Before starting the third chapter, I would like to thank SessRinLover, blackboldbeuaty, ZafiraMente, BlueYoukai, Silvia S.K., Snow, Cam, and Bluerose160 for leaving a feedback on the last chapter. Here are a few remarks on the reviews:
SessRinLover: glad you liked Sessh's characterization, although it's surprising to me that the cruel and emotionless Sessh is the norm in fanfics as you said. I used to think that it is the other way round, i.e. he is made more mushy, lol! I am very selective about the materials that I choose to read, which is why I don't get to read many fanfics and thereby may not have a comprehensive picture.
ZafiraMente: thank you for the feedback on both chapters. I too have been waiting like forever to see canon SessRin lol! It is interesting to hear about your headcanon, although in the original series, Rin did show concern over her mortality (Ep. 162). However, we have not seen her adult personality yet, so who knows!
BlueYoukai: thanks for reviewing both chapters. I don't think that Sessh would care about making an impression on the court anyway. Neither would Rin, but I think that her innate kindness makes it impossible for almost anyone to keep hating her once they get to know her even a bit, while Sessh's pride and aloofness does not exactly make him an agreeable person to be around. I can totally see Rin managing such situations for her socially awkward husband!
Bluerose160: can't argue with the things that you said about HNY, except pointing out that it is unlikely to run to around 200 episodes like the original series, so I expected a different pace. I got some weird Disney like vibes from the first few episodes that I watched with all the sleeping beauties, memory erasures and separated sisters, so I would wait until the denouement, just in the case they planned to sacrifice the parents' lives to save the daughters.
This chapter has the main plot point of the story. Hope you like it.
Disclaimer: The poem used in this chapter is the part of an English translation of one of my favorite poems. I do not own it, and neither am I using it for any type of profit.
Rin was roused from her sleep in the middle of the night by a disturbing dream. She had fidgeted in her bed for a while, before she was fully awake and sat up on her bed. Strangely, it was not one of the many nightmares that she was accustomed to having since the tragedy that had befallen her as a child. The vision that she had just seen in her sleep was sort of vague, yet nothing that she could recall having seen in it could be categorized as nightmarish elements. It was just a dream, yet she could not tell why it rattled her mind so much and awakened her with a feeling of sheer dread. Her throat felt dry, while her eyelashes were left moistened with tears. Her heart thumped rapidly, and she could detect another pulsation emanating from her hand. Looking down at her hand, she inspected the ring that her husband had put on her finger before he left for the patrols. It seemed to be emitting a steady vibration. Hastily, she opened the top to reveal the stone that had now changed its color from violet to a dark blue, and the glow from the stone had increased at least two times.
It is reacting to my fear, Rin realized. She promptly took off the ring from her finger and placed it on her pillow. I cannot let Lord Sesshomaru get worried about me now, not over something as silly as a dream, she breathed. Once the ring was removed from her contact, the vibrations seemed to die down gradually, and the glow diminished. Rin slowly climbed out of her bed and drank some water to calm herself down. She then went to the closed window and parted the heavy curtains to peer out through the glass panes. The night was dark, despite the faint light of the waxing moon, which had reached the shape of the pendant that hung from her neck. She clutched the sapphire pendant with the fingers of her right hand and gazed at the few stars that were visible in the patch of sky that she could see from her window. Calm down Rin, it was just a dream, she told herself as she tried to slow down her heartbeat. Maybe my mind is just restless because I miss him, she tried to reason.
Once the pace of her heart and her breathing became steady, Rin retrieved the ring and put it on again. She then lit a few candles affixed on the candle stand on her desk and slipped out of the bedchamber with the candle stand in her hand. It did not seem like sleep would come to her easily again, and she decided to go to her husband's study and distract herself with something for the remaining few hours till dawn.
Rin quietly made her way down the silent and dimly lit hall and entered Sesshomaru's study. She put down the candle stand on the large desk where they both worked. She had found some solace in this room while the demon lord was away, as she seemed to find a part of him in everything that was present there, in his neatly organized desk, in the stacks of books that interested him, and in the fine paper and ink that he used to write. Truly, this room helped Rin to understand her mysterious husband a little better, and it is the same room where she had serendipitously uncovered the secret of his heart one day not so long ago. She wondered if she would even be his wife today, had fate not brought her to this room one early morning, about a month before she married her lord.
Rin approached a bookshelf, determined to pick herself something interesting to read. As she pulled out a thick volume, a roll of paper tumbled from the top of the shelf and fell at her feet. She knelt down and picked it up, wondering what it was doing with his books, since her lord kept the document scrolls separately; it was not like him to misplace his things. She wondered for a moment if she should just place it back from where it had fallen or place it with the other documents. She then decided to find out what it was, and then decide accordingly.
