Disclaimer: I do not own any of the

main characters within this

fabrication. Their rightful owner

is Rumiko Takahashi. Please support

the official work.

Strangled Time

Chapter Seven

Warm, over-steeped tea felt good in the chilled weather and Kagome was glad that she didn't turn down Saburo's offer to treat her. The tall blacksmith sat beside her on the wooden bench, the clay teacup seemed small in his hands but he held it as if it were a bird. The priestess silently sipped her tea as she watched him from the corner of her eye. His long hair, which she came to noticed he preferred loose, was tied up in a tight top knot.

He had tried his hardest to look like anything but a blacksmith.

"Fifteen years." Saburo's deep voice cut through their comfortable silence. It was the answer to the question that she had originally sought him out for. "That is how long it has been since the fall of the castle. Though sometimes it feels much shorter."

Kagome leaned back against the wooden wall of the tea shop and looked up at the hill in the distance. The castle would have been overlooking the village from there, though most of it would have been hidden by trees. "Fifteen? That's not too bad. What happened to it anyway?"

He paused to study her for a moment, as if wondering if it were proper to tell her. He smiled and shook his head when he remembered that it was Kagome he was speaking with. With any other woman talk of battle or death was inappropriate. But Kagome wasn't any other woman.

She was special.

"A crazed demon attacked. He was after the Lady of the castle." A quiet woman refilled their cups without interrupting their conversation before disappearing back into the shop. "Her father, the Lord of the castle, and her betrothed had sent for many of the village's men to protect it." Finally he looked away from her to stare at the leaves spinning in his cup. "Those who didn't die by the hand of the demon were killed in the fire."

"No one survived at all?"

Their eyes met and Saburo's stern expression was suddenly marred by a lopsided grin. "Not unless you believe in rumors."

...

"It is possible?" the demon said as he looked down at the strange collection of parchment that was bound in a material similar to wood that Kagome had left at his side.

"It definitely is." That's what the little priestess had said to him before explaining to him about her own experiences with time travel.

Togashimaru had replayed her words through his head time and time again since she left to the village. He searched for something that didn't fit, something that would have proven her words to be lie or the rantings of the mentally ill. But each thing she had said rang with a crisp truth that hurt him more than when Ryukotsusei had run his clawed hand through his side instead of agreeing to the terms of their treaty.

She was from the future, approximately seven hundred years into the future. That explained her odd mannerisms, and the strange items and unrecognizable clothing that he had found in her bag. It also explained why the hair pin had aged, since she explained that she had received it in her own time.

For the past few years she had been going through time between her future and her past, which was five hundred years before her future. Kagome believed that she had been sent over two hundred years further into the past, whereas he was sent several years forward.

Why it had happened was beyond the both of them.

Again Togashimaru looked down at what Kagome had referred to as a 'hardcover textbook' and flipped it open to stare at the words that littered the pages. The writing was astonishing, so small and precise. Yet he couldn't wrap his mind around how it could have been made. The text itself, however, was practicality another language.

Many of the characters he could vaguely recognize, though they were not as detailed as the writing he was used to. Some of the characters were completely new to him or didn't make sense in context as he knew them. The rest of the print he recognized as women's script, which he had never bothered to learn and was never formally taught as a child.

His mother might have allowed it, but his strict calligraphy teacher would have had nothing of it.

But still, he was able to understand a very basic idea of what the book was trying to explain. Time was complex and even in the future nobody truly knew how it worked. Ideas from different scholars were thrown back and forth, sometimes stating similar beliefs, sometimes without showing any real parallels at all. None of them seemed to have a first hand experience on the matter. The only person who had previous experience was Kagome.

Therefore her words were the only ones that he could take as truth.

It was going to take a bit of time for the demon to get used to the idea of relying on a young girl. Though, after seeing how capable the priestess was despite having been displaced from her familiar eras, he knew that she would go above and beyond his expectations.

Setting aside the text, Togashimaru looked over to the edge of the hill just as Kagome became visible. Even from that distance he could tell that her eyebrows were scrunched and she was deep in thought.

