A/N: Hello! I'm back! Gomen for the long update. Writer's block... too much
schoolwork... eh... need I say more?
Anyway, here's the next chap! Please read and review! Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
-----/---@
ENCHANTED DAWN
The Four Pendants
-----/---@
"Kaede... where is Kagome?" he asked, a feeling of dread crawling through him as he simultaneously noticed his naked state, Kagome's discarded robes and the charm that hung around the blue/gray eyed cat's neck.
Kaede looked sad, confirming his own suspicions. "Inuyasha... THAT," she said, pointing to the cat, "Is Kagome."
-----/---@
"What are you talking about? How could that cat be my Kagome?! Baabaa! Answer me ima sugu ni!" Inuyasha demanded of his caretaker. "I want to know... What happened to her?"
Kaede looked forlorn, hardly daring to meet his eyes. "You have been cursed, Inuyasha," she said softly, watching his amber eyes widen in surprise. She threw him his fire rat kimono, and turned to give him privacy as he dressed.
Inuyasha looked at the cat in his arms. She was shivering in the harsh early morning cold, and Inuyasha didn't want to believe that this cat truly WAS Kagome. But something in him just told him that no matter how much he refused to believe it, this cat was his love. The cat's eyes said it all...
'Why a cat? Gods... of all the animals on the planet!' he grumped, not knowing whether he should put her down and let the curious cat watch him dress or to push her off to go to Kaede. He stroked her sleek fur one more time before gently putting her down.
"Oi... um, neko... Kag-chan?" he said hesitantly. "Go to Kaede..." he said softly, pushing the feline towards where the old lady was. She didn't budge. "Oi! Do you seriously want to watch me dress up?"
The cat simply purred and stared at him. Kaede snickered.
"Oh, man! Don't do this to me!" he nearly wailed. He stood up, dragging the green hakama, which still lay on his lap, with him. "I can't dress up with you watching! You made me promise! No naked activities until we're married!"
Kaede snorted loudly. "Inuyasha, she's a cat..."
"But she's still Kagome!"
"I know, idiot! What I'm trying to say is that she now has the mind of a cat as well!" Kaede said in exasperation. "Now dress up so I can tell you what happened! I can't talk to a naked man, you know!"
Inuyasha grumbled before dropping Kagome's hakama to his feet, blushing as he exposed himself to the cat. Kagome just stared at him, twitching her nose, as he dressed hurriedly.
"Oi, I'm decent," he called once he was dressed, taking the cat into his lap again. Kaede slowly faced them both, looking forlorn as she proceeded to tell him about her suspicions regarding the curse. When she finished, Inuyasha was all but smoking in fury.
"Fuck Naraku," Inuyasha said slowly. "Why did he have to do this?! He is such a fucking sore loser!"
"I believe his 'love' for Kagome is selfish enough to make him do such a vile thing," Kaede groused. "But I know just what we need to do to get you out of this..."
"I know what you're thinking, baabaa, and I'm telling you now, it's impossible!" Inuyasha said, staring at Kagome as she snuggled into his lap. "The Shikon no Tama does not exist, baabaa. It's a fucking legend!"
"It is NOT a legend, Inuyasha!" Kaede said. "Kagome had agreed to search for it, if ever. Or rather, for the pieces of it."
Inuyasha looked murderous. "Even if the damn thing was real, Kaede, it's scattered all around Japan. What the hell am I supposed to do, sniff around for it?"
"No. But have you ever taken a good look at the pendants that you and Kagome now wear?" Kaede asked. "You remember, that those were passed down to you by your father and mother?"
Inuyasha nodded.
Kaede reached down and clasped Inuyasha's pendant in her hand. She then turned the round orb and showed Inuyasha a seemingly cracked part of the pendant. He raised his eyebrows at her. "What? It's a defect. I noticed it when I dug those things up to give one to Kagome. Both pendants are cracked."
Wordlessly, the old woman pressed her thumb against the crack, and Inuyasha watched as the pendant slowly split into two. The pendant gradually separated evenly, and Inuyasha realized that the inside was hollow...