A big surprise awaited Rin the moment the contents of the paper was revealed to her eyes. She felt that she was looking into a mirror which reflected her countenance, albeit in black and white. From the smooth white surface of the paper, a likeness of her own self gazed back at her with a small smile on its lips. On the edge of the paper, a few words were neatly calligraphed. To remember her smile, the words said in a handwriting that was unmistakably her lord's. There was also a date written in a smaller font; she figured that the date was of the day before the one when Jaken had come to the village carrying the letter that conveyed the Lord of the West's blessing for her marriage to the man that Lady Kaede had apparently advocated for her.
Lord Sesshomaru, is that how much you loved Rin? The Lady of the West sat down with the paper in her hand, gazing at her own portrait that her husband had drawn with neat, decisive brush strokes that brought out every contour of her face in perfect semblance to reality. It's amazing, she brushed the tips of her fingers over the paper, never having known before that the demon she loved possessed such skills in painting. Rin could recognize the patterns of the kimono drawn at the shoulders of the portrait, where it ended at the edge of the paper. It was the kimono he had gifted her on her last birthday, the one she wore when she accompanied him to the lake after recovering from her illness. Taking a closer look, she realized that the lighter brush strokes made on the background depicted the landscape of the area near the lake. It seemed that he had pulled out a moment from his memory of the beautiful afternoon that they had spent together and illustrated it on the two dimensional surface of the paper. Each skilled brush stroke he had made on the smooth surface of the paper endeavored to make that moment last forever. At least, the high quality paper was likely to last a few centuries with proper care, unlike the young woman whose face it depicted.
Rin remembered that she had attempted something similar during the period when she did not see her lord for years. She was probably no older than fourteen at that time, and he had gone off to war for over a year. At that time, even Inuyasha had said that it was best that she forgot about Sesshomaru, since he might not even return before a few decades. While a part of Rin's mind was sure that it was impossible for her to forget the demon who had unconditionally put his own life on the edge to save hers time and again, another part of it had feared that a few more years of his absence from her life might make her do just that; forget him, as his brother suggested. No, perhaps one could not truly forget someone like that, perhaps Lord Inuyasha himself would never be able to truly forget Lady Kikyo; at least Rin believed so. However, as more and more time passes, their memories become inconsequential to the daily lives of those who had held them indispensable once. Their names are no longer uttered with a melancholic sigh, and the colors begin to fade from the very memories of them that one wants to treasure so desperately. Lady Kagome had said that the propensity of the human mind was to live in the present and look forward to the future. She said that without this ability to adapt to the constant and inevitable changes, it would be impossible for most people to simply live. Rin knew that it was true. She had felt it through her own existence. She did not love her own parents and brothers any less than her lord, and she knew that nothing could replace their loss. Yet, during those years, it was not her dead family she pined for, it was Sesshomaru. She did not stop loving her family, and nor did she forget them. The nightmares that had haunted her throughout the years testified that fact. Yet she knew that her parents and siblings were gone, their memories, no matter how precious they were to her, were irrelevant to the reality. So, instead she had yearned for the company of the demon lord who was her new reality. Thus, at that time, she had feared that part of her mind that might relegate Lord Sesshomaru to nothing more than a distant memory one day. People barely used to speak about Sesshomaru during that time, and thereby she did not have much to remind her of his presence in her life, other than his past gifts that filled her humble room, and an annual visit from Jaken, who came with yet more gifts.
It was on one of those days of despair and desperation that Rin had tried to draw a portrait of her lord, hoping that it would refresh the image of him in her mind and persuade it to become a permanent one. Unfortunately, the end result had been a ghastly misrepresentation of the reality. Realizing that she was no good at drawing, amidst fretful tears, she had torn away the piece of paper which depicted nothing but a caricature of the beautiful countenance that she could clearly see without even having to close her eyes, but had tried in vain to illustrate in paper and ink. The next time that Jaken came from the battlefront to inquire after her well being on his lord's behalf, she had clung to the imp, demanding that Master Jaken took her to her lord, wherever he might be. Of course, she was still very young back then and had no comprehension of how her feelings might evolve one day. All she knew that day was that her life was incomplete without Sesshomaru's visits. Jaken had screeched and complained that she was only growing in form but not in mind, and that he was going to report his lord just that. Eventually, Lady Kaede and Lady Sango had to pull away the sniveling young girl from Jaken when it was past the time for him to leave. Jaken must have had reported her breakdown for Sesshomaru, because within weeks, the imp was back with a written note from the demon lord that promised Rin of his resolve to end the war as soon as possible and visit her. The portrait that she just found confirmed that all that wait was worth it, Rin whisked away a single stray tear that risked the chance of running down her face and smudging the ink of the beautiful artwork held in her hands.
