I haven't been able to update for a long time because of the new website setting. My stories didn't come up, but now they do, so I can update. I already updated Babysitting Demons, and now I'll update on this. Oh, and I changed the ages. Sesshomaru and Kiara are 12 and Inuyasha is 4. I decided to give them an 8-year age separation.
Kiara and Sesshomaru had been looking forward to this for so many years. Even when they were toddlers, they have heard about the endurance tests that demons would be given at a certain age. These endurance tests were very important, however, neither Kiara nor Sesshomaru knew why. When they were small, they had asked their mother and father, and their parents told them that nobody really knows what the importance of the testing was. Anyway, Inutaisho was going to give them these endurance tests, since they had turned twelve three days ago. Kiara and Sesshomaru waited for their father in the backyard early that morning, both of them anxious to see what Inutaisho had in store for them.
Inutaisho came to them with two trays. He explained the first test to them that would be to test their physical strength. They were to hold these trays as long as they possibly could, while he kept adding items to put on top of the trays. Kiara and Sesshomaru each took one of the trays and held it. Inutaisho left them out in the backyard for a minute, and then returned with his arms full of pieces of wood. He piled half of the wood on Kiara's tray, and half of the wood on Sesshomaru's tray before he once again left them out there. About fifteen minutes later, both of them were still holding the trays full of wood. Inutaisho went outside to find them. This time, he put plates and books on top of the wood piles. The trays were getting heavy, but Kiara and Sesshomaru still held on.
"This is getting heavy," Sesshomaru said ten minutes after the plates and books were added.
"Yeah," Kiara agreed. "But we have to keep holding on."
Five minutes later, Izayoi came out to find them now struggling to keep holding the trays.
"I think I need these books and these plates," she said. She took a couple of small plates off of each of the trays and went back into the estate. Surprisingly, it helped, and it became easier for them to keep holding on. Inutaisho came back out to check on them a minute or two later. This time, he had rocks, which he dumped on the two trays before going back into the estate. The rocks made it even harder than the books and the plates. Inutaisho had taken rocks that were small, but still remarkably heavy to dump on the trays.
But Kiara and Sesshomaru still stood there, the sun beating down on them. They were hot, tired and again, struggling to hold the trays. But Izayoi came out and took some of the rocks off of the trays before Inutaisho came back with even more stuff. This procedure went on for at least an hour and a half longer. Inutaisho brings something heavier, Kiara and Sesshomaru struggle; Izayoi comes and takes some of the stuff off. The last time Inutaisho came back to check on Kiara and Sesshomaru, he was astounded.
"How the hell did you two do that?" he asked. "I didn't even hold on for that long! Put the trays down, it's time for the next test."
Inutaisho lead Kiara and Sesshomaru at the far end of the estate for the second test. He led them into a large room where Jaken was standing in.
"Jaken?" Kiara and Sesshomaru both said.
"That's right," Inutaisho told them. "You two have to stand against one of the walls and stay still in one position. This tests patience. Jaken will annoy you while you stay still, standing against the wall in that one position, so get comfortable. However, you can shake your head, nod and shrug, but you can't talk."
Kiara and Sesshomaru got in comfortable positions. Inutaisho then came over to them and took their boas off of their shoulders.
"You can't use these in this test," Inutaisho said.
"Why not?" Sesshomaru asked.
"Because Ja—" Inutaisho said, but then stopped himself. "Because you just can't. The test will begin." Inutaisho left the room, carrying Kiara and Sesshomaru's boas.
Jaken smiled. This was the perfect time for him. He could annoy Kiara and Sesshomaru without getting beaten to a pulp by them. First, Jaken did imitations of them from when they were babies. He imitated them crying, which consisted of Jaken sitting on the floor, covering his face with his arms and every once and a while pounding on the floor and pouting. Kiara and Sesshomaru narrowed their eyes, but weren't that annoyed by this part of the test. Next, Jaken imitated them when they learned how to walk. Jaken fell on his face, fell on his ass and even waddled face-first into the wall. The face-first into the wall part of the imitation was followed by imitated screaming, crying and sniffling, which was actually a lot like the scene that Sesshomaru had made when he had walked into the wall when he was a year old. This still didn't annoy them much, for neither of them ever remembered doing any of the things that Jaken did. They thought that the imp was just making them up.
