Chapter Five
She swayed somewhere pleasant- as though submerged beneath a lake where sunbeams could find her and the water flowed, caressing her skin, breathable. It felt so good to kiss him. Lose herself in fantasy.
This heady spell of temptation was broken the second his tongue thrust between parted lips, a rich, flavourful beverage flowing inside her mouth. Startled blue eyes snapped open. Kagome jolted, giving a muffled noise.
What?
She tried jerking her head back, but claws tangled in dark hair- his palm clutching the back of her neck, nails biting.
She gasped at the sharp pinpricks of pain, accidentally swallowing. Sesshoumaru's tongue stroked against her own for a moment, briefly exploring her mouth before pulling away.
Horror flooded her chest, cold and heavy. Kagome coughed, immediately thrusting two fingers into her mouth, trying to gag up the drink.
Sesshoumaru yanked her hand back, "enough. Such rules about food and drink only apply if I have offered something, and you accepted. Nothing will happen if your consent is not freely given."
Kagome massaged her neck, calming down a little. Fae couldn't lie. She knew that rule, too.
"I guess that makes sense," she sneered, flashing blunt teeth. "Still a jerk move though!"
Her lips burned. She stilled as the Fae King gave a cruel smile, taking another drink and leaning in close once more. It took a second to remember the context of what was happening. She should not enjoy his mouth on hers. Kagome quickly pressed a hand against his chest to halt his advance.
"I can sense your fatigue. Foolish woman…" he sighed. "Nothing will be gained if you collapse from exhaustion. Eat. Drink."
"I don't want any pomegranate seeds," she muttered, recovering from her shock slowly.
"Pomegran… ah, I see," he chuckled quietly. "You certainly enjoy your Greek myths. That underworld rule is quite similar to ours. Your Grandfather warned you about our laws quite intensely."
"It wasn't just Fae stuff, believe me. He ranted on about Japanese spirits, Norse Mythology, Ancient Egypt, urban legends, anything and everything to do with ancient Gods, spirits, artefacts, myths, you name it. I thought I'd forgotten most of it," she smiled fondly, soon catching herself.
A thumb smoothed over her mouth.
"Do not be afraid to smile before your fiancé, dear one."
Sesshoumaru took another long swig of his drink. He then swooped in- slanting his mouth perfectly over hers.
Pressing both hands against his chest as Sesshoumaru forced her to drink once more, Kagome accidentally let slip an embarrassing noise. The drink coated her tongue like melted chocolate, running down her throat with a pleasant, warming sensation. Her body sighed, feeling like liquid gold in his hands.
Wicked lips caressed hers with a few indulgent kisses and nibbles on her bottom lip, a chuckle answering her telling sounds. Kagome growled, pushing against him with her body. Breathing him in made her head spin for an entirely different reason. When had her lips parted to grant permission? She wasn't sure. She barely recognised herself as her body responded, grinding herself against him to try and alleviate the arousal twisting tight in her lower abdomen.
A large hand cupped her breast- and Kagome gasped, feeling it keenly as the fabric of her dress was a pitiful barrier. Sesshoumaru swallowed her breathy noises, responding with a low purr. He cupped and massaged the generous mound, claws pricking the gossamer lace-
"My King, I have the food you requested!"
Kagome blinked as Sesshoumaru pulled away. His face looked as black as thunder, jaw tight. A little green imp stood near the throne, a plate of raw meat raised above his small head.
"Hn," the Fae glanced away. "Leave it by my chair. Perhaps a little sparrow will eat it."
Kagome caught her breath, tugging his hand free from her chest and feeling strange. He was...helping her by bending the rules of his own kingdom by not explicitly offering it to her? Touching her thoroughly kissed lips, she frowned at the plate.
He could've let her starve.
Nonetheless, she had to speak up about the food. "Sparrows and humans alike don't really uh...eat pork raw. It would need to be cooked."
Sesshoumaru stared, turning a narrow gaze upon the imp. The air cooled with displeasure, making Kagome and other Fae shiver. "Jaken," he said calmly. "You claimed humans ate this food."
"W-well, they do!" Jaken insisted. "I didn't know this reincarnation would be so fussy!"
The Fae twitched. "I will plunge your miserable little body into the lake and bid the waters to freeze over your head after the festivities are over," he uttered lowly, gaze straying to Kagome, who struggled to formulate words.
"Reincarnation?"
Sesshoumaru sighed, making a dismissive gesture with his hand. Jaken quickly hurried away, sweating buckets. Kagome turned to the Fae King, eyes wide. "Is that why you want me? I remind you of someone else?"
"Oh please," Sesshoumaru drawled flatly. "It is nothing so romantic."
"Then what? Why DO you want me?"
