The Mayu Flower
Disclaimer: I do not own anything from InuYasha.
Chapter 5: Consequences
"This mystery will not be easily solved. I agree with your theory that the well reacts to human desires as well as the jewel, but that does not completely explain why the well is closing," Miroku said slowly, looking down into his cup. He, Sango, and Lady Kaede were all gathered around the kettle in their hut, drinking their now-usual mid-day tea. Each wore a tired and somewhat worried expression.
Lady Kaede sighed and put down her teacup. She looked up at the monk with a stern eye. "Ay, ye be right there. I have a suspicions to further explain this mystery, but for InuYasha's sake, I hope I am wrong."
"Why's that, Kaede?" Sango asked.
The old miko entwined her fingers together in her lap and cast a glance at the large canary yellow backpack in the corner before answering. "As I said, the Tree of Ages reacts to human desires as well as the power of the Shikon No Tama. When InuYasha said that the well may not be working because Kagome has met her new friend, I grew suspicious as to their relationship."
"You think their relationship is weakening," Miroku stated with a frown.
"Precisely. It is my belief that Kagome's love for our hanyou friend has weakened because she has found new affection in herself for this Kinuto fellow. This would serve as an explaination as to why the well has begun to seal itself off; she is growing unsure if this is what she truly wants. As their relationship continues, her bond to her world will grow too strong for the well to allow her passage and will eventually refuse to work at all, locking her in her time." She picked up her teacup again and drained the rest of its contents.
"I see your point. I agree, for InuYasha's sake, let's hope your theory is wrong. I cannot imagine how this would affect him. Something has happened between the two of them recently, and this will only make it worse," Sango said quietly.
"Indeed. For now, perhaps it is best if we keep this to ourselves. It is not our decision if Kagome chooses to remain in her time or not so telling her will not help either way. Her heart will have to decide the consequences," Miroku finished. Sango and Lady Kaede nodded in agreement.
Outside their little hut, a flash of red and silver hurried away from the hut towards the nearby forest.
In InuYasha's Forest...
"Kagome, how come you and InuYasha are fighting?" Shippou asked curiously. The young kitsune youkai was sitting on Kagome's shoulder while the miko was kneeling on the ground. She was picking a few herbs to take along with their company for their journey.
Placing her bundle of leaves in a pouch of cloth beside her, she sighed sadly. "We aren't fighting, Shippou," she answered simply.
"Oh, but then why won't you talk to InuYasha? He went to get you a couple days ago and he came back really angry."
Kagome sighed again before tying the pouch up and getting to her feet. Holding the herbs tenderly, she began to scan the ground for some more. "It's nothing for you to worry about, Shippou."
"But Kagome!"
"I'm sorry, Shippou," the miko said sadly. "I just can't talk about it right now. Maybe later." The kitsune looked sadly at her but remained silent. Once she had found enough herbs to satisfy her, the two began to make their way back to Kaede's village. As they came free from the woods, the miko caught sight of InuYasha in the corner of her eye. He sat in a tree on the edge of the forest while staring at her. She turned to face him and their eyes locked for a moment. His were too far for her to see which emotion they held, but he was able to see every detail of her sorrowful chocolate brown eyes. Kagome forced herself to rip her eyes away from him in fear that tears would begin to bloom once more. She walked away from him into the hut.
InuYasha never entered the hut that night. He remained outside while the rest of them slept soundly--well, as close to soundly as possible--inside the hut. Once morning dawned, they prepared to leave. Sango shouldered her Hiraikotsu as Kagome packed away the herbs she had gathered into her backpack and heaved it on. Miroku took a firm grip on his staff and bid Lady Kaeded farewell.
"Take care, all of you," the old miko said with a sad smile. She bowed her head to each of them as they passed. InuYasha was already in the far front with his arms crossed. Miroku came after him alongside Sango while Kagome and Shippou brought up the rear.
All day the company travelled further north, passing by the village they had stopped at days earlier. Kagome looked sadly at it as they passed, knowing that that had been the village they had stayed at the day she had seen InuYasha and Kikyou together. Forcing back her thoughts, she silenced her mind and continued on, deliberately not looking at the village. Soon night had fallen and they decided to camp in the forest beside a weak stream.
InuYasha glanced at Kagome from time to time. 'I have to...I have to tell her,' he thought determindly. 'She needs to know the truth. Why did I let her think that I care about her just because she looks like Kikyou! I should have told her the truth ages ago!' He waited until after they had eaten a small supper before creeping to Kagome's side. Before she realized he was there, he opened his mouth to get her attention, but his plans were drastically changed at that moment.
A familiar scent met his sensitive nose and he had barely had a chance to utter a growl when the person to match the smell came into view. "Hey, dog breath!" the figure growled, arms crossed in a smug grin.
