Ch. 15:

Kagome's distressed eyes burned into his amber ones as she instantly became angry at his obvious denial.

'Why won't he ever just :let me: take care of him without us having a fight?' She thought angrily, her eyes still shooting fire into his.

He leaned slightly away from her but still looked deep into her eyes, his own smoldering with challenge, worried that she might suddenly turn on him...he never knew with Kagome how she would react to things...he too though, was angered.

Everytime he got injured she wanted to baby him! He had survived for at least a hundred years sustaining all kinds of injuries to himself, and he never needed to have "special treatment." Not that he didn't like Kagome's treatment but, it made him feel weak. He had tried time and time again to tell her not to treat him but she always refused, and always they ended up getting into a huge stupid argument, which ended up usually taking Kagome back home, which pissed him off so much.

Kagome broke the silence, but not the staring match.

"Can I at least see how bad it is? Look, your bleeding everywhere!" She motioned to her now crimson-stained school shirt, and then to the puddle of blood on the ground where Inuyasha was standing. Inuyasha narrowed his eyes at her in agitation, and then without a word to her sat down indian-style in front of a tree.

It was his way of telling her to go ahead, but he still wasn't happy about it.

Relief swept over Kagome as she realized that there wasn't going to be a fight! Inuyasha was going to let it go, and let her help him!

She smiled up at him as she kneeled beside him on the ground.

"Thank you Inuyasha...you don't know how much better this makes me feel." She said sweetly to him.

"Keh." He ignored her and tried to one-handedly pull of his kimono, which did prove to be much harder than he had thought. After a while of struggling Kagome but in.

"Inuyasha, let me help you with this.."

"I'v got it Kagome." He barked at her. She glared at him again.

"Obviously not!" She barked back.

"Damnit! I can do this myself!"

"Then why isn't it off yet!" They yelled at eachother like that for awhile and the sun was much higher in the sky now. They soon forgot about what they had been getting ready to do, because they were so caught up in this argument and no one was here to stop them from arguing. Kagome's face was pressed all up close to Inuyasha's face.

"I just can't understand you!" She ground out exasperated.

"What the hell::I'm: confusing!" He said in shock, staring at her wide-eyed.

"Yes!"

"How the hell am :I: confusing when your the one who cries when your :happy: and always studies for those damn "tests" even though you hate them!" He growled back at her, moving closer to her face.

She slammed her hands down onto the ground in anger, but Inuyasha didn't wince away at all.

Even though he had been slightly afraid of her, he refused to show it. His dog instints were kicking into over-drive at this moment and he felt the need to show her who was the alpha...to dominate her.

"Let's just drop this." She told him icily.

"Hell no Kagome. We're gonna finish this---" He fumed at her and scrunched down his eyebrows.

Before he had finished his last word, she had somehow without his knowing, pulled off his top kimono by herself and she tossed it on the ground beside them.

Kagome gasped in horror. All the pint up anger left Kagome as she saw his arm...it was bad.

It had turned to a dark purple and a sickly dark green color all around this massive hole in his shoulder where there was still wet blood slowly oozing out of it, and there was an even bigger one where the sword had pierced through the back of his shoulder.

"Inuyasha, we're going to have to get you to Kaede's...I don't think i'm experienced enough to do anything for you now accept maybe slow down your bleeding..." She told him seriously.

"Kagome all I need is wrest and i'll be fine." She stared angrily at him.

"I don't care :what: you say, we're getting you to Kaede's for help. This is very bad Inuyasha.." She looked around the woods they were in for something to use to stop it from bleeding...when she saw nothing she tore one of the long sleeves off of her shirt at the seems.

Inuyasha watched her as she dedicatedly tied it tight around his shoulder. She ripped off her other sleeve and repeated the action. Inuyasha felt a pang of guilt in his heart and he looked away from her.

"Sorry about your shirt.." He said quietly. Kagome looked up at him as she finished tying it tightly around to stop his bleeding.

"Inuyasha, it was ruined anyways." She laughed alittle, trying to comfort him and one of his ears perked back towards her. "Besides, I have more back at my house." As he felt his stress and anger lift from him at her laughter, which made him feel all warm and happy on the inside, continued to not look at her. He had to keep his cool and not let her know how she was affecting him at this time... Instead he focused on listening to the sounds of the woods and wondered if Kurishuna had really been killed that easily...trying to keep his whole "tough-guy" act up.

"Do you think you can make it back to Kaede's tonight? This really should be taken care of really quickly.."

He suddenly stood up, seeming like he was in no pain.

"Of course I can make it to Kaede's. Hrmph." He stared down at her angrily, and then pulled her up off the ground with his left hand, just to emphasize that he was all right.

"Inuyasha!" She whined. "Don't strain yourself!" She bumped his not-hurt arm with her elbow to emphasize :her: point as he ground his teeth together to not make a noise of pain, and he angrily huffed to the front and lead the way back to Kaede's.

