Disclaimer: Nope I don't own Inuyasha

You'll never guess what I got back?!! Yup, my Internet!!! And here, with much thanks to your patience and toleration, is the chapter I promised you!!!

Chapter 19: Through Heaven's Gate

"It's so beautiful." Sango said in a reverent whisper as they walked through the empty palace doorway.

"Woh." Rikos and Shippo said at the same time staring in wonder at the large welcoming room.

"Look at that staircase." Kikyo said. It was wide at the bottom but thinner at the the middle and again wide at the top. It would be a great staircase to walk down showing off your beauty. The dust in the air bothered no one.

"The treasure is still here." Inuyasha said wiping a layer of dust off of a silver candle holder. "This place really hasn't seen anyone since the last Singer died.

"Just look at this architecture." Miroku said admiringly. The stone beneath their feet was smooth and unblemished by cracks caused by stones being lined up together. It all had an air of delicacy about it that took the breath away.

Kagome stared straight up at the large, many tiered chandelier still hanging from the ceiling. They were hard to make out through the darkness and grime, but it looked as if it was hung with crystals, pure white crystals. "Made for beauty, not as a fortress."

"Well, where to?" Rikos asked at last.

Kirara stepped forward and walked through an open doorway to the right. She turned and looked back at them and meowed as if to say, "Well, aren't you coming?"

They followed her, gazing at the rooms they passed.

A large dining room with the giant monolithic wooden table still standing. A long hallway with windows of stained glass in every color imaginable, some broken, but most still as beautiful and breathtaking as ever. Another staircase that led them up to a long hallway filled with doors that time had not yet claimed. Here the wood was inlaid with jewels, each precious and shining. Except one door that had only circular holes that made Inuyasha believe it had once held pearls, the most delicate of all gems.

One door stood ajar and Kirara walked right in. Everyone followed and saw that Kirara had taken a room and made it her own over the long years spent here. There were many pillows and blankets that moths and other rodents had not claimed. In some spaces and on some shelfs there was some treasure or some other such thing that Kirara had taken in there to decorate with.

Kagome walked over to the long empty fireplace and touched a golden circlet on the mantle. It was encrusted with fine jewels, mostly small as if they were stars shining in many colors as it moved in the sunlight. "The crown jewels." Kagome said recognizing such a thing immediately.

"Shippo hopped onto her shoulder and looked at it. "It's pretty." He said reaching out to touch it. He ran his hands over it softly as if he knew, even at his young age, to be gentle with it.

"Put it back, NOW!" Sango's voice rang in the hallway. Miroku, Inuyasha, Kagome, and Shippo turned to the doorway, which Sango and Rikos had not come through.

"It's mine, I found it and there is no one here to claim it." His voice said, the sound moved as if he was heading to the room.

But Sango burst through ahead of him and looked at Inuyasha dead in the eyes and said, "Make him put them back!"

"Put what..." he started but that was answered when Rikos came through the door his arms filled with jewels and treasures that he had picked up throughout the palace.

"Rikos!" He said knowing immediatly what happened. "What are you doing?!"

"Pirates right." He said his chin up. "Take your treasure, women, and drink at will and if a man says no, take his life as well."

"Rikos how could you?" Kikyo said her cheeks flushed in anger as she came in not a step behind him. Kirara hissed at him.

"What's the problem, no one's cared before?" He said unhappily. Sango marched up to him and tried to pry to pry a golden plate out of his hands.

"Hey, that's mine!"

"Gimme!" Sango and Rikos pulled on the plate as he dropped the rest of the stolen goods as the plate seemed to take first place in his desire for the riches.

"Rikos let go!" Inuyasha ordered as Kikyo grabbed Sango's waist and tried to help pull the plate away from him.

"Rikos drop it!" Kagome ordered with tears in her eyes. Rikos saw them and his grip on the plate went slack and the two girls fell over.

"Owie." Kikyo said rubbing her rump.

"Hah!" Sango said triumphant as she tried to get the rest of the goods before Rikos did.

