By Scribe of Figaro
SANGO'S SORROW: PART VI
"What have I become, my sweetest friend?
Everyone I know goes away in the end."
- Nine Inch Nails, "Hurt"
When next Miroku opened his eyes he found himself both surprised and pleased to feel rawhide laces over his wrists and ankles. He was sure Asesu held the memories and skills of a number of escape artists, but at very least this would slow him down if he failed.
He seemed to be alone here. Outside his shelter he could see it was still night, but the cloudy, starless sky was different than before. There would be a storm soon.
How long was I asleep?
Miroku was unsure. He could not sense Asesu anymore, but it was possible the ghost had gotten so deep into his memory that he could not be easily found. Miroku closed his eyes, knowing a brief meditation would quickly alert him to what Asesu was doing.
"Houshi-sama."
Miroku opened his eyes. Sango was sitting beside him, still in her taiji-ya uniform. Amazing that she could approach so quickly and so silently.
"Sango, how long was I asleep?"
"I'm sorry, Houshi-sama, I had hoped I would get back here before you awoke."
"Don't apologize. You take care of me far too well, and too often."
"Houshi-sama, when you speak like that, it almost makes me believe it's still you."
The color drained from Miroku's face.
"Sango? Nani?"
"We decided, all of us. Well, not Shippou and Kirara. But the three of us decided. Kagome was against this, but Inuyasha convinced her. We couldn't go through with it unless we all agreed."
Sango drew her sword.
"Inuyasha wanted to spare me from doing this, but I couldn't allow him. I am a youkai taiji-ya, and I will be the one to exact vengeance on Miroku's life."
"Sango, for the love of god, wait!"
Miroku raised his bound hands in a reflexive attempt at defense, but Sango's blade plunged unhindered into his chest.
His unbandaged chest.
You absolute son of a bitch!
Miroku concentrated his will on parting the illusion put before him, and suddenly the craggy overhang, the rocks around him, and the brush and trees he had seen outside the cave were simply no longer there. He could feel the blanket beneath him was now of soft grass and dirt. Flowers grew around him in all directions. The cloudy sky continued to swirl above him, but it was low, low enough to touch.
The sword disappeared, though the wound did not, and a low fountain of blood began to flow from it. Miroku's hands were still bound, and now he could see the rawhide loops holding the rosary tight to his right hand, making it impossible to remove it and unseal the Kazaana.
The figure beside him stood, and it did not wear Sango's shin-guards and boots but the robes of a houshi, and as Miroku looked to him he could see his own face, and Asesu's satisfied grin atop it.
Miroku felt something warm and coppery rising in the back of his throat, and an unsettling numbness in his legs moving quickly up his body.
"You were the first challenge I've had for well over a hundred years now," Asesu chuckled, "and still you fell quite easily. I suppose I would never have made a convincing impersonation of Sango using your memories, as you guarded them quite well, but I had all Sango's memories at my disposal and found them quite useful."
"Yours was a terrible impersonation of her, and I was a fool to believe it even for a moment."
Miroku coughed wetly, turned his head to the side and spat dark blood.
Asesu jammed his shakujou into Miroku's gut in sadistic exasperation. Miroku gagged.
"In about ten seconds you're going to be gone completely from this body, yet you won't even let me gloat."
Miroku ignored him. "Sango is a kind woman, a compassionate woman. She would never raise her sword to me." He coughed again, his body wracked with pain. "She would never raise her sword to anyone who asked for her mercy."
Miroku held his bound fists before his face. A loop of the rosary around his right hand hung over his mouth.
"And by my death, you will not lay a hand on her!"
Asesu's eyes widened, but he could not get a word out before Miroku bit into a bead of the rosary and wrenched his hands away from his mouth. The string snapped. A hail of beads littered the ground around his body.
The Kazaana, unsealed permanently, immediately drew in the gauntlet and protective coverings on his right hand. Asesu clawed at the ground but was sucked in with a fit of screams and agony, along with a shower of wildflowers.
The wildflowers. Miroku's memories. The reason he had not used the Kazaana against Asesu here.
Each piece of this land I suck in will be another memory lost forever. Now it is inevitable, for most of this land will be destroyed now. Since I will die here, that is of no consequence. When I am reincarnated, I will keep no memories.
Still . . . I wish, how I wish, that I could remember Sango.
Sango.
My Sango.
Miroku heard screaming, distantly realized it was coming from his own mouth, and was pulled into the void.
Kami-sama, please, whatever your intentions are for me, let me remember her name!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
There was a river not far from where Miroku lay, and there Sango stood in the pre-dawn twilight, with her yukata and leggings rolled up past her knees and her taiji-ya catsuit in her hands, scrubbing it on the smooth rocks at the edge of the water.
