Hi. New chapter time. I feel like my writing abilities have gone down again. Every so often, I go into a slump, and this feels like one of them. So I'm preemptively sorry if the story sucks. It's a lot longer than my average chapter, at about 9 pages long. It details...well, just read the blankety thing.
Oh yeah. Since nobody went to the previous chapter to see the changes (or nobody cared) I'll just put them here, for convenience. Here's the intro change:
'*Sob* *Choke* *Sniff* Sorry for all the emotional stuff, but I've finally broken that barrier...100,000 WORDS!!! I did it! I never thought it would be this long but it is! 100,000 words! That's enough for a book! I don't believe it...I honestly do not believe it...Out of 16,873 stories on Inuyasha on ff.net, mine is only one of 41 that broke that accursed barrier. *Tears stream down face* I actually did it! And I'd like to thank those who have been reviewing since the beginning: Kai19 (without whom I would have much less inspiration to keep writing), hersheykiss1012, cinnamin girl, AssassinReiX, and Jou-chan/kitsune-chan/shiro-okami (keeps changing her gol'darn name!). All of you have been instrumental in keeping me working on this project. And I'd also like to extend a big thanks to ALL my reviewers; past, present, and future; because without you, this story would never have sprung from my mind.'
And the story edit:
'"'Marcus!' I cried. 'Spare her! Put me in her place! She is innocent of any crime. I am the one you want. Take me and let her go!' Marcus looked at me, not saying a word. His eyes said enough, filled with malice and contempt. With a single swing of his sword he cut the rope holding up the floor under Maria.
"Maria...my beautiful Maria...died before my eyes."
The General stopped for some minutes, not speaking. Inuyasha glanced at Tobias, and saw that he was looking at something in his palm, with a mingled look of shock and horror. As soon as he noticed Inuyasha looking at him, he hurriedly closed his palm and deposited whatever it was into his pocket. The General, who after all missed nothing, saw this gesture and what he had held. His eyes widened slightly, then the corners of his mouth twitched.
"That..." he said slowly, "would explain an awful lot. But I must continue." He looked at Tobias again, rather pointedly. "It is not altogether unlike your story recalling me and Marcus later on...only the outcome of my memory is a bit better. But the interesting part has not yet come up.'
Time to respond to reviews.
Kai19: Glad I finally got to see your review. Stupid ff.net...grumble grumble... * You're dead-on about Inuyasha. As usual. I swear, I'm not just taking your ideas and passing them off as my own. I really came up with these myself. You're just THAT good at interpreting foreshadowing. * At the severe risk of repeating myself, you've judged that demon extremely well. Read on to see! * Get some sleep. It's not healthy to be up at 1:00 in the morning, even when reading my story. ^_^
Ryguy5387: You feel my pain!
Cerulean: More happiness for everyone indeed. Including me.
DemonSorceress: I know. It sucks when you're reading a gripping story and the author just abandons it partway through. I won't make the same mistake.
AssassinReiX: That's pretty much everyone's reaction, to Kikyo in this fic. Everyone seems to dislike her, even without my help. But...you may change your tune in just one or two chapters...
hersheykiss1012: I know nobody likes Kikyo. But who else would I use? I don't think I'm THAT predictable...but who else would I use under the circumstances? You have a point...
Also, one important detail I must point out. This story is really gloomy-and-doomy lately. I know about that. Rest assured, that despite the cliffhangers (cough), it'll lighten up in just a few chapters. I'm getting tired of writing gloom and doom.
Also, one OTHER important detail I must point out. This story is beginning to wind down. I'd say we are in the last third of the story. Twenty or twenty-five more chapters, and it just might end. I know, it's shocking, but there IS a definite conclusion to the story. Oh, that reminds me. STORY!
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Chapter 45: Lessons, Treachery, And Desire
"So what you're saying is, I'll be able to detect people's...auras? Is that like reading their mind?" Kagome asked. Kikyo had explained and demonstrated for about an hour, but Kagome still didn't entirely understand. There was far too much mysticism in this priestess business. Kagome had reconciled her and Kikyo's temporary truce. What else were they to do? They were both, essentially, prisoners of the General and subject to his will.
"Yes and no," said Kikyo dryly. "You can't just read someone's mind. It's far too complex. It's...it's sort of complicated. You'll be able to pick up on their personality, and some of their surface thoughts, and maybe even some memories. Of course, knowing you, that won't come for a while." Kikyo smirked. Kagome glared.
"Try it. I've shown you how enough times." Kikyo took two shards from the small pile and gave them to Kagome. Kagome concentrated, like Kikyo had told her. She could already sense the power of the Shikon shards; she had been able to do that for years. But there was no sense of anything else, no sense of an 'aura'. Kagome gritted her teeth and strained, her vision darkening and her grip clenching.
