Oblivion
Chapter Thirty-Five
POINTS OF NO RETURN
SONGS!
"Real Life" by Christopher (THE InuKag smut song for realsies "IS THIS WHAT HEAVEN FEELS LIKE, OH OH OHHHH, THIS JUST CAN'T BE REAL LIFE, OH OH OHHHHHHHH" I love it so much omg)
"Malamente" by Rosalia (it's in Spanish but it's for poor Sango and all this loredumping I'm subjecting her to SORRY SANGO HOPE YOU'RE TAKING NOTES CAUSE I SURE HAD TO AND I WROTE THE DAMN THING love youuuu)
"Human" by Rag'n'Bone Man (EYYY MIDORIKO GETS HER FIRST SONG CAUSE NOW IT'S NOT A SPOILER TO JUST MENTION HER NAME HALLELUJAH I'VE BEEN WAITING SO LONG FOR THIS)
"Is it time now, my lord?"
"Yes, my darling. It's time. Go, and make me proud."
The euphoria surrounded them both in an invisible mist, dulling out the sights and sounds of the surrounding world, and it held an eerie resemblance to the aura that appeared whenever Kagome used her healing powers.
Kagome managed to remember that eventually she'd have to break the kiss and come up for air, but, oh gods, the things he was doing, the things he was making her feel...she didn't want it to end.
What if they parted, and the illusion dispelled, and it was all revealed to be another one of those torturous dreams of him?
What if she awoke, alone and heartbroken and ostracized in the shogun's palace, hating herself for these fantasies that she always took refuge in?
Finally she could bear the suspense no longer and she pulled away; hell, she practically tore herself away.
And all that fretting was overtaken by joyful reassurance when she realized he'd done the exact same thing at the exact same time - pulled away to check once and for all that this wasn't just some fever dream.
Just alike, she thought with a quiet giggle. We're just alike.
They sat there wrapped in each other's arms, panting and flushed and smiling.
"This is real, right?" Inuyasha murmured, leaning down to touch his forehead to hers and closing his eyes. "I could have sworn I made this all up, just to cope with - with everything."
"Me too," Kagome said simply, leaning up to claim his lips once more.
He let her do it, but he pulled back far too quickly, much to her confusion.
"Kagome," he whispered, and once again, his forehead was pressed against hers and he seemed to be in a renewed fight to catch his breath. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do right now."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that I never expected any of...this. I was so sure that you'd never...well...and now it's happening, and I'm scared I won't be able to control myself if we keep this up right now, and I don't want to ask anything more than you want to give, and - "
Kagome's heart was already pounding, but now the thumps in her chest, in her very bloodstream, became deafening. She took a good look at his red face, his helpless expression, and without a second thought she knew exactly what she wanted to give him.
My adoration, she thought but didn't say.
What do I want to do?
I want to adore you. All of you.
She leaned up and kissed his cheek, then covered his mouth with hers once more, muffling the words into his lips.
"Are you saying you want me to tell you 'no?'"
"Y-Yeah, I mean, no, I - well - "
She paused to slick the tip of her tongue against the corner of his mouth, felt him shiver, and decided she had missed seeing that reaction, and now she wanted to see more.
"Inuyasha," she said softly, and in the back of her mind she was shocked at her own boldness as she slid her legs over his lap.
Inuyasha let out a groan that was surprising in its loudness, so hushed had been their spoken conversation. He screwed his eyes shut in clear embarrassment, biting back further sounds and hunching his posture slightly as Kagome got herself comfortable and curled her arms around his waist to resume the tight embrace.
"Kagome - please - "
"Inuyasha." She repeated the name again to test his reaction, and sure enough, there was a change in his expression. All that open vulnerability seemed to retreat; the furrows in his handsome features vanished, and the gold eyes went a few shades darker in tone beneath his long eyelashes.
There was one last moment of hesitation on his part, and then, before Kagome could blink, she was flat on her back in the middle of the mattress, and he was on top of her, propping himself up on clearly shaking arms and kissing her again.
And if he'd been holding back before, he certainly wasn't now, because Kagome's mind had gone fuzzy and her entire body seemed to have lost its strength -
He broke the kiss again, and again, it was all too soon. Kagome craned her neck up to chase after him as he pulled away, and when it proved unsuccessful, she gave a frustrated moan high in her throat and let her head flop back onto the bedroll.
"What are you - " She stopped when she realized where his hands were now - gently untying the belt of her oversized yukata.
"Say it again," he muttered, and that sharp, demanding edge was back in his voice.
And, oh gods, I like it. I like it.
"I-Inuyasha," she gasped, reaching up to grasp his face in her hands again, running her fingers through that silver-white hair -
He left no room for romantic ceremony when the yukata was untied; he practically whipped both sides open, exposing the whole of her naked body in a single motion. Kagome flinched in surprise, and snapped her legs tightly shut out of instinct.
Now, it seemed, he had purposely slowed himself down; he trailed both hands down her abdomen, his clawed fingers grazing the curve of both her hips down to her upper thighs. Was the reduced speed and urgency a way to give her another out, or was he just trying to savor the moment?