She was still blushing, and had been since she awoke beside the sleeping houshi and faced the gauntlet of Kagome, Shippou, and Inuyasha's stares of surprise. Even Kirara was looking at her mistress in a mocking and discernibly feline manner. Sango had checked Miroku, found his fever no worse, dressed his wound again, and mumbled sheepishly to her friends that she was going to wash her clothes before Miroku awoke.
When they came to this area the previous evening she had laid Miroku over the Kirara's back and ridden in front of him, holding the firecat's mane with one hand and a handful of Miroku's robes with the other. She had seen the river, a cool strip of rock-littered blue coming from the mountains far above. It was about five minutes' walk away from where they set up camp, and its cold, clean water filled their canteens and provided Inuyasha with several meals of ramen during the day – all eaten with a lack of satisfaction even Sango noticed, preoccupied as she was.
Sango had planned to return to the waters to wash her taiji-ya uniform and bathe, but after undressing and testing the river with a foot, she quickly realized it was far too cold for the latter and pulled on her yukata, tying the ends into the sash to keep the kimono dry in the knee-deep water.
She wasn't quite sure what came over her in the past few hours. Miroku's revelations had startled her, and in the wake of his confessions she found herself unable to keep her self-imposed distance from the houshi. He had revealed his hand; she had shown hers.
He gave her his feelings. She gave him a free caress.
He gave her his fears. She gave him her comfort.
He gave her honesty. She gave him acceptance.
He gave her intimacy. She gave him . . . a promise.
A promise.
"More than that." More than a caress.
Would you bear his child, if he asked? Would you go through pregnancy for this man, take yourself from battle for months or years, and let him fight without you while you bore and raised the child that would continue his battle if he should die? Could you do that?
"I can't," she whispered. "I can't stay behind in Kaede's village while you battle Naraku. I can't forfeit my mission to save Kohaku."
Her heart lightened, and she smiled. I shouldn't worry. I'm sure Houshi-sama knows of things men and women can do before they are ready to have a family. I can imagine a few myself.
The familiar howl of her firecat shook her back to reality. Kirara landed beside her, shaking her head slowly as she did when she sensed urgency. Shippou, eyes streaming with tears, clutched at the fur on the nape of her neck.
"Miroku's stopped breathing!"
Sango's fingernails drove into the material of her taiji-ya outfit as she ran to the pair of youkai. She threw her wet uniform across Shippou, straddled Kirara behind him, and held on.
"Kirara! Quickly!" she shouted.
She couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't believe that this was happening. She told herself she would be fine to leave Miroku for a few moments. How selfish could she have been to take time to clean Miroku's blood from her clothes while Miroku himself took his last breath? How could she ever forgive herself if he died with all his friends around him but her?
Kirara landed beside the overhang so quickly that Sango banged her head against Shippou's who had already folded Sango's clothes into a bundle. Although she surely hurt him, he did not cry out.
Sango kneeled opposite Kagome, who was already working over Miroku, using the medicine of her people. Miroku's face was ashen, and the dressing on his chest, which Sango had changed less than an hour ago, was already soaked through with blood.
Kagome was pressing her fists against his chest slowly and rhythmically, paused a moment, leaned her ear to Miroku's face to check his breathing, and then – kissed him?
Sango stared in shock as Kagome pinched Miroku's nose and held her mouth over his.
Suddenly, realization struck: She was breathing for him, forcing air into his lungs.
Miroku tried to do the same to me, shortly after we met, when I was nearly drowned by the false water god. He was trying to save my life, and I just hit him.
Kagome leaned back, pressed Miroku's chest five more times, and then leaned back to search through her first aid kit.
"Aspirin, bandages, gauze, penicillin . . . why didn't I ever steal some fucking atropine?"
Screaming, eyes shut with tears and rage, Kagome picked up the entire box and threw it over Sango's head. It struck the rock wall behind her with a metallic clang, knocking loose the lid and littering the inside of the cave with its contents.
Sango could have strangled her for doing such a useless thing.
"Keep doing it, whatever you're doing," Sango barked.
"I can't," Kagome cried. "I can't keep him alive for more than a minute or two without the right drugs, and I don't have anything strong enough!"
Sango pointed at the hanyou that was standing nearby, who would have been feigning ambivalence except for the way he watched the scene out one eye and the manner in which one foot was trembling.
"Then tell Inuyasha what medicines to get and he'll look for them. You and I will keep Houshi-sama breathing."
"Sango-chan, I don't know what sort of plants…"
Sango slapped Kagome across the face.
"Then guess!"
Kagome opened her eyes, staring at Sango in shock. A trickle of blood dripped from the corner of her mouth.
For a second, there was nothing – not a sound. Sango's open hand hung motionless before her, at the end of an arc that included Kagome's cheek.
