Chapter 25- The Impure House

Rouyakan and Inuyasha stared at the other; both of them trying to keep their guard up, both waiting for the other to make the first move as they circled each other. Rouyakan was crouched low to the ground, (Well as best he could, considering his height) getting ready to attack. The sharp end of the branch that Inuyasha held was aimed right at his head.

"Well, well, well," Rouyakan taunted him. It was time to test his theory and see if he truly was who he thought he was. "It looks like the leader of the resistance has returned. I see the curse is gone… to bad no one will ever see you again."

Inuyasha's eyes widened. What? How could Rouyakan know about the curse? It must mean…

"I get it!" he yelled furiously, "You work for Naraku don't you?"

Rouyakan took advantage of Inuyasha's distraction and attacked. By the time Inuyasha realized what was happening, it was too late; he had been pinned to the ground. The branch had been sent flying into the bushes. 'If only I had my sword back, I could kill him easily. And not only would we have a giant meal, but Satsuki would finally be left alone,' he thought, angry with himself for falling for such an obvious trick.

He felt the wolf's hot breath tickle his face. Saliva dripped form Rouyakan's huge mouth and onto his check. "You know, I could've easily had killed the puny demon and the two girls. I let them go because I thought that you'd be stronger and actually put up a fight. But seeing you on the ground like this, I guess I was wrong. After I kill you, I'll slowly kill Satsuki. That way your other friends see what will happen to them."

Inuyasha swung his foot up and kicked the wolf right in the stomach, the force was strong enough to throw him off and Inuyasha was able to get back onto his feet. "You want any one of them you have to get through me first!" he yelled. "They didn't do anything to you. Why are you following us anyways? Did Naraku send you?"

Rouyakan let out another growl, "Wouldn't you like to know?"

That was the last straw. Inuyasha was crouching low to the ground, thinking of the best way to kill him when…

"Hey, Rouyakan!" Kagome's voice called. The two of them looked over and saw Satsuki and Kagome standing there. "NOW!" Kagome cried as she and Satsuki both threw whatever sweets they had in their hands in another direction. One of Satsuki's didn't quite make it and hit Rouyakan in the head. "Oops," she muttered.

Rouyakan looked down at the piles of sweets and his mouth started to water. "What's going on?" Satsuki whispered confused.

"I thought that a guy like him wouldn't be able to resist free sweets," Kagome responded. "Inuyasha!" she yelled.

Inuyasha watched as Rouyakan approached the sweets and he seized his chance to run. He ran towards Kagome and Satsuki. "Let's go!" he yelled as he grabbed Kagome by the wrist, pulling her along. Kagome reached out and grabbed Satsuki.

*Juromaru and Kageromaru*

Juromaru and Kageromaru barely had any trouble corrupting the magic from this particular story. The little girl had been easy to steal magic from; the 3 bears on the other hand had been harder. However they had been able win in the end. Now their job was to corrupt the magic on the cottage. Kageromaru was finished with what he had to do and was now waiting for Juromaru to finish up.

At that moment in time the sadistic Hakudoshi had just showed up and was looking at the dark house. "Are you two done yet?" he asked coldly.

Kageromaru looked over his shoulder to see Hakudoshi standing there. "What are you doing here?" he asked. "I thought you were keeping a look-out."

Hakudoshi just shrugged, looking bored, "I was, but I tired of waiting and wanted to see if you were done yet."

Juromaru just stared at Hakudoshi for a long moment before Kageromaru said, "Almost, I'm just waiting for Juromaru to finish up. Once we're done, we can go report to Naraku."

"Report what?" Hakudoshi asked with a sick smile.

"Don't play dumb," said Kageromaru, "Report that we have started corrupting the magic in Ariellica and looking for the damn jewel."

Hakudoshi merely smiled even wider as he said, "I'm taking it that you haven't found it yet?"

The disgusting looking Kageromaru said, "What do you think? No one's seen the dumb jewel since Kikyo had hidden it."

Hakudoshi shook his head as his smile slowly faded into a grimace, "Well then?"

"Well what?" demanded Kageromaru.

"Why don't we go and ruin another happy ending in Ariellica? It will just look like we're slackers if we haven't ruined more than one fairytale."

Juromaru started making a strange sound as he opened his mouth to say something… but then they heard what sounded like voices. Kageromaru glared at Hakudoshi and hissed "You idiot! This is why you were supposed to be the look out!"

