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Rin
He was here. Even in her most unresponsive state she knew it as she felt a dark warmth envelop her in a bond so tight, so deep, so everlasting that it could only be him.
Her subconscious mind took relief in this state, as it meant she had not entered the next and final plane; that she had once again been presented the chance to escape the cold dark grip of death. In a place unacknowledged in her mind, she would breath knowing that she could exist in this plane forever, for as long as it took for her body to mend and for her soul to grow.
And yet now that she had found herself here in life for a third time, she found she had a better sense of discernment. This was only temporary, no being could exist in this plane for long, as life or death would come to claim you but before then. Yet before the break of day or the eve of one's final night; life would reveal itself to you. It would reveal great truths and falsehoods about all the universe and the power one could yield within it.
It was a gift, like all things in the world, and whether she was ready or not she would receive it. That would have to be enough for now.
It would be enough. He was enough.
She could feel a warmth settling into her now as she came to terms with the capriciousness of her being.
...
Kaede stood before her now, a bucket of warm sudsy water in her weathered but strong hands. She craned her neck and looked up towards the ceiling of their rebuilt hut; a hut that now sported a strong roof and walls, that winds couldn't knock over and rains could not penetrate. It was more spacious than the huts of the other villagers by far and was a coerced gift from the daiyoukai she had not seen in some time.
Her wrinkled and tanned face contorted into an expression of confusion and then deliberation before pulling the soft skin of her lips between her teeth and sighing.
"Hear me child and understand me well. Kagome is from a different time where, from what I have come to gather, miracles as we know them are not so profound. They live only with the demons that plague their spirits and I dare say that those demons are no different than the ones we face now, but to be so impartial as to attempt to determine where the soul goes? It is not her place, nor ours. It is something that will forever be beyond us, in a different plane." She said. "One we cannot exist in until it is our time."
Rin frowned and opened her mouth to remind Kaede that she had walked the plane she spoke of, the place between life and death; but found herself sputtering out water instead as the women drench her.
She coughed out the water, her lungs displaying a great show of vitality as she eyed the woman wearily.
"Obaasan," she coughed, "surely, if there are demons and kami, then there are these angels Kagome-sama speak of. It makes sense. I've died twice –"
"Ah but here you are child, alive, soul and all. Why did you not become an angel?" Kaede questioned. "A being that walks all planes and looks out for their loved ones?"
Rin smirked, "How are you so certain that I haven't? I've looked after you." She laughed.
Kaede smiled, "You have," she admitted, "were it not for your foolish antics keeping me up at night, I would have passed in a slumber befitting my age."
"Must you jest so crudely?" Rin rebuffed.
Kaede laughed in response, holding her rounded stomach for support. "Jest?" she countered.
Rin looked up at her beneath long wet lashes and flushed cheeks. "Obaasan," she whined. "Please, you speak as if….as if-"
"Oh, pipe down child. Ye have seen the doorstep of death more than anyone in this village. You fear what you know and embrace what you don't. This backward thinking is why – bah." The old woman spluttered.
"Why I am unmarried?" Rin finished for her.
Kaede poked her nose into the air refusing to reply or begin a conversation she deemed was no longer worth having.
Rin smirked, "Perhaps I'm unmarried because I am not favored."
Kaede rolled her eyes and began massaging the shampoo into her hair. "You forget the most important part about these angels," she sighed, "Kagome-kun said they were unimaginably beautiful, perhaps you are one of these beings after all."
Rin's smile faltered before becoming rigid in place.
Kaede noticed and said nothing as she continued to wash the girl's hair.
"When you pass obaasan, how would you like to be remembered?" Rin asked in a whisper, hugging her knees to her chest.
"What I want when I pass will not matter much." Kaede replied.
Rin nodded, "It will for those you will leave behind, it will for those who will live more lifetimes than you can imagine. When I pass I don't want people to remember me as beautiful. I want them to remember me as strong, caring, loving, devoted, as me. Who am I, if all I am to those around me….is beautiful?"
Kaede hummed a throaty laughter, "As much as you've grown you haven't changed at all, backwards and yet so forward in thinking. Child, the world might remember you as beautiful but those who know you, those who love you, will remember all that you were to them and to the world around you."
A moment of silence passed between them and Rin believed it to be the end of their conversation.
"You are so naïve Rin. Don't you see? You are only so beautiful because your soul could not contain the beauty that is within you." She gripped her chin and forced her to meet her eye. "Listen to me, stop this madness. It is not Sesshomaru who determines your worth in this life. Do you understand me Rin?"
Rin's startled eyes started to drift away from her own and she shook her with as much force as her elderly body could.
"Rin! I – I do not know how much longer I have here with you,"
"Obaasan," Rin began in an effort to talk her down.
"Hush! My time has come and gone; you are no longer a child. You have helped give life and you have ended it; I will not be here until you are old and grey. Let me go! I have made peace with it but I have not made peace and I will not find rest until you stop trying to please a phantom. Training, foraging, battling, pushing your body to its limits so that a demon can see you, see your worth; it's nonsensical."