"Shut up, wolf-boy!" InuYasha growled back.
"Hello, Kouga," Kagome greeted with no particular over-friendliness. Still, the wolf demon brushed past InuYasha and took Kagome's hands in his own. Looking straight into her eyes, he smiled happily.
"Hello, Kagome," he said softly. To much surprise of the others, Kagome did nothing to stop his usual flirting. InuYasha, though, looked ready to rip Kouga's head off.
"Will you get your hands off of her!" InuYasha snarled, flexing his clawed fingers with a crack.
Kagome's expression suddenly burst into fury. Her eerie calm anger was even more frightening as she politely took her hands from Kouga than if she had been yelling. This, however, was about to change. Turning on InuYasha she glared at him with daggers in her eyes until her calm outlook exploded. "WILL YOU STOP IT! GEEZ YOU ALWAYS GET SO JEALOUS AND GO OFF KILLING WHATEVER YOU CAN FIND! KINUTO WOULD NEVER--"
"Who's Kinuto?" Kouga cut in.
Kagome's furious expression suddenly melted away into confusion for a split second before switching to embarassment. "Kinuto? Oh, um...he's no one you'd be interested it, Kouga! He's just...a friend!" The young miko wore a forced grin as if the whole thing was a joke.
Apparently Kouga wasn't going to give in that easily. He frowned at Kagome seriously. "Kagome. Who's Kinuto?" he said in a calm but hard voice.
Kagome sighed heavily. "He is just a friend, Kouga. From...from where I live. Honestly."
Kouga frowned and crossed his arms. "I don't like the sound of this Kinuto fellow. My instincts are telling me that this guy is no good." He shot a glare at InuYasha, as if suggesting that it was his fault Kinuto had come into the picture. Suddenly he turned back to Kagome with a grand smile. "Say, why don't you come with me to the wolf den for a few days? You must be getting tired of this dog turd over here by now."
"Shut up you useless wolf! Kagome would never go off with you! I've waited long enough--" InuYasha drew his Tetsusaiga out with a blast of light from the tip of the sheath. "--to finish you off once and for all!"
"Sit, boy."
"Agh!" The beads around the hanyou's neck flashed purple and he plummaged to the ground with a loud thud.
"Kouga, it's really nice to see you and everything, but I'm very tired and I don't feel up to stopping you and InuYasha from fighting and..."
"Say no more, Kagome. I understand," Kouga cut in. He smiled broadly and gave a light salute to her. "See you around, Kagome!" he said before turning and running away at a normal pace.
As Kagome waved to Kouga as he sped away, InuYasha was struggling to climb to his feet. "Do...you HAVE...to...keep doing that?" he said in a chopped voice, pushing himself to stand.
"Hm! I do it when it's necessary," Kagome replied icily. She turned away from the hanyou and climbed into her sleeping bag. Sango and Miroku sighed quietly and prepared for sleep as well. Shippou snuggled into Kagome's embrace and immediately fell asleep. InuYasha supressed a sigh and sat down at the base of a tree, crossing his arms and closing his eyes. He tried to slip into sleep, but sleep wouldn't come.
After many silent hours, when dawn was roughly three hours away, Kagome woke with a start. She blinked hard, trying to focus her eyes. 'What woke me up?' she wondered. Suddenly a shiver ran up her spine and she realized her toes were frozen. 'Great, I forgot to pack extra socks...' she thought. She glanced at Sango and then Kirara. 'If I leave now, I can get back before they even realize I was gone.' Carefully getting up so she wouldn't wake Shippou, she woke Kirara and asked her to fly to the well for a minute. The cat demon mewed her sleep away and nodded.
Fire errupted around the cat demon and where once stood a harmless little kitten now stood a fierocious looking long-toothed tiger. Kagome climbed on and patted Kirara on the head, signalling their lift-off.
As the two disappeared into the oranging sky, Shippou woke. Rubbing his eyes with his small paws, he noticed the warmth of Kagome was not beside him. Looking around, he saw that there was no sign of the young miko. "Kagome?" Getting to his feet, he suddenly realized that a folded piece of paper was sticking out of Kagome's backpack. Taking it out, he unfolded it and read it. Though he didn't know Kaede's theory of the well, something told him that this was not very good news. Poking Miroku, he waited until the monk woke up with a start.
"Miroku, I just found this note from Kagome. It says she went home for a minute to get some extra clothes."
"She did WHAT!" Immediately his sleepiness was gone and his shout had aroused Sango and InuYasha. Miroku snatched the note from the kitsune and hurriedly read it.
"What's wrong Miroku? Where's Kagome?" Sango asked. Miroku handed the demon slayer the note with a shocked face. After reading it, her face fell. "Oh no..."
