Author's Note: I'm sorry it took forever to get this chapter produced. Still, I hope you enjoy and expect more time as the winter break kicks in.

Chapter Five: Hemlock

It was getting harder to push back the Shadow. Kannon was sitting, quiet and unmoved on the bench, her eyes shut with her palms laid flat over her knees. Gone were the arraignments of her position and trappings of her position. She was thin, pale and the curtain of her black hair hung limp over her shoulders. The ladies of her court were sent away, kept where they could be safe until a time after this trial passed. Only one remained of their own free will, the most trusted of Kannon's ladies: the Celt.

She pushed pass the darkness, and squatted beside Kannon. Tenderly, she pulled the thick curtain of hair back behind her shoulder and slid her cool hand over Kannon's cheek and neck. The Goddess inhaled sharply, forcing her weak eyes open. She turned and stared for a moment, pass the girl before finally blinking out of her dream and smiling weakly.

"Kier." Kannon breathed, calling the Celt by name. "You tarry when I have ordered you gone."

Kier shrugged idly and continued to sooth Kannon's hair, and dry her sweat-soaked brow. "You are my world, milady. Would you have me abandon you?"

"I grow weak…" Kannon whispered softly. "I can barely keep this realm formed. What chance do you have against the Shadow should I weaken?"

"How can this be? What has happened that you should lose so much strength?"

"Rin." Kannon leaned into Kier's arms slowly and only for a moment. "She's invited despair into my domain. I can ward off despair and darkness easily, but the human heart can produce sorrow and evil that not even I can touch. It is this rage the Darkness feeds on."

"She's just a child." Kier mumbled. "How can she wield so much cruelty?"

"It is not cruelty at work here. But doubt, and pain, and fear. It eats at her, she loves deep, Kier and as such, she mourns just as strongly. And she does so rightly. I cannot take it away from her."

"What devours her then? What is it that attacks you so?"

"Human pain." Kannon doubled over, nails digging into her own side. "It is human pain that brings cruelty into the world. They hide from it, and curse it. Or they are turned dark by it and in turn spread their shadow to others. It makes them evil and hungry for company. It is this Shadow that devours the souls and creates Un-Mothers, and No-Man. I did not know." She whispered softly, her facing drawing and becoming haunted. "Had I known…but no. Not even he could have known…it is beyond our natures, our domains?"

"What?" Kier pushed closer. "My lady what did you not know?"

"She would have become one." Kannon's voice was clear, sharp but not angry. Instead, she sounded resigned, patient even. "She will become one. She was to have died, and the Shadow would have taken her. To be some mindless, ravaging demon set upon the souls of those like her. Sesshoumaru couldn't have known that his act saved her from that." She folded herself in her arms again. "And I couldn't have known my actions would damn her again."

Kier suppressed the fear she felt rise within her. "The shadow seeks Rin?"

"Yes."

"And you keep her from it."

"Yes."

"Why? If it is ordained so, or set about so, why do you try and resist it? Throw the girl to the darkness! What is she to you? Why are you destroying yourself to protect her when she has done nothing to you but steal and take what belongs to you."

"Sesshoumaru never belonged to me."

"And your life? What of that?" Kier hissed. "My lady, you're dying. This is killing you. Surrender her."

"I cannot."

"Why? In mercy's name, why?"

Kannon smiled weakly. "Because I am mercy. It is my nature and purpose to hear and sooth those who suffer. I cannot do otherwise. We are all slaves to our nature, Kier. Remember that."

He heard her screaming from miles away. He wasn't even sure if it was truly her voice he heard, or something deep within his soul that was mindful of her always. He could feel the pain in her voice; the fear and panic that caused her voice to strain and carry farther then it should have been able coming from such a small vessel.

He turned and ran, not thinking or questioning the actions. The reaction to her call came as natural to him as pulling Tokijin for battle, or calling upon his light whip to dispatch lesser demons. It was as unquestioned and natural as he being Lord of the Western Lands, as he being called Youkai.

She called, Sesshoumaru came.

This was the way of things.

Sesshoumaru transformed into a stage of pure Yoki because it was faster and needed to catch her as she fell. But he did not catch her, he enveloped her, consumed her, shielded her with the most basic parts of who he was.

