Disclaimer: Inuyasha is Takahashi-sama's!

Belonging nowhere
By miyamoto yui
Part 8 – you are you.

To say the least, Rin was more of a spectacle than anything else in this new village in which she was finding temporary shelter. Her voice wasn't going to help her at the moment and Jaken just walked beside her with a curious expression, both expecting and surprised by humans and their reactions.
Nonetheless, the young man, now with a patch over his left eye, told the villagers that he was saved by this young woman and that no one question her presence in the village. Of course, that never stopped anyone and so rumors were starting to spread.

"Kin-san…" an old lady shook her head as she took the handsome young man to one side, "Are you sure she isn't a kitsune trying to trick you?"
In his heart, he knew she wasn't the kind. Rin's eyes had given him a confidence in what he felt. "No," he answered firmly.
The old woman, who trusted Kinnosuke, just shrugged her shoulders. "As you are the leader of the village, we must respect your wishes."

The silent Rin was the receiver of many stares. They were of all kinds. Envy of her beauty and youth. Anger that she had been the one to sway Kinnosuke's heart. Pity for being 'alone'. And hatred for being so trusting to a youkai.
All the while, Rin just did what she needed to. She just quietly washed clothes and hunted with Kinnosuke in thanks for his compassion.
"I wonder what will happen from here?" she thought to herself whenever the evening approached. As she cooked, she looked at Jaken, who would sit across her and tap his staff while saying, "Please stop wearing that expression."

Rin was distressed though she tried to be as tough as she could. Jaken was sitting with uneasiness unable to tell her what was going on.
Then, at that moment, he raised up his finger. "I have something for you."

The girl nodded her head as she saw Jaken take out Sesshomaru's fur from a folded cloth. The one he had received only a few days before.

Rin's heart jumped as she dropped the spoon she was holding onto. Her eyes fluttered as Jaken came over and handed it to her.

Her eyes kept asking, "Where? Why?"
She couldn't help but look at the soft her being put into her hands and at Jaken.

Jaken turned around. "I saw him as I was making some rounds."

Rin's fear was growing as she felt the fur almost communicating with the baby for she could almost feel it trying to touch a piece of its father. Impossible as it was.

She put one hand on her stomach as she looked at Jaken. Then, she smiled as she pulled Jaken to hug him. Snuggling her face happily, she couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of relief, yet apprehension at the same time.

She knew what it meant for Sesshomaru-sama to take off the fur…

Rin held the fur out to Jaken as he stood up in front of her. He lifted up his staff and clicked it on the ground. "I cannot return it to him. He specifically told me to give it to you."

She still held out to him.

"You need it protect the child," he answered her.

Her arm felt so heavy that she dropped it as a single tear made its way down her cheek. She looked down at her stomach.

"He knew…of course, he knew…" she thought as she really thought about her situation. This was Sesshomaru-sama. It was only a matter of time, after all.

Then, she took the fur into her arms and hugged it. She smelled it.

"Thank you," she thought to herself as the fur felt alive in her arms.
It still had his wonderful scent.
And all Rin could do was smile…

Even if she couldn't have him. Both of these things were enough…
--
With an evil smile, Sesshomaru was wandering in search of a solution to his latest challenge. Or rather his predicament. He bared his teeth angrily as he held a hand out while a small youkai in the form of large spider tried to attack him. Sesshomaru thrust his nails into the youkai as it vanished into thin air.

This would have been easier if only he hadn't given his fur. But Rin needed it more than he would ever need it.
Except, the other youkai were gradually coming to challenge him to test out their strength with the disillusionment that Sesshomaru was rumored to have gone soft. The only thing he could do was gradually get further and further away from the village where Rin and Jaken were.

He had another reason for doing this though, even if he didn't want to admit it…

"We keep on wandering in a maze which seems so redundant," he mumbled to himself. "And yet, I don't understand humans and their liking for ruts and the like."

It all seemed so far away now…
Things were becoming clearer, yet blurry simultaneously.

He wanted to curse Toutousai who had said that he knew who he was. For at the moment, he didn't know.

Being a youkai was a privilege to become stronger than anything and feel nothing. To absorb the feelings of others and manipulate them.
A race so superior to the other organisms that lived on the planet.

Yet now, Rin had made him think twice about this life of aimless wandering. Nowhere to go, nowhere to live, just keep on going.
She had once asked, "What were you doing all this time before Jaken and I came?"

He looked at her, almost wanting to scowl for he didn't want to answer such a mundane question. Especially to a thirteen-year-old human girl who knew nothing about life, for if she did, she wouldn't have inquired such a thing.

