Silent Night

The night calls for me
The darkness hides the memory

Into the blackness with the stars above
I run from the light which remembers my love

In the stillness the night always hears
Only the moonlight will see my tears
Aspen Snow


In the dark it is easy to pretend, that the truth is what it ought to be

"Why did you get in the way Kagome, you could have been killed!"

"I was trying..."

"You were trying to what?!"

"I didn't want you to get hurt" the miko cried in frustration. Why couldn't he see? Why couldn't he understand?

"Feh. As if I could get hurt" Typical, so typical. Arrogant, the stupid hanyou thought he was invincible, but he wasn't. He was only a half demon after all. Once every month he turned human, just like her, and he was just as vulnerable, just as mortal as she was. He would not live forever. Why couldn't he see that?

Kagome looked up to the hanyou in question. His arms crossed, his golden eyes blazing with fury and tinged with the barest hint of fear...fear for her. And it was that look that was her undoing, always would be. It was those looks that made her believe that maybe one day he would be hers.

She couldn't do it anymore. She couldn't, she wouldn't. She looked up to the demon she loved so much with tears in her eyes and hope beating furiously in her heart.

"I..." she stammered, rapidly losing the courage to give voice to the feelings that had been raging in her for a long time.

"What" he demanded impatiently

"I love you" she whispered through the fog of fear that had taken over. Desperately fighting the urge to run, fists clenched in anticipation at her side, Kagome anxiously awaited his response.

Her whole life she had been dreaming of this moment, the day when she offered her heart to another, her whole life she had eagerly anticipated that flood of joy and sweetness that came with knowing you had found your true love, with knowing that you were loved in return.

But all her dreams, all her whimsical fantasies and starry eyed daydreams didn't even begin to live up to this one moment. Because never had she imagined that when she finally did find herself standing here she would be rejected. Because she stood there waiting.

And he said nothing. Nothing at all.

She continued to wait long after he had left her standing there alone. She continued to wait, in shock, paralyzed by grief, dying of a broken heart. She continued to wait in the silence he had left.

And later, later she would be here again, waiting breathlessly for an answer that would never come. Later she would watch him chose someone else.

But for now, his answer to her unspoken question: Do you love me too?

Silence.

"You" the hanyou pinned to the tree said suddenly, as if he were shocked to see the woman that stood before him. "You came back" he said.

"Of course I did Inu Yasha" Kagome replied to the hanyou's statement. Of course she had come back. This was where she belonged, in this magnificent magic filled past with a stubborn half demon. "I promised to stay with you forever, don't you remember?"

At her question Inu Yasha's eyes narrowed, in anger. And he gave a quick glance to the arrow that held him prisoner against the tree.

"I remember" he finally said, "do you?"

Kagome opened her mouth, prepared to answer quickly in the affirmative. But she caught herself. Had she done that to him? She wondered frantically as she looked at the arrow burrowed deep in his chest. Is that why he questioned her?

She could see herself so clearly so many years before in a green school girl's uniform pledging her loyalty to him. But this, Inu Yasha pinned to a tree, this she could not see, could not recall.

"I loved you" Inu Yasha choked out, breaking the silence, hurt dripping from his reluctant confession.

What had she done to him?

"You betrayed me Inu Yasha!" The young miko screamed in agony.

The hanyou could do nothing but stand there in the presence of so much grief and anger. Where had she gone? The kind, gentle and beautiful girl he had fallen in love with. Her eyes were cold, hardened in fury, shadowed by an unfathomable hurt.

Where had she gone?

"I loved you" she whispered quietly, perhaps hoping that he wouldn't hear her. But he did. "I loved you...so much" she finished on a broken sob.

And now she was crying, the tears falling silently down her cheeks as she continued to stand there, poised dangerously with an arrow in hand.

An arrow aimed at him.

What had he done? He couldn't recall, he couldn't remember. And he so desperately wanted to know, needed to know what it was he had done to hurt her so badly, had to know what he could have possibly done to make her believe that she had only one choice left.

To kill him.

He took a small step, wanting to talk to her. If he could just talk to her he could fix this. He could, he would.

But her eyes flashed in warning, her fingers tightened menacingly on her bow. One more step and she would kill him. He got the message. Once he would never have believed that this innocent girl could ever be capable of killing.

His mistake.

He had been willing to give up so much for her, so much. Once he had been an outcast, scorned and hated and accepted nowhere. Once he had been nothing. Until her. In her eyes he was perfect.