And he returned to human form, she was in his arm, cradled against his chest. She had fainted from the fall, and he studied her small round face for a long time, barely paying attention to the weed she clutched in her small hands like life itself. He found himself wondering idly what could have possessed the child to traverse the perilous mountain for some herb.

Jaken's doing perhaps. He would kill the Imp.

He quelled the anger that was rising within him with the knowledge that she was safe and his mission was more or less fulfilled. The Poison Wasps had fled, or died. Naraku was gone. He'd find another way.

She was safe.

She was safe…

Sesshoumaru pulled the arrow from his side angrily and stared it. The dream again, pushing forward pass his conscience demanding his attention, and his attention. The girl again, this unformed, unfamiliar creature from dream and memory that could not belong to him. He was Sesshoumaru, of the Western Land. Who was he to care for a child of man? Who was this creature named Rin by his own tongue, this small pathetic human child with the round face and those eyes.

He knew those eyes, he realized. That face. So young, so frightened and haunted by nightmares unspoken but felt every moment; he knew the child that possessed that face. Sesshoumaru shuttered, reaching back with his mind to grasp at some part of the vapor through his mind to recapture her, anything to stir a memory or a dream. Anything that could tell him who this girl was.

His arm ached suddenly but not from pain. It felt as if it remembered a burden he had carried for so long that now was free of, but familiarity and habit had etched the weight into his very bones. He could feel the impression against the crook of his arm, the weight making a small pressure against his chest. He could almost the warmth of the burden pushed against his chest, could almost feel the heart…
He had carried her. In his arm, he had held her.

His lips parted to repeat the name he had whispered a moment before but found he could not. For fear, or inability, Sesshoumaru decided it was best not to delve too deep into. Instead, he turned his attention fully to the situation at hand, to things he could capture and hurt.

Jomei never saw him move. One moment the Taiyoukai had stood in silent pause, staring at the arrow and his hand, and the next, he was a blur of motion and Jomei only saw the bright starry explosions of pain behind his eyes as he was thrown against the wall. Jomei coughed and tried to force himself to his feet again.

But the Youkai was quicker. He reached out and swiped at Jomei, carelessly and lightly- tearing pass Jomei's clothing and grazing his skin with sharp, terrible claws. Jomei tried to scream but sheer pain and blackness filled his senses as he slumped over, clutching at his stomach. There were hardly scratches at all, but still it felt as if Jomei's body had begun to rebel against itself.

He slumped to his knees again, heaving and crumbling on himself because he could nothing else. Everything was blackness, dizziness and pain.

"My Dokkaso has the power to devour from the inside out at its leisure." Sesshoumaru whispered as he circled Jomei. "It is only for my mercy and my amusement I spared you from its true power. Now," He reached down and pulled Jomei by the collar and tossed him against the wall. "Tell me why you hunt me." He paused, staring at the bleeding pulp before him and tilted his head, "Look at me."

Jomei slowly rolled his head, pushing his eyes up to meet the demon's cool honeyed gaze with his own hateful glare. The Youkai hesitated for a moment. "You have her eyes." Sesshoumaru whispered. "The girl's eyes. Tell me, who is she to you?"

Jomei inhaled slowly, and with all the pain and hate in his body, he forced his body into one last action of defiance. He spat at the Youkai.

Sesshoumaru released the boy long enough to wipe his cheek slowly with the back of his hand. He blinked leisurely and tilted his head again.

Jomei found the strength to scream again as pain erupted from his shoulder and chest. His whole body tensed under the initial pain before slumping against the wall. He noticed somewhere above it all, as the pain began to detach him from reality, that he was now pinned to the mountain by a sword. The demon's sword blossomed from his shoulder keeping him like an insect pinned in a collection.

The demon was undeterred at all. In fact, when he spoke again, it was softly, almost polite. "We will talk." Sesshoumaru told him carefully. "About this girl." Then the demon smiled. "This girl whose eyes you have…"

The demon lifted his hand again and flexed the fingers, popping the knuckles as he went. "I'm sure she wants them back."