The folly of WAR becomes clearly apparent when one examines history, and listens to the calls of those who have experienced the reality of war, rather than the fantasies of those who have not.

-Joe Brandt

Chapter Fourteen: Fashioned for Conflict

"You've seemed disturbed all afternoon." Rimida commented as he watched the girl miss another of her shots at the target across the room. "If my presence bothers you so deeply you only need to mention it and I will have Lord Sesshomaru assign someone else to help you."

"I…" Kagome hesitated a moment. "I'm sorry Rimida but I just keep thinking about what happened yesterday. It's hard to concentrate. Were you really going to kill Kouga?"

He canted his head a little at the straightforward question, snowy eyes churning hypnotically. "I'm not completely certain if I would have dealt him the final blow or just injured him heavily but I intended to do him serious harm yes."

"Why?" She was nervous talking to him when he was okay with what he was saying but she wanted to know.

"He attacked me first. It is not common for any of the demon race to take such an insult without reprisal. If he'd of managed to actually strike Sesshomaru I doubt he would still be alive for you to be concerned with." Rimida explained, watching her reactions to his words carefully. "It might be hard for you to deal with but that is a part of our world and while Kouga is your friend, he too lives by such a code."

"It just seems so heartless." Kagome commented with a shrug, something about his answer seeming dishonest. "What does Sesshomaru want from me if that's how this society works? I'm not an aggressive person."

"I cannot speak for our lord though he is likely repaying the fact that you helped him during the final battle all of you had against Naraku." Rimida replied with a shrug. "I am appreciative that you were able to help him at that time."

"Oh…" she nodded a little, she'd forgotten that she'd been told that. "Um…just what happened to the chaos demons anyway? Most people seem like they don't know anything about them."

The change of subject was all Kagome could think to bring up, even if she was a little frightened she also really wanted to know a justification for why he'd been so psychotic the day previous.

"Have you been asking things about my family?" He was a little taken aback by the level of her interest in him and his but he considered a little. "It is a long story but I will try to abbreviate it as much as possible for you…"

"Chaos demons?" Hachi was fearful at the comment, wringing his paws nervously as he glanced around while Miroku glared in warning that he'd better talk. "Why would you wanna know about that? It's an unlucky thing to talk about."

"Just answer the question." Miroku replied as he tilted his staff a little in silent reminder of the punishment that awaited if the raccoon didn't answer.

"Well…" He was still looking at all corners of the room as if fearing sudden attack. "I don't know the whole story but the whole of the clan was banished from the normal world three hundred and fifty years ago. They had betrayed the rest of the demonic races as far as I know but I'm not really aware of much of anything. They're all gone now anyway so it's something better not spoken of."

He wasn't looking at Kagome directly as he explained, his stormy eyes somewhere else while he told the tale. "The story begins before my birth by several years, my family has always been a master of the magical arts and has been the holder of the most powerful of seers for ages. Of those many of them foresaw horrible things happening to the races of demons far in the future if they did not learn to live with the mortals with some level of respect. What this would be was unknown but it would result in the near destruction of all with demonic blood."

"That's why there aren't demons in my time anymore…" She thought to herself sadly, listening without comment however.

"The rest of the races didn't want to listen to what we had to say once it spoke of their destruction. They grew resentful, distrustful, envious; any number of negative things toward the chaos demons and decided that we had betrayed all the demon races stood for by admitting that we would be defeated in any time. As this came to pass my ancestors realized that it was only a matter of time before their warnings would be silenced by state of war." He settled a hand on her bow, taking it from her to put it away as he spoke.

"Yet, they were a race of magicians and while they were not defenseless, the art of war was something that they were unfamiliar with so they turned to magic to create themselves children that were capable of fighting this coming battle for them. That is what I was born for, to destroy what enemies would present themselves at our doorstep. Though the effort took so long that by the time my generation was coming of age it was still to early for us to succeed at what we were made for."

