"Papa?" Kagome asked, legs swinging happily against the garden wall as her father worked. "Can I ask you something?"
"When have you not been allowed to ask me something?" Saito Higurashi liked to laugh, and you could hear it in the low note of amusement that coloured most everything he said.
Kagome frowned. "I guess it's a weird question. My teacher didn't want me to talk about it, but I dunno why. She said it was a inapop- innerprop-"
"Inappropriate?" Saito supplied as his small daughter struggled.
"Yah. An appropriate topic." A tiny scowl twisted her face. "I was just curious was all though."
"Well go ahead then."
Still, Kagome hesitated, biting her lip before turning wide eyes on him. "Why are you married, papa?"
Saito choked on a laugh, before grinning at her. "I just couldn't help being madly in love your mama, that's why."
She scowled up at him, sensing the teasing tone of his voice. "Das not what I meant, daddy!" She complained, aggrieved.
"No," Saito agreed, crouching down to her level. "I expect not."
"Priests and stuff don't get married," Kagome explained, confused. "My teacher said so. And if they do, they lose their powers."
"Mmm," he agreed thoughtfully.
"You have lots of powers!" Kagome accused. "Does that mean you and mama aren't really married?"
He laughed, lowly. "No, me and your mama are really married." One day, when his daughter was a little more worldly, Saito was sure it would embarrass her greatly to realise marriage in itself wasn't the qualifying factor. "It's a little difficult to explain...but when I got married, I wasn't really so sure my holy power would fade, and I ended up being right."
"Why did you think it wouldn't go away?" She asked curiously.
"Well...let's just say I caught some priests doing married people things when no one was looking, and they kept their powers. But when I started thinking about it, I guess I just wasn't sure it made sense."
"What didn't make sense?"
"I guess it was hard for me to believe that the gods would love us so much and give us wonderful gifts, and take them away just because we fell in love too." Saito smiled down at his daughter gently as she bit her lip thoughtfully. As she raised her arms in silent request, he obliged her desire to be picked up.
"Do you think I will be a priestess when I get bigger?" Kagome asked.
"Oh yes," Saito agreed. "You're the most perfect, kind girl that ever existed, and you're my daughter. I bet Amarateresu decides you're her number one."
Kagome giggled. "And I'll be allowed to get married, too?"
"Well, no one can stop you from getting married, but if you mean: can you get married and be a priestess, I guess that will be up to you."
"I've never seen a priestess be married and have powers still," Kagome complained. "You're the only one I've seen."
"I'm not a priestess!" Saito rebutted, pretending to offense.
Kagome scowled at him again. "You know what I meant, papa. How'm I supposed to keep my powers when no one else does? You have to tell me the secret!"
"The secret, hmm."
Kagome nodded vigorously, the bow in her hair becoming dangerously lopsided.
"Well, I think there are a few different reasons people lose their powers," Saito confessed, setting his daughter back down on the wall so he could look her properly in the eye. "Some lose them because they always wanted to get married, and it makes them happier than being holy. Some lose them because they only have enough space in their heart to love one person the way they loved the gods. But mostly, I think people lose their powers once they marry...because they feel like they don't deserve to have them anymore."
The penetrating thunk of metal sinking into wood echoed in the courtyard, and Kagome's eyes grew grimmer at yet another failure.
"Again," she commanded, eyes narrowed as Kikyo glared at the target.
Obediently, the priestess turned princess renotched her bow.
Red and white linen fluttered in the breeze as Kikyo closed her eyes, clearly trying to draw out the power that had been so long disused.
Thunk. No brilliant flash of colour accompanied her release, but Kagome did not permit herself to sigh. The red and white suited her, but Kikyo had hesitated when Kagome had made her put it on.
"It's what you want, isn't it?" Kagome had demanded when it had seemed she would refuse.
"Again."
"What's the point?" Kikyo hissed back, nearly in tears. "Obviously, this isn't working." She renotched her bow anyway, as she had done every evening for the last three days.
Disappointed, infuriated, and demoralized, Kikyo had nevertheless, kept coming back.
Thunk.
They both stared at the innocent looking target as if it was at fault.
"Maybe that's enough for tonight," Inuyasha suggested hesitantly from the sidelines of their temporary range. "It's been two hours."
"...Alright," Kagome agreed, sighing finally. "Maybe we need to approach this from another angle. I'll do some thinking tonight and see if I can find another way."
"Maybe we should just stop," Kikyo muttered. "Maybe you're wrong."