"Kagome..." He seemed genuinely said about her unshed tears. "Sorry...I...I didn't think anyone would care. It's just an old building."

"Maybe to you. But this old building is who I am." Kagome said sadly.

Rikos and Kagome looked at each other silently for ten heartbreaking silent seconds. Finally Rikos hung his head in shame and Sango grabbed the last artifact and took them to Kirara's bed.

It was silent for a moment more before Rikos finally muttered, properly shamed, "Sorry."

"It's okay." Was all Kagome said as her wet eyes cleared. Rikos looked up his face in a comic puppy pout, "Forgiven?" He asked half tease, half serious.

Kagome smiled weak against that innocent and sad face. "Forgiven."

He smiled happily and crashed on Kirara's pillows, not even looking at the treasure as he said, "So where's this gate we're supposed to find next?"

"Heaven's Gate." Kagome said thinking. "Well I'm guessing that it would be at the center of the palace."

"Well the center of a palace is usually the throne room." Miroku said helpfully.

"Been to many palaces?" Inuyasha asked leaning against the wall.

"Common sense, the throne room was to hold audiences, it's only right to put it in the middle." he said sticking his nose in the air.

"Can you lead us, Kirara?" Sango asked.

The cat demon leapt from the bed and left the room again everyone following her eagerly seeing the end of their adventure looming.

Sango's breath escaped in a rush as they walked into the throne room. It echoed back loudly as it bounced of the neglected, but beautiful walls.

"Oh my God." Kagome said so lightly that it shouldn't have possibly echoed, but it did. The floor was white marble with ribbons of varying shades of gray twisting through it. Some parts were chipped and all was dusty covering it's brilliance, but it was still breathtaking. The walls were so covered in grime and cobwebs and dust that you could only make out faint lines of the designs etched into it. Birds and leaves, flowers and trees, nature, beautiful despite the grime.

There was a single chair, a tall proud throne with just as much dirt as the floor. There were large columns on either side still standing tall and proud, all but one that was laying broken and cracked halfway down the long room. The ceiling had once been made of glass and their were sharp shards still winking in the fading sunlight with the steel framework showing a pale imitation of the shape of the glass. There was ivy and plants growing down through the broken glass and sweeping gently on the floor.

It had an air of neglect and time that overpowered them. The ghosts of so many people's lives suddenly hit them with such force it almost knocked them down. A bird called from outside and they heard it reflected a hundred times over in the echo.

"Hell of a throne room." Rikos said walking to a wall and wiping away the layer of grime revealing a large diamond that sat where the eye of the outlined bird was.

"It's so....so...." Even the non-Singers could feel the magic here, but for Kikyo it was something new and amazing. Something she had always known existed but had been just out of reach.

"This is it." Kagome said deffinativley looking straight ahead, her eyes unfocused yet still focused on the room.

"What do you see?" Inuyasha asked setting a hand she ignored on her shoulder.

"I can feel it." She walked forward her eyes glued to the wall behind the throne. She walked around the fallen column and beautifully made chair and headed to the wall, the only section that didn't depict something from nature.

"What is it?" Kikyo asked drawn toward it as well.

Kagome started wiping the grime away from it, getting her hands and dress filthy but not really caring. Rikos, still trying to make up for his mistake, ran forward and started helping. Kagome payed him no mind, nor Kikyo when she joined, or any of the others.

Finally she stepped back and the others followed suit to see what they had uncovered. They were all filthy, Inuyasha's hair was more silver than gray and every one's clothes were filthy. Shippo sneezed once and Sango looked like she was about to follow.

But the design had taken every one's attention. There were four, full gray, shapes in the middle making four corners of a diamond shape. They were carved like many faceted gems but were dull and not from the dust. Each one had a tail coming off one corner that led into a different design. The one on top had just a single line, it turned many corners but they were all straight and perfect. At each corner there was a tiny emerald and where the line stopped at the high ceiling there was a much larger emerald slightly pulsing.