Bristling at his silence as he took another languid sip of his drink, Kagome struggled free from his lap, standing with clenched fists. "You know, your 'no questions' rule really sucks. Questions can build intimacy. They imply someone is interested in what another person has to say!"
Flinty golden eyes slid back to her, displeased she'd moved. "This one never said you could not ask questions. I merely prefer not to answer incredibly obvious ones."
Kagome crossed her arms. She wouldn't budge from this one. It felt like too big a detail to ignore.
Sesshoumaru's thin lips pulled down, a sigh hissing free from his teeth. "Fine," gesturing to his lap expectantly, he commanded; "Sit down again."
Taking a seat on the throne beside him instead, she looked at him flatly. The Fae gave a cold smirk and surprised her by calling Jaken back over, saying to 'fetch the children.'
Kagome immediately sat up straighter, eyeing him with genuine interest as the toad-like creature waddled away. "You have children?"
"They are mine in the sense that all things in these woods are mine, but I did not sire them," Sesshoumaru took out a kiseru pipe, lighting it and taking a drag. It made her feel a hint home-sick to see something from her country balanced easily in his fingers.
More questions cramped her windpipe with the desire to fall free from her tongue, but before she could ask, the nightmarish creatures around the bonfire stepped back. They made way for strange children. Some walked on goat legs, others had tree bark or ivy growing over their cheeks or arms. The 10 of them were a mixture of human, animal and nature.
A brown-eyed little girl gave a gap-toothed grin, a necklace of flowers clutched around her throat. She had brown wings instead of arms, which fluttered and gestured as she spoke.
"Hello! Welcome! We hope you'll be our new Queen!"
A taller, lanky boy with freckles and hair pulled back into a ponytail bowed to them. His left arm had been replaced with a weapon that appeared to be carved from bone.
"Are we here to act out a play for you?" he asked quietly.
"Indeed," Sesshoumaru exhaled a curling puff of smoke. "Tell her the bargain of Midoriko."
As the children arranged themselves, Kagome leaned across the space in between their thrones. "Why do they look like that?"
"Like what?"
She glanced away, trying to phrase it delicately. "...Like they're human children who have been altered."
Unreadable golden eyes watched her, unblinking as wafts of smoke melded into the air, curling around his antlers. "I many have sadistic inclinations, dear one, but you almost appear to be accusing this one of something very grave."
When she did not relent, he sighed, studying his pipe boredly. "It was necessary."
"For them to be accepted here?"
"To grant their wishes."
Kagome's heart shuddered and clenched, wishing he weren't so vague, especially about the subject matter. If he just opened his mouth and told her if she'd saved or stolen the children, it would make a difference. Before she could pry for more, the 'play' began.
A girl with milky white, blind eyes but tall bat ears gestured to the bonfire as the children made a circle around it. "Many centuries ago, one of your past lives made a deal with our glorious Fae King's Father. Her name was Midoriko~"
She threw leaves into the flames- which flickered and crackled. The fire changed colour, gaining blue and green lights as the face of a beautiful woman could be seen in their depths. Kagome gaped, feeling faint energy flow through the air, heightening her senses. Their quiet voices resounded in her mind, crystal clear.
"She wanted the power of a jewel that could contain evil. In exchange, the Fae bargained for her hand in marriage. She was spiritually powerful, you see. The Elder King saw her as a potential asset. That woman however, would not become their bride. When she used the malevolent jewel, her soul was taken inside it, along with the evil she sought to vanquish."
The girl with brown hair and bird wings gestured as the image changed within the bonfire, illustrating her words as more leaves were thrown in. "But the Fae were smart! Though she'd died before seeing through her end of the bargain, the Fae had cleverly twisted their words. They could now take her remaining daughter as their bride, because a promise remained unfulfilled!"
"Many years they waited- until Midoriko's daughter was of age! But upon learning of the bargain, Hinako refused! She took her own life to escape us."
Dancing flames dyed lavender, darkening to black. The creatures brayed, snarled and roared with outrage. Sesshoumaru looked on placidly.
Kagome met the solemn eyes of the freckled boy with a kusarigama for an arm. "And so the debt owed was to be paid by a reincarnation."
A child with huge orange eyes swallowing his face chimed in, the images changing to show a white-haired young man. Triangular dog ears sat upon his head.
"Our King sitting beside you declined against marrying Hinako's reincarnations but his brother, Lord Inuyasha, agreed to it. He even fell in love with one. But, unsurprisingly- for he was very foolish- Inuyasha fell so deep he did not want her to become a Fae."
Kagome found herself cutting in to blurt; "Because she'd lose what made her human?"
"My brother was half-fae," Sesshoumaru answered in a measured tone, kiseru perched in her corner of his mouth. "It is possible he feared what the change would do to her. Perhaps it would make her too prideful to stomach him."