And inside it was a single, sparkling pink shard.
"What the hell?!" Inuyasha exclaimed as he bent to pick at the strange shard. It was obviously a part of a jewel, shining brightly in the early morning light. Even Kagome raised her head from its comfortable position on his lap to look at the intriguing gem. "Is that..."
"The Shikon no Tama. One of its many shards. Another shard is within Kagome's necklace. Your father had forged these two pendants as a vault for the shards, and only those who bore pure reiryoku, or those descended from him, can open this necklace," Kaede explained.
"But... why would he put it here?" Inuyasha asked, taking the gem into the palm of his hand. The shard continued to glow and pulse lightly as he held it.
"I believe that your pendant may serve as a guide in searching for the missing pieces. Your father had never been very much interested in the Shikon no Tama, but he was aware of its powers. He wouldn't have wanted for it to fall into the wrong hands."
Inuyasha could barely believe it. The Shikon no Tama... was for real?
"Do you really think that this Shikon no Tama can help me and Kagome?" he asked slowly. "Is this what could break the curse?"
Kaede nodded.
'Anything for Kagome...' Inuyasha thought, his gaze narrowing slightly as he looked upon the cat form of his love, remembering that it had all been Naraku's doing.
"I'll do it."
-----/---@
"Hiraikotsu!"
The giant boomerang swiftly sliced through the trees that had been unfortunate enough to have been selected as the day's target practice. Sango took a stance as she waited for her oversized weapon to whirl its way back to her, and when it did, she jumped up slightly to catch it in mid air.
She had stopped fighting two years ago... that fateful day when her entire village was annihilated by a horde of youkai, and her father had made her promise, with his dying breath, to never seek vengeance, to never go against another youkai for as long as she lived. Sango had tearfully sworn to live a normal life, but the anger at the sudden loss was still within her, and it was hard to keep her word whenever a youkai, no matter how small, happened to be around. She never intended to use her weapon again, but somehow, the urge to never lose her touch was overwhelming enough to spur her to secretly practice herself every morning.
She looked up at the brightening sun. She had only a few minutes left before the monastery she served called upon her. The shrine had taken her in after they had found her broken in the middle of the forest, and its inhabitants had since been her family.
She sighed as she picked herself up and headed back for the shrine. She clutched tightly at the pendant that her father had given her on her fifteenth birthday as an heirloom. He had told her to never lose it... that it was important. Something about a jewel. 'As if I ever would,' she thought. He had never been given the chance to tell her how important it was though...
She brushed back her long bangs as she climbed the heavy staircase. Being the only woman in a monastery had its downs. She was of course, expected to do the cooking. And the washing. And the sweeping...
She hiked up to her room first of all, to stash away the gargantuan boomerang. She grinned as she picked up her usual hair tie, pulling her hair back into a low ponytail. Time to get to work.
-----/---@
Miroku looked up upon hearing the usual sound of falling trees. 'My, my. What a temper that girl has!' he thought in amusement. She had no idea, but he had always known of her 'secret' night duels with the unfortunate trees in the immediate area.
He chuckled as he heard another faint shout of 'hiraikotsu'. He had always liked the taijiya, but his vow of celibacy would forbid him to even go near her lovely presence. He had always just watched her from the sidelines - groped her at times - but he could never take anything regarding her seriously.
He walked out the shrine to have a short look at her as she came back into the shrine. He grasped the small pendant that hung around his neck, an inheritance from his beloved late father. The man had said that there were four of those pendants around, each as significant as the other. Miroku had thought he had seen a similar pendant on his cousin Kagome, but he couldn't be sure.
Sango walked steadily towards her quarters. The sun was beginning to rise, and she never neglected her responsibilities. He concealed himself behind a wall as she walked in, still swinging her boomerang around the air in a small arc.
She disappeared into her quarters, only to emerge a moment later with her hair in a low ponytail. 'Time to come out,' he thought.
He walked out into the open, and pretended to look surprised upon finding her there. "Sango-sama! You're up rather early, aren't you!"
