A/N: (exhibits a dashing shade of red upon her cheeks) Oh my, reviews! Thank you very much for them, you're all very kind!
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DISCLAIMER: I don't own Inuyasha.
(--)
:Last Dream:
-an Inuyasha fanfiction-
by C.o.m.t.e.s.s.a
(--)
"…." talking
(….) thinking
(--)
:Chapter 4:Suisoku:
Lazy puffs of mist arose through the air, cloudy wisps of steam drifting up from one of the many rocky springs that laid hidden at the foot of mount Sukushi, west of Kyushu Island.
A languid breeze blew and the mists parted, a figure distinctively seen resting at the spring's edge. Though the afternoon was hot, the air heavy with the blinding rays of the sun, someone was taking a bath in the hot water.
Sesshoumaru sat immerged in the soothing depths of the Anshin hot spring. His eyes were closed, head facing slightly up, the sunlight playing shadows on it as it passed through the dense foliage of the trees surrounding. He had spotted this secluded area by chance after having traveled all day and, upon laying eyes on it, had come to conclude a steaming bath was rather necessary.
As he'd shedded his clothing, puffs of dust and even a solitary moth had been released from the confines of his once pristine silk kimono. And he so hated dust.
The bubbly waters were quite pleasantly heated, not only good for dirt removal but also a welcome ministration for his cramped muscles -having remained sitting on a cold floor, sealed and tied for what felt like ages could do that to you.
An entire day had passed since his awakening, and only one question from the myriad he had swarming on his brain had been answered. Where was he?
In Yashima.
It had been rather shocking to realize that even a demon such as he found trouble pinpointing his exact location. Only by its still lingering earthen scent had he been able to realize his geographical position. After all, no one spent countless centuries roaming one's domain without sharing some sort of primal bond with it.
He had thus spent the majority of his recently reawakened state surmising the human oddity that his land had become. He'd flown over the entirety of Honshu, Hokkaido and Shikoku, saw the big towns and villages move with life beneath him; shimmering structures of abnormal height and crazy beings crawling in their buzzy environment; all a cram of colors, sounds and smells.
Sesshoumaru had roamed Modern Japan from head to toe in less than a day in the same manner as Columbus had upon discovering the wild new sights that America offered…
…well, except less eagerly and with a far better haircut.
His analytical mind had tried to find some common sense in this entire new environment. Perhaps he wasn't truly here, but dead?
He snorted.
Impossible. Nothing in the Nether World could ever compare to what he'd recently seen during his journey.
Perhaps he wasn't awake after all and this was just a figment of his imagination? Oh, please, it was such a ridiculous notion to think that he'd be able to dream such an obviously delusional place as this that, were he prone to laughing, he would have.
Instead, he just snorted again.
Truthfully, he couldn't think of anything that might explain his current situation. The worst part being he hadn't been able to find anything or anyone familiar. He'd visited the old Yuuwaku Mori where the talking tree spirit of his father's ancient seer had resided….only to find it gone and replaced with buildings. He'd gone to the Nishi Island, his homeland, in search of the House of the West…
His eyes drawled open, cat-like irises focused on the moving leaves looming close through the steam.
Only the base structure remained, the foundations of a once grand coastline palace. He'd been born on that house, just like his father and grandfather had, all the way back to the first member of his clan…But now, nothing of that prevailed.
(The House of the West is truly gone…) he mused.
He'd even stooped as low as to visit Inu-Yasha's forest. He'd been rather shocked to find it still in existence, though awfully diminished. He'd felt the obvious presence of strong youki in it, also quite surprising for he'd somehow assumed there wouldn't be any remotely destacable youkai roaming this odd place. Every now and then, he'd felt the faint flicker of a spirit at the edge of his senses, but they were minor and seemed to recognize him –or at least the threat he posed- for they moved wide and away from his path. Still the numbers were preposterously pathetic in comparison to what he remembered.
All around everything had changed, morphed into something completely different. And all because of humans.
It was so obviously the human's fault.
He couldn't fully understand how they had made this. They'd been always so small and fragile –though he conceded, defiantly cunning, too-, so preposterously easy to break. Everything hurt them, everything killed them. They moved about life too fast, burning away in record time. He surmised that perhaps that was due to their….spontaneity, their rushed behavior.
How had they made it through, then?
Humans were so… so… mortal it just didn't seem possible!
And their idiocy was legendary.
He distantly wondered if perhaps they'd acquired some new power while he'd been asleep. He doubted it but, one never knew…Nature was known for its whimsical eccentricities towards its creatures.
He shook his head lightly, silvery-white hair plastering to his face and shoulders.
