A/N: I just wanted to say that I apologize if there are any editing errors in here such as remnants of the second perspective. I first write these stories in the second view before eventually switching them over to the third. Which leaves errors. I apologize if it is distracting. Unfortunately my life at this point in time is too bogged down by drama llama life stuff to leave me very much time to edit once I post something up.
Raised
Chapter Sixteen
The first thing that Piper realized as she completely woke up was the fact that she had, actually, fallen asleep like planned. Although judging by the way that the sunlight lit up the room, Piper figured out that she hadn't been asleep for long. Just long enough for Kurama to invite company it seemed. The fact that she was so drowsy was an indication that she'd been sleeping rather well too in that short time. The second thing that the sleepy woman realized was the fact that there was something missing. The weight that had started to become a familiar thing was not there. Her hand went to blindly search around her neck then down her torso to see if the clasp had broken and it had slid down. When she realized that it wasn't there Piper started to search for it on the couch with her fingers.
Kurama noticed exactly what she was doing and some part of him felt a bit disappointed. He realized that Piper wasn't ready to move on from the past on her own. That was exactly why he was trying to help her through it. He also realized that she'd placed a great value on wearing the necklace without bringing it to the forefront of his attention. Which meant that it lead him to believe that in some way she was trying to hold on the necklace to remind herself not to move on. And while he was willing to extend a gratuitous amount of patience towards her reintroduction into the world he didn't want to make it any harder on himself by allowing Piper to cling to relics of the past.
"It hasn't been lost," Kurama said as he stood near the door.
His face just rose over the plants that sat atop the shelving units acting as a half wall by his front door. He could see every thought that ran across her mind.
"Where did you put it?" Piper asked.
"It is safe in the bedroom," Kurama told the medium as he moved away from the front door.
Piper hesitated as she looked to where the bedroom was. After figuring out that the relic had Kuronue's soul in it, or at least a fragment, she was timid about letting it stay alone. Especially in a world that she didn't know anymore. The only good thing about Kurama putting it away was that she did trust him. Despite everything that had gone on she still trusted him. Piper might not have liked his decisions, she might not have even have been able to respect them, but she trusted him. He'd stolen countless things over the millennia from people but anything he'd acquired from her had never really stayed out of her possession for long. She was satisfied in the knowledge that she would be able to get the pendant back soon enough.
"Come," the redhead said as he held out his hand to help her off the couch. "I have some people that I would like you to meet. I can assure you that you'll find their presence entertaining."
Although the brunette didn't actually need the assistance to stand up, Piper took his hand none the less out of habit. Her thoughts were more on his words. His recommendation of the people he wanted her to meet was high praise, of sorts, coming from him. If they were amusing enough to warrant an actual introduction that also spoke to the fact that on some level he enjoyed their presence enough for repeated exposures.
"Will I need to know you as Shuuichi Minamino or as Kurama?" Piper asked after she stood up.
"Both," he spoke with a resting yet mildly pleased expression. "It's a long story which I will tell you on the way, but they already have a general knowledge of my past life."
She nodded quietly as she went to get ready. Once more Piper's thoughts went to his words as she busied herself. He spoke of the time as Youko Kurama as his past life, a distinct separation of time. She knew that he'd made a grander show of civility and desire to move on from that life almost entirely. It just kept getting pounded in when she least expected it to happen. The life that she was used to, the one that Piper wasn't ready to move on from, was his past life, not the life in the past; it was a small difference really but it had large implications.
There was something interesting about seeing a large man fawn over a bunch of cats. In fact, she was hard pressed to hide the smile on her face at the scene. The orange haired man who went by the name of Kuwabara had picked an interesting place to meet up at. His friend, Yusuke, seemed less entertained by the choice that his friend has made. Piper wasn't quite sure over the place's appeal but it was amusing to watch the man fawn over the fluffballs that kept making such a ruckus. Still, she didn't want to be rude and point out the idiocracy that was played before her. It really wasn't for her to judge if this childish behavior was acceptable for men to have in society seeing as she still didn't quite understand the new version of the modern world.