He settled the bow back into it's place on the racks but his mind was definitely somewhere else by this time in his story.

"They were unable to kill most of us thanks to the various wards that our elders had formed in our defense yet they did manage to turn the very spells with which we were defending ourselves against us. They used them to somehow separate our homelands completely from any other realm, alive or dead. Imprisoning us in a hell of our own making…that was three hundred and fifty years ago that we were wiped from the world in a instant created by the fear of those that were once our comrades."

Kagome was quiet, listening with horrified surprised at what she was being told, wondering if she would have been better off not asking - but it was too late to take the question back now.

"There my clan remained trapped for another hundred and fifty years, many going insane with the long entrapment. Being separated from the world did not take away the gift of sight and they could still see many of the things that would happen with the time outside yet remained completely unable to do anything. Caged behind bars they couldn't even call from behind. The wisest of those tortured by it killed themselves to save the rest of us the unpleasant experience of putting them down if they attacked others."

"I had been made for the defense of my family and here I found myself killing them to protect others. It was something I got more experience in than I like to admit or remember. Less than a dozen of the original hundred that had been entrapped by the time that we were freed."

He was silent for a time after that last comment, perhaps taking a moment of silence in honor of those comrades that had fallen or he had been forced to fell. Kagome still had nothing she could say, she was definitely regretting having asked at all, her fear for Rimida being replaced by a deep feeling of pity for what she was hearing about what he'd been forced to go through.

"I'll skip over other less pleasant details but it was two hundred years ago that Sesshomaru managed to free us from that hell dimension, he never asked for our service and not all of us even chose to stay and serve him after such a long time without freedom. Though I feel as free here as I did the day I finally escaped, I know I could leave any day I desired and that by itself is all the liberty I need."

"Only a handful of us remained in his service and now that number has dropped to only three though it is good for us to have somewhere to belong again." He nodded a little then, as if agreeing with himself. "I hope that you will also understand this, I was a unique creation of a family whose mastery was in the arts of magic. The only reason I was born was to defend the blood I share with them, it is ingrained into me to do all I can to defend those of my race and so when I am faced with one of the demon races that helped to banish them it is all I can do to keep from carrying out a vengeance on them that I desire with all of my being."

Kagome nodded a little, realizing that meant that the wolf demons had been one of the clans that aided the unjust imprisonment of centuries before. "I…I'm sorry Rimida…"

"It is not something that you need to apologize for Lady Kagome." He replied with a small shrug, calmer than he should have been in her opinion after such a story. "Though I appreciate your sadness on my behalf it is not needed."

She nodded a little, silent as there was nothing else she could say to him that wouldn't seem like she was just grasping to fill uncomfortable space.

"I should return you to your room. Lessons for the day are likely pointless to try to continue with all the distraction you've been having thus far." He said as he opened the door for her, always about his duties even after such a sad story.

"Right." Kagome agreed, she doubted that the reason they were stopping was her previous issues but wasn't about to argue with Rimida after he'd been kind enough to tell her his whole story.

End Chapter

This chapter was actually hard with how it was with his history and such, I had to figure out which parts I wanted him to talk about or not talk about but I think I did an okay job of detailing out the basics of what happened with the chaos demons and why he is like he is.

-Aura

To my reviewers:

Simma - Well hopefully you didn't have to wait too long!

UtterChaos247 - Well there was a little more info on Saiya's family history at least. Love your name btw ;)

Firevixen73 - All updated.

BlazingMidnightRain - Um…Tylenol is good?

Flirtymiyu - Here you go.

Dominik Journot - Glad you enjoy it! giggle Saiya is fun to write for.

LovingoOKawaiiOoGirl - it would be too simple to just kill Kouga - less drama.

Shadowkitty33 - Saiya is worried for her brother is all. Hope you enjoyed the history for the chaos demons, figured there needed to be a reason they were never in the show or manga before.

Evil RULZ - Glad you like Rimida - he's fun to write for.