AN: Vacations=no access to internet. Or even a computer, for that matter. Sorry this chapter took so long. And for the record—when I say 'love triangle' (uck, that just sounds tacky, doesn't it?), I don't mean some half-assed attempt that's 99% Sesshoumaru and 1% Inuyasha. Keep that in mind, please. And enjoy. ^^
Chapter Two: Woven
"He's probably too busy drinking and stealing and rutting to jump at the Ulfric's bidding. That rat-fink bastard never was one for a lap dog."—Kagura
:::=:::=:::
She was grace. Majesty. The delicate legs picked carefully among the tangled vines and withered roots and hidden traps of forest. Her liquid dark eyes, large and unsuspecting, flitted from darkness to darkness like a wandering butterfly, and the pale line of her neck glowed pure as white lace. She tossed her head, ears pricking as the warm August wind whispered through the cool darkness, rustling leaves and stirring life. An owl hooted its lonesome cry, and then the branches above them shivered and parted; a thin sliver of moon showed through the dark green cover of elms and oaks.
She was innocence. He wondered only briefly where her child had gone to before he pounced, a graceful uncoiling of muscle and sinew, claws extended. The body of wolf: power, endurance, and the prized hunt.
And then, through the thick air and cool wings of night—
He watched her die. He watched her wither away. The proud wolf that she was...oh, no, she didn't stop breathing. Didn't stop smiling. Never stopped thinking about what was best for the pack, what was best for her people. They loved her, their beautiful, proud leader who had survived so much, and she loved them back. But there was always something missing, a single note of dissonance is the otherwise perfect symphony of pack life. Inuyasha had been still too young to comprehend. But Sesshoumaru knew his mother. He knew her masks. He knew—
She tried to twist away from him, those dark liquid eyes screaming terror—
His father had died in a suicide mission, uncaring and taking chances that even a werewolf couldn't have survived. The pack was left stranded, with the others after them—all the others—the shapeshifters, the vampires, the faeries, the ogres, the witches, even those pathetic beings called humans. His father, proud, brutal, suicidal, insane, violent—he heard the whispers among the pack, of his father's madness, all because of a single dead human whelp. But Inuyasha, the product of that unholy liaison, was accepted among them, because the pack loved their leader, loved him with the blinded loyalty of worshippers, of zealots.
His claws tore through the delicate skin of her back. She screamed, screamed, wrenched violently—
Sesshoumaru didn't accept his little brother. His half-breed little brother. The rest of the wolves were unseeing to the unnatural freak of nature that was Inuyasha. And then his father, he had gone and died on all of them, on Sesshoumaru, on his mother, on Inuyasha, on his pack, left them to go to the hunting grounds of heaven, where the game was plentiful and there was no betrayal, or lies, or pain. And Sesshoumaru's mother, oh, she had had no choice but to take another mate in place of her love, to lead the wolves away from their imminent slaughter. So they had come, to the vibrant forests of West Virginia, where game was ripe, and humans were few and far apart, where his mother wasted away, slowly, from a broken heart and a broken mind. She still loved his father, but his father was dead, gone to a place where there existed no pain, and she still had a pack to care for, and she did take care of them, for years after his father's death, and Sesshoumaru could only stand aside and watch as his mother died.
So slowly.
He buried teeth into the hollow of her neck. The smell of death lifted into his nostrils, thick and cloying. She thrashed only a little, kicked those delicate legs, twitching like a puppet with cut strings.
The deer died silently, and Sesshoumaru rose off the steaming corpse, teeth bared in disgust. His stomach revolted at the sight of her body, so delicate and graceful and lovely in life, now grayed and crimson, with dulled liquid eyes and stained lace of her throat. Leaves crinkled like tissue paper under his paws, and a sudden wind blew the forest carpet into a whirlwind of solid brown and rich green. He closed his eyes, scented the air—froze when the musk of a doe caught in the edge of his consciousness.
Her child.