Dark brows pulled together as the woman's imagination ran wild, wondering what would become of her if she met such a fate. Inuyasha could now be seen running with his beloved in the flames, their hands grasped tight.
One child sighed sadly. "He took her, and fled."
"They did not marry to fulfil the oath, instead evading us behind a village of iron. They eventually died behind those iron spikes," another smiled gleefully.
"The reincarnation wheel kept spinning! Eventually bringing us to you," the brown-haired girl bowed to Kagome. The rest of the children followed suit, the flames fluctuating, losing their vibrant colours and images. The monstrous audience clapped with boundless enthusiasm. Kagome remained frozen in place, speaking lowly under the loud noise. She knew he'd hear.
"So now it's your job to marry."
"Hn."
"I'm not the only reincarnation you've spoken to," she murmured, glancing over at his beautiful features bathed in the fire's orange glow as the noise died down. Thin threads decorating his antlers caught the light, gleaming like expensive silver jewels. "But you decided not to marry any of the ones who came before me."
"Indeed," Sesshoumaru closed his eyes, resting his chin against one hand. "Those who came before did not suit my tastes. Too controlled. Too eager. Too bland. If I must be forced into wedding a human, my condition was that I choose my bride."
His disposition changed the second golden eyes snapped open again. They burned with a rekindled glow, seeming to flicker like the fire before them. A wicked smile saturated his dark voice.
"And now I have chosen."
Kagome shook her head, tone rapidly escalating higher. "You can't be serious. W-we barely know each other!"
"We have plenty of time for that. And time does drag," he jadedly assured her. "You'll find that slowly unearthing secrets can help keep immortals engaged in one another. You intrigue me, vex me, and have the power of 'The Sight.' I find you worthy enough, for a human."
Taking a deep, steadying breath, Kagome turned her body to face him. She measured her words carefully, looking right into his eyes. "I'm not yours to have."
He did not even flinch, watching her placidly; Like he was playing a game and just biding time until the next move. "The markings on your abdomen say otherwise."
Shock froze the blood in her veins. It felt as though she'd misstepped on the stairs, foot and leg plunging into fraught, icy darkness. Kagome covered them with her hand. "W-what?" she choked out, eyes hardening. "I-I knew it. You did something to me, didn't you?"
What had he done? Was she just marked because he was possessive, or had he turned her part Fae? Or-
Absolute dread dropped low in her stomach, a heavy stone.
Kairi.
Was she already pregnant with him?
"The me who put them there is not my current self. Who can say?" Sesshoumaru drawled, reaching over and tangling his hand in her hair. A thumb brushed her ear as sweet, warm breath fanned over her lips. "I am inevitable, dear one. Accept it."
Kagome smacked his arm away and stood, heart thundering. A hand hovered over her abdomen protectively. "No. I'm not going to kill myself to escape you, and I won't hide behind some steel village like my other reincarnation- but I will be going home. I don't belong here- and you can't rob me of my free will," tears pricked her eyes. "I refuse to be used as a means of entertainment again."
Taking off like a shot, Kagome jumped off the platform and sprinted off towards the side- only to be caught. The fae women from before formed a circle, forcing her to be a part of it as they grasped her wrists, twirling around. Snarling, she struggled against their tight grip, forced to dance with them as they rejoined the others by the bonfire.
Pipe music started up again, the children having left. Kagome grit her teeth as panic rose in her chest. The wind changed, billowing smoke through their village square and filling her lungs. She coughed, stumbling, trying to keep her footing as music quickened. Her heart thundered, lungs on fire.
And then relief- relief as lips found hers. Kagome gasped, biting down before ripping her mouth away and striking simultaneously. Sesshoumaru's face turned from the force of the slap- expression going blank. The air changed, freezing. Every creature's gaze zeroed in on them.
Surpised golden eyes blinked. He reached up to dazedly touch his bleeding lip.
"I am not yours!" Kagome snarled, bolting away from the chaotic festivities.
Jaken gaped, hurrying up to Sesshoumaru's side. "Should we go after her, my King?"
A sinuous tongue slid out, touching gingerly to his lip. How long had it been since he'd last tasted his own immortal blood? He'd forgotten could even bleed, perhaps that was an indicator.
Fierce hawk-like eyes remained pinned on her retreating figure disappearing into the darkness. She'd wounded him without the use of iron.
Interest and arousal blazed to life, stealing his breath. Heat churned low in his gut.
"No," he said at length. "Let the little sparrow fly beyond the branches for a while. The woods will claim what's theirs soon enough," Sesshoumaru smiled, appreciating the chase. "Though I cannot guarantee she will like what she finds beyond the veil."