had maintained enough self-control to keep them just barely above her knees, but even that was much more intimate than he would have liked. Or so he told himself. That miko, and this placed, were toying with his mind and he resented it. Somewhat.

She was, without a doubt, the most infuriating creature he had ever come across. Yet anything that changed for the worst in her demeanour grated on his sense like an alarm. Even now, deep in his meditation, the sudden frustrated spike in her reiki and her haggard breathed jolted him into reality. He opened his eyes and what he saw caused his lips to curl in anger.

Kagome struggled to, at least, stay on her knees. The pain was white-hot and nearly blinding. She clutched her chest as though if she could stem the source of the pain, it would ease and she could stop trembling from the mind-numbing pain that flooded every inch of her body. It was as though she was being burnt, and flayed, and impaled all at the same time and there was nothing she could do about it but suffer. She struggled to look up at her incarnation who was trying to, once again, steal her soul. Kikyo had been killed, so how was she here again? How had she even found her way into this entrapment with her? Another wave of pain flooded her body and she screamed. She could feel her soul inching out of her.

Sesshomaru frowned at the miko standing in front of Kagome. He did not care that the two women looked alike, nor did he care that he had heard the second miko approach and he could not pick up a single scent off her. All he cared about was that Kagome was in pain and her pain was assaulting his senses. Without a second thought, he sent a clawed hand through Kikyo's back, but where he had expected to feel flesh and bone, he felt nothing. Not even blood. It was as though he had simply passed through air. He withdrew his hand and inspected the second miko's undamaged body. She was an illusion that he and Kagome were sharing, except for him she was a minor annoyance whilst for Kagome she was a walking nightmare.

He walked through Kikyo's apparition and stopped in front of Kagome so his form obscured Kikyo's. But this did nothing to alleviate Kagome's suffering. She just clutched her chest and writhed in pain as though she was being tortured. She looked up at him, her eyes full of pain and desperation, "It hurts Sesshomaru. My soul, please help. It hurts." He could smell the salt of her unshed tears. Sesshomaru had never felt so furious and helpless at the same time. He could not make it stop, but he could not just stand there and watch her suffer either. Kagome was infuriating, but she was actively infuriating. She was full of life, and fire, and blood-boiling disobedience. She had no business crying on her knees. The desperation in her voice clawed at his insides and for the first time in his life, Sesshomaru felt someone else's pain.

Against his better judgement, despite his mind screaming for his body to respect itself, he knelt in front of her. She looked at him, confusion showing through the pain in her eyes. He placed both hands on her shoulders and helped straighten her posture. "Miko, this is not real. The woman behind me, the pain you are feeling, they are all in your head. You can control this."

"It hurts. It is tearing out my soul, I can't." Her voice was small and shaky, far from the self-assured tone he was used to hearing. He never thought the day would come when he would wish for someone to be rude to him, but right now he would take obstinate Kagome over this one.

"Please make it stop." She pleaded. He had no idea what to do; he had already told her it was an illusion. What was he supposed to do, make it go away for her?

She was heaving, clutching her chest tightly, and crying. Sesshomaru stared at her as though she were metamorphosing into some alien creature. Tears, human tears in particular, had always perplexed him; humans were always crying about one thing or the other. But these tears were even worse; they from someone who had incessantly challenged him and, despite his deepest misgivings, someone who saw as an equal. He never cried and he would never be reduced to such desperate pleas for help, so he did not have the slightest clue what to do about her current state. All he could do was watch, and curse his own incompetence as she suffered.

She leaned forward and threw her arms around him. Sesshomaru froze, his shock turned into panic when he felt her go limp against him. He automatically began to assume the worst, but a sharp intake of breath reassured him that she was still alive and, for the first time since he had been pulled out of his meditation, he felt a slight relief wash over him. He could hear her struggling to keep her breaths deep and even through the pain. It was taking all her energy just to keep herself breathing properly, and just keeping upright had become too much for her. He wrapped his arms around her, in his attempt to comfort her. Even the more rational parts of his mind fell silent and allowed him to be her support.

Suddenly an idea struck him. If she needed to breathe calmly, he could help her focus. He could not make the pain go away, but he could help divert her focus. "Miko," He said almost softly, ignoring the feeling of her blunt nails digging into his shoulders. "You can feel me and you can hear my voice. Just focus on that. Right now, I am all that exists and all that you need to think about. Just focus on the sound of my voice."

As he talked, he could hear her breathing becoming less laboured. Slowly, she began to regain control of herself and she relied on his less and less for support. But she still held onto him and he still let her. He continued to speak throughout the night, reciting folklore and legends he had committed to memory whilst simultaneously monitoring her state. Finally, her breathing evened completely and her thrashing reiki settled around her softly. Sesshomaru looked behind him to find that the other miko was gone. It was over.