The muscles in the back of his hind legs tensed, wound tight like an overstressed spring. He growled softly, but restrained himself. He was getting soft, getting weak. Sentimental. Any other time he would've loped after her, the defenseless doe that she was, slaughtered her before anything else got there first. Yet—
He'd killed her mother, but he liked to think, maybe she was strong enough, maybe she would survive in this forest of darkness and lies and scavengers; maybe her mother had taught her enough for her to make it on her own. So for now he stood, lifting his face to the silver light of the moon, and felt her flee, spindly legs instinctively carrying her away from danger. Taking her away from him—and her mother. She knew—some part of her knew—her mother was dead, and a monster stalked nearby. So the doe ran, away from the werewolf called Sesshoumaru, and away from innocence.
The young were not always pure.
I know.
He tugged the deer up by the back of its long neck, dragged it through the forest. His back strained, if only a little, as the heavy weight of meat caught against a protruding root, green and velvety with lichen, moss. He gave it a tug, and the corpse jerked, but didn't come loose.
Damn.
Sesshoumaru braced his hind legs against the trunk of the withered pine. With a stubborn set of jaw, he rumbled deep in the back of his throat, and yanked again, this time harder. The root strained against him, wood creaking. Harder. He wrenched at it, teeth slipping in tender meat and fresh blood—and then the tree root splintered. The forelegs of the deer snagged in more vines; he tumbled backwards, surprised for only an instant before he landed on all fours, crouching down into the slope of ground. His breath panted out in small puffs of white.
This was beginning to seem like more trouble than it was worth. But still, Rin would be hungry, even if he wasn't. He was never hungry anymore. Food had lost its appeal a long time ago. Now he only ate what was necessary to sustain the change and his power.
There was a time when I loved whipped cream.
That was a few years back. Two, to be exact. Odd how things go. His lips peeled back in a half-snarl.
Damn his bastard half-breed of a brother.
He heaved at the corpse again, and tugged it with him. The clearing wasn't too far away, and the trees blurred together as he ran, the deer clutched tightly between his jaws. It was heaven, when he ran like this, his worries so far behind him that there was nothing left behind him but a faint shimmer of darkness. It was mindless pleasure, like the heated moment between flesh and fur, the drawn out pleasure-pain of the change. But this lasted so much longer, and he only had to run through his land, through trees and thickets and time, and let his thoughts bleed away with the wind.
When he burst out into open night the stars sung to him a song clear and sweet. The deer he dropped at the edge of the circle, forgotten.
The clearing was shaped like a circle, with five stones placed at regular intervals so that the points formed a pentagon. The stones towered into the velvet black of night, so beaten with weather and time that the edges had worn away into aged smoothness. The stones themselves were towering monoliths, structures humans had always believed as mystical—and they were.
Those pathetic beings have no idea what a powerful werewolf can do with such a holy ground.
Wild grasses didn't dare overflow into the clearing. Rather the line was drawn in a neat arch between green and brown. Where the clearing dissolved into the forest was where the separation between all things wolf and all things human began. The place was holy, and why the wolf tribe before them would leave such a gathering of power was something that Sesshoumaru had yet to puzzle out.
He had left his clothes in a tidy pile on the ground, and now he loped to them, let the change take him over. It still stirred something in him, every time he shifted back to his human form, when bones would stretch, and shorten, and his fur would flow off into delicate skin, and his claws retracted into weak human nails. Even after all this time, from birth to present, the change still disturbed his peace of mind.
Some part of him whispered hypocrite.
You're just as weak as those humans that you so despise.
He ran his tongue over his teeth, brought hands still slightly furred up to his eyes. With a small sigh he let his leash over the change dissipate into nothingness. His teeth dulled and his fingers roiled and stilled into delicate, slender digits.
Human once again.
The worn fabric of his jeans rubbed like comforting silk against his bared legs. The night was warm, and usually he would've discarded his clothing in favor of his natural form—only humans obstruct themselves with foolish things like belts and ties and shoes—but now wasn't as ordinary as he wanted it to be...
He didn't stiffen, only said, lazily, "I told you to leave me alone."
Shadows shifted, detached themselves from under the black canopy of gnarled oaks and draping foliage. The first shape glided along the ground, graceful, as if the normal laws of gravity were to lowly to apply to him. Starlight traced the lines of a slender brow, straight nose, and long hair the color of an oil spill; repulsive, but strangely beautiful. His lips lifted in a small smile, but he dropped to one knee, bowed his head. "Sesshoumaru-sama."