Her voice cracked then and Rin watched as the strong woman that had raised her collapsed with shortness of breath by bath in a small chair.
"Kaede!" Rin shouted as she shot out of the tub and covered the elderly woman with a dry towel.
"I'm fine." Kaede muttered.
"Obaasan, please." She pleaded. "Just sit, we still have the tea out, let me bring you some."
Rin walked purposely across the hut and grab the warm cup of tea she hadn't drank earlier and knelt before the woman that raised her.
Kaede took the tea from the naked woman before her and chuckled. "You'll catch your death running around like that."
Rin smirked, "Not before you catch yours working yourself up over me." stood up quickly; her lack of modesty a common theme in the home now.
Rin sighed, she knew she was right and in theory she understood but what everyone seemed to constantly misunderstand is that she simply didn't want to live a life alone anymore.
"Please Obaasan, do not speak like this and do not work yourself up. All life is finite, I know." She whispered. "But I still need you."
"I'm not going anywhere until you start living, until you give me a child to hold." Kaede promised cheekily.
Rin placed her hand on her hips, the water on her body glistening in the light, "Well then I have nothing to fear, you'll be alive a long time."
Kaede pursed her lips in thought, "Not too long, I'm sure."
Rin rolled her eyes.
Kohaku.
He watched as she sat across the river with a firm face, her tongue poking between her full lips in utter concentration as she washed her clothes against the rocks. Her hair was half up and half down in a wild disarray as she ran her wet hand through it repeatedly. The cool water doing nothing to abate the wild blush on her face; she looked adorable.
"Are you going to say something to her?" Miroku asked as he dried off the pouting boy in front of him.
The sun sat in the sky languidly, the river calm. Kohaku didn't reply as he made faces at his four-year-old nephew in an attempt to make him laugh.
"Kohaku, you are a man now, a renowned slayer in your own right. You should take a wife and if you fancy Rin…." He continued.
"Miroku," Kohaku said suddenly, "how did you know Sango was the one for you? Was she just the first woman to cave in or did you really pursue her?" Kohaku asked in response.
Miroku smiled as he reminisced, "Of course I wooed her, I presented her with what gifts I could, I sought to bring her the innermost peace, we shared moments of hardship and joy together. I even asked her to bear my child."
"But you did that with every woman Miroku, what did you do for Sango? Only for Sango."
Miroku turned beat red, "I did not do that to every woman! Is that what she told you?!"
Kohaku rolled his eyes, "What can I say to her that she doesn't know?"
"Well for starters you can tell her you love her." Mirok prompted.
Kohaku flushed, "I can't do that. Not when, she doesn't….love me like that."
"And just how would you know?" Miroku wagered.
Kohaku plucked at the grass at his feet unwilling to answer a question he knew everyone should have already guessed. "She doesn't…," he sighed, "she doesn't wait for me."
Miroku looked at him in confusion before snorting into a hard chuckle. "Well her life is not dependent on yours why would she? Women aren't the docile creatures we paint them to be, they don't wait on us to get things done. They are powerful in their own right and you of all people should know this. Sango and Kagome are some of the strongest people and fighters-"
"No Miroku," Kohaku said cutting him off, "She doesn't wait for me like she waits for Lord Sesshomaru. She doesn't hang on my every word like she does his or admire me like she does him. I won't - I can't compete with him."
Miroku nodded in understanding a look of thoughtfulness on his face. "You can't compete with him or you won't Koahku? Those are two different things."
"I won't." Kohaku affirmed. "I've loved Rin since I was a boy , since before I loved myself even and she loves him. She would follow him to the ends of this earth and it would make her happy. So at the price of my own happiness I am willing to give her to him uncontested. I won't deter her from her joy."
Miroku smiled albeit grudgingly, he remembered having thought the same way about Sango so many years ago.
"A noble thought from a noble man." Miroku said getting up and dusting off his robe. "But someone with a mean left hook once told me that a coward and a fool share the same thoughts as a noble man. Letting her go is easy, pursuing her is not."
"I'm not a coward or a fool Miroku." Kohaku bit back, "I love-"
"Kohaku?" Rin exclaimed as she narrowed her eyes to get a better look at him.
"Rin! Hey!" Kohaku shouted in return from across the river.
Rin smiled before cupping her hands over her mouth, "Don't move I'll hop over!"
"No, I'll come over to you." He replied bashfully.
Miroku laughed, "I'll leave you two alone."
Kohaku barely heard him as his heart skipped a beat watching rin lfit her gown to hop more comfortably over the stones to meet him.
She tried to gauge the distance between the stone she was on and the small boulder before her, her dress was too snug to make the leap she was sure. Kohaku too noticed this and began seamlessly jumping from stone to stone in order to meet her.
Watching his step carefully and not the woman before him, he jumped onto the small boulder a second before she made her attempt. A small shriek left her lips as their bodies collided and they fell into the river in an ungraceful heap of limbs.