Perfect. So he had dared to believe that there was happiness for him in this life, dared to believe in her, dared to believe in them.

Yet here she was screaming of betrayal, there she stood, ready to kill him. Anticipating it, yearning for it.

Where had things gone wrong? If she would just talk to him instead of hurling accusations then maybe he could figure this mess out, maybe he could prevent something rash and horrible from happening.

If he could just get her to talk to him. But he would never get the chance. Because even as he was taking a step to get nearer to her, even as he was opening his mouth preparing to ask the question that so badly needed to be asked she was shooting the arrow.

Before he could register what was happening he felt the impact of the holy weapon burning through his chest and slicing through his heart. The force of the impact pushed him back until he hit the rough bark of the tree behind him. The tip of the arrow striking the thick tree trunk was audible, and it was painful.

His hands moved of their own accord to the feathered end of the arrow that protruded from his chest. He looked up, his eyes blurred and re-focused on the lone figure that stood before him.

Her hands rested quietly at her side, one firmly clasping the bow, her eyes looked at him so calmly, and her hair fluttered gently in the wind. The girl before him was disturbing in her tranquility considering she had just shot an arrow through the heart of the one she was supposed to love.

She started to dim, blackness was creeping in, shadowing his vision, clouding his mind. His head started to droop, his eyes began to flutter, and she walked away with a graceful swing of her hips.

She really was beautiful, the miko he had fallen in love with.

Deadly.

But beautiful, always beautiful.

Oh God it hurt. Hurt so bad. The memories rushing back, filling her mind, and crushing her heart. Pain, heartache, betrayal. How could she have forgotten? How?

She fell to he knees as the weight of her memories proved to be too much for her to bear. He was the reason for all this, he was the cause of her suffering. Her eyes flicked quickly over the figure imprisoned against the tree. For the briefest moment she was glad he was there, glad he was here, useless and vulnerable with an arrow in his chest.

And she was horrified, because she had never believed she was capable of taking pleasure in another's pain. She wasn't a selfish person, she wasn't cruel, had never been. But in that one moment she wanted nothing more than to grasp the end of that arrow and twist it mercilessly until he begged for mercy, she wanted nothing more than to watch those golden eyes dim in pain.

But she didn't move. She sat quietly in front of him, afraid to speak, afraid to move because she didn't want to hurt him.

She did remember everything, she remembered her confession, she remembered his subtle cruelty, and she remembered him choosing someone else, she remembered him not choosing her. But still she sat quietly, refusing to act on her pain, refusing to exact revenge for his betrayal. She didn't want to hurt him

Because she had loved him once. And maybe, she thought as she continued to stare at his familiar face, well maybe she still did.

And maybe she could save him, rescue him from the torment; free him from the lonely prison he had been consigned to live in. Maybe she could rescue him.

And maybe he could rescue her.

She wasn't conscious of her hands moving, she didn't realize they had moved until she felt the feathers of the arrow tickling her palm.

Captive to the mindless actions of her own subconscious, her fingers closed firmly around the arrow, gaining the leverage to pull the object out of the hanyou's chest.

But somewhere inside of her, her heart rebelled against the single minded determination

of her subconscious. Soon there was a whisper in her head. Fragments she struggled to grasp, echoes of a conversation from another lifetime.

If I could go back in time...

Kagome closed her eyes in a desperate attempt to prevent the memory from resurfacing. It was instinctual, her fear of the past she had forgotten. There was something there...something. But no matter how hard she tried to will the memories away, they came still, forced their way through her foggy mind until they crystallized, focused, and became real.

Too real.

I wouldn't pull that arrow out of his chest...

Her hands stopped, her fingers released the arrow but still hovered over the weapon, hesitating, not knowing what to do.

If I could go back in time...

Was it possible? Possible to change her fate? Was it possible to step back to the one moment in time when her life began to unravel and change it all? Change the players, change the situation, change her.

I would fall in love with someone else...

Who? Her mind wondered and a distant voice demanded. Dazed, confused, hurting and everything in between, she looked up to meet the eyes of the demon before her. Golden eyes that were looking at her, looking at her yet seeing someone else. The anger was gone, replaced by a poignant look of disbelief and hurt.

"Why?" he whispered so quietly, so softly, as if he were afraid to hear the answer.

Why?

In her mind the rugged face of the hanyou was replaced by aristocratic perfection of another. Her mind replaced burning golden eyes with cold ones sparkling with unshed tears and something else, something she couldn't define.

