"And with this...I take thee..."
Chapter 1
Throughout their years together, no matter what their adventures—and they were many—three things remained constant: Kagome and Inuyasha's unwavering devotion to each other, a love that burned as bright and pure as the sun; a puzzling but persistent inability to speak of their feelings to one another; and especially puzzling to Kagome's family and their friends, a never-ending stream of petty squabbling over niggling trivialities, which only grew louder and more violent as time passed.
On one particular day, Inuyasha and Kagome had been quarrelling more violently than usual—in fact, more violently than ever. It started in Kaede's village—over what, neither of them would ever remember—but at some point, Kagome yelled "I'm going home!" and stomped off to the bone-eater's well. Usually, when she stormed homewards after one of their arguments, Inuyasha would just turn his back, sulk, and let her go; but this time, he chased after her, shouting at her every step of the way. They fought as they made their way through in the forest, they fought at the lip of the well, they fought as they flowed through the stream of time to Kagome's era, they fought as they climbed out of the well, and they fought all the way up to Kagome's room. Kagome's family was eating dinner at the time; they had become more or less used to these lover's spats (actually, they were usually quite amused by them), but this time it was so loud that they had to stuff their napkins in their ears as Inuyasha and Kagome chased each other up the stairs, bellowing all the way.
Finally, Kagome had had enough. She looked Inuyasha squarely in the face, and began screaming at the top of her lungs, "OSUWA..." But then, she had a sudden premonition of what might happen if she "sat" him that hard: she pictured Inuyasha plummeting through the floor and crashing into the dinner table, splattering her chagrined family with the evening meal. She stopped herself cold, and then through gritted teeth, she growled, "Just sit down and shut up."
Inuyasha's beads trembled, but they didn't pull him down; this only made him angrier. "After all these years," he yelled, "you still treat me like a dog. Sit here! Sit there! Sit, sit, sit! Don't you know how much I hate that?" He grabbed his necklace and shook it in her face angrily. "Don't you know how much I hate THESE?"
Kagome's face, already flushed purple with fury, suddenly blanched white-hot with rage. She grabbed the beads violently, and yanked hard on the necklace. Its cord parted with a dull snap, and Kagome hurled the necklace to the floor, where the beads pattered dully as they bounced on the tatami matting. With both hands she grabbed Inuyasha by the kimono, and with her face inches away from his, she screamed hoarsely, "OSUWARI! OSUWARI! OSUWARI! Are you happy? Are you happy? Are you happy?" She shoved him roughly away, and sat down heavily on the bed.
"Ka...Kagome..." Inuyasha stammered, his hand tentatively touching his chest where the beads used to lie, his face frozen in disbelief.
"Just...go away, Inuyasha," Kagome said weakly, holding her head in her hands. "Go back to your own time. Go anywhere you want. Just get out of my house. Just...just go away."
Inuyasha stared numbly at Kagome for a few moments. He started to reach for her, but then his hand dropped resignedly to his side. He desperately tried to think of something, anything to say to her; but no words came.
When he finally found his voice, all he could say was, "Kagome...goodbye." He walked to the window, looked at her one last time, and jumped out.
Inuyasha tottered dazedly across the temple courtyard, his eyes downcast on the ground, paying no attention to the direction he was heading. When he left Kagome's room, he had intended to go straight to the well and back to the past, but when he looked up, he found himself at the foot of the Goshinboku.
"Kagome..." he whispered weakly to himself. He pressed his forehead to the trunk, and felt the life that coursed through the tree; and he remembered how his soul had reached through time, rushing with the tree's spirit from his era to Kagome's time, to speak directly to her soul, and how he had somehow gathered all his courage to say to her, "I need you." It had been the first time in his life that he had ever said those words to anyone—but he had only managed as much because he was too afraid to speak the words that he had really wanted to say: "I love you." And now, he was afraid that it was too late.
He turned himself around, and leaned heavily against the tree, looking up into its spreading canopy. "I never knew my father," he said softly to himself, "he died the day I was born. My mother died when I was still a child. My brother hated me and tried to kill me every time we met. Naraku turned Kikyo against me. And now, Kagome is gone too." He sighed heavily. "I've always been alone. I guess I'm alone again." He straightened, took one last look at the Goshinboku, and then slowly headed towards the shrine of the well.
He had barely left the shade of the Goshinboku when a kind, mild voice stopped him: "Inuyasha. Please don't go." He wheeled around, and was surprised to see not Kagome, but her mother, standing in the middle of the courtyard.
Kagome's mother joined Inuyasha at the foot of the Goshinboku, and looked up into its canopy of leaves. "Kagome has told me what this tree means to the two of you, and I can see from the way you look at it that it has a special place in your life. It has a special place in all of our lives, too—and especially mine." She sat on the bench at the foot of the tree, and patted the empty side of the bench, inviting Inuyasha to join her.
Instead of sitting on the bench, he sat on the ground at her feet, his eyes downcast, unable to meet hers; but Kagome's mother smiled gently at him, and began to speak in a soothing voice. "Listening to you and Kagome reminds me very much of me and my husband. We fought all the time." She laughed, and winked at Inuyasha. "At least you two only argue. We used to throw things, too—we had to replace a lot of broken dishes during the first years of our marriage." She giggled at the memory, then continued, "But we knew that we loved each other, and that's what really mattered, and we always remembered that." Then she sighed, and looked longingly at the Goshinboku. "My dear husband...he was a gentle man, a kind man, a wonderful husband, and a loving father. He would have liked you very much."
