AN: Ahhh… We've neglected this story for too long… :bows head in shame: Gomen… Gomen… But now, look! An uber exciting, pace filled, plotting moving long chapter all for your reading pleasure with the promises of more updates to come soon! Been curious about what is going on? How things will go? Now is your chance to run and read the latest chapter! Without, of course, forgetting to review We love your reviews.
So from the PoF and I, we hope you enjoy the latest chapter! Also, as another bonus feature, at end of this chapter you can all get your own mini chocolate dipped Inu! The real one we are keeping for ourselves. Of course. If Takahashi will only let him go for a short time… .
"I'm not sure if pet is the right word," she laughed when the cat hissed at the idea of being considered a lowly bet. Sango wriggled out of Miroku's grasp and walked over to hug the sulking Inuyasha, who seemed very shocked to be hugged by Sango, but returned the sentiment eagerly. She smiled up at him. "Don't worry. We'll take care of everything. You guys came all the way here to save me, so we're not going to leave until Kagome's herself again."
Sango smiled at him briefly before giving the cat to him. "Here. Pet Kirara. She makes everything feel better." Inuyasha looked slightly repulsed at the idea of petting a feline, but the cat had been neglected for so long she was willing to look past the ears. Sango glared at him. "I said: pet Kirara."
He patted the cat he now held in his arms, rubbing the kitten's ears and surprised when the pet… er, not a pet, started to purr. He smiled briefly, feeling better immediately, until he started thinking if this was how Kagome thought about him and his ears. He kept on petting the cat anyway. "Is there any other way to break the spell?" he asked the monk, thinking wistfully of fairy tales when the kiss of one's true love could fix everything.
Miroku shrugged. "Probably. I never dwelt long on spells. Poltergeists? Sure. But not spells."
Seeing the look in Inuyasha's eyes, Miroku stepped closer to his friend and looked at the demon cat in Inuyasha's arms. "You know she loves you very much. You're an idiot, so you're probably dense to the love in her looks when she glances at you," Miroku said then scratched his chin. "I've been with a lot of women, Inuyasha and sharing a wall with you I know just what you two sounded like. Those are the sounds only a woman in love can make," he said and looked back at Sango. "I've recently found the difference out myself.
"Maybe there are other ways, proving the truth to her, breaking through the spell, making a connection, hell, maybe a kiss. I don't know. But we will find it out once we get her back," Miroku promised. He then arched a brow when he saw Kirara jump off of Inuyasha's arms and onto the ground. Flames momentarily surround her and she turned into a giant cat. "Demon kitty indeed..." Miroku muttered glancing at Sango. "Does she want us to follow her or what?"
Inuyasha stared at the cat and answered before Sango could. "No. She's offering us a ride. She must like you very much, Sango. What did you do that made a cat demon offer us a ride?"
Sango merely smiled. "I only fed her a bit of smoked meat. Kirara's just a very nice cat, aren't you, girl?" she asked, rubbing the cat's long nose and kissing it with a smile. There was something with cats and women that just seemed to make them understand each other.
"I think you might have a contender for my heart, Miroku," she teased as she climbed up on Kirara's back, helping her husband up.
Sitting behind Sango, Miroku looked apologetically at Inuyasha, but he circled his arms around her waist and pulled her close behind him. "I don't like competition," he teased, moving his hands down but stopping, knowing that now wasn't the right time. However, hearing the hitch in her breathing he knew he got his message through to her.
"Kirara will just have to be fed a lot of smoked meat," Miroku added when Inuyasha climbed on. When the cat took off, Miroku turned to Inuyasha, looking over his shoulder. "First sign of Kagome, yell."
He stared at his friend. "I'm going to kill whoever did this to her…"
The prey was close. He could smell it, fear gripping at her little heart. But at least she was putting up a fight, hiding from him like this. He licked his lips hungrily, already tasting meat and blood when he would sink his teeth into her neck…. The deer heard a twig snap and ran off. Kouga gave no chase, instead turning around and looking at the pups he led behind him, trying to teach them how to hunt.
"What have I told you before? You need to be quiet! Be aware of everything around you: not just your prey! That's how our dinner gets away, and how the killer becomes the stalked, understood?" The guilty pup nodded when the wind shifted direction. It brought with it a familiar scent.
'Inuyasha?' He sniffed again. 'No. Kagome. What the fuck is Kagome doing here?' He looked down at the pups. "Go home. I have work to finish up."
He waited until they had slunk off before he chased down her scent, hearing her not too long later. Was she sniffling? He could smell salt in the air. She was covered with Inuyasha's scent, but that wasn't surprising considering that she had some of his blood running in her veins. There were other scents too. He could smell Miroku's woman on her too, and a scent that had become too familiar in the war-filled days.
Naraku.