The fact of the matter was he felt aggravated at them and betrayed by fate. He, demon Ruler of Yashimas most powerful land, had been reduced to an embarrassingly clueless Lord.
The thought made him flinch.
A vision of the spreading forests, the cold meadows and tree-covered mountains flashed and replaced the view of the small spring. For a second he thought he felt a pang in his chest, a sort of needle-like pain.
He remembered. He missed. To know everything, to be the ruler of all that surrounded. Kami, how he longed for his territory, when everything he surveyed around was methodically known... and rightfully his.
He scowled. No more than twenty-four hours have passed since his recovery from the land of the unconscious and he was already lamenting past losses.
He was….brooding, he knew. That just didn't bode well with him at all.
Hmm….perhaps brood was the natural reaction to all recently reawakened? Somehow he logically doubted there were many reawakened youkais roaming about to test that theory, but…
(It does not matter.)
Rousing himself from the steaming waters, he turned and gracefully moved towards where he'd left his clothing. His wet hair was plastered all about him, rare white bangs traveling the lean length that was Sesshoumaru's form like strands of moonlight. His once exuberant white tail now hung wet and heavy over the side of his shoulder. His movements, though, were still precise and elegant, the killing perfection…well, a dripping wet, not-truly-terrifying-anymore perfection, but one nonetheless.
Ehmm…back to the matter at hand, in the depths of his mind, he conceded he was mildly amazed. He'd never realized the lack of open lands and the vastness that only forests and rice-fields could project would be so missed… Don't get him wrong, it wasn't as if he hadn't loved or cherished his territory back on the past, absolutely au contraire… but loosing it just made it a teeny tiny bit more desired now for his sanity.
Maybe he should try to go back? Find a way to return to the past?
He blinked.
Whoever said he was in the future, anyway? Maybe the dimensions were different….Was he stuck in some bizarre parallel universe, an alternative reality created by some mightier force to punish him for relenting his father's legacy without so much as a slap on a monk's face?
He tsked.
Absurd. No mightier force would dare mess with a demon of his caliber.
No, as more time flew by and he became better acquainted with this new world, he was becoming increasingly convinced that only the time was different. Actually, he was almost sure of it. He had been sealed, but the sands of time hadn't stopped to wait for him. No, they had flowed down just like they always did around him.
He dressed quietly, slim fingers gliding with precision over the fastenings of the silken materials of his clothes. His muscles rippled and relaxed beneath the thin layers of white silk as the ministrations of the hot water began working their wonder. Then, he reached down for the haori, gracefully donning it and working on its white linen ties. Lastly, he tied a yellow sash around his waist and rearranged his still damp tail over his right shoulder.
Once finished, he moved away from the spring towards the narrow paths that lead up the Sukushi Mount. Swift, measured strides propelled him as his booted feet paced the growingly uneven grounds.
The Sukushi Mount had always been famous for its glorious views of the spreading land of Kyushu. Located at the utmost western shore of the Island, it was so high that it was said on clear sunny days, one could even view the Pacific Ocean in all its blue vastness. That is, one in possession of very keen eyesight…and be assured Sesshoumaru had very good eyes.
But also, the mount was admired for its inexplicably picky formations of rocks. All around –and on it- stalactite-shaped stones erected murderously towards the sky. For example, if there were a human stupid enough to try to hike it, he would soon find himself falling faster than a lead balloon…the graphic, painful part of him staked to a huge rocky-thorn notwithstanding. Not only this was discouraging, but also the fact that the scenery it presented wasn't precisely appealing. The mount was completely barren and deserted, very few plants grew on its bordering-arid soil, for so many rocks were around that no sensible tree could start a life here. Mainly weed and some moss of dry terrains took up most of the mountainous background, but nothing more destacable.
It was also a site inclined to sudden avalanches.
In short, the place was a rocky dumpster, only truly enjoyable on winter for it offered the best and most grand natural hot-springs of the area that hadn't yet been commercialized.
Nevertheless, Sesshoumaru moved up its treacherous, ungodly sides without even looking mildly concerned. He even seemed content moving from razor-sharp column to abysmal cliff. The sun shone with a grudging fierceness upon the poor buggers on earth, yet the demon wasn't even breaking a sweat. He wasn't running, wasn't even hurrying….he seemed more to be taking a…stroll. A nice, baking-hot, walking-amidst-obscenely-picky-rocks-and-bottomless-cliffs stroll.
It was just what he needed to make his blood flow through his dried veins.
He had a mind to reach the top boulders and scan the oceanic horizon. He'd once heard that the God dragon Ryou-ue governed its depths and that it's shrine was located on the coasts of Edo. He had never before bothered to check if that was so –he didn't feel particularly friendly towards dragons-, but now it might come in handy. If the dragon was indeed a God, then it would have surely survived since old times. He might be able to shed some light on Sesshoumaru's mental conundrums, and if the dragon refused, well then he'd have to be more…persuasive.
