Yep, finally updating. I know, it's amazing, but true. Aaaaand, away with the show!
*****
Scarlet
Part 4
*****
"I'm pregnant."
I can't really put words to how I felt at that moment. Confused. Relieved. Terrified. Disappointed. Happy. Cheated. And really, really confused. I think Ayame was expecting some gesture of joy and love and excitement. Maybe I was supposed to laugh and kiss her and sweep her up and tell her I loved her and say how happy I was. Instead, I did the first thing I could think of.
"How?" I asked, my tone faint and confused, like the shock was so much I was in a daze. This reaction obviously disappointed Ayame as well as confusing her.
"What do you mean? I thought you knew how." Her tone was irate. Great, already with the mood swings. What an adventure this would be.
"Well…I just meant…I thought you couldn't…you know, we kept trying." My mind was still a jumble, so I wasn't very coherent. "But you never…yeah."
"Isn't it great! The healer says it's like a miracle." Ayame recovered her good mood in record time, giggling nervously. My mind belatedly noted that I had better appear excited and happy or this conversation would likely never end.
"Wow." I was not very good a acting right then, but I did force a smile. "That's…just great. Wonderful, really."
"I know! To think, we almost brought a consort into our lives. Horrible to think…this is the best thing that could happen to me. To us." She looked so pleased with herself. I felt like vomiting. I kissed her cheek and forced a smile again.
"Wow. Just…wow." I needed to get away. I was having trouble breathing. "Let me…I think I need to go for a walk." Ayame's face fell.
"Will…you be back soon?" she asked, eyes wide and pleading.
"Uh…yeah." I broke away, nearly running out of the cave in my desperate need to escape.
Somehow, I neded up at Kagura's cave. I had been here only an hour ago. She was cooking now, making herself a light lunch of rice. And when she saw me, her face lit up as though I'd been gone for days. There was some confusion there, but mostly happiness.
"Back so soon?" she set down her bowl, moving to greet me with a warm kiss. It felt like a breath of fresh air, but I was just…distracted. "Kouga? Are you feeling all right? You look pale."
"I'm fine." I lied. What was I doing here? I guess I was scared, so I went to where I felt safest and happiest. With Kagura.
"Are you hungry? I could make you rice." She offered, still obviously concerned, but respecting my privacy.
"No, no thanks." I told her, my hand ghosting over the side of her face. "I just need to be here right now."
"Oh." Her blush, the smile so full of joy and love and wonder was more beautiful than anything I'd ever seen.
"Don't mind me," I walked in a bit, sitting near her fire. "Go about your business. I just want to be with you."
"Alright." Still blushing, she sat next to me with her rice and began eating, her face still stuck in a smile as if I'd given her so much happiness that she couldn't possibly restrain it, and it kept seeping out, making her positively glow. After she had finished her rice, she looked up and blushed impossibly red.
"What?" I asked her as she turned away to clean up.
"You keep staring." She answered, still not facing me. "It makes me feel naked."
"Does it bother you?" I wanted to know.
"It…I don't know." She admitted, putting away her newly cleaned dishes and returning to sit with me. "Is it really that interesting to look at me?" I laughed at her, thinking she was joking, just fishing for compliments or something. But from the look of confusion on her face, I realized that she didn't see the joke, so I cleared my throat and explained.
"You're beautiful, Kagura." I explained, and she made a sharp choking noise. "Didn't you know?"
"Well…no one's ever…I try to be…but no one says so." She looked completely flustered.
"You are." I told her, reaching for her face and brushing my knuckles over her cheek. "Like the most perfect sunset…or a forest after an ice storm…or a mountain lake so clear it looks like two skies…I don't know." I chuckled self-consciously. "That must sound stupid."
"No." her voice was breathless, husky. "It's not stupid at all." And then she kissed me so hard I couldn't breathe. In a blur, my armor was being cast aside, nearly torn off. It felt like an attack. It felt like I was helpless, and Kagura was completely in control, and there was nothing I could do about it. It felt wonderful.