"Rise, Naraku. There is no need for the formalities when we have known each other for so long."
Naraku returned to his feet, eyes dark and unreadable. "I meant no offense, Ulfric."
The two shadows behind him flowed into the pale light, and they too dropped down to one knee, like their master. Although one did so almost reluctantly.
"Kagura, Kanna." Sesshoumaru let the names slip from his lips, acknowledging them as pack. He kept himself still, eyes lidded; but his ears pricked and his nose took in the night air, searching for the subtle, sour smell of impending danger. It was true that Naraku had been his second, his Freki, for years, but Sesshoumaru was too careful to trust him, even now. Naraku was a time bomb waiting to explode in his face—albeit a useful time bomb. Still, Naraku's usefulness would have to come to an end soon.
He wasn't much looking forward to it, though. If Naraku went off he would likely take out the whole pack with him.
"Sesshoumaru-sama," they both said. Kanna sounded soft and detached, and Kagura—well, she sounded as if the words had to be dragged out from between her teeth with a pair of pliers. Kanna blinked night-dark eyes at him, long white lashes casting shadows on childishly rounded cheeks. She was only a pup, but she followed Naraku with unrelenting loyalty; never one to say much, but always near when the need for claws and teeth and violence came.
"She was given as a gift, Sesshoumaru-sama."
An albino from another pack, perhaps.
"We were worried for you safety, Sesshoumaru-sama." The words were respectful, but the way Kagura let spite slide behind her voice was not. Eyes the color of fine wine glimmered in faint suggestion, and she rose in one graceful motion, the black claw in her left ear swaying to the wind. She took a few small steps towards him, hips weaving a hypnotic dance—that was, hypnotic to any other man.
Sesshoumaru had long avoided Kagura's spider-spun trap. He turned away, displeased but not showing it.
"The Ulfric should not be alone so late at night." Even without looking he knew that she was a passing dream closer than she'd been a bare moment ago, fingertips reaching out to touch his bare back. Her scent had taken on a musky edge. He smiled tightly.
His bare feet whispered silently against moss and the packed dirt of the clearing. Her touch missed, grazed past drifting strands of hair, scent growing frustrated, angry, and he smiled, lips quirking up into a baring of teeth that lacked mirth. When he spoke his voice was distant, cold. "Naraku. Control your wolf."
"Kagura." Naraku's voice held an edge of warning, as if he did not expect to be obeyed.
Sesshoumaru felt her retreat, the presence of her subtle power flaring in anger; but then it quieted, as if by long practice. "I am merely trying to beg the Ulfric's attention." Sulky slid into sly. "It is my right as the dominant alpha female of the pack. Sesshoumaru-sama is sadly lacking for a lupa right now—"
The growl slipped out before he could do anything to stop it. "It does not concern you, little one."
Kagura made an insulted sound. "'Little one'?"
"Kagura!" Naraku again. Anger had threaded its way into his words.
She paid him no attention. "Our Ulfric has no mate, and he has not had one for two years. And you say it does not concern me?"
Sesshoumaru only stood there, watching her. Her eyes when she met his gaze blazed a defiant crimson.
"It is ultimately up to the Ulfric to decide, Kagura," Naraku cut in, voice soft and edged at the same time. He watched Sesshoumaru too, skin pale white like a corpse's, but there was a faint stain of red on top of his elegant cheekbones. Spite slid behind his eyes as he turned back to her. "And you are not the dominant alpha female of this pack just yet."
She bared her teeth at him, angrily. "I am. All the females have submitted to me, and the ones that didn't are still nursing their wounds, Naraku."
Naraku laughed, and Sesshoumaru watched in indifference. He was undisputed Ulfric, but the pack hierarchy beneath him was always shifting, like an everchanging metamorph. "The pack still believes Sango is dominant to you. You are alpha, but only in name."
"I will fight her, then." Kagura flicked away a strand of hair with a sharp fingernail.
"Sango-chan does not want to fight." Kanna spoke up for the first time, but her head was still bowed so that the cascade of white hair hid her face. "But there is a way to force her hand."
"'Force her hand'..." Kagura mused.
"Not if she bares her belly like she did the last time you challenged her," Sesshoumaru said, quietly. "Pack law is pack law, Kagura."