"Stop!" commanded Kikyo. Kagome let out a breath and put down. "That's not the way to do it. You'll burst a blood vessel in your brain if you try it that way. Concentrating harder isn't the way to find the aura of the shards. You have to do it a different way. Like this." Kikyo closed her eyes and became perfectly still.
After about thirty seconds of silence, Kagome began to get uncomfortable. What is she doing? She doesn't look like she's doing anything... Kagome thought.
"I may not look like it, Kagome, but I am reading your aura right now," responded Kikyo. Kagome was shocked. So she really would be able to read other people's minds!
"I can hear your surface thoughts, but anything other than that is impossible," said Kikyo in an eerie monotone. "You are radiating purity and goodness, like any miko should. Except..." Without opening her eyes, Kikyo moved her hand right over Kagome's shoulder, right where her mating mark was. "I sense something...right there..." Kagome flushed a little and pulled away. Kikyo opened her eyes.
"What is it?" she asked.
"It's just...an injury, I'm trying to get over. We were attacked just a few days ago and I got hurt kind of badly..." Kagome lied. Evidently, Kikyo was convinced. "Kikyo?" Kagome said. "If you can read auras, why can't you reunite the shards?"
Kikyo gave Kagome a severe look. "I lost some of my abilities when I died," she said, with aggravation tingeing her voice. "I can still heal, and destroy demons, but I can no longer purify shards of the jewel...not that they need purification," she added. "The General purified Naraku's shards already, and yours were already pure. I cannot reunite the shards of the jewel. That power lies in you alone."
Kagome thought for a minute. "How did the General purify Naraku's shards? I thought only I could do that!"
"No, only you can reunite them. Any miko who is powerful enough can purify them. There aren't many of those left, but apparently the General found one." Kikyo smirked again. "And convinced her." Kagome glared at Kikyo again.
"You obviously have no clue what you're doing. Let me show you. First, you have to clear your mind..." Kikyo began going over the necessary steps.
Many, many miles away; Inuyasha was alone. Well, not quite. He was separated from the group, and was engaged in a furious battle with a massive snake demon. As he slashed at it again and again with Tetsusaiga, all he could think about was taking out his frustration and fury on anything he could. He had been purposely searching out fights all day. He hacked one of its teeth out and grimaced as its poisonous tail lashed at him in return.
Inuyasha moved in for the kill, but the demon moved faster. Somehow, it brought its formidable strength to bear and hurled itself through the air right at Inuyasha. Inuyasha was stunned by the ferocious impact and hurled against a wall.
Tetsusaiga flew from his hands and clattered to the ground.
Inuyasha stood, breathing heavily. My mate...my mate is gone...I have to find her...have to find my MATE!!! He raised his head and howled as his demon blood surged through his veins. Stripes appeared on his face as his full-demon side, previously locked away by Tetsusaiga, came roaring out to find Kagome.
He ripped the snake demon to shreds and leaped away. Tetsusaiga lay forgotten on the ground.
"That is all I can teach you today," said Kikyo. They had been trying for hours and hours, and Kagome was beginning to get it. She had been able to pick up a slight energy surrounding the shards. Kikyo had said it was a good start, but that there was much left to do. "I will come back first thing in the morning." She got up and began to walk away, but stopped and turned back. "One last thing." Kikyo gathered up the shards and put them in a pocket of her robes. "I must return these to the General. Suffice it to say that he does not trust you with them. From what I understand, he thinks you will try and run off with them, or some such thing." She left.
A few minutes later, a demon (thankfully not the one that had a grudge against her) brought her some food. Kagome picked at it, her mind not at all on the meal in front of her. If I reunite the shards, the General will become so powerful that not even Tobias or the others can stop him; and he'll kill all of us. If I don't, he'll kill me anyway. And I'll never see Inuyasha again... As soon as she thought Inuyasha's name, a very faint echo went through her mind, and her mating mark seemed to pulse slightly. She stopped, confused.
"What is this?" she said aloud. "Inuyasha?" There it was again. An echo, and she could have sworn she heard Inuyasha's voice in her head. Maybe...what I learned today... She tried calling out to Inuyasha in her mind. She felt a very slight flicker, as if someone had quietly whispered something into her ear.