"Miko." He said, somewhere in his bid to help her focus, a strange softness had crept into his voice and firmly planted itself so that no matter how stern he tried to sound, it remained. He looked at her closed eyes and realised that she was asleep. He gently picked her up and lay her down beneath a nearby tree. He watched her as she slept; she looked so calm and peaceful that were it not for her unusually pale skin he would never had guessed what she had just gone through. He felt his chest swell with pride; her calm features and undisturbed sleep, those were his doing. Even without an enemy to defeat, he had still triumphed. He was Lord Sesshomaru of the Western Lands, and nothing could best him.

In an uncharacteristic impulsiveness, he took off his mokomoko and draped it over the sleeping miko. The more rational parts of his mind demanded his stopped, and walked away; she was a human and her welfare had nothing to do with him. But Sesshomaru pushed that voice aside and sat next to her sleeping form, his eyes turned up towards the sky. After all, he had to make sure she did not do something strange to his mokomkoko; the miko was unpredictable.

~…...~

Kagome curled into the softest thing she had ever felt. No, the second softest since Sesshomaru had let her ride his mokomoko during the fight with Naraku. She dug her fingers deeper into the fur, perhaps it was a tie.

She opened her eyes slowly, and then sat up sharply when she noticed that what she was holding onto. She furrowed her brows in confusion as she tried to understand why she was holding onto Sesshomaru's mokomoko when the daiyoukai was the kind who would most likely cut off her hands for so much as dreaming about touching it. Immediately, memories the previous night's events came flooding back and Kagome suddenly realised that Sesshomaru must have given her his mokomoko after helping her.

She had never been so confused in her entire life.

She could remember Sesshomaru's attempts to calm her down and talk her through the pain. She could remember him holding her up when she could no longer remain upright on her own. She could even remember him wrapping his arms around her and speaking to her gently. But she could not accept that it was reality.

A brief look around told her that the daiyoukai was probably on the other side of the clearing. It was a large area divided into two by a small line of trees. On one side was soft, green grass and a slow moving river, on the other side, was a hot spring waterfall. She remembered thinking that this new part of the world was a paradise with its lush grass, bright flowers, clear blue sky, and, most importantly, hot spring. But as the previous night's events had proven, it was far from paradise.

Kagome stepped around the trees and froze. The daiyoukai stood waist-deep in the hot spring, his head tilted up towards the sky as water from the water fall beat down his broad shoulders and ran off his chest. His silver hair pooled around him, barely obscuring the magenta stripes on his hips that disappeared below the waterline. If she thought her body had been betraying her before, seeing the daiyoukai like this made her realise that there were deeper depths she could sink to. She had never seen a being so statuesque and beautiful. His perfection was almost offensive.

"I trust you slept well, Miko." His voice pulled her out of her trance and immediately she realised that she was watching the daiyoukai bath she leapt around, turning her back to him. She could feel the heat of a blush rising to her cheeks. Sesshomaru chuckled under his breath at her modesty.

"D-Don't laugh at me." She stuttered in the most indignant way she could muster, but her voice gave away that she was very flustered.

"Do you seek to give me instructions?" Sesshomaru asked, his smooth baritone reminded her that this was the same voice that had talked her through her pain the entire night, and Kagome felt her stomach flutter in a manner that was simultaneously unsettling, yet pleasant. She dug her fingers into his mokomoko and willed herself to be more composed. "I can feel that." He said. Kagome instantly let go and the white fur fell to the ground. Realising that it had dropped, she immediately picked it up, all the while cursing herself for letting the sight of one arrogant man reduce her to a flustered mess.

"Look, I just came to say thank you for helping me yesterday. I don't know why you were so nice to me, but I am in your debt." She said.

Sesshomaru could tell from her rigid form that she was still uncomfortable and that fact amused him far more than he was willing to admit. "Your ceasing that insufferable act you call 'crying' was enough payment. You were grating on my senses and I needed you to stop." He could see her tensing at every word and that encouraged him to continue, "You refuse to master your mind, and you refuse to master your reiki. Your uselessness, miko, left me no other choice."

Kagome went from grateful to furious in record time. "You pompous jerk! Does it burn your soul to be nice or are you just the way you are because you don't understand what being nice it?" She snapped as she turned to face the daiyoukai. The moment she caught sight of his naked form she yelped and spun around again, but not before she noticed the beginnings of a smirk on his usually serious lips. "You think this is funny," She said, realisation slowly dawning upon her. All this time, he was simply goading her, winding her up like some toy and like the idiot she was, she always rose to the occasion and served as his entertainment. "You are doing this on purpose to get a reaction, aren't you? Ugh. I cannot believe this."