Persuading others to do as he pleased was never a problem for him.
As he jumped lightly over a wide gulf, he sniffed the air. Something had caught his attention. He looked back momentarily from the corner of his left eye in mid-jump. His feet had barely touched the grubby surface of a landing when, faster than a blink, he vanished.
Minutes later, a huge round figure approached the landing, soaring on long, shabby wings. It was a bird, colored like a rainbow. Its feathers wore an array of blues, yellows, oranges, greens…all shinning metallic under the sun's glare.
The bird alighted and turned towards the precipice. The upper torso of a human man sprouted from the round mass of feathers, a wild mane of dirty-blond hair fanning messily all about him.
The Bird of Paradise turned this way and that, keen eyes narrowing to search up and about for that which it was sure it saw some moments ago, climbing the mount. The man-bird had been overseeing the land in search of food when it had suddenly sighted a white shadow at the mount's base. The figure had begun ascending and, though they were separated for miles, the demon-bird had felt the unmistakable shock of an unknown youki spreading from it.
The bird knew that the other was powerful, probably more than him, but four seasons had passed since his last decent meal and it was hungry…very hungry. Besides, if the other proved to be as powerful as it suspected and it were to caught him, the added bonus of swallowing his youki would give him enough energy-reserve to venture towards the north...
...two days ago, the bird had heard rumors of the Shikon Pearl's location.
So, the Gokuraku-chou had launched after this new mysterious youkai who'd dared glide so arrogantly through his territory. As he'd gotten near, he'd felt a sudden burst of the other's power and then…well, and then it was gone.
"What do you want?" came Sesshoumaru's voice from atop the landing.
The Gokuraku-chou started and looked up, bristling its rainbow feathers.
Sesshoumaru looked down his nose at the other, contempt written all over his features.
The man-bird bristled more intensely, shabby wings shaking at it's sides. It's eyes shone an unnatural shade of turquoise under long, heavy bangs. With a sudden gust it rose up, thin feathered arms extended to claw at the other.
Sesshoumaru, who had been standing over a picky boulder, merely moved back and dropped. In mid-air, he disappeared.
The demon bird gave a shrieking caw, flying and turning back around in search of his prey.
"You dare attack me," Sesshoumaru's drawled statement came a hair's breadth from the bird's right ear. Two silken-clad arms embraced it's mid-section from behind with an iron grip, squeezing. "Will you face the consequences?"
The man-bird, caught unprepared, cawed in pain and thrashed, only to have Sesshoumaru's arms tighten.
The wailing bird's cry was hurting Sesshoumaru's sensitive ears. The momentary thought of using this bird to have some questions answered flashed through his mind –that way he wouldn't have to face the bloody dragon-. But, as the thing kept cawing so excruciatingly high, Sesshoumaru felt his already-rather-thin patience slipping. Flexing his claws, he embedded them on its sides, but the darned thing's wail seemed to have gone up a notch. Hissing, Sesshoumaru was about to end its pathetic existence right then and there, when something he'd not predicted… happened.
The bird's lowered torso shook and a wide, sharp-teethed mouth opened from it. Hundreds of smaller birds flew out of it like a tidal wave. They flew off and amassed in the distance, darting speedily towards Sesshoumaru with claws and hungry beaks at the ready.
He dodged them.
His grasp on the big bird loosened.
The thing wriggled free from his grip.
(Kuso.)
Sesshoumaru fastly dropped, alighting on a boulder as the smaller birds followed him. The fall gave him impulse and he plunged up, the boulder falling to pieces under him with a crash and taking with it a dozen of the creatures.
The man-bird saw the white figure approaching at an ungodly speed and, smirking, opened its huge bird jaws. It raised a hand signaling for the other birds to attack. The animals launched towards Sesshoumaru like flying daggers, all aimed at his dismissal.
Sesshoumaru raised a brow. (Hn. Pathetic insects.)
"Enough of this nonsense," he said.
Extending one clawed hand, he slashed the air before him, instantly flying straight through. The mass of bird's bodies that had been coming towards him simply split in half after him, blood and feathers falling to smear the ground.
He sped on, swiftly gliding to the right and the up like a lightening, passing the other. He hovered there for a second, dropping over it once again. With a single slash, he cut the Gokuraku-chou in half.
A shrill gasp and the bird fell in three neat pieces. It's huge figure propelled towards the ground in a gory display of feathers and bloody organs.
