Disclaimer: I do not own either Ranma or Inuyasha. Rumiko Takahashi has that honour. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

"So, those two that looked after you are coming to dinner tonight?" Ranma looked down from atop the fence as Akane caught up to him.

"Yeah, so?" He asked, shoving his hands in his pockets as he walked, looking straight ahead.

"I don't see why, is all?" She stated and Ranma rolled his eyes. She had been in a mood since he had told Kasumi that Inuyasha and Kagome had accepted her invitation.

"Why don't you ask Kasumi?" He asked, glancing down at her as she strode on, her short hair bouncing around her jawline with her purposeful steps. "She's the one who invited them."

She huffed and didn't answer and Ranma decided not to push it. The continued the walk home in silence, Ranma relived that no one decided they were going to jump either of them on their short journey. He had even managed to avoid the ninja-ladle-lady which was a first for him. She was always there, no matter the time of day he went past, she was always there.

He reasoned she had to have been trained as a ninja in her younger years.

There was no other explanation.

He went through his regular routine when he got home, getting through his work out and completing a few katas and exercises in the dojo before Kasumi found him and berated him for cutting it so close before their guest's arrived. He was soon ushered upstairs for a bath, Kasumi insisting that he clean up before Inuyasha and Kagome arrived. He didn't understand the fuss but he wasn't going to push it.

After soaking in the tub, he made his way back into the room he shared with his father find that there was a more formal version of his usual red shirt laid out on his futon along with some black pants. The shirt, while in the Chinese style he preferred, the sleeves were longer and the colour was a deeper red than he normally wore. He reasoned that Kasumi had left the clothes out for him and decided not to poke the beast. He was also happy to find that she had not gone so far as to lay out any underwear for him. He quickly dressed and made his way downstairs to see that he was not the only ones that had been 'Kasumi'd' when it came to their clothing.

He was most shocked to see that she had managed to get both Soun and Genma out of their well-worn gi's and into actual clothing. Neither of them looked particularly comfortable and he couldn't help but smirk. They were both in western style shirts, Soun's being dark blue and Genma's a kind of plum colour. They had also been forced into western style pants and did not look happy about it.

Nabiki and Akane didn't seem to have escaped either. Nabiki was sitting in a dress that was more conservative than she would normally have gone for. Meaning that it didn't show off all of her assets – which was always a dangerous thing to do with Happosai roaming around. It was light blue in colour and had a high neckline. That was about all Ranma could see considering she was sitting down and he really didn't know that much about dresses in the first place.

Akane was sitting in her usual seat wearing a pale yellow dress. Like Nabiki's he couldn't really see much of it considering they were sitting down but he knew that she never usually showed her arms off even though she really should.

"Ah, Ranma-kun, I'm so glad they fit," He turned to see Kasumi standing in the doorway to the kitchen. He couldn't see what she was wearing due to the ever present apron being on but he could tell it was new. The pale pink skirt of the dress she was wearing flowed behind her as she walked. Unlike the outfits Nabiki and Akane were wearing, Kasumi's had a sleeve that stopped halfway down her upper arm. Shorter than she usually wore them but still covered.

Ranma was shaken out of his unnerved state at the quiet family and that was usually loud and rambunctious, insults and comments being thrown about all over the place as the doorbell rang. He wasn't used to it and he didn't like it.

"I'll get it," he called out, mostly to Kasumi whom he knew would drop whatever she was doing before going to get the door.

Opening the door, he saw Kagome and Inuyasha standing there and he gave them both a warm smile. There was something about the two of them that he couldn't help but like. Something that went beyond the fact that they had helped him when he didn't need it.

He gestured for them to enter and the two of them walked into the entrance way, slipping off their shoes before stepping up onto the wooden platform that would lead into the house. Inuyasha gently helped his wife with her coat, revealing the simply white dress with red floral patterns she wore underneath. Ranma took her coat and hung it up as Inuyasha took his own off. He was wearing a deep red western style shirt and black pants, his hair once again tied back in a long braid.

