Brotherly Love
**
"Well," Kaede said, looking thoughtfully up at the ceiling, "I'm afraid I don't know of anything that would help restore Inu-Yasha's hearing. I've never known a half-demon to go deaf before."
Kagome frowned, her hands moving fluidly as she translated for Inu-Yasha. They'd found the sign language to be much quicker and easier than having to write everything they wanted to say, and Inu-Yasha had quit bothering to talk aloud, since he could never tell how loud or quietly he was talking. Too often he'd ended up yelling, and aside from hurting his companion's ears, it could attract unwanted attention.
"Isn't there anything?" Shippô asked, sitting beside Kagome. "No spells, or… or… even something from your time, Kagome?"
Kagome shook her head. "I thought about taking Inu-Yasha to a vet, but how would I explain a boy with dog ears to them? They'd want to take him for medical study."
"You know…" Miroku spoke up, "there was something I heard once that might help. If it exists, that is. There was a legend about a mountain on which twin snake demons lived. If anyone could defeat the two in battle, they'd be granted any wish they wanted. Of course, it's only a legend…"
Inu-Yasha got excited when Kagome translated for him. "That's perfect!" he signed. "Two snake demons, is that all? That would be easy!"
"It's not quite that simple," Kaede said. "I've heard that legend as well, and there's more to it than that. Not one person can face the twins; it must be two to challenge them. And not any two, but brothers. It must be two brothers against the twin snakes. That's why I didn't mention it before."
"Inu-Yasha has a brother…" Sango said slowly.
"Sesshoumaru?" Inu-Yasha signed. The hand gesture for his brother's name was the combination of the "jerk" and "dog turd" signs. Inu-Yasha had made it up himself. "Forget it, there's no way he'd help."
"You know they're not exactly on good terms," Miroku sighed. "We'll have to think of something else."
"It's our best bet so far, though…" Kagome said. "We should at least check it out, to see if the legend is true. There's got to be a way of getting Sesshoumaru to help out; it's his brother, after all."
**
Sesshoumaru paused in a clearing, trying to decide on a direction to go, and waiting for his little toady Jaken to catch up. It had been nearly a week since he'd heard the weird sound, but he was still curious as to its origins.
It had been the weirdest thing, like a whistle, so high pitched it had made his ears ring. The sound had come from miles away, and Sesshoumaru could only be glad he'd not been closer to whatever it was that had made the sound. But he wanted to know where the sound had come from, and if it could be of use to him sometime. If it had hurt his ears from so far away, he could only imagine what it could do to his little half-demon brother. The thought was amusing, and worth looking into.
"Where are we going?" the little toady Jaken whined as he scurried to catch up to his master. "We've been walking for days!"
"I heard something," was Sesshoumaru's only explanation, as he determined what direction the sound had originated in, and continued on.