Chapter 15
Truth and Illusions
Sierra turned off the hair dryer and frowned as she tilted her head to listen. The soft knock came again, and she grinned as she yanked open the bathroom door and ran to admit her visitor. 'Toga . . . you're early . . . .'
Swinging open the door with a bright smile, Sierra's greeting died on her lips as her smile faded, and she stepped back in retreat.
"May I come in?"
Unable to find her voice, she nodded and held the door open wider to admit Sesshoumaru Inutaisho. Dressed in regular attire this time, Sierra still didn't find him any less intimidating than she had the first time they'd met. She tried not to show her reluctance as she closed the door but couldn't hide her trembling hands, and she just knew that he knew it, too.
"Thank you for letting me attend the wedding. It was lovely," Sierra commented, unsure what else she could say as she wondered why he was here.
"I did not come here to exchange pleasantries," he stated as he passed her. "I gather you know this."
"Then why did you?"
"It has come to my attention that my son has been a bit . . . lax . . . in telling you some things that you really ought to know," Sesshoumaru remarked as he slowly crossed the floor and turned to pin her with his cold gaze.
"Then maybe he should be telling me whatever it is you're going to say," she managed though her voice wasn't nearly as strong as she would have liked. Mustering her waning bravado, she checked her watch before crossing her arms over her stomach. "He is coming to go with me to dinner, and he said he had some things he wanted to tell me then."
"Toga isn't coming," Sesshoumaru assured her, flicking a nonexistent bit of fuzz off his immaculate suit sleeve. "He's having dinner with an old friend. I believe you saw her? His fiancé, Fujiko."
She shook her head slowly as her mouth went dry, as her hands broke out in a cold sweat. "His what? He said---"
"I know what he said. Unfortunately, it matters little what he says, just as it matters not what he wants. He will mate her, and you will be nothing."
"You can't tell him what to do . . . you can't make him marry someone he doesn't want to be with . . . ."
Sesshoumaru's cold chuckle made her wince. "I am Inu no Taisho. Toga will inherit the duties and responsibilities after me. I assure you, he will do what is expected of him."
"What kind of archaic nonsense is that? People don't marry someone they don't love . . . and you can't honestly expect Toga to do that, either."
"What I can expect is for him to do what is required. He may not mate your kind, and he knows this."
"My kind? What does that mean?"
His eyes widened in mock surprise before narrowing again as he sized her up. "What, indeed? I mean humans, you naïve girl. Did my son forget to mention that? He is youkai. He will marry youkai."
Sierra shook her head slowly as her expression registered her disbelief. "Youkai? I don't know what you're talking about."
Instead of answering, Sesshoumaru slowly, deliberately lifted his hand before his face. As he brought his hand down, revealing his true youkai markings, Sierra gasped. Images of Toga's face on Halloween pressed against her head, made her feel weak, dizzy . . . . Sesshoumaru grinned, and she saw his fangs. As his hand fell away, she saw his claws, and the fierce markings on the backs of his hands.
"Oh, my God," she mumbled as she stepped back, stepped away. Stumbling as she pushed herself against the wall, eyes wide in fear, she stared at him as she felt the blood being siphoned from her skin. "What are you?"
"Some call us demons. Some call us magic. Mononoke . . . youkai . . . . Now do you understand?"
Sierra's mind rebelled at what she saw, at what she'd been told. Unable to believe Sesshoumaru's claims . . . it had to be a trick of light, a slight of hand . . . . She choked out a harsh laugh before jamming the back of her hand against her dry lips. "There's no such thing . . . there can't be . . . ."
With a heavy sigh, Sesshoumaru swung around in a circle as a long, thin flash of green light shot out of his fingertips. He dragged the string through the air and cracked it against the mirror over the bureau, shattering it as Sierra yelped and shied away even further. The string sucked back into his fingers and disappeared. Only then did he bother to look at Sierra again. "Do you believe me now?"
Sierra didn't answer.
Slowly, he strode over to her, stopped before her, tilted her chin to force her to look at him. Trapped against the wall, Sierra had no escape, even if she could have moved. She bit back a sob. "Go home, Sierra, and for your own sake, stay away from my son."
