Jackie: Thank you my faithful reviewers, and fans who have been following me since my first fanfic "Silver Wings". I look forward to your reviews with every new chapter, and hope you will continue to enjoy the story.
I have to say I'm struggling with Sesshomaru's character. I have watched all of the episodes on Cartoon Network and own both of the Inuyasha movies that are out. However, the series doesn't give the best clues about him, and everyone who has published a character analysis on him disagrees. Sesshomaru's character is viewed differently by almost everyone that has watched the series.
Not being able to zero in on his character makes his transformation in this story that much more difficult. It didn't take him long in the series to take a protective interest in Rin, so I think his falling in love with Miyoiki happened at an appropriate pace. I know he's been talking more, and I consider that part of the transformation. Let me know how I'm doing.
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Chapter 14;
In the middle of the night he saw Miyoiki shiver and realized that they had left her pelt at their other campsite. He un-wrapped his tail and laid it over her. Her shivering ceased, and she stirred slightly. Her arms wrapped around his tail, and she nuzzled into it, purring softly. A tear slid down her cheek, twinkling in the darkness. She murmured quietly, "I'm sorry."
She was so kind-hearted that she had made his heartache her own. Just another reason to love her. His eyes hardened with determination. This Sesshomaru always got what he wanted. He knelt beside her and said, "You may not love me now, Miyoiki, but you will."
He watched over her for the rest of the night. As the sun began to brighten and filter through the waterfall into the cave it cast light shadows across her face. He found himself absently pushing the hair out of her face, combing it with his claws. She started purring again, and he was lost.
Miyoiki felt warm all over. Her arm tightened around something soft and silky. She felt fingers stroking her hair like the head monk had done when she was little. Slowly her eyes fluttered open and she looked up into Sesshomaru's love struck eyes. She froze, and he smiled. When he realized what he was doing, his face hardened and went blank again. He stood and turned away from her as he said, "You were cold."
He pulled his tail free from her and wrapped it over his shoulder as usual. He put on his normal placid face and said sternly, "Come, Miyoiki, to my castle."
She blinked at him. Apparently being his love didn't exempt her from cold commands. She stood and fell into rank behind him. She was somewhat grateful that things would not change because of her mistake. She did love him, she just didn't know if she could say that now that she had broken his heart. She hadn't meant to, but the fact remained that she had. She couldn't play with his feelings by taking it back now.
They flew off to the west in streaks of aqua and blue across the sky at blinding speeds. All day they traveled, they didn't stop for lunch or dinner, and they had not eaten breakfast. She had gone without food before, so it didn't bother her. What bothered her was that she believed he kept this pace so that he would not have to face her.
She was so angry at herself. How many times had she wished he would look at her as more than an object, vassal, or some perverse possession? It must have been very hard for someone as practiced at keeping people out to let her know how he felt. She had him, he had trusted her with his feeling… and she blew it. I'm such a fool… I'm so sorry, Sesshomaru. You trusted me, you bore your vulnerability to me, and I betrayed you, and I betrayed myself by missing my chance.
Sesshomaru flew on ahead of her just enough to keep her from seeing any expression that might bubble up on his face while he was thinking. The only downfall was that he could not smell her with his face pointing into the wind as he flew. How could one describe such a scent? It was not the dirty, over-perfumed scent of a human, nor the crisp bloody scent of a demon. He wondered how much of it was her scent, and how much of it could be patterned and identified as metamorph. It was light, like the wind, and sweet like flowers. Juniper… She smelt like the wind, whispering through Juniper trees and spring lilies. She smelled like a walk through the forest in spring. How could anything's smell invoke so many powerful images?
Miyoiki look up ahead at Sesshomaru watching his silken white lock billowing in flight. As the sun was setting in front of them she wished she could look into his eyes. The sunset reminded her so much of his beautiful golden eyes.
When the sun retreated and the silver moon advanced with its blue halo Sesshomaru could only think of Miyoiki's shining silver eyes. He warred with his very soul not to look back at her. How… How do I convince her to be mine?
Halfway through the night he stopped and touched down. She was directly behind him. She gaped at what she saw. A huge sprawling castle stretched out before them. Jaken came running through the gates yelling, "Lord Sesshomaru! Lord Sesshomaru! You have returned!"