That changed the moment that she saw him. Her entire face seemed to light up with an excitement that was near completely genuine, but not quite. In her hands was a parchment that was tied with twine around something that smelled sweet and sticky.

...

Empty skewers from sweet dumplings lay forgotten on the ground beside the duo. The priestess watched the demon closely as he took in her words. His elbow was resting on his knee and his hand was holding his chin.

It wasn't too difficult to tell what he was thinking. Though, Kagome admitted, he was slightly better as hiding his emotions than Inuyasha, but still far from having the emotionally frigid demeanor of Sesshoumaru.

His eyebrows pulled down as he looked at the rubble, then up again as he peered at her through the corner of his eye. Curiosity and frustration battled for dominance behind molten amber. The demon's nose twitched as he took in her scent, but the corner of his lips turned down slightly when he found no answer to his question.

Kagome let out a sigh as he looked away from her again to stare out at the field. "He could be off by one or two years," she decided to say in hopes that he would say something about it. "He really couldn't tell me much, since he was just a kid at the time. I could go ask one of the older shop owners if there's anything else you want to know."

She had left out the rumor that Izayoi was still alive and living in another village. If Togashimaru was anything like every other demon that she had ever met, then he would head out to find her before Kagome was even done talking. If he did that he would have been endangering himself as well as leaving her on her own.

It felt bad to hold such an important thing back from him, and she knew that she was partially doing it for selfish reasons, but she argued that it was for his own good.

Togashimaru turned to look at her, his eyes burning with an emotion that she couldn't quite place. She needed to bite her tongue to keep from telling him.

"How many years have you been alive?"

Kagome blinked, startled by how seemingly random his question was. "Seven- er, I just turned eighteen."

Gold widened to the size of the dumplings that they had just eaten and the priestess was almost positive that she saw his eyes dilate.

He didn't even give her time to ask any questions before he was speaking again. "In fifteen years you will be thirty three years old, is that old for a human? How long is the average human lifespan?"

A gust of wind swept past them, carrying with it several fallen leaves that had just changed colors. Kagome didn't know whether she was more shocked to learn that he didn't know anything about a human's aging process, or that the emotion on his face was fear.

It was unnerving to see a full demon have such a strong emotional response.

"Don't you think that would have been important to know before you started dating a human?!" The teen asked in a fluster, the words tumbling out before she had the chance to stop them. She practicality had to yell over the wind even though she knew fully well that he could have heard her.

Kagome clamped her hands over her mouth. The words continued to flow from behind her little barrier of shame in a pathetic attempt to right the wrong. "I mean, assuming you guys are already going out. I don't even know how long you've known her for. I'm not trying to say that you didn't care about it, not that it should even make a difference! Love knows no bounds, right-?"

Togashimaru ground his teeth together. "Would you answer the question?"

Kagome shut up. She would have felt intimidated by his harsh tone if he hadn't let his fear show through his irritation. Instead she felt a surge of sympathy; his fears struck her closer to home than she cared to admit. Even Inuyasha didn't know how long he could live for, he was already two hundred and fifty three years old.

She could be dead before he was even fully grown.

Not wanting to antagonize him any more, the priestess let out the breath she was holding and attempted to reel in her nerves. "In my time, thirty three is considered to be an adult, but is still kind of young. People still have kids well into their thirties,"

She paused, trying to remember how it was different in the feudal era. "Back home the average life span is about ninety... But in the past it's much harder for people to live that long. The oldest person I've ever seen is in her sixties. So, thirty would probably be considered middle aged around this era."

Togashimaru was silent for the longest time following her explanation. As the bearer of bad news, Kagome had a hard time looking at him. His emotions seemed to reset into a blank slate as he looked up at the sky. One by one they came back to grace his features until finally his lips turned up into a tragic grin.

"Perhaps that is why humans are so passionate, because they only have a moment to live," the demon turned to look at her. Kagome couldn't help but blush at the intensity of his stare.

"How old are you, Togashimaru?" She asked sheepishly, almost afraid to hear the answer. Logic stated that a half demon would live half as long as their full demon counterpart, right?

His gaze didn't lessen as the words slipped from his lips, as graceful as silk. "I have been alive for four thousand, five hundred and twelve winters.

