Disclaimer: No own. Getting lazy. You know what I mean by now.

A/N: Stuff. And things and whatnot. Nothing to say except that Life has been horrendously busy lately (20-hour drives, setting up transfers to new university and searching for job while keeping up with homework all make my brain hurt), so let's get to it. Thanks for patience, all.

Oh, and QuickEdit has pulled yet another charming trick: eliminating question marks when I pair them with exclamation points. If I seemed a bit nerdy with making statements out of what should've been angry questions last chapter a la Speed Racer, it was ff dot net acting up again. Sigh. Well, anything not to get the words mashed again, knock repeatedly on wood…

Beast

Chapter 35

Inuyasha was really starting to revisit his regrets about not just taking Kagome up on her initial assumptions and having her for dinner the night she got there, which might have spared them all this crap. It was more than bad enough to have woken up from that nightmare after the fight, then lost it in more sense than one—but to be caught in the middle of that by Kagome's little brother and possibly Kikyou as well, and then be informed that there was a problem by the latter, who was also the calmest and most capable person he'd ever known…quite frankly, it sucked.

Not surprisingly, Kagome wasn't helping. She'd insisted upon rushing the kid directly to her room, leaving Inuyasha to wonder whether to follow or not till Kikyou drifted after her, forcing him to rush after both and nearly barge into the shoji, which Kagome had unthinkingly closed and Kikyou failed to reopen as she passed through. Then Sango and Shippou had to be roused and introduced, and then Kagome had to finish calming Souta down long enough to tell them why he had come to the castle now, in the dead of night, and after two months of her absence.

"Well, Dad's getting lonely without you there," the boy mumbled lamely. They were perched on Kagome's bed, Sango smiling reassurance at him from the floor as he eyed her and then Shippou's tail and feet with undisguised curiosity in the eerie half-light of a torch near the foot of the bed. Inuyasha was crouching well back in the shadows, and Souta hadn't gotten a good look at the silent, unsmiling priestess yet, much to Kagome's relief. "And he wanted to know if that other guy was telling the truth about you being okay, 'cause you sounded kind of upset when he talked to you. I asked if I could come and see you, but Dad said no, so I waited till everyone was asleep and came out here by myself."

"Did you not know human entry into the castle is forbidden?" Kikyou asked from the back of the room. Kagome felt a rather unfamiliar pang of gratitude: for once, the quiet voice was gentle, not accusatory. "The woods are not entirely safe for a child on his own, either."

"I go out there a lot by myself," Souta protested, squinting to see whoever had addressed him. "Besides, no one else would come with me even if I asked."

"That's not the point, Souta." Kagome poked him to reclaim his attention before he could realize Kikyou looked exactly like her; she didn't think he was ready for That Story just yet. "You should've at least waited for morning. And how'd you get in?"

Souta's shoulders hunched, and Kagome's raw nerves twisted a little more at his guilty mumble. "I know, but…I just wanted to see if you were okay. I've snuck out a lot by myself, even when it's dark, and I never got anyone following me before. I didn't know—"

"Following you?" Kagome and Inuyasha repeated in synch. Souta half-smiled nervously as they blinked at each other, the hanyou retreating with uncharacteristic tact as Kagome spoke again. "Something was following you? Where? Did you see anything?"

"I dunno. It just felt like something was watching me the whole time. There was no one outside here, either, so I just walked in." His voice trembled, and Kagome squeezed his shoulders lightly. "I thought maybe it was the monster thing Dad was talking about, and I'm not a girl, so…"

Kagome snorted before she could help herself. "Inuyasha eats sushi raw, but that's pretty much all. He doesn't eat people, whether you're a girl or not, and he's a hanyou, not a 'monster thing.' Dad just…got a bad first impression." Not that I didn't, either, but that's about five light-years beside the point. "Not only has he not eaten me, he's turned out to be a pretty good guy. He doesn't even bite." Inspired, she beckoned with one hand. "Inuyasha, c'mere. Show him you don't bite."

"What am I, your pet?" he complained, rising to his feet just outside the light. "Don't blame me when he messes himself…" And Inuyasha stepped into full view, blood-red eyes and white fangs glistening dully in the pale orange glow. He clicked the tips of his claws together absently, one ear flicking at the stunned silence. "I didn't feel any demons out there. But first, kid, you wanna tell us how you got past the barrier without anyone noticing?"

Souta tensed, fingers tightening till his nails dug into Kagome's comforter and right leg. His eyes expanded slowly, and his mouth flapped for a few useless seconds. "Wow…" Almost forgetting the others' presence in his excitement, Souta tugged at his sister's bare arm urgently. "That's so cool! We all figured Dad just thought the guy had bad zits or something! I didn't know he was actually part demon!"

Kagome nearly fell off the bed, and Shippou came down with a bad fit of the near-giggles at Inuyasha's expression. "What the hell are 'zits,' kid?"

"Your name's Inuyasha?" Souta gaped up at the hanyou. "So those are dog ears? …Whoa! Are those fangs real?"

"Of course they're real!" Inuyasha snapped. He gave Kagome a look of utmost disbelief. "Everyone in your family's either selfish, spineless or psychotic, is that it?"

In lieu of a brilliant retort, Kagome stuck her tongue out. The gesture served only to remind Inuyasha that, wherever her bracelets were, she still wasn't wearing them. Crap. Can't say anything, or it might remind the brat how he—

"If they're real," Souta pressed, "how come you were chewing on Sis's face without making any big—"

"Hewasnotchewingonmyface," Kagome said cheerfully, through gritted teeth, in the space of a heartbeat—coincidentally, also the time it took to get her little brother in a friendly headlock and dig her knuckles into his skull in their time-honored fashion. "It's a long story, but he was not. Ha ha. Now…" She gave him one more noogie and released him, allowing him to regain some breath and not daring to look at anyone else. I swear I'm gonna kill the little mutant for this… "Now, seriously, how'd you get in? There's a barrier up around the castle that doesn't let humans in. It should've…well…not let you in."