Sesshoumaru alighted on the mount's near top and scoffed. "Disgusting…" His eyes swiftly trained away, towards the horizon, the afternoon sun glaring at his back. Beyond miles of forest and sprawling cities, cottages and buildings, the vast expanse of the ocean was barely discernable. He narrowed his eyes, irises dilating. He surmised the dragon was hidden asleep in its profound depths, perhaps some cavern under the sea? Though as its house of worship was rumored to be on the coastline, the dragon God would most surely inhabit near it. Still, the expedition would prove to be a rather difficult one, but he wasn't in a hurry….
…he had oodles of time.
This new world presented a true riddle, the likes Sesshoumaru had not seen for a long time and there was no stopping to his curiosity once it was picked. He was always one to fastly indulge on it.
Smirking, all memories of his recent encounter flying off his mind, Sesshoumaru launched forward, towards the north….
….towards Tokyo.
(-------------)
"So...what do you think?" Kagome asked, biting her lower lip as they entered the living-room.
She plopped down heavily on one of the plush pillows surrounding a dark-wooden chabudai. Miroku sat more gracefully in front of her, bowing low and murmuring a polite thank you to Kagome´s mother whom had brought a tray with two mugs of ice tea and a delicate array of home-made rice cookies.
The living-room's window welcomly opened behind Miroku, a gentle breeze swaying the white curtains and providing the room's occupants with a much needed reprieve from the merciless heat of the afternoon.
He sat, legs tucked neatly under the low table, sipping ice tea and mutedly cursing the way the sunrays pouring through the wide window seemed to be melting his back very slowly.
Kagome, on the other hand, was staring at him intently, in hopes that if she looked at his head hard enough, the answer to her last question would flash like a neon sign upon his forehead.
Ever since he'd arrived at the Higurashis temple an hour ago, scaring our poor heroine almost to the point of redecorating the shrine's wall with her miko powers and Miroku's brain, she'd taken a long, painful hour to retell, bit by bit, the case which she'd been assigned to solve. She'd showed him the files, told him about what she'd felt on her first encounter with the child-priestess, even half-whispered to him the uncertain conjectures she had come to unravel the previous night...
Sighing at his lack of response, eyes still straying once in a while towards him, she began dispersing over the table the papers and folders she had brought with her. She checked the black folder again -for what felt to be the hundredth time- trying to keep her weary mind occupied and give Miroku time to swallow it all in.
She knew it was wrong to divulge the case; that if anyone of her employers ever found out they'd probably arrest her for life, if not remove her tongue with a blunt fork -authorities were quite efficient when it came to punishing blabber-mouths. Still, for her, the fact of solving this goddamned puzzle and helping that poor kid (Powerful head priestess of a whole country, Kagome, please remember that...this is not your average kid we're talking about here…) just made her feel the impulsive need to seek help. She wasn't good at mind games or detective frazzle, she just wanted this to be over with. The child's condition had stringed a chord way too near her heart to be healthy in the long term. Of course, this didn't mean the image of slowly dying after a painful tongue extraction, as some black-dressed no-face governmental torturer lectured her on the negative consequences of divulging top imperial secrets to old friends, made her masochistic day or anything. On contraire, it made her rather...shifty.
So, after giving it as many twists and turns as she could think of, she'd resolved to consult her own personal monk: Miroku. When it came to spilling brain's content over something, or simply unraveling seemingly impossible creepy happenings, Miroku was the one to call. He had a mind quicker than his pervy right hand.
It had been a lucky strike that he'd stumbled upon Kagomes mother that morning on his way to accosting some new, unsuspecting girl that he'd probably sweet-talked the day before -a little problem he seemed to suffer ever since Kagome knew him: lecherousness. Kagomes mother had told him about her wanting to speak to him on an "urgent" matter. And just like that, he had turned around and popped unto Kagomes day.
(He's quite a darling... that is, when he's not trying to cope a feel of you...) she thought amusedly.
Now, here they sat, despite the bright heat of the day being in its summit, a heavy atmosphere surrounding them.
Miroku reached out and took his brown-with-flying-storks decorated mug of tea again, gently sipping off it. The cool liquid soothed his dry mouth, his mind boiling with questions. For all he'd heard, he already felt baffled at the case's so blatant "gaping holes" of information. No traces or weapons, a spotless scene, everything was simply…perfect. There was nothing at all to prove a true crime had been committed, except the inexplicably unconscious body of the daisaiin.
With nimble fingers he caressed the mug's surface, eyes focused on his task and at the same time completely oblivious of it. (What I don't get is…how is it possible there are no witnesses? A place as tightly guarded as the Emperor's personal shrine and no one saw anything?
What stranger can enter a place like that and not be suspected? Was it even a stranger, then?)
