We won't just fall away
We weren't just born to fade
Our stories are past the horizons
We're chasing the sun 'til we find them
Where The Skies End
The stars burned so brightly overhead. In the dead of night, the sky was awash with them, bathing Kagome's garden in their radiant light.
The feel of claws gliding languidly down her arm made her breath hitch.
Warm lips were upon hers again, and those same stars exploded behind her eyes, within her soul.
They'd been there for some time, kissing and touching, but she burned as brightly as a supernova, and she needed more.
So she didn't think twice about it when she reached for Sesshomaru's obi and yanked, unraveling the bow. It fell between them, and like a spark, they both ignited. Clothing vanished, and her hopes and dreams were finally answered in the form of his bare body pressed to hers.
But she couldn't see her hands anymore, or feel her feet. She could barely feel him between her thighs, and she desperately tried to hold on to the feeling of desire, of conviction.
She desperately tried to hold on to her dream.
She awoke suddenly, panting, the moon still heavy in the sky. Her heart beat like a vicious drum within her chest. Thunder rolled outside like the crashing of a violent wave, shaking her bedroom walls with its ferocity.
Kaminari-sama must be angry, Kagome thought vaguely as she settled her breathing.
She was in trouble. She knew she was in trouble.
Why had Sesshomaru fallen into her pond? Why had she agreed to let him remain here?
Why did he kiss me?!
The skies broke open overhead, and a downpour began. With a sigh, Kagome rolled onto her side, watching the lightning flash through the rice paper screens.
Should she confront Sesshomaru?
She pressed her thighs together, still aching from his phantom touch.
Perhaps she should just try to forget the whole thing happened. He didn't know how she felt about him – he couldn't know because she'd never told him. And he never seemed to see her, despite her efforts.
She may as well be invisible where he was concerned. He was only messing with her when he kissed her. And really she'd brought it on herself by antagonizing him. He probably kissed her to teach her a lesson.
With a heavy heart, she pulled herself from her futon and padded to the door, sliding it open to let in the full sound of the storm, hoping it'd somehow drown out her heartache.
••••••••••
Despite the previous nights rainstorm, the dawn brought blue skies with it.
The sun had trailed sluggishly across the sky, and Sesshomaru had yet to lay eyes on his hostess. He may have been offended – it was terribly rude to ignore a guest, after all – had he not known that she kept herself fairly busy.
She may be wealthy, but she didn't employ servants or guards. She delegated to Inuyasha, but then he reaped the same rewards she did simply by remaining beside her – it seemed appropriate that he'd be responsible for half the workload.
That said, a quick scan after her aura told him she was in her room – and had been for some time.
Sesshomaru was executing his forms in an open part of the garden, careful to avoid damaging any of Kagome's shrubbery, when he spotted Inuyasha.
His brother was practically skipping down the veranda toward Kagome's room. When he arrived, the hanyou rapped twice and entered.
Sesshomaru turned away – it was none of his business, after all.
The sound of her door snapping shut reached his ears, burrowing beneath his skin like a worm with razor teeth.
He reluctantly admitted to himself that the knowledge of his brother spending time alone with her bothered him. He'd admit that, but he refused to analyze why it irritated him.
Kagome was a lovely woman, that was easy enough to acknowledge. She was lacking in very few departments – but no one was perfect.
When he kissed her the previous night, it had only partially been to tease her. She was attractive and kind. She openly teased him, and never backed down from the danger he presented.
It was enticing, and so he also found himself desiring to kiss her. So he had. And brief as it'd been, he enjoyed it. He'd do it again if presented with the opportunity.
What his thoughts were trying to convey to him was that she was a likable female. Perhaps one of few.
But she was human and he was currently a hunted fugitive with nothing to his name until he destroyed his enemies and pried his birthright from their cold, dead hands.
And even then, she'd still be human. And that settled his internal debate more than anything else.
Sesshomaru shook his irritation away and continued his training.
It wasn't until some time later that her door slid open again and the hanyou strolled out.
Inuyasha greeted him and Sesshomaru used the distraction as an opportunity to get closer to the miko's room without seeming shady.
"I noticed you training earlier," Inuyasha said awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. "Sorry I didn't stop… I was kinda in a hurry."
"I noticed." Sesshomaru tried to keep the not-so-banished irritation from leeching into his voice and barely managed to do so. Taking a subtle sniff of the air around his brother, he was alarmingly relieved not to detect desire or sex in the hanyou's scent. He glanced toward Kagome's slightly opened door. "Is the miko well? She has yet to make an appearance."
Inuyasha's eyes widened briefly, honestly surprised that his brother would bother to ask or even care at all. He remembered the kiss they shared the previous night and his eyes narrowed. As much as he hated the idea that Kagome could get her heart broken, the more he thought about it, the more he came to the conclusion that if it's going to happen, it's better to happen sooner rather than later so she could finally move on with her life while she was still young.
"Feel free to ask her yourself, if you want," he said with a smirk growing on his lips. "She doesn't bite… unless you piss her off."
Without giving Sesshomaru the opportunity to decline the offer, Inuyasha called out to the miko, sliding her door open fully.