"What barrier?" Souta seemed to process the question for the first time. With one last paw through his thoroughly mussed hair, he submitted to Kagome's attempts to smooth it and slumped back on his elbows. Only Inuyasha, who had become similarly occupied looking anywhere but at the bed, noticed Shippou watching the siblings intently. "I didn't see anything."

"We have means of detecting any attempts to pass through the wards, and I wouldn't have noticed your entry at all if I hadn't been out and seen you normally," Kikyou clarified. "I saw nothing nearby that could have harmed you—in fact, it could have been my presence you felt." Souta relaxed noticeably at that. Kagome had a feeling Kikyou didn't believe it any more than she did, but silently thanked her again anyway for putting Souta at ease. "Was there any difficulty in getting here? Did you feel any resistance in the air, for example?"

"Nope. I just found my favorite tree and went from there. Dad already told us where the castle was before. I wandered around for a while, and there it was." He looked around appreciatively. "So this place actually has magic around it, huh? That's probably why no one could get in." He paused long enough to yawn. "But, then, how'd Dad find it? How long's the magic thing been up?"

"Isn't their shrine within the barrier, Kikyou-sama?" Sango asked for the first time, frowning slightly. "Kirara was able to bring me there to retrieve some things, and it didn't feel as if we had passed through a ward."

"The human ward's always been weird there," Inuyasha interjected. "Shifts around for no reason sometimes. I think it moved away from the shrine a couple days after the curse kicked in."

"For no reason?" The ominous edge was back in Kikyou's voice. "Have you noticed any kind of pattern in the changes?"

Inuyasha shrugged, dropping back into his favored cross-legged position on the floor. "Didn't notice any." He made an uncomfortable face. "Then again, didn't notice her family was there till the idiot came in and started puking on the bushes a little while ago, either."

Kagome was readying a comeback when Inuyasha's head shot up. "Wait! That's right, I noticed they were here before that, 'cause something woke me up, and when I went to go look at the Tree, it…felt weird. Hard to describe."

They waited for more, but Inuyasha merely glanced around, ears dipping back in annoyance. "What?"

Kagome scratched at her scalp, but the tight, unnatural itch didn't go away. "The first time I touched the Tree, it gave me a really weird vibe. That was when we were first settling into the shrine—did you see any of us that day? I remember, I was doing laundry and spilled the soap everywhere."

"How the hell'm I supposed to know? I didn't keep track of days when I was supposed to be sleeping, Kagome. I just slept." Try as he might, Inuyasha couldn't quite hide his disquiet: they cringed as he absently cracked his knuckles one-handed in an excellent imitation of his niece. "And I didn't go look or anything, just sensed someone was there. I didn't get a warning like I was s'posed to, so I figured it was some hermit or monk or something, one of those boring, preachy dicks the Jewel usually liked. Then I forgot about it till I started wandering around one day however long later and saw some guy turning himself inside out. I was bored, so I sent the runt to keep his ass from freezing."

Shippou opened his mouth to ask, then remembered how Kagome had explained the situation to him some time ago and shut it.

Meanwhile, Inuyasha still had the room's attention. He shifted uneasily, not sure what to do with it. "…That was all. You guys know the rest."

More silence. Inuyasha swallowed visibly under the weight of a few stares too many, particularly the female ones, edging away in each direction till it became apparent that nowhere was safe. "What? What'd I do this time?"

Kikyou sounded closer to open irritation than she had for quite some time now. "It never occurred to you that anyone coming inside the Jewel's area of influence without arousing its attention could be significant, much less an entire family living within it for several years?"

"Like I said, it was like they weren't there. I forgot about 'em most of the time."

"Exactly how long ago was this, Inuyasha?" Sango asked with exaggerated patience.

He shrugged again. "Feh. Hell if I know. Seems like I'd just got up from the last time we were all awake." His impatience faltered, then gave way to pensiveness. "Y'know, now that I think about it, we were supposed to stay asleep at least 200 more years after this."

"It had only been…" Sango faltered abruptly. She glanced cautious askance at the shadows, and continued after a tiny nod from Kikyou. "Seven years or so, I believe. That was the houshi-sama's estimate, at least…. Do you mean to tell us, Inuyasha, that you woke up – when was it that you moved there again, Kagome-chan? – three years ago and didn't think to mention this when the curse began?"

"Three years? Holy shit." Inuyasha gazed at the ceiling distantly. "Doesn't seem like that long. Still doesn't explain why I couldn't go back to sleep…"

There was another moment of silence as they digested the notion. Kagome tried to imagine dozing for three years straight, and started to feel a little sleepy in the process. It also came to her that they were being permitted to talk about this a lot more freely than she'd thought they would be, and that she was getting too sleepy to think about it.

Inuyasha looked over his shoulder at Kikyou. "Didn't you know about it? I mean, weren't you in the Tree?"

"Yes, but my soul has occupied more than one vessel, as you know, and only one at a time," the priestess murmured, and all eyes cut over to Kagome, who tried to keep her indignation off her face. She had too much to deal with here already for hair-splitting over whether Kikyou meant to insult her every time she said something cryptic. Good to know my entire purpose in life is to provide drama for Inuyasha and a place for her soul to stay for a while. Finders keepers, I say…

Inuyasha found himself perilously close to growling in sympathy as anger muddied Kagome's scent, and shushed it, appalled. Where the fuck are those stupid bracelets? Technically, he knew That Smell could and often did make males act stupid, but it was one thing to know that intellectually, and another to realize he was ready to side with Kagome against Kikyou merely because she smelled exceedingly nice. More crap to deal with. That's just great. Well, 'least the little bastard let us get that other shit out of the way before he butted in. …There went his brain again on the interruption, and his feelings on the matter didn't even vaguely resemble gratitude: they were closer to frustration bordering on the homicidal.