"Come on through," Ranma walked into the main house, his two guests following him, the rest of the occupants turning to face them as they walked into the room. "Everyone, you've already met Inuyasha-sama. This is his wife, Taisho Kagome." A faint clearing of a throat caught Ranma's attention and he remembered that Akane hadn't yet met Inuyasha as she had been preoccupied in the dojo when he had returned. "Sorry, this is Akane-chan. You didn't get to meet her when you were here before, Inuyasha-sama." He introduced everyone else to Kagome and they all greeted the pair, receiving polite bows in return. No one other than Genma noticed the once again narrowed eyes of the young man that had entered the Tendo home. Only this time, the look was mirrored by his wife. He would need to keep an eye on the two of them. He couldn't think why they would react that way to him.

He would have to find out.

He may need to resort to using Nabiki and her mercenary tendencies and skills to find out the information she wanted.

If he could afford her prices that is.

Kasumi called for Akane and Nabiki to help her in the kitchen, firmly telling Kagome that she was a guest and was not to lift a finger other than from her bowl to her lips. Inuyasha smirked at the rebuff, earning an eye roll from his wife.

"So, you're the ones that found Ranma, then?" Soun asked eyeing the two twenty-somethings that were sitting at his dining table.

"Well, it was Inuyasha that found him," Kagome gestured to her husband, "although when he brought him back to our home, we thought that he was a girl. Imagine our shock when it turned out he wasn't." She chuckled lightly.

"Oh, we don't have to imagine it." Kasumi giggled as she brought out steaming bowls, placing them on the table in front of everyone. Akane and Nabiki followed up with vegetables other side dishes and Kasumi sat, dishing out bowls of rice to everyone at the table. "When he and his father arrived here, they came as a panda and a red-haired girl."

"I bet that was a sight," Kagome laughed and the others, apart from Akane, joined in.

"It was a bit of a shock to find that the young girl in our house was actually a boy." Kasumi smiled at the two guests.

It appeared that Kasumi had made beef sukiyaki which everyone happily dug into, murmurs of appreciation rumbling around the table.

"The two of you seem awfully young to be married, don't you?" Soun suddenly asked, lowering his bowl to the table and picking up his cup of sake, not noticing the amused glances shared by the aforementioned couple. Ranma and Akane froze, glancing at each other, not completely believing the words that had just come out of Soun Tendo's mouth. "I mean, you've got be early twenties at the most."

Inuyasha placed his bowl on the table, looking over at the Tendo patriarch. "While we may seem too young to some, it was the right decision for us. That being said, it's not going to be the right thing for everyone." His words were vague enough to be have a general meaning but there was also an underlying tone to his words. Ranma and Akane picked up on it immediately. Akane glanced at Ranma, who nodded, indicating he had told Inuyasha of the agreement between their fathers. She turned back to her food in front of her, not sure how to process that.

"Have you given any thought to the rest of your lives though," he pressed and Inuyasha raised an eyebrow at him, questioning. "What about all the things you want to do."

"Just because we're married does not mean that we can't do the things we want to." Kagome answered in place of her husband. "We don't impose any restrictions on the other. We're not going to stop each other from doing what we want to do. We got married because we chose to, with the full blessings from our families. No one forced us to get married."

Ranma glanced between the two father's sitting at the table, wondering if they had picked up on the message behind the words. Considering how the two of them stilled, they had. However, like Inuyasha, Kagome hadn't said anything that would imply anything about their actions.

The fact that Soun was pushing Ranma and Akane to get married and yet questioning the marriage of the couple in front of him did nothing but make him an incredible hypocrite.

Something everyone in the room was aware of.

The rest of the meal was spent with quiet chatter, the girls asking Inuyasha and Kagome various different questions about themselves. Akane was incredibly interested in how long it had taken Inuyasha to grow his hair so long, considering the length of time hers had taken. Before the unwanted haircut from Ryoga that is.

