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Strangled Time
Chapter 56
There was something magical about that snowfall.
It had the power to make the most chaotic of nights seem calm and peaceful. It turned vibrant cities into whimsical snow globes. In that early morning the merchants and tourists were locked away in their homes and inns, lying low until the whispered threat of demons had passed. Tucked tight to their beds, the footprints they'd created the night before quickly disappeared unseen beneath a blanket of white. Their presence erased. The city renewed to a fresh and empty slate.
Blood took longer to be forgotten.
But eventually it too eased away to a distant memory of fear and violence.
Snow on that windless day was an insulator. It brushed up against the walls of buildings, securing the warmth of the burning hearth within and creating domes of silence. Throughout the streets, each snowflake acted to absorb the sounds that should have been heard in the new waking dawn. But those sounds were already absent. The waking of children and the murmurs of chores were nowhere to be heard. Even the echoes were silent.
It was in those echoes that the restless dog and his girl were able to slip past; they moved slowly and quietly through thick curtains of cold.
Unseen and unnoticed by all who dared look.
Like winter ghosts,
They left.
…
"Have you lost a lot of people?" She asked as they labored past the tree line. "Before Izayoi?"
"Only more… than there are stars in the sky." He responded, his voice stretched near silent. "Allies and acquaintances. Friends and kin. Bonded foes. Yes, Kagome. I have lost many."
She swallowed. "Were you ever ready for it?"
He paused. "No. Each one inflicts a unique wound that cannot be prepared for."
"But… it all healed up eventually, right?"
"Some, yes. Others, no. There is no denying the permanence of scars. The closer you hold somebody, the more pronounced their scar will be."
"...Were you ever scared? Knowing that you needed to move on without them?"
"Utterly terrified."
"Then how did you do it?"
"How?"
"How did you keep on moving?"
"Hm, by placing one foot before the other and walking forward. Just as we are managing now."
"That's it?"
"And... by following the moon."
"Why the moon?"
He pulled them to a stop so that they could rest for a moment. Her arm readjusted at his waist to keep him upright.
Looking at the snow falling through the branches he said, "The moon carries a rhythm that the earth does not. The earth turns in seasons, but it's inhabitants grow and change at a chaotic pace. Attempting to keep up can be overwhelming, especially in grief."
Overwhelming.
Yeah, that was a good word for how it was already starting to feel.
"The moon's phases are regular and constant. It encourages movement but does not force your speed. Following the moon allows you to exist and to heal in a time all your own."
She tried to smile, but her lips were quivering too much to hold it long.
Then she whimpered.
"Toga... I'm so sorry."
"What is it you have to apologize for?"
"I promised myself I'd keep you alive, but I think I screwed that up really bad. I failed."
"You did not fail, Kagome. You succeeded in helping me to live far longer than I ever expected to."
The dry wells in her eyes produced pain more than tears. "I promised to fight by your side. But in the end I was barely there. I hardly did anything to help."
"You saw that my son was safe. You protected my legacy and stood forth when it was needed most. Whats more, you will carry on with my story well into the future."
"But it wasn't enough."
"Oh, Kagome." He leaned, resting his forehead to her hair. "It was everything, and I am grateful for all that you've done. There isn't a person, sword, or stone on this earth that could have repaired the damage done to this body, so do not blame yourself for being unable to do an impossible thing."
"I... Toga, it hurts."
"I know."
"I don't want our journey to end."
"I know... But Kagome, it must."
…
Saburo hated seeing the dog like that, all battered and broken—shattered like a porcelain tea cup. He was supposed to be mighty. Even at his lowest point, unable to stand and facing ogres on the mountain, he'd been an indomitable force of confidence and will. He was intimidating despite weariness, haughty in light of mortal wounds. He kept Saburo on his toes with both his wit and his dangerous potential.
But now… Now Togashimaru was the shell of a king presiding over a court of ghosts, resting at the top of that hill with Kagome by his side.
His voice was so soft that the wind all but blew it away as if it were just another flake from the clouds. The dark of the poison had transformed his skin to aged, ink stained parchment. It was duller than before—no longer the vibrant, angry purple of a dragon's rage. Now it was tired and grey. All of him was: his skin, his presence, his smile. Muddy, wasted, translucent.
Lifeless.
That was what Saburo wanted in the beginning, wasn't it? Togashimaru's final end?
It was supposed to bring him validation. It was supposed to be a vengeance. It was supposed to protect the girl from misery and pain.
But this did none of those things.
It brought him no satisfaction or joy. Instead, it did the opposite. Seeing the demon so close to death made Saburo feel as if someone were carving out little pieces of his own chest and slowly lighting them aflame with tiny, finger singing matches. He felt shame and sorrow and anger. Anger towards himself, anger towards the situation, and yes, even anger towards Togashimaru. But not hatred. Somehow Saburo knew that he would never be able to hate the man, not ever again.
When had that changed?
When had he started looking at the General so differently? Less as an enemy, as a murderer, and more as a mentor? A confidant?
