Disclaimer: I do not own Wolf's Rain or Inuyasha.
Thank you so much for all of the wonderful reviews! I don't know if you people read this stuff I put at the beginning and end of my stories or not, but oh well, it gives me peace of mind knowing I tell you all of this stuff anyway. Anyways, this is a long one, seven pages on Microsoft Word w/o the notes at the beginning and end! Oh, sorry I did not update yesterday, but I did not finish writing the chapter until 11:00 and was in no mood to type it up. Oh well, it's better now then it was last night! I'm really excited about this chapter and am very proud of it. I hope you like it. Here are my responses to your reviews:
i love athrun: OK...
NYV: Thanks, I will.
Kirstin: Thanks! Plus, I know the feeling with school and all. I'm afraid this story has taken somewhat of a back seat to a big report I have due next week, EEP!
Nikkler: My poor little heart! I'm glad you still like it, I guess I'll forgive you. See, it's reviews like the ones you write that make me look back on my story and cry because I don't think it'll be good enough, and think I'm not worthy of all the readers I have. But that's good, because it gives me a good kick in the rear to do better! Thanks!
Thank you so much for the reviews, please, keep them coming!
Now, for the reason you review me, THE STORY!
7: The Blood before Dawn
A slight echo reverberated off the dark stone walls inside the castle. The wolves had had a hard time getting in past the castle's defenses and were more than a little concerned about how they were going to get out. They crept through the halls as quietly as they could, wincing at the loud crash when Hige ran into a statue, tipping it over so it leaned against the wall. They examined the damage and decided to leave it precariously balanced like it was. It did not look like it would fall now, but eventually and then the crash might help them. The smell of old blood and sweat filled the place and a feeling of raw energy made the hair on the back of the wolves neck stand up and Cheza glow.
The group soon came across a grand staircase. The smell of blood was greatest here and the energy levels rose.
"Such sadness, you are all so sad," Cheza cooed as she fondled the great potted plants on either side of the staircase. Blue stepped onto the first step and shivered and goose-bumps formed on her body as a cold blast of air hit her.
"Ghosts..."
"What happened here? What created this god-forsaken place?" asked Tsume who was looking rather pale. Manch noticed this and decided to keep an eye on the young man.
"It was conquered. This chill, this darkness, the energy, it must have all been created by the Nobles when they came here," said Kiba. Aurora started to walk away.
"Hey, where are you going?" Hige called out.
"Shh! I sincerely doubt that what we want is upstairs, if they have prisoners they'd be in a dungeon. When this castle was built the dungeons would most likely have been kept downstairs. That's where I'm going," Aurora whispered before turning and heading down a dark hallway. Cheza skipped after her with Kiba close behind. Tsume followed next, trying to hide his limp and not wince. He wasn't fooling anybody. The rest followed, keeping an eye on Tsume. Hige was the first to notice the smell of fresh blood mixing with the old. He shot a worried glance at Manch who returned the glance. They reached a silent agreement to let Tsume speak up first.
Up to this point, the wolves had actually seen very little in the way of security inside the castle. Suddenly they heard the metallic footsteps of a Noble's patrol, searching the area. They had no where to go to, nowhere to hide.
"Up there," Tsume suggested, pointing to a ledge under the high-arched ceiling.
"That's quite a jump, even for us," Mizu pointed out.
"I wasn't aware we had a choice!" Tsume snapped. Kiba grabbed Cheza and jumped, bouncing from one wall to the other until he made it to the ledge. Hige ran forward and grabbed Tsume's arm.
"And just what do you think you're doing?" Tsume snarled as he tore his arm out of Hige's grasp.
"I'm trying to help you! You're bleeding and can barley walk! There is no way you can jump up there on your own!"
"I'm fine, I don't need your help or anyone else's!" By this time the rest had gotten to the ledge and were watching the altercation from above. Hige glared at Tsume and jumped. As Hige's feet left the ground Tsume could have sworn he heard Hige say, "I wasn't doing it for you, I was doing it for Toboe..."
Tsume eyed the jump and realized there was a good chance he couldn't make it. The slow and heavy steps of the guards had gotten very close, making the ledge Tsume's only option. He jumped for the wall like everyone else before him had done. He hit the wall and collapsed on the floor, pain shooting through his body and causing him to cry out. Tsume weakly looked up to see Cheza's large eyes looking down at him in fear for his life. His bleeding was worse than before and as his eyes drifted over to lock onto Aurora's, he knew he wasn't going to make it. At least, not if he tried to bounce off the walls.