Jaken then flashed them a huge grin when he got ready to do his next impression. This time, it was of Sesshomaru when he was sick. Sesshomaru usually got stuffed ears when he got colds and when he was Inuyasha's age, he constantly complained about it. Once when he was sick, he was sitting with Kiara and said that his ears were stuffed twenty-five times.
"My ears are stuffed! I can't hear you, my ears are stuffed!" Jaken imitated the voice that Sesshomaru had when he was four and walked around the room as he held his ears. "What? I can't hear you, my ears are stuffed! They're stuffed! I don't like it! My ears are stuffed! Un-stuff them!"
Sesshomaru growled. He was ready to pounce on Jaken and beat the crap out of the imp, but he stayed in the position that he had to stay in, despite how difficult it was. Jaken did a little bit more of the Sesshomaru impression, until he switched to Kiara. Kiara rarely ever got sick, but she did get sore throats on occasion. She never really talked when she had a sore throat, but she had talked before. Her voice had sounded raspy, and Jaken imitated it perfectly. He made her voice sound worse than it actually was when she had a sore throat, just to get on her nerves even more. Kiara gritted her teeth and stayed in the position. She wished that she could have picked up Jaken by his shirt and thrust him into the woods, but she didn't. She didn't want to fail the test.
Jaken then left the room for a little while and came back with a bunch of scrolls.
"Lady Kiara, do you want me to read the love letters that Hakkaku wrote to you? They're very interesting." Jaken said.
Kiara shook her head, her face starting to take on a pinkish tinge.
"Are you sure, Lady Kiara?" Jaken asked.
Kiara nodded, her teeth gritting.
"Oh, okay," Jaken said. He then piled up the love letters and focused on another set of scrolls. "Lord Sesshomaru, these shoe designs are very well-drawn." He said.
Sesshomaru's eyes went wide. Making shoe designs was his secret passion. He was always thinking of different kinds of shoes that he could wear.
"Maybe I'll show them to Lady Kiara. She'll get a good laugh out of them." Jaken teased.
Sesshomaru shook his head. He didn't want Kiara to see the shoe designs. Kiara was the kind of person who wouldn't let him forget about the designs. Sesshomaru was a very good drawer, but because Kiara usually went barefoot or in sandals, she would laugh about his shoe designs and she would never let him forget about them.
"You sure you don't want me to show them?" Jaken asked. "Your sister will be amused,"
Sesshomaru shook his head quite nervously as he cracked his knuckles. Beside him, he saw that Kiara was holding in laughter.
"Fine," Jaken said. He gathered up the scrolls and once again left the room.
Jaken left the room for a few minutes. When he came back, Kiara and Sesshomaru became enraged. Jaken came back into the room with their boas. He was flipping the boas around, sliding around on them on the floor and kissing them. Kiara and Sesshomaru felt their faces become red from anger. They were both gritting their teeth, growling and cracking their knuckles as they watched what Jaken was doing with their boas. The boas would stink of imp stench for sure and it would take some good scrubbing to get the stench out. Jaken continued to play with the boas as Kiara and Sesshomaru got angrier and angrier. Their mother gave them those boas when they were babies. The boas were two of the very few things that they had left to remind themselves of their mother. But they stayed strong. They refused to fail the test.
After a little longer of Jaken continuing to play with the boas, he called for Inutaisho. Inutaisho immediately got to the room and took the boas from Jaken.
"You two can move now," he said. "But you can't ever, ever, beat up Jaken nor do anything to Jaken because he did this. I'll wash the boas for you to get the disgusting imp smell out of them. You two can have lunch. When the sun starts to set, meet me outside at the tree where you played 'flying samurai' with Inuyasha."
Later that day, Kiara and Sesshomaru found their father at the tree.
"This is the final test. You two will hang upside down from a tree branch. You are allowed to communicate with each other in this test. I will come to you and tell you when you can come down. Good luck." Inutaisho said. He left once Kiara and Sesshomaru were both up and hanging upside down in the tree.
