INUYASHA

There was more before this, but I never got around to writing it. Okay, here's a basic detail:

Kagome lives in a world basically divided into three kinds of people: summoners and priests. Summoners consider priests to be a lying, cheating, kidnapping bunch, and priests consider summoners to be impure and evil. Naturally, neither view is entirely true, but priests really do kidnap summoners all the time and try to 'purify' them. They want to find a way to 'save' those 'poor souls.' They really are trying to be good, but being a summoner doesn't make someone evil.

Summoners have, basically, magical powers. They can control elements, tell fortunes, yatta yatta yatta. In addition to the traditional magics as we know them, there is also a another dimension in this world, called the 'summoning realm.' In it lives what we term 'demons,' but to summoners they aren't evil, either. If someone, obviously, summons one, it does their bidding, if they're strong enough to control it (if they weren't, though, they wouldn't be able to summon it. Demons like staying right where they are, because the Rim area between the Earth and the Summoning Realm is painful for them to cross).

In this story, Kagome is a summoner. I somehow wanted her to be so strong that the rulers on her world had to put restraints on her power, which are mentioned later, but I haven't figured out why or how they did so. Anyways, in this chapter, she's walking home from school, when she accidentally walks past a temple or a shrine and the priest starts talking to her. The whole time she's praying he won't realize that she's a summoner and kidnap her, and she starts to walk away when he reads her aura or some such thing and realizes that she is part summoner (Not sure how that works, either, but I was gonna work on it). He grabs her and takes her into the temple courtyard.

Blood Calling

"Ahhhhhh, noooooo!" Kagome shrieked as the priest dragged her over onto the large block of stone in the center of the courtyard. It was a sacrificial stone -That was it! She'd had enough! She needed to get out of here, before she became a human sacrifice!

But before she knew it, he had her bound to the stone. She wouldn't be able to run. He pulled out a dagger, and held it to her shoulder. "Hold still." he said quietly. "I don't want to kill you, I just want to get rid of the evil."

"Sure, right! And that's why Summoners are disappearing left and right!" she cried, tugging at the bonds. She'd just have to summon a creature from the Summons realm. It was rather simple to summon something to do a simple chore for you. You just had to lock onto the kind of energy you needed to get the job done, connect that concentration with the Summons realm, and pull. They would pop up. But what type of energy did she need? What did she want done?

"I want to be safe!" she thought aloud. "I want someone to protect me!" She'd need a powerful youkai to do that, not just those lesser things she pulled out at school, and for a really strong youkai, she'd need to make a bond. And she'd need to know exactly what youkai she wanted. "Inu," she muttered. "Inu are best for bonds. If they feel like it, that is." Inu were very picky when they made up their minds.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!" she cried, as the priest cut her arm. Three small drops of blood fell from the wound, right onto the stand beside her, which was there to catch the blood. The wound wasn't very deep at all, but it hurt so bad because the dagger was laced with sacred poison, to destroy the 'evil' and 'taint' that the blood of a Summoner represented. "INU-YASHA!" she cried out in pure instinct, latched onto one aura, and tugged with all her might. The aura resisted, but she didn't have time to look for others. It was the only one that fit her qualifications - even though she didn't remember making any -, it was the only one that came to her call, and she didn't have time to start over. So she pulled harder, until finally the inu youkai's aura let itself be pulled through the gap in dimensions. As the swirling ball of gold was pulled through the purple black tunnel, a scream escaped her lips, and there was a yell, and a growl. She heard something fall to the ground, and then she passed out.

Kagome woke up, and reached a hand to her head. Ouch, she had an enormous headache. It felt like someone was pounding on her temple. Moaning, she rolled over, and felt the cold stone beneath her. Then the memories of when the priest had dragged her into the temple courtyard came rushing back, and she sat up, startled. Was she still there?

Looking around, she saw that, sure enough, she was still on the temple. Something cold and wet fell onto her lap, and she realized there had been a cold washcloth on her forehead. Instantly, heat overtook her, and she collapsed back, pressing the cloth to her face again.

"I need to get home . . . " she muttered. "Momma must be worried sick . . . "

She thought she felt someone watching her, and she opened her eyes, to see a face looking intently at her. She jumped. "W-w-wha-wh-who're you!" she finally forced out.

"Inu-Yasha." the boy said simply. "You summoned me, don't you remember?"

"Ungh . . . " she said, falling back again, but this time the boy caught her. "Are you the inu youkai I pulled from the Summons?" she asked, staring into his intense golden eyes. She didn't mean to stare, but they drew her gaze.

"Mm-hmm." he replied. "Inu-Yasha. You summoned me personally. May I ask why?"

"I don't know. I just started crying, and yours was the only aura I could reach. Sorry." she whispered.

"No problem." Inu-Yasha replied.

"Uh . . . Inu-Yasha? Could you . . . take me home?" she asked, trying not to pass out again.

"I don't know my way around your city yet." the youkai said quietly.

"What time is it? How long have I been asleep?" Kagome asked.

"A day. It's almost noon."

