Sango and Kagome led the way down the road, walking side by side in companionable silence. Kirara rode in the basket of Kagome's bicycle, an activity she seemed to enjoy very much. For once, Inuyasha and Miroku were the ones lagging behind.

Their friends' conversation drifted up to where they were walking in bits and pieces.

Inuyasha must have been examining his newly sharpened sword. "It doesn't look that different," he commented.

"You think it's really sharpened?" Shippou asked. "It looks just as rusty as it always has!"

For her part, Sango found it somehow cheering to be back on the road. Perhaps it was because they were on the road again together. Everyone had survived the harrowing events of the last few days more or less intact. Several times it had seemed as if their quest would be over, or that they would be forced to go on without one or more of their number. It was a relief to have everyone still together and in one piece. More or less.

Kagome still seemed far more subdued than she usually was. Ordinarily she was bright and cheerful, willing and able to chatter on about anything and everything to pass the time while they walked.

She supposed now was as good a time as any to get to the bottom of it. For once they had some semblance of privacy, with the rest of the group preoccupied with the new-and-improved Tessaiga. "What's going on, Kagome? You've been awfully quiet today."

"Well…" Kagome hesitated. "It's faint, but I think I sense a jewel shard nearby."

She understood Kagome's reluctance. A jewel shard was both an opportunity they couldn't afford to waste and the last thing they needed right now. Inuyasha healed faster than an ordinary human would, but he had still been injured from his fight with Sesshoumaru. The rest of them were worn out from the events on the kodoku mountain and the vines of illusory death. If someone else had already acquired the shard and they were forced to fight for it, it could go badly.

But now that she'd said it out loud, there was no chance Inuyasha had not overheard. "There's a jewel shard nearby and you didn't tell us?" he demanded.

Kagome stopped walking and almost managed to suppress her wince. No wonder she'd been hesitant to bring it up in the first place. "I said it's really faint," she protested. "I'm not even sure it's really there!"

Inuyasha caught up to them in only a couple of bounds. "Maybe, but if it is there, we need to get it before anyone else gets their hands on it."

"We're heading in the right direction, anyway," Kagome told him. "I should know before too much longer."

Miroku joined them at a much more sedate pace than the hanyou. "Perhaps we would cover ground more quickly if we made use of Kirara's abilities," he suggested mildly. The nekomata mewed cheerily from her place in Kagome's basket to signal her support of this idea.

"But what about my bike?"

"Leave it," Inuyasha decided. "I'm faster than that thing, anyway."

"We better come back for it, then! I'm not just leaving it in the middle of nowhere in the feudal era!"

While their friends squabbled, Kirara leaped out of the bicycle basket and changed to her larger form so Sango and the monk could ride. Sango still wasn't entirely sure how she felt about the enforced proximity to the monk, even though it had been her suggestion in the first place. But she had to admit, it was much faster to travel this way. And so far Miroku had managed to behave himself… though she had to wonder how long that would last now that they weren't in a life-or-death situation.

With the bicycle secreted beside the road and Kagome in place on Inuyasha's back, they hastened down the road in the direction that Kagome thought she sensed the jewel shard. There was no time to waste.

In short order, they found themselves approaching a village. It was the same thing they had seen so many times already: the village lay empty, its inhabitants dead in the streets.

Sango fought to stay calm as she dismounted from Kirara's back. Her first thought was of Kohaku, and Naraku. It was all too easy to see in this place another village destroyed by the child who had been her brother, sent at a demon's behest…

Breathing deep, she forcibly recalled her training. Don't assume you know what happened here, she reminded herself, and knelt beside one of the bodies to look for clues to what had happened. To her surprise, what she found was not the work of a youkai taiji-ya, but the marks of teeth and claws on flesh, and the marks of some large, predatory animal in the dirt.

"There are footprints," she told the others. "Or rather, pawprints."

Inuyasha made a sound of disgust. "Not surprising. The whole place reeks of wolves."

"Wolves!" Kagome exclaimed, looking around in alarm. She need not have worried; despite the pawprints and the bites that had felled the villagers, it appeared that the perpetrators, ordinary wolves or otherwise, were long gone.

"It's strange though," Miroku added. He stepped up next to Sango, bending down to peer at the evidence. "All the villagers appear to have been killed, but not eaten. Why would wolves kill humans, if not to eat them?" He straightened. "Not only that, but the livestock is unharmed. Wouldn't they make easy prey?" By the time he suggested, "I don't think this is the work of ordinary wolves," Sango had reached the same conclusion.

"Kagome, can you still sense the jewel shard?" she asked, an unpleasant idea occurring to her. A certain type of youkai, with access to the power of the Shikon jewel, could easily create this type of destruction. If that was the case, they might be in for some serious trouble. "Is it nearby?"

"I can still sense it, but it's…" She hesitated. "It's not here anymore. It's like it… ran off."

"So it's likely someone else has already acquired the shard."

"Then what are we waiting for?" Inuyasha interjected, impatient as ever. "Let's go track it down!"