This time, Kikyou and Sango both noted Shippou's uncertainty as the kit half-stood, gazed at the bed, and sat down in the slayer's lap again with a forlorn little sigh.

Oblivious to the mental turmoil surrounding him, Souta sat up and scratched his head. "Uh…I'm confused."

"That makes all except maybe one of us." Kagome drew her knees up to her chest. Her tank top and knee-length shorts were completely sweat-stained, and now that the adrenaline was finally starting to wear off, lack of sleep suddenly seemed drastically more severe a problem than little things like errant curses or grudges against dead predecessors. Unless my fourth-grade art teacher wants to pop out from under the bed and announce that she's really my father, I can't see any other plot twists keeping me up much longer at this rate. She yawned. "Vessel." Gee golly whiz crap, don't I feel important. Anyway, time to wrap this up…

Kagome sat up and spoke briskly. "The long and short is, the thing keeping the castle cursed likes our family or just ignores us for whatever reason, and it's not supposed to. The barriers don't stay around the shrine in a constant, unchanging state, the way they're supposed to. Inuyasha didn't stay cursed or go back to sleep for nearly as long as he was supposed to. There's a bad guy running around somewhere and screwing with us in various ways, maybe two, and they're definitely not supposed to. I stayed up all night angsting and sweating, and I wasn't supposed to. And you—" She poked her brother hard. "—came here by yourself while it was still dark, and you're gonna catch hell when you get home, and rightfully so. Till then, though, we need sleep." Kagome tousled his hair playfully. "After that, we can show you around and you can meet everyone else while we figure out what to do with you. Sound good?"

Souta blinked at her. "Could you run that by me again?"

Before she could attempt to kill him, the shoji opened with a gentle rustle. Miroku stepped in, raised an eyebrow at the small gathering, and blinked at Souta in surprise. Recovering quickly, he bowed to the room with a yawn of equal depth as Kohaku peered around him in more open curiosity. "Good morning, all. I haven't missed anything, have I?"

When the monk had been corrected at considerable length, more introductions made and Kagome's desire to go to bed now reiterated, the room was finally cleared. Kohaku and Sango promised to wake them at lunch, then left to confer with Miroku.

Kikyou said something to Inuyasha in an undertone; he nodded tersely and started to follow her from the room. He paused just long enough to look back at Kagome, who also paused in speaking to her brother to smile and nod at him.

Mind churning, Inuyasha nodded back shortly and took a step, very nearly tripping over Shippou as the kit hovered near the shoji. "What the hell…?" He plucked him off the ground by the tail, bringing him up to eye level; when this failed to elicit the usual complaints and protests, Inuyasha looked more carefully at Kagome and Souta, then Shippou's forlorn expression, and had a very rare attack of insight. Stupid brat. Inuyasha snorted, raising his voice carelessly. "Oi, Kagome."

"Huh?" Kagome glanced up and yelped, just barely catching the kitsune as he was tossed into her lap. "Inuyasha! Be more careful, you jerk!" She scooped Shippou up more carefully, settling him in her lap and favoring Inuyasha with a scowl. "Are you okay, Shippou-chan?"

"Uh huh." The tiny demon looked at her closely, almost fearfully, and she hastened to reassure him with a smile and a brief hug. Satisfied, he turned and made an elaborate face at Inuyasha, who cracked his knuckles again at him.

Kagome rubbed her forehead wearily. Don't make me point out that Shimoko's rubbing off on you, Inu-kins… "That's good. Let's get to sleep, then, before I pass out."

From his vantage point in Sango's futon, Souta glanced back and forth between his sister, the scowling half-breed, and the fox-footed little boy thumbing his nose from the safety of the bed. He was definitely missing something here, though he did not miss the way Inuyasha eyed his sister as Shippou obediently curled up and Kagome dropped her scowl, smiling gratefully at him instead and nodding to indicate he could leave now.

That part kind of made sense to Souta, though, as he recalled how he'd found them about an hour ago. He was only eleven, but one didn't live with two older brothers and Akemi his whole life without picking some things up, after all.

"I didn't even think about Shippou-chan," Kagome whispered a moment later over the kit's snoring, almost to herself. She sighed, draping her arm across her eyes in obvious chagrin. "I owe Inuyasha one for that."

"What was wrong with him?" Souta wanted to know, smothering a yawn. It almost seemed like a waste to sleep with all these weird new people and actual demons around, but he was suddenly exhausted.

"Slight case of jealousy, I think. I've been spoiling him like crazy, and he didn't know what to think of you. Funny, Inuyasha actually picked up on it…" She also yawned. "Trust him to fix it by acting like a jerk." Why couldn't I have fallen for a sweet, sensitive guy who shows it by not being passive-aggressive?

Souta yawned right back. "He seems weird. If he's half demon and he has all those claws and everything, why do you get to boss him around like that?" It was almost disappointing, after the way their dad had described Inuyasha: any monster that not only didn't eat people but got verbally assaulted by girls, let them take naps and extinguished the torch on his way out was clearly not a monster, no matter how cool he looked.

"Because he's a really nice guy, once you dig past all the defense mechanisms and big teeth and cussing." Kagome chuckled evilly. "It helps to know his weaknesses, too." I completely forgot that he's ticklish, for example. Hmmmmm…

The conversation almost ended there. Something else struck Souta just as he was starting to drift off, unfortunately: "Isn't Inuyasha the one you're supposed to marry?"

Kagome's leg jerked under the light sheet, mind rousing itself instantly. "How did…oh. The cell phone, right?" She could probably blame Kouga for that. The wolf demon was the only one with access to her father's cell phone who knew everything and would bother to tell Yoshio, unless, say, Shimoko was going behind her back. Kagome had only given her father the most basic outline of her being alive, when the curse was likely to end, what not to do in the meantime, etc., and no little details like marriage or potential mass slaughter.

