To Outwit a Fox By: Jineka
Disclaimers: I don't own Inuyasha, its characters or storylines.
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Chapter 4 The Far East
Youko eyed the retreating back of Yusuke and laughed, "He always gets to you like doesn't he 'dog-breath'?"
Sesshoumaru glared at Youko. Youko sighed and bowed, "Lord Sesshoumaru." He continued to mutter under his breath.
"Silver Kitsune," Sesshoumaru spoke as if he was proving his politeness and supriority.
" 'Yes milord'," Youko mocked Jakken, his voice hoarse and raspy. Sesshoumaru silenced Youko with another one of his infamous glares.
"The woman." Sesshoumaru was a man of few words. He could've said 'What are we going to do with that woman, the priestess, Kikyou over there?', but no, it had to be 'the woman'. Got a bit sidetracted there.
"Oh," Youko said, he had honestly forget that the woman was still in the room, "Oh yeah. So what are we going to do with you?" He turned to face the woman. Her eyes seemed to sparkle, and they filled with determination instead of fear as Youko had wanted. Youko sighed, "What are we going to do with you?"
Kikyou stayed silent, positive that the fox wouldn't kill something that he was protecting and caring for just days before. Kikyou kept her gaze on the fox's eyes, and it was the first time she noticed how deep they were. Not literally of course, but they seemed to go on forever. You could probably get lost in his eyes, his beautiful, beautiful golden eyes.
Kikyou shook her head, trying to clear her head of all 'good' thoughts about that fox. Youko, seeing this, smirked widely, "What are we going to do with you?"
Sesshoumaru took one glance at the fox and sighed, "I think we all got the question." Youko continued to smirk, but he nodded acknowledgement to Sesshoumaru. The Taiyoukai looked at the woman appraisingly as if deciding her fate. Kikyou was not phased and turned to rest her gaze on Sesshoumaru. "Excuse us." He turned toward the other side of the throne room, motioning the fox to follow him.
Kikyou watched them talk. First Youko looked pleased, then distraught, then happy, then mad, then they came back. Of course Sesshoumaru didn't have much facial expression which Kikyou thought was just another shield to protect him.
Youko said, "Ok, you got four choices woman." He spat the word woman, but smiled widely despite it, "One: I train you to war for the West," this didn't please Kikyou too much. She wasn't just a tool, she was her own person, "Two: I kill you," ok, that one was even worse, "Three: You become my mate and bare healthy sons," Kikyou snorted at this, not likely fox, "Or Four: You mate with Lord Shi of the bear demons and bare his sons." Kikyou almost snorted, but kept a straight face.
"And if I refuse them all…" Kikyou pausing for the answer.
"I kill you," Sesshoumaru said simply. Kikyou looked at the waiting faces of both demons. What did she do to desearve this? She was just a simple priestess, well a bit more powerful than your regular priestess, but still…fuck that fox. This was all his stupid fault.
She sighed, "Do I get any time to think this over?"
Sesshoumaru immediately said "no", but Youko looked at him funny, and Sesshoumaru sighed, "Fine, tell us in the morning, and if you don't I kill you."
Kikyou nodded. Sesshoumaru called his servant, the toad, to watch Kikyou for the rest of the day, and then show her her room at the end of the day. The toad bowed with a simple, "Yes milord." Kikyou looked at the toad warily, did she really have to spend the day with a two-foot tall, smelly little toad?
^_^
Yusuke rode the fastest stallion and Keiko the swiftest mare. They rode across the sky, soaring above the Western Lands. It was by far the most beautiful part of this world. Forests and plains scattered the landscape as well as tall towering mountains, small streams, and fast rivers.
The treetops were just a blur of green as Yusuke and Keiko neared the Eastern Lands. The West and East were seperated by one of the largest rivers and the fastest for sure. If you fell in, it was death for sure. The current would whisk you away and you'd go first in rapids with sharp, jagged rocks everywhere and if you survived that, then the waterfall at the end of the river onto those sharp, jagged rocks would kill you.
Keiko rode with one leg on each side of the mare, though that was not how ladies were supposed to ride. Keiko was a fierce woman with so many morals, that it was surprising that she'd even protect herself if she had to fight. She was willful and powerful and possibly the sharpest shooter with the bow in that time.
Keiko snapped the reins and the mare stopped at once, right at the border of the West and East. Yusuke jerked his horse to a stop, too. "Oi Keiko, what's wrong?"
