A/N - Like, oh m'gosh, I'm finally updating! gasp

With You

Chapter 12

What She Never Knew

"Where is he going?" Kagome frowned perplexedly. Inuyasha had more impudence than a donkey if he was going to run off and tell them to just stay put. He should have known by now that no matter where he went, she was going to stick to him like a leech.

Kagome turned to Inashi and smiled, "So, what do you think? Should we follow him?"

"Why not?" he laughed, amused with her mischievous behavior.

They started off quickly, guessing for the most part which way to go. I wonder why he ran off so suddenly… Kagome wondered, Maybe it had something to do with that weapon or whatever that he had been talking about. But then why did he leave Inashi and me here? She sighed as she tramped through the dense forest; Inuyasha was impossible for her to understand.

Kagome looked at Inashi, about to inquire as to whether or not he thought they were on the right track, only to find him staring at her. "What?" she chortled, raising and eyebrow.

Inashi blinked at her and smiled timidly, saying it was nothing. But a few minutes later, he put his hand on her shoulder. "Kagome, wait…" he told her as he stared into the trees around them. "There's someone here."

"What do you mean?" Kagome stepped to face him, "Is someone following us?"

He didn't answer her, only kept looking warily into the woods.

"Inashi, what is it?" she joined him in scanning the area around her, "Don't you think that it might just be some sort of an animal or something?"

Inashi shook his head "It's no animal."

"What is it then?"

He gave her an odd look and questioned slowly, "Do you feel anything…strange?"

"What do you mean by 'strange'?" she quirked an eyebrow.

"Something unusual; something you wouldn't normally feel."

Kagome frowned, but continued to nod uncertainly. "What are you implying?"

He looked back at the trees, "Kagome, as you grow older, though you may already know this, your spiritual awareness matures and bit by bit, you are aware of and understand more of what the average human would not."

"Meaning…?"

"Meaning," he continued patiently, looking back at her and smiling, "That you'll develop the ability to sense demons and spirits and such. Right now, for example, you said that you felt something strange, correct? So if I had one guess, I'd say that what you felt was a demon, and we're being tracked by it."

A slight shiver zipped through Kagome's thin frame. That 'strange feeling' was getting more intense by the minute. Their pursuer was coming nearer at a quick pace. "Inashi, I think we need to start running."

"Let's go."

A blinding flash of light from the girls mirror pierced Inuyasha's eyes, but that was insignificant compared to what he experienced otherwise. Four razor-sharp beams of energy raced towards him, and his body was instantly thrown to the ground; tearing long sections of his gi and leaving deep cuts in his skin.

"D-damnit…" he cursed and forced himself to sit upright. What the hell was that…?

"My mirror," Kanna began, "Can either absorb or reflect all of your long range attacks, depending on which I choose. Upon your attacking and my choosing to reflect, your own attack will be shot straight back, directed at you, faster than you can escape it." He dragged himself to his feet, ignoring the pain as she calmly continued, "So, therefore, your attacks against me are worthless. You are hurting only yourself."

Inuyasha growled in frustrated resolve, still determined to get what he came for. He leapt forward again, but instead of using one of his more powerful attacks, he headed straight for the girl - intending to hit her directly.

But all that his arm struck was the air in front of him. Inuyasha spun to her composed voice behind him once again, "You cannot win that way either."

He jumped at her a third time, but she seemingly disappeared as he slashed at her. "You are not listening to what I am telling you."

Inuyasha was starting to get aggravated - why couldn't he just snatch a stupid sword from a little girl?! Well, one thing was for sure; he wasn't going anywhere until he got it.

And that was when he got a dangerous idea…

Kagome sped breathlessly behind Inashi through the forest. She knew that whatever was following them was faster than they were, and it was scaring her more as time passed. That, and how she was sure that they were moving away form Inuyasha.

"Inashi," she panted, "We're not heading towards Inuyasha! We need to turn!"

"I know."

"Well, then let's turn…!" she grabbed his sleeve and tried in vain to tug him to her left.

"I know," he repeated inattentively, "But we can't."

"Why?"

He seemed distant as he answered her, "We don't have enough time!"

"What?"

"We've got to get to somewhere open… a prairie… a meadow, maybe… even a swamp would do…"

Huh?

"The crest… the emerald crest… it's our only chance…"

What in the world was he talking about?

Kagome couldn't tear her eyes away from him as they ran; he was sweating profusely and his breath was coming out in ragged pants. He was clutching something tightly in his hand as he mumbled something under his breath. He was starting to scare her.

"Ah!' Kagome gasped as she tripped over who-knows-what and fell to the ground--the result of not watching where she was going.