"Yeah, Dad said he talked to your fiancé for a while, and he was really happy," Souta said absently, unaware that Kagome's eyes had opened and were now approximately the size of CDs. "He forgot the guy's name, but he said that he sounded rich and he was gonna make the beast leave you alone."

"Well, it's…kinda complicated, but I'm not marrying anyone." Kagome fiddled with the sheet as her ears took their time passing information along to her brain, which slowly but surely grasped the terms fiancé and beast as separate concepts and, also slowly but no less surely, began to implode.

Souta was only human, and so it wasn't his fault that the sound of Kagome's blood pressure skyrocketing evaded his notice as he continued thoughtfully. "But if he said that about the beast, he probably meant Inuyasha, right? So the fiancé wasn't Inuyasha. But who else would be able to callDad on a cell? It's not like anyone here has their own magic phone. And it's not like anyone here is delusional enough to say he's your fiancé when he's not, right?"

He sealed his eardrums' fates with an even more thoughtful pause. "…I still don't get it. If you're not marrying Inuyasha, but he's the one you were making out with, then who—"

"KOUGA!"

Inuyasha nodded slowly, eyes drifting away from Kikyou's. "I'll be damned. I didn't think I could actually do it." There was no relief in knowing that his plan had ceased to be a desperate hope and was now a certainty, guaranteeing the lives of everyone in the castle in exchange for his. At least Kagome won't be in any danger… That did ease the knot in his stomach, he found, so long as he didn't think about several other factors involving Kagome.

"You may, once all your business here has been concluded." The priestess leaned in ever so slightly. A slender sunbeam opened on the floor as the sun edged from around the heavy clouds outside, highlighting her translucent hand. "Though, in all honesty, you may wish to reconsider."

"Reconsider?" That one caught him completely off guard, just when he thought he'd at least had something clearly defined. "As in…?"

Kikyou didn't move, but the air seemed to cool, and the shorter hairs on the back of his neck bristled at the force behind her words. "In light of certain events, particularly the past two nights and this morning, I thought perhaps you would be reluctant to…that is, sometimes, Inuyasha, the most noble path is not necessarily the wisest, not when a more simple answer has been within reach the whole time."

His heart rose into his throat. Was she suggesting he—

"You seem speechless." As always, whenever Kikyou pointed out the obvious, it sounded more meaningful than stupid. He usually failed to get the point, but – whether from the emotional overload he'd experienced lately or just through lucky guessing – he could detect quite a few implications this time. "As well you should be. Tell me, have you ever seriously considered what possibilities might arise should Kagome accept you?"

Inuyasha surreptitiously jabbed the heels of his hands with his claws to make sure he was really awake. "I…"

"KOUGA!"

Kagome's bellow hurt his ears from three floors and more than half the castle's breadth away. Kikyou wisely made no attempt to continue their discussion, electing to vacate the room while Inuyasha staggered to his feet, head ringing. When the echoes died away, he waited all of three seconds to calm down before willing himself down to the source of the noise, hoping fervently that it wouldn't be repeated just as he arrived.

His wish was granted, and then some. When he stomped into her room, he found Shippou curled up on the bed, clasping his own pointed ears, and Souta on the floor, looking bewildered. A cloud of pure rage burning his nostrils was the only trace of Kagome's presence left, though it was fresh within the minute.

"All I did was tell her about the guy who told Dad he was her fiancé," Souta said meekly.

Inuyasha tried to tone down his glare. The kid smelled faintly of fear, but it was already fading into sheepishness, which suggested it was of her and not the hanyou. "What—oh, you mean Kouga?" Despite himself, Inuyasha snorted, and some of his irritation faded in malicious amusement as the pieces fell into place. "And now she knows about it, eh?"

To their surprise, Inuyasha turned on his heel and slammed the shoji open. "C'mon, you two. It's about time she found out about it, and hell if I'm gonna miss this!" He nodded impatiently at a cleaning woman. "You. Guess what I'm about to ask?"

"She went that way, Inuyasha-sama." Though the servants who stood nearby were nearly dying of curiosity, they kept their mouths shut as Inuyasha swept past them towards the main entrance, smirking savagely. But when Souta emerged after the kitsune and ran with him down the hall, it was just too much: the women literally dropped what they were doing and scattered to seek out whoever came to mind and tell her the news. Word of Inuyasha-sama's indiscretion this morning – overheard by a maid coming back from the privy – had barely been spread to half the castle as it was, and there was a great deal of catching up to do already.

Meanwhile, Kagome, mental powers restored 110 percent by sheer temper, managed to unconsciously do several things she wouldn't have normally even considered to be within her ability: as she stalked through the halls, her mind ranged outward, seeking the wolf lord within the castle, and located the familiar prickle approaching the main steps. She made a few swift turns, deftly avoided curious servants in her way, put on a burst of speed, and almost walked straight into the closed doors. A muttered curse about the door's parentage and intelligence, and she was outside, too incensed to even think of her shoes or state of dress. If he does not have a bloody perfect explanation, I'm going to tell Inuyasha…no, I'll tell Sesshoumaru that Kouga said their father was just a big, fluffy bunny demon in disguise, and watch him tear him three new ones!

Kouga stopped what he was doing at the bottom of the steps, eyebrows raised appreciatively as Kagome darted into sight, vaulted onto the rail, and nearly flew down to meet him, hopping off and all but withering grass under her bare feet. The wind was at his back, and the wolf was so pleased with himself that the flames crackling around her aura didn't even register. "Good morning, dearest Kagome. You're up early."

There was no reply, unless one could count seething as an answer, but Kouga was too busy bowing, smiling, and enjoying the half-dressed sight of her to feel the daggers her eyes were launching directly at his skull. "I was just about to send for you—Ginta finally delivered that thing you wanted."

