Amaranth
By Aycelcus
Rating: R (for violence and sexual situations in later chapters)
Disclaimer: I do not own Inu Yasha, it's characters or likenesses. I am borrowing them for just a little while. Also, I do not own the Landers and any related characters. They belong to my best friend. I do own Cillara, her likeness and all things that pertain to her character.
A.N.: Okay, so here we are on chapter two. There isn't much to note here, except that I've never seen any episodes that show Fluffy's castle, so I am making this up as I go. A great deal is drawn upon other writer's ideas of how the inside might look, and if I reach a point where I think I am plagiarizing their ideas, I will try and remember who wrote what and make an annotation. If I screw up, or leave something out let me know. I'm going to try and make the interior as original as possible without compromising the story or the intrinsic nature of Sesshoumaru's character.
Note Two: There will be no Rin saying, "Will you be my mommy?" in this fic. At all. It's become cliché', people. It's sweet, it's cute, but in this story, it's about as out of place as Kikkyo saying "I forgive you for everything, Inu Yasha, now go screw my reincarnation while I float down to Hell." See my point?
Note Three: It occurred to me that you may not know this yet, but this is set a few years after Naraku was defeated. No wait… don't run away… give it a chance!
Chapter Two: That Which Does Not Fade
She did not expect Mr. Beautiful to lean forward and sniff delicately at her neck. She wasn't sure what she expected, but that wasn't it. Her breath hitched in her lungs as his own warmed the hairs at her throat. In that moment, she completely forgot her sorrow, forgot her dead Lady and her dead world. All she knew was that this man, this… striking creature of golden eyes and silver hair falling in rivers about him had his face buried at the juncture of her shoulder. Then she felt his tongue lick the skin there, gently and slowly like a puppy trying to comfort.
Every instinct of dealing with men came back to her, and before she quite knew what she was doing, she heard her voice (deep with disuse, but her voice, nonetheless.)
"It's not like I'm not grateful, but is there any particular reason why you are licking my neck?"
The beautiful man pulled back as if stung. For one brief moment his face was mired by surprise, anger, and something… else. Then a mask of indifference, cool like glass, slid over his features. It was one that was obviously well practiced. A long moment followed as the two took measure of each other.
He was tall, and well dressed in a heavily embroidered Japanese-style kimono. Over his breast was some sort of armor, and over his shoulder was some sort of giant fur stole. In combination with his paled skin marked by red and purple, and his silver hair streaming about him, the effect was perhaps the most exotic she had seen in quite some time. He was noble in his bearing, and arrogant in his cool way. Almost as an afterthought came the knowledge that he only had one arm. It seemed to contradict with the rest of his appearance.
The moment grew longer and longer as Sesshoumaru studied the girl lying on the ground. This creature continually surprised him. Up until her voice had startled him out of his reverie, Sesshoumaru had no recollection of licking her neck. Sniffing, yes, that was standard practice (although not usually on the neck,) but actually tasting her? It seemed surreal to the youkai Lord. Mysteries within mysteries…
It occurred to him in that moment that she had not moved or spoken since. Time was growing thin, and the cave they were in could just as easily become a grave if enough youkai came investigating. So with one smooth motion, he picked her up and slung her over his shoulder, using his tail to steady her. She hung limply, like a rag doll, but she was not without weapons.
"Hey! What the hell do you think you are doing?"
He tightened his tail about her as a warning. He could feel the crinkle of feathers through his fur. The sensation was odd… but odder still was that it felt right. Very strange.
"It is obvious that you are too weak to move, regardless of what your mouth implies. I suggest that you still even that. Others come, and quickly." With that he began to run.
He ran by feel. The purple light that had come off the woman's crystal cocoon was fading quickly. Faster and faster he ran, and his strange passenger did not speak again.
This has become surreal, she thought as she swayed across his shoulder. A hundred worlds and a hundred different encounters and still the multiverse had something new to show her. But the multiverse was down by one… and the tattered remains of her world only existed within her memories. How do you cry, how do you mourn a universe? She did not know how long she had floated in her dreams; could not count how many had tried to break her free as the crystal's insistence. Her sorrow was a tangible thing, drawn up about her. Its dust clouded her vision, closed her eyes and dried her tears. So here she found herself, her face buried in soft fur, too tired to move.
Time had been a fluid thing for her long before she had been suspended in amaranth. It flowed forward and backward, sometimes pausing around her as if the very stuff of the world was holding its breath. It had been a difficult thing, those days when first she became an avatar of her Lady. Eventually she had adapted, persevered. But her time sense was rusty from disuse, so she could not tell how long she had lain with her faced pressed into his shoulder before they came upon a fortress. She did not expect a young girl to come running out with a disgruntled… toad-thing… in tow.
"Sesshomaru-sama! Sesshoumaru-sama! You're back! Rin wondered where you went! You… brought back a… bird?" The girl, who could have been seven and could have been ten, (age and time are strange bedfellows), stopped short of "Sesshoumaru-sama" and stared in surprise. Sesshoumaru, in all fairness did not yell or snap at the child.
"Rin, go inside. Tell the servants to prepare a bath. Jaken, go with her." The toad-thing looked uttered disgusted by the idea, but said nothing. He simply turned with his staff in hand while the child nodded, wide-eyed and confused, and ran back into the castle.
