Disclaimer: I do not under any circumstances own any Inuyasha themes, settings, characters, ect.

Note: Thanks for reading! I hope you like it so far. By the way her name is pronounced Nee-ah just in case you were wondering. Please review!! Please tell me if you hate it (nicely please).

Chapter 4: Unwelcome reunions

In the minutes after, Sesshoumaru studied Nia more. Though she was confused at the moment, that didn't completely stop her from being a threat. He couldn't understand her yet, and that bothered him as well. He couldn't rule her out as an enemy of his. Sessoumaru's hand stayed lightly seated on his lap, and Nia's hands rested on the ground.

By the look of her, she was exhausted. Her arms supported her upper body and her legs folded behind her. She had a pair of dark circles under her eyes, glazed over irises, and a posture that suggested a 100lb barbell was weighing her down. Her very thin frame looked like it was about to break. She looked like she would let go of all her strength and fall to a laying position.

He wondered if she was feeling ill or looked like that on a daily basis.

After about forty minutes, he let his hand fall from where it had rested on his stomach and turned his head away from her. It brushed her arm slightly in its descend to the ground.

She flinched at his touch. She wasn't used to feeling the emotions that it stirred inside of her. The entire world was new to her. It amazed her and scared her at the same time. She got up, mainly to get away from him. She decided she didn't like being that close to a demon yet. "Still..." she thought. "He hasn't hurt me. He has however saved my life...I suppose that means I'm indebted to him..."

Sesshoumaru looked up, "What is it about her... She's ...intoxicating..." He shook himself. "Never! Never could I care for someone like her. She's a rude and hot-tempered woman, with not so much as a weapon on her. How can she survive this way?"

Nia started to laugh a moment after he finished his thought. At first it was a simple shaking movement. It then developed into a full out laugh. She'd felt this before and tried to recollect, "I know I've been happy before...I can't seem to remember."

Sesshoumaru glared at her. "She read my thoughts...she mocks me for thinking such things...how dare she..." He thought. When Nia didn't cease her "insidious" laughing, Sesshoumaru became annoyed. He finally spoke, "Do you dare mock my thoughts?"

At this statement Nia folded forward in an attempt to stop herself. It was too much for her. She couldn't help but laugh at him. "He thinks I'm rude..." she thought. "I've been wrong before, but the only one I see here who is at all the way you described, is you...you've not asked a single decent question about me and yet this entire time I'm the only one you've been thinking of," she laughed holding her sides.

Sesshoumaru was simply stunned that this woman had insulted him in such a way as that. To add the insult she was laughing at him this very instant. To keep his composure he stood and remarked, "I fail to see the humor in your statements...I'd suggest you don't barge in on my thoughts again..." He then put a hand on his sword. "This ought to prove weather she's a foe or not" he glared as he pulled the Tensaiga from its sheath. "Unless you don't value your life," He said coldly, directing the swords tip underneath her chin.

She bust out laughing again, "The Tensaiga?! You think you can intimidate me with the Tensaiga?! Honestly Lord Sesshoumaru, what do you take me for?" She stopped all of a sudden when she'd realized her mistake.

Sesshoumaru slyly smiled. "So...we've met before...since my name was never mentioned to you...you must have had knowledge of it before we came upon you in this field," he calmly stated. "You're an enemy of mine then..." he concluded, slightly turning his head in her direction. He then returned the Tensaiga to its sheath and took Toukijin from its sheath.

Nia looked at him intensely as if she would spring backwards and run at any moment. This coarse of action would have been expected in the situation at hand.

To Sesshoumaru's surprise she did no such thing. He prepared himself mentally for a battle with this woman, who ever she was. She had to be a sorceress of some kind. Her aura pulsed with power.

She stood only inches from him. The blade of his sword aimed across her neck.

He flinched slightly (Sessy flinched? What is the world coming to?) when she put her hand on his arm.

She was silent, as she looked into his eyes. After a few seconds she said, "Do you really think that I would try to kill you? Look at me Lord Sesshoumaru and look at yourself...a demon of much taller and stronger in stature." She then paused removing her hand from his arm. "Do you really think I would try and kill you?" she repeated.