Sango smiled upon approaching him, but as usual kept an arm's length away from his wandering hands. "Not really, Houshi-sama. I have to go and feed the birds in the aviary right now."
Miroku scratched his head. "You do? But isn't that Hachi's job?"
Sango laughed lightly. "Hai. But he claims that he has very important things to do today, and can't be bothered by feeding birds."
"Indolence," Miroku said, shaking his head. "May I go with you?"
"If you wish to be bothered by watching me feed the birds," she said with a smile.
Miroku laughed heartily. "Hai, hai. I should help you do so."
"But don't you have meditation practices today, Houshi-sama?"
"Yeah. But I believe it would be better if I helped other people instead of sitting in my room, ne?" he grinned.
Sango blushed and nodded. "If you insist..."
-----/---@
"Are you sure this is not forbidden, Houshi-sama?" Sango asked as Miroku led her to his family's shrine, which stood atop a hill in the far side of the town. "Are we allowed out of the monastery on days like this?"
Miroku grinned as he shook his head. After feeding the birds, Miroku had invited Sango to come along as he visited his old home. "No, it is not forbidden. And besides, I know you miss my cousin. You two seemed to have gotten along quite well."
Sango brightened. "Yeah. She's very nice! And now that I think about it, I haven't been out of the monastery for a long time."
"Aa," Miroku agreed, his hand slowly inching its way towards her backside.
"Houshi-sama, you are going to lose those fingers."
"Ah! Gomen!"
Both looked up as they neared the shrine, perplexed as the frantic voice of Kagome's mother reached their ears. "... what happened to her! I have to go. If you had seen Inuyasha..."
"Inuyasha? Houshi-sama, isn't that the name of your hanyou friend?" Sango asked. She also knew that the hanyou was her friend Kagome's love interest.
"Hai. I wonder what's going on?" Miroku absently said as he quickened his steps. "Obasan!" he cried, making the woman's head turn to her. He was startled to see tears glistening on her face. "Obasan! What happened? Where is Kagome?"
She looked ready to faint as she quickly relayed to him where the girls was, and what had happened the day before.
"Inuyasha turned into a wolf?" Miroku said in disbelief, and he heard Sango suck in a deep breath. "Nani, Sango?"
"Higurashi-san," Sango said, not even looking at Miroku as she addressed the worried woman. "Was Kagome affected?"
"No. But Kaede-sama had said that she had a feeling that Kagome would be in a matter of time and..."
"The Dawn Bane," Sango said softly, looking up at Miroku with fright. Miroku looked puzzled, but Kagome's mom started violently.
"Hai! That's what Kaede said! How do you..."
"Can I come to Kaede-sama's home with you? Because... I may be able to help..." Sango said, looking down at her shoes.
"Yes, yes, by all means! Let's go! I want to see Kagome. Miroku, do you want to go?"
Miroku looked down at Sango, trying to catch her eyes. When Sango looked up, she nodded sadly. "Your friend Inuyasha may need you right now, Houshi- sama."
Miroku nodded.
-----/---@
A/N: Gomen for the short chapter. But I have the feeling that it might have been the best place to end it. Next chap is halfway done, I'll be posting in three or five days. ^_^
Responses:
Roze: Thanks! Glad you like it!
Mage: Gomen for the long update. That would be so romantic... the looking into each other's eyes thing. ^_^
fetchboy69: Glad you liked it! Arigatou!
Chevere: Thanks! Glad you like it!
Litwolf689: I'm updating them all right now! ^_____^ Glad you liked it!
Mustard Yellow Sunshine: Nice name! Anyway, I'm glad you like it. Thanks! And gomen for the long update!
Jesse the Wolf Demon: I like mystical movies too! Hehe... glad you liked it. Gomen for the late update!
Caligo Origuu: Glad you like it! Here's the next chap! ^_^
Jeanne-chan56: I can't bear sad endings... anyway, I'm glad you like it!
Hanamaru285: Glad you like it! And gomen for the late update.
I hope I didn't miss anyone! Anyway, arigatou to all those who reviewed my past chapters. Please read and review. Hope you enjoyed! Ja ne!
