Author's Note: This will teach me to try and disobey Lord Sesshoumaru. If he wants his Rin back, no pining or burnt out-ness will keep him from her. To DPM, yes the chapters are named after flowers per your request. They are actually flowers used in an old system of code between lovers used in Victorian England. That should give you spoilers to the chapter should you want to research. Thank you for your kind words.

Chapter Two: Asphodel

Daigo Jomei never dreams. He lives in nightmares. Some of them are even when he sleeps. There is one nightmare that remains and keeps vigil in his mind. It was the night the bandits came, swooping down like carrion crows on his father's caravan: screeching just as terribly and attacking without mercy. The night of a full moon, Jomei remembered, and relived every night. It is the night his family died and left him an orphan.

It was night he had killed them.

His sister Rin was the first one he saw, cutting through the woods and stumbling over the path. She was playing with the stones on the path, making small piles that she used to practice her counting. He could hear his mother, Miwa, calling Rin back in and the youngest of their family- a screaming infant named Kaoru. Jomei heard his father humming some ridiculous song despite the worries that had plagued the family for days now.

The horse were quiet, eating dinner perhaps as the other hands of the caravan moved, jingled and hustled about winding down the day. He heard the silver buckles folded and stored in the night; heard the cracking of the wood in the fire and smelled the sizzling fish cooking. He heard his father call out for Miwa and Rin. Heard him ask about Jomei and Jomei smiled.

It was going to be all right after all. They were going to make it.

"Coming, Ienobu, coming!" Miwa called behind her, toddling up the hill to Rin while Kaoru squirmed in her arms. Three children had filled out the curves of his mother body, and the hard life of a Courier-Merchant's wife made her dark and wrinkled. Her hair was one long pool of black that trailed wild down her back and swished with her robes. She turned, calling back down the hill to her husband. Kaoru hollered and reached forward, taking fistfuls of his mother's hair and stuffing them into his mouth. Miwa laughed and tried to pull away. "Rin, come here! Help me prepare the beds!"

"One more!" Rin shouted back, giggling as she watched her little pile crumble. "I'm also to nine."

"Now Rin."

"Daddy!"

"Oh, Miwa, let her make one more pile."

Miwa frowned, and fussed, pushing Kaoru's hand down after his little fist met her nose. She turned back, frowning down the hill. "It's already dark, how will she make a good wife if she doesn't mind her parents?"

"She'll just have to stay with her papa then."

"Ienobu, don't give her ideas!"
Rin looked up then and saw Jomei. He smiled as he saw his sister's face brighten, pushing back hair and sweat. She smiled brightly at him and began to run. "Jomei! Daddy, Jomei's back!"

"Jomei, thank…" Miwa began as she stared at him. Her bright happy face turned pale and hallow as she stared pass Jomei. She was still several feet from Rin, as her mouth formed slow words that forever seared themselves into Jomei's heart. "Jomei, run!"

Jomei heard thunder or thought he did as he turned to discover it was the pounding hooves of a horse so huge and black it looked like night descending on him. He was so close to the horse by the time he turned, he could reach out and touch the beast. He felt the massive swing of a club coming down and cracking against his skull. He saw stars and then, as he tumbled down he could see Rin running sideways, off the path towards the woods instead of back to the Camp. He saw the massive black horse come on Miwa, swallowing up his mother and Kaoru.

Then, it went black.

Jomei jerked up from sleep and brushed the sweat from his brow. He had another headache brewing from behind the eyes. He could feel it. He winced as he held his hand to his eyes and willed his mind to be at ease. It was very early in the morning and the thieves he rode with were still asleep. Grunting, mindfully, Jomei pushed himself up and stretched. He looked at his comrades as they sleep with disdain and apathy. There was Jiro who played with axes, and there Hoshi who fancied himself a poet, there was Ume who once was a farmer till the Shogun took his lands and raped his wife. Each had a story that Jomei listened to time and again, when these self-styled 'warriors' had recounted them over drink and food. He hated them all. But he understood them.