He knew that in all cases there was at least one person whose retelling of the events just didn't fit, yet here everyone had obscenely impeccable alibis!
Except for Shikimura Ryoei.
Miroku shook his head, brows furrowing. No, even his recount of the deed could be said to be acceptable. A bit rough around the edges, that's true, but still allowable.
His hands strayed towards the black folder that Kagome had left aside in favor of switching the automatic fan, his eyes momentarily fixed upon it's cover seal: a circle of gold that in it's center held a bloomed chrysanthemum, emblem of Japan's Mikado.
He opened the folder and skipped towards page 6. A small black-and-white picture of a man in his forties greeted him. He was impeccably dressed with a deep colored haori slitted at the shoulders, the white juuban peaking out through it. In his head he wore the long black hat traditional of high ranking daishoten. His face was impacid, dark eyes boring holes through Miroku's skull.
Under it, the man's personal information and background was detailed –well, as detailed as was allowed by governmental standards. On the next page appeared his declaration. Miroku read it through carefully, violet eyes interested. The man gave very clear details; his recount of the event was very clean, almost to the point of being…detached. (He knew the daisaiin since she was brought, he practically raised her…yet there's nothing here that reveals him feeling anything but professional respect towards her…Interesting.)
Kagome had told him she suspected Shikimura of having been inside the main pagoda when the attack –if it could be called thus, he thought- happened; or perhaps very near it. On the declaration, the man alleged to have been carrying some important temple documents towards the library-and here he concurred with what others had said they seen him do-, but, upon realizing he'd forgotten the papers for the oncoming Kagura no Mai, he'd given his load to a passing assistant and hurried back. As he was passing the closed gates of the main pagoda, he'd heard the scream.
"Don't you think it's too…oh, I don't know, perfectly timed, or something?" Kagome had asked him when she'd been telling him this part.
"Well, it sounds too much coincidental, one could say, but still…it could have happened," he'd replied doggedly.
The man continued his tale alleging that, upon seeing no one around to help him, he pushed the unresisting doors open –an unprecedented sacrilege to enter the Goddesses residence when the priestess is praying inside- and barged straight in. The first thing he saw was the unconscious child, lying on fresh blood. He'd been so stunned he had staggered inside without first checking round to see if the perpetrator still lurked somewhere near. A rather baffling attitude but comprehensible if one assumed his position: such a sight would make anyone's mind a puddle of idiocy. Some minutes later, other people approached the place and the chain of already known consequences began. The thing was no one could truly testify if all this was true for no one saw him enter.
No one had been guarding the doors.
There his declaration ended.
"Hmm..." Miroku mumbled, lost in thought.
Kagome waited some minutes more, but her impatient nature getting the best of her, she shifted slightly.
"Anou, Miroku? What…eh…what do you think?" Kagome asked again, interrupting the monk's silent ponderings. He looked up at her, and smiled ruefully.
"Well, Kagome-sama, I must say this is rather…alarming." He reached out and placed the half-empty cup over the smooth surface of the chabudai, slightly tanned fingers circling the cup's edge. "As you know, the daisaiin is our country's most influential figure, only compared to the House of Royals themselves. She is rumored to be the Goddesses true child, too...a symbol of the Emperor's divine allegiance." He stared off to some point over Kagomes head. "Were this openly known and the entire Koshitsu no Shinto would surely fall from grace. People would start speculating and the most easily corruptible would look upon the structure of our religion as a lie," he said carefully.
"But why? Why is she so important? I mean, I do know she's…well…special, above everyone else, and that Amaterasu-redi chose her to become her representant on Earth, but…" Kagome drifted. She remembered the little Tatakai-san had told her about the girl having been chosen and taken away when she was barely a babe. Kajiura Yuki had been raised in the shrine, revered and adored as the immortal Goddess in person…locked and feared as someone that held unfathomable powers. Someone that was different.
Kagome shook her head, troubled eyes focusing on her friend's amiable ones. "Can't they find another one? Can't the emperor relieve her of her duty, at least until she's awake again? What's the good of holding her unconscious, prisoner of her own temple! For God's sake! She's just a child and they won't even let her go to a hospital to have proper treatment because the Goddess vessel cannot leave the safety of her shrine under any circumstance´!" Kagome rudely imitated Tatakais voice when he'd clarified as to why the child remained locked inside the Jinja no Zojoji and not in a hospital.
Miroku smiled, his mind sympathizing with Kagomes obvious frustration. "It is hard to accept but… there is only one way for a new daisaiin to appear –and only high priestesses are allowed to command the Zojoji Temple-... the previous one must vanish."