The rest of the week passed away uneventfully, and the uneasiness Rin felt that night on waking up from the disconcerting dream slowly receded to the back of her mind. Her longing for her husband gradually took its place, and each day she found herself looking forward to his return a bit more. The days had grown steadily colder since he had left, and Sesshomaru had been gone for ten days when the first snow of the season fell to the ground.
That night, Rin sat by her bedroom window, gazing at the frozen landscape outside the castle. It had started snowing since sundown, and the castle grounds were already under a layer of snow. Huffing a little, she parted one of the glass panes slightly and extended her hand through the opening to catch a few of the frozen flakes that drifted down steadily from the sky. The chilly air that blew in through the narrow opening made her shiver a bit, despite the warm fur lined haori she was wearing over her kimono. Closing the pane again, she blew air on the few snowflakes that had collected on her palm, watching them drift away. It was one of her silly little wishes to enjoy the first snowfall of the season with her husband by her side, but the more reasonable part of her mind realized that life had no obligation to fulfill every wish that one makes. Maybe another year, she sighed. Her lord was out there somewhere in this harsh cold weather to carry out the stern duty of protecting his lands that his title imposed on him. Though she knew well that the elements of the weather had no effect on someone as powerful as him, she prayed that he was safe, and hoped that he would come home soon. She had so much that she wanted to tell him already.
When Sesshomaru entered the room much later, Rin was already asleep. He watched her for a few moments, satisfied to see that she seemed to be well. He then proceeded to remove his armor. As he was hanging it on the wall, he noticed the low desk to his right. After their marriage, Rin was the one who primarily used this small desk at their bedroom for her nightly studies, and he could not help but notice that she did not keep it as orderly as it was. A couple of brushes lay outside their stands, a few pieces of paper have not been placed back in their stack, and a book lay open with its face down on the desk. He noticed that there were also a few feminine objects, a pair of earrings and a hair clip that lay scattered there. Overall, it was certainly not an unacceptable mess, but being a stickler for tidiness, the sight of the somewhat disorganized desk seemed to cause him a certain level of discomfort. His fingers itched to put everything back in order, and after a moment of hesitation, he knelt before the desk to simply do that. It was a small chore that came with being Rin's husband, he had learnt that already since their marriage. He put the brushes back in the stand, stacked up the loose papers, picked up the book and turned it over. He was about to flip it shut, when his eyes fell on page that was open, and he stopped. It was not a book for reading, but one for writing that was bound with blank pages. He remembered that he had gifted Rin a few of such items without any particular purpose over the years. The page that he was looking at was filled with his wife's simple but neat handwriting. Before his mind could ponder over whether it was proper to read it or not, his demonic eyes that could see clearly see even in the darkness of the night had already scanned over the page which read:
A hundred years from today
are you sitting, reading a verse of mine,
under curiosity's sway -
a hundred years from today?
Not the least fraction
of this young spring morning's bliss,
neither its blossom nor birdsong,
nor any of its colorful splashes
can I drench in affection
and dispatch to your hands
a hundred years hence!
Yet, to you I convey
this springtime's gladsome greetings.
May my vernal song find its echo for a moment
in your spring day
in the rhythm of your heart, in the buzzing of bees,
in the rustling of leaves
a hundred years from today.
Perhaps it was the for first time since Rin's life was taken in the underworld that the Lord of the West felt a small lump in his throat as he glanced over the poem that his wife had written once again, his acute mind immediately realizing its significance. The young woman had expressed her deepest feelings quite articulately in every line of the verse. Although he was curious to know what else she might have written in the remaining pages of the book, he forced himself to close it. Rin might have been using it as a journal to record her thoughts, and he considered it an indecorous intrusion on her privacy to read them without her knowledge. Going by the volumes of words that seemed to incessantly spill from her mouth, Sesshomaru had assumed that knew everything about his Rin. Yet, he had never known that she could compose poetry or that she maintained a journal, which surprised him to some extent. However, given her emotional nature, it did not seem unlikely at all that she would have a penchant for such things.
Rin stirred in her sleep, and rolled over to the other side. Sesshomaru turned his head a little to observe her. He would certainly ask her about it, but first, he needed a warm bath to get rid of the powdery mass of snow that adamantly stuck to his long hair and thick fur pelt. He quickly organized the rest of the desk, and walked over to the wardrobe to silently retrieve a change of clothes before leaving the room.
