Gah. The website was acting screwy. Had this done before the weekend and couldn't do a thing about it. Anyways, sorry it's taken so long guys. I am still here, I promise. Just...you know. Life getting in the way. So, here's the next chap, and I'm gonna start #22 tomorrow, and hopefully get it up faster than this one. (Not that that will be hard to do...) Not a lot of remembering here, but there will definitely be some coming up, and the memories should start to snowball, if I can get things to work the way I want them. OK, that's enough of my rambling. ;)
The young woman shivers, tightening her hold on the boy in front of her, trying to steal as much warmth as possible. She rests her burning cheek against his back, ignoring the low rumble that says that he's talking to her, choosing to close her eyes instead.
"Sakura?"
When the girl refuses to answer a second time, the hanyou turns, frowning at the top of the her head. He can almost see the steam rising from her in soft tendrils.
Damn it... She's gotten worse. Not that I'm surprised...
Kiiru--because he and Sakura had yet to discuss anything that had happened at the Fortress, and therefore wasn't comfortable with referring to himself by another name--utters another low growl, and begins scanning the snow-covered land for some place to stop. The two fairies perched on his shoulders glance briefly at the girl before taking off in a flurry of sparkles and snowflakes and misgivings, disappearing into the whiteness, searching for the same.
The small group had been traveling all night, and were now quickly succumbing to the fatigue from their experiences the previous day. Sakura moreso than the others, though they were still having trouble keeping their thoughts focused on the task at hand. Which was primarily just staying warm, as there wasn't much else to do.
It had snowed again during the night, as was the prediction, and the white flakes had come down hard. Kuri had done well for a few hours on her own, but finally reached her limit when the freezing wetness began pushing against her belly. She refused to go any farther until Kiiru dismounted--with an irritated sigh--and took the reins, breaking through the piling drifts as he led the mare along the edge of the forest.
The hanyou had just recently returned to Sakura, when the fatigue seemed about to take over and remove her unwillingly from Kuri's back. The snow wasn't as deep here, though it was still coming down in droves, and the group needed to stop to rest and eat, for a few hours at least. Also, Kiiru was positive he could hear the breaking of ocean waves in the distance, though it would probably be another half a day before they would reach it.
"Anything?" the boy asks, when the two fairies return, trying to keep the hope out of his voice. It wasn't likely that they would find shelter out here in the middle of nowhere, especially since they couldn't see more than five feet in any direction.
The hanyou gets a shock when the female nods feverently at him, waving one tiny hand, beckoning him to follow. Kiiru exchanges a slightly astonished glance with the small male, before they both shrug and the larger of the two pulls on their mount's reins so that she angles inland.
The tired group continues on for a little less than a kilo, Kiiru growing more and more irritated that they had left the mild shelter the trees had offered, which was being seconded by the fidgeting mare beneath him. It was bad enough having to walk through the cold and damp, without having the biting wind against your back.
"How much farther?" the boy finally asks, almost angrily. He pauses a moment to dismount and take the lead from the protesting roan, stopping again to shrug off his haori a few seconds later, when Sakura's shivering becomes noticeable. He bites his tongue against the chill seeping into his bones.
The winged woman shakes off several snowflakes that had collected on her head and shoulders, pursing her lips as she glances in a Northwesterly direction. After a few seconds, she holds up 5 tiny fingers.
"Five minutes?" Kiiru confirms, releasing a breathy sigh as the woman nods, a forced smile on her face as she looks past him. The half-demon glances at the obviously ill miko behind him, his relief vanishing when Sakura coughs, the sound rattling up from somewhere low in her chest.
The boy curses silently to himself, immediately turning and plowing through the drifts, following the glittering wings in front of him. He ignores Kuri's attempt to return to the forest running parallel to their direction, snapping her reins and forcing her to face forward. The mare snorts almost indignantly, nipping at the boy's hakamas a few times, until she realizes that he's not paying any attention to her. She quickly forgets this, however, when a small wooden dwelling comes into view through the swirling mists.
