Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha or Naruto. The only thing I own is the plot.

Betas: Michelle T., AstaraelDarkrahBlack

Chapter 12: The Quiet After - The Quiet Before (Part 1)


They made the return to the temple from the Kazekage's office with haste, travelling under the guise of the night. Oren carried Kagome in her arms as she leapt silently from rooftop to rooftop, flanked by her similarly mute comrades. No one said a word of the day's incident but at that time, Kagome was too tired and sleepy to say anything about it.

The second day brought with it the impact of her actions the day before. Everyone walked on eggshells around her and talked to her with a reservation that hadn't been there ever since they first came to her as her companions, protectors, friends. Where there was once fond acceptance, there now was uncertainty. The maidens were distant once again, their months spent in close proximity together having been suddenly erased by Kagome's effortlessly neutralizing one of them in a time of need. Yuhi, who had come out of the whole incidence without so much as a scratch on her, would spend much of her time flinching while in Kagome's presence.

"Are you… upset?" It took Kagome until late evening of the second day to scrounge up the courage and faced Oren with the question on her mind while the other woman rebandaged the palm Rasa cut with a clean roll of soft spun linen after rubbing it down in oil of myrrh. The cut was clean but deep and she ached still from the open wound. It was yet one more reminder that this body was wholly mortal. She could feel the weight of stares on the cut, her maidens seemingly coming to the same conclusion that she was flesh and blood just like them, softer even.

"Upset? Because you ran away from the orphanage and left us behind?"

"... Yes…"

The warrioress looked at her then, her gaze long and slow and weighted before it slid past her shoulders to come rest on the faces of her comrades sitting behind Kagome in the same room. A minute passed before Oren looked back at her charge once again and said.

"I think the word you are looking is… resent, isn't it? Do… we... " Her 'we' was weighted with pointed intention. "...resent you for making us fail our task?"

Very slowly, Kagome nodded.

"How can we?" said Oren "When we kept you against your wishes." Bringing her nicely rebandaged hand up high and laying a soft kiss against the cloth covered palm of her hand, Oren spoke quietly.

"Miko-sama is dear to my heart. I would never do that as long as I draw breath…" There was a pause, heavy and fraught, before she continued. "Miko-sama is her own person. She doesn't know a whole lot about my world but her freedom is sacrosanct. I cannot tell her where she must go or what she must do. I can only do my best to keep her safe. But… if, one day, for whatever reason, she were to decide to leave us, then it would greatly sadden me."

Kagome had never once harbored any delusions concerning the purpose of her maidens. She knew, just from the sharp tones of their bodies and the easy way they handled knives, whether inside or outside of the kitchen, that their work likely involved violence and bloodshed of some kind. It was that kind of world she was in. That did not subtract from the fact that each and every one of them were decent people and their fondness of her was genuine in nature. Still, to suddenly have their previously gentle plant-growing charge revealed as less than perfectly harmless must be a shock that was not easy to get over. She sensed more than saw the slightest flicker in the expressions of the maidens after Oren's quiet but staunch declaration, but they too stayed silent.

It would take time, but she hoped that they would soon be able to return to the easy semi-friendship they once had. The people of Suna had taken every care to ensure her a comfortable life but this room, this temple, this status as the provider of many of the village was a lonely place to be.

.

.

.

Her trips out of the temple were all cancelled for the day, even her usual walks across the fields and gardens hanging above the mesas surrounding the village. When she asked why, Oren simply shook her head and told her it was a complicated scene outside right now with the cleanup effort after the tanuki's rampage going on. A part of the market square had collapsed and would need a quick rebuild. A couple fuel and grain silos had also taken hits and needed a patch-up. There were also people stuck under sand dunes and collapsed buildings waiting for rescue and medical care. All this in addition the construction and preparation for the festival that was to take place in mere weeks. Too many new faces, too many things going on, too many things could go wrong, would probably go wrong if people got wind that the Miko was walking out in public.

When Kagome asked to come out and help with the clean up too, Oren simply shook her head and said, "You are but one more hand in a thousand. I've seen you do manual work. Your magic doesn't help you there." Oren took her hand, turned it till her bandage palm was face up, the red line where Rasa cut her plain to see. "If you truly so desire to go, I will carry you out there myself and plunge my hands into the rubble by your side, but if Kagome-sama would deign to hear me; the people can take care of themselves in this case. They too, would not want to bother you with things that they could take care of by themselves. Stay. Stay here where we can keep you safe."

It was frustrating but Kagome didn't want to push them so soon after what she had to do to Yuhi and the stunning revelation of her miko abilities.

"Will you… at least tell me how… Gaara is doing?"

"Last I heard, the boy had been returned home, and sleeps still," said Oren. "But I can request updates for you."

"Please do. I want to know. I want to know more about him."

Rasa never came for the usual nightly language lesson. Oren told her it was because the Kazekage had been busy directing the cleanup and rescue efforts in the village today. That might be true but Kagome wondered if that was it or perhaps he wanted to make a statement about 'repercussions' and such. That might sound childish of her to think so of the man, but if she knew him—and she thought she had a fair idea what kind of man her taciturn guardian was—then mind games like that would just be right up his alley.