"Well, excuse me if no one ever travels this way," replied Hakudoshi looking unconcerned.

"Let's just get out of here before they find us," Kageromaru whispered as they ran off into the woods.

*Inuyasha gang*

Satsuki began to fall behind the others; they had long stopped running when they felt they had put distance between themselves and Rouyakan. She was tired and wanted to rest; her eyelids beginning to droop. She was so tired that she didn't even notice when the others had stopped and shen ended up walking right into them. Glancing up out of her stupor she was about to apologize when she saw the reason why the sudden stop. In front of them was a small cottage… only instead of color… the entire house had turned black, and seemed to pulse darkness.

"What is that? Why does that house look like that?" Kagome asked as she took a step forward.

Reaching out Inuyasha grasped Kagome's wrist, "Don't go any closer. Unless you want to be corrupted."

Kagome lept back, but still not understanding what's going on, "What are you talking about? Just what is it?"

Shippo leapt onto her shoulder and spoke up, "It means that there's no pure magic left. All of it has been defiled, and pumping out evil."

"Everything that has color means that they have either been touched by magic or is magic," Satsuki finished.

"So…" said Kagome starting to get it, "If you touch it what will happen?"

"You become defiled," said Inuyasha. "You become a mindless, souless servant to the person who corrupted the magic that you touched in the first place."

Kagome gulped, "What should we do?"

"Move on. There nothing we can do," Inuyasha said. Then his eyes widened as he realized that he was still holding Kagome's hand and quickly let go. He turned his back on her and said, harshly, "C-come on! Let's get going. Where do we go from here?"

"This way," Kagome said as she led the others in the direction away from the polluted house.

*A few hours later*

The path they followed led them through the forest that eventually thinned out to wide clearing in the forest. Kagome stopped walking and said, "I'm really starting to get worried about Miroku and Sango… we should've run into them by now."

Satsuki nodded as she looked around the clearing. "Do you think something happened to them?" she asked.

What they didn't know was that there were people up in the trees looking down at them.

"Do you think that they're the ones that we were told to help Momiji?" asked a young girl dressed all in blue and white.

"I think so, Botan," replied her friend that was all in red and white.

"But how do you know?" Botan asked.

"Kikyo said that we were to look for a group of travelers… and they don't look like they work for Naraku. And look at that cute little demon with them! And a little girl to? They can't possibly be working for Naraku."

"So we should help them out?" Botan asked excitedly.

Momiji nodded.

*On the ground*

"Maybe we can take a little rest here" Satsuki asked as she crouched down to give her legs a rest. "I'm really tired."

"That would be nice," Kagome commented as she leaned up against a tree. "Just for a minute. We've been walking for hours."

"Keh," said Inuyasha sitting down. "Man, you humans can be a pain to be with."

"Now now, Inuyasha," said Shippo sitting next to Satsuki. "The girls are tired! We have to let them rest."

Satsuki clapped her hands together and said, "Thank you Shippo!"

Shippo flushed a deep red.

"Excuse me?" said a voice from above.

Everyone leapt to their feet and looked up to see two girls sitting on the branches above them. A girl with red hair, and dressed in red and white clothes waved cheerfully as the girl with blue hair and blue and white clothes smiled gently.

"You're more than free to rest here!" the red one cried out.

"Yep! This part of the forest is safe!" the blue one agreed.

These girls didn't seem dangerous so Kagome smiled and waved back. "Thank you!" she called up the tree. "Why don't you come down and we can talk?"

Both girls looked at each other, nodded, and slid down the trunk of the trees and landed in front of them.

"Allow us to introduce ourselves," the blue one replied.

"My name is Momiji," the red said.

"And I am Botan!" the blue said.

Kagome smiled at them again and said, "Momiji? Botan? I don't mean to sound rude or anything, but… you see… we've been traveling for a long time, we can't find our friends, and we need a place to rest for a little while. I mean I know you don't kn-"

Momiji laughed as Botan intruppted her and said, "No, it's alright. You guys are more than welcome to rest here for awhile."

Satsuki smiled at her and nodded, "Thank you! I'm Satsuki, and this Shippo, Kagome, and Inuyasha." As she said their names, she pointed to each one of them in turn.

"Well, it's nice to meet all three of you," Botan said.

Momiji then said, "We've been expecting you."

"You have?" Inuyasha asked as he raised an eyebrow suspiciously.