The building is little more than a run-down shack, with a lean-to and a broken fence on one side, presumably for an animal that had long since vacated the residence. The thatched roof of the dwelling has half-collapsed inward, and there is a question as to whether or not the aged wood of the building itself can survive even one more night in the current weather. But a sparse copse of pines is blocking the worst of the wind on one side, and also providing a break for the snowfall, while a small pile of logs beneath the overhang promises dry warmth, if only someone were to set them burning. There's no sign of any inhabitants.
Kiiru visibly relaxes as the group reaches the dwelling, shaking off the worst of the cold as they step under the extended roof, stamping his feet on packed mud to warm his toes. He takes a few seconds to look around, smiling grimly at the wood, wondering if he knew how to make a fire.
The sound of quiet chewing reaches his ears a moment later, and the hanyou turns to find the roan nibbling on bits of new grass that were hiding beneath the snow at the edge of the roof, which had been sprouting before the storm had hit. He offers the animal a smirk and a small pat when he sees that Kuri was still staying safely beneath the confines of the overhang, however.
Frowning to himself, the boy wonders how he is going to provide a measure of warmth for the animal, when a glittering in the corner of his eyes catches his attention. The two fairies were waving their small arms, hovering next to a tall, brownish stack of items. Kiiru walks over to them, grimly smiling again before toppling the pile of worn potato sacks, arranging them on the ground close to the wall of the shack. There was little worry that the mare would wander off in this weather, but these sacks would help to sustain her own body heat without the aid of her two passengers.
Now that Kuri is taken care of, the hanyou turns his attention to the girl still seated on the horse's back, biting down on the urge to growl. Sakura was pale and shivering, and the racking cough she'd developed seemed to have gotten infinitely worse since their exposure to the biting wind, though they'd been in it less than half an hour. Kiiru needed to get the young miko inside and warm her as quickly as possible.
The boy glances briefly at the two tiny people who were rummaging in his pack, frowning at them in confusion but mostly ignoring the pair as he lifts the girl into his arms, unable to help his chill as he feels how warm she is.
A fever... Definitely not good...
The boy cuts off further disparaging comments to himself as he steps around the corner of the shack and takes the full force of the freezing wind in his face, instantly setting his teeth to chattering. He quickly turns to shield Sakura from the worst of it, hurrying along this side of the dwelling to the door, pushing it open with his foot.
Once inside Kiiru closes the door and glances around, uttering a slight grunt of annoyance that there's not anything more helpful than small piles of dried pine needles, a broken stool, and a few leftover potatoes that decided to start their own tribe in one of the corners. The boy takes a step forward and cringes at the creaking of the boards beneath his feet.
Won't do us any good if we get buried under it...
Kiiru walks several more steps into the single-room building, keeping Sakura in his arms while he checks the corner and crossbeams for stability, in case they had to leave in a hurry. Deciding that they'll survive unless one of the pines actually falls on the house, the boy makes a mental note to check the supports of the overhang when he goes back out for the wood, and sets the girl down near the firepit.
"I'll be right back, Sakura," he says, setting their bags and her bow and quiver beside the girl and pulling his haori over her head, so that as much of her was covered by the material as was possible.
The young miko mumbles something that Kiiru doesn't catch, before she clutches the robe around her, so that only a small portion of her face is still visible.
"Stay with her," Kiiru says to the winged pair now digging in Sakura's pack. The boy gets two vaguely waving arms and no faces for his answer, to which he scowls before leaving the room again, vowing to carry enough logs back in so that he doesn't have to go back outside a second time.
Kuri has progressed from the back of the shack to the side, leaving a trail of grass hair about a foot across in her wake. She flicks an ear at Kiiru when he begins stacking logs on his arms, but otherwise doesn't respond to his presence.
"You'll be alright; right?" the boy asks as he checks the roof's supports, deciding that he was definitely getting tired, if he was asking for their horse's opinion. He shakes his head, giving the mare another pat on the rump before heading back inside, piling the extra logs along the inside of the door and taking only a few to the firepit to begin with.