Piper leaned down and held out her hand to the bunch of felines that Kuwabara was having a hard time attracting. The orange haired man looked at her with a friendly grin before going back to try to encourage the cats to come out for some type of dried, salty smelling kernels on his hand. From what she had gathered it's what people fed their cats now a days.
"Come on, don't you want some food?" he tried talking to them, seemingly distressed on their behalf.
Trying to help put Kurama's friend back at ease Piper released a bit of her aura. It was like an energy hook that drew that cats in slowly but surely. The man beside her sensed the change in her spirit energy as it mingled with what naturally made her a medium. Kuwabara's face was one part confused and another part astonished as the cats started walking to her open hand. They danced around it, rubbing their faces and bodies along her hand all the way down her exposed forearm and continued to ignore the food held in his. Idly she wondered how strong their scent marking would get from these simple, possessive acts of the co-dominate cats in the area.
Without commenting at the look on Kuwabara's face Piper reached into the clear bag of salty kernels that were meant for the animals. Before she'd even made it back towards her body she had the cats' interest. By the time she had it out they were all practically pushing and shoving, their raspy tongues licking up every grain that they could find.
"What's wrong with the good I have?"
Piper looked over to the very expressive male and smiled good naturedly even as she took note of how many cats had started to come out of the wood works. "Nothing is wrong with the food. You just seemed concerned that they weren't eating so I suppose you could argue that I'm cheating."
"What? How?"
He seemed very interested in what you meant so you decided to indulge him. "As a medium, I have a way with living creatures. It is something to do with life force and the way mine feels to them. If I released my aura as I have just done, I could walk into a swarm of angry bees and never fear being stung."
"That's neat. Why don't you have it that way all the time then?"
The brunette motioned around her to the street full of cats that had decided to pay homage and demand attention. "I do not have a say in what gets attracted to my life force. Imagine waking up covered in snakes or rats. Or to a few different animal spirits or demons demanding to know what you were."
There'd been a few times that some of the demons had taken it a little too far. It wasn't that they'd gotten violent per say, it was just that they'd gotten too friendly. Piper hadn't even gotten the time to try and deal with them herself before a green, thorny vine had been wrapped around their neck. Thankfully their death hadn't been dragged out for too long. Although she was still pretty sure that decapitation was not exactly the nicest way to meet the afterlife.
While her words caused Kuwabara to shiver, Piper felt herself being licked and nudged by as many cats as could reach her. There was even the sound of cat fights about to start up judging by what she could hear. And though Piper had good balance, cats walking under her and brushing up with all their might as they tried to put their scent over every single inch of her body did eventually throw her off balance. That was the cue that she'd let it get a little too far.
As Piper pulled her aura back into her body, she spoke out in a humorous tone to the austoned Kuwabara who was doing his best to personally pet each and every cat that had knocked her off balance. "I am just thankful that what you call insects do not have the exact same reaction as other creatures."
Sure Piper might not get harmed by walking to a swarm of them, but just as luckily she didn't attract them either. It would have been horrible to wake up and find herself covered in ants or spiders; truly the stuff of nightmares. Considering that she had lived with Youko Kurama who could get inventive over punishments or how he killed people...that was saying something. Then again, it wasn't about the pain so much as the fact that there could have been spiders and ants crawling over every surface of her body.
"Don't you ever get tired of bottling it all up?"
Even though Kuwabara had spoken calmly and clearly, Piper still didn't understand him. After all she was still re-learning the language and a lot of the expressions were lost on her.
"I do not understand."
"Like, don't you get sick of keeping your energy to yourself? Doesn't that make you feel tense?"
