A/N: This is the revised version of chapter 6. Please read and review. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha and company.
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SEVEN WEEKS
Confusion
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"Kagura! Teme... Fucking bitch! Let her off NOW!" he started to panic when Kagome aimed steadily and shot, the arrow heading at lightning speed for his heart.
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Just when he thought he was too stunned to move, Inuyasha regained his senses and jumped out of the arrow's direct path. It ended up striking his left arm, leaving a long bloody gash in its wake.
He howled in pain, now realizing how her arrows could have killed youkai so easily. Her weapon glowed with a strange sort of force, like she had some kind of immeasurable youki confined within her arrows.
He landed on the ground on his right side. He twisted up and stood just in time to miss the newly fired arrow. Kagome was smirking slightly and Inuyasha was confused.
"Is she really under a spell?' he asked himself. He couldn't hurt her if she was. But if she wasn't... he refused to think about it.
Kagura smirked as she watched Kagome fire at the eternally dodging hanyou. 'Good girl, Kagome-chan,' she thought amusedly. Who could ask for a better slave? Kagome was not only a lovely mistress of seduction; she was also a skilled fighter.
Kagome bent to pick up another arrow to fire at Inuyasha when she stopped and stood stiffly. Kanna was looking as panicked as a poker-faced youkai could ever get, and she was calling for Kagura.
"Kagura," she called. "Something's wrong..."
Kagura stared at her sister. Could it be that Kagome was telling them to back off AND succeeding in it? She was fighting the spell?
Before Kagura could think of the next step, Kagome's eyes flashed angrily as she pulled her arrow out of her quiver and aimed for her.
"Ka- Kagura... onna... you have no right t- to tell me- what to do!" she stuttered out, heaving breaths between her words. "I have my o-own m-m- mind! I'm more skilled than you think, and I don't need y-your 'help'! BACK OFF!" she cried, releasing the tightly strung arrow.
Inuyasha was stunned. 'What is she talking about? Does this mean that she really IS with Naraku? Gods... no..."
He watched as the smoky band around Kagome disappeared and the color of her eyes went back to normal. She slumped to the ground as the arrow whizzed past Kagura. Kagome's aim seemed a little off.
While Kagura was recovering from the shock of nearly being killed by a human's arrow, Inuyasha wasted no time in recovering his Tetsusaiga. He ran off to where Kagome had laid it earlier. It had been beside Kagura, but since she had jumped away, the sword lay unguarded between some rocks.
"Inuyasha... get her now!" Kagome suddenly shouted. He was confused, but he would not pass up an opportunity to kill Kagura and that freaky white youkai. He would interrogate Kagome later.
He ran towards the two youkai and took a fully transformed Tetsusaiga out of its case, taking a mad swing at Kagura and Kanna. Unfortunately, Kagura was fast, and he ended up once again slicing air as Kagura flew up into the air with Kanna on another one of her giant feathers.
"Chikuso!" he swore, clutching his bleeding left arm as he watched the retreating figures.
Inuyasha held his still transformed sword as he walked slowly towards Kagome. She kneeled on the ground, gasping for breath. He didn't know what had just happened, and he placed Tetsusaiga back in its scabbard as he approached her.
She looked exhausted, and she glowed faintly from the exertion. He hated to think that she would betray him. He had grown very fond of her and Kagome had been a lot of help to him. But if she truly was with Naraku...
Tough. He couldn't kill her if he wanted to.
"I- I understand if you kill me right here and now. I know you probably hate me," she said so softly, he almost didn't hear her. "I- betrayed you... I'm so sorry!"
Inuyasha's heart stopped. 'Masaka! No! So she really did betray me!'
"I fell under Kagura's spell so quickly. She took one swig at my soul and she captured it with ease. After I had promised to be strong for you... Gomen nasai!" she continued.
His heart suddenly glowed with hope. "So, you don't work for Kagura?" he asked.
Kagome kept her eyes on the ground. "No, of course not. I hate her and Naraku. I would never work for her! But I still betrayed you. She controlled me so easily..."
She looked up and stared at Inuyasha, her gaze lingering on the wound her own arrow had created. "I wounded you. I took your sword under her command and I fought you. You would have died!" Kagome said in anguish as tears formed in her eyes. "And the worst is that I could see what I was doing. My body was acting on its own and I could do nothing to stop it!"