Now what do I do?
Kiiru glances at the girl beside him, reaching a hand over and moving the collar of his haori so that he can feel her forehead. Sakura leans into his cool fingers when they brush against her brow, but keeps her eyes closed, swaying slightly even though she was sitting down.
Maybe she can start the fire...the boy thinks, scowling at the heat against his hand and the fact that he couldn't for the life of him remember anything about igniting a flame. And also that he hadn't paid much attention when Sakura had started their previous fires. It just seemed the kind of thing that she did, really.
Kiiru feels his face warming when the girl suddenly reaches up and grasps his hand, moving it to first one cheek, then the other, a small smile on her lips.
Wrong kind of flame... he thinks, slowly removing his hand and fighting a smirk when the girl opens her eyes, her bottom lip pushed out slightly.
"Fire first, then medicine, then food. You're burning up," he says, when Sakura looks at him blankly.
A clicking in the pit catches both of their attentions, and the pair glances toward the sound, staring in silence at the fairies, who are struggling to smash two rocks together.
"What are you doing?" Kiiru asks, lifting the small male with his cargo and prying the latter away from the former. He squints sideways at the sharpened rock, ignoring the irritated, explanatory tone and gestures the fairy was flinging towards him. "Flint?" he asks, glancing down at the female, who was holding the larger rock at an angle to a tiny pile of pine needles they'd gathered, and looking distinctly embarrassed.
"And steel," Sakura says, roughly, and not completely coherently, while making a strange waving motion with her hands. She quickly withdraws them back under Kiiru's haori, shivering again.
"Where did they come from?" Kiiru asks, some vague recollection finally coming back to him that he had done this before, although only rarely. There always seemed to be some easier way; something that involved a tiny, wooden stick and a squarish piece of paper. The boy shakes his head to dispel the confusion, then takes the rock from the female fairy and strikes the two against each other. "And don't do that again; you could have set yourselves on fire," he says, sending a small growl to his audience.
The small man and woman scoff at the hanyou, rolling their eyes before they point at Sakura's pack, then rise into the air. Kiiru blinks at the woman as she gathers more needles, the man disappearing outside through a crack in one window's covering. The hanyou turns back to his task, making a few unsuccessful tries before he gets any sparks, then several more before the pile of needles begins to smoke.
The female fairy immediately begins fanning the spark with her wings, now looking almost bored. She stifles a yawn, watching silently as Kiiru adds more needles, breaking into a grin when the flame finally catches and the tiny fire is born.
The male fairy had returned sometime inbetween the frustrated curses, and was turning half of a potato sack into brown strips. He throws a few onto the fire, his grin reflecting oddly in the orange light.
"Anyone else think he's enjoying that too much?" Kiiru asks, to no one in particular. "You have something against potatoes?"
He smirks as small male glares at him, throwing one of the strips at the boy's head. The two girls giggle, which instantly sends Sakura into a coughing fit.
"Time for your medicine," Kiiru says, gruffly, pulling the girl's pack over to him. He sets some packages of food off to the side before finding the scroll containing the instructions on Habigaku's remedies.
The boy had only been paying partial attention when the herbalist had explained what each one was for, and therefore didn't know what most of them did. He scans down the small, neat writing, searching for herb that would work for Sakura's cold, mentally noting to read about the rest before he or the girl would require the use of one of them in an emergency. They'd been lucky with that so far.
The winged man and woman watch him curiously as he searches the girl's bag for the pouch containing the dried and crushed flowers, tilting their heads as he grins at the item.
"It smells better than the last one," he says, referring to the leaves he'd used on Sakura's ankle. The boy then removes a small pottery bowl from the miko's pack with a sigh. He would have to go back outside.
A few minutes later Kiiru returns, shaking the flakes off of his head with a grunt and grabbing a couple more logs to throw on the growing fire. He then adds the snow-filled bowl, waiting until the liquid is bubbling quietly before throwing a few pinches of the herb in. The soothing scent almost instantly fills the space, and Sakura moans softly.