In fact, there was only one person in this whole troupe that Jomei could think to love.

Heiji called Raptor was a thief, born of one and good at it. He was coarse and cruel but he had been the first thing Jomei saw waking up on that road where he'd been left for dead. Heiji had shown him the remains of the camp, shown Jomei Miwa's body cradling Kaoru in death. He saw his father thrown across the fire, arrows jutting from his chest like spikes in armor. Ienobu was in the front of the group, strewn over the other bodies. Jomei thought his father must have tried to save them all. Heiji took him to a small stain of blood not far from the beaten path that was smeared against a tree.

That's all there had been left of Rin.

Then, Heiji showed him a sword and taught him the art of revenge.

For that, Jomei loved him.

Jomei looked away to the ground and noticed there were footprints on the ground, at the foot of where he slept. Grabbing his sword, Jomei pulled it and searched the woods in the early morning light- ignoring the sounds of sleeping comrades and waking wildlife for anything out of the ordinary.

When Jomei first told Eari he thought someone was watching him, she had smiled at him and told him he had a sacred guardian. Jomei had laughed it off. He didn't believe in gods or Youkai anymore.

His father, Ienobu, had grown up in a Temple raised on stories of magic and wonder. Ienobu asked permission from the spirits of the Forests before crossing and would always leave meals and small trinkets on the path for Taiyoukai that may have watched them pass. He even told Jomei he had seen a true Taiyoukai once, pinned to a tree in a forest. Jomei, being nothing more then a child, had believed him fully and begged him to take him one day to Inuyasha's Forest. Ienobu had laughed and told him would.

Once, when Heiji had led them through the Western Lands, Jomei had gone to Inuyasha's forest, and had found the god-tree his father had spoken of. It had been that childish will that drove his actions. He wanted to see if what his father had whispered was true.

There was no demon pinned to the tree. Only a bald spot of stripped bark, and a hold from an arrow impaled there long ago.

It proved what Jomei had always known. For all Ienobu's grand words, Jomei knew the truth: there was no such thing as magic.

Eari could afford to be whimsical and innocent. The hardest trial of her life was choosing which robe to wear each morning. That's the reason Jomei found reasons to go to her village, and give her Master small gifts to remain in his good favor. He liked the way Eari blushed around him. How she whispered words into his ear as a friend first, and followed him with her eyes, wishing to become his lover.

And Jomei was proud of the simple fact he had never touched Eari in anything but friendship. Let the wars and the Sengoku Jidai made monsters of other men, Jomei was a thief but he was not a monster.

Not yet anyways.

Jomei reached behind his head and brushed the sweat from his neck. The pale morning had by now become a full sky of light blue and white powdery clouds. Heiji and the others would wake soon and they would continue on to Ume's farm, which was only half a day from Eari's village. Jomei still had the small silver and gold bells they had taken from the Turkish pilgrims a week ago. He'd give them to Eari's Master, and present her with the ivory comb.

Then, he could sit and light incense at her shrine and pray for his family.

If there's any gods to hear the prayers of a thief, Jomei thought idly.

"I hear them."

Jomei swung around, and fist flying blindly.

The woman who had spoken side stepped the punch as easily as a hawk would swoop down and devour a sparrow. She inclined her head and smiled. Jomei thought he heard whispering in his ears, in the woman's voice. Though her lips never moved, Jomei heard the voice crisply, speaking words of comfort he had not heard since he was a small child on Miwa's lap. She was a beautiful woman, older by many years but breath taking. Her lips were curled into a small, knowing smile.

And beside her, was a demon. Jomei knew this beyond all doubt and was surprised at how normal it sounded to him. His father's doing. The creature was tall, blinded in one eye and dark skinned, bronzed and copper colored unlike the humans Jomei had seen from his travels. He wore thick armor, and a whip around his neck like a brace. The way he followed Jomei with his eyes were familiar, as if he was accustomed to Jomei's movements by now. It made him very nervous.

"Who are you?" Jomei demanded.

