All Miroku could do was pace while they all waited for Kotori to wake up, much to the annoyance of everyone else.

"Relax Miroku, or you'll wear a hole in the ground." said Kita as she hung upside down from a tree branch.

"How can I relax when she's hurt?"

Shippo rolled his eyes, "Kaede said she's going to be fine. She just needs rest. You're acting like she was having your baby or something."

Miroku stopped in his tracks.

"Wait, she isn't having your baby, is she?" said Kita, suspiciously.

Miroku's face was drained of all color. "That's the problem. I don't know."

Shigure grabbed the front of Miroku's robes, "What do you mean you don't know!?"

Miroku released himself from Shigure's grasp and stared at him coldly. "I mean I don't know if she's carrying my child or not! I don't know if she's carrying a child at all!"

"What if she is carrying your child? Or worse, what if she's carrying the child of that man we killed? What would we do then?" asked Inuyasha who was sitting with his back against a tree trunk.

"Would you just lighten up, Inuyasha? If she's having a baby, then she's having a baby! We should welcome it all the same, no matter who's it is." said Kagome.

"Could we just stop talking about this? We don't even know if she's pregnant or not, yet. Let's just wait it out." said Kita.

"You may see her now, Miroku." said a voice behind them.

They all quickly turned around to discover that Kaede was standing beside her hut, holding the flap open.

Miroku nodded and walked inside.

He found Kotori lying comfortably on a futon next to a warm fire. He hadn't realized how cold it had gotten with the coming of fall. He quietly knelt beside her and looked at her sleeping face. It was peaceful and carefree, like everything that had happened in the past few days was simply a bad dream that she had awakened from. Safe and unharmed.

"This is my Kotori. This is the woman I love, the woman I would give my life for. She has suffered far too much in her lifetime, and all I want to do is take away all her pain and suffering, to make her whole once more." thought Miroku as he lightly stroked her cheek.

Her eyes slowly opened at his touch and she smiled when she saw him, "Hello Miroku."

He smiled, "Hello Kotori. How are you feeling?"

"Just as I felt when I got here. Fine. How are you feeling?"

"Wonderful, now that I know you'll be ok."

"I told you that before. Now I'm ready to set off again and find the other jewel fragments." said Kotori as she tried to sit up.

Miroku placed a hand on her chest and gently pushed her back down. "Lady Kaede said you need rest. I don't want you over exerting yourself so early in your recovery."

"I told you I'm fine! I just needed a little rest and now I'm...." But her sentence was cut short by Miroku's lips.

His kiss was light at first, just tempting her, making her want more. She deepened the kiss, pulling him down towards her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her mouth to receive his eager tongue. He explored her mouth. He ran his tongue along the back of her front teeth, ran it along the roof of her mouth, and massaged her tongue with his own.

She moaned into his mouth and clutched his robes tightly. Then her hand went to the knot that held his robes together and untied it.

His robes slipped off his shoulders and came to rest at the top of his waist. When he noticed, he quickly broke off the kiss and sat up.

"No we can't do this! She's still recovering! This is the last thing her body needs right now!" thought Miroku.

Kotori looked up at him and frowned. "What's wrong?"

Miroku sighed, "You know we can't do this."

"Why not?"

"You know perfectly well why not. Number one, you're still recovering, number two, we're in Lady Kaede's hut, and number three, Inuyasha and the others are waiting outside! What if they walk in on us?"

"Relax," said Kotori, running her hands up and down his bare chest, "I have a feeling they won't walk in on us."

Miroku thought for a minute, "Well, if you're sure you really want to do this. Are you sure you feel up to it?"

She smiled at him, "I'm positively sure that I feel up to it, Miroku."



Kaede stood outside her hut and was just about to enter when she heard Kotori and Miroku talking. She listened intently and just as the conversation ended, she took a small peek inside. Miroku was bare-chested and he had straddled Kotori, who was still lying down. She quickly closed the flap to her hut and hurried away, completely forgetting that Inuyasha and the others were sitting right outside.

She chuckled to herself, "I see that the Kotori I once knew has changed for the better."

Inuyasha noticed Kaede hurry away after looking in the hut, so naturally, his curiosity kicked in. He strained his ears to see if he could pick up anything Kotori and Miroku were talking about, if in fact that was what they were doing, which he doubted.

After a few seconds, he picked up a sound. Though faint, it told him everything he needed to know. He quickly turned to Kagome and said, "We should give them a little privacy and space. We can all talk to her later."

Kagome was confused at Inuyasha's sudden interest in Kotori and Miroku's privacy. She began to think of all the reasons why he'd act like this, when she heard a small sound. Her eyes widened when she recognized it and she quickly grabbed Shippo and Kita.

"Hey! What are you doing Kagome!? Put us down!" shouted Shippo.

"Inuyasha's right. We should give them some privacy." said Kagome as she carried Shippo and Kita off. Inuyasha followed close behind her.

Shigure began to follow them, but he turned around and took one last look at the hut. Then he turned back around and followed Inuyasha and Kagome into the village.

As Kagome carried her off, Kita's ears twitched and she began to realize why Kagome was in such a hurry.