"That smells lovely," she mumbles, shifting closer to the bowl, so that she's almost right in the pit itself.
Kiiru snatches the girl as she pauses to cough, just before his haori catches fire. Or would have, if it could have caught. He turns the miko toward him, shaking her slightly, forgetting her cold in light of the fact that she'd almost hurt herself again.
"Sakura! What the hell are you doing?! You almost went right into the fire, idiot!" he yells, hugging the girl to his chest and ignoring her muffled attempts at an apology, not completely sure that she even knew what she was apologizing for. He doesn't explain that she probably would have been alright, since she was wearing his robe, because the girl might not always have that protection. "What were you thinking?"
He pushes the girl back, moving his haori off her head so that he can see her face. Sakura's cheeks are red, but Kiiru doesn't know if that's from the fever or embarrassment.
"S...sorry," she mumbles, shivering again. The boy isn't sure if she's simply cold or if what she had almost done had finally penetrated through her sick-induced haze. "I...forgot that the fire was there, I guess. It smells so nice," she says, glancing back at the bowl, her dark eyes glazed.
Kiiru stares at the miko for several seconds, trying to wrap his mind around the fact that the girl's better sense had been overruled by a flowery smell. He had the distinct feeling that things like this happened more often than he liked.
"Sakura," he says, pulling the girl around so that she's facing him again. "I want you focus on resting and staying warm and getting well, ok? Just stay put and I'll bring you anything you need. I don't want you to get hurt again."
The girl blinks at him several times before nodding, a slight frown on her brow at Kiiru's serious, almost pleading, expression. The hanyou was obviously upset, and she didn't like that she was the reason. All she really wanted was for him to be happy, and he definitely wasn't.
Wait...where had that come from? the girl thinks, watching the boy as he removes the bowl from the fire to cool. He sits back down beside her, checking her temperature again.
"Too warm...," he mumbles, moving away to retrieve the instruction scroll again, scanning down the list. Sakura watches him silently for a few seconds before sliding next to him and putting her good arm through one of his.
"Thanks... for watching over me," she says, smiling up at the boy before snuggling against his side.
Kiiru blinks at the girl, giving a half-hearted shrug as his face warms, before turning back to the herb list. "'S no problem," he mumbles, frowning at the paper in his hands, not really looking at it anymore. He feels the girl shiver against him, hesitating a moment longer before putting an arm around her. He tries not to smirk when Sakura makes a contented sigh, but doesn't succeed very well.
His grin falls a second later when he hears the snickering.
The boy glares at the two on the other side of the fire, who were grinning innocently. "She's cold. I'm just helping her stay warm," he says, scowling at the serious--and completely unbelievable--smiles being aimed at him. He bares his fangs when the laughing starts again. "Oi! Shut up!"
The pair breaks down into fits at the fact that Kiiru can't move without upsetting the girl, laughing even harder when he begins growling at them. They finally settle down when Sakura coughs again, and Kiiru decides that the tea is cool enough, lifting the bowl to her lips, speaking softly to wake her from her semi-daze.
"You need to drink this before you sleep, Sakura. It will make you feel better."
The girl opens her eyes, inhaling the tea slowly, a smile breaking across her face. "It smells lovely," she says again, taking small sips from the bowl. She manages to drink the entire amount without coughing, and also without moving an inch from Kiiru's side. "Time to sleep now?" she asks with a yawn, when he places the bowl back on the wooden floor.
"Yes, time to sleep, if you're not hungry. You'd be more comfortable lying down, though," the boy answers, making a small, reluctant attempt to remove the girl attached to him. He gives up when Sakura tightens her hold, shaking her head.
"Not...hungry... ...lovely...sleep...," she murmurs, falling completely under a minute later, a small smile lighting her pale face.