I realized as she nearly dragged me to the furs and cast aside her kimono quicker than I'd ever gotten through all those layers of silk that this should bother me. But it didn't. I trusted Kagura so completely, it didn't bother me to let her have control like it always did if Ayame tried to be on top. But here I was, underneath Kagura in all her raw glory, the most beautiful woman that ever was, that ever would be, and I loved it.
I loved her.
"Fuck." The realization was like being smashed under a ton of stone, it hit so hard. And then Kagura froze over me, her hands still tight on my shoulders, lifting her head from where she had just been laying siege to my right shoulder with her mouth, the pause in motion jarring me as her insides pulsed, protesting against the interruption.
"You okay?" her eyes went from crazy, uncontrolled lust and need to concern and curiosity in the space of two seconds. It really was remarkable.
"Yeah." I didn't really think before I spoke, but in my defense, I had a beautiful, naked woman on top of me, and most of my blood was obviously not going to my brain at the moment, so my mind was not really sharp. "I'm in love with you."
Silence.
Her hands tightened when I said it, but then loosened again, as if she worried she'd hurt me. She blinked at me, her expression now completely confused. There was that pulse again, like her body wanted to swallow me whole, but she didn't move, didn't say anything, only blinked and pulsed around me twice more before the gravity of the situation finally escaped me entirely and I ground my hips up against her. She made a noise then, half surprise and half pleasure, and I felt suddenly foolish.
"Sorry," I told her. I meant that I was sorry for interrupting her inner monologue. She apparently thought that I was sorry I had said what I did.
"Do you?" her voice was desperate, still soft and breathless from what we'd just been doing, what we technically still were doing. If ever she needed something from me, it was at that moment. "Love me…I mean." Her voice was so shaky, so vulnerable. She needed me to lover her, I realized, just as I needed her to love me, though I had tried to deny for a long time that I needed anything from her other than an heir. I tried so hard to convince myself that she was just a consort, and in the end, I hurt her by making her doubt her own worth.
"Yeah." I answered, and her breath hitched before she kissed me again, so hard I thought my lips might bruise.
"I love you, too." She panted as she resumed her rhythm above me. "So much."
Maybe it was because she was on top, and I'd never done it that way. Or because she had started the whole thing. But I thought there was another reason that it felt better than it ever had before. It had always been great with Kagura, but sex was sex, and in a way, it was the same as what I did with Ayame. But for the first time in my life, I was making love. To Kagura. I felt whole, as though a piece of me that I had never known was missing had suddenly been returned. I felt like crying. When we had finished, Kagura did cry, for nearly ten minutes.
"I'm so happy…" she told me after I asked if she was alright. "So happy it hurts. Do you know what I mean?"
I did.
I even forgot about Ayame and her surprise pregnancy until Kagura was sipping tea beside me, still smiling uncontrollably. And then it began nagging at me, before I sat up with a sudden realization. All the pieces fit, and all the sudden, I just knew how to explain all of it.
"Kouga?" Kagura tilted her head in question and I blurted out my thoughts immediately.
"Ayame's sleeping with someone else."
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I had just told Kagura everything that happened on my brief visit home after leaving her that morning, and now she was sipping tea and staring ahead of herself thoughtfully considering what to tell me. I hadn't really explained my reasoning behind the conclusion I'd drawn, but now that I had told her about the pregnancy, I somehow assumed she'd come to the same conclusion as me. But then, after she had finished her tea, she got up and cleaned her cup without saying anything, I cleared my throat.
"So, what do you think?" I asked her.
"About your baby? Congratulations, I guess." Kagura sounded annoyed. Great, just what I needed. Two moody women.
"No, I mean, don't you think it makes sense? Think about it." I attempted again. "First, we're trying and trying all the time to have a kid, and nothing works. Then I take on…I mean…I met…"
"I know what I'm here for, don't worry about offending my delicate whore sensibilities." Kagura rolled her eyes.