When Rin's eyes opened at dawn, a white gleam had barely appeared above the eastern horizon and the sleepy chirps of a few birds roused early from their nests could be faintly heard from outside. The sun was yet to rise above the horizon. As Rin rolled over, and yawned, she was stunned to find the recumbent figure of her husband next to her. She quickly rubbed her eyes with her hands to make sure she was really awake and not seeing an image conjured by a dream. He is back for real, she realized as a wave of joy rippled through her. He was lying on his side with his eyes shut and one arm crossed diagonally over his chest. Due to the angle at which he kept his arm, The loose sleeve of the slate blue yukata that he wore fell back to his elbow to reveal the pale skin of that arm with the faint mark of a long scar; the scar from the deep wound he received when he had left the castle infuriated by her words, a month before their marriage. The wound had healed since then, and it looked like the scar that it left would also vanish in a few more days. His fur pelt sprawled around him like another cushion, while Tenseiga and Bakusaiga rested upright against the adjacent wall. He looked so regal and poised even as he reposed, although the sharp contours of his face appeared softer than usual. Actually, Rin could never really tell if he was asleep or simply resting, as his senses were always so alert. She wanted to squeal in pure delight and throw herself into his arms, but she also did not want to disturb his rest. So, instead she propped herself up on her elbow and gazed at her husband's face with dreamy eyes. When the light that crept in through the thick curtains of their bedroom windows grew a little brighter, she decided to get up and get ready for the morning's training session. Usually, her husband would be up earlier, and sometimes she overslept a little and only got ready to start a bit later than their appointed time. Well, not today, she thought. As she sat up on the bed, and started scooting out of it, Sesshomaru extended his hand and caught one of hers.
"Where are you going at this hour?" he asked without opening his eyes.
"I thought I would get ready for my training, my lord," she answered plainly.
"It had snowed all night and the ground was frozen when I returned. You will practice indoors when it gets warmer later during the day," he gently pulled her hand, dragging her back to the bed. "For now, stay here," he said.
Rin resumed her earlier posture of propping herself up on her pillow. Her hand was still held in her husband's. "Looks like someone had missed his wife," she smiled playfully.
Sesshomaru's eyes finally opened. "Rin, I merely wanted you to rest a bit more because it didn't seem that you had slept very well last night. But if you have something better to do than teasing your husband, then you are free to go," he immediately released his hold on her hand and turned to lie on his back, closing his eyes again.
Rin wondered if her husband would gradually learn to develop his poor sense of humor, but for the present, she loved the cute sulky look on his face. He always had that expression whenever anyone tried to joke with him about anything. Her apparently emotionless lord was oddly sentimental in such matters, but luckily, she knew how to placate him. She scooted closer to him and leaned over to brush back the soft silver bangs from his forehead with her hand.
"Who said that I had anything better to do?" Rin smiled, kissing the moon mark on his forehead. "I have missed you," this time she allowed herself to fall into his arms. Immediately he placed an arm around her shoulders. "A lot," she emphasized as she placed her head at the junction of his neck and shoulder.
"I hope that you have fared well, Rin," Sesshomaru said, brushing his knuckles lightly over his wife's cheek. Her smile made up for all the extra demonic energy that he had used to make his trip as quick as possible. It would have taken at least a few more days for him to return had he conducted his patrol at his usual pace. However, Rin's voice had resounded in his ears; Each day away from you seems to be an irreparable loss, she had said before his departure. Those words did not allow the Lord of the West to stop and rest even for a moment as he ceaselessly patrolled his vast lands.
Rin remembered that her lord always used to ask her this question whenever he saw her again after a while. "Very well my lord. A-Un and I had a great time. I flew him around the castle a few times. Although Master Jaken has been in terribly low spirits," Rin said. Her answer to the question had not changed much either after all these years. "Oh, and there are some messages for you, I think most of them are regular ones apart from Lady Toran's," she added.
"What did Toran write?" her husband questioned.
"Well, I don't know my lord, apart from the greeting, it was written in some sort of cryptic language. I could not decipher it," she answered.
"Then it will be taken care of soon," Sesshomaru stated. "Rin, there is something that you have never mentioned to me," he said again after a pause.
"What is that my lord?" Rin tilted up her face, to meet his eyes, evidently puzzled by the remark.
In response Sesshomaru leaned down and whispered in her ear the lines that he had read in her writing book. A blush quickly rose to Rin's face. Her husband had found out about her amateur avocation, and she felt that she was melting like a wax doll in his arms by the effect of the rich voice softly uttering the words of her verse next to her ear. "This," he said as he finished, his lips brushing lightly against her cheek. "I never knew that you wrote verses," he added.