Kagome did not care what Ginta had delivered, and began gathering the appropriate swear words in the proper order to tell him so, not to mention considerable reserves of oxygen—and he stepped aside with a flourish the moment her mouth opened. "Here it is! Whaddya think?"

"What do I think? I think…it's…a bike! You…got me a…stupid…bike!" This was awkward: her anger hadn't gone anywhere, but excitement at seeing a shiny, gleaming ten-speed right behind him promptly popped up, and as much as she'd just wanted to hit him, Kagome would've liked to squeal and thank him. Then she wanted to hit him again. Then she wanted to hit him as she thanked him, and her mouth couldn't quite work around the conflict. "It's…so…I can't believe you…but…!"

"Ah, well, you know…" Kouga made a display of proper humility, rubbing the back of his neck and shrugging with a half-grin. "It's not much, but I hope you like it."

Inuyasha emerged to a much different scene than what he'd gleefully envisioned. Instead of dismembering Kouga, Kagome appeared to be thanking him and examining a bizarrely shaped metal object as the wolf tried to act modest and ogled her while her back was turned. What the fuck does she look so happy about? If her eyes were twitching at odd intervals and she went from smiling to gritting her teeth every few words, neither male noticed as Inuyasha deliberately began to make his way down.

Kagome mastered her enthusiasm for the unexpected present, summoning all her ire as Kouga drifted a little too close. "Now, look, Kouga-kun, I need to talk to you, and I'm serious. My brother just came here, and he says you told my dad—"

"Ah, not now, Kagome. I promised Ginta and Hakkaku I'd get right back to 'em. I'll see you later, though." He patted her cheek genially and was gone in a small cloud of dust before she could blink.

Souta missed most of the exchange, and it was with great bewilderment that he and Shippou came out to witness the end of a fairly intense intellectual exchange between Kagome and Inuyasha, the main thrust of which seemed to be which of them was the bigger idiot.

"Did you think I wouldn't want to know about this before? Why didn't you tell me? I kind of thought you were on my side here!"

"What the hell are you bitching at me for? I'm not gonna run and tattle every time he does something stupid—"

"Lemme guess," Souta muttered around a yawn. "Is this a regular—"

"Uh huh," Shippou said flatly.

"And if it pissed you off so much, why'd he get off so easy? You came all the way out here almost naked just to stare at that weird metal—what the hell is it, anyway?"

"It's a bike, and I'm not…almost…shit." Kagome belatedly gave herself a once-over and realized he not only had a point, but she smelled like a locker room. Her wrists were still conspicuously bare, too, though that lack of covering rather paled next to the dearth of fabric over the rest of her. It was one thing to be minimally dressed in her own bed, in the dark, and another to be standing around outside and have Inuyasha point it out with his usual tact. Not like most of the sweat stains weren't his fault, either…

Great. There went her face, and his, too, after a few seconds. Now that we've gotten our yearly recommended dose of Awkward out of the way… "Forget it. I'm going to sleep now." Kagome willed the last shreds of her dignity back into place and turned on her bare heel, accidentally stepping on a squishy bug in the process. "At least Souta won't—"

"Hey, Sis, where you going?" Almost right on cue, her brother came whooshing down the rail, landing rather decently in that he didn't break anything. "Who was that guy? And where'd the bike come from? …Say, now we're all here, can I get that tour you were talking about? I'm not tired any more. Please?"

Being younger but wiser, Shippou waited for the sounds of inarticulate snarling and the occasional hair-whitening obscenity to die out, and for Kagome to stomp up the stairs and slam her way back inside, and only then came down to speak very matter-of-factly. "You guys look freaked out. So, how about that tour?" He wasn't too thrilled about it himself, but it would be a good idea to keep these two away from her for a while…and not just for Kagome's sake, to judge from their expressions, which were somewhere between stomach-cramp discomfort and the feelings associated with watching someone poke you in the eye.

Luckily for all concerned, Kagome did have a long, refreshing nap despite the muggy warmth of her room and less-than-fresh sheets. She half-woke just before noon and dozed for a while, fuzzily contemplating Souta's presence, the resolution of her fight with Inuyasha, and the fact that, acting on the assumption that Inuyasha did not in fact think she was icky – bolstered somewhat by recalling his much-less-than-hesitant response – all her mind really felt like doing was replaying that kiss they'd started for a second there. All that mattered was that, in the world of Not Awake, her mind could and did run free, ignoring its own little voices about Kikyou and heat of the moment and whether other girls ever notice that a guy's breath technically doesn't really smell all that great and still want to make out anyway, or how I get his fangs to stop jabbing me, even if I don't actually dislike that in a weird kind of way.

…Along that line of rambling thought, where were her bracelets? Her ego deflated a little as it came to her that her hormones had probably already laid out the welcome mat. No wonder he'd been so willing to make up that way…aside from the obvious buildup of guilt, horror and relief that had made him seek her out in the first place, of course. Eh. I'm not a sex goddess, but I rarely get mistaken for barnyard animals, either. Comme ci, comme ca. No point stressing over what I can't change without about 3 million yen and five plastic surgeons.

Empowered by reaffirmation of her mediocrity, Kagome clipped on the choker and went about the business of digging through her sheets, pillows and under the bed in search of the bracelets. Nothing came up topside, but next to the sticky mess of sake near one bedpost, she did locate one silver band and her CD player.

"Nuts. No wonder it smells like a hotel in here…" The Discman reminded her of the song she'd had on Repeat for most of her gloom-time yesterday morning. Kagome set the anklet on the bed and shucked off her sweaty clothes, humming under her breath as she hesitated, then shrugged and got into new ones. She'd be better off saving a bath for nighttime, when she was less likely to have to take another immediately. Gotta get the covers washed, too. Poor Shippou can't enjoy having to share a sleeping spot with someone who wets the bed. The childish pun – better in English, a bit of a stretch in her mother tongue – amused her sleep-dulled mind just enough to distract it from the bracelets as she got up, chuckling at a random line: "I am drowning, help me to breathe…" Maybe I've been reading too much into the lyrics all these years, and whoever wrote it just didn't have A/C in their apartment.