Ranma let out a relieved sigh. Other than the hiccup at first, the meal had gone rather smoothly, everyone enjoying Kasumi's meal and Kagome wanting to know the recipe so she could make it herself. Something the elder Tendo girl was only too happy to oblige with.

Ranma tensed as he felt a familiar aura approaching the Tendo compound along with the voice Ranma had hoped would stay away until at least the Taisho's had gone home.

"Wahoo! What a haul!" Soun and Genma stiffened at the sound of Happosai approaching the house and Ranma moaned. "What a haul!"

Ranma glanced over to the visiting couple as the diminutive martial artist bounded into view through the sliding door that led into the garden, having been left open to allow some cool air into the room on the muggy night. The two of them looked at the small man who was wearing a cloth around his face and had an enormous sack on his back. Part of him never wanted them to find out what was in it.

Their eyebrows flew up, practically into their hairlines as Happosai took off the cloth, revealing his face to the room and Ranma wondered what was going through their minds.

"Doesn't he look like . . .?" Kagome asked quietly, a finger daintily pointing towards the grandmaster martial artist.

"Yeah," Inuyasha cocked his head to the side as he took in the strange looking little man. Shrink him down a bit and give him an extra set of limbs and he would look exactly like Myoga, the flea retainer that had been loyal to his family. Speaking of which, he hadn't seen the little coward in a couple hundred years. He wondered in that instant what had happened to the flea.

"So, you had dinner without me, huh?" The man asked and Soun and Genma tensed even further, if that was possible.

"He even sounds like . . ." Kagome giggled a little and Inuyasha couldn't help but grin at the similarity. Maybe the guy had flea demon in him. Would account for his size too.

"Well, who do we have here?" The eyes of the grandmaster went wide when his gaze hit on Kagome and her slightly low cut dress. "Well, cutie, how's about I give you a real hello?"

Inuyasha saw the intent of the small man across the table before he had even made a move. His enhanced demon sight and speed allowed him to see the exact path he was taking and that made him see red. He had to ensure to control himself, considering they were in the presence of humans but there was no way that he could allow this slight on his mate.

Moving without anyone even the sharp eyes of the martial artists catching it, Inuyasha's arm struck out and his strong fingers wrapped themselves around Happosai's neck, catching him in mid-air before he could get anywhere near the hanyou's mate.

There was a collective gasp as Happosai stopped before he could hit Kagome, who for her part, hadn't moved, as though she had known that he wouldn't ever reach his target. She sat there calmly, turning to Inuyasha and placing a hand on his arm as though to calm him.

It took a moment for it to register that the young man had simply reached out and stopped the martial artist that Soun and Genma feared so much. Ranma and Akane sat there with their mouths open, trying to process what they had just seen. Not even Ranma in his female form – which they had determine was much faster than his male form – could work up that kind of speed. They were all lucky if they got anywhere near him and they knew his moves.

And yet, this young man that had never met Happosai before, had stopped him in his tracks.

Happosai himself was in as much shock as the rest of the room. No one had ever stopped him like that before. Yes, he had received some whacks in his time but that was always after he had at least managed a fondle of his target. He turned his head as much as he could against the strong grip and saw that the young man in question was not even looking at him. Instead, he was sitting there, quite serenely with his eyes closed.

Inuyasha took a moment to calm himself after he had caught the little letch that had leaped towards Kagome, steadying himself. He opened his eyes, pulling his prey towards him and holding him in front of him.

"Don't you know it's rude to go after someone else's wife?" His voice was low, practically a growl. Happosai's eyes flew to Kagome at the mention of the word 'wife' but Inuyasha it didn't matter whether he had known or not. Being Inu-youkai and coming from the House of the Lord of the West, honour was incredibly important to Inuyasha and in his mind, Happosai's actions were inexcusable. "Or any girl for that matter?"