Kiiru rolls his eyes, shaking his head at the girl beside him, but secretly pleased that he didn't have to let go of her just yet. He would wait half an hour, then retrieve his other haori and lay her down. She didn't need to wake up with a stiff neck on top of her cold, arm, ribs, and ankle.
The boy blows a heavy sigh, ruffling his bangs, before picking up the scroll again. He studiously ignores the pair staring at him and the girl, whispering quietly behind their tiny hands, and scans down the list, searching for something stronger if the tea Sakura had taken didn't work. They could stay here for a few days, or until the storm passed, but they couldn't make any sort of time if her cold didn't subside. Or worsened.
It won't happen. She'll be fine in the morning...
Kiiru glances down at the girl, willing away the less than encouraging thoughts. Sakura's cold might...no, would go away in a few days, at the most, but what about her arm? Or her ankle? The insane doctor at the Fortress had confirmed that it was broken--not that there was any doubt--but it definitely wouldn't be healing anytime soon.
But did they really have anywhere to go? Couldn't they stay here as long they needed to?
The hanyou frowns, willing himself to remember...anything. He and Sakura knew that they didn't belong here, but where exactly did they belong? And how soon did they need to get back?
The boy gives up after several fruitless minutes, scowling at the paper in his hand. He kept feeling as if he and the girl needed to be somewhere, but he couldn't figure out anything more. The most they could do was keep moving South, as quickly as possible, and hope that they'd keep remembering things.
Kiiru releases an annoyed snort as he returns to scanning the list, reading over each item slowly, so that he could remember the herbs and their uses, if for some reason he didn't have access to the list. He runs through everything twice, frowning when he reaches the end for the second time. Something was missing.
Or somethings. Kiiru doesn't see the two special vials that Habigaku had given each of them, though it was unlikely they would forget their uses. Was that why the herbalist hadn't included them on the list?
The half-demon's frown deepens as he thinks about the two concoctions. If they could really do what Habigaku said, it was more likely that the villager hadn't wanted anyone else to know about the potions. Leaving them off the list and placing them in the invisible pouches inside their packs meant that only Sakura and Kiiru knew about them. Had that been the herbalist's idea, or Grandmother's?
The hanyou debates for a minute before deciding on the latter, as this was definitely not the first proviso that the witch had made for them. Kiiru and Sakura owed her more than they could ever repay.
The boy releases a resigned sigh as he glances down at the girl, eyeing each of her injuries, wondering. One of the two special potions could heal any wound, no matter how bad. Could it possibly work on more than one, if none of them were too serious?
Sakura mumbles in her sleep, pressing her face closer into the boy's kosode. Kiiru smiles at her peaceful, slightly pleased expression, wondering what she was dreaming about. He had thought briefly about lying down himself, but he was mostly just tired. Simply sitting and watching over the girl would be enough rest for him.
Sighing again, the hanyou decides that it was time to separate himself and Sakura. She would be more comfortable, and he could tend the fire, make something to soothe his growling stomach, and check on Kuri without disturbing her too much.
The boy has just laid the girl on her side and is moving to retrieve his other haori when they hear it. Sakura bolts upright, as do the fairies, and the foursome hears Kuri scramble to her feet, whinnying in panic.
"What's going on?" the girl almost screams, her eyes instantly finding the half-demon in the dim light.
"Stay here!" he says, bolting from the shack and yelling over his shoulder at the now-hovering pair. "Watch her!"
The male fairy ignores the command, choosing to stay right on Kiiru's heels as he heads around the side of the building to check on the mare. The female fairy heads for the door, but stops at the threshhold, squinting through the snow to see what had caused the bone-chilling sound. The tiny hairs on her head rise when they hear it again, closer this time.
Kiiru has just reached the roan when the sound comes again. He manages to grab Kuri's reins before she rears, holding the horse steady as she tries to pull away. He takes a few seconds to calm her, but doesn't hold much faith that she won't bolt if the sound should come again. He can understand why.