Either way, he was teasing her, and all she could do was shudder and moan.
When Inuyasha's hands reached her knees, they stopped once more, just once more.
"Kagome." He seemed to be choking the words out. "If you don't - if you want me to stop - "
All her verbal insistences seemed to be doing nothing to quell his doubts, so Kagome decided that, once again, she would let her actions do the talking.
With a shy smile, she leaned up on her shoulders and ghosted her fingers against the side of Inuyasha's face. When his eyes fluttered closed and he leaned his head into the touch, she shoved herself upright even further and kissed him again.
As she let herself drink him in again, as she heard him give a pleasured growl and return the kiss despite his professed indecision, Kagome trailed her other hand downward. In between them.
And Inuyasha didn't take any notice of it until the moment she wrapped her hand around his length through his hakama.
This time he didn't break the kiss, but his shuddering, surprised moan into her mouth made Kagome want to giggle again, this time in triumph.
She inched her fingers upward, felt for what she knew was the tip, and caressed it with her fingers in a near-tickling motion. In response, he seized her roughly about the shoulders, and just when she was sure she'd gone too far and now would be shoved away, he pleasantly surprised her again by drawing her even closer.
She felt the tip of one of his sharp fangs nip at her bottom lip and gave a pleasured squeal, feeling her eyes roll backward briefly behind her closed eyelids. To pay him back for that she secured a firmer grip around him, feeling him freeze in response.
Fighting back a mischievous smile into his lips, she stroked him up and down.
Twice.
Before she could even blink, the kiss had ended and Inuyasha was suddenly out of reach, and all Kagome could hear was the low growl rumbling from his throat as she caught herself on her elbows.
"Wha - "
He knelt there behind her curled-up legs, and before Kagome could say anything else he leaned down and trailed his hot tongue over the smooth, white skin of her knee, and then she couldn't say anything even if she'd wanted to -
I thought I'd never feel this again and neither did he, neither did he -
Both his hands braced on her kneecaps, and when he pulled her legs apart she didn't resist, just tried to control the speed of her heart and the erratic pattern of her gasping breaths.
He leaned down again, even lower this time, and Kagome felt the white-hot spark of sensation before she realized just what he was doing with his tongue.
"O-Ohhh," she cried, clapping both hands over her mouth to muffle the volume, feeling her spine twist this way and that involuntarily.
And then she heard it. That low, self-satisfied chuckle.
"I missed you so much, you know that?"
Kagome opened misty eyes to find him, poised above her warm center, smirking at her.
It was like nothing had ever gone wrong, ever.
It was like nothing had changed.
Nothing except a few of his physical features, anyway.
She felt his mouth close over her again, felt his tongue explore and tease and stroke, and she fell back into the moment as if pushed, giving a moan of utter abandonment. It kept her from weeping like a relieved child again, and for that, she supposed, she could be dimly grateful.
The heat of his tongue was all over her, all over her, and all her motions became distant and unintentional, as if she herself were watching it unfold from a place near the room's ceiling and that was the extent to which she could control herself.
She felt herself arch her pelvis upward, closer to him, letting him reach even deeper inside her.
She felt herself fumble with her two hands until they tangled tightly in his hair, felt herself stroke the softness of his pointed white ears again, and when he gave a shuddering grunt and drank her in with even more hungry fervor she felt herself make a sound to match.
Gods, am I this close am I already this close we just started and already I'm going to -
"I-Inuyasha," she whispered. He had already shown how much he liked that name, his real name, spoken from her mouth, and she intended it this time as a gift to spur him on and encourage him.
And so it was. Suddenly the delicious patterns traced by his lips and tongue were no longer slow and delicate and teasing; they were fervent and eager and desperate.
And Kagome realized that saying that name, that name that name that name, had just as much of an erotic effect on her as it did him, because her physical sensitivity, her awareness of every motion he was undertaking, rose to near-pinpoint accuracy.
"Inuyasha," she said again, to test the theory, and then all she could do was gasp and thrash her legs about with no rhyme or reason as he gave a muffled grunt of acknowledgment that sent a hot puff of air over her core.
"I know." His lips formed the words against her and sent her reeling even further. "You're so - "
He cut off there and his tongue pressed down firmly and slid from bottom to top, then top to bottom, and she knew what he was trying to say anyway.
So close. Gods, so close. Let yourself go, love, I've got you.
As the white-hot pressure deep in her core increased, she desperately tried to tighten her hands' grip in the hair on the crown of his head, but her fingers felt almost numb at this point, and the numbness was spreading downward toward her elbows with no sign of easing up.
"I - I'm gonna - Inuyasha - "
His hands were suddenly gripping either side of her waist, holding her in place, and his lips, those lips she'd never expected to feel again, closed over her clitoris with a tantalizing, gentle slowness.
A single roll of his lips, a single sucking motion, and that was it.