On the second day, they could hear the sounds of construction—of massive stones being moved and waves of sand shifted about and beams of metal bending to commands—coming from outside through the few windows in Kagome's quarters at the back of the temple. At around midday, Oren came with news.

Gaara was awake… and well. That was all Oren would say on the subject before veering to other topics. The rebuilding of the central market square and other buildings collapsed during the tanuki's rampage was in full swing. It seemed most, if not all, of the people missing in the chaos were accounted for. Some were in the hospital. Some had died before help could reach them. A few more children would soon be admitted into the village's now incredibly well supplied orphanage. But many more yet lived and were unharmed. The Go-Ikenban had been holding daily meetings, apparently furiously discussing the particulars of some concord among them. Most likely it had something to do with her and her request to be allowed contact with the boy whose soul was merged with the tanuki. For the moment, it seemed Kagome's confrontation and swift curbing of the tanuki had been completely covered up by the state. Though the minute-long clash had been of epic proportion and out in the public under clear daylight, it had also transpired within a localized sandstorm courtesy of the tanuki's power. Aside from Rasa, the Suna warriors accompanying him, and the two thousand civilians stuck within the market, the rest of the village had been herded off to safe houses or underground bunkers and so had seen nothing.

By the words of the village's upper echelons, it was the Kazekage who subdued the rampaging Shukaku as usual. For the most part, the village people believed in the words of their leaders. There were rumors still of course, of the Desert Spirit in human form pacifying the terrible beast with some mythical power never before seen, but without definite proof and against years of the very same beast being brought to heel by their Kazekage, the rumor never quite took off except within specific circles, the orphanage being one of them.

"Your little guide to the market had quite the tale to regale his friends with it seemed," Oren remarked. For the moment, most of the village remained ignorant of her power. It was just as well. She had never wanted anyone to know, being well aware that it could attract attention of the unsavory kind. That she even used her Miko ki in broad daylight and with so many witnesses had been a product of circumstance and not of choice.

From the farms, fields and orchards atop the mesas came wreaths of flowers, pots of fresh honey, fruits with their stems still oozing sap, and many many well-wishes and concerned inquiries of her health. The plants and trees were doing well in Kagome's absence though her presence was dearly missed by the farmers and gardeners that undertook their daily tending.

Rasa-sama, said Oren, would not be coming for a few days. The leader of Sunagakure was fully occupied with village repairs, the encroaching Maharra which would not be postponed except for war or great calamities, and the lengthy meetings with the Go-Ikenban. Likely he would not visit but for another week. While he was preoccupied—said the order from a sealed missive in Oren's hand in ever so polite phrasing—Miko Kagome Higurashi was not to leave the perimeter of Saruka temple regardless of circumstances. For her protection and welfare, additional guards, doctors, and other attendants were stationed right outside of her quarters.

In other words, she had been effectively placed under tacit house arrest.

Oren touched Kagome's hand as she watched emotions—first shock, then frustration followed by a hint of anger—flit by on her charge's face.

"It's only for a week," she said, "Things are hectic right now. Taking recent events into consideration, Kazekage-sama must worry that you would act… rashly. I hear things are tense in the Go-Ikenban meetings. Matters concerning Gaara-sama aren't things that even the honorable Kazekage-sama could decide by himself. He'll be back before you know it and then we will go see Gaara-sama… together."

Her voice was soft, spoken with the slow, placid tone that one would use to console a child. It had the opposite effect on Kagome however. She was no child to be consoled and her request not one made on a whim.

"And if… he doesn't allow me to see Gaara?" said Kagome quietly. "If he… would not hear me again. What then, Oren?"

The eldest and most perceptive of Kagome's maidens gave her a long, slow look that went on for a full minute before finally replying.

"Then I will not stop you the next time you decide to… make him listen to you."


In Rasa's absence, Kagome gained another language teacher in his stead. On the second night, Temari appeared before her, wearing a mixture of uncertainty and awkwardness on her face. In her hands she held stacks of books and a box, and looking shyly at Kagome while surrounded by the maidens, she said her greeting.

"Hi… you.. remember me right? From the other day?"

"Yes. You are Temari." Rasa's daughter though she favored him little in looks. Temari was her mother's spitting image. The same hair, the same face, with eyes that were just a little more fierce. A direct result of being her father's daughter most likely. "We never really got to... talk that day, did we? I should have… at least sent words to you. I'm sorry." Then she made a gesture at the seat by the low table where her lessons were usually conducted. "Come sit!"

"Your pronunciation improved," Temari cracked a tentative smile as she sat down on the plush cushions by the table. The crooked smile fit better on her face than the previous look of uncertainty. "Your grammar too."

"I have nothing else to do… these days," replied Kagome, frowning as she made a vague gesture at the room they now sat in. "I cannot go out. I want to but... Kazekage-san is..." she wracked her memory for that one phrase she had heard Mokoto yelling at a recalcitrant Mei over something they had both been too embarrassed to explain. "... bullheaded old man! He would not listen."

Temari gave off a barking laugh, as if surprised.

"Yes, dad can be... " she coughed, smiling and relaxing a little. "... frustrating at times."