"Stay with her if she runs," he says to the male fairy, who doesn't seem to like this assignment, and frowns at the hanyou. "Don't try to stop her; that's a warning sound for them. Just try to calm her down and bring her back. We can't afford to lose her, and I don't want her dying in this storm or if some demon should get to her."
The tiny man stares after Kiiru as he pivots on his heel and disappears into the whiteness, not waiting for a response. He shivers when the sound comes a third time, somehow managing to keep the mare from leaving the vicinity of the house completely, but just barely. Kuri fidgets on the far side of the house, kicking up drifts of snow with her hooves, puffs appearing before her flared nostrils each time she breathes. The fairy knew that there was no way he could keep her from leaving after this. He just hoped he could hold on or keep up if she ran. Fairies didn't do so well when their wings got wet.
Kiiru races over the snow drifts, hardly feeling the cold on his bare feet. The crazed tone sounds again, almost directly in front of him, and the boy slows, straining his eyes to see. After a few seconds a small, darkish blob appears through the wall of white, and the boy takes a step back, confused and fairly alarmed.
What he had expected to see was not what was now pelting toward him as fast as it's legs could carry it. The 'warning' should have been coming from a screaming horse, and this was anything but.
It was about the size of a cat, but definitely wasn't. The creature had red-blond hair that stood out from it's body in short, spiky tufts, and each of it's ears was at least twice the size of it's head. A long tail made mostly of hair stuck straight out behind it, while a sort of gold shimmer seemed to flow along it's body as it ran.
It was the huge, violet-colored eyes that gave it away, though. They were wide with genuine fear, and the now softer cry the creature releases a second later confirms the fact that it had been the one making the awful noise. Whatever it was, it wasn't a threat.
The three howling shapes that follow it out of the whiteness, however, are.
OoooOoooO
"Are you sure there's nothing else we can do?"
The shrine maiden shakes her head, her light hair swinging back and forth over her dark robes.
"No. Even if this young one...," the woman gestures to the kitsune at the monk's feet, "...remembered something more, I do not believe so. They are out of our range and our skills. Only with luck on our side have we done any good with the spell. Your friends must rely on their own powers to get them back."
"But why can't we go look for them? Surely there's no harm in that?"
"And where would you begin, tajiya?" the priestess asks, giving Sango a leveling glance with her steel-blue gaze. "At the sea? Here, at the great mountain?" she asks, waving an arm to the towering peak behind her. "Perhaps they are not even in the country... No, if their memories return, then they will find their way home, eventually. It is best to be there to greet them."
"And what if their memories don't return?" Sango asks, now fighting back tears. She, Miroku, Shippo, and Kilala had been at this woman's village for two days, trying to find some way to help or return their friends. They'd performed one spell, under the shrine maiden's direction, but had no way of knowing if it had worked. And now she was telling them that there was nothing more they could do?
"They will, dear; it is just a matter of time. They may now have their identities returned to them and are heading to your Kaede's village, or they may still regard each other with uneasy trust. Without an elixir--which only certain priests and pristesses know how to create--their minds will have to heal in a normal length of time. It may take longer than the kit and the wolf, but it will happen, as theirs would have. Sentient beings are funny that way."
Sango frowns at the woman as she smiles to herself, thinking that she had spent too much time in her chosen art. The slayer glances at Miroku, who shrugs.
"And you're certain about these demons, Lady Mirai? Capturing one will have no effect on getting Inuyasha and Kagome back?"
The elder woman turns to the monk, giving him a sad smile. "No. Their powers are individualistic, and limited. Capturing one only means that you are a very smart predator. I am astonished that he was able to control their power; it was not thought that one could utilize them in that way. Nor is it desired, as you can see."
"Nothing about him surprises me anymore."
The adults glance down at the fox between them, who was absently stroking Kilala's tails while the conversation floated over the demon's heads.
"At least I remember you guys, though," Shippo adds with a frown. "Mostly, at least. A lot of things are still blurry. Like, why does the monk ask every woman he meets to have his child?"
La la la... Comment if you like... :)