Kagome gave out a cry that sounded more like a sob. Every muscle in her body went painfully taut all at once, and then they all seemed to flinch, and the wave of the orgasm rolled over her like a crack of thunder.
"Kagome…"
With her eyes screwed shut and her face drawn in a silent scream, she couldn't see Inuyasha but she could still feel him; his face was still fixed to her tightly and he seemed to be drinking in every twitch, every spasm, as if he'd been starving and she was his only sustenance.
It was the hardest she'd ever come in her life, and he'd gotten her there in less than a minute.
Had it been because of their long separation, the one they'd both assumed would be permanent? Had it been the still-lingering danger of not only their current situation, but also of their uncertain future? Had it been that this was, for certain, the first time she'd been able to make love to him in his true form without deception or pretense?
Or was it something even simpler - that Kagome, always the rebel, was getting off on the idea of tasting that forbidden youkai fruit now that she'd allowed herself to?
Probably a bit of all of those, Kagome thought, as her violent breaths slowly quieted.
"Thank you for that," he said with a mischievous, loving smile, as he laid his head sideways and pressed his warm cheek to her inner thigh.
You're thanking me? I should be thanking you if anything!
She grinned back at him and reached down to stroke those soft white ears once again, relished his low, pleasured growl at her touch...
"Come here," she whispered, and he paused only to plant a small peck to the junction of her hip before he eagerly followed orders. The cloth of his hakama tickled at her center as he slid himself up over her naked body, and she lightly moaned again just as he was bracing himself over her once more, with one hand on either side of her head.
And then he was kissing her again, and she knew what that initial faint and unfamiliar taste was before it quickly faded; it was her, she was tasting herself on his mouth and it was - it was -
Breaking the kiss with a cheeky smile of her own, she reached up and took one of his hands in her own, guiding it back downward to her core and placing the padded tips of his first two fingers there.
His golden eyes blinked once in surprise, and he matched her smirk.
"Already, huh?"
Kagome nodded, and her elated giggle was cut off and replaced with an excited whimper as those two fingers of his stroked once into the hot wetness of her, and then withdrew again.
"I guess we do have to make up for lost time, right?" He chuckled under his breath, leaning down to nip once at her ear with his pointed teeth before kissing her again.
She threw both arms around his neck and pulled him down even closer, running her tongue over his and relishing the sensation of that long white hair cascading around her arms and shoulders.
"Please don't make me beg you," she panted into the curve of his jawline as he fell flush over her and she could only desperately fumble her hands over the spanse of his bare shoulders, the sweat-sheened hardness of his back, down further and further toward the lining of his hakama…
"Never," he whispered, and the sweetness and simplicity of it was enough to make her want to cry like a wanton child again, but such a poetic and overwhelming moment was short-lived, because he was now bracing his weight on one arm and reaching down toward his pants with the other.
"Let me," she said quickly, trying to wriggle her hands around to reach the ties of the hakama that was such a barrier. He gave a minute shrug of those muscled shoulders and his free hand returned to the side of her head, and his mouth was upon hers again as she cursed her still-numb hands and fumblingly untied the knot.
To make it easier for her, Inuyasha leaned back upright, and she sat up to follow him, sliding the cloth over his hips.
There was such a confident, lascivious look on his face as she did it, and it was maddening to Kagome.
So to get him back, she didn't even pause for a moment when his hakama was off and his erection was revealed; she sprang forward before he could even react. Around the base of his length she wrapped one hand, and around the tip she wrapped her lips, moistening him with her tongue and then sliding him into her mouth with no time to spare.
"Kagome!" His stunned cry sounded almost strangled, and she felt the palms of his hands close over both her naked shoulders with a gentle smack. She smiled to herself with satisfaction, and tasted him just as he'd tasted her.
As she ran her tongue up and down his length, applying pressure with the insides of her mouth, he gave a guttural, feral groan and his hands gripped her even tighter, as if he were trying to push her away but his body wouldn't allow him to.
"Y-You can't - " he protested weakly, his breaths rattling in his throat like a strange sort of purring, "Not when you're that wet and ready...ready for me...can't waste the moment - ah!"
As she encircled the head of his stiff length with a warm, wet kiss, Kagome let herself stare up at him, right into his eyes, and his complete helplessness under her power was so evident and so intoxicating that she herself had to let out an aroused moan.
That one little glance up, that one little sound…
...And his demeanor changed entirely.
Within a fraction of a second, the lost, powerless look was wiped from his handsome features. A darkness overtook those golden eyes. His mouth snapped shut, and his jaw set itself slightly forward.
Kagome knew she'd lost this teasing battle of wills even before Inuyasha took action.
And so, when he lunged for her, gripped her under the shoulders and pulled her up onto his lap like she weighed little more than a feather, parted her center with his fingers to allow his hard cock to slip inside with unfettered ease, buried himself all the way into her with a growl…
Well, she realized she had no reason to complain about losing.
With a keening wail, she arched into him, brushing her bare breasts against the heat of his muscular chest, thinking all the while that she could die right here and now with him inside of her like this and she'd leave the world with no regrets.