"Bullheaded. Unreasonably... pa… paranoid. Don't know how to listen."

Somewhere in the back, Mei tried in vain to stifle her snickers. Temari however simply nodded sagely in agreement.

"Well, he probably is right you know? Everyone is talking about you these days. People are excited to see your first public appearance. If you go out now and people know who you are, it might just cause a big commotion and nobody wants that after a Shukaku episode."

She laid the books on the table, patting them affectionately.

"Anyhow, he's not going to be around for at least another week. So I'm here to fill in for him. Dad said you liked tales and stories."

She did. Despite her grounded temperament, Kagome had always been too fond of fantastic tales of otherworldly realms and people for her own good. Modern day Tokyo could be a terribly dull place, especially for a schoolgirl whose life revolved mostly around the mundane. It was this fondness that initially got Kagome to commit herself to following Inuyasha around in their wild goose chase across the Sengoku Jidai. Rasa, who apparently owned an entire library in his private residence, had capitalized on this and taught her the Sand people language through myriads of stories. He would read to her once or twice and then let her read it herself. That way, Kagome would steadily absorb the words and writing and culture that were part and parcel of the stories. They were simple tales, probably mundane by the standards of the local people, but to Kagome who knew little of their world, they verged on the border of being delightfully outlandish fables.

Modern Tokyo certainly had no humans that could move around mountains and grow crystal out of sand. Neither did the Sengoku Jidai for that matter. Add in the fact that Kagome rarely ever got to travel and see things in this new world, those books had been the sole window through which she saw the lives of the people of this world.

They had started out with nursery rhymes and children story books. In the last two months, Kagome had made her way into the territory of short and simple Suna folk tales. The books Temari brought however, looked nothing like the usual leather bound tomes that came from her father. These books were a little more in line with what Kagome used to see through the glass windows of downtown Tokyo. All glossy covers and bold, colorful prints, bearing titles such as 'Chunin Girl', 'Adventures in Nadeshiko country', 'Maybe in Another Hidden Village', and 'Confessions of a she-ANBU'.

"What is this?" asked Kagome, picking up the one on top the stack. A slim volume with the illustration of a pretty warrioress surrounded by… chains and kunais? And there were maybe two or three warriors in the background with varying expressions of pain and yearning on their faces and they were all… shirtless?... and glistening? And they all had some very amazing abs painted in great details…

Behind Kagome, Mei sputtered incoherently. "Are those…"

"Best-selling kunoichi lit…" offered Temari tentatively, her face flushed and her voice wavering between embarrassed and eager. "I thought you would be fed up with all the boring books from dad's part of the library. He can be very… um… old fashioned, so he can't really be counted on to know what girls our age like. So I… uh… somebody I know assured me these are all the rage with the girls these days. I checked them out. They should have a lot of… a lot of… new vocabulary that you haven't learned from the other books…"

"New vocabulary indeed. Do they include words like 'heaving' or 'throbbing' or 'glistening'?" commented Mokoto as she opened one and skimmed the pages. "They do!" She announced mere seconds later.

"Oh…" said Kagome, face red like a tomato. Across from her, Temari was in no better shape but the girl was soldiering on regardless, though her voice now came out in a high-pitched barely discernible string of sounds.

"... The setting is closer to modern day Suna than those old folk tales dad usually brought you. These are… okay… a little saucy yeah, but it's good fun right? And I hear that people tend to learn things faster if they really enjoy the learning process and every girl I talked to really really enjoyed these books and… and—oh god, please-don't-tell-father-I-bought-these..."

By this time, Mei's snickering and gasping had become full blown, hysterical guffaws. Yuhi, who was sitting by her long time friend, was shaking with barely restrained laughter. The commotion drew the rest of the maidens to the living room where they cluttered around the red faced Temari and Kagome and the glossy, conspicuous books on the table.

"Is that the new Fifty Ways to Use Chains and Kunais for Pleasure by S-Class Madame?" Aiki started, gasping scandalously. "Temari-hime I had no idea you were…" Her comment effectively kickstarted a twittering ruckus among the warrior maidens.

"You know who S-Class Madame is, Aiki?" Yuhi ribbed her fellow warrioress with teasing eyes. "Something you haven't told us huh?"

"Of course not! I just! I mean… my cousin read it and told me about it. Yeah!"

"Your cousin, huh?"

"Ooh, I haven't read this one yet," Mokoto cut in with her nose buried in between the pages. "I hear she put in a twenty-page long torture scene using just chains and kunai. Is that true? In her previous book she wrote about which poisons to use for a first date picnic. A bit of Night Wind and a bit of Shimmering Oasis make just about any guy thinks he's out of breath and lightheaded by your looks and charms. S-Class Madame really is very creative with her ninja tools. She doesn't waste anything ever. A true Sunagakure kunoichi! If I hadn't read her books I wouldn't even have known that could be done!"

"Then you should have read her debut novella," Chiyome advised, throwing a sly smile at her comrades. "She was showing how to strip a guy of his armour and have him hog-tied and helpless in under three minutes using just a spool of ninja wire or chakra string. Handy in and out of the battlefield. That book is soooo popular with the girls of the puppet brigade and I hear it has become something of a cult classic with the ladies from Konoha medic corps."