Piper shrugged slightly without giving him more of an answer than that. It was one thing to divulge information about what she had let someone see her do, it was another to give away any hints to what could be done. After all, the brunette wasn't the only one affected if she told Kuwabara the truth. He was right though, it did get stifling to keep it bottled in all the time. Which was why when she released her essence in the past it was always in unison with Kurama. The strength of his more aggressive spirit energy was like a warning to all creatures who tried to get in close despite hers practically opening the door for them to come visit. Of course, this was always done in the human world. Kurama might have been a lot of things but he'd never been on the very top tier of power. His aura only deterred those who were weaker than himself. Which was still most of demon world but they had both decided a long time ago that it wasn't wise to press their luck just incase she did attract a demon who was stronger than him.
As Piper tried to stand back up in the clowder of cats, which was thankfully slowly dispersing as the food ran out, she felt more than saw Kurama nearing. With him came Yusuke who had that sort of attitude that he couldn't care either way about whatever was going on around him. It wasn't that he was pretending to dislike what was happening and more along the lines that he just wasn't interested.
Kurama held out his hand as a way to offer assistance as the cats cleared out from around him. The medium knew that she could stand up without help but it would have been rude to decline after he offered it. But once she was completely back up, Piper realized that his hand wasn't offered for pure politeness. Discretely his fingers kept rubbing at the areas that the cats had licked the most, which had pretty much been her entire hand. As the group started to walk down the path with Yusuke in the lead and Kuwabara digging into a bag trying to find more things to feed the cats, Kurama's kept her hand between his and her body as he rubbed at the skin in a distracting fashion.
Piper looked at him for a moment with a bit of confusion. Sure she knew what he was doing, which was trying to recover her with his scent and not that cats, but what she didn't quite understand if it was just a habit from bygone days or if he could still smell other scents. Considering that she was human, Piper knew that she couldn't smell other people's scents unless they were up close and sweaty. Which most humans were, actually, considering that ritualized bathing on a daily or every other day basis was a modern concept. But she also knew that unlike some demon or other animal's noses, that a human's sense of smell was very underdeveloped. Piper had seen Kurama track down people or things by their scent along and was able to make distinctions in it that had been beyond her wildest day dreams until he had shown her that it was a possibility.
In a much older form of Japanese than either Kuwabara or Yusuke would have understood, Piper questioned Kurama, "Did you retain your fox senses?"
"To some degree," he acknowledged.
That was surprising, actually, and no doubt that showed on her face. Kurama smiled as though something had gone in his favor. Grudgingly she had to admit that he was probably right to think so, despite what she would have prefered. Piper felt the tightness born from excitement in her gut that she tried to squish back down. The sensation that made her wonder if it wouldn't be so different to lead this life after all. But that was just some part of her that she knew was desperate to not have to make the hard decisions which were coming up. It was a part of the woman that wanted to stay with him and it wasn't exactly a small sliver either. She just knew that despite how much she wanted to stay, she couldn't. Not only did she have a promise to keep to Yomi but there were other factors that came into play.
So in order to try to combat the similarity that popped up, as cruel as it was, Piper reminded him, "Then you know that you now lack the scent glands to truly cover up their scents."
Kurama's hand tightened around hers as his eyes steeled over. She did feel bad bringing up something he could no longer do because of his human physiology (although how he retained a heightened sense of smell she didn't know) but at the same time she knew that it needed to be pointed out. If he was going to insist on this life then Piper knew she had to help break him of some old habits that might have had baring at some point but were long longer applicable. There were sure to be a lot of them. Just like he was trying to adjust her to modern life she had to try to adjust him to the fact that they couldn't live the same way anymore.
"Stop muttering back there and get a room already, shesh," Yusuke expressed as he looked back towards the two of them.
"Why would we need a room?" Piper questioned back up right as Kuwabara started a verbal spat with Yusuke. Something about how 'men don't say things like that' or something along that nature.