He let his hand drop from her face as he turned his back on her. Strolling to the door, he stopped with his hand on the knob and looked back at her. "My private plane is waiting for you at the airport. I'll tell them to expect you within the hour."
He slipped out quietly as Sierra's knees buckled. She sank to the floor with a soft sob. Shaking, heart hammering, she couldn't control the violent tremors in her body as she fought to find reason behind Sesshoumaru's statements.
'There's no such thing as mythical beings . . . youkai or whatever . . . they aren't real . . . .'
Eyes rising to stare at the shattered remnants of the mirror, she winced and drew back as the echo of the energy whip rattled through her head again and again. 'Toga . . . I . . . why didn't you tell me . . . ?'
Nothing made sense. Nothing seemed real. The only thing she could think of were the words Toga had said to her . . . 'I'll tell you later . . . .'
The things that she hadn't ever understood about him suddenly seemed to fall into place. The quiet questions that he never had answered . . . now she knew.
'He may not mate your kind, and he knows this.'
"God!" Sierra gasped as she leaned forward, wrapped her arms around her raised knees. "Toga . . . ."
The image of his face, his shy smile, his bashful demeanor as he jammed his hands deep into his pockets . . . . Sierra willed the images away, tried to ignore the hurt that came with them.
'Why didn't you tell me all this, Toga . . . ? Why did you . . . lie?'
Was that the reason he'd been able to rescue her from that tree? Was that the reason he'd moved so fast the night in the park? Feeling like a fool, like a complete and utter dupe, Sierra couldn't cry. Her mind wouldn't let her.
'Don't think, Sierra . . . don't think about it . . . the plane . . . get on the plane and go home, where everything makes sense . . . .'
"Home," she whispered as she pushed herself to her feet. "Home . . . ."
--0--0--0--0--0--
Toga loped down the stairs, two at a time. "Going to see Sierra?" Kagura asked as he stepped down the last few.
"Yeah . . . I, uh . . . I need to tell her . . . ."
Kagura nodded. "If you're serious about her, then yes."
Toga dropped his gaze and shook his head as a hint of color filled his cheeks. "Mother . . . I promised her that I'd protect her."
She didn't look at all surprised by his admission. "I see . . . ."
"Do you?"
Kagura nodded as she smoothed his hair out of his eyes, her gaze searching his for some sort of truth. She must have found it. She smiled sadly, as if whatever it was she saw in her son was undeniable, as she cupped his face in her hands.
"Toga . . . you know I want you to be happy, and I think your father does, too." When he opened his mouth to protest, Kagura silenced him with a finger to his lips, just as she had when he was small. "I know it's hard for you to see it. "You are his son---his only son. He's always demanded more of you, always demanded perfection . . . but in this . . . this one time . . . I think he might be wrong."
"Mother . . . I've never felt for anyone the way I feel for her."
Kagura smiled. "She's a beautiful girl."
"She's more than that," he said slowly. "She's . . . she makes me want to smile."
She shook her head slowly, the conflict rising in her expression. Trapped between husband and son in a battle of wills . . . Toga winced. He didn't want her to have to be there, ever. "I wish you and your father could come to terms on this, but if you can't, don't you dare back down. If you love her, you fight for her, even if that means you must fight your father."
Toga sighed and shook his head. "Can I . . . can I do that?"
Kagura stroked his cheek, her eyes clouded with unmasked concern. "Toga, you may have to, if Sierra is the woman you want." She stepped back and gave him the once over before nodding. "You'd better get moving if you're supposed to meet her for dinner. Darling . . . be careful, telling her your secret. It isn't quite like telling her that you're lying about your age."
He made a face. "She's not going to take this well, is she?"
Kagura lifted her eyebrows. "Probably not, but if she truly cares about you . . . ."
Leaning down to kiss his mother's cheek, Toga grinned as Kagura yanked his hair. "Get out of here, boy . . . and don't you dare tell her that your mother was the reason you kept her waiting."
Toga nodded and headed toward the door. He barely stepped back in time to avoid colliding with his father as Sesshoumaru stalked inside with his cell phone plastered against his ear. Toga inclined his head in a barely civil greeting as he reached for the door. Sesshoumaru's voice stopped him. "Toga . . . if you're going to see that girl, she is gone." he flipped his phone closed and stuck it in his pocket as he turned to stare at his son.