"Ohhh," she moaned, unable to do much more than shiver at the flood of delicious sensation.
"Y-You're so…" He attacked her neck with his mouth, licking and nipping and sucking. She could feel his whole body trembling just as hers was. "You're so...fucking perfect."
"I-I'm not," she replied, trying to raise and lower herself upon him, but realizing quickly that she couldn't handle that just yet, not yet, not yet, "I'm so stupid, because up until - up until - I was ready to never do this again with you, and if that's not stupid I don't know wh-what is - ohhh…"
Inuyasha had responded to her stuttered denials by gripping her around the buttocks and grinding himself up into her roughly. "Can you feel that?" he growled in a whispered tone.
Kagome, tears of ecstacy springing into her eyes, nodded, her mouth agape.
He did it again, the splay of his fingers across her skin like a direct conduit of heat that she could track perfectly with her mind's eye, and she nearly lost all the strength in her spine and fell over. "Tell me you feel it," he said, and that demanding edge was back in his voice and turning her to jelly.
"I feel it," she breathed, using the last of her strength to drape her arms over his shoulders to try and hold herself upright, placing her lips inches from his.
Inuyasha's eyes of spun gold seemed to be glowing from within as he kissed her softly, and when he leaned back again she could see that in the corners sat tears of his very own.
He smiled. "We fit together perfectly."
So many layered meanings in that one statement.
Will we ever get through making love again without shedding tears of joy? Kagome couldn't say for sure, but right now it seemed impossible.
"Yes," she cried, leaning forward to tenderly press her forehead to his and closing her eyes with a soft smile, "Yes, we do."
They shared yet another loving kiss, a kiss punctuated by mutual groans of pleasure as Inuyasha gently lifted her up by her rear end and lowered her again, then again, and again…
Kagome had to break the kiss to take a gulping breath of air, and she tried her best to keep her grip around Inuyasha's neck as he took the brunt of the hard work for both of them.
"Are you alright?" he panted into her ear.
"Y-Yes," she moaned, "Gods, yes, I'm alright - you?"
"I-I don't know how to put it into words," he whispered, his breath warm against her damp skin, "Not without sounding like - "
"Same here," she said with a nod, "Ohhh, Inuyasha, this is - "
"Again, Kagome," he grunted, his rhythm growing even faster, "Please. Say my name again."
"Inuyasha."
With barely a pause, he eased them downward so that she was face-up on the mattress, surrounded by their discarded clothing, and he was perched over her, still thrusting into her with a wondrous and delicious ease.
Kagome took his face in both her hands and arched up to kiss him again. "Inuyasha," she murmured again, "I'm so sorry I ever - "
"Shut up," he whispered sharply.
He ran his hands up from the curves of her hips, over her toned abdomen, up to the swell of her breasts, and onward to stroke the sides of her face in a loving caress of his own. "You - you never have to tell me that, not ever. I don't want to hear it, Kagome."
All she could do was nod silently, turning her face to kiss his fingers, and the speed of his thrusts increased and she was starting to lose herself entirely to forget her own name even as their mutual cries grew louder and louder and the motions of their respective hands grew more fervent and intense…
"Inuyasha, I think I'm - oh, Inuyasha, I'm about to - again - "
In response he drove harder and harder into her, and she felt herself contract around him as a shriek emanated from her mouth and she jerked up towards him once, twice, three times, even more than that -
"Kagome." His final word wasn't a cry of abandon like hers; it was just her name, barely above a whisper, as if he was still trying so hard to maintain control where she had lost hers long ago. And then he gave a final thrust with a shuddering moan, screwing his eyes shut and gritting his teeth, and she knew that he'd reached his own peak, just the same.
Shakily, he lowered himself down on top of her, and Kagome found herself remembering a long-destroyed room in a long-destroyed hostel in a long-destroyed mountain village. Their first night together had ended in the exact same way - with his body laying heavily atop hers, both of them struggling for breath and gently linking hands as they savored the moment.
Until Inuyasha gave a brief sniff of the air and raised himself up a few inches, his eyes trailing over the skin of her nude body. Before she could ask what was wrong, his dark brows furrowed and he sat up with a start, retreating from her in a rush of cold air.
"What's wrong? Come back, you're warm and I'm cold." She sent him a curious but reassuring smile.
He was staring at his hands, now removed from her skin, and looking utterly horrified at himself. "I - Kagome, I - I didn't mean to - it was an accident, I wasn't thinking - "
Kagome raised an eyebrow and looked down at herself questioningly.
Oh.
There were a few red scratches trailing up the sides of her stomach, each of them dotted them with beads of dark red. Kagome absently touched one with the pad of her pointer finger, and the blood smeared beneath it.
Inuyasha, meanwhile, was trying to slide away from her on the bed, his whole face curled in shame and anguish. "I can't believe I forgot," he ranted to himself darkly, staring down at his claws with clear disgust, "I forgot about these and I actually hurt you because I'm a fucking idiot - "
"Shut up." Now it was her turn to say it.
He paused mid-muttering and stared at her helplessly.