"Oh, that is nothing significant," she said quickly to hide her embarrassment. "Wait, how did you find it?" she asked.
"I noticed that it was on the page where you had left your book open. Not that it was my intention to read it," he replied, maintaining his indifferent tone. Rin peered over his broad shoulder to the other side of the room to look at the then tidy desk, realizing that her husband must have had organized it after his return. The observation only added to her present embarrassment.
"Uh, sorry that the desk was untidy, my lord," she said meekly.
"That is not the point that I intended to make," Sesshomaru said. "Although it is all right if you do not wish to talk about your writings," he closed his eyes again.
"There's nothing in the world that I don't want to talk to you about Lord Sesshomaru," Rin placed her hand on his face. "Do you remember that time last spring when I stayed here for a few days after I had fallen ill?" she asked.
"Of course," he replied briskly.
"After I returned to the village, I realized the truth of my feelings for you," she explained. "I had written the verse shortly after that. It was a beautiful spring day, and I wished that we were together just like we were during that afternoon we spent by the lake. I had hoped that even if you could never return my feelings, you would read it someday, when I am gone. Oh Lord Sesshomaru, how I had wished that time that I could tell you how much I was in love with you," she said ardently, latching an arm around his neck.
Indeed, that was what her verse was all about, she had desired to whisper the feelings of her heart in time's ears, hoping that it would carry them to eternity, where he would find them one day. Sesshomaru turned to his side with his wife in his arms, and brought his face closer to hers till their foreheads touched. "Silly," he said, looking into her eyes. "Why didn't you do it then?" he asked. It was not common for them to discuss their feelings for each other. Sesshomaru never actually described his feelings to his wife, and Rin did not either since the day she had confessed about her feelings. Yet, both knew that their feelings were returned, and it was enough for the couple.
"I didn't think that it was possible that they would matter to you." his wife reasoned. "Whenever something comes to my mind I usually write them down in verse if I can. Sometimes, I also write my thoughts in prose. I thought that you would consider such things as useless; that's why I never thought of mentioning them to you. Anyway, they are not very meaningful, I know. But all that I have ever written is for you Lord Sesshomaru, they always were," she declared.
"Such things are indeed useless," the demon lord stated. "Mere channels of expressing one's emotions I believe," he expanded.
"I see, I was right then," Rin said, failing to conceal the look of disappointment that flashed on her face for a moment.
"That is why it's strange to find that no other writing holds more value to me than the apparently useless things Rin has written for me," he continued his previous statement, ignoring her intermediate remark.
"Really?" Rin pressed her hand on his cheek. But then she understood. The numerous flowers that he gave him throughout the years were useless to a demon like him, and yet he accepted them. Her prolix letters that discussed mundane aspects of her village life were equally useless, and not only was she sure that he always read them entirely, she had seen firsthand how each one of them were neatly preserved on his desk to that day.
"Your writings won't remain unread," her husband covered her hand with his larger palm. Rin's smile seemed to brighten their dimly lit bedchamber, and Sesshomaru felt that he was watching the sunrise right there, even though the curtains were drawn.
Soon, another thought seemed to cross Rin's mind. "My dearest, I know one of your secrets too," she said with a cheeky grin.
"I don't have the habit of keeping secrets from my wife," Sesshomaru did not seem perturbed by the declaration. Probably some innocuous little thing that she found out, he surmised.
Rin looked at her husband, he had closed his eyes again, and his voice seemed a bit heavier towards the end. It seems that he is really tired after all that travel, though I am sure he won't admit it if I ask, she thought. She decided against presently pestering him about the history of the portrait that she had found a few days ago in his study. I will ask him later, she resolved.
"We will see about that," Rin said softly, as she settled down, satisfied to be in her husband's embrace for the moment. As she lay there beside him, with the steady rhythm of his heart already exercising a soporific effect on her senses, for the first time since her family's tragic death, she felt that she was finally at home. When she joined Sesshomaru and Jaken as a child, she felt that she belonged there. She also felt safe and loved in the village she grew up in. Nevertheless, in both these cases, at the back of her mind, she knew that she did not really have a family, and that those were only temporary arrangements of some sorts. At last, that situation changed. With a content sigh, the young Lady of the West thought that she finally had a family, and her home was with her lord, her husband, who had presently fallen quiet beside her. "Welcome home, Lord Sesshomaru," she whispered to him and closed her eyes to enjoy the blissful moment that the cold winter morning had brought with it.
I thought that the words of the verse that I used here were very appropriate in this scenario, and conversely, this scenario also made me see the verse in a whole new light. The next chapter is likely to be the last one of this story. As usual, I shall look forward to reading your thoughts on this chapter.