"That's incredible," Akane whispered and Ranma nodded, silent. He watched Inuyasha closely, wondering how he had achieved such speed. Not even with his Imperial Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire technique was he that fast. Maybe he could find out from him.

Inuyasha didn't need to say anything more as he brought the small martial artist closer so that they were almost touching nose to nose. He kept eye contact with his tiny victim as he pulled on his youkai power, breaking through the concealment spell held in place by the ring on his right hand enough for the brown of his iris's to turn electric blue and back again. The tiny man's eyes widened and he spluttered for a moment, realising that the young man who held his life in his hand was not all he seemed.

"Do we have an understanding?" Inuyasha murmured and the head attached to the neck in his hand nodded up and down so quickly he thought it was going to fly off at any moment. Inuyasha dropped him on the floor beside him and Happosai ran out of the door so quickly he completed forgot about his haul.

"How did you do that?" Akane asked after a moment, still gaping at the open doorway where Happosai had disappeared. "No one has ever been able to catch him before."

"Maybe you're just not thinking about it in the right way," Inuyasha turned to look at them.

"What do you mean?" Ranma would take any way of getting rid of the letch he could. Too many times had he been subjected to cold water and then that pervert attached to his female forms chest.

"You're reacting to what he's doing," Inuyasha explained. "You gotta anticipate what he's gonna do. You all know him well enough. You should be able to see what he's got planned."

"Tell me, do you practice martial arts?" Genma spoke directly to Inuyasha for the first time that evening, drawing the attention of his dark eyes.

"Not exactly, no," Inuyasha's answer was vague. While he had been fighting for his entire life, with the exception of the last century or so when everything had calmed down for him, he wasn't limited to one particular style of fighting. He did whatever it took for him to win. While that could class as their 'Anything Goes' style, he didn't see it as much of a style himself.

He was a fighter. Not a martial artist.

It was a stunned Kasumi that went into the kitchen and returned a few moments later with a plate full of daifuku. Everyone snapped out of their haze to grab one, relishing Kasumi's cooking. Her desserts were divine.

It wasn't long before Inuyasha and Kagome made their way out of the door, thanking Kasumi for the meal and thanking the Tendo's for their hospitality. Inuyasha gave Ranma a pointed look and the teen knew that he was silently reinforcing what he had said earlier that day.

~I~R~I~R~I~R~I~R~I~R~I~R~I~R~I~R~

"Airen!" Ranma groaned as he heard Shampoo coming up behind him on that blasted bike of hers. "Ranma! Airen!" She stopped the bike directly in front of him before bounding off and throwing her arms around him, rubbing her chest against his as she so often did.

"Shampoo!" He tried to get away from the wriggling girl that was attached to him like a vine wrapped around a tree. "Shampoo! Let go! Argh! Get off me!" He managed to disentangle himself from her, stepping away as she stood there.

"Why you push Shampoo away?" She asked, her hands going to her hips as she stared at him. "Shampoo no see too too violent girl. We go out now, yes?"

"No!" Ranma almost shocked himself with the ferocity of his shout. "No, I will not go out with you and no! I am not going to marry you! When are you going to understand that!"

Standing there staring at the Amazon girl, he noticed the look in her eyes changing to show the same one she had when she felt Akane was in her way. It was a much darker side to Shampoo. One that showed she was willing to do pretty much anything she could to get what she wanted.

Unfortunately for Ranma, that was usually him.

Not wanting to be around when his words really sank in, he took off. He had been on the receiving end of the angry Amazon girl before and he had no desire to be there again. People often accused him of not using his head in situations that called for it and some of the time they were right. But he was sure going to use it now.

That and his legs.

He heard her shout as he rounded the corner but he didn't stop.