"What?" Toga demanded sharply.
"She is gone. That was the pilot on my plane. She's on her way home. She, at least, could see reason." That said, Sesshoumaru wheeled around to head upstairs to change. "By the way, you have a change in dinner plans. Pick up Fujiko. You're having dinner with her."
"What the hell did you do, Father?" Toga growled.
Sesshoumaru was already half-way up the staircase. He stopped and glanced back over his shoulder. "I saved you from making a terrible mistake, Toga. Now leave it. Fujiko is waiting for you."
"Damn you . . ." Toga said quietly as he headed for the stairs after Sesshoumaru. Eyes cold, expression blank, Toga didn't give an inch as he stared at his father. "Get it through your head. I don't want Fujiko. I don't want any youkai. Sierra's the one I've chosen. She is the one I want. You can take your demands and your ideas of what's best for me and shove them up your ass because I'm not doing what you want, not now, not in this!"
"Toga!" Sesshoumaru hollered after him as the younger youkai stalked up the stairs to his room.
'This is the last time,' Toga thought as he snatched the suitcase and threw in his things. 'The last time you fuck in my life, the last time I roll over and submit to your whims . . . . No more . . . .' He paused long enough to grab his passport and cell phone before heading back downstairs again.
Kagura's voice stopped him. They had moved from the foyer to the adjacent living room. Toga's frown darkened. He'd never heard that tone from his mother before, had never heard her openly challenge his authority, not like this. "Of all the underhanded, sneaky things to have done! Sesshoumaru, he's your son!"
"Yes, my son!" Sesshoumaru hissed back. "My son, and the future Inu no Taisho! He must do what he must do!"
"How can you be so stubborn? How can you say that he must do something that will not make him happy? What would you have said if Aiko had brought home a human?"
"I'd have told her to be happy!"
"Then why not Toga?"
The heavy clink of a glass being thumped on a table echoed out of the living room. "Do you think I want to do this to him? Do you believe I want to see him unhappy? If he takes a human to mate, Kagura . . . you know as well as I that he will be challenged, and he may be killed."
"You don't trust that Toga is strong enough to handle that, too? I thought you said that he is your son!"
"And so he is! He's also been sheltered. Name one time he's had to fight, other than his formal instruction."
Kagura sighed. "You will cost us our son, Sesshoumaru, and if you do, may kami protect you because there won't be a place on this earth where you will be able to hide from me."
He'd heard enough. Sickened at the thought of what he'd caused, disgusted and angry at his father yet unable to thank his mother for her obvious support, he shook his head slowly, the light of finality punctuating his every movement. Toga stomped down the stairs, purposefully making more noise than was necessary. He didn't acknowledge either of his parents as he jerked the door open and stepped out into the falling night.
Throwing his suitcase into the car before getting in and starting the engine, he didn't look back at the mansion until he was making his way down the driveway. Glancing into his rearview mirror, Toga nearly stopped. Kagura stood in the open doorway, arms crossed over her chest as she watched him go. As though she could sense his gaze on her, she raised a thin hand and waved.
She was still in the doorway when he turned out onto the street.
Fumbling with his cell phone, Toga tried to call Sierra. Whether she was out of range or just wasn't answering, he didn't know. Clenching his jaw in abject frustration, Toga hung up and dialed the airport. At least something was working in his favor. Ten minutes later, he was booked on the next flight out, providing he could make it to the airport within the next hour.
Mumbling every swear that Uncle Yasha had ever taught him, Toga grimaced as he was caught behind yet another red light.
'Baka . . . I should have told her sooner . . . I've known she was the one I wanted, and yet . . . .' Toga ground his teeth together as he waited for traffic to move again. 'There wasn't a good time, maybe . . . would there have ever been a good time for that?'
Traffic finally started moving again. Toga stifled a sigh, leaning his elbow against the window and letting his forehead fall into his raised hand. 'Sierra . . . just listen to me . . . .'
A/N:
Final Thought from Sierra:
What a strange family …
Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Defiance): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.
Sue
