Heart Broken Arrows

Chapter 10

Disclaimer: Not mine; it belongs to Rumiko Takahashi…I don't make a profit from it.

Rating: M for language, gore, adult themes, and violence.

Thanks: This chapter (one of my longest yet) is for Cold Kikyo for her awesome, encouraging reviews.

Notes: I don't know if what happened to Kagome's father is ever discussed, but for the sake of this story, he's dead. No, this piece of info is not anything like a spoiler; it has no bearing on the overall story, other than a few sentences below.Also, I've deviated with kagura stuff...I think...er, you'll see...

ENJOY!

and as always...please, oh please, review.

I like input, give me suggestions, constructive criticisms, etc..

Last Time:

"Yes...Kagome! You ugly idiot. Now do someth-"A great convulsion ran up and down the length of Kagura's body, causing her mouth to snap shut on her words. Kouga watched in alarm as the witch began choking on her on tongue. Making a quick decision, he bent down and grasped the shaft of the arrow, but a purple barrier repelled his hand. Abandoning that course of action, he lifted the witch off the blood-stained ground and hurried her back to the pack. They had healers, but he wasn't sure if they would be willing (or even able) to help her. Getting information was one thing, but bringing a wolf murderess into the 'den' was another thing entirely.

As Kouga sped back towards his wolves, he wondered at just why and how Kagome had inflicted such terrible suffering even upon someone as twisted as the woman he held in his arms.

Present:

This time Kagome's dream was different. She was in a dark, black room. It felt small and contained and yet the blackness seemed to stretch out forever, not stopping at any wall or ceiling that she could see. The place she was in could be infinitely wide and impossibly tall. Only a single shaft of light fell on her from directly above. She was afraid to move from it, afraid to leave the safety of the light and go into the darkness beyond. Kagome called out into the empty space, knowing already that she would receive no answer, "Inu-yasha?"

"Fool," came a voice from the abyss, and Kagome knew without a doubt whom it belonged to. Right in front of her, Kikyo appeared and stepped just barely into the light, leaving her eyes shadowed and covered by the dark. The priestess spoke again, "You are a fool. Inuyasha is not here. No one is here…except you."

"You are here," stated Kagome, trying to keep her voice from trembling.

"I am not," the priestess replied back. Suddenly, a terrible realization came to Kagome. "Am I dead!" she asked in alarm. The priestess laughed dryly, bitterly, the sound like dead leaves whipping through tree tops. "You are not." She sounded like she wished Kagome was however.

"Do you wish to know why you are here?"

Kagome's heart began thumping painfully in her chest. "Yes," she whispered. She couldn't seem to remember...

Kikyo sneered at her, conveying all her disdain in the curl of her lips. She stepped closer to Kagome, and the light revealed the tears that were silently running down Kikyo's face. Kagome gasped and without thinking, raised her hand to touch the cold miko's cheek. Kikyo jerked back and hissed out her words, "You are here because you failed. I have won." There was regret in the priestess's words. "I won."

Those words chilled Kagome to her very core.

Kouga raced through the trees, approaching his pack at breakneck speed. He whipped his head back, and uttered a howl of warning. Kagura writhed in his arms, gasping for breath. Kouga moved faster, all thoughts of enemy and friend and the boundaries between gone. No one should die so horribly. The wind witch coughed up blood against his chest, and then uttered almost unintelligible words. Kouga bent his head down trying to catch what she was saying.

"….maru…" The witch began coughing harder, "Sess…." Kouga realized the witch's intent. Inuyasha older brother, whose lands they were passing through, had a sword if he recalled correctly, a sword of healing. He howled out another update to his pack, and veered to the right, feeling warm winds push him onward. The speed that he was now traveling at was incredible; the trees and bushes around him blurred into one long green line, and he barely felt the branches and twigs that snapped against his legs. Kouga felt his beast stir within, and he uttered another howl, this one without words behind it. It was a howl of freedom, a feeling of life and power; he was running with the wind!