"Can't you feel it?" Keiko asked straining to see into one particularly large of trees. Yusuke looked into the trees, but felt nothing. He didn't need to feel anything though, for the sky suddenly darkened and a single cloud began to rain on the large clump of trees. And almost at once, the trees grew even larger.
Keiko's mare whined loud and reared, throwing Keiko into the river. She screamed and the crow demons flew out of the trees and flew straight to Keiko, grabbing her in their many talons.
"KEIKO!!" Yusuke yelled, chasing the crow demons. They all grew to an immense size and flew further East, the biggest one carrying Keiko. Yusuke followed, but the birds were way faster than his horse. "KEIKO!!"
Yusuke kept going, though the distance between them was slowly getting farther and farther. He heard a faint 'Yusuke!' before the birds completely disappeared from view. "Damnit."
He continued to ride in the general direction the crows had went, but they could've turned. Yusuke didn't know if he would ever see Keiko, and he had never told her that he loved her…
^_^
The rest of the day passed like a blur and Kikyou even bathed in the royal hot springs. She told the toad that she was extremely dirty, but it was really just to get away from the slimy male.
Jakken followed her around with the attraction similar to a fly is attracted to a horse's ass, but that is a bit besides the point. The point was…nevermind, there was no point.
Jakken had already seen to Kikyou's lunch and dinner, and now was trying to persude the priestess to go to bed, because following her around was taking its toll on his fatigue. "Its very late. Go on to bed."
Kikyou looked at the toad, "The sun hasn't even gone, do you take me for a fool?" Kikyou silently continued walking; she had been walking around the vast estate the whole day now and had found some very interesting things. Like the garden, the giant garden with a small dirt path passing the flowers and plants that seemed to be every color shining, buds open.
The fountains in the back area were also very fancy, a well-like structure with a pool of crystal clean water sitting around a sculpture of some important youkai. And the strangest thing about the fountains was that there was a sculpture of a human woman. Beautiful, she was sitting in the center like she had all the importance of the youkai combined, but Sesshoumaru didn't seem the type to like humans or females.
Kikyou turned the corner of the hall and found another hall quite similar. It was after a while before she realized that the halls were connected in a circular pattern and that she had been walking in circles.
Kikyou turned to leave the halls, Jakken crying after her. She turned sharply and crashed into something. Something warm. She looked up to see the fox looking at her. His face was void of any sign of amusement, and instead had an ugly scowl plastered on it.
"Is everything alright?" Kikyou asked slowly.
"Mind your own business, human wench," Youko snarled turning to leave.
"…" Kikyou watched the retreating back of the fox, stunned really. She didn't know this side of him; Youko was usually smirking amusing himself with the simplest of things, seeing him angry was a bit of a shock for Kikyou. She regained composture quickly and hurridly followed the fox, concealing herself, her scent, and her aura.
Kikyou followed him for a while before seeing him turn into a room. He didn't close the door, so Kikyou quickly sneaked in after him. It wasn't a brigthly lit room, but Kikyou could see fairly well. Youko stood at his desk, and he was holding something. It was a mirror. Fairly small with gold rimming the top and sides.
Youko continued to look at the mirror, or himself, silently. Suddenly his face broke out into scowl of greatest fury and he pounded the mirror with his fists. The result, pices of glass flew and cut his hand and his face. All the cuts were small, but they all bled.
Kikyou winced for him, crouching lower, hiding behind another desk. Youko walked in Kikyou's direction. The priestess held her breath in anxiety.
"You can come out. Don't follow me, I'm fine by myself."
The door slammed and all light was cut off resulting in a black room Kikyou found herself in. How had he known that she was here?
^_^
A young woman crouched as the men around her started to beat her. They kicked her and stepped on her and then moved back. The woman looked at them each with a smile, bowed, and limped away.
She was hiding a small fish in the folds of her sash. The forest was pretty bare and dead trees were as abundant as the green ones. The woman made her way to the clearing and picked up the ax laying near a small cabin in the clearing.
Crack!
The ax connected with the trunk of the tree. She swung it again and again. Over the course of the next hour the dull crack of the ax could be heard in the village where the men who beat her lived.
"That's a freakish woman. Never shows any sign of fear or remorse," one man said.
"Stealing fish from the reserve again?" questioned the elder.
"Yeah, but we gave her whats coming to her," another man replied.
Thud!
The tree finally fell. The woman spent the rest of the day choping the giantic tree into reasonably sized pieces of firewood. The sun had set, and the moon was shining brightly, almost as bright as day.
The woman smiled as the last log was stacked. She started a fire, and smoked the small fish. She ate the fish slowly, careful to pick off all the edible parts, savoring the taste in her mouth.