Kagome thought back to something Sango had said to her a few weeks, when they had come across a mated pair of demons: "Demons are very closely bonded to their mates. When a pair of demons mates, at first they are just connected normally. But as time goes by, the connection grows immeasurably strong. They can feel each other's emotions and sense each other's presence. It is as if the two demons join to form one soul, which is shared between both of them." At this point, she had smiled slightly, and turned to Kagome. "It was said once that when a demon and a priestess were mated, their bond would be such that they would even be aware of each other's thoughts. You might do that with Inuyasha someday, Kagome. But I think it'll be a while before that happens."
Perhaps enough time had gone by that Kagome's connection to Inuyasha had become even stronger than before. And the aura-sensing I learned today must have awakened that ability! Kagome thought excitedly. She called out to Inuyasha in her mind, mentally shouting his name, over and over, trying to somehow get his attention, however far away he was.
Inuyasha stirred. He perked his head up. He had just heard Kagome's voice. He whirled left and right, trying to find where it had come from. He heard her cry out his name, anguished; begging him to come back to her. Her voice pulsed in his mind, and he pointed his head in the direction it had come from. Inuyasha ran off in that direction, faster than he had ever moved in his life.
Kagome, oddly, was exhausted. Just doing that one small thing seemed to have sapped her energy. She tried again, but could not muster the energy needed for another try. All she could do now was wait and hope, hope that he would come to her.
She felt very hungry all of a sudden and began to eat her dinner. But as soon as she took her first bite, she tasted something different. The rice was...bitter. Kagome swallowed and gagged. There was definitely something funny about this food. It wasn't like this before. There was something different.
Kagome got up, surprised at the effort it took to even stand. She had lost more energy than she thought with her efforts to contact Inuyasha. She opened the door and walked, a little unsteadily, over to what she sincerely hoped was the General's main room. She knocked faintly.
Seven seconds later, the General opened the door. He had a hint of a scowl on his face. Kagome saw something glowing in the room behind him, but she had no time to tell what it was before the General shut the door.
"What is it this time?" he said.
"There's...there's something wrong with my dinner," Kagome said, a little embarrassed to be interrupting him for such a petty thing.
"What? Has it not arrived? As soon as I see that demon again, I shall-"
"No," Kagome interrupted, "it's here, but there's something strange about it. It tastes kind of bitter." The General raised an eyebrow.
"Let me see," he said dryly. He walked over to her room, Kagome close behind. He picked up her bowl and tasted it. The General thought for a second, then took the bowl into the hallway. He hurled it down the corridor, and it flew out the window and outside. The General returned into the room.
"Poison," he said quietly. Kagome gasped. "Someone wants you dead, Kagome. Obviously we have a traitor in our midst. It must be the cook, I will have his head." The General started to leave.
"No!" said Kagome sharply. The General stopped and turned his head back. "I don't think it's the cook," Kagome continued faintly. "I think it's that demon who was in charge of serving me."
"Him? No. He is a very loyal servant. It would not be him. It must be somebody else." The General opened the door.
"I really think it was him. I mean, did you see the way he looked at me? It looked like he wanted to kill me!" said Kagome shrilly.
"If I did not see it, I cannot make judgements based upon it. He is a trusted servant. You are just some silly girl. I trust him more than you, even if he does alter my orders occasionally." The General left, and shut the door behind him.
The next morning, the General accompanied the demon that brought Kagome her breakfast. He tasted it, then put it down, evidently satisfied. The demon bowed to the General and left. The General himself was about to leave when a breathless demon in robes came running up to him, right outside Kagome's doorway.
"My lord," he gasped. "The inu-hanyou is coming. Inuyasha. He has discovered our location and will be here in approximately twenty minutes." Kagome felt a surge of hope and joy that seemed to flood her whole body. He heard me! He came!
"What?" said the General sharply. "Impossible. Not eight hours ago, he was five hundred miles away." The demon repeated his statement. The General glanced toward Kagome before looking out the small window at the end of the hallway.
"I have never seen a creature move so fast on foot," he said, with a touch of awe in his voice. "Not even the boy." The General seemed to regain his composure (A/N: What's to regain?) and turned to the demon.
"Get Kikyo in here in thirty minutes. I will intercept Inuyasha. He cannot discover our whereabouts." The demon bowed and left. The General muttered something to himself and walked out also.
Inuyasha burst into a clearing. He was close to his mate, he knew it. And nothing and nobody was going to stand in his way. If any people tried, he'd just rip them apart. That thought made him give a feral grin. He bounded along, but stopped suddenly. There was a new threat. He could smell it.
"Inuyasha, I presume," said the General. He stepped in front of Inuyasha, blocking his path. "And yet not Inuyasha? I sense there is something significantly different about you..." His gaze moved to the stripes on Inuyasha's face and the red glint to his eyes. "You are different somehow. And your sword is no longer with you." The General's eyebrows creased a bit. "Now what was it that happened when you lost your sword?" His expression returned to normal. "Oh, yes. You become a full-demon."