A friend?
Saburo wasn't quite sure
But he didn't like it.
Not because Togashimaru was a demon or because he'd been the monster of a thousand nightmares—grey war crimes all painted red by prejudice—or any other fault of the dog's, but because it meant Saburo wasn't going to be returning home a lighter man. He'd walk away from this as a stranger to himself and to his family… while Togashimaru wouldn't be walking away from it at all.
That just wasn't fair.
The blacksmith tried not to think too hard about it as he carried Inuyasha up the hill, but the kid was pressing that necklace into his sternum, making it all the more impossible to ignore. He swallowed, hoping that the heat of the jewel would go away.
It never did.
Inuyasha had woken up for a little bit once they'd gotten to the campsite. His first reaction was to panic, which resulted in the new trio of scratches across Saburo's cheek, but he apologized profusely once he realized who he was back with. He was so scared that he was shaking and for the first time since his mother died, the little half demon cried. He clung to Saburo as the blacksmith wrapped his wrist in a bandage, and he wept without making a sound.
Saburo was familiar with that cry, dead silent and wracking—it was what you did when you lived in a busy home and didn't want to draw attention to yourself. You trained your tears and turned your anguish into a mouse, small and peripheral. Saburo had been good at it. Inuyasha was an expert.
At some point the little boy asked with sniffles and quivers about the loud energies clashing off somewhere deeper in the woods and the human blacksmith reassured him that it was nothing. He used his wholesome lack of spiritual awareness to truthfully tell the kid that he didn't feel anything—that they were safe where they were on that side of the border and that the old dog and the priestess would be back for them soon.
Trusting the older man's words and exhausted from their night out, Inuyasha eventually let down his brick wall guard of fear. He cried himself to sleep at Saburo's side, curled up like a kitten in Kagome's bedroll.
Saburo, though, was anything but tired.
If there really was something else out there fighting, he had no way to know.
So with his eyes trained on the forest and his grip steeled around his hammer, he waited. Ready to fight and ready to protect.
That was how Kagome found them when she returned to camp half-carrying Togashimaru. And that was how she left them when she turned to take the old dog further up the mountain. She didn't say much, but she didn't mention anything out beyond the Western border, either. So Saburo's fear of Inuyasha's phantom fighters eased.
Only to be replaced by dread and concern.
Kagome didn't look good. She sounded worse.
But Toga?
He was an awful mess.
Saburo couldn't look at the General. He focused on the sleeping child beside him as the priestess and her demon disappeared through the trees and deeper into the forest.
Up the hillside.
He knew what was coming, had heard it straight from the dog's mouth, but that didn't make the shock burn any less. There was heat on his face and on his arms. He could practically feel the flames from that open doorway, down the hill from the castle where the dog first fell. Where so many had died. Red hot coals like a dragon. He, a child, staring up at them, too young to fight. Too small to help. Unable to say goodbye.
Like standing too close to the kiln, it singed.
Startled, the blacksmith glanced over to the campfire pit.
It was out and cold. Had been for hours.
A memory.
He swatted at the hairs on his arms, untouched by flames but sticking on end all the same.
Then he looked back at the boy.
Inuyasha was just a little brat, six, maybe seven. He'd grown up without knowing his father, and now that he finally, finally got the chance to meet the guy, what? Togashimaru was taken away, just like that.
And they were stuck there, waiting for the news of his death down at the bottom of a hill.
It shouldn't have to be like that. It wasn't fair to th' demon. It wasn't fair to th' kid.
It wasn't fair!
They only just—!
Saburo froze.
No, it wasn't fair. But they weren't stuck there, either.
Saburo wasn't a child. He wasn't helpless. He had two hands and a sturdy working pair of feet.
Why was he waiting?
With that thought and only that thought in mind, Saburo leaned forward to gather the little snow covered half demon to his chest. He took extra care not to jostle or wake the boy as he picked Inuyasha up and climbed to his feet. He was gentle as he followed the trail of blood to the line of trees and beyond, even as his steps felt like lead. Up and up he followed after the two, charge in hand.
He knew that he couldn't change fate—he couldn't save the demon's life—but he could help in a different way.
Togashimaru had every right to see his son one last time.
To say his goodbyes.
It was a slow hike, and he often faltered at the blood. Droplets, splatters, and running rivulets. It was everywhere. Frighteningly everywhere. But eventually he made it to the crest.
He found the two of them at the top of the hill, the demon propped up against the tombstone of his human lover with Kagome curled tight by his side…
Saburo hated seeing the dog like that, all battered and broken—shattered like a porcelain tea cup.
…
"Thank you." Kagome mouthed the words as Saburo handed down Inuyasha and helped to settle the sleeping boy between the young woman and his father.
"Sure." He whispered, awkwardly trying to keep from looking at silks that should have been white. "I'll, uh, be down th' way if ya need me."
"'Kay." She whispered back.