With Kagome...
"Thanks, Kirara. I won't be long," Kagome said with a small smile for the large cat. With one knee on the edge of the well, she jumped in with a grunt. The blue light surrounded her as usual and soon she felt the firm ground of the bottom of the well below her feet once more. Grabbing hold of the ladder, she climbed up and out of the well.Opening the shrine doors, she saw it was still a good few hours till dawn in her era. Slipping into the house, she tried not to make any noise as she crept up to her room and took a few socks as well as a sweater. Holding them tightly, she slipped back out of the house, hoping no one would wake from her short visit.
Once she entered the shrine again, she descended the ladder quickly and jumped from the last few steps onto the ground. Closing her eyes, she waited for the feeling of weighlessness, but nothing happened. Fear grabbed hold of her heart as her eyes popped open. "No..." Her voice was strangely hoarse. She stomped her foot on the ground, but still nothing. She grabbed hold of the jewel shards in the glass bottle around her neck but still nothing happened. "No!" she said louder.
In the Feudal Era...
"Kirara!" a childish voice yelled. The great cat demon looked up from her spot to see the familiar image of a large floating pink ball with eyes coming towards her. There was a pop and a puff of smoke and suddenly Shippou came falling to the ground. Landing with a light grunt, he ran towards Kirara with a worried face. Kirara mewed in greeting. "Kirara, did you take Kagome here?" Another mew. Shippou grew angry and began hitting his head with his tiny fists. "Oooh! This is just awful! Miroku just told me that the well might not let Kagome back through to us! What'll we do if she can't get back!"
"Shippou? What are you doing here?" came a voice.
The young kitsune jumped in surprise and turned around to see Kaede looking at him curiously with a bow in her hands and a quiver on her back. "Lady Kaede!" Shippou ran to her and began to tell her the story. Immediately the old miko's face fell and she shook her head disappointedly.
"Oh dear," she mumbled roughly, "Perhaps it was unwise to keep it a secret." 'It was meant to allow her heart to have a free will, but perhaps not telling her will only make her choice harder. If the well choices for her, then she will never be happy,' she thought sadly.
"What? Keep what a secret?" Shippou blinked in confusion.
Kaede looked back up as if surprised she had spoken aloud. "Nothing, little one. Where are Miroku and Sango and InuYasha?"
"Oh, they sent me to come find Kirara since I was the only one that could fly but they are coming here too." He then turned to Kirara. "Kirara, could you go find the others and fly them here? It would be much faster." The large demon mewed and took off into the sky.
In Kagome's time...
...Mom and Souta and Gramps were pretty worried when I told them, Kagome scribbled into her journal, Gramps of course said it was just some demon that had posessed the well so now he's out there putting a million sutras on it. How could I have been so stupid to come back here? I know that the well acting weird and starting not to let me through, but how could I just forget like that? I must have still been half-asleep or something.
"Kagome, Mom wants to know if you plan to go to school today," Souta's voice suddenly said.
Kagome squeaked in surprise and glared at her younger brother. "Ever heard of knocking!" she hissed.
"I'll take that as a yes," he replied dully. His eyes were still half-closed, showing his annoyment at having had to wake up three hours earlier when Kagome had come back. He closed the door again and his dragging footsteps slid down the hall to the stairs.
Kagome sighed and shut her journal. She slipped it back into her desk drawer before getting up and dressing into a clean school shirt and skirt. Checking herself in the mirror, she brushed her hair with a sad face. After a short breakfast and a ten minute walk, she was approaching the doors of her school.
"Kagome!" someone shouted. Turning around she saw the bright face of Kinuto waving to her. He walked leisurely down the street with his backpack hanging off one shoulder.
She felt her breath catch as she caught a glimpse of the black-haired, grey-eyed teen. 'He sure is a sight for sore eyes,' she thought and then blushed furiously. 'What am I thinking!' Forcing her mind to silence, she grinned. "Hey there Kinuto," she answered happily.
"So what---" he suddenly trailed off, blinking curiously at Kagome. "Um, Kagome, that thing around your neck is growing purple again."
"What?" Kagome blinked and looked down. The jewel shards were glowing. "Oh nevermind tha--" Suddenly she felt her knees grow weak and her vision blackened. Wind rushed by her ears as she fell and the last thing she remembered hearing was the scream of Kinuto calling her name.
Mwahaha, a cliff hanger! I love 'em. lol I appologize if the pace of this chapter was a little fast, especially at the end. I definitely wasn't feeling my writing best when doing this. Either way, thanks for all the reviews and enjoy! Right now I'm trying to cram in another chapter this weekend so with some luck there will be a new one in a couple of days! Oh by the way, I have many projects being crammed at me for school so Chapter 7 may take a while. Please review and thanks again!