"Oi, Sango," Inuyasha shouted gruffly. "You're a youkai taiji-ya. If you're looking to get out some aggressions, you come to me."
Sango stared at Inuyasha, her face a cacophony of surprise and rage.
"You know how good my sense of smell is," Inuyasha said. "It's too late."
"Too late," Sango whispered. She got to her feet.
"Too late! Inuyasha, how long?"
"Ah…"
"How long has he been dead?"
Sango dashed to where Inuyasha stood, grabbing at the collar of his coat.
"He died a few minutes ago," Inuyasha said flatly.
"Before I got here?"
Inuyasha stared back at her, but said nothing.
"Did Houshi-sama die because I left him?"
"He died in his sleep, Sango," Inuyasha said, in perhaps the most compassionate tone she had ever heard from his mouth. "He didn't cry out for you, he didn't struggle or scream. He just passed on quietly, a minute after we sent Shippou to find you. He would never have known if you were there or not. You heard his last words earlier tonight, Sango. He wanted nothing more from you, and I think you know it."
Sango slid to her knees, one hand holding a leg of Inuyasha's hakama to keep from falling over.
Slowly, wobbling on her feet, bracing herself on Inuyasha's extended arm, Sango stood and walked to Miroku.
Not Miroku anymore; it's Miroku's body.
I killed him. He's dead and it's all my fault.
She hugged him, pressing her face to his shoulder, staining her chest and hair with his blood, begging his hand to reach up and caress her, for how often had she sat beside him while he was deathly ill and he had done the same thing as this?
This time it's different.
"Houshi-sama," she gasped. She leaned close to his face and whispered in his ear, quiet enough that she hoped no one else could hear.
"I'm so sorry. Sorry for holding back from you, for hiding my feelings. For caring for you – even loving you – and keeping it secret. For losing patience with you. For being jealous, when you flirted with other girls, and turning you down whenever you came to me instead."
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you this before. Please forgive me."
She thought of the many times she had been saved by him, of the times she had fought and been lax, and Miroku had pushed her free of the sharp claws of a youkai, or had opened up his Kazzana to a swarm of poison. He had been hurt so badly so many times for her. She knew this would happen some day. She knew some day she would be leaning over him like this, holding him, and know the wound was too deep, the poison too strong, the strike too powerful. One day she knew she would hold him and the blood would never stop flowing, and she would feel his last breath on her face. Or not feel it at all.
"I'll give you a child," she whispered, so softly she might have only been mouthing the words. "I'd give you anything if you came back to me. I need you, Miroku. Don't leave me. Not now."
Kagome's hand was on her shoulder now, but both it and her own body felt a world away. Only vaguely did she hear Shippou crying Miroku's name, or Inuyasha cursing under his breath, or feel Kirara rubbing her hand sympathetically.
"We need to bury him," Sango said. "A pyre would destroy the rosary and unleash the Kazaana." She touched his face with gentle fingers. "He wanted to die this way, I think. Not in a void, but with his friends around him." She brought her hand away, studying it. "I don't know how I know that. He never told me, but . . ." She bit her lip. "I can't believe I killed him."
"Sango-chan," Kagome said.
"He told me he would fight Asesu, in his mind, and that he might sacrifice his life to stop him. He died for us. But . . . if I hadn't hurt him . . . he might not have needed to."
"It's alright, Sango-chan," Kagome said.
Sango leaned back from him, hands spread before her, again red with his blood.
"I . . . I left my armor at the river."
"I can go get it," Kagome said quietly.
"No, I'll go. I'm wearing his blood again. I need to wash."
"Then I'll go with you."
"I didn't mean to hit you, Kagome-chan."
"I know. Don't worry about it."
Sango nodded and, with Kagome's help, stood and walked back to the river. Kirara followed them, her nose and tails trailing the ground.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Inuyasha watched them go. Only after they had left his field of vision did he approach the houshi.
"How dare you die on us," he growled.
Inuyasha kneeled beside the body, finding his youkai senses a curse as the scent of Miroku and death filled his nostrils.
"Bastard."
He untied the knot on his kesa and slid it off from around his body, then unfolded it beside him.
"I've buried a lot of humans since we teamed up, but I never expected you to be one of them."
He rolled Miroku atop his kesa and began to wrap him with some rawhide strips Sango had left near where she had been sitting.
"And to say those things to Sango . . .how could you do that? How dare you bring her so close to you and hurt her like this?" He clenched his fists, his claws digging into his palms. "You're a human, so you know how fragile humans can be. If you care for one, and you can't be sure you'll be able to live for her, then you should know well enough to keep your damned mouth shut!"
Shippou, crying loud enough to have missed this monologue, had taken to the medical supplies Kagome had scattered and was putting them away in the dented-but-still-functional metal box.