The redhead firmly attached to Piper's hand didn't look her way as he answered in a calm, collected tone, "It's an expression that one often teases those who are displaying intimacies in public. Usually intended with the implication that someone expects that the two being intimate to engage in sexual relations once behind closed doors."
Well he wasn't entirely wrong with his implications. Although Piper knew that she should put a stop to any more engaging actions at this point. The fact that she was getting much better meant that you would be able to uphold her promise. It also meant that she would need to find a way to separate herself from Kurama. Which was already hard as it was. If he felt blindsided by a separation it was going to be harder to do. Weening herself off of his affection was the safer route. Of course, that was assuming he would let her. Given everything that she knew about him and had witnessed of the new version of him so far that was an improbability. Still, she could endeavor to reduce the sexual implications or implicit promises.
If he noticed how lost in thought the displaced woman was after his seemingly simple explanation to Yusuke's statement, Kurama said nothing about it. In fact, the whole air seemed to change as he watched Yusuke and Kuwabara start to engage in a bit of a spat over Yusuke's language. Watching the redhead smile in amusement was pretty much contagious though Piper tried not to make that too apparent. In that moment she realized that the whole reattachment thing was a bitch because no matter how much she fought against it, Piper knew it was happening anyways. And it was going to be the hardest thing she'd ever done to walk away. She just knew it. Which meant that she would need to do it sooner rather than later.
As though he sensed her thoughts, Kurama's hand slowly untangled itself from hers and wrapped itself around her. His hand rested on her opposite hip and she had no illusion to the fact that despite how lose it seemed to be now, if she tried moving away it was going to instinctively tighten.
The redheaded avatar spoke up, though it wasn't directly intended to stop the bickering boys, "May I suggest we start back into the town before it starts raining?"
Piper nodded as she looked up. The clouds did look dark and judging by the way that they'd been kind of hovering for the last hour there was no doubt that it would start raining soon.
"Yes we need a few rooms please," Kurama spoke out smoothly to the owner of the establishment.
Due to the small amount of squabbling that had taken place after Yusuke's comment, they had all missed the last ferry back to the mainland. It would have been difficult to make it back to the mainland by swimming given the way that society was set up, or so Kurama had tried to explain. It had been both amusing and confusing to see why Yusuke and Kuwabara had been surprised that she'd brought up getting back without the boat. Apparently that thing had just never crossed their mind. As soon as Yusuke had understood what she was talking about he'd muttered something about 'just as bad as the old woman' or something along those lines. It made her curious over who the old woman he was referring to was.
"We only have three rooms available, sir," the owner of the bed and breakfast said in a gracious, very polite tone.
"That will be fine," Kurama said in return. "My wife and I will share one of the rooms."
Though she hadn't understood the term he'd used (wife) right away, it wasn't hard to guess at the meaning. Especially when Kuwabara started stuttering at it and asking him when he'd gotten married. That was when Piper realized exactly what Kurama had said though she'd made no move to dismiss it. All societies that she'd gone to over the years had issues with non-ceremonially-bound males and females sharing a room. Which was exactly why she didn't say a thing as Kurama took care of all the necessary details.
At the end he'd even managed to get clothing on loan from the accommodating host. It had been a while since Piper had worn a true yukata, she'd gotten used to a modified version mixed with some chinese influence. Thankfully it was a lot comfier than the traditional clothing of most European nations that she'd been used to prior to waking up. Of course they weren't immediately delivered over as the host had to go and retrieve them first but it was the thought that counted.
What wasn't as comfortable was the size of a room with all of them inside of it. With the low sitting table and two chairs placed on the ground, there wasn't much room left to do anything. The bedding had yet to be pulled down and made, of course, so at least there was enough room to sit down. But that was about it. So despite the fact that the Yusuke and Kuwabara were trying to be quiet, Piper could hear them very clearly.
"When did you get married?" Kuwabara demanded from Kurama.
"Yeah, and how come you didn't tell us?" Yusuke added in with his eyes narrowing.