"I was keeping things in check," he simply answered as he walked on.

"But weren't lonely?" she asked cautiously while looking up to him.

"…"

She fidgeted her fingers as she said, "I was when I lost my family."

Then, she jumped in front of him and held his hands. "Now, I don't feel that anymore."

Rin immediately let go as Jaken exasperated a sigh with a shake of his head. He teased, "I told you we should have given her back to her village."

Sesshomaru ignored the remark and watched Rin walk quickly in front him happily.
Without a care.

Wanting nothing more than what was around her…
Jaken and himself.
As a few more weeks passed, Sesshomaru was quite a distance away from where he wanted to be as Kinnosuke's village was slowly being attacked by youkai more often. Before it was only once every six months, now, they had come twice in less than two months.

The villagers were finally getting used to Rin. They still looked at this girl who strangely sang songs to herself ever since she had regained her voice. But they didn't feel anything but respect once they had seen her fight alongside with Kinnosuke to keep the youkai away…
About three days after the latest attack, in the late evening…

"Woman, what are you doing?" Kinnosuke asked Rin as she stood in front of the dwelling in the middle of the night. "It isn't safe."

Though he was quite arrogant for an eighteen-year-old, Kinnosuke was quite tender-hearted. Actually, it was quite endearing for him to call Rin 'Woman' in the first place. She had saved him, but in turn, he treated her as his equal. And 'Rin-chan' or any other name would have been too awkward for strangers living under the same roof, just on two different sides of it.

Rin's hands were folded, but they were turning white with worry at the way she kept them together. Her calm demeanor deceived many as she looked up at the moon thinking of Sesshomaru, again wondering what he was doing at that moment.
She turned her head as she looked at Kinnosuke. "I couldn't go to sleep."
"You do this every night. It is more than insomnia." He gave her a jug of water. "Don't dehydrate yourself."
She laughed. "I just drank at dinner time."
He blushed while grunting and still handing it to her.
Nodding her head, she thanked him quietly.

"Are you waiting for him?" he asked her as they both looked at the moon together.

"Waiting for whom?" she asked as she stopped looking at the moon because it was too painful. Her heart was beating fast at the fact that she had not spoken to anyone about Sesshomaru, except that one time with Kohaku.

"The master of the Jaken-sama," he said matter-of-factly.

Rin shook her head. "Oh, he'll never come back."

She tried not to cry and so she kept on smiling softly as she said this. It was to shadow the thoughts of seeing Sesshomaru on the ground and telling her, "LEAVE NOW." The same voice that had told her, "I cannot understand you." He thought she was sleeping, but she had heard him with his heartbeat so loud that she could feel it on her own skin since he held her so tightly.

"It is better that he doesn't come back," she said knowingly. Her eyes surveyed the fields and the land before her.

He looked at her with a curious look. "Why is that?"

"I will leave here soon also, Kinnosuke," she said to him.

He argued, "Where will you go? You have nowhere to go. That is what Jaken-sama had told me."

"Youkai will attack your village if I stay here." She turned to him and gave him a serious look.

"How do you know that?" He blinked his eyes and gave her a skeptical expression.

"I've lived with youkai for most of my life, so I recognize their smell. Latent as it may be to you, I can sense it."

He grabbed her wrist, he persisted. "But where will you go?"

"Wherever the wind and moon will lead me."

"Youkai will always come because they will never be rid from the world." Kinnosuke said as he still held onto her. "Humans are even worse sometimes.

Rin's hands went over Kinnosuke's as she shook her head. She looked at him in the eye. "You have been really kind to me. And I thank you for that, but I have to go."

When she blinked her eyes, she looked at the moon and back at him. Patting her stomach, she said, "I'm having a baby, by the man with a moon on his forehead."

In astonishment, he blurted out, "The youkai who is Jaken-sama's master?"

Rin shook her head thoughtfully. "No, Sesshomaru-sama. To me, he is not a youkai, nor is he human."

Kinnosuke was awed at her even more than before.

Then, she let go as she turned around and went back into the thatched dwelling without another word.
She kissed the sleeping Jaken as she set her futon and went to sleep.

Holding the fur next to her, she thought about the time she had said his name. For, Rin never called Sesshomaru without the '-sama' until she had told him while lying on the grass one night.

She had whispered to his ear,
"Sesshomaru…
I love you because you are you. Nothing more."
Tsuzuku…
--
Author's note: And we will just persist to keep on going. ^_^