Inashi stopped and turned, rushing to her and grabbing her hand to pull her to her feet. He dragged her in his wake so she wouldn't fall behind as he began to run once again. And that was when Kagome felt it.

The demon was less than 100 meters behind them.

How long had Inuyasha been battling for? Seconds? Minutes? Hours? He'd completely lost track of time. Although he could guess that he'd wasted quite a bit of it; which was why he was pleading with fate to let his plan work.

He kinda wondered, though, what would happen if his idea didn't, well… go the way he was planning it to. Would he be severely injured yet again? Or perhaps die? And what would happen to the girl?

Waaait…

Not that again.

Inuyasha groaned to himself and tried to ignore the smiley little face that kept popping into his head. Now was definitely not the time for this.

He took a deep breath and prepared to jump - now was the time to take a chance; a very big chance. But hey, he had been born to live dangerously - risking his life was on his everyday 'to-do list'. So here went something…

Inuyasha leapt off the ground and raised his arm once again, mustering all his strength into one diagonal slash as he shouted, "Sankontetsou!!"

He smirked to himself as he hunched down once connecting with the ground, because even though these quite possibly could have been the last few seconds of his life, he couldn't help but enjoy the look of utter confusion that spread over the generally emotionally void face of the small, white girl. She stared at him bemusedly and held her mirror in front of her so to reflect his attack; and that was exactly what it did.

He watched for exactly the right moment, exactly the right time, and soon enough, he saw it. As the blades of energy sped towards him, he stood quickly and countered his attack with none other than his own attack--Sankontetsou. But, much to Inuyasha's annoyance and anger, his second attack did nothing to the first but split each of the energy blades in half, now resulting in eight smaller, but less powerful beams.

Inuyasha took a deep breath and leapt forward--straight into Sankontetsou.

He was hit by 3 of them at full force, but made himself finish what he's started anyway, because as soon as he'd broken through his attack, Kanna was entirely vulnerable. She fell to the ground as his clawed fist hit her, but he backed off as soon as he had grabbed the sword. There was no need to kill her--little had he realized that his punch hit her hard enough to knock her out. If he ever saw her around causing trouble again though, he'd finish her off for sure.

A sharp chill ran down Kagome's spine as Inashi tugged her through the brush by her chilled hand. She could clearly feel how close the demon was, and how much closer it was getting by the second.

75 meters.

"Inashi!" He didn't respond. "Inashi, listen to me!"

Kagome looked at him pointedly as he sprinted through the brush. Whatever he was holding in his other hand was beginning to glow some sort of a greenish color, sorta emerald-ish… wait; emerald?

50 meters.

Way to close for Kagome's comfort. She shivered as the wind around them seemed to steadily pick up its pace. "Inashi Rankeru, I think you should know that whatever happens to be following us is less than 50 meters away-!"

Kagome was cut off when Inashi stopped abruptly as they entered an open field. Despite her efforts to cease movement, though, she ended up running flat into him with an exaggerated 'oomph'.

"Way to tell me you're going to stop…" she groused snippily whilst rubbing her offended nose; but he didn't seem to be listening.

Very unlike him…

He suddenly snapped to face her and clamped his hands onto her shoulders firmly, "You have to hide somewhere!"

"W-why?!" she yelped, stepping away.

"Because it's coming! Please, go now!" he pleaded.

She had to listen to him--she had no choice.

Kagome turned from Inashi and ran through the long grass. She kept going until she was far enough away to satisfy him, but he was still within the range of her eyesight. She ducked behind a large patch of shrubs and mangled bushes, peeking through to see Inashi still watching where she had run.

He soon raised his gaze to the clouds above him and opened his hand. The small, green, glowing jewel that he had been clutching in his fingers seemed to rise into the air; moving higher and higher. She observed the emerald with growing anticipation as the flickering light that surrounded it grew and flashed brightly.

Kagome examined Inashi as she saw his lips begin to move, but she couldn't hear the words he was speaking. They eventually reached her ears, though, and the volume of his voice was raising itself as the jewel brightened.

She couldn't understand what he was saying… he wasn't speaking Japanese--he was speaking something foreign. Very foreign. Her tutors had taught her over 7 languages, which she was now all fluent in, and that wasn't any one of them.

But as all of this was happening, Kagome noticed a drastic change in the wind. It was now blowing rather forcefully around her and whipping her hair every which way as she tried unsuccessfully to contain it between her hands--and at that moment, something appeared.

No, not something… rather, someone.

The demon.

Inuyasha sniffed the air impatiently and tried to pick up Kagome's scent, but it was awfully distant. She couldn't have been anywhere near where he would have thought her to be.