"It didn't hurt," Kagome said sternly. "It didn't hurt, Inuyasha. I didn't even notice. And it was an accident; you said it yourself."
"But - "
"Shut. Up." She held up her hand, the one with the small pinpricks of blood on the fingers, and closed her eyes. The air grew haltingly still and silent once more, and her hand glowed with warm energy, and with a single swiping motion across her torso she made the scratches disappear. "See? It's fine."
When she opened her eyes to look at him again, Inuyasha looked utterly bewildered, and it was like he'd never even seen her use the powers before.
"What?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Your powers," he murmured.
"Don't look so worried," she said with a minute shrug, flicking away the leftover blood droplets with the back of her hand, "I'm not worried about any side effects from a few scratches, Inuyasha."
"No, it's not that," he said. "The light - the pink light - "
Kagome frowned.
"It was...brighter. Almost blinding."
"What?" Now she regretted having closed her eyes. "Are you sure?"
"Here, look." Before she could say one word to stop him, Inuyasha took a single pointed claw and dug it in an arch along his forearm, drawing blood without even wincing. "Heal it." He held out his wrist urgently.
She did, and he was right.
The pink of her healing powers had always been muted, with almost an undertone of gray. But now?
So pink, so bright...it almost hurts my eyes to look at it.
They sat there, silent and naked in his bed, staring at each other with confused eyes and wary expressions.
Something, just now, had changed.
But was it for better...or worse?
"You speak of the wolf youkai attacking Taijiya," Midoriko said softly, sitting there across from Sango with her hands folded neatly. "I'm sure that was a terrible thing for you to witness."
At this, Sango would normally have responded with biting sarcasm, bitterly lashing out at such a downplayed statement about the single most traumatic moment in her life.
But in her humbled state, Sango could only give a brief nod in agreement, feeling the tears budding in her eyes.
Midoriko's voice had become gentle again. "I will not defend their brutality," she said, "just as I will not defend the humans when they do the very same thing. But I will tell you that all is not as it seems to an outside witness like yourself."
What does that even mean? Sango swallowed; her throat was tight and dry.
"I'm sure you already know how deep and bitter the enmity runs between your people and those of the wolf tribes."
"They've been a threat to our village from the start," Sango whispered, again feeling that spark of righteous anger. "They were always front-and-center at every battle in the great youkai wars, and always the biggest threat to our warriors."
"The mutual hatred runs deep, and has done so from the first," Midoriko agreed, still speaking very softly. "But let me ask you something.
"If a human village were sending secretive garrisons of assassins to wipe out entire tribes of your people, there while you slept; if they showed no mercy or hesitation at beheading parents in front of children, children in front of parents, if they did all this without being directly provoked...would you find some small justice in doing the same years later?"
"What are you talking about?" Sango blurted, shaking her head. "Are you saying my village - "
"The wolf tribes have always dwelled in caves. Entire clans, all existing together as a family unit. Until about four decades ago, most of those clans lived just miles from where Taijiya stood."
"Until - "
"Until a young man named Suzuki became village leader, yes."
My father. Oh gods, my father. She felt the chill course through her veins, but Sango remained silent. Scared to speak, scared to ask, scared to know…
Midoriko sat motionless, aiming that dignified look of sympathy straight into Sango's eyes. "You flinched back when I said his name," she said softly. "That tells me all I need to know. Your father, was he?"
Sango gave a brief wordless nod, averting her gaze from the miko's.
Midoriko sighed. "I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this," she said, "I fear you won't want to hear it and that all my efforts will be for naught after all. But will you give me the courtesy of listening for just a bit longer, and then you are free to make your own decision? I will do my best to speak delicately."
Another nod, even though all Sango wanted was to drive her fingers into her ears and try to run again, to get away from here because I don't want to hear this I don't want to hear it -
"Suzuki was...well, the shogun's followers would praise him as a true believer."
I don't want to know I don't want to know I don't want to know -
"The youkai wars raged long and hard for years, getting nowhere, until Suzuki took power, broke Taijiya's famed isolationist tradition, and sent his best warriors into the fray on the shogun's behalf. No one knows for sure what made him do so; Taijiya's anti-youkai stance was of course under no question, even then, but to that point your village had always stayed out of any direct conflict and kept to themselves and their own territory.
"The Taijiya warriors brought something new to the fight - ancient weapons, forged from youkai bone and essence, enchanted with long-lost dark magic so that they could kill with a single touch." There was a sageness in Midoriko's tone there, as if she was well aware that Sango already knew this part. "The Inu no Taisho, ruler and king of all youkai-kind, knew what a threat this weaponry posed, and so he and his armies retreated back, back into the territory they still occupy today, far from any human settlements.
"And that might have been the state of things until this very day, if not for Suzuki."
No no no I don't want to hear this please -
A warm, smooth hand closed over Sango's own, and she looked up to see Midoriko staring her openly in the face, her perfectly arched brows furrowed with kind concern.