"How is Rin?" Miyoiki interrupted.
"She is sleeping, of course," Jaken growled, "I'll have you know I took good care of her before you-"
"That is enough, Jaken," Sesshomaru cut him off, "Show Miyoiki to the dragon suite."
"The dragon suite!" Jaken cried, "But my lord-"
"Do it," Sesshomaru growled, "Miyoiki, those will be your quarters so long as you serve me."
"I understand," Miyoiki said and allowed herself to be lead away.
Sesshomaru watched them disappear and went to his own room. He was somewhat grateful to be alone for a change except that it gave him too much time to contemplate the ache in his heart. She will be mine. He was the great lord Sesshomaru; he would make her see that. He growled to himself.
After a bath he sat at his desk and started drawing. His lady needed some new clothes, clothes that would befit her stature as his bride.
The next morning……
Miyoiki was sitting in a plush bed when the sun's rays peeked through the windows. She had not been able to sleep. When Jaken led her to this suite he had done little to conceal his dissatisfaction with lord Sesshomaru giving her the most lavish suite in the castle. He's trying to impress me. Miyoiki thought. She didn't know weather to smile or to cry.
I should just come out and tell him I love him back, if he hasn't given up on me it wouldn't be considered playing with his emotions if I decided to accept… Would it?
In spite of having many suitors growing up, Miyoiki had precious little experience in truly rejecting or accepting advances. Usually the monks that surrounded her had made men keep their distance. She tried to turn on that little logic button in her brain but she was finding it harder and harder to think logically about or around Sesshomaru.
There was the problem of her race. She was a metamorph, whatever that meant. Did she even know she was compatible with demons? If she wasn't, what about humans? It was an important question. Sesshomaru was a lord, and lords need heirs.
Heirs… Her mind wandered off to a place and time where Rin would play with young demon children with honey colored eyes and silver hair. She imagined him with his arms around her swelling belly, watching the others play.
Miyoiki blinked and shook her head. Where had that come from? She had never been prone to daydreaming, and especially not about having children. She stood and told herself it was lack of sleep.
She immediately felt a serge of heat in her belly. She nearly jumped out of her skin at the sudden feeling of complete arousal. She tingled all over, and one thing took hold of her mind. Finding and ravaging a certain white-haired lord. She reached for her doorway with that very intention and stopped. What was happening to her? This wasn't like her either.
Sesshomaru seemed to know more about her kind than she did, so it made sense to ask him what was going on. Yeah, right. I'll just walk up and say, "Hey, I had the sudden urge to throw you down and have my way with you. Do you know what might be wrong with me? Oh, and before that I was daydreaming about having your children."
That would go over well. She pressed her back against the door and slid down it. It seemed like she spent hours going in and out of these sensations, but truthfully it was only a few moments before Rin tapped on her door.
"Lady Miyoiki!" Rin nearly cheered, "Are you in there? Jaken told me you arrived last night!"
"I'm here," Miyoiki said softly, "I'm just… sick."
"Oh no!" Rin cried, "I shall tell master Jaken at once."
"No wait!" Miyoiki started, but Rin was already gone.
Sesshomaru headed for Miyoiki's suite, after Jaken came to deliver the news of Miyoiki's 'laziness'. Sesshomaru knew very well that Miyoiki was not lazy, so there must be something wrong. He had Jaken take the scrolls he'd worked on last night into a nearby town, so he could check on Miyoiki without unwanted intrusions.
As he neared the door his nose caught a slight musty scent in the air and he froze. The dog in him howled with delight. He pressed it down and tried to think rationally. Why would she say she was sick when she was actually in heat? Oh yes, because she's never been in heat before, and probably doesn't understand what is happening.
He suppressed the urge to run in and 'help' her with her condition, and took pride that all the years he spent disciplining himself were coming in handy for the first time since he met Miyoiki. Instead he tapped on the doorway and asked, "Miyoiki? Jaken tells me you are ill?"
Oh gods! It's HIM! Every muscle tensed. Her pushing muscles tried to push her to her feet on instinct to go to him, her pull muscles held her down denying the urge. Go away, go away, go AWAY! One side said while the other huskily replied. Please, please, PLEASE, come in!