In her mind Inu Yasha was forgotten, because in her mind she saw clearly for the first time the image of a man who loved her stoically, loyally, and forever. In her mind she saw the man who had held her when she was alone, felt the coolness of his cheek and the icy moisture that marred his skin.

The words were coming back furiously now, getting louder and louder as she remembered each detail of a forgotten dream and a suppressed nightmare. And then they were there, clear and right.

Next time.

Yes next time. Next time was now. Now she had promise to keep. Now she had to leave a hanyou pinned helplessly to a tree because once upon a time, in the pouring rain she had promised to love someone next time.

Inu Yasha's time was over. And the girl whose every breath had once been for him walked away. Walked away because she had to. Walked away because she wanted to.

In her rush to get away from the half demon she missed the question he posed to her retreating figure, missed the despondency with which he asked the one question he had never gotten an answer to.

"Why?" he cried out in anguish as she continued to walk away from him. She continued on, heedless of the desperateness of his tone. Perhaps fate was kind after all, because she missed his next words as well, they were spoken into the silence of her departure, whispered frailly into the emptiness, swallowed up by the darkness, left only for the night to remember.

"I loved you...Kikyou"

And the night never tells.

You in the moonlight, could you ever love a man like me?

"Why?"

It was such a small question, spoken so quietly and somewhat desperately. It was the question of a woman who didn't have much time left.

And she didn't.

It was a reality that Sesshoumaru had finally come to accept. His golden eyes swept across the darkened room, anyone else might not have seen anything in the shadow shrouded room, but Sesshoumaru could see. He could see the figure that lay so still on the bed; he could see the exhaustion, the weakness. He could practically feel the life leaving her body.

Sesshoumaru closed his eyes, suddenly finding himself tired as well. Denial had been so much better than this. Ignorance had been bliss, as long as she was alive.

She had been asking the same question for years now and every time she asked he said nothing, not willing, or perhaps not ready to give her an answer. He still wasn't willing to answer her question, still wasn't ready to reveal his motives.

But it was time, simply because she was out of time.

"Why did you save me Sesshoumaru-sama?" He nearly smiled, after all this time she still referred to him as Sesshoumaru-sama, the same as she had done since the moment he had brought her back from death.

Rin

She was a dead child then, she was a dying woman now. She needed to know his reasons for saving her that day. And he was beginning to realize that maybe, just maybe he needed to tell someone, tell her.

"Because you reminded me of someone"

The truth. It hurt.

"Who?" Another question from the only other human he had ever cared for. Rin was curious, innocent, and completely oblivious to all the reasons why it was wrong for a demon lord to care for a human.

She was so much like her, so much like Kagome. So he had brought her back to life that day so long ago, saved her because once he had watched a human girl die, and it had broken his heart.

"Someone..." He could not bring himself to say her name out loud.

"Someone you can't forget" Rin finished for him.

Yes. Someone he couldn't forget.

"I'm glad" she whispered as he continued to stay silent.

He turned to her and gave her a look which clearly questioned the reasoning behind her sudden bout of happiness.

Sensing the question he did not ask, Rin merely smiled into the darkness.

"I'm glad that you will have someone to keep you company after I die...even if it's only a memory"

A memory. That's all he had, memories. It was all a powerful demon like him could afford to have. His heart would forever be haunted by the memories of two human women who had looked at him and seen so much more than what he was.

The only two to see who he was.

"It's so dark in here Sesshoumaru-sama" he heard her say so faintly. She was fading now, it wouldn't be too much longer, soon she would be dead and this time he wouldn't be able to bring her back.

So he opened the curtains covering the window and let the bright white light of the moon spill in to the room.

"Isn't it beautiful?" she whispered more to herself than to him. The question brought back a memory of another girl, in another time, looking so longingly at the moon and wistfully posing the same question.

He knew the moment her heart stopped beating. The room grew cold, almost as if her death had sucked all the warmth out. Perhaps it had, for so long she had been his sunshine, his laughter.

He stood there, in the brilliant light of the moon they had both loved so much.

"Beautiful" he said in response to two frivolous questions he had left unanswered.

He had seen them both die. Their deaths were tragic, and sad.

Gazing down at the figure of his former ward and seeing the smile she wore so beautifully in death, Sesshoumaru realized something he had been missing all this time.

Yes he had seen them both die, but more importantly he had seen them live.

And for now that would have to be enough.

Kagome stepped out of the past much the same way she had stepped into it, in haze of confusion and perhaps just a hint of magic.

And it was raining, pouring. She smiled. Of course it was.