"I cannot speak delicately or with kindness about your father's actions, dear girl, but I can objectively understand his point of view. A true believer for the shogun's cause would see youkai as mindless creatures and reject any attempts to treat them with any more dignity and care than, say, a farmer would for a fox in his chicken coop. He would not be content with mere stagnation of hostilities; he would want to exterminate the entire den.
"And so, just as it seemed the lifetimes upon lifetimes of endless war would finally know peace, Suzuki reclaimed his warriors from the frontlines, cut ties with the shogunate, and took on a personal mission of his own. Taijiya would become isolationist once more, and would never again aid another man's wars, but only once Suzuki established that the whole of Taijiya territory was free of all youkai, once and for all."
"And that's where the wolves came in," Sango whispered, her mouth as dry as desert sand.
Midoriko gave her hand a gentle squeeze, as if to try and reassure her.
As if I could possibly be reassured right now.
"The wolves were always outliers of the main youkai forces, just as the Taijiya warriors were for the shogun's. From the time before we knew to record time itself, the wolf clans valued their independence and sustained themselves, while also showing up whenever their king called them forth to battle. And so when the Inu no Taisho ordered the retreat, the wolf clans remained in their ancestral homes, thinking the truce would hold and that their families would be safe. They were wrong on both counts."
Sango closed her eyes under lashes damp with unshed tears.
How many times have I heard these stories, she thought, heard these 'tales of Taijiya heroism' and lapped them up like a cat with a dish of milk? Always, they took place in dark foreboding caves, and always, always, they ended with triumph after bloody struggles against all odds.
But they never mentioned that the caves housed families...children.
They never mentioned that the hostilities were unprovoked and defying all the rules of warlike engagement.
They only described gnashing teeth and deadly claws. Feral monsters with no desire but the kill.
Scary bedtime stories for budding child warriors. Stories to strengthen their resolve against an unseen enemy. Stories to make them work that much harder in the next day's training, to make them that much more determined to keep the youkai threat, a threat none of the children had ever seen face-to-face, away from their lonely village.
"Sango, my child," her father said with a fond smile on his face. "You're nearly a full-grown woman now, and you have made your old father proud in so many immeasurable ways. You are the most capable of your entire generation, the strongest warrior, the smartest strategist."
Sango, barely fourteen and still growing into her front teeth at that point, blushed and could think of nothing to say in the wake of such unusual praise from a man she knew to be so stern and cold most of the time.
"One day, when I am gone, you will be the one to lead Taijiya, to protect our village against intrusion not only from the beasts who would slaughter us, but also from the soft-bellied humans who would see us under shogunate rule and exploit our people for their own gain."
She felt a bit overwhelmed with the idea, but forced any uncertainty off her face as she nodded her acknowledgment; her father would have immediately seen the doubt in her expression and derided it - to her face - as youthful weakness, and all the confidence he was showing in her at this moment was so rarely given that she clung desperately to the promise of more.
"There are only four of our sacred weapons left intact," Suzuki continued, "And until the time they are called for again, which I fear may be soon, it is our family's sacred duty - well, one of many sacred duties - to keep them safe and hidden from the outside world. There are some who would take the news of these four weapons' continued survival as an excuse to try to seize their power for nefarious means, or worse yet, to destroy them in some sort of amoral crusade."
Suzuki held out his open palm and dropped a tiny stonelike object into Sango's hand. "This was my own weapon," he said, as Sango delicately cradled it in her fingers and tried not to squeal with eager excitement when she realized what she was holding. "I bound my blood to it when I wasn't much older than you are now, and it served me well in glorious battle. Of all the weapons we still have, it is this one that has killed the greatest number of monsters.
But now, I am growing old, and my spine is less apt to twist and turn as it once was, and so I will take the katana instead, now that your uncle Yano has no more use for it, gods rest his soul."
"Gods rest his soul," Sango replied automatically, trying with her young mind to pay attention as best she could and not get ahead of herself.
The boomerang. Her father was giving her the boomerang. It had always been her favorite. An aggressive weapon, capable of distraction as well as precise lethality.
And now it was hers.
She knew what came next, and so when her father held out his other hand to her, a hand that held a simple handmade dagger, Sango knew exactly what to do.
Careful not to flinch under her father's watching eye, she used the dagger's point to slice a deep gash into her right palm - the hand that would wield this weapon - and coated the tiny ornament entirely with a coat of her fresh, warm blood.
"Now from your heart."
This was the part of the ritual that had always frightened her to hear about; her father had never been very generous with details anyway, but about this he had never elaborated further than "blood from the heart."
Hesitantly, casting a quick glance at Suzuki to ascertain whether or not she was doing it correctly, Sango took the dagger point in her unbloodied hand and hovered it over where her heart pounded beneath her small, budding breast.
Determined to keep her courage, at least outwardly, she let out a sharp exhale and gave herself a shallow poke, and when she withdrew the knife, a small stream of red trickled forth, splattering the front of her simple linen kimono.