"Hey, Kagome! You've got a visitor."
"Okay," came a distracted voice from within, though from where he stood in the garden, Sesshomaru couldn't see her. "Who is it?"
But Inuyasha didn't answer because he was already heading down the veranda and disappearing around a corner, leaving Sesshomaru to climb up the large stone slabs serving as steps and onto the veranda to greet his hostess.
His eyes found her right away, and he took her obvious distraction as an opportunity to openly observe her room.
He hadn't been there since moving into her guest room days ago, and he'd still been mildly delirious at the time.
Now, he viewed her room with fresh, lucid eyes.
One entire wall was a painting of a scene he couldn't comprehend – a painting of which she currently worked on.
She glanced over her shoulder then, giving him a disarming smile.
"Sesshomaru-sama, come in. Did you need something?" She gestured to the wall with her paintbrush. "I hope you don't mind if I keep working while we talk?"
"Do as you please," he said while slipping off his boots and stepping over her threshold. It allowed him to continue his observations of her room.
She turned back, dipping her brush into paint before bringing it to the wall.
Golden eyes trailed further through the room. Another wall held multiple small, incredibly realistic portraits and he took several steps closer to them. The miko was in many of them, smiling brightly or making ridiculous faces. But still more of them saw her absent.
"Were you able to sleep last night? The storm was pretty noisy," Kagome said, though her back remained to him.
His eyes took in the faces of people – some he recognized. Inuyasha, with his crimson garment or admiring his sword with a cocky smirk. Rin, with a pretty blush or hiding behind a fan, only her eyes visible, though it was clear she was smiling happily. There were a couple of Rin and Kohauku's wedding.
"Hn," he answered distractedly. "I had no trouble."
Other members of Kagome's pack – the slayer and the monk holding an infant child or holding one another. Their wedding.
Still, more people he'd never seen before but whom resembled Kagome – her family, perhaps.
"Good, I'm glad. Crap! I spilled it." She sighed heavily and began mumbling to herself about remembering to wear an apron when painting so she didn't ruin her clothing – which she apparently did often.
The kitsune and his vibrant foxfire were in another portrait, triumph on his face. There were several of him performing tricks on Inuyasha. He smiled proudly in another, displaying his second tail.
Sesshomaru's eyes widened when he spotted himself among the tiny portraits.
There were many. And as he studied them, he became increasingly baffled. How had she managed to capture his likeness so well? Some of them were moments he'd actually experienced. How had she recalled them vividly enough to paint them?
Most of them were of him in profile, displaying different emotions – irritation, serenity, a soft smirk, pure violence. There was one of a young Rin, lying asleep across his lap. Kagome must have witnessed that when he traveled with them to defeat Naraku.
There was one of him, almost glowing from the shafts of sunlight that filtered through the leaves overhead.
There was one of him peering down at a teenaged Rin, his hand resting on her head as she smiled up at him. Jaken stood teary-eyed beside them and Ah-Un towered over them from behind, his heads coming around either side of Sesshomaru to peer at Rin and Jaken.
One of him with eyes of crimson, his claws curled with the promise of violence. He wondered who he was so angry with. Likely his brother.
Another of him as his beast, growling viciously, green toxin dripping from his maw. He looked terrifying and it nearly brought a smile to his face.
There was one of him in profile, leaning comfortably against a tree with his arms crossed. Another of him as he appeared to be sleeping. And another of him more recently, smoking his pipe upon her veranda.
So, she'd captured him at his best moments and his worst.
And hung them upon her bedroom wall.
But there was something about them that made him question. They truly didn't seem like paintings. They were too… lifelike.
He was so enthralled by the portraits, he hardly noticed her get up, pad softly across her room to her shelf and grab her Polaroid camera until an odd noise and a flash broke him from his enchantment.
He turned and watched as the device in her hands spat out, like a tongue, a square of black and white. Kagome waved it in the air a few times, peeked at it and smiled before turning it to show him.
It was him in that very place, seemingly enraptured by the many portraits of himself. It almost seemed vain, really.
"I've never known magic such as this before."
Again, there was a question in his comment. This time she gratified him with an answer, using this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something she'd wanted to do for years.
"It's not magic," she said, walking up to stand beside him and smiling. "Watch."
He watched. And the device made the same odd noise before spitting out the same square of black and white. Only this time, after waving it around in the air, it revealed himself and the miko in full color.
She smiled so brightly it had to have hurt, and as she'd instructed he'd been watching.
Watching her.
He peered at the magical portrait, seeing things he hadn't realized were happening in the moment.
In the image of them, he appeared to be gazing down at her like a lover, his eyes and face soft. He'd angled his body toward her, his attention undivided.
And she… she'd been leaning into him, her head canted toward him, though her brilliant blue eyes were ahead. Her smile seemed equal parts alluring and cunning.
Then he noticed other things. How her hair draped over her shoulder to mingle with his own. How her eyes appeared seductively hooded. The way the collar of her kimono opened just enough to reveal the soft curves of her breasts.
Sesshomaru straightened and stepped away from her, clearing his throat.