What the hell was Kagome doing with Naraku's scent on her?
Slowing down behind her, closer now, he could make out a whole new scent. His surprise was so great that he said it out loud, though it came out as more of an oath rather than a statement of surprise. "What the fuck did Inuyasha do bringing a pregnant woman here and reeking with the scent of the doomed and the dead? I think maybe you fucked him a bit too hard, Kagome!"
Kagome turned around and stared at him hollow eyed. "Probably," Kagome whispered in agreement. How long had she been walking? Kagome wondered, finally allowing her legs to collapse under her as she sat with a loud thud on the ground.
"You can smell my baby?" Kagome asked looking down at her stomach. "Can you smell it's father?" Kagome questioned.
"I can smell it, but I can't smell who the father is," he said, gentle, as he knelt down on one knee, leaning his weight on the other. He stared at her, but did not touch her… though some part of him wanted to. He wanted to pat down her hair and tell her that whatever was wrong would be alright. Something was wrong, that was certain! "No demon has a nose that good. What are you doing all the way out here?"
"Running..." she said, turning her haunted eyes to him. "I want to go running to him, but he hurt me," Kagome said, remembering yesterday's memories very abstractly. She remembered burn marks, but... When Kagome looked down at her wrists she saw none. She remembered being sore, forcing herself to... Kagome shook her head.
"I feel as though a spider has crawled into my skull and spun deadly webs around my mind. Each time I try to slice through a line, like a plague it deepens its hold." Kagome began crying, though her well of tears was dried up. "When I try to fight it hurts... He swore he'd kill my baby," Kagome said grasping onto Kouga's hand with deadly strength. "You were there that night..." Kagome's mind rattled and shook.
Swallowing, Kagome felt like a puppet being pulled by the strings. "I'm going to look for my baby's father... I remember he asked you to lay with me.." Kagome touched her temple and massaged it furiously. "Did you?" Kagome asked moving forward and placing her hand on his bare knee. "I don't remember. You can if you want. He has already... He was very rough though, if you promise not to..." Kagome tried to make sense, but couldn't.
Kouga was confused trying to follow her speech. Was she talking about Inuyasha, or about the time that Sesshomaru had tried to hurt her so that his half brother wouldn't want her anymore? He peeled her hand off his knee and wrapped it around her other hand. "I haven't, and I'm not going to, either, Kagome. You're Inuyasha's mate and…" He stared at her neck. The bite mark wasn't as strong as it should have been. It was half gone, and looked like a pale birthmark now, rather than the sign of her marriage with a demon prince.
"Holy shit…." His eyes switched to her face, and he gently cupped her cheek. She didn't even have any more tears. She must have really hated Inuyasha to have her body actually start rejecting the mark! But still… threatening his wife? Threatening to kill her baby? Hurting her? That just didn't seem like the guy he'd grown up with, calling him 'dog piss' or the like since he had been old enough to talk.
He sighed. "Let me take you back to my den, Kagome. We'll give you some food to fill your stomach. You must be famished coming all this way," he said, even though she still hadn't told him why she was in the demon world in the first place.
Kagome nodded and grabbed fist fulls of his skirt. "Not. Fish… I'll throw up," she explained and took his hand placing it on her stomach. "I can't smell him. Can you feel him?" Kagome asked weakly, then her eyes pleaded into his. "My fear is his turn on." Kagome confided, falling forward wrapping her arms around his shoulders.
"He never really cared. He just took pleasure in the body," she whimpered into his shoulder before crawling onto his lap completely like a little baby and hissing into his ear. "I cannot fight this sickness... These woods eat at me as the spider drills away, my powers are for the child. Otherwise, I'll miscarry." Kagome hoped in what message she tried to get through before diving back into the mad hell she found herself in, with contradicting voices and images she didn't want to see. Seeing one before her now, Kagome turned her eyes away from the blood soaked bed. "I divorced him..." Kagome whispered and fell limply against the wolf demon. "You'll protect me. Right?"
"Of course I will," he sincerely promised. 'Damn, is it just me or does that grass look lighter?' Kouga stroked her hair gently, feeling not quite like himself at all. "Don't worry, Princess. I'll take care of you. You just relax for now, and save your strength for that babe and your brain, to keep those nasty spiders away. I promise: no fish. But Kagome, this doesn't sound like Inuyasha at all. There's no way he'd get off on your fear. Inuyasha doesn't like people being scared of him?" He smiled. "I should know this. I'm his friend, after all, right?"
He stood up, holding her against his chest. "Yup, Princess, you just rest up now, and let me take care of you."
Kagome smiled softly, allowing herself to let her guard down. "He leaned close, and kissed me, he raked his hands over me… And told me he loves the smell of my fear." Kagome confided, then fell in step beside him. "Later, will you take me to Sesshomaru? I've got a child... His."