Did I do it right, she wondered frantically, taken aback at the amount of blood pooling at the folds of her obi, did I stab too shallowly? Or too deeply? What if I did it wrong and I nicked the wrong spot and I'm going to die from blood loss here and now, and my father will just have to settle for the disappointment that his only child and heir was unfit to be a warrior after all?
To distract herself, she raised her wounded hand and held the tiny weapon under the stream of her heart's blood, covering with a second coat of bright, brilliant crimson.
"Good. Now close your eyes, Sango."
She did, clenching the miniaturized boomerang tightly in her dripping fist.
"Now picture it. The triumph of battle. The swiftness and accuracy of the kill. Picture the fear in every beast's eye when it encounters you on the field of glory. Picture yourself extinguishing the light in each of those eyes as easily as you take a breath."
She pictured it. And it was sublime.
Within her closed hand, the tiny bone boomerang began to expand in size, until it was too large for her hand, too large for her entire arm by itself, too large almost for the tent in which they stood.
At the end of it all, the boomerang was draped precariously over her shoulder, towering over her adolescent height, smeared with blood just as she herself now was.
"By the time those wounds heal," her father said, offering her bandages to press against both her stinging, self-inflicted cuts, "That weapon will be an extension of your own arm. Make me proud."
And that day, she'd been so determined to. She'd sworn that as long as she drew breath, she would never allow a youkai to do the same in her presence. Her family legacy demanded it. Her role as a Taijiya slayer demanded it.
But…
But...
Kaede had placed a small seed of doubt in Sango's mind with her tale of being exiled and stricken from the records, stricken from mere mention. There was enough anecdotal familiarity in the old woman's tale to give her pause, however brief, and however easily dismissed from her stubborn mind.
And now, this woman Midoriko, who knew Sango's father's name without even asking, and who related the same tales of glorious victory that Sango had been raised on so eagerly but from the opposite, darker perspective, was enlarging that seed of doubt as if it were a sacred bone boomerang treated with blood of both hand and heart.
Midoriko squeezed her hand once more; she seemed to have noticed the slump in Sango's posture and acted accordingly. "I have more to tell you, but trust me when I say the hardest part is over, sweet girl. You will need time to adjust and to think, but indulge me just a few moments longer, and then you are free to make your decision. Whatever you choose, I will relate to Kaede and Nazuna, and we will not think any less of you if your choice is to set out on your own once more."
It seemed that once again, all Sango could do was nod like an idiot, as tears streaked down her windblown cheeks.
"When the Inu no Taisho discovered what Taijiya had done, he of course sent troops to fight back, to match blood for blood and wipe out the aggressors just as had been done to his subjects. For what did peaceful retreat achieve for youkai-kind except this? Slaughter of non-combatants in their sleep as their families watched?
"The war resumed as if truce had never been on the table, and it was even fiercer and more violent than before, on both sides. Taijiya remained mostly unscathed in their isolation, but thousands of lives were lost elsewhere.
"And then, nearly two decades ago, the Inu no Taisho announced the cessation of warmaking on the part of all youkai, returning to his original aim of peaceful retreat far from human reach. And it happened, but not before the Inu no Taisho himself was murdered. His only son, Sesshomaru, took over as ruler. Sesshomaru is a strange one, I must say; he refuses to be crowned king while he lives in what he calls 'the ruins of his father's kingdom,' or so it's been related to me secondhand. But at the same time he never once moved against the humans, never once took offensive action, up until just a short while ago. And even then, he only gave orders against the shogunate army itself, and never once against civilians."
"But - "
"The youkai attacks you have witnessed - yes, even the one on your own village - are not the work of the true youkai leadership, but a pretender to the throne. The youkai that we ally ourselves with - we miko - are the ones who have done their best to keep the peace. That would be Prince Sesshomaru and those loyal to him."
Sango suddenly remembered a name that Kaede had spoken briefly. "Who is Naraku?"
The calm demeanor on Midoriko's face slipped for just an instant, just a split second, and if Sango hadn't been staring the older woman right in the face or been nearly as perceptive, she would have missed it.
"A sickness," the miko said, matter-of-factly. "A plague upon both youkai and humankind. There's no doubt in my mind that he's the one to blame for Taijiya, for Ryusei, for the half-dozen or so other human villages. Anywhere that you see catastrophe and anguish, take it to heart that he had a hand in it. It's all that he wants, all that he craves."
This was the most unsettled Midoriko had ever been, or at least the most unsettled that Sango had ever witnessed. Once again Sango wanted to ask more questions, and once again she held back.
"So you see," Midoriko went on, and suddenly she was as dignified and serene as she'd ever acted, "your war is not with youkai as a whole. The humans and Prince Sesshomaru share a common enemy, and it is our role as mikos, as representatives of the space between the species, to try to show you that. Until you eliminate him, the one who sows the seeds of chaos and genocide, there will be no peace until all in this world are dead. Or worse."
Or worse? What does that mean? But once again, Sango was hesitant to ask the question, and when she finally summoned the courage to do so in the silence that followed Midoriko's final words, they were interrupted quite suddenly.