"Temari-hime, if your father knew…" Temari was so red Kagome thought steam was going to come out of her ears any moment now. Still, the embarrassed smile on her face hadn't yet disappeared. "He might just attempt to get the press shut down and set ANBU on uncovering S-Class Madame's real identity. These books really aren't appropriate for girls your age, yet you know of them? Should have waited a couple more years but you have always been an overachiever, haven't you?"

That was when the conversation abruptly changed course.

"Wait a minute. Are these even appropriate for Kagome-sama?" Hirano cut in, the quietest of all seven maidens; she could go on an entire day without uttering a single word. As a result, in the rare occasion that she did speak up, others in the group tended to pay attention. Immediately all eyes in the room focused on Kagome who squirmed under the sudden scrutiny.

"Umm…" said Kagome, face hot and tongue tied and looking anywhere but the books with their tempting, glossy covers.

"You dumbass! She's the same age as us!" Yuhi came to her rescue. Surprising considering they hadn't exchanged a word since the incident at the orphanage.

"But she's civilian… She's like… eighteen now right? That's legal age for civilians right?" Apparently the people of Suna had two separate standards to define who was underage and who was of age, and Kagome was deemed squarely in the other more fragile and slower growing category.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Chiyome protested. "The point is… does Kagome-san like those kinds of books?"

Kagome, being a private person, had never liked being put under the spotlight. Having that kind of question pointed at her all of a sudden only made it so much worse. She fidgeted under their attention, twisting her hands underneath the table, like a deer in the headlight.

"Umm… uh… I… uh…" She was flushed all the way to the tip of her ears and was looking anywhere but the girls and the sassy volumes on the table.

This time, it was Oren who came to her rescue. The eldest warrioress and clear team leader had up until now stayed out of the quickly raucous-turning girl talk. The moment she saw that it was creeping into uncomfortable territory for her charge however, she stepped in immediately. Laying a reassuring hand on Kagome's shoulder, she leveled a stern look at the twittering warrior girls before her.

"Ladies, have you nothing better to do than pester Kagome-sama? What she prefers to read is not something you need to know." Her voice was not harsh but it carried a definite command in it.

The girls withered and quieted at once under Oren's stern look.

"It is now Kagome-sama's time to study with Temari-san. We should not bother them needlessly. Come…" She stood up, waving a beckoning gesture at the girls. "Your reaction time was sloppy at the orphanage two days ago. I will see to it that you all improve."

Just like that, Oren got the six teenage warrior maidens to meekly march out of the room, leaving Kagome and Temari alone to their devices. As she followed her younger teammates out the door, she turned to nod her goodbye at them.

"Kagome-sama, Temari-sama…" then and only then did the corner of her mouth curved into an amused smile. "... have fun studying."

The moment the door clicked shut, Temari mumbled apologetically.

"Sorry… I didn't mean to put you in the spot. I just…" Kagome stopped her before she could get further than that.

"No no. I'm not… I mean... I have to.. thank you." Despite the slightly embarrassing experience, because of Temari and her kunoichi lit, the tension that had festered between Kagome and her maidens since the tanuki incidence had lifted if only for a moment. Two days might not be a lot for some people, but with how stilted her conversations were with the maidens with the exception of Oren these days, Kagome was more than just a little grateful for the reprieve brought about by Temari's presence.

"You mean you like it!" There was pleasant surprise on Temari's face this time, along with an impish expression that looked far better her on her than uncertainty did.

"I… I don't know. I never tried. But, like you said, it's good harmless fun right?" Kagome replied, smiling in return at the younger girl. "I can already tell I will enjoy study sessions with you."

And that was how Kagome's tentative friendship with the eldest daughter of Rasa started. Temari came every day in the morning and in the evening. Taking advantage of Kagome's suddenly free schedule, the younger girl crammed back-to-back lessons on local customs, etiquette and social niceties from eight in the morning to eleven in the afternoon on Kagome. Then after dinner of the same day, she would come back for their language lessons.

Almost immediately, Temari proved to be a far less demanding teacher than her father, preferring to get to know her student on a personal level over grilling her on her vocabulary and speaking skill, but also far more fun to be with. She would often bring gifts of local sweets and cute pastries to be shared with the maidens, and provoke bouts of whimsical girl talk that momentarily eased the strain in Kagome's relationship with her watchers due to her much younger age and propensity to become easy teasing target to the older warrioresses. Occasionally, she would bring in local board games and through open sessions with the maidens, taught Kagome a casual version of the Sand people language that her father never used.

Outside of Temari's classes however, Kagome suddenly found herself with more time than she knew what to do with. Though her life under the Kazekage's watch was one of comfort and needs taken care of before she even thought to ask, it was also often without a spare moment. Kagome's service to the common people of Suna was one that was very much appreciated and under great demand. Sunagakure was a village in name only. In truth, with its sheer scale, its number of population and autonomy, it was more a city state than actual village. More than a million people called this place home and Kagome, ever since she accepted the Kazekage's offer, had become the sole provider for most of them.