Her eyes flickered to him. "If I am dominant, then you will have to consider me for your lupa, Sesshoumaru-sama."
He only looked at her, tiredly. "You know that I will not choose you."
"You will have to choose someone soon. The pack demands it." She barked out a laugh, a joyous sound that held only a sliver of bitterness in it. "Who will it be, oh great Sesshoumaru-sama? Do you hate me so much that even Sango-chan would be more bearable?" She leaned towards him, eyes sparking in malice. "You know that she still pines after Miroku. Poor fool. How will it feel to fuck a wolf who lusts after one of your personal bodyguards, oh all-powerful Ulfric?—"
He backhanded her across her face, and the blow sent her skidding backwards into one of the stones. She crashed with a painful-sounding crack, but the glare that she sent him was conscious—and baleful. He had not hurt her all the much. Sometimes he wished that his self-restraint was not so great.
"Insolent whelp. You will not dirty Miroku's name in my presence."
Kanna watched the ongoings like a distant memory, so far away her eyes had glazed over in apparent stillness. Naraku laughed. Kagura hissed at him but said nothing, only returned to her feet, leaning against the stone for support.
Sesshoumaru turned away, disgusted. Disgusted with her, with Naraku, with Kanna, with himself. She was right, however crudely she put it. The pack had been clamoring for a lupa for the past two moons, but there was no one he wanted. Sango was strong, and beautiful, but she hated him, and loved Miroku. Hate and love were two powerful forces, and in this case, they were both working against him.
Mating had to be on the consent of both sides; otherwise it would amount to rape.
The pack does not advocate rape.
"There are plenty more willing than Sango-chan, Sesshoumaru-sama." He didn't realize he'd spoken outloud until Naraku's words shredded through his contemplation.
"That is not what needs to be addressed." He closed the distance between him and the center of the clearing in a few long strides. "Inuyasha..." Anger stirred within him, and he reached for his power, that current of energy gathering in the center of his cupped palm like water, and let it spill over, pouring over his spread fingers like fine-grained sand; they trickled, wove grains into the air and the winds, something alive with the smell of fur.
The center was a place of power, marked by a single slender sapling, its tender shoots as young as they had been two years ago.
Two years ago. When his mother had still been alive, had still been leader. (Broken leader, broken, she wanted to die, don't you remember—) Still the young tree, planted when the pack had first moved to the forests of Virginia, hadn't grown an inch.
Since her death.
He touched a delicate leaf, and blinked. The veins of pale green that trailed along the edges of the stem darkened to a rotting yellow color before his eyes. When he blinked again the leaf shivered in the wind, green and tender and perfect.
"It is because the tree senses the pack's unrest. Two years ago, you and Inuyasha tore the wolves apart with your power struggles. Now you are Ulfric in your father's place. But the tree—it understands that the pack is still not at peace."
Peace. Peace was an elusive thing. He hadn't needed the old were-leopard-leader-slash-reluctant-wisewoman to tell him that. But Kaede had had more to say.
"Your business with Inuyasha has not been settled. Resolve your problems according to pack law. It is not natural for two blood brothers to fight like you and Inuyasha do, but if both insist and neither backs out, the fight to be Ulfric must be to the death."
He curled a finger around the slight stem, resisting the urge to rip it out. It could've been finished two years ago, but circumstances had not allowed.
And now...
"Settle things fairly, and the pack will prosper. But if only this bloodshed could be avoided—if only one of you would be willing to bow down to the other..."
"Perhaps the decision to attack was a bit hasty, Sesshoumaru-sama."
He said nothing, and Naraku took it as a sign to continue. "You proclaimed him innocent of all crimes, after all."
Sesshoumaru trailed his fingers along veined granite, over the flecked roughness of stone. "I did the honorable thing, Naraku. Do you chastise me for it?"
"No, not at all."
"Then what are you saying?" Power flared under his fingertips like a distant storm. He caressed the feel of it inside his mind, eyes drifting shut to the faint strains of a silver song that thrummed through the air. The flow of liquid thunder left a faint aftertaste of jagged electricity—hot, dangerous, coppery—inside his mouth.