He was off in her direction in seconds though; following the fragrance that his nose stubbornly refused to forget.

Upon returning to the path that he'd left her and that boy on, he noticed something. They'd ran in completely the opposite direction he'd gone in.

Why would they do that?

He had to consider this… but not now, later. He seemed to have just picked up on the scent of another little not-so-good something--the smell of a mildly impressive demon. Whether it would be of any real danger to those two or not, he couldn't tell, but he sure wasn't going to risk his ticket to a boatload of gold getting killed.

He sped along the path that her scent fell on, but frowned at how he tired much quicker than he normally would have. "Damnit…" he cursed as he tentatively put the back of his claw to one of his wounds. Duh. He should have known he wouldn't get too far with those…

Until then, the he had been able to avoid the pain, but now…? It was bothering him a great deal more than he could put up with. He decided to slow his pace a bit as to not open the cuts any more, and tore off strips of his white gi to tie around his injuries until he found a minute to take care of them. He could hold up 'til he found his traveling cohorts.

But… his suspicions of a strong demon slowly grew as he felt the wind blow.

It was all happening so fast… everything was just one big blur.

The demon was a woman; one who apparently had the power to control the wind. Inashi was only a man… did he even have a fighting chance?

Kagome had watched with dread as Inashi was continually attacked by the woman with rapidly approaching blades of wind. She could see the pain etched into his features as he was mercilessly attacked.

He had tried to fight back, of course, but her advantage of being able to take to the air when he couldn't made it nearly impossible to attack her with his sword alone.

But the jewel…the emerald that he had been using… had disappeared the moment she arrived.

Had Inashi hidden it? Had he destroyed it? Had it simply vanished from existence? Kagome had no idea.

Right now, though… all she really knew was that there must have been some way for her to help him. At this rate, Inashi was probably going to die. She had to do something.

What if it so happened that he had the jewel? She didn't really know what he had been doing with it before this demon woman came, but he must have had something up his sleeve for him to bother with it at all. Perhaps she could create some sort of a diversion, a distraction. Anything to temporarily deter the attention of the wind-demon. But what in the world could she do?

At times like this, usually, something would come to Kagome. An idea would hit her like a brick and she'd have it all planned out and executed in seconds time. But sadly, today wasn't one of those bright days. She couldn't think of a thing. The only person that came to mind that she knew would know just how to deal with a situation like this one was Inuyasha…

Inuyasha!

That was it--all that she had to do was get him. He was half demon, right? Surely a guy like him could beat this girlie to a pulp.

Without a second thought, Kagome leapt out of her refuge in the undergrowth and ran back towards the forest where she remembered that they had come from.

But that was a decision that she came to regret about three whole seconds later.

She was stopped in her tracks as a wide oak fell three feet in front of her. "Hey!" she barked as she began to turn "That was a serious attempt on my lif--ah!" she squeaked and dived out of the way of a falling maple. This lady really was out to get her…

Inashi looked up agitatedly from where the woman had knocked him down. "Ka-Kagome!!" he rasped, clutching the bloodstained cloth of his shirt. "Don't go near her! Get away from this place, quickly!!"

Kagome turned to see him standing on unsteady limbs and yelling for her to run. But as she looked at him… she knew that she couldn't. Running now would mean leaving him to certain death. The moment she had gotten away, the demon wouldn't hesitate to kill him--her childhood friend would die alone.

She didn't have time to find Inuyasha… that wouldn't do her any good. All she could do was wish that he would come to find them soon.

She dived past yet another tree that the woman had felled near her and dashed towards Inashi. He shook his head furiously and waved her off, but she kept moving. Foliage was being whirled at her fiercely, but she managed to avoid getting hit with anything more than a couple of tree branches.

"You--you shouldn't have come out here!! Please, go back!" his fear for her was beginning to show on his face "I don't want you to get killed along with me!"

"Don't think like that!" she tried to smile, but her uncertainly showed through it "We'll be fine!"

But while they were arguing, a certain wind demon's frustration was only growing. She raised her wind fan and unleashed her attach on her unsuspecting male victim.

Inashi turned a second too late as the wind blades connected with his back--knocking him forward to his hands and knees. It took him everything not to yell from the pain.

Kagome dropped to her knees and reached to touch his arm. It… hurt so much to see him this way. She didn't know what to do. She didn't know what to say. She couldn't help him.

Kagome started as she was pushed flat to the ground by Inashi, who was now leaning over her with his hands on either side of her. Her body was frozen in place as she saw him cringe and release a strangled cry when several more of the wind blades hit him. His whole body was shaking as he spoke the best that he could. "I'll c-can't let you die…!!"