"If you want to believe that," Kagome snipped, "then don't bother showing up. I'll be training here anyway. You know, for the war."
Kikyo shot her a furious look before turning on her heel and making a dramatic exit.
The look Inuyasha shot Kagome as he followed made her scowl at his back.
"You're the one who asked me to fix your girlfriend," Kagome muttered to herself, knowing perfectly well he could still hear her.
~The Coast of Ida, Southern Peninsula~
"How long are you going to lurk in the shadows?" Inu Kimi asked as she inspected the blackberry she had plucked from it's bush. Passable. It went in her basket.
"I do not lurk, mother," her son responded in cool tones, but he emerged to stand beside her nonetheless.
Delicately licking her purple stained fingers, the demoness shrugged and moved on to the next branch, questing for other viable candidates.
"Mother…"
"Mmm?"
"You know what I have come to say." Sesshomaru's voice was layered with annoyance at her sub par acknowledgment, but Inu Kimi had no intention of catering to his ego.
"And yet," she answered absently, "you still hesitate to speak the words."
Her son stiffened, yokai whispering around him in agitation. "Do you think the course unwise?"
Inu Kimi paused, considering. "No. If conquering the west is truly your wish, no better opportunity will come than this one."
"You know it is what this one desires," he answered coldly.
Smothering a sigh, she turned to him at last, gold piercing gold. "Then do it."
"Mother-"
"Save us the farce of any prettied words, son," she said tiredly. Then, more kindly, she placed her hand on his shoulder and stretched up, lips brushing his cheek. She knew he did not require her forgiveness to forge ahead, but would want for it, nonetheless. "You know that you are always first in my heart."
"...you will not oppose me?" He asked, the slightest touch of hesitation in him.
"I will remain here," Inu Kimi promised. "In the home we built when we left the west."
"And after?"
She smiled at him sadly, and he nodded, frowning thoughtfully at the sky.
"I will look after Rin, until you return." If you return.
"Jaken will be staying behind," Sesshomaru told her, and in spite of herself, Inu Kimi felt her lips twitch.
"How generous."
~Elsewhere~
The heat of the fire in the dwindling twilight danced against Rin's skin as she edged closer. She slid another log carefully onto the flame, adjusting it with the metal pronged poker until she was satisfied.
"Rin?" Kohaku asked quietly, startling her.
She smiled at him brightly, inviting him to continue. His cheeks were already pink from the warmth of the fire, but sometimes, when she smiled at him without saying anything, his cheeks got pinker.
"Do you think Lord Sesshomaru will go through with it?" Kohaku asked softly. His eyes were somewhere else, and Rin's smile dimmed a little.
She looked back into the fire. "Lord Sesshomaru will go," she confirmed. He hadn't told her so, but she knew her own father.
Kohaku looked relieved, but then he noticed her frown. "Sango and I will go with him," Kohaku reassured her, mistaking the change in her mood. "You don't have to worry about him."
Rin smiled. "Lord Sesshomaru will come back," she assured him, certain. Her chest was tight, and she didn't understand it, exactly. "I… I wish you wouldn't go, Kohaku."
"W-what?" He stammered, brown eyes widening. It was nice. Rin liked that he was still a kid, like her, even though he was tall like Lord Sesshomaru now, and could use a sword almost as good as he could.
Rin tucked her arms around her knees, staring at him with her lips pressed tight. "You have to promise to come back. You have to marry me when I get older, you know."
Speechless, he stared at her with is mouth open until his face turned bright red and he turned his face away. "Rin, you're only 13," He said quietly. "You don't know what you mean."
"You were only 11 when you decided you wanted revenge," Rin shot back hotly. "No one said you were stupid for that!"
His face whitened. "I didn't say you were stupid," he replied quietly.
Rin glared at him before letting out a great big sigh. "I made you this-" she reached into her satchel.
Kohaka stared, pink faced, at the necklace in her outstretched hand. It wasn't an ugly, clunky thing, but made of the tiny glittering snail shells that could be found in shallow pools at low tide. It had taken Rin ages to find them all, and to have Jaken teach her how to use a fine drill to make the holes without breaking them.
She held it out to him, insistent, until his hesitant fingers closed over it.
"Rin…"
"Just promise you'll come back," she said, voice wavering. "That's enough, ok?"
His brown eyes were dark as he gave a slow nod. "I promise...I'll come back."
Rin smiled, relieved, and turned back to the fire before her cheeks could also turn to flame.
After a moment, he too returned his attention to the fire, but Rin could see from the corner of her eye as his fingers traced the seashells she had given him.