The Lord of the West motioned for his young ward to get behind him, as his servant Jaken ran up to him, positively quivering with fear. "My Lord, a demon approaches!" he said, stating the obvious. If there was one thing that jaken did the best, besides groveling, it would be stating the obvious. Green drops of sweat rolled off the toad's forehead, and Sesshomaru turned away slightly, arching one eyebrow in displeasure. He scented the wind that was now gusting through the trees. Naraku…the stench of Naraku approached, not the true Naraku, but one of his incarnations, and it appeared to be poisoned. This would be interesting. He placed his hand upon the hilt of Toukijin, and waited.
Kagome waited in her pool of light for Kikyo to explain what she meant. How had she, Kikyo, won? Won what? Nothing made sense anymore...Kagome shook her head; her dark locks falling forward to hide her own eyes from the undead priestess.

What had she lost? She frantically searched her memories, but they were covered, somehow blocked from her; they were like dark, formless shadows in her mind. Kagome grew even more afraid as even the shadows began leaving.Kagome felt the Kikyo move closer to her, until the cool breath of the priestess caressed her cheek.

"You lost...everything."

A purple light flared up between them, and suddenly, image upon image crashed through Kagome's mind, filling her emptiness, causing her to fall down upon the ground. She saw everything in a haze of bloody purple light. Inuyasha and Kikyo, the deaths of Kirara, Sango, Miroku, and Shippo, Kaede's gruesome end, all because of...because ofher, she had betrayed them to Naraku.She saw the innocent villagers that she killed, her destruction and her evil.The dead bodies of her friends rose up in her mind, pointing at her, sightless eyes accusing her...Kagome pressed her hands over eyes, as if trying to block out the images within her, but it didn't work. She uttered a deep, agonizing, soul-wrenching cry, and curled into a tiny ball. The pain of her failure was so very intense.

"It hurts!" she cried out.

"Yes," Kikyo replied softly,"yes it does." The undead miko watched as the light above the young girl dimmed, until only a tiny fragment remained. Kikyo knew that this soon would extinguish until only the darkness was left for the girl named Kagome. She backed away silently, watching as the last of the implanted memories entered the girl very much like way the stolen souls entered her own body. Kikyo then began to complete the final portion of the spell, and with a few unspoken words, she took the new shadows that flitted about Kagome like an angry nest of bees. Kagome's memories. She brushed off the magic on them, and they turned into what looked like pieces of a broken sunset, some crimson, some golden, some deep, midnight blue.

Kikyo opened the palm of her left hand and willed them to her. She looked at the pieces of Kagome's memory in her grasp. One midnight blue one showed a younger Kagome in a strange room, next to a man with several odd looking tentacles sticking out. His black hair and facial features give him away as Kagome's father. She watched as the soul light within him left, causing odd looking boxes in the room to emit strange beeps and whistles. The young Kagome put her head down upon the man's chest and cried.

Kikyo next looked at a golden memory. It held all of her companions in it, and they were simply sitting around a campfire, talking and laughing. Kikyo felt regret well up within her, but she pushed it back down. The young girl would never have beaten Naraku. She would never had succeeded if this was how easily she fell to her magic. Kikyo closed her eyes, willing herself back into her own body at Naraku's palace. She now had what she needed to accomplish her task.

As the priestess faded away, she didn't notice one small fragment of white light that lay hidden behind the shivering body of Kagome. It lay dormant as the priestess pulled its fellows away, and then in the instant the priestess was distracted by what she held in her hand, it darted up, up, up into sliver of light that remained.

Kikyo opened her eyes slowly and unclenched the fingers on her hand. The memories she held between had all been squeezed into one single, longpiece of glowing, shimmering light. She walked over to a shelf with several vases on it, and carefully lowered the light into an obsidian colored vase.

"So that is what memories look like?" The voice of Naraku intruded upon her, momentarily breaking her concentration. A piece at the end of the strand broke off and began to dart away. Kikyo grabbed at it ungracefully, and shoved it back into the vase with its fellows. She heard Naraku chuckle behind her, and she grew angry. Kikyo placed a barrier around the vase, and watched as the strand inside shattered and the pieces of Kagome's memory again took on the likeness of angry bees as they flew against the barrier, causing it to crackle and sizzle.A red one buzzed angrily at her; within it, she saw Inuyasha yelling at the girl Kagome. Kikyo closed her eyes to break away from its lure.

"What do you want?" she asked once free from the memory.

"I presume the final portion of the spell was successful."

"Yes." Kikyo turned to leave the room; she didn't want to see the vile being pour through the young girl's memories.