Anyway, here's the next chap! Please read and review! Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
-----/---@
ENCHANTED DAWN
The Four Pendants
-----/---@
"Kaede... where is Kagome?" he asked, a feeling of dread crawling through him as he simultaneously noticed his naked state, Kagome's discarded robes and the charm that hung around the blue/gray eyed cat's neck.
Kaede looked sad, confirming his own suspicions. "Inuyasha... THAT," she said, pointing to the cat, "Is Kagome."
-----/---@
"What are you talking about? How could that cat be my Kagome?! Baabaa! Answer me ima sugu ni!" Inuyasha demanded of his caretaker. "I want to know... What happened to her?"
Kaede looked forlorn, hardly daring to meet his eyes. "You have been cursed, Inuyasha," she said softly, watching his amber eyes widen in surprise. She threw him his fire rat kimono, and turned to give him privacy as he dressed.
Inuyasha looked at the cat in his arms. She was shivering in the harsh early morning cold, and Inuyasha didn't want to believe that this cat truly WAS Kagome. But something in him just told him that no matter how much he refused to believe it, this cat was his love. The cat's eyes said it all...
'Why a cat? Gods... of all the animals on the planet!' he grumped, not knowing whether he should put her down and let the curious cat watch him dress or to push her off to go to Kaede. He stroked her sleek fur one more time before gently putting her down.
"Oi... um, neko... Kag-chan?" he said hesitantly. "Go to Kaede..." he said softly, pushing the feline towards where the old lady was. She didn't budge. "Oi! Do you seriously want to watch me dress up?"
The cat simply purred and stared at him. Kaede snickered.
"Oh, man! Don't do this to me!" he nearly wailed. He stood up, dragging the green hakama, which still lay on his lap, with him. "I can't dress up with you watching! You made me promise! No naked activities until we're married!"
Kaede snorted loudly. "Inuyasha, she's a cat..."
"But she's still Kagome!"
"I know, idiot! What I'm trying to say is that she now has the mind of a cat as well!" Kaede said in exasperation. "Now dress up so I can tell you what happened! I can't talk to a naked man, you know!"
Inuyasha grumbled before dropping Kagome's hakama to his feet, blushing as he exposed himself to the cat. Kagome just stared at him, twitching her nose, as he dressed hurriedly.
"Oi, I'm decent," he called once he was dressed, taking the cat into his lap again. Kaede slowly faced them both, looking forlorn as she proceeded to tell him about her suspicions regarding the curse. When she finished, Inuyasha was all but smoking in fury.
"Fuck Naraku," Inuyasha said slowly. "Why did he have to do this?! He is such a fucking sore loser!"
"I believe his 'love' for Kagome is selfish enough to make him do such a vile thing," Kaede groused. "But I know just what we need to do to get you out of this..."
"I know what you're thinking, baabaa, and I'm telling you now, it's impossible!" Inuyasha said, staring at Kagome as she snuggled into his lap. "The Shikon no Tama does not exist, baabaa. It's a fucking legend!"
"It is NOT a legend, Inuyasha!" Kaede said. "Kagome had agreed to search for it, if ever. Or rather, for the pieces of it."
Inuyasha looked murderous. "Even if the damn thing was real, Kaede, it's scattered all around Japan. What the hell am I supposed to do, sniff around for it?"
"No. But have you ever taken a good look at the pendants that you and Kagome now wear?" Kaede asked. "You remember, that those were passed down to you by your father and mother?"
Inuyasha nodded.
Kaede reached down and clasped Inuyasha's pendant in her hand. She then turned the round orb and showed Inuyasha a seemingly cracked part of the pendant. He raised his eyebrows at her. "What? It's a defect. I noticed it when I dug those things up to give one to Kagome. Both pendants are cracked."
Wordlessly, the old woman pressed her thumb against the crack, and Inuyasha watched as the pendant slowly split into two. The pendant gradually separated evenly, and Inuyasha realized that the inside was hollow...
And inside it was a single, sparkling pink shard.