Even for desert folks accustomed to making the most of what they had, a million was a lot of people to feed. The trees that Kagome planted might be growing fine even without her presence for weeks on end, but it still took Kagome the better part of a month to make a round through the agricultural land that now spanned the vast space above the mesas. Before her tacit house arrest, Kagome would often spend most of her day just strolling the paths between the crops and fruit trees under the close supervision of her maidens and whatever guards Rasa put on her for the day, or visiting the farmer families that manned these newborn farms and fruit plantations.

Once these visits ceased, all of a sudden her days were filled with hours of next to nothing to do and plagued by an increasing sense of restlessness that left Kagome feeling frustrated and cooped up. Her quarters inside the temple—an apartment unit with three bedrooms, two showers, a pantry, a living room, and a backyard separated from the temple and surrounded entirely by either temple walls or mesa cliffs—might not be small, but it was quickly growing cramped for an antsy miko with a cadre of attendants that still more often than not acted unduly cautious around her.

Kagome tried not to let her frustration show, but she was less than successful when Oren came to her on the third day after the tanuki incident to present something to pass the time with.

"A secret language?" asked Kagome as she sat by the older woman on a cedar bench in the backyard, looking up at the star-studded desert night skies.

"Yes," said Oren. In her hands were a length of crimson cloth embroidered with arrays of colorful intricate motifs. A gift from a villager to the Miko whose mere presence brought them a time of plentifulness that they hadn't known for decades. One of the many. Though Rasa no doubt put anything sent to her through stringent security screens—and had most likely destroyed more than a small percentage of the villager's offerings—the stuff that were allowed to reach her still took up an entire room in the temple by themselves. There were furs and silk and cloths aplenty, and jewelries made out of shiny colorful gemstones. There were trinkets and books and shoes and fanciful crystal pots and bottles filled with fragrant cream and perfume. There were things that were many people's ideas of what to give to a budding young woman of importance but Kagome, who had grown used to the simple life from her travels through the Sengoku Jidai and later on among the poorest of Suna, really had no use for. Out of that pile of glittering gifts, handmade scarves and home woven, embroidered cloths like the one in Oren's hands were a dime a dozen. Which only made what the warrioress just told her all the more intriguing.

"Kilims," said Oren as she ran one hand over the exquisitely embroidered symbols on the crimson cloth. Her eyes, chocolate brown and framed under thick black lashes, gleamed as she traced the exquisitely crafted embroideries. "The secret language of Sunagakure women of the cloth and needles. They say it's thousands of years old. Would you like to hear the story?"

Did Kagome want to hear the story behind a gift someone had obviously spent an inordinate amount of time and work on to create for her? Of course!

"Long ago, before even the founding of Sunagakure, most of the people of this nation were illiterate," Oren started. "Literacy was the privilege of noble born clans and most of us back then were laborers, soldiers, craftspeople. A single small settlement of desert dwellers would have maybe a scribe who knew enough letters to compose news or messages to neighbor settlements, two if they were lucky. In contrast, even in the poorest, most backwater settlement, most women knew a thing or two about cloth making and sewing. The desert provided no easy supplies for cloth making of course, but most of us had to learn out of sheer necessity. It was only a matter of time that more complex crafts such as weaving or embroidery became common skills among the ancient Kaze no Kuni women populace."

What she said was true. The ordinary Suna citizen wore a lot of cloth on their bodies courtesy of the extreme year round weather of their home country. Anybody that walked out the house dressed only in one or two layers—as the people of Kagome's home or the Sengoku Jidai did—would quickly succumb to dehydration, heat strokes, even burns. While the warrior class seemed to prefer simple garments of muted tones such as black, white, or brown, the civilians, especially those with the means, tended to be more partial to colorful garbs with complex decorative elements. Despite a scarcity of resources in the desert, the fabric market commandeered a large part of Sunagakure internal economy and was often the most bustling part of town, always teeming with people and activities.

"Back then, there weren't many female warriors. Women were deemed too important to waste in battlefields. So most stayed home with their children, their looms, their homespun wool and fur and their needles. To support their families, many of these women would weave or sew clothes and fabric to sell to passing trader caravans, which in turn honed their skills even further than the the household level. It was not surprising in those days for a housewife to produce beautifully embroidered or woven masterpieces that could be sold to nobles or even royalty. Gradually, through centuries of shared mythologies and fables, a system composed of thousands of motifs, symbols, and designs—each with a specific meaning and lore—formed and was later on developed into a secret language."

She brought the scarf up and pointed at a crooked design made with gleaming silver threads "This one is a snake", the another one that looked like series of pointy waves made from indigo blue threads "Running water", and then the one next to it "Scorpion—great danger in the desert. A star—direction that you must follow. An eye—somebody is watching."

Kagome scooted closer, enthralled by the tale Oren was weaving. In her head she imagined ancient women at their looms or bending over an embroidery bone hoop. "These are beautiful..." Up close, she could see how much work must have gone into a mere scarf. Almost every inch of the cloth was covered in stunning hand embroidered designs. And to think she had not given much thought to these before. Unbidden, she felt the twinge of guilt. It was not that she did not value the gifts freely given by the ordinary villager. It was that she simply did not need much in life, even less so with an ever attentive guardian and provider in the form of the village leader himself. She had not known the time and heart that must have gone into the making of these items. Kagome quietly resolved to herself to go over all the fabric in the pile once she was done with Oren. Outwardly, she said.