"You don't like it?" She almost sounded hurt, but she laughed. "I'm still keeping it, anyway."
He watched her closely as she replaced the device on the shelf and tucked the tiny portraits between several pages of bound parchment.
"How does it work?" He finally asked, unable to contain his curiosity this time.
She laughed again before grabbing the device once more and holding it out to him.
"It's called a camera. It takes Polaroid pictures," she explained as he took it. She manipulated his hands on the camera and he took note of her warmth. "You point it at who you want to take a picture of, click this button and wait for it to print. Try it."
He glanced around her room, his eyes landing on her, and she smiled at him, tucking hair behind her ear.
He aimed it at her, clicked the button and she laughed as they waited for the picture to print.
He shook it as she had, waiting for it to clear. The image was a bit lopsided and she couldn't be seen from the waist down, but sure enough, he'd caught her image.
She'd gazed over the camera, at him, a remarkably soft look in her eyes and her smile. Her hand was still lifted to her ear.
"Hn."
He handed the device back to her, and switched topics.
"I was not aware you were such a talented artist," he said, directing her attention to her painting.
"It's called Tokyo," she revealed, her eyes lingering on the city skyline, the world from which she'd come. "I was born there."
He'd had suspicions she came from some other plane of existence – mystical and alien as she was – but it didn't make it any less shocking to hear it confirmed.
His eyes drifted to her writing desk and the calligraphy paper strewn across it. "You are quite skilled with the fude as well."
He bent down to pick one up and her eyes widened before she snatched it from his hand, laughing awkwardly as she tucked it into her sleeve. He lifted a bemused brow.
"That one's private."
Nodding, his eyes slid over her room again, snagging on imperial purple fundoshi hanging over the side of a wicker basket.
She noticed him eyeing them and tried to withhold her blush as the memory of him in her bathing pool came back to her.
"The most expensive pair of panties I've ever purchased," she sighed. "I'm not prone to impulse buys, but the atelier made me angry."
He turned questioning eyes upon her and she shrugged.
"Miko are revered, but they aren't paid well," she explained. "Because I was wearing the uniform, the atelier automatically assumed I couldn't afford the purple dye." She stuck her hands on either hip looking rather put out. "Then proceeded to accuse me of lying about being a miko because I was 'galavanting around' with a half-demon." She humphed. "So I dragged Inuyasha across the road to their competitor and purchased the item from them instead." She snickered, amusement in her eyes. "I bought one in the same color for Inuyasha, too."
So she flaunted her money to put someone in their place, Sesshomaru thought with a mental shrug. He'd done that many times, himself.
Wandering over to her shelf, he ran his finger along the spine of one of her books.
"This…I have not seen books like these," he said, his eyes sweeping over her collection.
Kagome, for her part, appeared calm on the exterior. Inside, like a live wire, she was a mess of excitement and nerves.
Only in her wildest dreams had she dared to hope that Sesshomaru would show such interest in her. Or be standing, by choice, within her room. She rode it like the best of highs, never wanting to come back down.
"I brought most of them with me from Tokyo," she told him, coming to stand close beside him. She grabbed the book he touched, her hand brushing his, and ran her fingers over the cover.
"Herbal Alchemy," Sesshomaru said, reading the title.
"Nature itself is the best physician." She quoted Hippocrates, but that was a whole can of worms she didn't feel like opening at the moment, so she kept it to herself.
"You have read all of these books?"
He eyed the shelf-lined wall, filled with books and trinkets and other such items.
"Most of them. Not yet all of them."
"Are they all about herbs?"
"Nope," she admitted with a smile. "Some are about health and ailments. History. Meditation. General survival. Some are about art. Some are fiction-fantasy."
"Like a play."
"Yeah, sort of," she said softly, her heart melting at his open curiosity.
Citrine eyes glanced back to her unfinished wall, and her drying paints.
"I should let you get back to your work."
"Oh, okay. Sure, I should get back to it," she agreed, glancing over her shoulder at the nearly finished skyline. "It's finally almost complete."
Sesshomaru stepped over the threshold, pausing on the veranda to slide his feet into his boots.
"Show me once it's finished."
"It's a date," she said softly and he nodded before heading out into the garden, disappearing around a bend.
Sesshomaru sat beneath a willow, it's weeping branches lazily bending toward the pond near its base. They swayed in the gentle breeze and Sesshomaru closed his eyes, flashes of sunlight capering over his lids.
Inhaling, Sesshomaru pulled from his sleeve the picture he'd taken of Kagome.
Pink paint streaked her hair and cheekbone. A smear of blue across her nose. Green and gray on her fingers.
Sesshomaru's stomach pitched uncomfortably because there was undeniable beauty in her disarray. Because what he saw was a lovely, effervescent woman.
The blood drained from his face, his hands developing a fine tremor.
Because he was his fathers progeny, and damn it if the implication behind that didn't disturb him.
•••••••••
It wasn't until later that evening as Kagome gazed longingly at the picture of her and Sesshomaru that she realized it – he had returned the camera, but he'd kept the photo of her.
AN: All lyrics use throughout this fic are attributed to Starset.