CHAPTER 23: CORONETS IN YOUR HEART

"Listen to me girl,
You have castles inside your bones,
Coronets in your heart,
If he threatens you with battle,
You raise him a whole war,

The last time I checked,
Queens cower before no man."
(Queens II, Nikita Gill)

There is no one happier than Kagome the next day when she announces to everyone that she doesn't want to wait – that she loves Sesshomaru, that she loves it in this manor with Rin, and there's no part of her that wants to waste time when they can be formally married (mated) now. She will be happy. And Sesshomaru won't have the threat of succession hanging over his head.

No one is more filled with questions than Inuyasha.

"But how are you going to search for Jewel Shards – "

"He doesn't own me, Inuyasha, I can and will come help you still, he does mind. He'll even help."

His face shows how much he cares that his brother might spend time traveling around the Feudal Era with them. "Well, what about your…" He struggles to find the correct word, "… school? Does he even know – "

"He knows I'm not from this time. He doesn't care."

"And your mom – "

"Will love him, I'm sure. Because I'm happy." She stares at him pointedly until he shuffles his feet, ears flicking backwards. "And, because you're still the only one who can travel through the well besides me," He perks up at that. "We've come up with a plan. We're going to pick a date and I'm going to go home and we'll meet up there and I can introduce him to mama."

Inuyasha frowns. "If he doesn't show up, though…"

She doesn't really want to think about the implications of him not showing up in the future are, so she doesn't dwell on them. "Well, we'll deal with that if it becomes a problem, I guess."

There is no one around the two of them, so when Kagome slumps in melancholy at the thought, Inuyasha reaches out to wrap his arms around her. "I'm sure it'll be okay. If he survived all this shit, I'm sure he'll survive… cars and whatever other weird crap you've got in the future."

She nods against his shoulder, pulling back and brightening considerably. "Yeah, you're probably right. After all, you couldn't kill him." He grins down at her. When she smiles at him again, there's a little sadness in it, but not for herself, for her first and oldest friend from the Feudal Era. "Inuyasha, you're going to be okay, right?"

"Why wouldn't I be, woman?"

"I mean, Koga-kun is going to be upset, but he'll bounce back pretty quick, I think. I just want to make sure that you'll be okay, too. Kikyo – "

" – is dead. As you all keep telling me."

She cocks her head at him. "Yes and no. And besides, you have access to some of this land's power, you might get to keep it even after the ceremony." He flinches at the reminded of their upcoming mating ceremony, but seems intrigued at the thought of keeping a smidgen of his brother's power. "Kikyo is a stronger priestess than me, she always has been. It's the part of her soul in me that lets me travel back her. If I can grow back a limb, there's no telling what the two of you might be able to do together."

He looks like he wants to be hopeful, but has been disappointed so many times he doesn't know if it's worth the risk.

"Well, it's something to think about, anyway." She squeezed him tightly one more time, glad that he had come to his senses about the two of them finally. When she had thought herself in love with him, she had hated Kikyo. But as time went on, and she realized that it wasn't love she felt, she just grew sad for the two of them. They had loved each other and Naraku had destroyed it just because he was jealous. It wasn't fair and she would do anything she could to help them be together. Whatever Inuyasha decided. She just wanted him to be happy. The way she was. She smiled at him. "Let's go get me married!"

Much like the naming of her as Lady of the Western Lands, the ceremony appeared simple. Tetsu had some paperwork for them to sign, as he grinned at them the entire time. And afterwards, the pair of them reached out with the wells of power they had stored within them and enveloped the other. For Kagome, it was easy, she had just done something similar when she healed his arm. So the feeling of her power sliding beneath his skin was familiar. She could feel sense him in a way that felt like telepathy or déjà vu.

When his own power slide beneath her, struggling over the first initial distrust of her spiritual powers, her senses filled with him. She could feel his breath in her lungs, sense his deadly poison like it was pooling beneath her own nailbeds. She felt superimposed, like two images overlaid on top of one another. There was Kagome, as she was. But there was a part of her inside of him, connected by more than emotions and titles and signatures.

She took a deep breath to steady the rolling waves of power that wanted to leap out of her skin, and with it she felt a shockwave like an earthquake rattling in her bones. Her senses expanded. It felt like if she took in another drop of power she would shatter with it.

Across from her, Sesshomaru took in a shuddering gasp, and a tension she had not even been aware he was carrying simply vanished from the set of his shoulders, the cant of his mouth, the width of his stance. He took in a steadying breath and, as he did, the flowers within the walled garden suddenly bloomed into riotous life, vines crept up the bricked walls, trees with browned and deadened branch suddenly sprouted a summer's worth of leaves and fruit. Sesshomaru glances around his courtyard with a look of such fierce pride and joy that it brought the pinprick of tears to Kagome's eyes.

This was the connection to the land that he had spoken of to her. How could he have been willing to give all of this up, just for her? The very thought made her so giddy with how much he loved her that she thought she might squeal. But luckily for both of them, she loved him far too much to let him do something so incredibly noble, but also so incredibly stupid, just for her sake.

She smiled at him, and, as if sensing the warmth and force of her delight, he turned to her, a smile tugging at the corner of his own mouth. Leaning up on her tiptoes, she let her eyes flutter closed as he leaned down to close the distance between them. "My husband," she whispered.

His response is growled against his lips as the meet in a searing kiss. It is all possessive lust and blistering happiness and burning love rolled into one rumbling term of endearment. "My mate."