Kagome blinked, dumbstruck. This was something she didn't know. "You mean…"
Miroku nodded. "For the Emperor to receive the name of the next Chosen from the lips of the Goddess herself, her predecessor must die. It is tradition, Kagome-sama."
Kagome halted, sudden rage beginning to flare inside of her. (That's horrible!) "But-but how can that be so! The girl is sick, cursed! She barely responds to aura-channeling," Kagome argued, eyes flashing. "She needs help, not—"
"I know, I know, Kagome-sama," Miroku said pacifically. "But it is the way that things are. We cannot change that." His hands strayed from the cup and shuffled through the folder, keen eyes searching. "What we can do, though, is try to figure this out." He fingered page 6 absently and, taking out the page, turned it to face the miko. "Have you noticed there were no guards at the entrance of the pagoda that morning?"
Kagome blinked her ire away, brows furrowing. Eyes traveling down, she skipped through the white page Miroku had just handed her.
Indeed, according to Shikimura there were none near the place. (So odd...I thought the daisaiin was supposed to have two personal guards constantly trailing after her. Then why weren't they?)
She made a small sound of doubt and took the black folder from her friend's hands. Moving through the other shoten´s declarations, she found that the imperial guards had had to be called for they had been nowhere to be seen.
"You´re right. Her personal guard was not at the doors as they were supposed to." With fine fingers she moved from page to page, avid eyes scrutinizing the contents. "This makes no sense..."
Miroku leaned over. "What is it?"
"Well, no guard has been questioned except those from the shrine, summoned upon discovering her..." she looked up at him then, puzzled. "But no one from her personal entourage."
Miroku remained leaning, chin resting on his left hand. "Yes, I noticed that, too. It is a rather odd thing not to have the alibis from those that were supposed to be there with her on the day of the crime." He surveyed the page that rested over the table as Kagome unconsciously tapped her fingers rhythmically over it. "I don't think the police simply forgot to—"he stopped abruptly and turned his head.
"Huh? Miroku?"
His eyes narrowed and he stood up slowly. "Shh... I sense something."
He moved towards the grand window. The curtains were gently moving as hot air swished through the open glass-panes. Miroku approached it. Through narrowed eyes he noticed there was a small shadowy figure standing amidst the curtains, perched on the window-sill. Despite the fluttering movements of the curtains, it remained very still.
Kagome began standing, too, heart fluttering slightly in fear.
Abruptly, Miroku grabbed one swishing border of the curtain and pulled. It drew open to reveal the fierce sun glaring upon them and the identity of the strange thing.
It was a black bird, still as stone.
"A crow?" Kagome whispered, baffled.
The thing didn't even flinch or fly off upon having the two humans so near, like any normal bird would do. On the contrary, it remained nailed to the window-sill, face intent on the living-room's occupants. Mainly, on the shorter of the two.
It was looking at Kagome with penetrating red eyes, as if scrutinizing the depths of her very soul. She shuddered instinctively and looked at her friend who, suddenly, grabbed an ofuda from the hidden receses of his pants and planted it firmly on the crow's face.
The thing cawed miserably and flew up, trying to escape. Before long, it disintegrated in mid-air.
Kagome gasped at the sight and turned towards Miroku. "I-it was a demon!"
He passed a hand through his hair and looked at her, the picture of the pensive. "Apparently so, Kagome-sama. And it seemed to be spying..." He blinked deep amethyst eyes, a strange look on his face. "...at you."
Kagome, taken aback, snorted. "Me? Why would it spy me?"
Miroku shrugged. An idea occurred to him.
He moved slightly closer to her, right hand twitching. "My, my Kagome-sama, may it be that you are not aware of your own...alluring mystique?" he said solemnly, right arm going around her shoulders.
Kagome froze and blushed, looking up at him questioningly. When she saw blatant mischief dancing in his eyes and felt that arm that seconds before had been so innocently lying round her shoulders now moving dangerously south...she whirled around and slapped him full on the head.
"Miroku, you baka!"
"Ajajajaja," he laughed heartily, right hand now massaging his injured scalp. "You sure are aware of your wonderful right hook, at least, Kagome-sama."
Kagome sighed and shook her head. "Whatever," she muttered, moving away towards the kitchen, intent on putting as much distance as possible between her and the once-again teasing monk.
(What a tactless way he has to break compromising moments...) That man could only remain focused for as much as ten minutes top, you couldn't ask for more. After that, he became a bloody menace to all innocent young women. A smile danced briefly on her lips as she remembered the way they had met so long ago. Barely upon seeing her, that sage-looking man of deep purple eyes and a smile that could make even saints blush, dressed in monk robes and surrounded by a beatific aura, had downright asked her to bear his child and, upon seeing poor naive her blushing and sputtering incoherently for fifteen minutes, he'd moved towards her friend, Yuka, and asked the same thing to her, too. Without even loosing a beat! What a creep...