"What the hell?!" Inuyasha exclaimed as he bent to pick at the strange shard. It was obviously a part of a jewel, shining brightly in the early morning light. Even Kagome raised her head from its comfortable position on his lap to look at the intriguing gem. "Is that..."
"The Shikon no Tama. One of its many shards. Another shard is within Kagome's necklace. Your father had forged these two pendants as a vault for the shards, and only those who bore pure reiryoku, or those descended from him, can open this necklace," Kaede explained.
"But... why would he put it here?" Inuyasha asked, taking the gem into the palm of his hand. The shard continued to glow and pulse lightly as he held it.
"I believe that your pendant may serve as a guide in searching for the missing pieces. Your father had never been very much interested in the Shikon no Tama, but he was aware of its powers. He wouldn't have wanted for it to fall into the wrong hands."
Inuyasha could barely believe it. The Shikon no Tama... was for real?
"Do you really think that this Shikon no Tama can help me and Kagome?" he asked slowly. "Is this what could break the curse?"
Kaede nodded.
'Anything for Kagome...' Inuyasha thought, his gaze narrowing slightly as he looked upon the cat form of his love, remembering that it had all been Naraku's doing.
"I'll do it."
-----/---@
"Hiraikotsu!"
The giant boomerang swiftly sliced through the trees that had been unfortunate enough to have been selected as the day's target practice. Sango took a stance as she waited for her oversized weapon to whirl its way back to her, and when it did, she jumped up slightly to catch it in mid air.
She had stopped fighting two years ago... that fateful day when her entire village was annihilated by a horde of youkai, and her father had made her promise, with his dying breath, to never seek vengeance, to never go against another youkai for as long as she lived. Sango had tearfully sworn to live a normal life, but the anger at the sudden loss was still within her, and it was hard to keep her word whenever a youkai, no matter how small, happened to be around. She never intended to use her weapon again, but somehow, the urge to never lose her touch was overwhelming enough to spur her to secretly practice herself every morning.
She looked up at the brightening sun. She had only a few minutes left before the monastery she served called upon her. The shrine had taken her in after they had found her broken in the middle of the forest, and its inhabitants had since been her family.
She sighed as she picked herself up and headed back for the shrine. She clutched tightly at the pendant that her father had given her on her fifteenth birthday as an heirloom. He had told her to never lose it... that it was important. Something about a jewel. 'As if I ever would,' she thought. He had never been given the chance to tell her how important it was though...
She brushed back her long bangs as she climbed the heavy staircase. Being the only woman in a monastery had its downs. She was of course, expected to do the cooking. And the washing. And the sweeping...
She hiked up to her room first of all, to stash away the gargantuan boomerang. She grinned as she picked up her usual hair tie, pulling her hair back into a low ponytail. Time to get to work.
-----/---@
Miroku looked up upon hearing the usual sound of falling trees. 'My, my. What a temper that girl has!' he thought in amusement. She had no idea, but he had always known of her 'secret' night duels with the unfortunate trees in the immediate area.
He chuckled as he heard another faint shout of 'hiraikotsu'. He had always liked the taijiya, but his vow of celibacy would forbid him to even go near her lovely presence. He had always just watched her from the sidelines - groped her at times - but he could never take anything regarding her seriously.
He walked out the shrine to have a short look at her as she came back into the shrine. He grasped the small pendant that hung around his neck, an inheritance from his beloved late father. The man had said that there were four of those pendants around, each as significant as the other. Miroku had thought he had seen a similar pendant on his cousin Kagome, but he couldn't be sure.
Sango walked steadily towards her quarters. The sun was beginning to rise, and she never neglected her responsibilities. He concealed himself behind a wall as she walked in, still swinging her boomerang around the air in a small arc.
She disappeared into her quarters, only to emerge a moment later with her hair in a low ponytail. 'Time to come out,' he thought.
He walked out into the open, and pretended to look surprised upon finding her there. "Sango-sama! You're up rather early, aren't you!"