"Where is Kagura?" Kikyo stopped in her departure and felt a moment's surprise at his question. Naraku didn't know? It was unlike the him not to know the details of a battle; he liked to watch, liked to gloat when his plans went accordingly. If Naraku had not known, it meant he had been doing something else that he considered more important. Perhaps it had something to do with his growing strength...maybe he had met with someone.

Pushing her thoughts to the side, Kikyo suddenly felt real satisfaction at being able to supply him with an answer.

"The wind witch is dead, or dying. She was shot with a dark miko's poison arrow. She will not survive." Kikyo smiled with her back still facing him, she didn't have to look at him to feel Naraku's irritation. Having the wind demoness dead was an unexpected bonus to the day's work, and an unexpected blow to Naraku. Kikyo left the room feeling very satisfied.

Inuyasha held Kagome's body close, pratically flying back to Kaede's hut. "Find Kaede!" he roared over his shoulder, praying that old priestess would not be too far away. He sighed in relief as he saw that the sturdy hut was still standing. He entered quickly and lowered Kagome down upon the blankets, tenderly brushing the hair out of her closed eyes. He dragged some furs from the corner of the room and piled them upon her, but Kagome continued to shiver. Her face was pale and drawn, and as he watched a blue tinge appeared on the corner of her lips.

"Where are they?" he whispered, feeling very much a weak half-demon. Shippoburst into the room behind him.

"She's dead!" he yelled. Inuyasha sighed in exasperation. "No Shippo. Kagome's not-"

"Not Kagome. Kaede! Kaede's dead!" Inuyasha whirled to look at thefox kit whose eyes were wide with fear and sadness. "Kaede's dead." He said again as those were the only words left to him. Behind Shippo, Sango, Miroku, anda tiny Kirara entered the hut. The truth was written plainly upon alltheir faces.

Kagome's voice broke the silence left by Shippo's announcement. "It hurts!" she yelled. Inuyasha growled in helplessness. "What do we do?"

The silence that reigned was most telling.

No one had a clue.

Sesshomaru scented the wind again as the demon, or rather demons came nearer. It seemed that the wolf princeling was bringing the wind witch, and both were covered in her blood. It would not do for his ward to witness it.

"Rin, go pick some flowers for our guests." The human child beamed up at him, showing off her brand new missing teeth.

"Yes Lord Sesshomaru." She bobbed her head, grabbed at the nervous Jaken, and dragged him along behind her, the toad protesting the entire way.

Within moments of Rin disappearing behind a large boulder, the princeling arrived with his burden. He carefully lowered the wind witch to the ground and turned his intense blue eyes upon the golden ones of Sesshomaru.

Kouga looked at the ice brother of Inuyasha, feeling his hackles rise. The dog lord was just staring at him. Kouga knew what he was waiting for. He growled softly, but nevertheless bowed down on one knee, thanking the kami that mutt-face wasn't here to see this. Lord Sesshomaru acknowledged his status as alpha with a barely perceptable nod. Kouga rose swiftly; he could fight high and mighty Sesshomaru later, but right now, he needed answers. His Kagome was involved in this somehow and he needed to know why, as much as it galled him to admit, he needed the Lord of the West.
Sesshomaru approached the dying witch slowly, noticing the arrow sticking out of her thigh. He bent down and yanked it out, before Kouga could protest, dropping it up the grass as it slowly melted away.

"I tried that before, but there was a barrier, " Kouga fumed. Sesshomaru waited for the wind witch to open her eyes. Kagura did so, moaning in agony.

"You must die first," stated Sesshomaru. She nodded in understanding, and whispered, "Wait for the heartbeat." She knew Naraku and anticipated what he would do once he saw her in this state. It would be his final punishment for her failure. The witch closed her eyes again as she felt a weak flutter in her chest. Sesshomaru felt Tensaiga pulse and knew the witch could truly be revived, and so, once again faster than Kouga could stop him, he unseathed Toukijin and with a single stroke ended the wind witch's life.

Now! If you have read through this entire story...please oh please oh please, go back, pick your fave chapter and review!

I need some input! I am on my knees. Tell me what sucks or what works. Come on...it'll take you two seconds seriously.

Cold Kikyo is having to do all the work here folks!

Till then,

Aidyn