"These are really pretty."

"Yes, they are, aren't they?" agreed Oren. "Which makes the Kilims incredibly useful when the era of ninjas and hidden villages came."

"Oh? How so? Because it's a… secret language?"

"Precisely," said Oren. "For some reason, and despite frequent trade and cultural exchange, the secret of the Kilim never left Kaze no Kuni. Possibly it was because most if not all of the practitioners had been women until then and thus were far away from active battlefields and frontlines. With the founding of Sunagakure, there was a surge of female warriors in espionage and infiltration taskforces. The Kilims, previously merely a secret language practiced among sisterhoods of the loom and needle, became a ready made complex coding system consisting of thousands of codes with various meanings depending on the color and compositions. Many first and second generation Sunagakure female spies and infiltrators were sent deep into other countries and enemy bases as simple seamstresses or house women. They would then send missives back to their home village under the form of hand embroidered or woven presents to relatives. A message on possible attacks could be found in the vines and flower motifs of a comb pouch. Vital intelligence regarding enemy forces could be read from the whorls at the hem of a dress."

"Wow…" commented Kagome, awed by the sheer coolness of cadres of spy seamstresses. It was like a spy novel starring housewives with secret identities. "Are they still in use these days?"

Oren smiled at her undisguised curiosity. "Not any more, regretfully, not as a secret coding system. The code was broken during the first ninja world war. Well, the part of it that could be used for military communication anyhow. Nowaday we use a coding system with rotating cyphers. But you see, here is where it gets interesting. The secret language of Kilims encompasses way more than what is needed for military communication. When the Kilim was discarded from our intelligence system, other parts of the language were still in use and actually flourished once it was no longer utilized by the state. The Kilim was a language created by women, wives, daughters and sisters. At its heart, it is the prayers that came from the hearts of women that waited back home."

That… sounded really romantic. The girl part of Kagome sighed dreamily. Beside her, Oren moved to a different part of the scarf. Right at the center was a design stitched with gold threads and around it were strings of smaller curves and curls in silver that fanned out like the light of the moon.

"This one," said Oren. "... is the symbol of the tree of life." Her finger traced the patterns in silver. "And around it are the blessings of health, love, and fortune. There are many more. Blessings of courage, of wisdom, of luck. Hundreds of them, each for a specific reason," she explained. "In the era of the Hidden Villages, Kilim and fabric arts were not as popular and widespread in the ninja population as they were in the civilian population. Still, during the reign of the first Kazekage, one out of three kunoichi were well versed in the craft of the loom and needle. When they became wives and mothers, these kunoichi too sewed scarves, belts and clothes for their beloved. The only difference was that whereas the normal civilian woman could only infuse her prayers in the cloth, the kunoichi instead soaked their creations with their chakra and their will to protect. It was not their intention to impregnate the cloth with chakra at first, merely something that happened naturally when they were in a state of concentration and thinking about the people that they wanted to protect. The designs themselves, passed down from generations of Kaze no Kuni women, were already potent icons. Powered by chakra and guided by the will of their creators, the meaning behind them became active amulets of protection. This was a complete accident. Up until the reign of the first Kazekage, sealing was a secret art only a few clans in the world were privy to and they tended to guard their knowledge zealously. There was an international outcry when clans with sealing arts discovered what we had accidentally created."

"They were upset?" asked Kagome.

"Very much so," replied Oren. "Some even accused us of stealing from them and went so far as to declare wars of retaliation on us. It was a mess for a while. But, either way, once it was created, none could take that knowledge from us. And that was how the kunoichi of Sunagakure gave birth to our native art of Sunagakure cloth sealing."

Then, looking Kagome in the eye, Oren said. "The tree of life. The blessings of health, love and fortune. There is no chakra in the cloth so it was most likely made by a civilian woman, but that does not diminish her message. The person who made this for you wished that you would lead a long and happy life Kagome-sama."

Kagome was struck speechless. She looked at the scarf in Oren's hands and suddenly see what she had been missing for a long time. Without saying a word, the older woman wrapped the scarf around her neck, and then smiling at her, she offered.

"Would you like to learn it?" She gestured at the embroidery on the scarf, meaning the language as well as the craft behind it.

There was a curious similarity between the Sand people Kilim and the Omamori, Shinto talismans her grandpa made and sold from the family shrine. She had always found them interesting, in a cutesy sort of way (and indeed the most popular ones were without fail those wrapped in cute pouches) but she herself had never properly learned to make one. The lore and artistry behind the Kilim was also an enthralling subject. It was not like Kagome had anything else to do in the long hours between Temari's daily classes and already at the back of her mind was the tantalizing thought of learning how to perhaps recreate the Omamori of her home culture through the art of Sunagakure Kilim. Kagome jumped at Oren's offer.

For the better part of the next week, in an effort to keep her mind from the cautious glances thrown her way from the maidens as well as the restlessness of being kept in an enclosed space for days on end, Kagome busied herself either with Temari or with Oren. If she was not making her way through some books, she was practicing saying a polite greeting for formal gatherings or trying her hand at stitching with the hoop and needle brought to her.