'If I make a straight jump, I might make it in time.' Tsume's loss of blood was starting to affect him. He felt dizzy, lightheaded and weak. He gathered what little energy he had left and jumped. The pain grew as his body cried out against his actions. Tsume stretched out his arms, feeling as though he was reaching for the star. He was going to miss it by so little! As the tips of Tsume's fingers grazed the edge of the ledge, Aurora lunged forward and grabbed his wrists.
"I'm sorry," she whispered as Tsume slipped out of her grasp. Tsume fell to the ground below just as the guards came around the corner. Tsume attempted a growl and passed out.
"Someone's coming," Sesshomaru warned. Footsteps were heard coming down the hallway towards the group of cells. Toboe put his face against the bars, trying to see who was coming. All he could see were guards.
"Uh-oh," he whispered. The soldiers proceeded past his cell. In the center of the group of soldiers was a female Noble. She was tall and very lovely. Her hair was long and blond and she wore a cloak that hid her body. She looked straight ahead and turned to face a cell further down the row.
"Sesshomaru, it has been two hundred years now, are you ready to talk to us yet?" she asked.
"No, and I dare say you will not kill me for my silence either," was his response. The Noble laughed a high, bell-like laugh that would have been enchanting from any other woman.
"What makes you so sure about that? You are useless to me if you will not talk and a waist of supplies."
"The fact that the castle's defenses have been penetrated and you woke up the damned," Sesshomaru answered with a chill in his voice that could have frozen ice. The Noble glared daggers at the chained man.
"Fine. So I can't kill you. However, you will talk, one way—or another," she said, looking pointedly towards Toboe's cell.
'Don't worry, if she tries to hurt you, just scream,' said Sesshomaru's voice in Toboe's mind. Toboe was shocked to hear the man's voice in his mind, especially when it was obvious no one else could. 'Who are you?' he thought, wondering if Sesshomaru could hear him.
'Later,' was the response he got. Three of the guards broke away from the rest and approached Toboe's cell. One opened the door then two walked in and grabbed Toboe, restraining him. The third pulled out a machine the likes of which Toboe had never seen before. It looked very complicated with a long needle at one end. The guard slowly eased the needle into Toboe's side and pushed a button. Toboe could not tell what was supposed to happen, but it tickled. He remembered what Sesshomaru had told him just moments before and screamed. The Noble watched Toboe "suffer" for a moment then turned to see Sesshomaru's reaction. Obviously, she did not like what she saw.
"ENOUGH! It does not matter that you refuse to help us! The intruder will be eliminated and we will learn to control Naraku and we will find the miko without you! As for right now, we still have the girl. Bring her," she ordered. The guards left Toboe and went for Luna. She screamed as they grabbed her out of her cell and dragged her away into the darkness.
"Perfect," said Sesshomaru in a cold yet victorious voice.
"What's perfect? They took Luna!" Toboe cried, tears streaming down his face.
"She said 'the intruder,'"
"So? Isn't that a bad thing that our only chance for escape has been caught?"
"There are eight."
The guards approached Tsume cautiously, as though they were afraid he might explode. Meanwhile, Mizu was on the move up above while the rest positioned themselves, waiting for his signal. Mizu crept down the hall along the ledge and found a power box.
'Please let their damn radios be powered from here...' he thought desperately. No such luck. But, the power to the wing they were in was and a radio of some sort was. 'Well, can't do any harm, lets start disconnecting wires!" Mizu started to pull and cut all of the wires he could get a hold of, managing to only get shocked once. He beamed with pride as the hall was bathed in darkness and the guards started to murmur. His little victory did not last long once the generators kicked in.
"Well, the lights run by the generators are duller then the ones before, if that's possible," he said quietly to himself bitterly.
Meanwhile, the guards had finally approached Tsume and had injected him with something. The rest of the wolves were chomping at the bit wanting to get down there and save their friend. That was when there was a momentary blackout. Kiba used the opportunity to strike some fear into the guards by swooping down and killing one at the back of the group.
"That's what happens when you lag behind," he whispered.
The backup lights came on and Kiba was once again on the ledge. The guards were more concerned as to why the lights went out in the first place to notice their dead comrade right away. When they did, all hell broke loose on the ground.
The wolves were sitting on the ledge, laughing quietly at the sight of the guards trying to find Kiba who had already taken out two more in the commotion.
"Well he sure is enjoying himself," Mizu commented, making Blue and Aurora jump. "Sorry I couldn't kill all of the lights or the radios, but in order to do that we have to find the generator. I did manage however to kill the radios in the building, so only the ones in their suits should work unless those are on the generator as well," Mizu reported.
"Good work. Come on, lets join Kiba," Manch snarled, ready to fight. The wolves jumped down onto the guards while dropping the human guises, killing anyone they could get to. Cheza went down the hall a ways in order to jump down safely. She then ran over and snuck into the fray, searching for Tsume. Once she found him, she tried to drag him away, only to find he was too heavy.