As they walked on through the woods together, things began to become more familiar to Kagome. They were getting close to home now...

She had noticed over the past few minutes that Inuyasha had began to slow down.

"Hey Inuyasha?"

"What."

"Umm. I need to take a little wrest...you don't mind do you?" She said politely as she sat down onto the ground anyways. He turned around and glared down at her.

"I thought you were the one in a hurry to get to Kaede's."

"I am! But i'm so tired!" She looked up at him with those big innocent brown eyes...He stood there and just turned his head to the side and closed his eyes irritably. He could see what she was up to. She was trying to make him wrest, and not doing it so much for herself. He was slightly irritated but deep down happy that she was taking into consideration how he felt so much.

He decided, against his demon self to sit down beside her.

He saw her look curiously up at him and he kept his eyes forward, trying to think of things besides her.

"Hey Inuyasha, just out of curiosity because I never knew..." She stopped talking and waited for a response from him.

"Yah?"

"How old exactly are you? Minus those fifty years?" He looked down at her slightly caught off-guard. Talk about things out of the blue...

"Well...i'm around 200 years I guess..I stopped counting awhile back."

Kagome looked at him in shock.

"I had no idea you were that old! You don't act like it at all!" She said in shock as she pointed her finger at his face. He narrowed his eyes at her.

"What's that mean?" He asked in his deep threatening voice. Kagome laughed at him. "What now?" He slightly relaxed, he'd never understand her.

"It's just unreal that your that old and you look so young...and act it too." She added playfuly. He stared her down for that and grabbed her finger and pushed it out of his face. "No, I don't mean it offensevely! It's just unreal!"

"Why? I'v told you before, I was immortal even when I was half-demon." She opened her mouth, then closed it and looked away deep in thought. He raised an eyebrow at her actions.

"What was that?" He wanted to know what was on her mind, what she had been about to say.

She stared off into the woods, her eyes distant. "Umm..." She got this look of concentration and determination on her face. "If your immortal as a demon, and then you marry a mortal human...she will just grow old and then die while the demon keeps living on?"

"Well...that's not exactly right.."

"Huh? How?" She asked him extremely interested. Inuyasha shifted uncomftorably, not wanting to really talk about it.

"Keh. Kagome, why do you wanna know?" He asked softly. The tender tone in his voice along with his question caused Kagome's heart to skip a beat inside her chest. His deep amber eyes stared curiously into hers.

"I...was only curious...So she dies and the demon lives on forever, or what? What is it I have wrong?" Inuyasha looked straight ahead again, and there was a short silence then, as he thought about how to explain it.

"Full demons have alot of power, and it enables them to live forever, or at least until something else kills them but they never die of natural causes...When a demon...eh..chooses a mate---- or wife, whatever you humans say, they exchange and share eachother's power so that if one of them dies...the other also will die. It's just apart of demon bonding...But when a demon mates with a human, he shares his power with her and elongates her life...and as long as he continues living, she will age at his pace, unless he dies and then she will automatically turn the age she is supposed to be."

"Wow...and is it vice versa if the female dies first?"

"Because he shared his power with the human girl, he won't die if she does. But it depends on the demon too. Say dogs mate for life and are extremely loyal to their families, he would probably go crazy and follow his mate to death rather than continue to live his life."

Inuyasha turned his eyes to look at Kagome from the side and see what her reaction was. She too was staring ahead at the woods, thinking.

"It's amazing how loyal..." She whispered to herself. "It's sad really." Kagome felt Inuyasha watching her and she turned her head to look up at him. Inuyasha's eyes were smoldering with something very deep. Kagome had seen this look in his eyes on only several important occasions and she couldn't quite place what it was but...it made her heart stop and her blood rush and her tummy fill with butterflies all at once.

She loved it, but it confused her as well...why was he staring at her like that? And why did his face suddenly seem like it was so close to hers? She subconsciously leaned forward towards him...trying to get closer. His eyes were locked onto hers, and wouldn't let her look away.

Their faces were less than an inch apart and she could feel his soft breath tickling her face. She instinctively closed her eyes and she felt his lips press sofly against hers. She felt the need to get closer to him and, all on instinct, wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer to her.

She felt him nibble on her bottom lip and she couldn't supress a sigh.

Inuyasha loved the feel of her soft lips...and he nibbled at her bottom one playfuly to see what she'd do. When she sighed into his mouth he could hardly stand it...his instincts were telling him to do things to her and it took everything he had to fight them. He pulled slightly away from her to try and calm himself down but found that neither of them wanted to stop and Kagome whined when he had pulled ever so slightly away which drove him crazy, his heart sped up quickly...he brought his mouth back to hers and made this kiss even deeper, and they kissed eachother and then he pulled away quickly panting...Kagome tried to kiss him again but he grabbed her with his good arm and hugged her tightly to his chest instead.

He had to stop right now or else...