Kiara and Sesshomaru both hung there for about ten minutes, neither of them really saying anything to each other. Everything was peaceful until Yoshi came running towards them, the goat's horns was pointing right at their heads. Kiara and Sesshomaru screamed and lifted up their heads for dear life. Inutaisho came running outside after hearing them scream. He found Yoshi trying to get to Kiara and Sesshomaru's heads. Inutaisho got Yoshi out of the way.
"Sorry about that," he said. "Sometimes I hang melons up there and Yoshi and I play 'crack the melon'."
"Those weren't melons, those were our heads," Kiara said.
"I know, I'm really, sincerely sorry about that," Inutaisho said. He then left with the goat by his side.
"Was that part of the test?" Sesshomaru asked.
Kiara said that she didn't know.
They hung there for about another hour. Inuyasha then came by with a book in his hands.
"Can Inuyasha read?" Inuyasha asked.
"Sure," Sesshomaru replied with a little bit of a sigh.
Inuyasha started reading the book. He stumbled over words and he read the book slowly. Kiara and Sesshomaru were becoming bored, but they didn't show it. They listened to Inuyasha's reading and realized that their four year old brother was reading sections from Aunt Kagome's manners book. Inuyasha, of course, didn't see anything of it. However, Kiara and Sesshomaru had read sections of that book as punishment from Aunt Kagome, and hearing that book made them want to throw up. An hour had passed before Inuyasha finally decided to stop reading from the manners book. He waved to them and went back into the estate, for he smelt that dinner was ready. Kiara and Sesshomaru were both hungry, they wished that the test was over. Fifteen minutes passed until Inutaisho came to get them down.
"Did we pass?" Kiara and Sesshomaru both asked once Inutaisho got them down.
"Yes, the two of you did very, very well," Inutaisho said. "I thought that you would do well, but to tell you the truth, I was surprised with how good you actually did. I'm proud of you two."
Kiara and Sesshomaru smiled.
"Can we have our boas back?" Sesshomaru asked.
"They're drying," Inutaisho told them.
Kiara and Sesshomaru headed back the estate so that they could eat. Inutaisho had gone far into the backyard to play with the goat. But then, as they were walking towards the estate, something took Kiara's attention. She felt something, as if she and Sesshomaru were being watched. It had to be in her head, right? It had to be her imagination. But then, Sesshomaru turned around.
"Do you feel that?" he asked.
"It feels like we're being watched," Kiara replied. She turned around, too. "It's coming from the woods."
"I don't smell anything," Sesshomaru said. "Do you?"
Kiara shook her head. All she could smell was the normal scents that she smelt every day.
"It's probably just in our heads," Kiara said, even though she had to admit that there was something strange about this.
"Yeah," Sesshomaru agreed. "Come on, let's eat,"
They went into the estate to eat, both of them knowing that something strange was going on. Little did they know that it was not just strange, but more than that. They had no idea who was watching them. But they would have never expected who it was.
The stalker who hid himself within the woods chuckled to himself. "Kiara, Sesshomaru, soon you will face the same tragic fate that your mother did …"
So, what do you think? I'm thinking of taking this story 2 different ways. I want my readers to vote on which option they like best. Here are your choices.
Choice #1: I can continue it on with it this way, with Kiara and Sesshomaru 8 years older than Inuyasha. I won't fast forward a few years into the future.
Choice #2: I can fast-forward a few years into the future, and keep the 8 year separation between Kiara and Sesshomaru and Inuyasha. This version will have just as much action as the choice above, but there will be a lot of romance between Kiara and Hakkaku. This version will have character deaths. (not Kiara, Sesshomaru or Inuyasha)
I really like both of these choices. So vote on which one you like best when you review. So please review and vote. I would also like to know how many people like Kiara and Sesshomaru being 8 years older than Inuyasha. Right now, it might seem not to be a big change from the 6 year separation, but in later chapters it will be. So tell me if you'll like Kiara and Sesshomaru to just be 6 years older. I might change it back, it depends on how many people like it with them 6 years older and how many people like it with them 8 years older. But anyway, vote and review. I would really like your opinions so I can continue the story the way that my readers will prefer it. If you like 1 option better than the other or 1 age separation better than the other, tell me in your review. Don't just sit there hoping that I do it the way you like it, review and tell me.