"I…um," Miyoiki started, her voice strained, "Yeah, I guess you could call it that."
"You are not ill," He said, trying to hide the strain in his voice, "You are in heat. It will pass, and it's nothing to be afraid of."
In heat? She blinked and tried to digest to comment. Great… Another thing to get used to about her new body. She raked her hand back through her silver hair in frustration and yelped as doing so accidentally pulled on one of her antennae painfully. She groaned with frustration. Sesshomaru tapped on the door again, "You stay in there. I'll have Jaken bring you your meals until it passes. If you go out in your… condition… You are likely to attract the attention of every demon within five miles"
Sesshomaru used the statement as an escape and walked away with forced steps. Everything demon in him, everything dog in him, was howling with the urge to react in carnal instinct to Miyoiki's condition. However, he had always likened the frenzied sex of cyclical mating as unclean and likened it to rape. His logic was simple, if the wouldn't do it in their right mind, then it was wrong to take advantage of them in an altered state. He would not mate while inebriated, in heat, or with any other interference that might cheapen the event. For that reason, he was a hundred year old bachelor, with no heirs, and retained monk-like abstinence.
That was not the only reason. His father was completely unfaithful. When his father came into cycle the closest female was easy prey to him with his dashing good looks. His mother, and Inuyasha's mother were just the only ones to conceive. Sesshomaru had loved his mother, and remembered her weeping. She knew the exact time his father would come into cycle because it corresponded exactly to hers. Since he was often off fighting somewhere he was almost never home during his cycle. Inevitably that meant he was with someone else while Sesshomaru's mother was locked up in a room weeping.
It was an arranged and loveless marriage, and his mother had died broken and bitter. On her death bed she made Sesshomaru promise to kill the wretched half-demon that brought proof of her disgrace, and dishonor to their family. Until that day, he had managed to love his father in spite of it all, but as his mother died weeping in his arms he could not help but loath his father. When the Tetsusiaga was willed to Inuyasha, it was adding insult to injury.
He was only recently coming to understand that his father may not have loved his mother, but he loved Sesshomaru and Inuyasha equally. His choice of who got which sword was not only right but wise. Inuyasha, being a half-demon would spend his life fighting off demons who thought less of him. In addition, the sword suppressed the demon blood that would consume him otherwise. Sesshomaru was powerful enough not to need a sword capable of such destruction, and if he did, he was fully capable of having one constructed. Tokijin was evidence of that. Further Tensaiga had saved Sesshomaru from death as aptly as Tetsusaiga had saved Inuyasha from his demon blood.
Was there even more to it than that? Could his father possibly have known the sword would compel him to revive humans? Through this revival, could he have known that Sesshomaru's hatred of humans and his brother would start to disintegrate?
All these thoughts caused unimaginable amounts of guilt to swell in his stomach. Was he so fickle? The lord of cold calculation, whose icy stare alone had subjugated many foes. No one doubted him when he said, "Out of the way, if you value your life." Wasn't that the way he liked it? Further, he made a promise to a person that was once the center of his life; his mother. What could be said of his honor if he did not oblige? Given the chance, would he so easily break a promise to his beloved Miyoiki?
Lost in his introspection, he wandered back to his room. Surprisingly enough he had completely forgotten about Miyoiki's state.
Jaken returned later that day, which reminded Sesshomaru that it had almost been two full days since Miyoiki had eaten. He growled at himself for his oversight and immediately commanded Jaken to take a meal to Miyoiki. He informed Jaken of Miyoiki's condition and advised Jaken that if he or anyone else defiled her, their head would be mounted above her headboard. Jaken was, after all, was a demon imp, and would not be immune to her heat either. A demon is a demon. Luckily, Jaken was also hopelessly loyal, and had great fear for his life.
Rin burst in shortly after that and remained with him for the rest of the day, showering him with her hero-worship. Jaken took Miyoiki dinner, and put Rin to bed. Sesshomaru tried to sleep, but being alone in a quiet room with nothing to occupy his thoughts made it impossible to force the scent of Miyoiki's heat out of his mind. To make matters worse he was coming into cycle, which made the situation maddening. He wagered that one way to drive that physical activity out of his mind was to replace it with another physical activity, so he headed down to the practice yard.
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Jackie: Cya next chapter!