"Yep," Momiji chirped. "Kikyo, the fairy godmother told us you would be coming soon and we were to help you out."

"Kikyo told you about us?" Kagome asked as she looked from one to the other, who nodded. "That fairy godmother sure seem to get around."

"Yes, and she asked us to aid you with whatever you needed," Momiji explained. "And if you need a place to rest then so be it."

"Thank you, again," Kagome said gratefully as she sat down next to the tree and leaned up against it.

Inuyasha grunted as he sat down next to a different tree and began to doze off. In no time at all, Shippo and the girls all fell asleep with Momiji and Botan watching over them.

*Later*

Satsuki and Shippo were the first to awaken from their naps. As they waited for Kagome and Inuyasha to wake up, they spent their time talking with Momiji and Botan. They chatted about all kinds of things for a while until Satsuki asked, "Hey guys? I have a question for you two."

Boton blinked as she titled her head to the side, "What is it?"

"What are you supposed to do when you have two people who you are pretty sure want to be more than friends with each other?"

"Try to get them together of course," answered Momiji as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Satsuki sighed. She had thought that would have been her answer. "Yes, but how do you do that?"

The girls thought about it for a while before Momiji said, "Well, I'd try to get them to do something together. It really depends on the people." She gave a defeated shrug, "Sorry."

Satsuki gave her a half smile. "It's alright. Thank you anyway though."

Shippo looked from Satsuki to the sleeping Kagome and Inuyasha before he looked back at her and asked, "How do you know if people who want to be more than just friends, really WANT to be more than just friends?"

Satsuki shrugged and said, "Women can just tell."

At that moment, Inuyasha and Kagome both began to stir, and woke up in just a few minutes. Boton leapt up and said, "Oh, good. You two are up."

"So," Momiji began as she looked at them all, "Where are you guys heading?"

The others were quiet for a moment before Satsuki answered truthfully, "We're not too sure yet."

"We were traveling with a monk and a demon slayer and a cat demon…" said Kagome, worriedly. "But we haven't found them yet."

"Maybe if we look at our map, we might get a better idea of where to go?" Shippo suggested, uncertainly. Inuyasha took out the map, unrolled it, and laid it out in front of them. Momiji and Boton watched them pour over the map as they sat patiently.

"So, where should we go from here?" Satsuki asked as she pointed to a spot on the map, the spot that marked where they currently were.

Kagome scanned the map. There were at least a dozen different directions that they could go in, but her eyes fell on one place in particular. "I think we should go to this town here," she said as she pointed to the city labeled Hlanith. "If we're to find Miroku, Sango, and Kirara then I say that we head to the nearest town."

"Hlanith?" Momiji asked as she looked over to where the town was marked on the map. "Boton and I go there a lot, right Boton?"

"Mmhm," said Boton. "We can take you there if you'd like?"

"Oh no, we couldn't ask you to do that for us," Kagome said quickly. They had given them a safe place for them to rest and not have to worry about being attacked. Taking them to the next town would be too much to ask for.

"Why not?" asked Inuyasha gruffly. "They're volunteering aren't they?"

"Inuyasha!" Kagome said warningly.

Momiji held up her hand to stop them from continuing to argue and said, "You don't need to worry. We go there a lot anyway so it'll be no problem taking you there with us."

Boton nodded, "That's right! Besides, Kikyo said that we were to help you anyway that we can."

Satsuki smiled widely, "Thank you; I was worried that we would get lost on the way."

But before anyone else could say another word, they all heard a loud growl from somewhere above them. Everyone looked up, and they could see through the canopy of the trees that there was a fireball in the sky, streaking towards them… only this fireball had flaming red eyes. Kagome recognized who it was immediately. Momiji and Boton both stumbled back and let out startled screams.

Kagome went to them, "No! Calm down its ok! She's a friend of ours!"

"It's Kirara!" Satsuki cried excitedly.

"And not just Kirara!" Shippo yelled out happily. "Miroku and Sango are on her back!"

The giant cat spotted them; it flew down lower and lower until it landed just a few feet in front of them. Kagome's happiness quickly turned to horror as she watched Sango leap off Kirara's back, and turned to help Miroku. Miroku was pale and covered in blood…

"What happened?" Kagome gasped as she ran to them, with Inuyasha, Shippo and the girls behind her.

(Does anyone have any requests for a fairytale they would like to see make an appearance in my story? I'm open to any suggestions! ;-)