He quickly found himself in a familiar area, marvelling momentarily at how he had ended up there without even realising it and quickly ran towards the mountain of steps he knew was there. He heard the tell-tale sound of Shampoo following him and he was counting on the partial obscurity of the trees that lined the steps on either side as cover. He ran as fast up the steps as he could, glancing back as he reached the top, seeing Shampoo stop at the bottom.

"Whoa, kid, what's the hurry," Ranma turned to see Inuyasha standing in the courtyard, a broom in hand. He was dressed in some jeans and a t-shirt, his hair once again braided, watching Ranma with a perplexed expression. "Everything okay?"

Ranma glanced down the steps, seeing Shampoo still standing at the bottom, turning to see where he had gone. He waved Inuyasha over, wondering why he had the broom. The man stopped beside him, looking down the steps as Ranma dove behind him.

"The girl coming up the steps?" Inuyasha queried, looking at the kid and getting slightly worried when his heart rate increased and his face paled when he mentioned she was coming up. "Who is she?"

"Shampoo," Ranma croaked out.

"The Amazon girl?" Ranma nodded and Inuyasha looked down again, seeing that she was nearly halfway up. "No wonder you were running. Come on." Inuyasha grabbed his arm, quickly running towards the house. If what he had heard over the years about the Chinese Amazons was true, it was no wonder why Ranma had run. He had heard some nasty things and he wouldn't want to be a human male in a confrontation with one. He opened the front door to the house, shoving Ranma inside before barking out a warning to stay inside before taking on a casual appearance of cleaning up the shrine after a day of visitors.

"Ranma-kun?" He turned to see Kagome standing behind him, a younger boy of about twelve standing beside her, looking at him curiously. "What are you doing here?"

"Umm . . ." She narrowed her eyes at him, much the same way as a mother would a child. "I don't know whether Inuyasha's told you about the whole situation with me and . . ."

"The fiancée situation?" Kagome raised an eyebrow and Ranma nodded. "Yes, he's told me about them."

"Well, I ran into one of them on the way home and made her angry, which I probably shouldn't have done and she chased me all the way here." He admitted, narrowing his eyes as the boy beside Kagome began to snicker.

"You ran away from a girl?"

"Souta-kun, enough." Kagome scolded and he quickly shut up. "Which one?"

"Shampoo,"

"The Amazon?" Kagome's eyebrows shot up and Ranma nodded. "No wonder you ran."

"Inuyasha-san said the same thing." Ranma remarked and the boy Kagome had called Souta rolled his eyes. "She was coming up the steps so Inuyasha kind of shoved me in here."

"Come on," Kagome motioned for him to follow her, so he slipped off his shoes and put his pack down before walking into the house. She led him into a room off the kitchen with a high window. He looked around, seeing it was nothing more than a small storage area. "We only really use this room for drying laundry when the weather's bad." Ranma nodded as Kagome opened a window and motioned for him to stand on the other side. "This is right next to the courtyard so we'll be able to hear what's going on."

Ranma nodded, seeing that the boy had disappeared. He stiffened as he heard Shampoo call out to Inuyasha. "Why was he outside with a broom?"

"Hey, gotta keep the shrine tidy for the visitors." Kagome shrugged, giving the teen a smirk.

"Can I help you, miss?" Inuyasha asked as though he didn't know she was chasing after Ranma and that he was hiding her quarry inside the house. "If you're looking to visit the shrine, I'm sorry but we're closed for the day."

"No, I no want to visit shrine," the two of them heard Shampoo's response and Ranma tensed a little. He had the urge to look out of the window but knew he would be pushing his luck. "I looking for someone. Have you seen boy, black hair with pigtail?"

"No, sorry, haven't seen anyone like that?" The two of them grinned at Inuyasha's outright lie, hoping the Chinese girl would believe him.

"You sure?" Her tone was skeptical. Damn, Ranma thought to himself, she must have seen him at the top of the steps. "I sure I saw him come up here."