Speaking of reading too much into things, it was time to find the boys. Now that she wasn't angry anymore, Kagome could vaguely remember doing something earlier that helped her find Kouga by "feeling" his youki; considering Inuyasha also had a bit of demon energy, she mused, maybe she could find him the same way. All she had to do was…uh…

Crap. She had no clue what she'd done. With a long-suffering sigh at herself, Kagome wound her fingertips in her long, sleeveless mint blouse's loose hem and forced her mind to behave. Assuming her lack of headache equated no Inuyasha in the vicinity, they were probably doing something outside still, which meant she just had to ignore a twinge of nostalgia, form the pool in her mind of, say, the outer courtyard, and…get nothing.

Nuts. Nostalgia was soon followed by irritation as Kagome tried different places in quick succession, unsuccessfully, and began to remember why she'd fallen out of the habit of doing this, aside from the fact that spending more time with Inuyasha had made it unnecessary for quite some time now. It'd be more practical to ask Shimoko to set up a spy satellite……what the…?

She had just tried the servants' quarters, but using the viewpoint from when she'd held the baby in the shade and had her back to the huts, facing the castle, had produced something downright startling. From a distance, she could see that Inuyasha, her brother, and the kitsune were near the side of the very back of the main building, looking at something in the hanyou's hands…but instead of the creepy empty space she remembered so clearly from real life, Kagome now saw them crouching in front of several tall bushes of some sort. The picture wavered as her resolve did, and she tried to hang on long enough to see why the purple blobs on the dark green looked so familiar—to no avail, as the vision abruptly flung itself out into nothingness and Kagome dropped to her knees with a yelp of surprised pain.

"Kagome-chan?"

"I got kicked out by my own powers," Kagome complained as Sango slid the shoji open.

The slayer blinked at her. "I was going to say, 'You're awake already,' but now I'm not quite so sure."

"Awake enough." Kagome exchanged smiles and bows with Miroku as he appeared behind Sango. "Morning, I think. Is lunch almost ready?"

"Soon enough, Kagome-sama. In the meantime, we—"

"Need to find Souta and drag his butt back in here. He's gotta be pooped by now, and he needs to eat." Spurred by a dose of nap-made energy, Kagome started to move past them.

Miroku's slight cough, the equivalent of a shout from another person, brought her back worriedly. "What? Did Inuyasha eat him and set up some kind of dummy to trick me? The servants think he's evil? What?"

"Ah…not quite, Kagome-chan. The servants seem to…well, to be blunt, they're more concerned with what his being here has to do with you," Sango said uneasily.

"Ahhhh. I…don't see." Kagome held up a hand as her friends exchanged uncomfortable glances. "Okay, okay. Let's go get the others in here, and you can tell me about it then. Come on."

"That may not be the wisest—"

Too late; she was already out in the hallway.

"She'll find out soon enough," the monk observed pragmatically, and was rewarded with an unpleasant look as they hurried after her.

He hadn't counted on how distracted Kagome was, though; they successfully reached a back exit, crossed several smaller courtyards and spotted Inuyasha et al without her noticing the difference in the maids' usual discreet glances and whispering. "Hey. What're you guys up to?"

Almost before the words had left her mouth, Inuyasha was up and backing away from her as something fell from his hands. "Where the fuck are your brace-things?"

"Oh. My bracelets? I couldn't find most of 'em." Kagome was too busy scanning the area to pay as much heed to the question as she probably should've. Where did the bushes go? There was only hard-packed dirt around them, no indication of any shrubbery or flowers…but as she stared, that creepy feeling rose to meet her again, and her feet backed away without consulting her brain. "Let's go inside now."

"Hold on, Kagome!" As the only one not thrown off by her appearance, it was Shippou who stopped her long enough to run back and scoop up the thing Inuyasha had dropped, leaping nimbly onto her shoulder and dropping it into her hands proudly. "It's you! See?"

Already moving again, Kagome glanced down and started. "Wha—how…?"

"Inuyasha said your dad dropped 'em when he was first here." The kit beamed, gratified by her stunned silence as she slowed and allowed Sango and Miroku to see the long row of old photos in their plastic sleeves. Her fingers unconsciously bracketed one of her when she was perhaps five years old, chocolate smeared on her face and dripping from her hair, and her mother smiling in exasperation at the camera as the little girl generously held out a sticky hand. I remember that. I asked her if she wanted to lick my hands off the way I licked the bowl when she was done baking. Ewwww.

"Hey, Sis…" Souta had quickly recovered from the shock of seeing his sister brush off Inuyasha's rudeness – she usually offered at least token resistance to Akemi and Nabiki, after all – and now came forward to tug at her shirt's hem. "You should've been here. He told us all this cool stuff, like how there's no outer wall 'cause his dad said they didn't need one, and the castle's not that big 'cause he didn't want one in the first place and it's easier to defend that way, plus there used to be rice fields out there and over there—"

Inuyasha trailed behind them, lost in thought. He wasn't bothered by the kid's rambling; what was more disturbing was the fact that, though answering thousands of pointless questions had helped to put Kikyou's words out of his head, her possible meaning had doubled back and ambushed him the moment he spotted the pictures on the ground.

Common sense had advised he leave the things there, since neither of the brats had noticed, but his curiosity had gotten the best of him as he spotted what had to have been Kagome's face in the jumble of faded images, forcing him to stroll over and pick them up, then listen to Souta as he recognized his family and immediately began to point everyone out. The presentation had felt almost voyeuristic to Inuyasha, not to mention unnatural, considering the baby in its mother's arms was now a half-grown boy sitting beside him, the pleasantly smiling mother had been dead for seven years, the snot-faced little girl was a woman ready to have children of her own…yet there they were, unaging, locked into reality by the strange, colorless protection of the "plastic" sleeves.