"Do not flatter yourself; you are not that interesting." He said flatly. Such cruel words, but in such a lovely, enchanting baritone that they still made her knees weak despite every fibre in her being screaming for her to have some self-respect. "That other miko you saw yesterday, why was she causing you so much pain?"

Kagome felt the air between them change. It was the same type of serious air that hung between them when they took on the wolf pack in the village.

At the very least, she owed him the truth. Arrogant or not, he had helped her and it was the least she could do. "That was Kikyo. I am her reincarnation. During the time Inuyasha and I were searching for Naraku, she was resurrected and she tried to take my soul. She did not completely succeed, but she ended up taking a part of it for a while."

"You walked around with an incomplete soul? Hn, that must not have been pleasant."

"It wasn't." The sadness in her voice did not sit well with the daiyoukai and suddenly he was the uncomfortable one. "It hurt in a strange absent manner. Some days it burned, especially when she was nearby; I think it was because my soul wanted to be complete. But I had a jewel to complete so I had to endure it."

Sesshomaru watched her through new eyes. Kagome was impressive before, with her raw power, bravery, and sense of pride. But this new information that, with an incomplete soul, she had walked around Japan and fought demons, made him respect her more. For hours she had endured the pain of having her soul ripped out of her, and she had retained consciousness. Perhaps he would stop giving her grief about not having mastered herself. Perhaps. "You have finally learned to speak the truth, Miko. It seems as though pain is good for you."

Kagome was about to retort when she realised the new manner in which he referred to her. "Wait, you are not calling me just 'woman' anymore. Have I graduated from 'woman' to 'miko'?"

"I must be feeling generous." He said dismissively. She was teasing him, and he was not sure how to reply. People did not tease the Lord of the West, they feared him.

"Generosity?" She said, making a great show of surprise and awe, "From the great Lord Sesshomaru of the West? I will mark this day down and remember it always. My children's children will remember this day."

"Miko," Sesshomaru said sternly. His patience with her was wearing thin as his discomfort at her amusement at his expense increased.

"Oh, take a joke Sesshomaru." She said lightly. With her back still turned to the bathing daiyoukai, she lowered herself onto the ground and gathered his mokomoko in her lap. "Laughter will add years to your life."

"Advice from a human? How long will you live to fifty? Sixty if time is particularly kind to you? It would seem that it is the laughter that is killing you." Sesshomaru cursed his inability to remain quiet. Words came into his mind, and before he could quell them they escaped his lips.

"Wherever do you get your sunny disposition from Sesshomaru? You are like my own personal sunshine." Kagome words dripped with sarcasm, and he could feel himself rising to the bait. No matter how hard he fought, the words still found their way into the open and encouraged her incessant chatter. He was growing to hate this world the most out of all the others.

~…...~

Inuyasha approached the demon huntress nervously. After Kagome's disappearance Shippo would not stop crying, so he had taken the kit back to Kaede's village and continued searching for his friend on his own. Sango looked up sharply, the hope in her eyes fading into fear when she saw the look on the hanyou's face.

"You still can't find her?"

Inuyasha shook his head, unable to speak. He had left her alone in the forest. He knew it was the border of the Eastern and Northern lands, and that borders were the most dangerous parts of the land, but he had ran off all the same. "Why would you even leave her alone in the first place? Is that the best you could do? She is gone for three years and the moment she comes back you leave just like you always did before?" The words of the pregnant demon-huntress hit a bitter note, and it took all his willpower not to snap at her. He had refused to tell anyone why he had to leave her, and so they all thought he did so because he was careless and thoughtless. But it was Kagome; he loved her more than life itself, but not one had ever believed that. Not even Kagome herself.

"I will find her. Miroku is looking, I am looking. You just take care of yourself, and I promise she will be here to see you and all your little brats." He huffed. He crossed his arms and turned away, "If you keep yelling at me like that I am going to stop coming to check on you. I am only here because Miroku made me promise to."

Sango settled, sensing the unfairness in her words she apologised, "I am sorry. I know you had your reasons for leaving even though you won't tell me. I am just so worried about her."

"Kagome's strong. She will be fine." Inuyasha said more for himself than for Sango. He was scared for her; it had been three days already and he had not so much as picked up her scent. He could not stand to lose her a fourth time. Twice as Kikyo, once when she disappeared through the well and it refused to open, and now? Again? No, he was going to find her, win her, and have the life and happiness he had earned.