"Uhnnn . . . The school is down the road . . . go get Sango from the office . . . " she half smiled, muttering, " . . . she'll be glad to get out of class . . . " before she nodded off.

Inu-Yasha ran out of the courtyard, and down the road, heading towards the school, leaving a pile of blood where they had been. The blood was slowly turning green, and disapearing. That can't be good . . .

"Paging Sango Taiji and Miroku Kazaana to the office. Paging Sango Taiji and Miroku Kazaana to the office please." the voice called over the intercom.

Miroku and Sango looked up at Miss Takanoji. Did this possibly have anything to do with Kagome? She hadn't come to school, and her mother hadn't seen her at all last night. Miss Takanoji nodded, and they both bolted up and ran out of the class, not even bothering to get their books. The hurtled down the hall, and ran into the office.

"M . . . Mrs. Nakogi? We . . . we were called?" Miroku said, huffing from running down the hall.

"Sango Taiji? Miroku Kazaana? Kagome Higurashi just showed up, and she's back in the nurses room." the lady at the desk said, looking up. She looked almost frightened, but covered that up with annoyance quickly. "You shouldn't run in the halls . . . "

"What happened!" Sango yelled. "What happened to Kagome! Is she alright!"

"She's in the nurses room." Mrs. Nakogi repeated, returning to her paperwork. "Honestly, you would think someone would have come up with a spell to make papers file themselves by now . . . "

So they ran back into the nurse's room. Kagome was there, looking flushed, and lying on one of the beds that lined the walls. She was hooked up to an anti-poison machine, which could drain 'sacred poison' from a Summoner's veins. The blanket was up over her chest, but her arms were above it. She had what looked like a wet cloth on her head. The curtains, which were there for privacy, had only been partially pulled around, so you could see her from the door.

"Kagome!" Sango cried, running to the bed. She clutched her friend's hand, turning to the nurse at the desk. "Is she alright?"

"I don't know yet. She might live, she might not. That poison was very strong. She would be dead right now . . . " the lady said, shaking her head.

"Why isn't she, then?" Miroku was about to ask, when he noticed the youkai sitting backwards in the chair on the other side of the bed. His eyes were half closed, but he was in a position so that he could see Kagome, and everything that went on in her little secluded section of the room. He was resting his chin on his arms, which were crossed over the back of the chair. "Who are you?" he asked.

The youkai looked up, his eyes dull. "Inu-Yasha." he murmured, letting his head fall down again, and closing his eyes. "Are you Miroku and Sango?" he asked.

"Yes." Sango said. "How do you know our names?"

"Kagome said you'd be happy to get out of class. Right now I feel like shit, so I'm gonna . . . " His voice faded away as his shoulders slumped, and his head lolled to the side. He was unconscious.

"Well, that does sound like something Kagome would say." Sango remarked cautiously. Then she turned back to the nurse. "Who is he?" she asked.

"Well, he's the one that brought Kagome in." The nurse said thoughtfully. "I think he either found her, or she summoned him. I think it's safe to assume a priest attacked Kagome. Or maybe she was dragged onto a shrine's ground. There is one between here and her home, isn't there?"

"Yes," Miroku replied. "But he's an inu youkai. They are so very picky, they won't allow themselves to be summoned unless they form a bond with you."

"And Kagome isn't strong enough to form a bond. Not in her condition." Sango finished.

"Well of course she didn't summon him now." the nurse said dryly. "That's not what I meant."

"And that's not what I meant." Sango returned. "I mean, she has restricting cables around her wrists. She couldn't bond with a lesser dragon, much less summon a high-ranking youkai and bond to it."

"Unless . . . " Miroku said, thinking out loud. "Unless she used a Blood Calling ritual. She wouldn't even have to know she was doing it, if she was in trouble . . . "

"A what?" the nurse asked.

"A Blood Calling ritual. If blood was taken out of her body, and she summoned this youkai then, the energy could flow into that blood, create a portal between dimensions, and she could channel as much energy as she wanted and bond with any youkai." He looked over to the silver-haired inu youkai. "But her blood would leave an imprint on him, somewhere, since he would have to travel through a portal created by it." He then took a closer look at the inu youkai. First he frowned, but then he smiled. "Hang on just a moment." he said. "This is a hanyou. A hanyou could have created the portal himself . They have fair Summon abilities. And they can create or reject a bond. Or rather, they create a kind of dormant bond when they are born, and connect with a Summoner here on Earth. If that summoner calls, they will automatically be bonded, and if any other summoner calls, and tries to bond with them, they will reject it."

The nurse, during this enlightening speech, had traveled over, and checked the hanyou's pulse. It was slow and quiet, and quickly fading. She hooked him up to a heart monitor, and attached him to the same anti-poison machine that Kagome was hooked up to. "Well, there's no doubt about it." she said.

"No doubt about what?" Sango asked, turning.

"They most certainly are bonded, and it's a rather strong bond, too. Now I know why her blood wasn't dissipating as fast as it should have been, for how strong the poison was. The boy's soul was absorbing it. But now there's a problem." she said quietly.

"What?" Miroku asked.

"They're both dying."