"Shut up," growled Inuyasha. "Get out of way. I need my mate."
"I would have guessed that it was something about that. Why else would you be so motivated? And why else would you lose seventy-five percent of your vocabulary?" The General walked up to Inuyasha until they were almost touching. He spoke in a low whisper. "But you cannot go any further. Leave now, or I shall make you leave."
With astonishing speed, Inuyasha raked his claws across the General's face. The General, though expecting an attack, was caught slightly off guard and stumbled a bit. Inuyasha leaped over his head and charged, but did not get two steps before the General had recovered. The other man smashed Inuyasha on the head with the flat of his blade. The blow would have been enough to kill a man, but Inuyasha barely felt it as he plunged into battle with a roar.
They traded blows for a few minutes, but the General was inevitably going to win. He was stronger and faster by far; and without his sword, Inuyasha was much less effective against another swordsman. The General dodged Inuyasha's claws, ducked low, and smashed a powerful punch to Inuyasha's chest. Inuyasha howled as he felt his ribs shatter under the impact. The General whirled around and knocked Inuyasha off his feet with one solid blow. As Inuyasha struggled to get back up, the General was upon him again.
With a sickening sound, the General skewered Inuyasha through the chest with his sword. Groaning, Inuyasha lay still. The General pulled his sword out and picked up Inuyasha by his throat.
"If I am lucky, then you will not remember anything you experienced in your full-demon state. So it is only necessary to relocate you, further away." The General lifted Inuyasha over his shoulder and looked into the distance. There was a fairly obvious path of destruction through the normally tranquil forest. "Your route, I assume? Following this may yet lead me to your sword..." He glowed blue, and they both vanished.
After several attempts, the General finally happened upon the ruins of the snake demon and Tetsusaiga. After securing it in Inuyasha's sheath, the General dumped Inuyasha in a clearing. He watched as the demon blood receded and Inuyasha once more became a hanyou. The stress of the battle and his transformation caused Inuyasha to lose consciousness completely. The General nodded slightly and teleported away.
A week passed. Inuyasha had found the group again, after a few days of searching, and they traveled together in a sullen silence. What were they to do? Inuyasha remembered nothing of his sojourn as a full demon, and they had no way to find Kagome. But this did not stop Inuyasha from trying to find her. Tobias claimed that attacking the General was suicide, but Inuyasha would have none of it. So they searched for any trace of the General's whereabouts. They had little luck; as any creature that encountered the General usually died shortly thereafter.
Kagome had caught on quickly to detecting auras. At the evening of the seventh day, she had succeeded in detecting the auras of several objects and small creatures Kikyo had hidden around the room, and describing them in detail. I'm not telling ANYONE this, but even if I do learn auras, I'm not reuniting the shards! thought Kagome fiercely as Kikyo reviewed the day's instructions. He'll kill everyone he can find, and he'll find EVERYONE!
"Very good," said Kikyo, and she sounded genuinely impressed. "You have learned much. I am certain that in the morning, you should be ready to try and reunite the jewel shards. Your progress is fast but not entirely surprising...you are coming into your miko powers, and you can learn things very quickly now. I will see you in the morning." She gathered up the jewel shards and left. "You should practice," she called out.
Kagome began to concentrate. Building up her miko powers was important to her; if not for the General's advantage, then for hers. She began to 'see' the auras in the room. There were some fleas in the corner and a spiderweb over the doorway. Kagome could sense the life of these creatures. This is still kind of strange... she thought to herself. But I have to learn how, if I'm EVER going to put the jewel together. After the General's been dealt with.
The door swung open, and the General walked in. Kagome turned her attention to him. She was concentrating so fiercely that she inadvertently began to read the General's aura.
Kagome hadn't made a worse mistake in years. As soon as she got a glimpse of his aura, Kagome was struck by it.
Evil.
Sheer, all-consuming, evil. Waves of immeasurable evil radiated from him so powerfully, it would have stunned Naraku. He delighted in causing pain, torture, death. Kagome had never felt anything like this before and prayed never to again. The unbelievable force of his evil struck her as hard as a physical blow. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she fainted. She collapsed to the floor, twitching and jerking as if having a seizure.
The General's eyes widened and he took in a sharp breath. "Kikyo," he said. "Get here – now." Kikyo had never heard him put so much emotion into one word before. She raced to the doorway and shrieked at Kagome's prone form.
"What have you done to her?" said the General in a dangerous voice.