The woman was defiantly beautiful, her ebony hair waist-long, a small ponytail on the right side of her head. She wore tattered rags of clothes that once was a beautiful yellow and orange checkered kimono. The green sash tied around her waist was ripped in more then four places and she went barefoot since her sandals had broke, all those years ago.
She smiled patting her belly and went to sleep. She had no real blanket or fur to cover herself in so her skin was accustomed to the cold and she barely felt it now. She was happy, fed, and finally would be able to get some sleep.
The village men had been trying to force themselves on her for some time now, so she moved into the forest. She hated living for many reasons, but one hope kept her alive. The man of her dreams. He was somewhere here, and she knew it.
She could remember so vividly his rich beautiful voice, his handsome body, and the one thing she remembered most: the small blue cresant moon right on his forehead.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Chapter 4 Sango's Brother
Suuichi stared. It was all so easy before the schools merged, now it was strange, it was different, and it was confusing. He was walking home, the right one, and he just witnessed Kagome shoot an arrow, shouting 'Stop, you won't get away demon', and it had triggered something inside Suuichi. Something weird.
It was like a whole different entity, living inside him, for how long? All his life, the other guy was here. Sleeping if you will, but this girl, Kagome, with her arrow and words had awakened this entity.
It was even stranger to Suuichi. A new voice in his head was now bugging him nonstop and no one seemed to be able to hear him except Suuichi. And even stranger, Suuichi became just a voice, too, and a whole new being was formed, known to them as simple Kurama.
Kurama raised his hands, examining them, it was like he was just born out of nothing. Born into the body of a red-head boy, who just happened to have two voices into his head. It was all very strange.
Kurama sensed something. * What is it? * {:: Shut up, you stupid human boy ::} * You, you idiot fox * {:: What did you just--::} Kurama cut him off with a "Shut up, both of you, something's here."
It was Hiei, Suuichi's friend. "Kurama?" Hiei landed next to Kurama.
"Hey Hiei," Kurama said, "Wait, how'd you know I'm Kurama now?"
Hiei shurgged, "Youko's there isn't he?"
Kurama eyes opened in shock, "How do you know about Youko?"
Hiei shurgged again, "I just do." Always the discreet one.
"Sure, whatever you say. Let's go to my house."
Hiei agreed with a simple "hn" and they left for Suuichi's house. The road there was quick and the new house was far better than the old one. It was strange though, like it had its own life, but of course that was absurd.
Kurama greeted his mother or Suuichi's mother, or whatever, and went up the stairs, still getting used to the two story house. Hiei followed, without even a glance at Suuichi's mom, not that she minded anyway.
Kurama jumped onto his bed and in a very blasé manner said, "Kill any crows lately?" Not that that was much of a question. Hiei loved to take lives.
Hiei smirked, "Completely slaughtered them." The sadist to the very end. It was a boring conversation, yes, but not entirely for Kurama, he had two voices in his head to listen to.
* You mean they just want you for your skills in bed? * {:: I was very good, not my fault ::}
So maybe their conversation wasn't too interesting either, but Kurama couldn't not listen. Like, if your using ear phones to listen to music, you can completely drown out something, but if that something was loud, then you could hear it even with the ear phones blasting whatever song you're listening to.
But Kurama couldn't drown out Suuichi and Youko's blabber. It was there, and refused to go away.
* You know, I have my own fanclub. And all of them want to date me * {:: If they knew me, they'd want much more ::} Pause {:: I'd give it to them, if they would return the favor ::}
"Okay. Get out of my head you two pervs!" Kurama got of the bed, screaming at his mirror.
Hiei raised an eyebrow, "…"
Kurama was still shouting though it was kind of a whine, "You do not know what its like with a teenage boy and a sex-driven fox living in you. I don't want to live my life with two horny bastards with me for the rest of my life!"
^_^
Kagome slumped to the ground in defeat. She had let a human boy get away from her. She was Kagome, number one at the bow and arrow, never miss a shot kind of person. But she had hit him. She saw that arrow go through, though it wasn't supposed to. It was supposed to hit the target and stick out.
Kagome pounded the ground with her hands, which did nothing to help the current situation. Kouga walked over and picked her up. Kagome struggled, but the wolf did have a tight grip. Kagome felt her heart pounding as Kouga nimbly jumped up the the tree house. She didn't like Kouga, did she?
Sango was in the room, apparently crying in the corner of Kouga's bed. Miroku was haplessly trying to comfort her, and had no idea what was going on anyway. Kagome instantly forgot about Inuyasha when she saw Sango's distress. "Sango! What's wrong?"
