Chapter 2 - Everything
Is Okay, But...
Or, Feeling Like
Death Warmed Over
-
'The miko certainly did a good job,' Sakiiki mused to himself. Turning to the water, which had started to ripple in a non-existent breeze, he chuckled. "You can come out now, Kiou."
The pool rippled again and shrank into itself, the water rising up to form into the image of a man. This one was darkly tanned, as though he had spent his whole life laying about the Southern beaches. His hair was a deep shade of blue and his eyes a deep, diffused green. Smiling mischievously, he waited for his elegant robes to form from the remaining water before stepping towards his brother and the prone form of Kagome.
Both looked down at the still form, her powers healing their host as best they could while she was unaware. They turned as one to the child weeping behind them. "She did it, aniki. She beat me," Kiou murmured. Saki nodded his assent and turned his gaze back to Kagome.
The girl looked up as she heard voices and saw the two standing over the fainted miko. Crying harder, she beat against the inside of the shield to try and reach her savior. A hand lowered through the pink barrier to settle on the girl's head. A soft voice accompanied the hand and the ningen calmed immediately. "The miko is fine, child. She will no doubt wish to see you when she wakes, but for now, we must return her to her camp. We will leave you to watch over her, yes?"
The little brown-haired girl looked up into the caring orange eyes of the black-haired older woman who stood above her. As she nodded once, Kagome's barrier fell away and the energy rushed back to its mistress to aid in her recovery. "Genze," Kiou began as he stepped towards the two, but was silenced as the woman knelt before the child once more.
"What is your name, child?"
The little girl grinned suddenly. "My name is Soshina! What's your name?"
Genze shook her head, raising the girl's chin to stare into the wide eyes fixed back on her. "It doesn't matter now, child. You must forget your parents and your name if you are to help the miko. I will tell you all you need to know, but you must stay by her side no matter what, okay?"
The little girl nodded enthusiastically, smiling up at the beautiful woman kneeled before her. The woman smiled briefly in return and placed one pale hand over the child's eyes. A pale peach glow surrounded them, disappearing as soon as it appeared. When Genze removed her hand, the girl opened troubled eyes. Before she could open her mouth to speak, Genze stood and Kiou kneeled in her place. Smiling faintly at the child, he mimicked his sister's gesture, and soon a pale blue glow surrounded them for a short time.
When he finished, Kiou stood again and stared down at the ningen child. The girl opened large violet eyes and immediately turned to go towards Kagome's prone form. A hand on her shoulder stopped her. She looked up at the blue-haired man with a question forming silently on her lips. He shook his head in return. "Aniki's takin' good care of 'er. There's no need fer ya to worry, Atai."
The girl, now named Atai, smiled brilliantly up at him and nodded. Her need for speech seemed to be gone, now that she had received her gifts from two of the three wise siblings. Sakiiki stood from where he knelt by the priestess and turned to the others. "This makes a few things clearer, but not a lot. I have seen her before, in the visions, but they are of a time far ahead of this. She confuses things, but also makes them clearer."
Kiou scoffed at his brother and stalked up to him, poking the older entity in the chest with an indignant finger. "Just 'cuz ya get visions an' all that doesn't mean ya gotta be mysterious about 'em!"
Saki only smiled down at his oto and shrugged lithe shoulders. Behind him, Kagome began to stir. Kiou peered around the black-haired man to see what she was doing. He raised an eyebrow as he saw her clasp something that glowed a faint pink at her throat. His eyes widened in realization. Turning back to Sakiiki, he neglected to blink, as if the movement would hinder his processing the knowledge faster.
"She's the Shikon's protectress? No wonder she beat my little inu."
Saki gave his younger brother a disapproving look and turned to Genze, who still stood across the clearing with the child. "We should return her to camp now, before the hanyou comes to his senses and finds her missing."
Kiou scoffed as his older sister moved forward, Atai trailing behind. "It's not like he really cares… he's just gonna turn out like everyone else who wanted that damned thing before."
The older female smiled faintly at her ototo's words and patted him on the shoulder, moving past both brothers to gently lift the miko from the ground. Atai still trailed silently after Genze, clutching her Beni-sama to her chest protectively. Turning to gaze behind herself at the place her savior had rested, she saw Kiou and Sakiiki talking quietly. After a moment, the elder smiled and slipped a black blindfold over his ghostly white eyes and faded into the forest surrounding them. Kiou shook his head slowly and glanced over at her, smiling faintly before fading away into the forest as well.
Shivering slightly in a sudden wind, she turned back towards Genze and hurried to catch up to the woman who carried Kagome.
-
'Morning..?' Kagome shielded her eyes from the bright light that signified the sun was above her. 'No, midday. What happened? Why didn't anyone…'
"The child!" Kagome sat up straight in her sleeping bag, wincing and hissing as she stretched still-healing wounds. Ignoring them for the moment, she looked around at the campsite frantically. Seeing who she was looking for, she relaxed a bit and smiled at the girl who had stood from her place by the fire. Atai smiled back as she sat again, and Kagome cast her blue-grey gaze over the rest of the camp, silently taking stock of who was present.
Slowly standing, Kagome noticed she'd been dressed in her spare uniform. Making her way to the fire in the middle of the camp, she sat beside Atai, absently stroking the girl's hair when she cuddled protectively closer to the miko. After a moment, she voiced what was expected of her by her other companions. "Where's Inuyasha?"
Miroku and Shippou both looked up at her suddenly, as if startled to find her up and about. Sango just shook her head, being a girl left her privy to Kagome's slight change of heart. Miroku, however, answered. "He never came back last night, Kagome-sama. You were both missing when we went to sleep. We had assumed, incorrectly, I suppose, that you had gone after him."
Shippou spoke up, breaking from his daze to hop into Kagome's lap as he did so. "I woke up before them, and you still weren't back, but then this tall lady came into camp carrying you and she," he gestured to Atai, who looked at him briefly with her wide violet orbs, "was walking behind looking cold."
Here he paused to puff out his chest in pride at what the miko could only assume he would tell her next. Smiling down at him, she waited for him to continue. The little kitsune did soon, pride in his voice, laced beneath with a question of whether she would approve. "When the lady came, she put you down in your sleeping bag and told something to her," he waved a little clawed hand in Atai's direction again, relaxing back into Kagome's lap, "and left. But she was still looking cold, so I told her to come and sleep in the sleeping bag with us."
Both children looked up at Kagome with their adoring eyes and she beamed back at them. "You two are just so precious. You did very well, Shippou-chan and-" she paused, taken aback a moment by the fact she still didn't know the child's name, then smiled again. "What's your name, little one? I can't just call you 'girl', can I?" She tapped the human child on the nose affectionately, as she had done to Shippou so many times before.
The child smiled, bearing her little white teeth to the miko. "My name is Atai."
"Ah, what an unusual name. But it suits you." Kagome looked around for a moment, then looked back at the little mocha-haired girl at her side. "Ne, Atai-chan, where's your Beni-sama?"
Her back stiffened as a gruff voice came from behind her. "Who asks of the great Benishi-sama?"
