A Father's Embrace

Chapter Eleven

Heritage

Maiki blinked incredulously at her bloodied left hand, at the deadly claws that adorned each finger. She removed her right hand from the wall, examining that one as well. Claws on that hand too. What else about her had changed? Panicked, she ignored the minor pain that still ebbed through her body. She brushed past Miroku, Sachiko, and Kazuki, pushing through the bamboo curtain.

Outside, the early morning sun blazed down upon her, blinding her momentarily. She missed the worrisome stares from nearby patrons. Her eyes focused in the outside light, scanning the area, gathering her bearings. Her eyes swept over Miroku's home, next door to the hut she had just emerged from. No, she didn't want to go in there. She had to get away.

Her eyes snapped to the small irrigation stream twenty feet in front of the huts. The sound of the flowing water seemed to thunder in her ears. Still in a daze, she stumbled forward towards the water. Downstream, a few children played in the waters. Their mothers were washing clothes or filling buckets for their chores. The few men who owned horses had brought them to the stream to drink.

Maiki ignored them all. She disregarded them as they stared at her in fear, shock, animosity. The women and children shied away. The men stood on guard. Maiki fell to her knees at the bank of the stream. She leaned forward, and looked upon the surface of the water. The person she saw in her reflection was not her, yet it was.

Golden eyes stared at her. Silver hair fell around her shoulders and her face. And her ears. They were no longer normal. Now, they had become two triangle shaped appendages on top of her head. Were they real? Maiki reached up to touch them, fingers brushing along her earrings. Strange, how the piercings that were in her normal, human ears were still there, but now in these bizarre, yokai ears.

How? How did this all happen? Why did this happen?

"Maiki?" a woman's voice called out to her. A familiar voice. A comforting voice. The girl barely registered who's voice it belonged to. She slowly looked up to face the owner of the voice with a detached look of confusion scribbled all over her face. The teenage girl took in the sight of the woman standing twenty paces from her. She wore a green skirt and a white shirt. An old backpack sat on the ground beside her, a bow and quiver of arrows on her back.

"Mama?" the girl-turned-yokai cried with uncertainty, eyes filling with tears.

Kagome rushed to her daughter's side, falling to her knees in front of her daughter, collecting her into a reassuring hug. She allowed her frightened daughter a moment to cry into her shoulder. Maiki felt stupid and embarrassed. She was crying her eyes out in front of everyone, yet she couldn't stop. She hated crying, especially when others knew about it. And the thought only caused her to cry harder, the salty scent serving to further remind her of her weakness.

"Shh. It's okay, Maiki. Everything's gonna be okay."

"Mama," she sobbed. "What's happened to me, mama? What am I?"

Kagome tried the best as she could to soothe her daughter. One hand rested gently on the back of Maiki's head. The other rubbed smooth circles on her back. Maiki could hear footsteps approaching, but she ignored them. It seemed like forever before the owner of the footsteps finally stopped.

"Kagome-chan, this might be of some use," Sango replied quietly, not wishing to disturb them. Being a mother herself, she knew all-too-well the delicate process of trying to comfort a child. And it seemed that the older the child became, the harder it was to comfort said child. Kagome looked up at her long-lost friend with wide eyes. The unofficial miko reached out and accepted the sheathed sword Sango held out to her.

"Thank you, Sango-chan."

"And this belongs to you too." The slayer handed something else to the other woman, though Maiki could not see what that was. Kagome accepted it with a single nod of gratitude before turning back to her daughter.

Although the exterminator had many questions to ask of the newly arrived Kagome, she returned to her hut instead, leaving the mother and daughter to their much needed talk. By now, all the villagers that had been in the area beforehand had now left. Kagome pulled away from Maiki slightly so that she could look into her daughter's eyes. She set the sword down beside her on the ground so that she could use both her hands to wipe the tears from Maiki's face, to brush the stray strands of now-silver hair behind her ears.

"I'm so sorry I hid this from you, Maiki," she began. "I only wished for you to have a happy, normal life. I didn't want you to know about all of this… about this place." She reclaimed the sword that lay at her side. "I want you to take this."

Maiki hesitantly wrapped her hand around the sheath. "A sword? What for? I don't…"

"It's a special sword. It… belonged to your father."

The teenager immediately released the sheath. "I don't want it," she stated acidly.

Kagome was puzzled. "Why not?"

"I don't want anything that belonged to Nanashi."

The older woman mentally slapped herself, shaking her head instead. "No. This didn't belong to Nanashi. This belonged to your father. Your real father."

Maiki gave her mother a look of uncertainty. "I thought you said you didn't know who my real father was…"

Kagome averted her gaze as guilt panged her. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm sorry I lied to you."

For once, Maiki had an assignment for school that actually seemed like it would be fun. In her biology class, they were learning about genetics and family traits. The assignment was for each student to research his or her family history and record any unusual or unique family traits that had been passed down. They were required to go up to three generations back, if possible.