"A more simple answer has been within reach this whole time."

If she hadn't come right out and asked him about what might happen if Kagome accepted him, Inuyasha would have been able to convince himself she'd meant something else. Now…

Now he understood why his father had once remarked in his hearing that women were a greater threat to men's peace of mind than false friends, war, or impotence, all together.

Inuyasha had finally ironed out the last details of his plan, ensuring that he would be able to eliminate himself without repercussion to the rest of the castle – once the kugutsu had been found and destroyed, of course – and restored some tiny measure of control over the situation; if Kikyou had ever wanted to throw him off by insinuating that he should try considering his nightly question as more than an embarrassing ritual, she had always had plenty of opportunity to do so. Why urge him to think of marrying Kagome now, right as they'd made up and his mind was too busy connecting her unguarded scent and the talk of family and the distinct probability of her making a good mother to shut itself up as usual?

There was really only one thing to blame for it: his nose. Inuyasha had never had a problem ignoring his instincts when Kikyou was alive, largely because she had always been careful to dose herself in plenty of time and no other woman's smell had even remotely interested him. True, his eyes misbehaved once in a while…not to mention his hands, more rarely, and his arms, and he wouldn't even think of his mouth, but at least they never—

"Oh!" Kagome's gasp brought him out of his haze of confused resentment and into the present, where she had dropped to her knees and was holding a hand out to her huge cat. "Buyo, what did you do?"

The calico gave a noncommittal meow and shifted his bulk around, freeing a smaller form trapped under his front paws. Inuyasha's first thought echoed hers, that he'd caught one of the kittens and killed it—till a little head poked up from almost underneath the folds of splotched fat, and another, and the first kitten mewed sleepily.

"I suppose he's better than nothing," Sango remarked as Buyo yawned, grumpily climbing to his feet and displacing a fourth kitten. The calico toddled out of his way, nearly tripping him as he tried to take a step and found himself flanked by the tabbies.

Partly to give the older cat some relief, and partly because Kagome immediately scooped the calico up and refused to set her down, they returned to the room with much lighter spirits and four bundles of fur, one in each human's hands. Souta nearly dropped the tortoiseshell as he halted on the threshold, observing the room in full light for the first time. "So that's what happened to our stuff!" He gaped at the metal pads. "How come I didn't see those before?"

"Maybe because it was dark before and you were freaked out?" Kagome seated herself on the bed and set the calico on her lap, beckoning Sango and Miroku to do the same with the tabbies. Souta put the last on the bed and made a beeline for the PlayStation. "Nuh-uh, not yet. You can play it later if you want, but not with these guys right here. It's too loud." She stroked the calico briefly and began to re-herd them back onto her lap.

"What about me?" Inuyasha seated himself as far from her as the room would permit, not expecting an answer and too conscious of her to care. "Hurry up and do something about the smell."

Kagome unhooked tiny claws from her blouse for the fifteenth time, instantly aware of his meaning. "Souta, do me a favor and find my bracelets. Two gold and two silver ones. They're around here somewhere."

"I'm not your slave," he retorted, though Sango was secretly amused to see that, like Inuyasha had earlier, he obliged promptly. "You've got a lot of junk under here…I see a gold one…" A toss, and Kagome managed to catch it on her foot by sheer luck. Miroku and Shippou made a show of elaborate respect, and she bowed as well as she could around an ongoing kitten roundup. "Whoa! Where'd you get this, Sis?" Souta emerged with a plastic bag, digging through it frantically. "Did Inuyasha make this, too?"

"No, his niece bought it for us. Even if he knew how, why would Inuyasha waste his time making manga?" Kagome leaned over as Souta began to empty the bag, which she had only had time to glance through. "Most of it's for me, but I asked her to get you Hagaren and that stupid ninja one."

"Hey, don't call Naruto stupid!" Souta threw aside the One Piece, Furuba and anthology magazines, sitting back to gaze raptly at the cover in his hands. "Wow, I don't even recognize this guy. You think the niece lady could get all the ones I missed?"

"That manga goes through characters like tissues, remember? Except Kleenex is more fun to read about," Kagome said absently, persuading the calico and orange tabby to stop attempting escape. She really had nothing against her brother's favorite series, but because it was his favorite, she was obligated to tease him about it, the same way he mocked her for drooling over boys prettier than she was who technically did not exist.

"Smell," Inuyasha mumbled pointedly from the corner.

Kagome sighed and set the kittens on her pillow. "Right, right. Slave…I mean, Souta—"

Kohaku soon arrived with a huge lunch; the room wasn't too badly crowded, particularly with Inuyasha sitting so far out of the way, even when Kagome insisted upon keeping the kittens with them. Neither of the missing bracelets had turned up, and he was getting grumpier and grumpier the longer he had to sit there and smell and not look at her.

"Why don't you go make a surprise inspection of the kitchens, Inuyasha?" Miroku finally suggested, polite as ever but with an acidic edge. "If they've truly been using the rice barrels as privies, as you keep suggesting, perhaps you should look into it."

"Keh." Glad for the excuse, Inuyasha rose and folded his arms. "Good idea. Too many people in here anyway. I'm goin' out for some air."

"Take these guys with you," Kagome said on impulse, carefully gathering all four snoozing fluffballs in her lap and lifting the corners to make a loose basket. They moved aside to let her pass as she stood, moved to the shoji, and turned to lift an eyebrow at Inuyasha. "On second thought, I'd better do it."