Kagome padded towards the fridge and took out the orange juice. While she was serving two glasses, the incident with the crow replayed itself on her head out of the blue. Its glinting eyes flashed through her mind and blended with a pair of very similar piercing ones that had been staring at her from atop the old torii the previous day. (Demon's eyes...just like the crow's.)
She walked out of the kitchen and towards him.
"You know," Kagome mused as she approached Miroku, extending a glass to him and sipping from hers. "This is the second time something stares so...oddly at me."
Miroku cocked his head and raised a brow. "What do you mean?"
Kagome blinked at him, lost in thought for a minute. Then, she smacked her head.
"Kami, I'm such a baka! I forgot to tell you..." she halted and, drowning the last of her orange juice, moved towards the chabudai. The heat was so strong that merely standing made her sweat. Her white chihaya and red hakama, though made of a soft material, were sticky and stifling upon her back. She plopped down on one of the plush pillows near the small automatic fan, facing Miroku. Raking a hand through her slightly sweaty hair, she continued. "Erhmm...well, you see...I-I think I saw a demon yesterday."
There was a long pause, in which her words echoed and glided through the air before vanishing, leaving behind the long beginnings of a heavy silence.
Miroku, now reclining against the cream-colored wall and balancing his juice, stared at his friend blankly.
Kagome wrung her hands nervously, eyes averted, a light shade of pink coloring her cheeks. She hated it when he looked at her as if she'd lost some common-sense marvels up her brain.
As the monk realized she wasn't about to elaborate any time soon, he cleared his throat. The sound had the desired effect: it startled her into attention. "And?" he inquired blandly.
Kagome´s blush deepened. "And it was powerful!"
Miroku remained unfazed. "Ehmm...you do know powerful demons exist, don't you, Kagome-sama?" he smiled, raising his cursed hand and using the fingers to count one by one. "Just like spirits, ghouls, mononokes, evil slobbering monsters and other countless crawling things that tend to go bump in the night."
"Of course I know that, it's just...it was very powerful and...cold and...and creepy!" she said, hands flailing in the air. "He just stood there...looking at me!"
His amused smile only widened.
Her eyes, on the other hand, narrowed. She was becoming increasingly irritated at her friend's so recently un-understanding nature.
"It looked human, too. I've never seen anything like that."
This bit made Miroku´s smile falter. He approached the table and laid the juice on it, plopping down next to her. "A humanoid demon, you say?"
"Hai. He was at the Kyoudenkyo shrine, standing over the torii," her face scrunched in concentration, trying to peel from her mind the little details about him she'd been able to catch. "He was very tall, with long hair. I couldn't quite catch his face but," she shivered, "his youki was too strong. He was even able to disappear without leaving any trace."
Now Miroku´s previous amusement vanished. "A demon on a holy gate ? And he wasn't writhing in a pool of his own goo...He should've been melting, not staring at you."
"I know! Isn't it weird?" she said smugly, at last feeling that her friend understood her.
Miroku pondered, the fingers of his left hand playing idly with the rosary beads that held his curse at bay. At length he said, "Are you sure it was a demon?"
"Of course I'm sure...well, I- think I am," she faltered, remembering her first doubts. After all, she'd only seen him for like a second, so... "But anyway, I'm positive it was youki what I felt, so it must have been a demon. What other thing can have youki?"
"I see... Did he seem hostile?"
Kagome snorted. "Hostile? The guy only had to look at me for a second and already I felt like fainting!" She passed an irritated hand through her messy bangs again, flinching when her fingers encountered knots. Looking over her shoulder at the complicated mess one of her bangs had become, she scrunched her face and began working with both hands on unraveling it. "Thank Kami I´m not a demon hunter...I wouldn't want to meet with him in bloody battle." The mere notion made her shiver.
Miroku started up suddenly. "Kuso!"
"Huh?" Her eyes averted from the hair task towards his now up and departing persona. He ran towards the kitchen and from it's recesses, Kagome heard him curse again. "Something wrong, Miroku?" she called after him.
His discontent face peeked back from the door frame. "I'm late!"
She tilted her head, knotty bang loosing itself form her hands and lost in the recesses of her hair.