Inuyasha stepped towards her as her tears fell. He knelt down before her and touched her cheek softly, coaxing her to look back at him again.
She pushed his hand away for a moment, fighting the small force he used to pull her face towards his. She conceded after a while and Inuyasha made her look straight in his eyes.
"Kagome," he began. "Tell me. You didn't want to do those things, did you?" She shook her head. "Then there's nothing to be guilty about. I don't hate you. And this," he pointed to his wound. "It'll heal. No problem. I won't kill you. And you're not weak! You fought that controlling spell and shot Kagura! You're a strong onna!"
Kagome looked uncertain, but as she looked deeper into his eyes, she felt her heart melting. He said he didn't blame her and he was true to his word. She closed her eyes against the fresh bout of tears and unconsciously nuzzled his palm. His hand felt comforting against her sweat and tear dampened cheek, and some of her pain seemed to fade at his tender words.
"It's ok, Kagome. I... I'm not mad."
Had Kagome opened her eyes, she would have seen the brilliant scarlet that covered Inuyasha's cheeks as she leaned into his touch, and when she covered his hand with her smaller one, the blush darkened visibly.
Inuyasha fought to compose himself. She was making him blush and sweat at her tiny, innocent actions. He had barely controlled his reddened cheeks when she opened her dazzling eyes, now so full of life. She smiled at him and he melted.
'Am I mad at her! HELL NO!'
"Thank you, Inuyasha. I- I still find it hard to believe that you don't hate me... demo, I'm glad. Arigatou," she said seriously.
"It's nothing. Now... shall we go back to sleep?" Inuyasha said with a tiny smile.
He stood up and began to tug her up with him. His arm stung like hell actually, but he tried to not let it show to keep Kagome from getting all upset and guilty again.
Kagome stood and the pair started to walk back to the inn. Then something occurred to Inuyasha. He frowned thoughtfully and was about to ask when Kagome beat him to it.
"It's a good thing no one from the inn awoke during all the action, right Inuyasha? It would have been hard to explain about what happened to the 'baby'," she said jokingly.
They looked at each other and began to laugh softly as they sneaked back into the inn.
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Inuyasha awoke to his fourth day in Crystallia with a smirk as he peered at his bandaged arm. It was healed, as he predicted, but Kagome had endlessly begged him to let her bandage his arm the night before that, though he knew it was futile, he had let her do so.
He got up from his place on the floor and looked up on the bed. Kagome was still sleeping peacefully, her head turned in his direction, a hand absently reaching down to him.
Her lips were slightly parted and her brows were relaxed. Inuyasha thought she looked like an angel. He slowly got up and picked his haori up from the floor. It wasn't much of a garment, but it sure made a hell of a pillow! Not to mention, it was a good armor.
He took his self-filling flask out of his haori and drank. It filled itself up, the way his haori fixed itself up after every fight. 'This place is just full of surprises,' he thought.
He looked back at Kagome then stilled as he felt and heard his stomach growl. He hadn't eaten yet, and though dinner had been brought to them the night before, right before they slept, his stomach felt completely ignored.
He heard a soft giggle come from somewhere near and he turned to see Kagome stifling a laugh. She was groggily looking up at him with a smile on her face.
"Ohayou, Inuyasha," she said softly.
"Ohayou," he replied. "I guess you heard my stomach's physical agitation."
"Yeah," she said. "I didn't realize you were that hungry."
She got up and took the haori from his arms. Then, she picked up the pillow she used as her 'baby' and turned to him.
"I'll go get us some food. Maybe there's something in here," she said with a shy grin.
"Yeah. I might freak the humans out if I went down there."
Kagome came back a few minutes later with stew, slices of pork, two apples and some milk. The food was good, but Inuyasha can't help but wish that it were Kagome's veggie stew that was on the table.
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Kagome seemed to have woken up from the wrong side of the bed.
Inuyasha absently guessed that it was PMS. It all added up: the sudden mood swing, the pain in her stomach that she kept complaining about, and the thing that got HIM into a bad mood as well - the sudden change in her scent.
While it was true that Kagome always smelled refreshingly wondrous, Inuyasha couldn't deny the fact that her scent had gotten even more alluring. He mentally cursed the gods for his luck. The only woman he had ever been attracted to for god knows how long was in heat.
It had been five days since Inuyasha and Kagome had last gone into battle. The wound Kagome had given him that night was now more than completely healed. That would have been great, except for one thing: that had also been the last time they had slept on a bed in an inn. The last few nights had been spent in either a cave or a secluded dry meadow.