Time flew quickly when one was busy. So when the week finally passed, the noises of constructions from outside ceased, and the Kazekage of Sunagakure appeared for the first time after their standoff on the front of her door one fine morning in the place of his daughter, Kagome was caught completely unprepared.


End Chapter 12 - part 1


1. Chapter was getting too long again (nearing 7000 words and only half done) and I predict some hold-up from work so I split it into two parts. First part is pretty much a breather chapter since the last 3 chapters were all plot movers. The second part will up the pace again. Hopefully the second part goes up soon. Second part will cover the talk between Kazekage and Kagome (or rather a fight). The decision to allow Kagome to meet Gaara once per week, and the Maharra. Chapter should end with the start of the first meeting between Kagome and Gaara. After that, possibly a short interlude chapter starring Jiraiya as he meets up with a contact to discuss the big changes happening in Suna and the possibility of an intelligence/counter-intelligence war between villages revolving around this 'Miko' that nobody outside of Suna is sure is what or who exactly. He also gets to hear the announcement of a big campaign started by Suna that has Iwa and Kumo sending in spies in droves to feel out what the hell is going on.

This part is also half edited. One of my two beta is caught in a bad time (busy work). I'll come back to this chapter and upload the fully edited and proof-read. Please excuse any grammatical errors on my part. I hope it doesn't diminish your enjoyment of the story.

2. I realized during writing this chapter that Kagome had gone up one year in age since the start of the story. Kagome's birthday was never officially released but she was a confirmed Fall season baby and her horoscope apparently is Scorpio so most likely she was born late September to October. At this point in the story, we are in the latter half of December. So Kagome is now 18 years old.

3. Kilim is an actual secret language/system of motifs on Turkish rugs. The real life Kilim is a flat-weave used mostly on rugs though. The Kilim in this fic is more a composite of the Turkish Kilim and the embroidery techniques and traditions of various Turko-Mungol tribes such as Uyghurs, Khazars, and Khiljis. I thought the canon Sunagakure cloth binding techniques were quite interesting (especially when the most major character to use it so far is a kunoichi in the anime). It reminds me of the rich culture around fabric and fabric arts around the Arab, Persia, Turkey, and Mongol cultural sphere (cultures built in desert or oasis landscapes whose ethnic groups were composed of various previously nomad groups of people) that I was leaning on to create the Sunagakure of this story. The real world Kilim, in the world building perspective, really just fits right into this universe. I've always liked Turkish and Persian culture too so it was extra chance to read up on the cultures. I wish there were more books on West Asia cultures and history though, especially folk history and culture like this. It was really difficult for me to find research materials (so please forgive me if you are from the above cultures and found that I got it wrong somewhere).

Later on in the story, Kagome's experimentation at hybrid Kilim-Omamori will become... plot relevant (let's put it at that. I don't want to spoil stuff).

4. With this chapter, From the Garden of Gods officially passes the Bechdel test. There were several occasions in previous chapters but none were quite clear. This chapter with the talk and bonding between Kagome and Oren is a clear cincher though, so… hooray!

5. This fifth part is going to be long (just a warning) and it will address two linked questions that several readers have sent to me after the previous chapter of From the Garden of Gods. I thought that those were very interesting and valid questions and a lot of readers probably would like to hear the answers too so here they are. The questions are:

a/ Aren't Miko supposed to be virgins?

b/ Regarding Kagome's answer to the Go-Ikenban on the hereditary nature of Kagome's power, isn't that a bit sketchy since little in canon Inuyasha actually outright states that Miko power is hereditary (since we see Kagome's family are largely ordinary people). Also if Miko were supposed to be virgins like nuns, then the power being hereditary is kinda contradictory.

Interesting and valid questions and probably will help a lot of readers understand the world building of From the Garden of Gods better.

First, let's resolve question a. This is a resounding no—Miko in real life and in canon Inuyasha are not required to be virgins and never have been. In real life Japanese folklore, Ame-no-Uzume is the patron deity of all miko, as her dance is the origin of the Miko's Kagura dance among other things. Ame-no-Uzume is also the goddess of revelry and sensuality, including sex. Sex is seen as a divine act and also enables one's spiritual senses to heighten. A miko that has to be a virgin doesn't make sense.

The popular Western misconception that Miko have to be virgins is because Western audience link Miko with Catholic nuns who swear themselves to the one god and abstain from sex altogether and also the fetishization of Miko being virgins in hentai and Japanese erotica. (I know what you guys did. Sythe is genre savvy.)

In real practice and history, some Mikos were virgins, some weren't. In fact some are even married with children. (There's no age limit either) What matters is that they devote their hearts to the kami of their shrine, and have sincere intentions to take care of that kami.

In the Inuyasha anime, there was also a Miko named Tsukiyomi who had a lover (a demon lover by the way) while maintaining her duty as an active Miko warrioress.