Maiki had rushed home from school that day, now over two years ago, excited to get started on the assignment. When she got home, she was surprised to discover that her mother was not there. Kagome was almost always home. Not sure when her mother would return, and knowing her father wouldn't be home for several hours, Maiki took it upon herself to dig through the family records. She entered her father's study, and helped herself to his file cabinet, searching through all the important documents he kept there.

Finally, she came upon what she was looking for. She found her father's birth certificate, followed by her mother's and then their marriage license. After that came her own birth certificate. And what she saw made her blood run cold. On it, her name read 'Higurashi Maiki' instead of 'Hojo Maiki.' And under 'Father's Name' it read 'Unknown'. Could it be a mistake? As far as she knew, her legal surname was 'Hojo'. What did this mean? Suddenly, she heard the front door open and slam shut. Maiki strode to the doorway of the study, peering out. She heard her mother's stifled sobs.

"Mama?" she cautiously called out, entering the kitchen and finding her mother sitting at the table, crying. Kagome looked up, realizing she was not alone, and quickly attempted to school her features.

"Oh, Maiki! I didn't know you were home so early," she rambled, trying to dry her eyes and hide her tear-stained face.

"Mama, what's wrong?" Concerned for her mother, the teenager quickly forgot about her own worries for the moment.

"Nothing dear. I just stubbed my toe on the walk outside. I think I'm fine now."

"Mama… You slammed the door really hard. I don't think you 'just stubbed your toe'."

Kagome looked back at her daughter with desperation. A look that said, 'please don't force me to answer your question…' Maiki noticed the container of food that had been thrown into the trash. Her eyebrows furrowed together and shot her mother a look, silently demanding that she explain what had happened.

"Your father had to work late at the hospital again," Kagome replied, her voice hollow, lacking emotion. "I thought I'd surprise him and bring him dinner. So I went to the hospital. But when I reached his office, he was… he was…"

"He was what, mama?"

Kagome's eyes returned to her daughter. No, she couldn't say it. "He was… with a patient," she choked. She hadn't said the complete truth, but she hadn't lied either. Unfortunately, Maiki was a bright girl, and caught the hidden meaning.

"I see…" she replied, her voice quiet and vindictive.

The mother looked down just then, noticing the single piece of paper in her daughter's hands. "What's that, Maiki?"

The teenager stiffened suddenly, trying to hide the paper behind her back. "Nothing. Just research for a project for school."

"Is that... Is that your birth certificate?"

Busted. "Yes, mama." The girl's eyes told of the pain and confusion she felt. An awkward silence ensued. After several moments, Maiki finally asked, "Who is he, mama?"

"Who is who?"

"Who is my father? Isn't Nanashi my father?"

"I'm sorry, Maiki. But… I… I don't know who he is. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry I lied to you," Kagome whispered again. "I deceived you so many times in the past, but please have trust in me now. You must take this sword and never abandon it."

"Why?"

"Your father, your real father, was a hanyo. This sword, the Tetsusaiga, belonged to him, it had been given to him by his father. Because he was a hanyo, he couldn't control his yokai blood, especially if he was in a near-death situation. For that reason, this sword was enchanted with a spell to suppress his yoki. If not kept in check, his yokai half would take control. Unable to recognize friend from foe, he would attack anyone around him. And he wouldn't stop unless he was either rendered unconscious or if he died while fighting. That is why you must never separate from this sword. If something terrible should happen to you, your yoki will take over and you will lose yourself to it."

Maiki took hold of the sword, clutching the only keepsake of her biological father to her chest. "I'm confused, mama. How come I never looked like this before?"

Kagome sighed. "Because of this." She held up the object in her hand, the other object that Sango had given her. It was the sliver of the Sacred Jewel that had been expelled from Maiki's body.

The girl squinted her eyes at the object. "What is that? Is that a fragment of the Shikon no Tama?"

Her mother nodded. "Three days after you were born, you began to portray the physical traits of your father. Being the daughter of a hanyo and a human makes you a shibunyo. You have the blood of the inu-yokai running through your veins, and because of that, you have inherited the dominant features of your inu-hanyo father. Because of this, I used the largest of the three shards I had in my possession at the time to contain your yoki and your yokai characteristics. I'm very sorry I hid this from you for so long."

Maiki was speechless. 'I'm… a shibunyo?' the teenager echoed her mother's words in her head. 'And my father was a hanyo?' Her head seemed to spin. It was a lot to take in all at once.

She stared into her mother's eyes. There was more to the story, Maiki could tell… But the pain she saw in her mother's eyes prevented her from pushing the issue. Instead, the teenager wrapped her arms around her mother, who returned the embrace, and the two silently comforted each other.

shibunyo - 'shibun' - meaning one-fourth, (and obviously) 'yo' is derived from yokai

About Maiki: It's finally reveailed; Inuyasha is her father. She's obviously not a full-blooded yokai, but when she transformed, her yokai bood had taken over (much like what happens occasionally to Inuyasha).