Kagome jumped onto the bed and went to Sango. "Did Miroku do something?" Miroku looked a bit pained, and slid off the bed.
Sango continued to sob, and nothing seemed to make too much sense for anybody. "Sango?" Kagome looked expectently at her friend.
Sango couged and cried, "..Ko..(sob)..th-that (sob)..Ko-Ko…(sob) Haku…Ko-Kohaku…" After finally managing to say 'Kohaku' Sango burst into tears again. Kagome didn't know what to do. This wasn't like Sango, it was so strange that a boy, that came from nowhere, was having such an effect on Sango.
It was a while before Sango finally calmed down, bringing her wailing to small hiccups, and it was Miroku who had really calmed her down. Got to give that perv some credit. Kouga brought Sango some water and she seemed ok enough to talk.
"Sango?" Kagome asked, it wasn't a really a question she asked, more like a request to explain whats going on.
"Ka-Kagome, that w-was brother, my br-brother, Kohaku," Sango said, stuttering a bit.
Kagome still didn't understand, and what Sango said seemed to confuse the matter even more. Kagome knew that Sango had a brother, but…she had told Kagome that he had died a long time ago.
"Isn't he dead?" Kouga asked, cocking her head sideways as if that would help him understand.
Sango was on the verge of crying once again. "HE IS!!!!" Sango wailed before dissolving into tears again.
Kagome looked at Kouga with a confused look on her face. Kouga looked just as confused as Kagome, if not more. Miroku was trying to calm Sango down again. It wasn't that easy. "Sango, love, calm down." And Miroku wasn't doing to the best job either.
By the end of the day all they could get out of Sango was 1) the boy who attacked was her brother. 2) She only had one brother. 3) that brother was dead. And 4) There was some evil demon named Naraku.
^_^
Kurama lay awake, the moonlight pooring into his room. Hiei had long since left leaving Kurama with no company other than his two horny selves, but they weren't too interesting; they'd fallen asleep.
If your two selves are asleep, then aren't you supposed to be asleep? Kurama pondered the thought a while, and finding no valuable answer tried to fall asleep.
Kurama's dream
It was some strange place. So close and familiar, screaming at me to remember, but I couldn't. A giant castle-like palace was on one side and the other? A woman?
It was a woman alright. No doubt about that, and she too was so familiar…it was Kagome! No. It wasn't. She was far more mature and indifferent, almost a bit cold if you will.
"Fox? You still there?" her voice was silky smooth and had a dangerous tone to it. Kind of like Sesshoumaru's. Wait a sec. Who the heck is Sesshoumaru?
"You would do good to hold your tongue, human wench." It was me. I mean, a weird me, but still me. I could feel the words come off my tongue, but it sounded…different? It wasn't my voice, but it was. I think I need to lie down.
"Are you going to start or what?" Kagome again, I mean not Kagome, someone…like her?
"Hold your tongue." It was a menacing command, venom lacing the words, but it sounded strangely fake, as if it was real. Fake malice, if you will. I felt my lips turn up suddenly in a smile, er…smirk more like. "So willful. I will make you mine."
I felt the woman shiver and turn away. She looked back with an unemotional face, but her eyes seemed to shine with anticipation and anxiety.
Ring! Ring!
Kurama blinked a few times and yawned. He rolled over and turned the alarm off. He yawned again and sat up. Even if it was Sunday, Kurama was still up at the break of dawn. He found some suitable clothes, a simple white top, a red jacket, and black jeans. He checked the mirror.
* Looking good * {:: Not half as good as I was ::} * Are you kidding? Look at me! *
Kurama sighed and went to eat breakfast. He searched the drawers and cupboards, but there was anything edible left. He sighed again and left for the café he had seen walking back from school yesterday.
Kurama suddenly was reminded of his dream. Who was that woman? {:: Who? Oh that was just Kikyou ::} Anime fall "Hey! You could've told me." {:: I did ::} "Tell me more." His infamous curiousity.
{:: What do you want to know? ::} "Everything." {:: She died. End of story. ::} "What? How? Details, man." {:: Prying into other people's business could prove lethal like with Kikyou ::} The last part was muttered so low, both Kurama and Suuichi didn't hear. Kind of sad since they share a brain.
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R & R. This story is kinda going a bit faster then I though it would, but it was still ok, ne?
There are a bunch of different parts in this story, but everyones ok with it, ne? Like the first part has like three different places and stuff, but it will all fit together at the end. I hope…
REVIEW.