"Saburo." Toga's low voice cut through before the blacksmith could fully turn away. "You are doing well. It is not a simple task, changing the way one views the world."
Saburo flushed. He reached up to scratch the nape of his neck before moving his feet to face the path. "Yeah, well I'm tryin'. Woulda been easier if ya weren't such a bastard."
Toga managed a humored rumble. "Indeed."
"...'Till moonrise, yeah?"
"Correct."
"Right, well..." The human man hesitated for a drawn out moment before he began to leave back down the side of the slope. "Gotcha." He choked. "Count on me, then."
"I hope that I can." Toga replied somberly as Saburo stepped out of view and vanished form the reality that was their hillside snowglobe.
Kagome looked away from the bank and up at the dog demon. "Moonrise?" She asked, but Toga was no longer paying attention to the retreating craftsman. His gaze had fallen down to the boy in his lap.
It was his first time seeing the half demon side of his hybrid son.
She watched his reaction shift with emotions as he took Inuyasha's appearance in anew. That hair that was so like his own. Those tiny claws. The puppy ears softer than silk. His own scent mixing and twining with Izayoi's to create something new and perfect.
He'd been enamored before with the boy's human half.
But now Toga was hopelessly, head over heals in love.
"Cute, right?" Kagome leaned against him. "Like this, he looks like you."
With a wistful smile, the dog demon brushed a clump of short white bangs out of the sleeping child's face. Then he responded with the same awed response that he'd given her at the procession.
"Yes...Indescribably so."
…
Kagome sat there beside Toga for a while, resting against his shoulder as he pet Inuyasha's hair. His movements were slow and soothing, matching the time of his own breaths, and Kagome almost found herself hypnotized. She was exhausted, but didn't dare sleep. She couldn't sleep, not while Toga remained with her.
But her lids, they were so heavy. They betrayed her will and her thoughts.
Fluttering, closing. It was so tempting to give in, to sleep like a child in his lap, safe and sound.
If she did that, though... She knew that he wouldn't be there to greet her when she woke up. No. She couldn't sleep.
Just a for little while?
"Kagome?" He drew her attention, rough voice nearly inaudible.
"Yeah?" She blinked away her tired and hummed.
"Tell me a story." He requested.
She had so many stories that she hadn't told him yet. Stories of battles and downtimes. Of allegiances and friends they'd made off the beaten path. Stories starring Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru and so many others.
"Whose story do you want to hear?"
"...Tell me your story."
Confused, Kagome pushed up to get a better look at the demon. "My story?" She asked, hushed.
Toga was leaning with his head back against the stone, his eyes half lidded as he watched heavy clouds passing in the sky above them. Snow was clustering on his hair and lashes, but he didn't have the energy to mind.
"Tell me the story of how a human girl from the future fell through a magic well, and became the Shikon priestess, demon kindred... and daughter to the House of the West"
Kagome blushed and settled back into her warm spot. "Oh, I think I know that one. You sure that's what you want to hear?"
"Positive."
"It's long."
"I have time to listen."
She tried to smile.
When it didn't work, she didn't force it. And that was okay.
"Alright... well, let's see..." Where was she even supposed to start in her own story? Where was the beginning?
After a few moments to think about it, Kagome closed her eyes and sighed. She reached forward to caress little Inuyasha's velveteen ear, and then shifted into storymode.
"When I was younger, all I wanted more than anything else in the world was to just be normal." The priestess started. "I kept up good grades, hung out with average girls, and I was good at sports, but not enough to really stick out. I was the daughter of a college professor and a housewife and my favorite hobby was meeting up with my friends after school for a burger and a milkshake."
"...what are burgers and milkshakes?"
"Food. They're not important, shush." She halfheartedly hushed him before continuing. "I didn't want to be known as the weird kid who lived at a shrine. I didn't want to be the girl people pitied because her dad died. So I kept a low profile and followed the other kids.
"I tried so hard to be normal... But I wasn't. I was never meant to be normal. I was the reincarnation of a powerful priestess with a sacred jewel sealed away in my body. Looking back now… I'm glad I wasn't normal; if I were I'd never have met some of the greatest people in my life. I would have never met Inuyasha, Miroku, or Sango. Shippo and Kirara... You.
Her chuckle sounded both hollow and way too heavy.
Was it really a chuckle... or was it a sob?
"Yeah, I complain sometimes about the bumps and turns I go through, but I wouldn't change my life now. Not for anything. These friendships and experiences? They're worth infinitely more than being normal ever could have been. But back when I was fifteen, I didn't know that yet. I had no clue what I was getting myself into when I wandered down the steps of that well house... looking for what I though was just a cat."
…
Kagome didn't know how far she got before her story drifted off. She didn't even know when she started drifting.
However, she did know when Toga stopped soothing the boy between them. She was all too painfully aware.
And now he was still and she was quiet.
In that silence she cried into his shoulder, knowing that he wouldn't be able to console her.
He'd never again tuck her close or smooth her hair.
And she'd never again see him smile.
Chapter End