"Pretty sure," they heard something thunk gently against the wall underneath the window and realised that Inuyasha must have been holding the broom. "Like I said, shrine's closed. The only ones here now are the family."

"Oh," she sounded dejected and Ranma heard the shuffling of footsteps as she turned away.

Kagome nodded her head for Ranma to follow her out of the small room and they walked into the main room at the same time Inuyasha did.

"So how come you were running away from her?" Inuyasha asked as Kagome went to make some tea. He started to walk towards the table, sitting at the end that in the Tendo household would have been taken by Soun Tendo. The face that he sat there without hesitation meant that that was most likely his seat. Was Inuyasha classed as the head of their family? It was possible, he assumed, that is, if Kagome's father wasn't around. In the short amount of time he had been inside the shrine, he hadn't seen any evidence of him being there.

"Well, you remember how I told you I'd had enough?" The other man nodded. "She's just . . . too much. I can't even describe her, really. She just . . . I basically told her to get the hell away from me and that nothing was ever going to happen between us – which she should have got by now considering the only time I've ever actually gone near her was when I was under the influence of some kind of potion – and she didn't take to kindly to that."

"Yeah, I've heard it's not good to piss off an Amazon," Inuyasha shot him a sympathetic look. "Especially if you're male."

"No kidding." Ranma sighed, crossing his arms on the table in front of him and dropping his head onto them.

Inuyasha had to sympathise with the poor kid. He looked utterly defeated. It wasn't any wonder. He'd heard about the Joketsuzoku and their traditions. He hated some of them, especially the whole 'Kiss of Death', 'Kiss of Marriage' thing they had going on. From what Ranma had said, he had been subjected to both and from what he had told him about the girl and her great-grandmother, they weren't going to let him go without fulfilling either of those challenges.

He placed a hand on Ranma's shoulder before standing up and walking through to the kitchen to see Kagome. She turned as he walked into the room, her smile fading as she saw the look on his face.

"What's the matter?" She asked, placing the cups she had gotten out of the cupboard on the side and walking over to her husband.

She felt how tense he was as she placed a hand on his arm, feeling the tremors that ran through his body in short intervals. She sucked in a breath, glancing towards the door into the dining room before looking back at his face, moving in front of him and cupping his chin with her hands.

"Yash, you have to calm down," she cooed softly, her thumbs running across the purple marks that were appearing and fading across his cheekbones. "Your youkai is overpowering the concealment spell." Her voice was nothing more than a whisper as his eyes opened and she sighed, seeing the irises flicker between amber and dark brown. "What happened?"

He let out a frustrated breath, loosening his tensed hands and wrapping them around his mate's waist, pulling her to him as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, pulling him to her. He buried his nose in her hair, allowing her scent to wash over him, to calm him as it had for the last five hundred years.

"He just seems so lost." He murmured, closing his eyes and feeling himself calming. "Everything he's told me . . . he doesn't have a choice in his own life and . . . it just pisses me off."

"I can see that," Kagome gave a soft chuckle, pulling him tighter.

"We have to tell him," she pulled away ducking down to look him in the eye. "We have to, Kags."

"You feel it, too." She whispered and he nodded. The connection they both knew as their own thrumming whenever Ranma was close to them. The two of them were certain that Sesshomaru felt it too. Despite all of his outward appearances, as a breed, there was nothing more important to an Inu than family. Since she had figured that out, she had reasoned that that had been why the brothers had never been able to kill each other. Not because they were so evenly matched – although Inuyasha grew in strength exponentially as time went on – but because something in their base instincts couldn't kill the other.

Maim? Yes.

Poison? No problem.

Dismember? Done.

But actually kill each other? Neither brother had found that they could swing the killing blow. And it wasn't for lack of want or desire. Sesshomaru could have very easily killed Inuyasha after removing the black pearly from his eye. The hanyou was confused and disoriented and Sesshomaru could have very easily landed a fatal blow while he was recovering from the abuse his right eye had just endured but he didn't.