The woman raised a finger to her lips to quiet him. Jomei immediately fell silent. "Don't wake the others," she advised. "I am the Lady Kannon."

"Kannon is a god." Jomei told her, reminding her perhaps.

Kannon seemed to smile and nodded. "I was Miwa's favorite, because she thought she could not have children. She took you to my temple on my feast days always, to bring me boons like you take Eari. She dedicated you to my cause."

"What cause is that?"

"Compassion."

Jomei glanced at Tama, swallowing nervously. Kannon laughed and motioned to her vulpine companion. "This is Lord Tama, of the Western Lands."

Jomei threw his eyes down and tried to sound more humble then he really was. He was only half-sure this was not some fevered dream brought on by his headaches or remains of the Sake from last night. "What business do a god and a Taiyoukai have with me? I am nothing. Just a lowly human…"

"You're right." Tama told him gently. "But you can be more."

Jomei dared to look him in the eye. The Kitsune knew him, Jomei understood but how. The stories of his childhood pained the Fox as tricksters and blood hungry for pure souls. Jomei could not claim such a distinction.

"You are more important then you think." Kannon told him. "Because of your sister."

"Rin is dead."

"That was remedied."

"I don't understand."

"The Lord of the Western Lands is a inu-youkai named Sesshoumaru. In his possession is a blade named Tenseiga." Kannon told him softly. "This sword has the power to rent a soul from the grasp of death. He used the blade to tear Rin from the underworld."

Jomei felt his legs give out from under him. Tama was there to catch him. Reaching out blindly, Jomei gripped Tama's arm and held it. His mind was swimming, as his headache swirled around him blinding his senses.

Rin alive.

In the grasp of a demon.

Jomei struggled with the words that came next. "…I don't understand…why Rin? What does he want with her? What did she do…why would he keep her from the peace of the afterlife? What does he desire?" He felt his eyes black from tears or pain, he could not tell. For a time, he was only certain of Tama holding him steady. "…Why?'

Tama's voice was in his ear. "I was Sesshoumaru's retainer, but even I do not understand. The Western Lord's mind has gone to madness."

Jomei had wished from time to time that his family was still alive. There had been times he would have given everything to hear Kaoru's screams, Miwa's demands, Ineobu's silly songs or Rin's endless chatter once more. Now, the idea of Rin, with her beautiful child face, alive and real so close to him made Jomei do something he had not done in years: hope. And the idea of some callous demon keeping her prisoner filled him with something he had become quite accustomed to in these years: hate.

"She is beyond your grasp for now." Kannon told him. "But Sesshoumaru isn't. He travels now to find Tama." Her voice became quiet, silky. "You could stop him. You can save your sister. If you wish…"

"Of course I do." Jomei practically shouted. "Just tell me what I have to do. I'll do anything. Just tell me."

"Wait for us." Kannon told him. "We will come again and prepare you." With that, she turned and disappeared into the forests, with Tama trailing at her back like a dog awaiting snacks.

Tama turned back and watched as Jomei slumped to his knees without his brace and sobbed quietly into his arms. Jomei probably didn't know if he should trust the specters that had just visited him but hope, especially to a human like Jomei who had nothing, it was a powerful motivator.

"Sesshoumaru could dispatch him with the flick of his wrist." Tama said softly, as he continued to watch Jomei break against emotion that he must have kept hidden till then.

Kannon didn't even slow in her step. "If he kills Jomei, Sesshoumaru will sever any link he has to Rin."

"And if he doesn't?" Tama asked, narrowing his eyes. "I still cannot see Compassion herself working to destroy the bond between them."

"Jomei's claim to Rin is more justified. Should Sesshoumaru spare Jomei's life they be reunited, Rin's place would be with her brother. Either way, Sesshoumaru loses Rin. That is enough to keep you content."

"And you? Would you be content, All-mother?"

Kannon paused for a long time. "I am Kannon. It is not in my nature to feel displeasure or pleasure from the affairs of Youkai or men." She seemed to be speaking inwardly. "It is not my place…not at all."