"Kagura, please, you know I hate when you talk yourself down like that." I sighed in annoyance. We had just had mind-blowing sex and now she was going all female on me. Life was unfair. "Can you just help me try and figure this out? I don't wanna accuse Ayame of something she didn't do."
"Oh, sure, let's talk about how often you two have sex, and when was the last time, and what the baby might look like, and maybe I'll send her a nice card for getting pregnant before me." Kagura nearly broke her cup, putting it away with a harsh slam. "Congratulations on getting me fired, Kouga's all yours again! I guess where there's a will, there's a legitimate child heir."
"Kagura!" I snapped then. I didn't mean to, I just…she was driving me insane. I knew that she was upset, but when she talked about herself like she was something totally worthless after I had just told her I loved her…after I had only just realized my feelings…it stung deeper than she could possibly know. It was like she was throwing my feelings in my face, saying that what I thought and felt meant nothing to her. It hurt, and it made me angry. "Dammit, can you stop? You don't have any idea—"
"You don't have any idea! Another woman is having your baby!" Kagura stood, stomping sharply to emphasize her point. Her face screwed up, became red, and in moments, tears were spilling down her cheeks. What was wrong with everyone today? "And you just said you loved me! How am I supposed to believe you now? All you want to talk about is her and it's just…dammit." Kagura wiped her eyes, embarrassed at her own outburst. "I wanted to have it…so much. I prayed for it…I just wanted to see your face. I dreamed about telling you one day that I was pregnant, that we were going to have a baby…you would have smiled…kissed me and been so pleased…I took so many lives from you, and I thought if I could give you just one…" she turned away then, her shoulders shaking slightly, showing me that even though she had gone silent, she was crying again.
"Kagura…" I stood then, moving toward her and pulling her to me, despite her initial resistance. She didn't want me to see that she was still crying, but I didn't care. I just wanted her to know that I really did love her. "Kagura, it's not my baby. That's what I'm saying. Think about it. All this time, it was me. I'm the one who can't…because look at us, and you've never gotten pregnant. And Ayame just showed that it's not her, so you see…that only leaves one thing. Another guy. But you should know that even though I would have loved a child from you more than anything else, because it would be yours, I meant it when I said I love you. And it doesn't matter if we can't have kids. I didn't fall in love with you because I thought you could give me something like that. I want to be with you, Kagura. That's all. Just you. And you don't owe me anything, so stop beating yourself up about it."
"But…if that's it, then what do you even care if Ayame's with someone else?" Kagura asked, looking up hesitantly. "I mean, if you love me, do you…can you love her too?"
"Kagura, no." I sighed, feeling stupid now that I realized exactly why she was upset. "Never mind. It doesn't matter if she is with someone else. I actually…I mean, I feel guilty that she's tried so hard to please me, and I've never loved her the way she wanted. And then…you. All there is for me is you, but I mean…I do still feel responsible for Ayame, for the tribe, and I think I should figure out what to do about all this. I didn't mean to make you jealous or anything, I just…was thinking out loud, you know?"
"Okay." Kagura sighed, blushing slightly. "I'm sorry I got so upset. I guess I'm just…not really feeling very confident about this."
"That's because of me. I let you think that you're less than you really are." I burrowed my face into her hair. "I want you to know…it won't always be this way, Kagura. I'll make it better. I'll make sure that you're happy, that you get everything you deserve if you just stay with me. Believe in me."
"Kouga," her voice was so soft and smooth, it sent chills down my spine. "I'm happy with you. You don't need anything more than that to keep me here."
"Kagura…" I felt like the atmosphere was heavy, too thick, too serious, so I blurted out something ridiculous to lighten it. "Wanna fuck?" Kagura burst into laughter, the kind that I loved, her true laugh, like a wonderful, rich musical sound rolling through the air. She kissed the side of my neck lightly after she had recovered slightly.
"That's what I love about you." She told me then. "No bullshit. Straight to what matters."
*****
The End (Of Part 4, That Is)