The stronger a demon is, the longer they live."

...

Kagome shivered, the small fire that burned in front of her did little to combat the chill that had overcome her after learning her companion's true age.

He had lived longer than modern society itself. She didn't even know how that could have been possible. He was a living relic, his knowledge could have stretched far beyond the limits of her imagination. Yet he had been sheltered enough to be blind to the years of humans.

The priestess had tried to imagine falling in love with a being that had practically lived longer than time itself, but her thoughts kept wandering back to Inuyasha. If he were human he would have been around seventeen years old, with time left to grow and mature. In that regard she was already older than him, and she would only continue to age as he seemed to stay the same. Perhaps he would even be fully grown by the time she was her grandfather's age.

But she had already known about that to an extent. She had anticipated something similar to happen.

It was the thought of falling in love with a full demon that already held the experiences of hundreds of humans that scared her. What if Inuyasha had been born a full demon, would she still be able to love him all the same?

But he wasn't a full demon thanks to Togashimaru and thanks to Izayoi.

Kagome hated to admit it, but she was starting to feel envious of the human princess. She must have known that Togashimaru was so much older than herself, yet her love was pure enough to overcome that. Kagome wished that she could see Togashimaru through Izayoi's eyes, at least for a moment. Did Izayoi have worries as well?

Kagome frowned as she poured hot water from her kettle into two ramen bowls; she hadn't felt like hunting.

The teen stood up and walked over to the demon who was sitting silently next to her bag. She placed the foam cup next to him. "It's not ready yet, you'll have to let it sit for a few minutes."

Togashimaru looked up at her, he looked exhausted. They looked at each other in silence for a few moments until Kagome turn to walk back to the fire.

"Thank you," she heard him say from behind her.

Kagome paused. She had a feeling that he wasn't talking about the food. Carefully she peeked over her shoulder to look at him, but he seemed to be studying the sky. "For what?" She's asked when she realized that he wasn't planning on saying anything further.

The demon shifted his eyes from the blue of the sky to the blue of her eyes. The hues of the sky shimmered reflectivity in his hair as the wind blew it about, making it look like water. Kagome couldn't help but believe that all of the gods of Japanese folklore were actually real, but they weren't really gods, simply demons that looked like they could be.

His voice was quiet. "For not leaving."

The priestess blinked in confusion before it finally made sense to her. He thought that she was so shocked to learn that he was powerful and potentially deadly that she was going to run away from him in fright.

But she had already known that. He was Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru's father after all.

A warm smile blossomed on her lips. "I didn't even consider it."

End Chapter

(A/N~ Hey everyone! Updates are probably going to take as much time as this one did. I never realized that working and going to school at the same time was so draining. Well, as promised, I'm here to answer your questions!)

Q&A:

Warning:

There may be a few little spoilers, if you don't want to be spoiled then feel free to skip this part.

...

Q: Is the name Toga going to stick?

A: It is! But not for several more chapters.

Q: Has the world changed by Kagome being there?

A: Not in the slightest! The wheel weaves as the wheel wills.

Q: Is Togashimaru going to think she is crazy if she tells him her story?

A: The exact opposite, actually. He's a pretty logical thinker and the idea that she is a time traveler means that he isn't crazy. About his boys, however, I'll leave that for a future chapter.

Q: Who will get [with] Kag? (Correct me if that question is wrong)

A: Nobody! Well, technically Inuyasha. There is going to be little to no romance within this story, aside from Saburo's potential little crush.

Q: How long do you thing this story'll be, in terms of chapters or time?

A: It really depends on how the chapters play out, sometimes I'll separate the ideas of one chapter into two because my hands wanted to write more than I had planned. Time is even iffier, considering my lack of it. But in story it is going to be only about a month or two for them. Once they leave the village it should speed up pretty quickly.

I added one question that I know a few people where wondering since it won't be explained in story.

Q: Where did the swords go?

A: Myouga, Totosai and Saya found all of his swords in the rubble directly after the battle in the movie, so they fell off in battle. (You ever notice how it didn't show them finding his body? ~Skeptic Tsarashi~)

That's all for now! If you liked this chapter, please tell me about it!