Kurama and Piper shared a look. She shrugged and motioned towards the two others as she leaned back against the wall. The medium let Kurama take the lead on what he was going to say because they were his friends. Besides, the questions were mostly directed at him. Most likely for the former reason as well.
"I haven't," Kurama answered simply.
"But you told them that she was your wife," Kuwabara pointed out.
"I did."
"So you were lying?" the orange haired man followed up.
"Not exactly," Kurama admitted mildly.
"What are you talking about? You either are or you aren't married," Yusuke butted in as he looked between the woman and the slightly amused avatar.
"She is my wife in all ways that count," the redhead replied calmly.
Piper felt a twinge at that. It might have been true at one time but she wasn't sure it that was going to continue to be true. After all, she was still planning on leaving. But Piper had to admit that as of right now she'd given him little reason to doubt the relationship even with the subtle changes that had to be made. Of course she'd told him multiple times that she was going back to demon world but one did not achieve what he'd achieved over the years without being stubborn and strong headed; traits which she shared even if she didn't admit it.
"But you've never actually gotten married," Yusuke pointed out in a slightly smug type of tone.
"We've participated in as many private ceremonies," with that sentence you realized that Kurama was having fun with it. His friends, however, were not.
Putting her hand on his shoulder, Piper drew his attention and leveled him with an admonishing stare. The unabashed expression she'd gotten in return was enduring but she knew that if she wanted to get to sleep tonight, then she needed to settle this topic. Neither Kuwabara nor Yusuke seemed like the type of people to let something go until they got all their answers.
"I was born a human, at the time Kurama had not," Piper started out although that should have been obvious. Still, she was trying to make this as simple for them to understand as she could. Which was why Piper had paused to try and find the words without giving away everything. "In non-human societies we would have been considered to have been married. But by human laws and traditions, we could not marry. Regardless, for all intents and purposes I was his wife for around three thousand years."
Kurama shifted beside her at the tense that she'd used in her speech. Piper watched as Yusuke's attention darted towards him as well as he picked up on that. The both of them stayed quiet as their friend digested all the information you'd given.
"So...did you guys ever have kids?"
Despite how innocently that'd come out of Kuwabara's mouth, the brunette instantly closed her own. The air shifted from light and teasing to tense. It was definitely a topic that had been contested silently for the longest time before she'd gone into a coma. It wasn't exactly something that she'd ever fought him on; it had never actually been brought up other than a few occasions. The idea of settling down enough to have children just had never fit into what Kurama had wanted back when he'd been a fox spirit and she'd accepted that. It just had been one of the things she had given up and waited for him to be ready for. Over two-thousand and five hundred years was a long time to wait, though.
"No we did not," Kurama answered in what seemed to be an unperturbed tone.
"Why not?" Kuwabara's question felt like a bulging ram. "Didn't you want them?"
"I did," Piper answered honestly, causing the tenseness in the room to escalate. "It was never the right time based on the lifestyle we lived. Children were a liability without a secured territory."
It was words that had been said in the rare moments that such a topic had been brought up. As such when she repeated them they were more monotone than anything else. Thankfully such a topic was instantly cut off when Kuwabara realized how personal he was getting in such a short time. Most likely it was his spirit awareness finally kicking in and making him notice just how thick the tension had gotten. Piper's expression had stilled much like one might expect of someone about to go into a fight, but mostly because she didn't want them to see how awkward it was talking about such a thing. One would have thought that the topic would have been exhausted after how long she'd lived with Kurama. It was not; it had been a rare one actually as she'd never really wanted to broach the topic. Piper figure that once he was ready, she would know as she'd get pregnant. That had never happened. She'd never even so much as got to adopt a child to finally just have someone else close to her.
"Uh, I'm going to go see if there's any snacks," Kuwabara said almost abruptly. "Come on Yusuke, let's see if there are any stores open."
And that was exactly how the two boys left - awkward.