What happened next would always remain lodged in Inuyasha's memory, in the unique and curiously relentless way humiliation is etched into the brain for the rest of one's life: in a moment of weakness, as he scowled back at her, it came to him that she looked rather cute, almost ridiculously so, with the kittens, her arch expression, scent and all. And it came to him that the way she delicately nudged the shoji open with her foot forced her to twist in such a manner as to emphasize the mass against her stomach, making her look for a moment as if she had either put on far too much weight or been knocked up. He snorted very quietly. Cute. Right.

She chose that exact moment to glance at him again and smile.

Without asking him for permission, Inuyasha's body drew several unfounded conclusions responded in a swift, decisive, and horribly unmistakable manner. Mercifully, she had already turned to ease herself and her suggestive burden through the shoji, and he couldn't be sure if she'd noticed or not.

A few seconds, frozen, and he allowed himself to slip out, expression betraying nothing till he had closed the shoji. Then he transported himself outside, found the nearest post with no servants nearby, and very calmly began beating his head on it.

Back in the room, silence reigned briefly. Souta spoke: "So, Sis, and Inuyasha…are they…?"

"Yes."

"No."

"Are they what?"

Souta blinked at Miroku, Sango, and Shippou in turn, glancing at Kohaku for good measure and receiving a blank stare. "Well, I—"

Kagome's return shut him up effectively. She sat down gracefully, fanning herself, ignoring them all. "So, Souta, you want to go back now, or should we wait till tomorrow?"

"Go back?" he protested. "Why?"

"One, so Dad doesn't think you got eaten…"

"Kouga has a talking thingy he could use to tell him, doesn't he?" Shippou asked.

Twitch. "Two, there's no room…"

"Actually, Kagome-sama, the castle was designed to accommodate four times more people in the servants' quarters alone than our current capacity."

"…Three, the curse might get weirded out, if it hasn't already…"

"But it let him in with no trouble, Kagome-chan, and Kikyou-sama didn't say he needed to be removed, did she?"

"And four, there's nothing for you to do here for another four weeks. You're gonna be bored spitless."

"He hasn't seen the river yet," Shippou volunteered. "Or the treehouse, or the treasure or war rooms, or DDR, or—"

"Five! It's not friggin' safe here, okay?" Kagome addressed Souta directly. "Something's been trying to either kill or screw with us for a while now, and it might go after you, too. You even said something was following you this morning, right?"

"If it wanted to kill me, it coulda done it then," the boy said reasonably. "'Sides, Inuyasha's kinda weird, but not bad weird. If I have to pick between him and Dad watching out for me, I'll go with the guy with the big teeth."

Kagome let herself flop back on the bed dramatically. "Fine. You can stay till tomorrow. But then we're gonna call Dad and tell him, all right?" Souta cheered, as did Shippou, and Kagome sighed at the knowledge that, provided as he was with new people, his sister and fresh Naruto, he was likely not going back home till she did. Can't say I blame him. Still, it's one more thing to worry about. …I wonder if that was just my imagination…? She squeezed her eyes shut. Ugh. Time to surround myself with more reliably weird guys. "Pass me some Furuba, would you?"

"If you want to destroy the castle so much, you could always take a good look at the things on the ends of your hands, oji-chan."

"Shut up," Inuyasha snapped without looking behind him, forehead still resting against the post. Trust Shimoko to come back early and uninvited and now. "What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were gonna do that test thing first."

"Yes, but to be frank, I'm bored." The flippancy dropped from her tone. "You're lucky I did. It was pure luck I found these before a servant did and began asking embarrassing questions."

Inuyasha turned and started. "What the…?" Shimoko was holding up the missing gold bracelet in her left hand, the silver in the right. "What the hell are you doing! She needs those, dammit!"

"I'll pretend you didn't insinuate that I'd have any reason to steal them after I not only gave them to her, but paid two years' salary to have them ready in time for her next cycle," she said tightly, and he ducked his head. "They were sitting near the main stairs, actually. Someone had placed them atop each other and written something in the dirt. You could go see, or I could just tell you, or ask whether the word 'unnecessary' has any significance."

"'Unnecessary'? What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Mindful that she was still angry, Inuyasha took the bracelets back with some semblance of humility, scowling at them as though they might know. "Thanks anyway."

"It was nothing." Shimoko bowed shortly. "I must be going, but my real reason for coming was purely philanthropic."

Inuyasha didn't like the sound of that. "…Yeah?"

"Yep. As soon as I'm done discussing the test results with Shiro, I'd like to have a little get-together here. Some sake, a couple of modern foods, maybe some music, just to cheer you up because I love you so much, oji-chan." She smiled blandly.

Inuyasha really didn't like the sound of that. "What'd I do?"

"You reminded me that I have maybe thirty days now in which to torture you before you either die or become free to try to escape me. Not that you'll be able to, but one thing at a time, I always say." She cracked her knuckles. "I'm fairly serious. You have no idea how long it's been since I've found fresh meat for karaoke, and being near-immortal gets really boring sometimes—and I'm not even two hundred."

"Karaoke?" he repeated suspiciously.

"You'll find out soon enough, oji-chan." The usual turn and saunter off…was she leaving? Inuyasha tried not to get his hopes up. Sure enough, Shimoko paused and gazed at him critically. "In the meantime, I can see you won't be needing any of that medication I was thinking of. I'd recommend a good course of ice water instead. I'm sure Kagome is relieved to know you're happy to see her, but—"

He hurled the bracelets at her head, but she was gone too fast.

A/N: Another chapter I'm cutting short because it's too damn long otherwise, and because I said so. For the record, Furuba is the popular Japanese shortening of the lovely shoujo series "Fruits Basket," whilst "Hagaren" is short for "Hagane no Renkinjutsushi"…if you don't know that one, I might give in and say so next time, which will be only three or four days at most, considering a good chunk of it's already written. (Assuming anyone cares. I'm just slightly bored and sleep-deprived.) Don't worry, this is all going somewhere, I promise…