THERE WAS A SHIP
Scribe Figaro
Story rewritten July 2007! Read the earlier chapters again!
Chapter Eight
One by One
One after one, by the star-dogg'd Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turn'd his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.
Four times fifty living men
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan),
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropp'd down one by one.
I.
Kagome cried, a horrified cry, gurgling in her throat, wailing, lifting up, breaking, stopping for a moment, coming back again, sliding down a register, dissolving into staccato sobs interrupted with short whimpers.
Inuyasha wanted to die. Wanted to go deaf. Blind. Wanted to escape. To set her down. To run away from the bloody, writhing mess in his arms. To get the smell out of his nose. The taste out of his mouth.
He begged her to be quiet. Absolutely begged her.
And, suddenly, she was silent.
Inuyasha screamed.
II.
Koharu was young. Koharu was poor. Koharu was soft and scared and would never get the stink of fish-oil off her hands. Koharu was not a fighter like Sango, but she was strong still. Even with her small stature, she could easily defeat Sango in a contest of lifting dead weight.
But Miroku-sama would never challenge them to such a thing. Miroku-sama would never say, "I will marry the girl who can move thirty drums of oil into a wagon the fastest."
At least, not outside Koharu's dreams.
Koharu would never be Sango, but Koharu worked hard, for she knew Miroku-sama would return to her someday, possibly by accident, for Miroku-sama would probably forget her. But he would see her someday, and remember, and he would see a woman who worked hard, who did not shirk her duties, who was trustworthy and kind and pure. She was not pretty like the girls who spent their days lounging and bathing and seeking a husband, but neither was Sango, so Koharu believed this did not reflect badly on her. Miroku-sama would return someday, and see she was older, the perfect age for him, with full breasts, virginity intact, a tireless servant, a wondrous cook, a lover with no experience and limitless dedication. She possessed three changes of clothes, and one of them she kept delicately arranged and hidden for the day Miroku-sama came, a kosode of brilliant white and deep magenta. She kept a stack of firewood hidden near her home, so that if Miroku-sama came on a day that there was no wood stacked, she could still make him a hot bath.
Koharu did not hate Sango. Even though it was the only way she could imagine Miroku-sama wanting to take her away, she did not want Sango to die. Sango was not a bad person, and did not take Miroku-sama away from her. It was simple circumstance. Koharu was not a fighter. She could not fight beside Miroku-sama, and thus she could not travel with him. That was her fate. To dwell on such matters would only steer her from her goal. She must be realistic. She must be resolute.
Someday, Miroku-sama would return to her. On that day, she would be much older. Sango would be dead then, but she would have died well, without pain, having lived a full life, having children that Koharu would care for and love as her own.
Koharu would comfort Miroku-sama, and care for him, and anything she had suffered up to that point would be well worth it.
But Miroku-sama did not arrive in this manner.
Miroku-sama appeared in the field before her, between her master's old grazing mare and her master's nearly-emptied cart. He rode Sango's firecat, and the stench of blood was so strong her mare nearly strangled itself on its lead in attempt to flee.
She could barely approach him, for he screamed and shouted and kicked the firecat and demanded she return him to wherever it was they came, but the firecat was stalwart and barely flinched even as Miroku-sama's proddings caused blood to spurt from dark clumps of fur around its belly and flank.
Miroku-sama slowly relaxed, though still not so much as acknowledging her, and as she reached for him he went limp and fell into her arms.
He weighed slightly less than two barrels of fish-oil.
She lay him out on the cart, glad it was long enough to fit such a tall man. She made his bedding out of some twenty yards of the softest silk, for which she had only yesterday traded a hundred pounds of uncooked rice, and she knew such an act would destroy the delicate material and bankrupt her master, and she did not care. She stripped him and made herself clinical, and assessed his wounds. She bandaged his upper right arm with strips of white linen, but she did not know what to do about the hole on the right side of his chest. It was only about as wide as the tip of her finger, and it did not bleed very much, but it was terribly deep. She could see the glint of a broken rib beneath, and every ten breaths or so, it produced a bloody foam of bubbles.
The firecat had made a quick circle of the cart over all this time; Koharu did not see this but could see the regular splotches of blood surrounding them when she looked around. The firecat sat resolutely, its eyes clear, guarding Houshi-sama with what little remained of its life.
Koharu at once decided she loved this creature more than words could express.
She bandaged the chest wound as best she could, and as she pulled several warm layers of silk and linen over Houshi-sama, the firecat emitted a whorl of flame, and now she was nothing more than a kitten. Koharu stepped down from the cart to fetch the firecat, but the creature turned to the sky and gave off a crying mew of such misery and pity that Koharu's legs went weak and she fell to her knees, and Koharu understood Kirara as well as Sango could, and the feline cry of I have failed my mistress forgive me made her crumble, and as Koharu walk-stumble-crawled to the firecat. Kirara was curled up into a ball, and by the time she reached the creature Kirara was red and sticky and barely warm at all.
Koharu cradled the soft bundle in her arms for the longest time, but when she heard Miroku-sama's labored breathing and wet coughs, she delicately but quickly lay the firecat down and forgot about her.
Miroku-sama remembered her.
"Koharu."
"Hai, Miroku-sama?"
"The others are in danger. I have to return to them."
"I'm sorry, Miroku-sama. You're badly hurt. It's too dangerous to move you now."
"Where am I?"
"A field not far from the South Road. I made my camp here last night. I was about to leave when you came."