"The pack is convinced of Inuyasha's innocence, and we can do nothing more but accept him back. But he has been branded coward among shapeshifters; he will not have as many supporters as he did before." Naraku was leaning forward, black hair tumbling down around shoulders like a midnight waterfall. His eyes were lidded, but underneath the veil of thick lashes they danced in anticipation. "Inuyasha will challenge you again, but this time we will defeat him, Sesshoumaru-sama."
"Your wolves will prosper, as they did under your father's rule."
Dance to pack law. Fight to pack law. Love, eat, kill, live—all to pack law.
Pack law will be the death of me yet.
Sesshoumaru closed his eyes. "The challenge has not yet been issued. Send Miroku and Kouga to inform Inuyasha that the formal reception will be in a few days. He knows where, and when."
Inuyasha will be accepted back into the pack. Dear brother, how I've missed you. The edge of his lips curled up in a sardonic smile.
"Kouga? He's probably too busy drinking and stealing and rutting to jump at the Ulfric's bidding." Kagura tossed her head, and the silver of the delicate chain-link claw flashed in pale moonlight. "That rat-fink bastard never was one for a lap dog." She had risen off the ground now, but still kept her distance from Sesshoumaru.
"Yes, that Kouga is somewhat of a miscreant, isn't he?" Naraku sounded amused.
"Maybe Inuyasha can kick his ass for you, Sesshoumaru-sama." Kagura's words were carefully devoid of malice.
Sesshoumaru placed his palm against the stone. The girl had no idea how closely she'd followed his thoughts. "Naraku, Miroku will take Kouga with him if I insist."
"Sesshoumaru-sama, are you sure that Inuyasha will not...?" He let the words trail off, but his dark eyes left no questions as to what he was asking.
"Inuyasha will not harm Miroku."
"What of Kouga?"
Sesshoumaru turned his head her way. "Are you worried for his safety, Kagura?"
"No!"
"Then do not question what I say."
Her silence was a stubborn one.
"And also—" he paused, considered his next words. "How is Rin?"
"Coming along nicely." Kagura gave a very unladylike snort. "Her dear 'Jakan-sama' is telling her bedtime stories right now. How she managed to get him to do that is beyond me."
Naraku chuckled quietly. "Probably flashed those little cat-fangs of hers his way, yes?"
He closed his eyes, having already heard what he wanted to hear. "That is enough. You may go."
Naraku bowed his head, and turned to leave. But then he stopped again. "Sesshoumaru-sama, who was the girl with Inuyasha yesterday night?"
He glanced his way. "An unknowing witch, by her scent. Why do you ask?"
"Inuyasha seemed very concerned for her safety." Naraku smiled, a wicked curve of lips.
Sesshoumaru was quiet for a while. "I'll keep it in mind."
Kagura gave a disgruntled hmph, as if to say I can't believe you're more interested in a human whelp than in me. But one thing Kagura wasn't was dumb, and she kept her silence, despite the shimmer of barely contained power that roiled around her like a wave of heat.
"Control yourself, Kagura." He turned to her an empty face. "I may have to choose a lupa by the next moon, but there is nothing stopping me from choosing your death even sooner. I am Ulfric. My word is law. Remember this."
He rose. The wind had quieted, and he strode away to where the deer lay, naked flesh still steaming in the night air.
Rin will be hungry.
He left them, and the memory of their eyes followed him even as he melted into the safety of the forest.
My forest.
My home.
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AN: All the characters of Inuyasha appeal to me on some level, but note that Kikyo and Shippou are missing from this profound statement. Also note that Shippou is missing from this fic altogether. Sorry to fox-groupies out there. (Well, maybe I'll stick him in there later. Somehow.)
Can you tell that I'm a Kagura fan? There's just something so wonderfully bitchy about her, and she says the most interesting things. And you can't help but love the outfit. And the fan. And her scary eyes. O.o
Assuming my dear muse doesn't desert me anytime soon, you guys can expect an update every few days or so. At the rate I'm going, anyway.
*tackles muse and grabs her in a stranglehold*
Muse: Gack!
*attempts to chain her down*
Muse: Gasp! Choke! DIE!
Oh dear. She's no good to me zonked out like this, is she? (Don't you just love that word?)
Leave a review, and you will have my eternal love. Which is better than a mere cookie, yes? ^^