This was day number nine for our good old hanyou. He spoke to Miroku once every day to tell him and Sango of their progress. Kagome still refused to let the palace people know about her. They had gotten a good length nearer to the Garnet tower but he still felt like they were making no progress.
Apparently, so did Kagome.
"Shit!" Kagome swore rather loudly after tripping on a small stone. Inuyasha was a bit surprised, but she WAS in a bad mood. It was excusable. "I hate rocks!"
"You said that a couple of minutes ago. You also said that you hate dry trees, cloudy skies, soil, sand, dead plants..."
"Urusai," Kagome interrupted Inuyasha's tirade. "I get the point."
"Well, don't take your anger out on me!" Inuyasha snapped. "Keh! It's not my fucking fault that you seem to be having your PMS right now!" He was beyond irritated. 'Stupid god damn scent!'
"WHAT is PMS!" Kagome replied hotly.
"When you have a really bad mood for a female reason!" Inuyasha shouted back, furiously fighting the urge to cover his nose to keep out the tempting scent.
"That does NOT make any sense!" Kagome yelled back. She took a few deep breaths and tried to control herself before speaking again. "Alright, so I'm not in the best of moods..."
"Damn right," he commented. "What's your problem?"
"I... it's just that... I can't help but feel like we're not getting anything accomplished. Then there's this irritating feeling that I have... like we're being watched or something..." she said.
Inuyasha perked up at that. He tried to sniff his surroundings. 'Nothing.'
"Well, cool it! Nothing's wrong. Don't tell me that the lack of battles is boring you!"
"No, of course not," Kagome said reluctantly.
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Naraku grinned at the mirror that Kanna held before him. The couple kept walking and it was nearly time to pull off his plan. 'The enchantress is doing a very good job,' he thought.
He waved the youkai off as he turned and quickly walked to the princess' prison.
The dome was pulsing with a glow that burned red when his presence was felt in the chamber. 'Hatred,' he thought to himself as he settled on a cushion he had placed before the dome.
"Lady Azalea," he began, his long black hair glinting in the bright red light. He seemed to see the princess' silhouette shift at his words. "Have you considered my offer?"
The light just burned angrily. He could sense her alluring presence in the dome. Her powerful, alluring presence that gave him his forbidden attraction for the princess.
"It is not really that hard to think of. Agreeing to my wish would save your kingdom, as well as give you the life that any ordinary lady would wish. Just say the word," he said with a small grin. The princess remained silent.
"Do you know what I went through to gain the garnet tower's hidden power? I did all this just so I could touch you and gain what I wanted so desperately."
Silence.
Naraku began to laugh. "Are you waiting for your knight to come and save you? Well, that is far-fetched my dear lady. I doubt that he would get past me. And besides, he is being skillfully sidetracked. Did you know that?"
More silence, but this time, the dome turned a nearly blinding shade of red. Naraku took a step back and smirked.
"Why don't you just accept the fact that you have no other choice, Azalea? Accept my offer. Think about it. After all, I can touch you. It would not be too hard to consider."
He left as the light from the dome became too hot to bear.
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Inuyasha was still mad about her scent. It was sending his thoughts and feelings to another dimension! After all, there was only so much that a MALE hanyou could take.
It was a hot afternoon. Ah! What he wouldn't give for a nice, cool bath. No, make that a nice, ICY COLD bath. The last time he had taken a bath was the night before he left his world, which was more than a week ago. And as far as he knew, it was the same with Kagome.
Crystallia had no water holes, no rivers, nothing. When they stayed in the inn, a bath was impossible if they didn't want to be thrown out.
His nose desperately sniffed at himself. He didn't stink yet - well, at least not too much. 'The lack of baths could be annoying Kagome as well,' he thought with a smirk. He knew how pressy women were about hygiene.
He sniffed the air absently and nearly fainted from frustration. 'A week without baths and she still smells incredible. Even more with that fucking scent! Why couldn't our situation have just lessened her good scent! She smells as if she just had a luxury bath!' he silently fumed.
Kagome was still marching behind him. Her bag was slung over her shoulder, and if he didn't know better, he'd think she was dying from a heatstroke. She looked dry and exhausted, but her scent said otherwise.