They tussled in the water before finally breaking free. His hair blinding him as he burst through the surface and grabbed much needed air. "Rin!" he shouted.
A halo of dark hair emerged from the water and as panic coursed through him, his heart stuttered as he watched as she laughed without restraint beside him in the water.
"Kohaku!" she shouted between her fits of laughter. She pushed her long hair out of her eyes and face before bringing her arms around his neck. "Hi." she beamed.
"Hi,h-how have you been?" Kohaku asked.
"Drier." Rin laughed, "And warmer, yourself?"
Kohaku laughed, "Hold onto me, I'll get us to the other side."
He turned to help her transition onto his back which she held onto firmly as she leaned over and brought her lips to his ear. "How about I race you instead?" she countered before pushing him beneath the water and swimming toward the shore.
He grabbed her ankle and yanked her into the water as he popped through and started swimming.
"Cheater!" she yelled as she emerged again.
….
They dried off in a fit of laughter on the riverside, Kohaku ran his hands through her silky strands and Rin hummed in approval.
"You've gotten better at this part." Rin admitted.
"That and a number of other things I hope." Kohaku laughed.
"Well in the time you've spent becoming a master hair braider, you've certainly become quite the renowned slayer." Rin breathed as he began braiding her hair.
Kohaku said nothing in reply; hearing the heaviness of her tone he knew there was more to follow.
"I am so happy for you Kohaku, you've accomplished so much, you followed your dreams and you are so free." she muttered.
Only because you set me free, he wanted to say. Only because you allowed me to be. He itched to say it, he choked on the words that wouldn't leave him.
"I want to be free Kohaku." she sighed.
"You can be." Kohaku promised.
"I-I….He never came for me. I thought he would come and free me but he never did." she whispered. "He...I'm trapped here Kohaku, in a life I never wanted. What do I do? I cannot continue to be a burden. I need to make something of myself, a wife, a teacher, a farm hand, something! I...I just do not know!"
"Would those things make you happy?" He asked her genuinely.
"Happy?" she sniffled.
He wrapped his arms around her small frame, "Yes Rin, happy. Would staying here and becoming a wife, a teacher or a farm hand make you happy?"
She shook her head mutely.
"No." she whispered. "I want to travel, I want to see more of the world, I want to make my own place in the world."
"Then you will." Kohaku promised. "And I will help you."
"Will you teach me to become a slayer?" she asked.
"Is that what you want?" Kohaku asked her genuinely, softly stroking her cheek to wipe the tears away.
"Yes." she said her eyes beseeching him.
"Why did you wait for him?" Kohaku asked. "Why didn't you free yourself?"
She turned to look at him, her brown eyes drowning in what he knew was not river water.
"I didn't know I could, will you show me how? Will you teach me?"
"Yes." he said as he brought his lips to her forehead.
Rin caught his face between her hands and pressed her lips to his. Kohaku could feel his eyes widen in shock before the feeling of heat coursed through him as she began to devour him. Breaking away for air for a second before attacking his lips again, pushing him against the soft forest floor before licking his bottom lip and then slipping her tongue into his mouth.
He felt his mind, soul, and bones begin to melt as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him.
Sesshomaru.
The heat coursing through his body was unbearable and left everything feeling like tinder ready to kindle at a moment's notice.
Every part of his being was consumed in what he knew were imaginary flames although he could not convince his body to understand.
It was a covenant, the bond that he had so carelessly inflicted on himself, that their souls would be tied to one another until death parted them and even then, there was no true promise of separation. Bonds were so rare among demons and even rarer among daiyoukai; though they were coveted, treasured and often manipulated.
They were greedy beings born to hunger for power and dominance wherever it could be won but in creating a bond with another creature, their baser instinct were thwarted in an effort to serve the only thing they deemed valuable; their partners.
This was the outcome he had been attempting to avoid for over a decade. Yes, as he burned in an effort to save the only creature that ever felt for him, he could recall now why it had been so necessary to leave her; it was to avoid this fate. Their lives would be irrefutably changed, their fates tied, and his legacy devastated.
He had been going soft, unable to justify the ugliness of his presence in her life anymore. Naraku no longer pursued them and she was in more danger of him than anything else.
They corrupted one another like slow poison except what made this worse was that it seemed natural. It had become natural to him to become complacent with not killing, it had become natural to him to defer to her needs, it had become natural to him to protect her like a vassal would a Lord or deity.
And so it was necessary for him to leave her though he had originally told himself he would just visit her less often. It had been necessary to become more savage, more determined in battle to conquer more lands, to obtain more vassals, to constantly be in motion if only to exile all thoughts of her. it had all been necessary.
It had all been futile.
He roared as a pain like no other engulfed his mind and soul, branding him as hers for all of eternity and robbing him of his consciousness if only briefly and like every other being in the cave he succumbed to his fevered dreams and memories.