"Kirara. Did she return to Sango?"
"Miroku-sama. She . . ." Koharu shook her head.
Miroku-sama pulled his right fist out from beneath the covers and held his palm before his face. If the wound hurt with such an action, he did not show it.
"After all this," Miroku said, "we fall to a group of samurai. No last battle with Naraku. Not even close."
He clenched his fist.
"My fault entirely. My karma has grown to such proportions that it came to me all in this lifetime, and spread to my friends as well. I stole a thousand trinkets and drove a bullet through Kagome-sama's heart. I drank a thousand bottles of sake and filled Sango's belly with spears."
His hand gripped Koharu's collar and pulled her face inches from hers.
"Kill me. Kill me right now. I will bring my karma with me to the next world. I will overflow hell with it. I will take it away from the others, and maybe they will live."
"No," she said. "Never. Don't talk nonsense. You're still alive. The others might be alive. You don't know, do you?" She did not ask what happened to the others. She did not care.
"Koharu," he said, releasing her. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."
"You need to get better. Rest and you'll heal."
"Let me see the wound," he said.
She nodded, pulling down his covers, and if he was curious or bothered that he was naked beneath them he did not show it. She pulled aside the bandage for him, and he did not flinch.
"No," Miroku said. "No, I will not heal."
"Miroku-sama . . ."
"I am sorry to meet you in this way, Koharu. You have been so kind to me. Even after I have left you time and time again. And now all I have to give you is my death. You deserve better, Koharu."
"It is enough, Miroku-sama. It is more than enough, to have you here, to relieve your pain as much as I can."
Miroku-sama caressed her cheek with his hand.
"I wish I could have found you a good man. Someone worthy of you. Someone kind. You deserve nothing less."
Koharu knew Miroku-sama loved Sango and not her. Koharu knew she was not attractive to Miroku-sama, and that he would not touch her.
He slept, and as night came she got beneath the same covers to keep him warm, and to make sure he stayed warm she wriggled out of her clothes, and lay beside him, and then atop him, and then around him, and he murmured apologies, and he caressed her hair.
She did not mean to be the one to bear his child.
She knew such a thing was to be Sango's honor.
But the child had to be born.
And Sango was not there.
It was simple circumstance.
III.
Kouga traveled approximately ten ri with the taste of Kagome's blood strong in his mouth. He had gone for nearly an hour this way, seeking the source of the cloud of pungent lifeblood that stung him with every breath. At first, it was sweet to him, and filled him with longing, and he believed she had hurt herself only slightly, and her scent called to him.
But he dismissed that assumption within minutes, and realized most of what was inside Kagome was now outside Kagome, and he intended to reach her immediately even if it meant his limbs and sinew would separate sometime afterward.
He found her beside Dogshit, in a forest, in a pool of shared blood. Dogshit breathed laboriously and though his eyes were open he did not so much as glance in Kouga's direction as he pushed the hanyou over and took a look at Kagome.
Kagome was badly off. She was bloody and dirty almost all over, and the rest was pale and sweat. Kouga allowed himself a few seconds to curse Dogshit and point out his failings and that letting Kagome be hurt was beyond forgiveness, and then took Kagome in his arms and brought her straightaway to . . . where?
Kouga debated and cursed himself and within a few minutes, already far out of sight of Dogshit, decided on the mountains, the home he had so long ago abandoned, the ancestral home of the Wolf Clan. There were places of healing there. He did not know all the techniques, but he would ask his ancestors and they would tell him.
Kagome would not die. She would live, and see that he excelled Dogshit in both strength and compassion, and she would make the proper choice.
IV.
Inuyasha would not live.
That much was obvious to the priestess.
She found him easily enough, for few other creatures leave trails of blood dripping from the top branches of trees. His breath was a low growl, and he lay splayed and shameless as she approached.
"Kikyou," he said, as it was their custom that she would approach him, and he would say her name, and she would be perfectly silent and emotionless and pretend the sound of her name on his lips did not remind her how much she absolutely loved him such a short time ago.
Blood flowed through several holes in his chest, and she drove one finger into the hole in his upper right chest. He winced, but did not cry out, for she had once torn into him in more painful ways, and she withdrew a finger stained red to the last knuckle. Beneath her fingernail was a black half-moon of stinking corruption.
"I can't extract them," she said. "The steel driven into your chest has been festering for days. I will pray for you, Inuyasha."
"Your promise," he said.
She turned away from him.
"You promised, once. To bring me with you. To hell."
"Inuyasha." She had abandoned such foolish notions already. She would never have attempted such a thing if she knew how great a danger Naraku and the Shikon no Tama would become.
"You are dead, Kikyou, and I am dying. So we can be together now."
"We cannot. It is still my duty to protect the Shikon no Tama."
Besides, entertaining such idiotic feelings of love and loyalty to another was the thing that created this entire mess. My shameful existence in this world is penance; I will not spurn it.
"Then watch over Kagome. Kouga took her. She'll be safe with him for a while."
She nodded. Most of her soul was within Kagome, and she had felt the sensation of that soul going very distant, to a place outside this world, but she saw no need to tell Inuyasha the girl was already dead.
She made a camp there, and burned incense for him, and when he died she kissed his lips and buried him.
In her heart, the feeling of distance and direction toward the place she last felt Kagome's soul cooled and darkened like the embers of the dead campfire, but she fixed it in her mind, and in the morning she set out to retrieve the girl's shards before they could be stolen.