Sesshoumaru was completely unnerved by the action she had taken. "She risked the fact that I'm faster than she is and stood within striking distance of Toukijin...this could have been an act of utter stupidity... or pure genius," He thought about it for a few minutes. He finally decided that she was smarter than he'd given her credit for. He sheathed his sword and watched her sit down again against the tree again.

When Rin and Jaken returned they discovered that things were exactly the way they had left them. Sesshoumaru was standing silently on the other side of the tree. The mysterious woman sat spaciously staring at the scenery.

Rin pranced over to Nia and kneeled in front of her. "These are for you. Lord Sesshoumaru got them for you," She smiled happily and handed the robes to Nia's outstretched arms.

"How generous," Nia nodded in thanks to Sesshoumaru with slight sarcasm in her voice. Then she stood and walked away from them. She went to the nearest pond. She decided that since she was already changing she might as well bath. Her old robes, and new, were piled neatly on a rock. She slipped into the water. She began washing her hair. It became increasingly soft and slightly curled. "Ah...this is the reason I miss being an Earth bound creature," she thought. She leaned against the rocks surrounding the small pond. She began to think about her situation. "How can I rejoin the four souls...I am only one, but there was an unbalance when we were all separated. Does that mean that there are only three...or were more joined as a result of this unbalance...I just don't know..." her thoughts were interrupted by a loud explosion from the field. "Oh dear... seems they've arrived a little earlier than I'd expected." She quickly got out and threw on her new robes and ran to the field opening. "Lord Sesshouaru don't!" she screamed in an attempt to stop a fateful event.

4 Hours Earlier...

Inuyasha and gang had been wandering for hours now.

"Can you smell anything Inuyasha?" Miroku asked.

Inuyasha continued on without looking back. "If I could smell something, do ya think we would still be wandering around?" He replied, irritated that he had to state the obvious. "Besides, I ain't your blood hound. Why don't you do something useful for once?" he stated with his normal arrogant voice.

Kagome sighed and looked around. She was sick of hearing Inuyasha complain. That was all he'd been doing for the last hour and a half. They were at the edge of a forest. "Inuyasha...do you think we should go in?" she asked looking at the tall, black trees.

"Defiantly," he said sniffing the air.

"You do smell something then?" Kagome asked with peeked suspicion.

"An all too familiar smell," he said with a hint of danger searing through.

Sango raised her weapon and put it in front of her to lean on. She then asked, "So Inuyasha what is this smell?"

"My brother..." these were the cold harsh words that rang in echo through the entire group.

They all knew what the words meant. Inuyasha would try and kill his brother, which was pointless to begin with.

Inuyasha then ran off through the woods faster than the rest could keep up.

"I know I smell her now. I can sense it!" He thought as he rushed through leaves and branches. He stopped in a clearing. "she's here...that scent was in the cave I know it!" he said out loud. "SHOW YOURSELF SORCERESS!" He yelled into the unyielding trees.

He heard a moan from the bushes to his left. Inuyasha unsheathed the Tetsuagia and held it above the "moaning" bushes. Then he cut the bushes in half right at the very instant Kagome and the others caught up to him.

Kagome screamed for a split second before the impulse of, "SIT!" that rang from her mouth. "Inuyasha you can't just go around killing bushes...Let me guess, you heard a noise and immediately you start hacking away at a bush. What if it was an innocent person. You can't go around assuming that every noise is from evil incarnate!"

Straightening out his back with a loud cracking noise Inuyasha raised his voice once more, "WOULD. YOU. STOP. DOING. THAT."

After this was followed by another "sit "command, the person who'd been in the bushes in the first place sat up rubbing her head. This woman was dressed slightly better than the one they had encountered before. She was in a black ceremonial robe with white lining. She had white hair, which was all too surprising to Inuyasha.

Inuyasha stood and picked up Tetsuagia again. He put the sword over his left shoulder and stood looking at this woman. He thought that she resembled the woman earlier but didn't quite fit the description. She also had a calmness about her that was nothing like the other woman. "Who are you? What's your name?" he asked harshly.