While Inuyasha was lost in his thoughts, Kagome's mind also wandered about. "I need a bath. Now,' she thought angrily. 'If the shikon was in order, it wouldn't be too hard to get a bath. If the princess was not taken, the lakes and rivers would still be around.' She raged mentally. "Wait... if she wasn't taken, I wouldn't have had to travel around in the first place! But then again...' she glanced momentarily at the man walking ahead of her. 'Maybe it IS a good thing that this happened,' she giggled rebelliously against her angry thoughts.
She was beautiful, and knew it. But no man had ever paid heed to her because of her unique abilities. Ever. Not even before... well, before everything started.
Inuyasha was different. He didn't push her away with fright. He protected her. He was rough, but really nice. It also didn't hurt that he was quite gorgeous, even with the doggy ears.
Only Inuyasha seemed to realize that she was female. He cared, and even if it was only because he needed her help with the quest, she didn't care. At least he was there.
She shook her head against her thoughts. 'Baka,' she scolded herself mentally. 'Don't get too attached to him! He's gonna leave in less than six weeks. Besides, he's the KNIGHT. And you...' she cut her thoughts off as she bumped into Inuyasha. "Watch it doggy!"
"Shh..." he said blankly. He seemed to be listening around carefully, sniffing the air as he did. He looked pensive and Kagome was concerned.
"What's wrong? Youkai?" she asked, instinctively clutching her bow. He shook his head and looked at her with bright eyes.
"Water!" he declared. She just stared at him. "Baka! Don't you get it! There's water around here! I could smell it! And I could hear it running lightly."
"You mean there's a lake or a river here?" she asked excitedly.
Inuyasha nodded, then pointed off somewhere a bit to their right. Kagome took off.
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"Houshi-sama, are you alright!"
Sango rushed to Miroku as she saw him slump to the ground, clutching his right hand, his face contorted in pain. He was silent, but clearly, something was wrong.
"Sango," he said as he looked at her. She was surprised. He never called her by her name alone! She knelt beside him and asked again. "Daijobu?"
"Hai, daijobu." He said with a tiny smile. Sango would have believed him if she hadn't seen what had happened. They were in the draught-stricken palace garden. Sango had excused herself to get a drink, and when she came back, he was falling to the ground.
"Houshi," she warned. He gave up.
"The Kazaana," he replied as he sat up. "I had opened up the seal to see how it was. It still does it, Sango-sama. Look," he motioned around, and Sango noticed for the first time that the large rocks around the flowerbed were all gone.
"The Kazaana sucked them all up..." Sango said, astonished. The Kazaana truly WAS getting larger! 'By the gods, this is bad!' she thought.
"I'm supposing that this could suck in a whole civilization by now," Miroku said jokingly to ease the tension, but Sango just looked horrified.
"How could you joke about this? You might get sucked in! Besides, you get terribly hurt whenever you use your Kazaana!" she exclaimed hotly.
"I'm not joking. But I've been thinking... the Kazaana could probably be used as a weapon now. You know what I mean?" Miroku said.
"You mean..."
"We could help Inuyasha-sama in some way. Maybe even travel with him!"
Sango perked up. "That's wonderful! Even without our spiritual powers, we could be of help! You can use the Kazaana and I could use my Hiraikotsu..." she began enthusiastically but Miroku cut her off.
"Hiraikotsu? You mean that large, horrid, heavy bone-made boomerang that you used when you still worked as a taijiya?" Miroku said, crinkling his nose.
"Well, yes! I used it before coming to the palace, when I was still a demon exterminator. I haven't used it for a long time, but I'd bet I could still use it well! After all, I've been a taijiya since I was four. I was an exterminator for seven years! That's one year more than I've been here in crystal castle!" she said excitedly.
"Well, if you think so. But you should practice before we leave the palace. I could take my monk's staff," Miroku said, "I haven't stopped using the shakujou since I was brought here."
'I know,' Sango thought. 'I watch you practice every night, Miroku.' She could never bring herself to call him by his name, but in her mind, she undoubtedly could. She blushed as she remembered cold nights when she sat, hardly breathing in fear of being caught, behind one of the large stones that the Kazaana had just sucked in, spying on the houshi as he practiced fighting moves.
"Sango, were you listening to me?"
"Oh," Sango blushed more darkly when she realized that in her reminiscing, she had totally missed what he said. "Gomen. I was imagining things..."
"I know you're enthusiastic, Sango-sama, but like I said, we have more than enough time to practice our skills before we head out." Miroku said, his eyes twinkling.