Inashi half-fell to the ground and Kagome quickly got up to her knees. Her head turned just in time to see the woman attacking again. Kagome couldn't let her hurt him again. Not for her.

She quickly moved in front of Inashi, her back facing the attack. This might be--

…nothing…?

Kagome turned around in puzzlement; why hadn't she been hit?

There was nothing in sight that she would have imagined would be able to stop the blow…so what did?

She turned back to Inashi who was staring at her in surprise. "You…"

"What just happened?" Kagome asked bluntly.

He tried smiling "You created a barrier, I think…"

"Perish!!"

They both turned simultaneously as the demon attacked again. "Don't!!" Kagome shouted, automatically throwing her arms in front of her--she was astonished to find a half-transparent wall of....well, wall of something, form in front of her. The attack had been blocked.

But the woman, refusing to relent, continued to try and attack them. Every time, the barrier went up again--shielding Kagome for a good 5 foot distance in every direction, also protecting Inashi. "Inashi, it works!"

She would have expected him to smile and agree… but he didn't. "It won't last much longer, Kagome."

"What do you mean? Of course it will! Won't it?" She frowned worriedly "It's lasted this far--why won't it respond infinitely?"

"Watch it." He gestured with his head as he pulled himself to his knees. "It's growing smaller every time. You're power has an end, you know." He flinched when he tried to get to his feet and dropped down again.

She drew her hand to her mouth "You're hurt so terribly…"

"Don't worry about it." He smiled weakly. "But we need to do something. Now."

"Right." She nodded, noticing with discouragement how quickly the twenty-five area space she had only a minute earlier had diminished to an extremely unimpressive eight. "Here," she got to her knees next to him "We'll go over there-."

He shook his head disapprovingly "Not enough time."

"Inashi…?!" Kagome whimpered.

"I need to use the crest." He looked to the ground "Remember that jewel I had?"

She nodded.

"There's something inside of that that I guarantee will kill the demon, and you'll be safe. I just need you to keep a barrier. After that, you won't need it anymore."

"Um, okay." She nodded obediently "Just keep a barrier."

"Yeah. Oh, and Kagome…" he faced her with a distressed expression suddenly tainting his features "When this is over, make sure you get home. Stay with that Inu guy… he should be able to bring you there…"

"Inashi… I don't understand. You're coming with us--."

Inashi leaned forward and pulled her into a tight hug. "No…I'm not."

Kagome couldn't stop looking at his face as he pulled away.

He was crying.

"Inashi, tell me what--."

He pushed her away from him and stood, the jewel suddenly appearing in his hand. "I… hope you find happiness, Kagome."

Kagome felt herself shake, "I-Inashi, what's happening--?"

"I may never be here again, and I know that you'll find someone perfect and fall in love some day while I'm gone, but I need to tell you…"

She tried to stand as he spoke "Inashi--!"

"That I love you." He looked up at her, smiling brighter than ever "I always have."

And with that he closed his eyes, and was gone.

A/N - BWAhahahahahHA! Major cliffy. P I know, I'm an evil person. But for all of you out there that think she might love him back… let me give you a little heads up. We like to call what he feels for her 'unrequited love'. Yeah. And for those of you that don't know what that means, go look it up. Right now. Didn't I say this is an Inu/Kag fic? Well, that's because it is. I just haven't gotten to the part where they actually start to like each other yet…. But honestly, I had to kill this guy off (he was SO in the way), and I just couldn't help myself from being so dramatic. But you all can be happy now--he's gone!!! D

And before anybody says anything or bites my head off, yes--I know that I took like half a year to update, but I'm truly sorry. I was insanely busy, and honestly--most of the time I didn't have as much motivation to write as I did to make a super-de-duper Inuyasha music video. Did I ever finish it? No, not yet--most likely because it was accidentally erased by a certain sibling of mine cough little sister cough THREE times when I was like more than half way through with putting it together and editing. I seem to like it better each time that I redo it though…. Idk. Again, I apologize for the insane wait, and I'll will try my very, very hardest to be quicker--much quicker. I'm finally setting in to high school, so yeah…. I'm getting the hang of things. I think I might have a bit more time a night. (of the 2 to 3 nights a week that I actually, on occasion, have an hour or so to spare for my drawing, piano, and writing) other things just seem to take super priority sometimes. Sorry!

Well, anyway, hope y'all liked the chapter! Thanks so much for reading!!!

The Riceball Who Lost Her Fruitdrop

PS -- Excuse my uh… lack of knowledge on Kagura. I haven't seen Inuyasha all the way through since a year or two ago, so my memory's a pinch rusty. . My apologies.