"Milady! Milady!" It was Nazuna, running at a full clip as she was wont to do more than most. "Please, if you can, come quickly!"
"Which one?" Midoriko rose so quickly from her seat that Sango shrank back in surprise.
"Th-The girl, the female," Nazuna said, "Kaede says it's time, but we have to keep her calm and my powers only go so far before I get - "
"It's alright, little dove," Midoriko said reassuringly to the frantic girl, then turned to Sango. "Come with me, girl of Taijiya. I know I told you much, too much to believe right away, but if this means what I think it does, then there will soon be someone else awake to back up our story."
Sango realized she was following along only once they reached the mouth of the cave, and, deciding it was too late to go back now, she proceeded into the darkness behind the other two women.
So tired...I'm so tired…
Gotta keep going.
Gotta keep going for the kid's sake.
It's cold.
I'm hungry.
Gotta keep going.
Kid's asleep. Good for him.
Sleep sounds great right now.
Can't sleep.
Can't sleep.
Gotta keep going.
My legs are numb. Damn snow.
At least I tried, right?
Gotta keep going.
Gotta keep going.
Can't keep going.
Can't.
Gotta sleep.
Find a shelter.
No shelter. Gotta sleep.
Kid, stop crying and go to sleep. It'll be fine. I'll be with you in a second, I promise.
I promise.
There was no way to find the answers they sought, not from their isolation here in this palace room where they were virtually imprisoned for their own safety, and they both knew that.
So they tried to push the questions from their mind and let themselves find solace in each other's post-lovemaking embrace.
They lay there beneath a thin blanket, and they were wrapped together so tightly that it was as if they both feared that it had all been a dream after all, and that giving way to sleep or distance from each other would bring the cold rush of reality over them again.
To distract them both, Inuyasha tried to make small talk, but there was still so much to be said to her that said small talk quickly devolved into more deep, heartfelt confessions.
"When I left you - that night," he whispered, pressing a chaste kiss to the top of Kagome's head where it was nestled in the crook of his arm, "I told myself that was it, that was the end of you and me. And when I started to hear your voice in my head, when I couldn't spend a waking moment without seeing your face...I knew, I knew that it was my punishment. Because I loved you so much, and because that love ended up nearly destroying you. Destroying both of us."
Kagome said nothing for a moment, and Inuyasha wondered for a moment if he'd gone too far with the callbacks to the world outside that hated them both, hated their union most of all.
But then she raised her arms to loop them around his neck, pulling herself even tighter against the hard muscles of his chest. "I thought you were my punishment," she said, scared to speak above a whisper for fear of dissolving back into tears, "I heard your voice, saw your face, and when the shogun told me I was cursed...I thought for sure that was why.
"But then when I tried to end the curse," she went on, and there was no stopping the tears now as she buried her face in his shoulder, "When I drove that knife into your back and watched you fall...at that point I knew. I lied to myself even then, but I knew."
"Knew what?" He was nervous about the answer. Nervous, but hopeful, and trying not to show too much of both sides.
Kagome swallowed and raised herself up slightly in his arms so that they were face-to-face.
"I knew," she murmured thickly, "that there's no peace for me...without you."
All he could do was pull her even closer and kiss her again. There were no words that would make an adequate response, especially not coming from him. I never was much of a poet, after all.
Before they could even taste their fill of each other again, however, Inuyasha's bedroom door burst open with a loud crack.
Both Inuyasha and Kagome scrambled into defensive stances, their mutual nudity a secondary concern if it was Yura coming back for revenge.
But it wasn't Yura standing there.
Kagome immediately gave a small squeak of embarrassment and dove for the blanket to cover them both as best as possible.
"Sesshomaru," Inuyasha said, furrowing his brow in confusion and backing down.
The elder youkai prince was actually disheveled for once, his stately robes in disarray and his hair wild and somewhat tangled where it fell over the front of his shoulders.
As amusing as it was, it wasn't nearly as relevant - or, in fact, disconcerting - to Inuyasha as the expression on his older brother's face.
For someone so markedly stoic, so cold and deadpan, it was possibly the most openly disturbed Sesshomaru had ever looked. He looked almost traumatized, but that was a silly notion, wasn't it?
"What's wrong?" Inuyasha demanded.
"He's dead," Sesshomaru said, slamming the door shut behind him and starting to pace the room, "Kouga is dead."
UH OHHHHH
UH OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I wonder what happened to Sesshomaru I hope we find out next chapter WINK WINK
InuKag like LET'S GET IT ONNNNNNNNNNNNNNN (this started out way shorter so give a big thanks to fantastiqueparfait for making me not chicken out and actually, you know, GO THERE)
Sango like wow what think what do idk (idk either Sango sorry for doing this to you but here's hoping u get through it, big ups)
Miroku just deciding to die in the snow like that what a JERK amirite
Let me know what y'all think, and thanks for your patience! I had a birthday this month and so did my momma so it was a busy time hahaha. Drop me a review if you can; I love hearing the theories and the thoughts! LOVE Y'ALLLLLLLL - meggz0rz