She couldn't help herself, really. Two hundred something-odd years doesn't change a person all that much, and she had annoyed the best. So it wasn't surprising when she heard herself speak in a familiar, sarcastic tone. In fact, it felt like coming home…
"Cute kid, Fluffy. I really didn't see you as the fatherly type. Must have been the mascara and the giant sword… let's pray that kid won't need therapy when she grows up." She managed to drum up enough energy to pull her face away from his shoulder, and cupped her chin on her palm. "Please, just don't tell me that disgusting frog is her brother. That's just nasty."
She heard a low growl and then the hand that had clamped her to his shoulder suddenly had the front of her bloody dragon-leather vest. Her legs swung as she hung from his grip.
"You will never address this Sesshoumaru in such a manner again."
"Ugn…" Okay, stupid move. Let's insult our savior right out of the gate. Did she learn nothing from her Lady? And so she composed herself (as well as anyone can when hanging helpless from a stranger's grip) and spoke again.
"I beg your pardon. I know not how to address you. There wasn't much of an introduction before you snatched and grabbed and ran like hell. So," and she saluted him smartly with a flick of her wrist as she gained more strength, " I am the Cillara De Santo, Avatar to the Lady Irene of… well I suppose that doesn't matter much now."
He just stared at her.
"Oookaay. This is where you say back something like, `I'm Sesshoumaru, Lord of the Fortress of Solitude or whatever'."
He dropped her. She really didn't have far to go, but her legs were still not cooperating, so she crumpled to the ground at his feet.
The last time anyone had spoken to Sesshoumaru thusly, it had been the miko wench that his half brother had taken to mate. It was a peculiar sensation not to be feared by someone, a sensation he had gotten used to with Rin and the miko, Kagome. He was still trying to process her introduction when she had spoken again, and although she demonstrated an acute knowledge of his name, the easy way in which she tossed it off into the wind shocked him to the point of dropping her. Before he had a chance to pick her back up and take her inside (his first and foremost intention, for the creature was a weak-limbed as she was out-spoken and smelled too strongly of blood and burned feathers) he heard her growl low in her throat. Quick as lightening then, and somehow the woman who could barely move had swept his feet out from under him. He hit hard in the dust and the grass, flashes of light burning behind his eyelids, and lay stunned for a moment beside the woman; two figures stretched out side by side like children watching clouds.
"There," she breathed beside him. "Now we are even."
A.N.: And Round one goes to…. Well it goes to the rain that is drowning my yard. Hopefully I will manage to make it to the library to update today.
A.N.: For those of you too young to know what this is, a stole is generally a thing of fabric or fur strewn across a wealthy lady's shoulders. Ex. A mink stole, a rabbit stole, a fox-fur stole. It was not uncommon (still isn't, I suppose) for those rich-type ladies to wear the dead animals complete with their heads and feet still attached. Some fashion statement. Less seamstressing, more taxidermy, please. I suppose I wouldn't have a problem if they actually ate the animals that they bastardized for fashion. Here, Lady Watterly, more roast mink? Come on, it doesn't smell THAT much like cooked ferret.
^.^
I wrote this is class today, being that it was the first day and I have the same teacher fro all three of my science classes, and he covered the same damn syllabus crap each time. You may like it, and you may hate it. It's just one of the songs I have written about Cillara. I also draw her constantly, which is odd because my two main current projects outside of work and school are Modern Thieves, a graphic novel about space pirates and Demented Little People, a daily strip that I might get to publish if I ever frelling get web access at home! Neither one of these has anything to do with Cillara, but she has captured my fancy none the less.
Queen of Wind and Dust
She dances and the wind comes to carry her away
Her memories are havens of dreams that couldn't stay
Scars upon her body mirror scars within her soul
Proof that damage takes its time and always takes its toll.
She's lost and found
And turned around
Her Lady calls to bring her down.
She fills her cup up to the brim; takes another drink
She wants to forget again, pull back from the brink
Ghosts and phantoms call her name; specters brush her cheeks
They press their lips against her eyes and reach for what they seek.
She's burned to ash
She's faced the lash
She's sacrificed to lovers past.
She's walking mines and building shrines
To everything she ever knew
If you perchanced to steal a glance
Her eyes would all but bury you…
A wistful tune, a melody for those who never sleep
A dancer, she, who winds her way through waters dark and deep
So heaven strikes at broken walls, castles fall to rust
Still she stands within her halls, a queen of wind and dust.
A crown of tusks
A staff of rust
She's but a queen of wind and dust.
Hell, if you like that, I might put a few more up later. Most are angsty and sad, but a few are pretty. I have the tune in my head, but Lady forbid I ever try and play it on the piano. I don't suck at piano, but on the other hand I don't exactly excel at it. That is what comes of trying to learn an instrument as a child when your talents lay (obviously) elsewhere. I'm sure those of you with recorders stashed in your closets as that last bastion of Middle School can attest to that. ~shudder~ a recorder. Ugh.
One more note, although I'm sure most of you have gone away to do far more interesting things by now. There is a side story that I wrote and posted last week to this. It's humorous (I think so at least). Go read it if you like. It's called Fortress of Solicitude.
Read and Review Onegai Shimasu!