"I did nothing!" cried Kikyo. "I merely took the shards and left, as I have done always!"
"Do not lie to me, Kikyo!" said the General harshly. "I walked in, and she took one look at me and collapsed. I did nothing. You must have done something."
"I swear it! I swear I did nothing to her!" shouted Kikyo. She was terrified. The General could kill her with an extravagant gesture, and he looked angrier than she had ever seen him before. "I swear, by the spirit of the Shikon no Tama, that I did not cause her to do this! I do not know what happened!"
The General said nothing. He stared at Kagome. She had recovered a little, and was blinking. The force of the General's aura had left her with a throbbing headache and blurry vision. Kagome was still incredulous as to how one man could possibly contain such evil in his heart, and yet contain it under an appearance of such calm. She struggled to her feet.
"Are you all right?" said the General quietly. "You do not look well. Are you ill?"
"No...I...I don't know," lied Kagome. What can I say? That I read his mind and was overwhelmed? "I guess...I just put a little too much effort into practicing today." The General did not seem convinced.
"Do not leave the room or attempt anything strenuous. I will return shortly, and try to figure out what has happened." He swept out, taking Kikyo with him.
They rounded the corner and nearly bumped into a demon. He was the one who had threatened Kagome back in the servants' room. He snapped into a salute.
"My lord," he said. "Inuyasha is back." The General nearly grimaced. "But he is not alone. He appears to be following something. Our scouts cannot identify it, but describe it as wispy and ethereal, like a ghost." Kikyo took in a quick breath. One of my soul stealers... Neither her nor the General noticed the small grin on the demon's face.
"General," Kikyo said quickly. "I must attend to Kagome. I realize now what the problem is." She hurried away without waiting for the General's consent. The General watched her leave, then turned back to the demon.
"I cannot go out again. We will have to send out troops in my stead. Write this down." The demon produced a sheet of parchment and a quill and started copying. The General rapped out orders in efficient military style.
"Send thirty archers, Inuyasha has no distance weapons. Try to keep him afar. Include ten berserkers and order them to disarm him. As long as he has his sword with him, you are all in danger. He has a sword technique known as the Kaze no Kizu which can destroy many demons in one swing. Include five ice elites, they are unaffected by his power. Tell them to subdue him somehow, and include some demon blood tranquilizer to keep him down once they knock him out. Do not kill him. Be off." The demon left. As he turned away, he snickered to himself.
"He thinks he's so smart," he sniggered. "But I've outsmarted them all." He continued to giggle to himself as he went down the hallways.
Kikyo ran into Kagome's room and slammed the door.
"Kikyo!" said Kagome faintly. "I was-"
"I don't care," snapped Kikyo. "I have things to do. I can't let you or even the General interfere. This is important." She waved her hand and muttered some words. The far wall began to glow. She walked into the wall and vanished.
Half a second later, the General opened the door. A quick glance told him that Kagome was alone.
"Where is Kikyo?" he said calmly.
"I...I don't know," said Kagome, a little shakily. Her fear of the General was reaffirmed in the face of this new truth about him. "She kind of...vanished." Kagome gestured vaguely towards the wall. "She walked into the wall and-"
"A dimension door," murmured the General. "Nothing seems to be working out lately." He looked at Kagome. "Fortunately, I have a backup plan for just such an eventuality. I lined up another miko to teach you, in case something should happen to Kikyo. I will call her, and she will be here sometime tomorrow." He glanced at the floor where Kagome had fallen. "In the meantime, get some sleep. If you are as overexerted as you say, you should have plenty of rest before undertaking any more activity." He swept out of the room.
Later that night, Kagome was asleep. She really WAS tired after such a jarring experience. She turned over in the bed and mumbled something unintelligible.
She never noticed the door open, so quietly that even Inuyasha would have trouble hearing it. A dark figure slunk into the room. It closed the door even more softly than it had opened it, and crept over to Kagome's bedside. With one swift movement, it pinned Kagome to the bed and covered her mouth roughly.
Kagome came awake sharply, to the feeling of a heavy body on top of her. She tried to scream, but her mouth was covered.
"Bitch," a voice growled. Trembling, Kagome recognized it as the demon who had scorned her. "They all think they're so smart. But I outsmarted them all. Inuyasha hadn't really come. That was just to get rid of Kikyo." He clenched her tighter to him. "And now I have you...all to myself."
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Cliffhanger. I know. Please don't hunt me down and lay siege to my house with an army of pitchfork-and-torch wielding angry fangirls. (Great, now you've given them an idea.) Ahem. Just REVIEW, and try and repress the homicidal urges. If my house burns down, how will I ever finish writing the story? REVIEW!