"Nani? Why do you say that, houshi-sama?"
"Well, for one, Inuyasha told me he hadn't gone too far. Secondly, the second barrier protecting the palace and its inhabitants has sealed up. It won't let anything through, may it be from the outside or from the inside..." Miroku explained with a grim smile.
"Nani! Demo... how could we help if we can't even get out?" Sango said incredulously.
"It's simple. I bet that this is the princess' doing. She must have put it on before she left. I'm guessing that she put it there so that we would be better protected once the knight leaves." Miroku said, then, "It could also be from Naraku, so we couldn't help Inuyasha out. But I have the kekai figured out. I've put a spell on it so that it would weaken and in a few days, three weeks at most, and we could get out of here and get to Inuyasha!"
"Three weeks? That's so long!"
"But it's enough time to practice our skills so we would not be a burden."
Sango considered, then nodded. "I guess that would be great. We could catch up easily if we ride Kirara..."
"Kirara's feeling better after the attack, isn't she?" Miroku asked, while his hand was slowly inching towards Sango's bottom once again. The giant two-tailed fire-cat Kirara, that was Sango's pet, had been wounded heavily in the battle with Naraku. She had been recuperating for the last few weeks.
Sango was delighted. "Oh yes! She can actually walk on three of her legs by now! She still has a little trouble transforming though, and..."
SLAP!
"Hentai!"
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"Yahoooo! Water!" Kagome shrieked as she spotted the small lake. She ran to the rocky side of the water and ducked behind one of the good boulders.
"Hey, Kagome! Wait up! Where in the seven hells are you, wench?" Inuyasha bellowed when Kagome ran off.
"No, wait, STOP! Don't come any closer, Inuyasha! I'm gonna take a bath." Kagome said as he heard a rustle of soft fabric. It meant only one thing: Kagome was stripping.
"You mean you're gonna get all naked, here!" Inuyasha shouted. He didn't want to admit it, but the thought of Kagome naked and within reach was just too tempting.
"Yeah, so what? And don't even think of peeping, Inuyasha!" she yelled as she jumped into the water.
"Keh! Like I'd want to see your skinny body!" he snapped back, irritated. He of course knew that he was fooling himself. He heard her swear softly at the freezing cold water and he had to bite back a laugh. "Cold?" he asked with a grin, finding a spot on the ground a few meters from the lake and sitting there with his legs crossed. He could hear her splashing the water around from her spot in the water, hidden from him by a couple of huge rocks.
"As a m-matter of f-fa-fact, it is, Inuya-yasha!" she said through chattering teeth.
"But it's the middle of the day! How cold could water get!" Inuyasha asked.
"May-b-be you should try it, Inuyasha! It's reeeally c-cold, but I'd bet y- you could handle it! Besides, you need it!" she replied.
"Hey, what's that supposed to mean!" he shouted as his heart started to beat faster. 'Did she just ask me to bathe... with her?'
"I'm not saying that you stink, Inuyasha," she began. She seemed to be getting over the cold. "I'm saying that it's hot and this would cool you off. Besides, this lake is divided by a large rock. That way, we wouldn't have to see each other as we bathe, even if we do it at the same time! Come on Inuyasha, please!"
"Alright! Stupid wench," he groused as he got up. "I want a bath anyway."
"Must you insist on calling me wench, Inuyasha?"
"Yeah I do, now shut up already," he called back. He began to undress by the lake and hoped that he was entering the right side of the lake.
Man, was he lucky. Kagome was on the other side, and it disturbed him to think that he and Kagome were bathing in the same body of water.
He could hear her happily splashing about in the water. She was humming softly, the same sound that he awoke to after that battle with Kagura some days ago.
She was still singing and Inuyasha could only take too much. The water had cleared her scent up even more, making it more fragrant and potent than ever before. He could clearly see her curves in his mind's eye, the self- same alluring waves that he could see clearly through her dress, and he began to wonder how they would look without its covers...
'IIE! I would not sink that low! I would not peep! I would not LOOK! I am a decent man!' Inuyasha mentally chanted even as he felt himself slowly nearing the edge of the dividing rock. 'Hey, I'm only human... kinda...' he thought as he gave in, leaning over and becoming the peeping tom that he swore he wouldn't be.
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A/N: This is the revised version of chapter 6. Please read and review. Thank you for your time.
ScarletRaven1001