Miroku came back in the living-room and began picking up his socks and trainers. "I was contacted some days ago by the Head of the demon slayer's family of Koufu-"
Kagome gasped and leaned over the table "The taijiya´s of Koufu!" she asked astonished, cutting him off. They were of the few and most renowned family of hunters still in existence, their bloodline extending far back to the times beyond the Sengoku Jidai and to the creation of the Shikon no Tama. She'd heard her grandfather countless times mumble about how they proclaimed themselves as being the rightful owners of the Pearl for they alleged Midoriko-redi belonged to their clan of fighters. Apparently, they'd tried numerous times to steal the Pearl from their temple, even going so as far murdering the at that time Shikon protector, her great-great-great-great grandfather or something. Of course, that had never been proved –her mother having whispered to her once that her ancestor had most probably died from slipping and falling down the temple's stairs as most of the others did, too. Let's not forget that one can never truly separate reality from foggy fantasy where her grandfather's tales were concerned. Still the fact remained their sudden apparition out of the depths of secrecy was quite alarming.
Miroku sighed. "Yes, the old hunters. Anyway, their chief called me and asked me to meet with him today at four, and it's already half past three!"
"Why?"
Miroku remained still for a moment in mid trainer-tying. His eyes riveted past his bent leg, towards his right hand. Kagome followed his eyes and focused on the purple holy nuno and wooden beads wrapped all around his hand, almost reaching up to his elbow.
Kagome felt a pang of pity, eyes softening. Beneath those simple wrappings laid the stigma that Miroku had to carry since his birth, a physical curse put upon one of his ancestors a long time ago for having committed a mistake...
...the guy had grabbed the ass of the wrong person.
(A woman of legendary beauty...a man who swallowed a thousand demons...A half-breed that could acquire the form of any human he so wished...)
Now, ten something generations later, his descendants still carried the wretched consequences upon their right hands as reminders of another's damnation. Of course, none seemed to have learned from that poor old bugger's mistake...they all remained a long line of pure perverted monks!
She knew he'd searched far and wide for a cure, wasted away his entire childhood and adolescence locked up inside his teacher's temple library, pouring over the dusty diaries and papyruses of his forefathers, hoping against hope there would be some clue as to how to get rid of it. He'd tried exorcisms, black and white magic, medicine...nothing had worked. She even knew he'd once tried to cut his hand off, but the curse had prevented it...
"They have information about the demon who gave me this curse," he said, barely above a whisper. "Apparently, he's re appeared."
Kagome drew a shaky breath, "You mean...Nara-"
The phone rang, startling them both, heads simultaneously turning to stare at it. The shrill cry repeated itself several times, before Kagome snapped out completely of her reverie and jumped up, quickly moving towards it. "I-I'm sorry Miroku. It'll just be a minute."
"Moshi-moshi? Higurashi no Jinja desu."
There was a pause as the caller replied on the other side of the line.
"Hai, this is Kagome speaking."
Another pause, Kagome began drawing circles with her finger over the surface of the phone's slim table, nodding absently once in a while.
Then, a gasp. "I-I see...arigatou Kikuchi-san."
She hung up noiselessly.
Kagome remained staring at the wall, her back to Miroku. "It was the prime minister's secretary, Kikuchi Yoko," she whispered.
Kagome turned around slowly, dazed eyes the color of a sooty sky focused on Miroku´s questioning ones.
"The daisaiin she...she is awake."
(---------------)
On a sunbathed chamber, deep within the entrails of the Mikado's temple, a child had barely stirred from the recesses of gold colored-linens.
Pale eye-lids had fluttered and drawled open as if burdened by a century old sleep. Misty eyes were shown under them, focusing on the intrinsecate pattern that adorned her room's wooden ceiling, yet they didn't seem to be truly looking at it. Actually, they didn't seem to be seeing anything at all.
They were glassy, sightless.
People around her whispered, aghast.
The child's lips parted, like a doll speaking for the first time.
"Please..." she breathed out.
The air around her had seemed to take a deep breath, the other occupants of the room stilling completely in shock.
"Please, kill me..."
(------------)
Glossary of Japanese words:
Suisoku: conjectures.
Yashima: ancient name given to Japan.
Yuuwaku Mori: Forest of Temptation.
Nishi: West.
Ryou-ue: Higher Dragon.
Edo: ancient name for Tokyo.
Gokuraku-chou: Birds of Paradise that attacked Kouga´s pack on the eastern caves.
Chabudai: low wooden table.
Kagura no Mai: holy ritual dances celebrated at the end of summer.
Koshitsu no Shinto: the Shinto of the Imperial House.
Jinja no Zojoji: lit. The Zojoji Shrine (The Emperor's Shrine).
Chihaya: white long-sleeved top worn by a shinto miko.
Hakama: loose wool pants.
Nuno: a piece of cloth.
"Moshi-moshi? Higurashi no Jinja desu.": lit. "Hello? This is the Higurashi Temple."
(-----------)
C.o.m.t.e.s.s.a.