"What?" Now the whole world was upside down. Inuyasha being aroused by fear and his wife pregnant with the heir of the rightful King?
Oh, this was just going to be one of those days! First a good hunt ruined by a clumsy runt, and now a royal scandal.
He sighed. "I will after you've gotten some rest, Kagome." He scooped her up much as Inuyasha did when he carried her off to bed, and smiled rakishly. "We're going to take forever to get home if you're planning on walking. Hold on tight."
A crackling fire lit the early morning sky, even though the wolves didn't need it. Kouga checked on the food once more before erecting his back and crossing his arms. "I don't like this, not one bit. This doesn't sound like Inuyasha. I want you all to go and find him. Find him and find out what the fuck is going on. I'll take care of Kagome."
"We could eat her, sir," one wolf demon said. A glare from Kouga said no.
"You feel like eating the woman who claims to be carrying the child of King Sesshomaru? You feel like eating the wife of your prince? Do you have a death wish, or were you just born stupid?" He glanced at Kagome's sleeping body. "Like I said: I'll take care of Inuyasha's wife. I owe both of them that much. Sango could have killed me, she could have killed me on that ship, but they didn't. This will repay them for that kindness." He rubbed his cheek, thinking of when she had thrown the needle at him. "Besides, she has spunk."
His followers didn't move and he snarled at them like the wolf demon he was. "Get going will ya! Go and find him and don't come back until you can answer my questions!"
Kagome's eyes fluttered open just to see dog tails wagging away into the distance. "Is he here?" Kagome whispered, too frightened to move or change her position.
"No," Kouga said after looking over his shoulder. He scooped some of the broth into a bowl and walked over to sit beside her. He offered her the bowl with a face that seemed friendly and serious all at the same time. "Here, Princess. No fish, I promise."
Kagome smiled and sat up, taking the offered soup and drinking it slowly. Sighing with satisfaction, Kagome looked over at him. "This tastes great. I haven't had anything to eat since the morning... of... the day before yesterday. But even that meal didn't help, Inuyasha and I..." Kagome paused and tried to remember. She remembered a warm fuzzy feeling but a vision of him leering over her wickedly, his claws scraping down her sides, and the pain of her wrist breaking broke through those memories, shattering them. "It doesn't matter."
"Thanks, Kagome," he grinned proudly, "I made it myself." Kouga's blue eyes stared at her. "It does matter, Kagome. I still can't believe that this is the same person who nearly died protecting humans. He could've died saving you, and then he goes and starts to hurt you? It just doesn't add up."
"He didn't start after... It was on the ship still," Kagome said weakly, holding out the empty bowl to him for some more soup. "You're a better cook then me," Kagome joked, her head still throbbing. "Master.." Kagome tested out the word she remembered him telling her to call him.
He poured her some more. She could have his share. "He made you call him master?" Kouga surmised. He whistled when he handed the bowl to her. That seemed even less like Inuyasha! "So why in the world do you want to go and see Sesshomaru?"
"Because he is the father of my baby. He'll protect me from his brother. At least, when I give birth he won't snap the baby's neck," Kagome said, her hands shaking. "Something inside of me is telling me to go to him."
"Okay…." He didn't think that sound like Sesshomaru. To fall to the same so-called disgrace that had been the cause of so many family disagreements between Sesshomaru and his father…. He wouldn't stand for it. Inuyasha was the one who would save the child. But Kagome needed a friend more than a devil's advocate right now. "Eat it. You need the food, and so does the baby. Speaking of which, outta curiosity, why do you need magic to keep the baby some miscarrying?"
"This place... It's draining me," Kagome said, her eyes looking down at the ever greener grass beneath her. "The spiders are eating away at me." Kagome said, wishing she could explain better. "My body doesn't want a child of rape." Kagome whispered, dropping the bowl and its contents, allowing it to spill over the stone floor as her hands flew to her stomach, and she felt herself want to vomit.
He wrapped his arm around her and helped her outside and into fresher air in an attempt to help her stomach settle. "Rape, Kagome? Did Inuyasha…" He stopped that question, thankfully. She had said that Sesshomaru was the father. And Sesshomaru had asked him to do it… he gulped. "Kagome, trust me, Sesshomaru wouldn't do that to you."
Kagome stared at him. "If he wouldn't..." Kagome thought about it and remembered how Kikyo had mentioned rightfully so, the way Kagome begged Inuyasha to stop and protested. "Then Inuyasha..."
"Fuck, Inuyasha wouldn't do that either, no matter how lowly you think of him! He's half fucking human and cares too much for people who were like his mother!" He rolled his eyes. "I meant Sesshomaru wouldn't because he's disgusted by humans. Not to mention that at the time it also would have been so totally wrong since you were his brother's mate! Fuck! Inuyasha… I don't know who told you that, Kagome, but they're lying."