"Inyuasha," he asked, "What are we going to do?"
Inuyasha tied the last strap around Miroku and stood up. "We bury him, have a funeral, and we go on our way."
"How can you be so cold, Inuyasha? We can't keep going now!"
"What, should we just go back to Kaede and cry? Will Naraku wait for us to come to him? Or will he simply become more powerful and come after us himself?"
Inuyasha kneeled down and, hesitating for a moment, placed a hand on Shippou's head.
"Look, we'll slow down a little, give ourselves some time to lick our wounds. But we'll keep going, and soon we'll be traveling as we used to be. We'll track down Naraku and defeat him. We won't forget Miroku, and we won't let his sacrifice go to waste by giving up. Understand?"
Shippou nodded, closing Kagome's first-aid box in his hands. Inuyasha stood, looking around.
"Will you be alright by yourself for a while?"
Shippou nodded. "I sort of want a few minutes to talk to him alone."
"Then you'll have your time. Kagome and Sango won't be gone long. I'll see your foxfire if there's any trouble."
Feet digging into the ground, Inuyasha ran off, leaving a thin trail of a dust cloud.
Shippou leaned over the bundled Miroku with hands clasped. But the thoughts in his head were jumbled, disjointed, and before he could think of anything to say his youkai ears faintly picked up the sound of cursing, screaming, the inhuman howls and bays of a sorrowful, vengeful inu-youkai, the crash of splintering wood, and the cacophony of the ageless trees tearing through their neighbors and crashing into the underbrush.
Shippou smiled inwardly, despite his tears.
I am not a lone youkai in my grief, for that is how Inuyasha cries.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Kagome tried very hard not to stare at the pink trails that came from Sango's yukata when she dipped it into the river, or the taiji-ya that sat in the shallows upstream with her knees pulled up to her chest.
"Sango-chan," she called out softly. "Sango-chan, you'll catch cold if you stay there."
Sango turned to her slowly. Her eyes were still dry, though distant. She stared at Kagome for a moment, as if she did not recognize her, then stood, pulled her long hair over one shoulder, and squeezed the water from it with her hands.
Sango picked up the towels Kagome had brought her and dried herself, then stepped into her black uniform. Her face betrayed no discomfort even as she pulled the damp clothing over her naked flesh and fastened it. As if by habit, she pulled on the remainder of the uniform – her armor, her boots, her sash. But as she reached into her bundle to pick up her short sword – the sword that was wiped clean of Miroku's lifeblood only a day before – she recoiled as if burned.
Sango made a fist and turned away, then sat on a rock several feet above the waterline and tied up her hair. As she finished the knot, Kirara padded over to her and placed her head on Sango's lap. Sango absently brushed the neko-youkai between the ears.
Kagome wrung out the yukata in her hands and shook it out. She suppressed a smile. Her detergent had worked; the bloodstains were gone. One thing went right today.
The pettiness of such a concern hit her like a truck, and as she folded the clothing in her arms it took all her willpower not to burst into tears.
"Your yukata," she said, her voice strained. "It's cleaned, good as new. We should bring it back to camp to dry."
"Thank you, Kagome-chan."
Kagome pulled herself up to a rock, dried her feet with the crumpled towel Sango had left, and put on her shoes and socks. She then picked up the bottle of detergent, her towels, and Sango's yukata, leapt to the bank, and stuffed them into her already-bulging backpack.
"Are you coming, Sango-chan?"
"I'll return soon."
"Is it safe to be here alone?"
Sango nodded almost imperceptibly. Still she continued facing east, across the river, to the coming sunrise.
"Asesu is dead. Had Houshi-sama not succeeded, that thing would have taken over me a long time ago."
"And the other youkai in this area?"
Sango scratched her neko-youkai beneath the chin, eliciting a satisfied purr.
"Whenever I was weak, Kirara has protected me. I'm safe with her."
Kagome turned.
"Bring my wakizashi with you, Kagome-chan."
Kagome nodded, bent down to pick up the sword by its plain but functional wooden scabbard, and carried it with her. She could read Sango's intent in her voice:
Bring my wakizashi with you, Kagome-chan, lest I join Houshi-sama this morning.
Protect me from myself. From my loneliness, my depression, my desperation.
She walked slowly, wanting to stay near but knowing Sango would not allow it. As she crossed into the trees she could hear Sango speaking, though she could not discern the words, and knew they were not intended for her.
As Kagome left her friend, echoes of pained, tear-stricken words she shared with her brother Kohaku, relayed to her by Inuyasha not long ago, echoed in her mind:
"I will kill you, and I will die too. It's the only way I can get you back from Naraku."
Sango-chan, Kagome thought, I know you aren't afraid to take your life. But please come back to us. I could never forgive you if you didn't.
Chapter completed 20 July 2003