"And just what do you think you're doing?" one of the guards asked, grabbing Cheza. A few others spotted this somewhat safer confrontation and joined in, one grabbing Cheza and another picking up Tsume.
"KIBA!" Cheza shouted, trying to get the wolf's attention. Kiba saw the guards with Cheza and Tsume, knowing he would not be able to get to them in time. He looked around frantically, only to discover the other wolves were all locked in life or death battles with the guards with no relief in sight. They would not be able to get to the quickly retreating flower maiden and wolf.
"Don't worry, Cheza! We'll find you!" Kiba called out. Cheza smiled, trusting the wolf so completely it made his heart skip a beat. The guards then bore Cheza and Tsume through a door, vanishing from sight.
About twenty minutes later, the battle was over. The hall was littered with the bodies of guards and blood. The wolves had escaped mostly unscathed, save for a few bumps and bruises.
"Oh no, don't tell me I hear what I think I hear," whined Hige, referring to the sound of echoing footsteps quickly approaching.
"Yep, those would be reinforcements," replied Manch.
"Come on, lets get out of here," said Aurora. The group ran off led by Kiba through the door and down the stairs that Kiba had seen the guards leave with Cheza and Tsume through. They came to a split in the passage, both directions looking very uninviting.
"Hige, do you smell anything?" Kiba asked.
"Yeah, old and mildew and not much else. Yuck!"
"What do we do now?" Blue asked.
"Should we split up?" Manch suggested.
"We already are split up! I don't think we should risk splitting up. Give those blasted guards something to do," said Mizu.
"Then, we just pick a way and go. Come on, lets go left," said Kiba, already going that way. The wolves ran down the chosen stairs, going deeper into the gloom.
"Sesshomaru?"
"Hmm?"
"Do you hear something?"
"Yes."
"What is it? Can you tell?"
"They're coming..."
"Hey, is that a light up ahead?" asked Hige.
"Yeah, come on!" shouted Aurora, eager to see what awaited them.
"The light is coming from under that door," Blue pointed to the door just ahead at the foot of the stairs.
"Hey, I think I smell Toboe!" Hige exclaimed.
"Come on then!" Blue shouted. The wolves rushed forward and opened the door. They were in a dark and dreary dungeon that contained only two occupants.
"Kiba! Hige! Blue! Where's Cheza and Tsume?" asked Toboe.
"Gone, the guards got them. Are you OK, Runt?" said Hige.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Gone? Are they all right? Where did they take them?"
"We don't know. The guards took them through a door and we followed, but must have taken the wrong path to find them," Kiba informed him.
"They must have taken your friends down to the lower dungeons then," Sesshomaru said. The others jumped, not fully realizing until that moment that he was there.
"Um, yeah, lets, lets get you guys out of there," said Hige, pulling a key he lifted off one of the guards in the fight upstairs. In a matter of seconds both Toboe and Sesshomaru were free.
Toboe gasped when he saw Sesshomaru. Sesshomaru was tall and naturally pale with forbidding golden eyes, two purple stripes on each side of his face, a purple crescent moon on his forehead, and long silver hair that reached his thighs. He wore white baggy pants, a white gi with red on the left shoulder, a large, white boa on his right shoulder, black boots and a yellow belt around his waist. He wore armor that covered his chest. He looked around at all of the faces surrounding him.
'Toboe?' rang Sesshomaru's voice in Toboe's head. Toboe smiled and introduced everyone he knew. Then Kiba introduced the others.
"Come on, lets get out of here and find Tsume and Cheza!" said Hige.
"And Luna!" said Toboe. Aurora spun around to face the pup.
"Luna? Did you just say Luna?" she asked desperately.
"Yeah, they came and took her away just a little while ago." Toboe informed her.
"Then lets go get them!" Aurora shouted.
"I'm afraid it is not that easy," said Sesshomaru. You see, if our comrades were indeed taken to the lower dungeons, that means they are in grave danger of being offered up to Naraku in order to pacify him until they find Kagome. You see, they woke up Naraku's dormant spirit without fully understanding what they had done until it was too late. Now they must find Kagome to rectify that mistake before he consumes all of our souls..."
Well, that's this chapter. Hope you liked it! I'm so sorry! I was planning on them getting out of there this chapter, but instead they'll be in the castle even longer! I'm afraid my description of Sesshomaru did not do him justice. If you go to or type his name into Google you can find some very nice pictures of him. If you want to know why I say that thing on his shoulder is a boa and not his tail, it is because on the ep. where he meets Rin you can see both ends of it. Thank you so much for taking the time to read it, now please, review me! Love ya all!