She gently stroked Inuyasha's long silky hair as she spoke; she did not know it, but that was exactly what his mother used to do when he was sad or lonely. And without even realizing that he was doing so, he leaned against her and rested his head in her lap, just as he used to do with his own mother, so very many years ago.
Kagome's mother continued: "You know, don't you, that Kagome and Souta owe their existence to this tree. It was here that I realized that my husband and I were born to be together, and it was here that I proposed to him. We were married at the foot of this tree, as well—and soon I had my beautiful children. They loved this tree too—Kagome especially loved to play here. She danced around this tree before she could walk to it. Grandpa used to get so angry at her, especially during temple festivals—he'd be in the middle of some long rambling prayer, trying his best to look solemn, and never doing really a very good job of it, and Kagome would run around the tree through the middle of everything, singing and dancing." She giggled again, and despite himself, even Inuyasha had to laugh at the thought.
And she told him how her husband had died very unexpectedly in a terrible accident that had nearly destroyed the temple, and that it had been a horrible shock to all of them; and how Kagome had always been the strongest of them all. Kagome, who was only nine years old when her father died, had been the one who pulled everyone else through the pain and the loss. She had helped Mama tend the house when even the simple act of sweeping was too much to bear; she had helped Grandfather with the putting up and taking down of all the ritual materials that a death at the temple demanded, something that was all the more difficult because it was for a family member; and she had been the perfect big sister to Souta, who had taken Father's death especially hard. Kagome was always supportive, always brave, always strong, and it was only she who could make Souta smile during the first difficult months after Father had died.
Mama rose, then walked to the tree and caressed it tenderly. "It was also this tree that showed me how special Kagome was. I didn't tell her at the time—I didn't tell her until years later—but a few weeks after the funeral, I brought my husband's ashes here, and buried them at the foot of our tree, so that he could nourish it and help it watch over us. I didn't tell Kagome—but somehow, she could feel her father's presence here...just as I can to this day...just as I can right now." She pressed her forehead lovingly against the Goshinboku's trunk, then turned back to Inuyasha and continued. "Helping us so much had worn her out. She was such a big help for so long, but finally it was too much for such a little girl. She stopped playing, stopped talking to her friends...and eventually, she never even came out of her room, not even for meals. She wouldn't have eaten anything if I hadn't brought it in to her, and sat with her until she had finished at least something. But the very day that I buried her father's ashes at the foot of the tree, Kagome left her room—she came here that evening, and every evening after that, for weeks. I don't know exactly what she felt, but she knew that she could find comfort here. I can't tell you how many times I carried her to bed...I would find her here, with her little arms trying to reach all the way around the trunk of that big tree, lying where she had cried herself to sleep. But she never let Souta see one tear—not one."
Again Mama rested her forehead against the tree, and smiled at something only she could perceive; then, she raised her face to the sun as it shined gently through the canopy of leaves, and said quietly, "It is my wish that when I die, my ashes should be brought here, so that my husband and I can be reunited—and then the two of us can watch over our family together, just as we have always done." She walked back to Inuyasha, resumed her seat beside him, looked deeply into his golden eyes, and said kindly but gravely, "And you must promise me that no matter what happens, if Kagome is still traveling into the past, you will take some of my ashes there and bury them at your Goshinboku, so that I can watch over her in your time, too."
Inuyasha couldn't meet her gaze; he looked down, and choked out quietly, "I promise."
This, at last, was too much for him to bear. Inuyasha had loved his own mother dearly, and he had never truly recovered from his grief at her death. His mother's courtiers had only suffered Inuyasha's presence at his mother's insistence; when she died, he was shunned, thrown out into the world alone with only Myoga for a companion (who was well intentioned, but worse than useless in helping the young Inuyasha cope with his mother's death, and was quick to abandon his young master at the least sign of trouble). Inuyasha had come to love Kagome's mother nearly as much as he had his own, and in the gentle good humor and soothing voice of Kagome's mother he had found the comfort that he had missed terribly for so many years. And it broke his heart to think that had he not only lost Kagome, whom he loved more than his own life, but that he would have to say farewell to this kind woman as well, and speaking to her of her own death was simply too much; and only for the second time since his childhood, he quietly began to cry.
Kagome's mother thoughtfully made no mention of the tears that she saw in the corners of Inuyasha's eyes, or how he blinked furiously to hold them back and dabbed furtively at his eyes with the edge of his robe; she just kept talking quietly, gently stroking his hair, until she felt that his grief had run its course and he had mastered himself again. Then she hugged him lovingly, and kissed his cheek; and as she stood up, her gaze rose again to the Goshinboku's regal canopy, and she said, "I knew that you and Kagome were meant for each other the first day that I met you. Please be patient with her. Don't go back to your own time just yet. Stay here; please wait, just a little longer." She walked quietly off towards the house, leaving Inuyasha with his thoughts.