"Kikyo," Kagome said, looking at Kouga, to see if the words registered. "Kikyo told me that."
"Um…" Kouga was more than just surprised. His face melted into confusion, but his voice was still gentle, and so much more realistic in that tenderness than Kikyo's had ever been. "Kagome, Kikyo's dead. She died four years ago, on the pirate ship. Sesshomaru fed her to sharks. Trust me, she's dead."
Kagome shook her head at him. Why did they keep saying that? "She's real!" Kagome hissed at him, her nails closing around his wrist biting into his flesh. "Just as real as the little girl with the mirror."
'Little girl with the… oh.' Kouga put his hands on his hips. "Kanna! What the fuck were you doing with Kanna! She's as close to Naraku as… as… well, no body else is that close to Naraku! And talk about heartless…! She's just about as bad as he is! You can't listen to anything that bitch shows you, understand? She manipulates that mirror as easily as Naraku manipulates her!"
Kagome looked up at Kouga, a flutter rushing through her mind. "But..." she whispered remembering the scenes show her. "I remember..." Kagome muttered.
He rolled his eyes. "Yeah, right. You can remember something that happened a month ago when you can't even get a good night's sleep, have morning sickness in the morning, and spend the whole day wandering around the demon world." His sarcasm was cut short as he waved away an annoying thought, trying to be easy going.
"I'm going to go and take a nap. You… get some sleep or something. But no being sick in our den! If you still want to go see Sesshomaru after the other demons show up, then I can take you to him in no time whatsoever, but only if you want to." He glanced at her and grinned. "And if you start feeling lonely at all, Princess, I wouldn't mind an extra body to keep me warm." He chuckled wildly and waved at her over his shoulder. "Sweet dreams!"
Kagome sat there blinking. Another body to keep him warm? Kagome shuddered and brought her knees up close to her chest. If she could, she'd channel energy to heal this fever she had on her mind, but she had to keep the protective shield around her baby up.
"Another body... It's all about the body. No one wants the person inside, just the body." Kagome cried into her knees. "My memories might be wrong, the images I saw might be lies, but he came to me."
Looking back into the den, Kagome wished Kouga a goodnight and went on her way towards Sesshomaru's castle. She knew where it would be. Something was dragging her there. "He's strong enough to stand against Inuyasha."
Led by the wolf demons, the journey to the den didn't take very long. Kouga heard his pack's triumphant cries and came out of then, rubbing his eyes. Then he realized that Kagome was missing. Cursing like the ex-sailor he was, Kouga shut up when a giant flaming cat almost squashed him. He screeched and heard familiar laughter. Looking around a giant paw, he saw Miroku and Inuyasha were laughing at his outburst.
"I hope both of you get boils where you can't scratch…. Why the fuck are you two riding a giant cat?"
"Be nice to Kirara!" Sango chided. While Kouga didn't like the cat, Kirara seemed to like him well enough, and licked Kouga's face as her travelers climbed off.
Leaping off of the cat, Miroku held his arms out to Sango, grasping her around the waist and bringing her down to the ground. Maybe he held her a little too close and moved slightly too slow. Judging by their howls, Kouga's pack had taken notice to their actions.
"What's wrong Kouga? Cat got your tongue?" Miroku asked, ushering Sango to walk beside him. His hand played over the small of her back. "Your pack had some interesting news for us," Miroku said and left the rest to Kouga, though he did notice Inuyasha smelling the air. "Yasha?"
Kirara changed back to her small form and began to wash herself, trying to get the smell of dog demon out of her pretty coat. Inuyasha took a moment out of smelling the air to glare at the feline. "Oh, bite me. Kouga… ow! Damn it, I wasn't being serious!" He rubbed his ankle as Kirara went back to having a bath. "Kagome was here, I can smell her. She's not too far off…"
Kouga let out a sigh of relief. At least that meant he didn't have to explain to Inuyasha that he lost his woman….
Miroku shifted his feet. "Did she say anything to you?" Miroku asked. He was guessing by the look on Kouga's face that he knew something.
The wolf looked hot under the collar and lowered his eyes. Then he reminded himself he had done nothing wrong. "She thinks the kid is Sesshomaru's. She thinks that you get aroused by her fear. She thinks a hundred different things, and each of them is wrong! She says that Kanna showed her things. I can only guess what the little bitch showed Kagome." He looked up Miroku and Inuyasha questioningly. "Is it true what she says? Is Kikyo back?"
Actually, he only looked to Miroku, as Inuyasha had suddenly vanished. "Where'd he go to?"
Sango groaned. "He's gone after Kagome again." She looked up at her husband. "Should we let him? I mean, it's his choice, but if he keeps on chasing her like this…"