There had been a time not long after Kagome had been able to travel back through the well, back to Inuyasha when Sesshomaru had appeared. He and Inuyasha had called an uneasy truce in the time she had been gone and had stopped trying to kill each other every time they saw each other. Mostly because Rin was living in the same village where Inuyasha lived by the well and Sesshomaru would not want to risk any harm coming to his ward. She liked to wander so there was still a chance even if they were a fair distance.

He had appeared at the small house she and Inuyasha shared on the outskirts of the village. She and Inuyasha had been laying in the sun, enjoying the afternoon before she realised that her husband had drifted off into a mid-afternoon nap. She had learned since coming back that Inu's – apparently not just limited to Inuyasha – loved nothing more than a snooze in the sun.

Rin had let slip that Sesshomaru often did the same thing.

Must be a dog thing.

It had been then that Sesshomaru had appeared, Inuyasha not even stirring in his sleep. It went to show how much had changed in her absence as before, he would have been awake and on his feet before Sesshomaru had even been in the immediate vicinity.

The elder Inu had come to investigate the rumours he had heard of her return. She hadn't missed the slightly relieved look in his eye as his gaze drifted down to his sleeping sibling. His face had remained unchanged but after so long dealing with a hanyou that hated to show his emotions, she had gotten good at reading the eyes. It was then that she had broached her way of thinking to him and he had confirmed that there had always been something holding him back. And what with Inuyasha, with his youkai markings, looking so much like their father had, killing him had become harder. So he had chosen not to.

She had had a similar conversation with Inuyasha after he had woken, immediately scenting Sesshomaru in the area. She had been surprised that he wasn't as wound up as he had been before but reasoned if they had a truce then he wouldn't be.

Since then, the truce had drifted away and they had become what she reasoned both Inu's were looking for all along but wouldn't admit to themselves or each other.

A family.

And now, looking at her mate, she could see the tension as that was under threat once again.

"Okay," she whispered, resting her chin on his shoulder and pulling him close to her again. "We'll tell him."

"It's going to have to be soon." Came the murmured reply.

"What about now?" She questioned and it was Inuyasha that pulled away this time, looking down into his mate's eyes. She smiled at the sight. His markings and eyes were no longer going haywire and she could see that he was calmer. "Why wait? He's here. Why not tell him now? Not everything of course but maybe something to make him feel like his life isn't totally messed up?"

"What 'hey, I know your life seems like a mess but guess what? My husband's a half demon and we actually met when I fell down a well and ended up five hundred years in the past?" Inuyasha chuckled and Kagome rolled her eyes.

"Well, when you put it like that," she huffed, giving him one last squeeze and moving away from her mate to grab the tea things she had been setting up before he walked in.

He let out one last breath before following her out into the dining room to see Ranma in the same position he had been in before. He sat down in the same spot he had been in before, watching the boy as he lifted his head, a dejected look on his face.

"You okay, kid?" Inuyasha asked, crossing his legs in front of him.

Ranma let out a sigh, grabbing at the pigtail he always wore. "I don't know. I shouldn't have come here. It's not your problem to deal with and you shouldn't have to."

"Hey, like I said, kid, you're welcome here anytime." Inuyasha was set in his tone, making no room for argument and Kagome nodded, an equally resolute look on her face as she agreed with her husband.

"I just don't feel right bringing all my issues here."

"Well, to be honest, compared to some of the stuff we've been through," Kagome raised an eyebrow at Inuyasha who rolled his eyes at her, "what you're dealing with seems like a walk in the park."

"So you've been cursed?" The teen raised an eyebrow and Kagome nodded.

"More times than I can count." She shrugged, her tone at ease and Ranma felt a little offended at her words. "Curses, witches, exorcists, demons-"

"Demons?"

"Yuh-huh," she grinned, her gaze shifting to her husband. "As a matter of fact, I'm married to one."

"What?"