Now, a few of you may be thinking, but Sythe, what about Canon Kikyo and all that drama about 'To be with Inuyasha I must return to being an ordinary woman.' Again, that is a tricky part. Consider this for a moment, Inuyasha as a series is deeply rooted in Japanese folklore and culture. It's a series written for Japanese people, and it expects its audiences to already be knowledgeable on various Japanese mythologies, folklores and value. Non-Japanese audiences, even with superb translation, tend to miss out on many subtle cultural elements of the series (imagine a pop novel written by an American author for American audiences referring things like the confederate flag or Kim K to make a point. The American audience would get it immediately but that would just fly over the head of many international readers). This case is one of those cultural nuances in which Rumiko Takahashi's intention probably is something else completely. Miko not being required to be virgins is a sure fact (and Rumiko knows it, which means she is trying to say something else completely when she wrote the part on how Kikyo wanted to become an ordinary woman and spend her life as Inuyasha's wife), but on the other hand, there are many other cultural factors (such as the fact that most Japanese women face societal pressure to retire from whatever career they hold before and become a housewife once they marry. Same goes for Miko. Though they are not required to specifically, many give up their spiritual vocation to become an ordinary housewife. This ingrained sexism is a much talked about issue of modern Japan) as well as Kikyo's emotions to take into account (especially considering that many fans interpret her love for Inuyasha as a manifestation of her weariness and loneliness due to her extremely powerful Miko abilities. Inuyasha in this case could have been a way for Kikyo to escape the loneliness of Miko life where other humans were at once reverent and fearful of her. Not to say that her love for him wasn't genuine, but it could have been started up and helped along by something else other than simple love too).

My personal interpretation aligns with the above interpretation from many Japanese fans: that Kikyo no longer wanted to be the powerful but lonely Miko (with her power waning as an effect of her unconscious wish on the Shikon no Tama) but to be an ordinary woman who was loved and in turn love an ordinary man. What she longed for was not just to be with Inuyasha (she could have done the same as Tsukiyomi did) but for him and her to have the normal life they never had (her because she was discovered to have tremendous potential when she was a child and him because of his halfbreed nature).

As to question b, this is a little more tricky. It is true that if we go by pure canon Inuyasha materials alone, whether Miko power (or Monk holy power for that matter) is hereditary or not is never very clear. On the not hereditary camp, we have Kagome's family being largely ordinary people. On the hereditary camp, we have Miroku, his father, grandfather and previous ancestors who had, without fail, produced children with potent Holy Power.

But, Miko and Monk power in Inuyasha was not something Rumiko Takahashi created by herself though. This fictional power is based on Japanese folklore in which all spiritual based power are called Reiryoku (basically Spiritual Power in Japanese). Sounds familiar? That's because Reiryoku is a popular superpower in many Japanese series including but is not limited to Yu Yu Hakusho, Bleach, Shaman King, etc…

Based on Japanese folklore and other series featuring the same Reiryoku, the answer to question b is much clearer. Reiryoku is hereditary, but hereditary alone does not necessarily means the children who inherit it can wield it.

There are two parts to Reiryoku: hereditary—which is the innate potential of a person to have spiritual power—and awakening. Awakening here can come from two things: either through training designed to tap into this potential, or a traumatic event that activates the power as a defense mechanism. In Japanese folklore, the plot element of a character undergoing some traumatic event (near death experience, witnessing the death of someone, meeting a supernatural entity, etc..) and coming away with some new supernatural power is very popular. On the hand, there are also characters that come from established clans, families or organizations that have traditions surrounding the awakening and training of this potential.

Without the second part of this equation (no awakening, no training), a person with a potential for Reiryoku can go their whole life as a normal person and pass on their latent potential to their offsprings without knowing.

Apply this to Inuyasha and immediately we see things clearing up. In the case of Kagome, it is a classic awakening. Subsequent to falling down into the Bone Eater's Well and meeting Mistress Centipede (traumatic event), Kagome started to develop her power (awakening). But her Miko abilities for the most part of the series were weak because she never received any training (unlike other Miko in the series such as Kikyo, Kanade, Tsukiyomi or Hitomiko). Kagome's family are people with potential but never underwent an awakening and so went most of their life as normal people.

In the case of Miroku, it's a classic cultivated potential scenario. Miroku's linage is one of powerful monks and demon fighters. He also received training since childhood from his father and later on from his monk guardian.

If you apply this same explanation to other series with Reiryoku in them, you will see that it fits too. Yu Yu Hakusho's Yusuke was born with the potential (being the descendant of a demon of all things), and up until his first death was a more or less normal kid. Only after his first death did his power awaken and start to grow.

Shaman King's Yoh is a cultivated potential case. Nuff said.

Bleach's Ichigo is overflowing potential and awakening from the moment of his birth, being the son of a female pureblood Quincy, a Shinigami in flesh form and infused with the soul of an artificial Hollow. Dang, talk about unfair genetics. Some kids just have it all.

So, to get back to Kagome's answer to the Go-Ikenban's question, her answer is correct and honest, but also lacking because the truth is a little more complicated than a clear cut yes. But even in the world of Naruto, powers that must have both hereditary and awakening factors are no strange things either (e.g. Sharingan, Rinnegan, both require latent potential and awakening) so it's not like the Suna nins are entirely without clues.