When those first cold drops hit her she knew. Knew he was standing there, waiting for her.

And suddenly Kagome didn't want to turn around, suddenly she didn't want to face the man who was standing behind her, waiting. Where was she going to find the courage to face a demon who had spent 500 years remembering her death while she had so selfishly forgotten?

She started to shiver. Because she was cold, because she was afraid. Here they were again, caught in the silver veil of rain once more. Would she have the strength to do what she couldn't before? Was she strong enough to stand against the painful burden of the past and reach for a happiness she didn't deserve?

Was she strong enough for him?

And suddenly she saw Inu Yasha. Saw him embracing another, saw him choosing another, saw him loving another.

And she saw the fiery golden eyes of an unlikely angel.

And that was it. The end. She couldn't do it anymore, she couldn't agonize over a past she had lived long ago. She couldn't punish herself for it, she wouldn't.

The future. It was waiting, had always been. Instinctively she had known that, despite the pain, despite the grief, somehow hope had managed to live on inside of her, because she had made a promise.

A promise of next time. A promise of the future. And here she was, in the future with a second chance, a new life and she too afraid to face it, too afraid to let go of a familiar past to grasp the unknown.

She had been afraid before and she had succumbed to that fear.

Weak. She had been weak and stupid.

But not this time.

She turned around, closed the door forever on her past.

And then nothing mattered.

Because he was there.

Always.

Raindrops fall like silent tears, mourning all the wasted years

Expectations. They were horrible things, terrible. He hadn't expected to find her again, hadn't expected to see her, hadn't expected to feel her.

But there she was, a heartbeat away in the falling rain.

They had been here before. He had been here before, holding her, loving her, and watching her die.

But this time was different. He could see it in her eyes, the hope.

There would be no blood this time and this time he would forever remember the way she looked in the rain.

Because she looked beautiful. She looked alive.

She had kept her promise, she was here, she had chosen. And that made everything worthwhile, the long lonely years, the heartache, the longing. In the end she had come back.

He wanted nothing more than to break the silence of this dramatic scene. But he couldn't move, and he found that he didn't really want to. He feared that any movement on his part, any words however softly spoken would mar the dream, expose it for what it really was, a fantasy, a hopefully desperate hallucination, and nothing more.

So he simply stood there, watching her standing there, and said nothing. Their meeting here like this was anticlimactic really, a quiet end to long and anguished journey.

It was perfect.

No more painful memories, no more regrets, no more remembering. There was so much to tell her. The things he had seen, the things he had done, the man he had become. So many things to tell her.

A lifetime worth of things.

I search only for something I can't see

Striking. Beautiful. Hauntingly perfect. Some things never change. And he certainly hadn't.

Dressed in modern day clothes and glaringly lacking the presence of his powerful swords, she saw less of the demon lord he had once been and more of a man, just a man.

But he was so much more than that and even he couldn't mask the power that still radiated from him.

Powerful. He would always be.

He didn't say anything, didn't move when she turned and found him standing there so quietly.

He stood so casually with his hands in his pockets as if he had known she would come back, as if he had always known.

Maybe he had.

She walked up to him, heedless of the rain that soaked her clothes, heedless of the mud and water at her feet. She needed to see him, had to be near him. After all this time she had to know that he was there, had to know that he wasn't just an image conjured up by her desperate and lonely heart.

She stopped when she reached him, a breath away, a whisper. Yet still he did not move. His golden eyes watched her, they burned.

No. They raged.

She reached out, her fingers trailed lightly over the wet cloth of his shirt.

He trembled.

Her hand stopped over his heart, hesitated, but this time he didn't stop her and she discovered that this extraordinary man, this strong, impenetrable man was scared.

Scared. His heart was beating at the same frenzied, panicked driven pace as hers.

They could be scared together.

The future was there waiting for them. And she wanted nothing more than to grab his hand and run off into the sunset, happily ever after.

But this wasn't a fairytale, this wasn't a dream.

It was so much more. It was real. It was hers.

It was theirs.

She knew what she wanted, had always known. No more doubts.

She wanted to spend the rest of her life with him. And she wanted the rest of her life to start now.

"Always so quiet Sesshoumaru, you have nothing to say, even now?" she whispered as they continued to stand in the pouring rain, silent and unmoving. The future was waiting.

Once she had breathlessly waited for a man to tell her he loved her and had found only heartbreaking silence.

This time she didn't have to wait.

Because this time he smiled.

She smiled back.

And that was enough.

No matter where you go I will find you, if it takes a long, long time