The one on the right had a flowing swirlish design sprouting from it's tip. At the center of the many swirls which all branched off each other, there was a small white diamong with a larger one were the swirls ended, also slightly pulsing.

The bottom had graceful sweeping lines each one branching off the other in a design that made them think of fire. At the begging and end of each line was a small ruby and, like the other two a larger ruby at the floor. This one, however, was not pulsing and in fact looked almost as dull as the gems in the center.

The last one on the left had wavelike lines with sapphire dust in all the lines. It also had a large sapphire at the end, and like the ruby it was dull and lifeless.

"What is it?" Shippo asked.

Sango walked over to the diamond and used her sleeve to clean off a little more grime. With more of it in the air she finally sneezed, right on the diamond. They all gasped as the pulsing increased and white light started to make it's way down the lines. Sango stepped back, but just as soon as it started the light faded.

"Wow. Sneeze again." Rikos said smiling.

"You can't sneeze on command." Sango snapped not taking her eyes off the gem which had returned to normal.

"Blow on it." Kagome said. She turned to her and saw her eyes were strong and deep and no longer unfocused.

"Uh...sure." Sango took a deep breath and blew hard on the gem.

Again the pulsing increased and expanded, racing down the swirling lines lighting up the other diamonds and finally landing on the gray lump. It flared a bright white. There was tension in the air, as everyone waited for something, but the glow faded and it returned to normal.

"What a rip off." Rikos complained.

"Why are only those two glowing?" Shippo asked.

Kagome walked up to it and ran her hands on the gray lumps.

"Singers are most at home on the sea." she said sounding like she was quoting a book. "But every element listens to their voice. The four base element being thus: Earth," She looked at the emerald, "Air," The diamond, "Fire," the ruby, "And Water." and the sapphire.

She reached down and grabbed a handful of grime and dust and threw it in the air. It hit the emerald making it glow and do the same process as the diamond. One again, one of the lumps glowed, green this time, but it stopped again after only a few seconds.

"Get water, fire, and dirt." Kagome ordered.

Miroku grabbed his water skin as Rikos ran outside. Sango and Kikyo dropped to the ground to gather the dirt and dust that made the grime and pile it into a large pile.

A minute later Rikos ran back in with a log that Shippo set on fire with his fox magic.

"At the same time." Kagome said. Miroku opened his skin and held it up to the sapphire, Inuyasha grabbed two hand fulls of the pile of dust and got ready to jump, Rikos with Shippo on his shoulder held the torch at the ready next to the ruby and Sango and Kikyo stood next to the diamond.

"Now." Kagome order and as one they placed their elements to their gems.

Sango and Kikyo blew hard making the gem pulse brighter and sending the white light down the lines to the lump again, Miroku's water made the sapphire finally activate and run down it's lines lighting the sapphire dust with blue light.

Inuyasha jumped and slammed both of his hands full of dirt onto the emerald and Rikos put the torch directly on the ruby.

Different colors of light flared from the four jewels and once they were all lit, they moved together circling around each other and coming closer together.

Then they touched and a light burst forth again, this one was one they had never seen, so bright and beautiful in no color of the rainbow they knew.

And the light faded and they stared, with light dazzled eyes, into a large room filled with treasure.

"Woh." Rikos said as the gold in the sealed room shined with barely any dust on it.

They all walked inside with careful footsteps to examine what could only be the royal treasury.

"There's so much stuff." Sango picked up a silver staff with a large spherical emerald at the top.

"I won't touch nothing." Rikos promised Kikyo who was glaring at him but his eyes said he dearly wanted to.

"There must be at least three fortunes in here." Inuyasha said gazing at a gold coin.

"Too bad you wont be able to enjoy it." Everyone turned at the dark humor filled voice.

Naraku stood framed in the doorway, a knife at Kagome's neck who had not moved from the spot where she had stood before. Here eyes were unfocused and lost again and she stood limply in Naraku's arms.

"Now this doesn't have to be violent does it?" Naraku asked smiling evilly.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Sorry no more for you for now. *smiles wickedly* What's a kick ass chapter without a cliffy like that, huh?