Sango smiled upon approaching him, but as usual kept an arm's length away from his wandering hands. "Not really, Houshi-sama. I have to go and feed the birds in the aviary right now."
Miroku scratched his head. "You do? But isn't that Hachi's job?"
Sango laughed lightly. "Hai. But he claims that he has very important things to do today, and can't be bothered by feeding birds."
"Indolence," Miroku said, shaking his head. "May I go with you?"
"If you wish to be bothered by watching me feed the birds," she said with a smile.
Miroku laughed heartily. "Hai, hai. I should help you do so."
"But don't you have meditation practices today, Houshi-sama?"
"Yeah. But I believe it would be better if I helped other people instead of sitting in my room, ne?" he grinned.
Sango blushed and nodded. "If you insist..."
-----/---@
"Are you sure this is not forbidden, Houshi-sama?" Sango asked as Miroku led her to his family's shrine, which stood atop a hill in the far side of the town. "Are we allowed out of the monastery on days like this?"
Miroku grinned as he shook his head. After feeding the birds, Miroku had invited Sango to come along as he visited his old home. "No, it is not forbidden. And besides, I know you miss my cousin. You two seemed to have gotten along quite well."
Sango brightened. "Yeah. She's very nice! And now that I think about it, I haven't been out of the monastery for a long time."
"Aa," Miroku agreed, his hand slowly inching its way towards her backside.
"Houshi-sama, you are going to lose those fingers."
"Ah! Gomen!"
Both looked up as they neared the shrine, perplexed as the frantic voice of Kagome's mother reached their ears. "... what happened to her! I have to go. If you had seen Inuyasha..."
"Inuyasha? Houshi-sama, isn't that the name of your hanyou friend?" Sango asked. She also knew that the hanyou was her friend Kagome's love interest.
"Hai. I wonder what's going on?" Miroku absently said as he quickened his steps. "Obasan!" he cried, making the woman's head turn to her. He was startled to see tears glistening on her face. "Obasan! What happened? Where is Kagome?"
She looked ready to faint as she quickly relayed to him where the girls was, and what had happened the day before.
"Inuyasha turned into a wolf?" Miroku said in disbelief, and he heard Sango suck in a deep breath. "Nani, Sango?"
"Higurashi-san," Sango said, not even looking at Miroku as she addressed the worried woman. "Was Kagome affected?"
"No. But Kaede-sama had said that she had a feeling that Kagome would be in a matter of time and..."
"The Dawn Bane," Sango said softly, looking up at Miroku with fright. Miroku looked puzzled, but Kagome's mom started violently.
"Hai! That's what Kaede said! How do you..."
"Can I come to Kaede-sama's home with you? Because... I may be able to help..." Sango said, looking down at her shoes.
"Yes, yes, by all means! Let's go! I want to see Kagome. Miroku, do you want to go?"
Miroku looked down at Sango, trying to catch her eyes. When Sango looked up, she nodded sadly. "Your friend Inuyasha may need you right now, Houshi- sama."
Miroku nodded.
-----/---@
A/N: Gomen for the short chapter. But I have the feeling that it might have been the best place to end it. Next chap is halfway done, I'll be posting in three or five days. ^_^
Responses:
Roze: Thanks! Glad you like it!
Mage: Gomen for the long update. That would be so romantic... the looking into each other's eyes thing. ^_^
fetchboy69: Glad you liked it! Arigatou!
Chevere: Thanks! Glad you like it!
Litwolf689: I'm updating them all right now! ^_____^ Glad you liked it!
Mustard Yellow Sunshine: Nice name! Anyway, I'm glad you like it. Thanks! And gomen for the long update!
Jesse the Wolf Demon: I like mystical movies too! Hehe... glad you liked it. Gomen for the late update!
Caligo Origuu: Glad you like it! Here's the next chap! ^_^
Jeanne-chan56: I can't bear sad endings... anyway, I'm glad you like it!
Hanamaru285: Glad you like it! And gomen for the late update.
I hope I didn't miss anyone! Anyway, arigatou to all those who reviewed my past chapters. Please read and review. Hope you enjoyed! Ja ne!