Disclaimer: I do not own any part of InuYasha, only my own character Kakiya.
Chapter 13
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Kagura had left the room when she finished lighting the candle, leaving Kakiya and Sesshomaru alone with the man. Kakiya stepped forward to get a better view of the man, she lazily held out her hand and three orbs of light appeared, illuminating the dark room. The orbs floated from her hand and started to circle around the room.
"My name is Kakiya. I take it that you must be Naraku?"
He stood up, "Yes, I am Naraku, however…' He walked towards Kakiya until he was right in front of her and looking down at her, "My… you have changed. You look… different." He smirked, "Will you let me examine you?"
"What are you talking about? I've never met you." Kakiya's demon self snapped.
Naraku frowned at her question, 'Never met me? She must know that I was Onigumo… unless…' he grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at the wall to his right, and then to his left. 'Strange how she has markings on only one side of her cheek."
Kakiya mentally growled, 'I guess I'll let him look at me now, but if he does anything…'
Using his thumb, he traced the lower of the two stripes on her left cheek. Although he the stripe had already ended, he continued to trail his thumb along her face to her lips.
He lifted up the soft lip, revealing her pointed fang, 'She doesn't even look like the girl I saw fighting in Kanna's mirror anymore.'
By now, Kakiya was getting pissed off at this Naraku character and Sesshomaru, who was behind her, had let a small growl escape from his lips and was trying to hold another one in, with difficulty.
"Let. Me. Go." Kakiya growled out every vowel, "now."
Naraku ignored her threat and tightened his grip on her chin and grabbed her arm with his other free hand. He slowly slid his hand up her arm and reached the side of her face, brushing her silver hair off to the side to reveal pointed elf-like ears. Naraku flicked the pointed part of her ear causing Kakiya to jerk slightly. He tightened his grip once more and pierced through the skin on her cheek with his nails, causing her to bleed.
Kakiya's eyes glowed red as she felt her blood trickle down her left cheek, "How dare you…" she growled, "I allowed you to touch me and you had refused to let go when I asked you to. Now you dare to go so far as to doing this to my face." Her red demonic aura was now swirling around her, making Naraku let go of her and slightly step back, watching her with a slight smirk on his face, "You are pushing your luck with me, demon."
She made her body explode with an outburst of power, knocked Naraku back. He quickly did a small flip in the air and handed on his feet.
Naraku liked her blood of his finger and suddenly, all the little scratches and bruises on his body was gone, he felt like he had just awoken from a week's worth of rest, his body felt so alive and rejuvenated, "Tasty…" he taunted.
Sesshomaru whipped him with his green whip of energy and lopped off his arm. Kakiya watched him and touched her cheek, healing the scratch.
Naraku's tentacles, which were attached to his back, swung at Sesshomaru, but they were deflected off of Kakiya's barrier. He quickly regenerated his arm.
"I see you have a barrier too." He said as he put up his own barrier.
"Before we get too serious, let's take this outside." Kakiya told him.
Kakiya's eyes glowed white and the three orbs circled around the three of them. A great flash of white light blinded them for a few seconds. Once the light faded away, Sesshomaru and Naraku found themselves in a forest clearing with the cave entrance to Naraku's hide out visible behind them, but it was small. Kakiya smirked at how easy it was her to teleport compared to her weaker self.
Naraku stared at the strange Kakiya before him and saw her features more clearly under the pale light of the full moon and stars.
"You are different from when I last saw you fight against Kagura and you barely look like the child Onigumo tried to rob from many years ago."
"I am not the one you saw fighting the wind sorceress nor am I the one 'Onigumo' tried to rob from. My name is Kakiya, Kakiya the demon. The one you saw was my other self, Kakiya, the half-breed."
Kakiya formed a dark sword in her hand, except this time, the sword had a glowing purple mist that surrounded it; she had no desire, whatsoever, to keep her ever growing powers at bay, so she let it leak out of her body and sword.
She held it up and pointed it at Naraku, "Draw your sword, demon… No wait that would be wrong, you're not a demon. You are a half-breed, aren't you?"
"Again, you are correct." He simply replied, "I was once a human who had my body devoured by demons." Naraku's tentacles grew larger and it had already started to creep up towards her.
Kakiya charged at him and swung at his barrier, easily shattering it in a matter of seconds, "You call that a barrier?" Kakiya stopped and thought for a moment, "I'll do you a favour and drop mine since yours was so weak." and dropped her barrier.
"I will see to it that you will regret showing me such sympathy." He growled.
He stabbed one of his tentacles at her, but she merely moved to the side and hacked off the end, leaving the tentacle burning at the place where her sword had contacted it.
'Poison?' he thought and quickly smirked, 'two can play at this game.'
He changed some of his tentacles into claws and coated them with an extra layer of his poisonous miasma, which he had turned solid. He released his miasma around them and created a foggy barrier so he could try to fool Kakiya with shadows and confuse her senses.
Sesshomaru had stayed out of this fight, deciding that it was Kakiya's fight and not his, but he knew that the demon side of Kakiya was very easy to beat if you knew what her weak points were; which was her blinding anger, and he didn't want her to die because then he would have to deal with Rin's whines and crying afterwards. He quickly made his way towards Kakiya, trying to make sure that Naraku wouldn't notice him. Kakiya recognized his scent since she couldn't see anything and let him approach.
He touched on her right shoulder and leaned in beside her ear, "Make sure you don't get fooled by his tricks, do not let his pathetic comments cloud your mind… I'll be watching, I do not wish to battle such a disgusting demon." He added quickly and jumped away.
Kakiya scowled at Sesshomaru for treating her like a child again, "I'll show you..." she muttered.
She thought she heard a faint chuckle but decided not to let it get to her head. She looked around, but to her dismay, she could see no signs of Naraku through his thick miasma. Her sense of smell couldn't even help her since his miasma was making the whole place reek with his stench.
'Damn…' she thought bitterly, "Why must he hide, it is very cowardly of him" she tried to blow the miasma away, but she failed to accomplish anything.
Naraku laughed, but Kakiya could not figure out where it was coming from; it seemed to be all over the place, echoing again and again. Naraku, who could see perfectly fine in his miasma, was watching the struggling Kakiya in front of him. He reached out and grabbed a handful of her hair and lightly tugged at it. He quickly let do and jumped back just in time to avoid Kakiya's rough attack from her sword.
"Don't touch me!" she yelled out.
Naraku smirked and started to circle her, randomly attacking her whether she was distracted of not. He was still surprised that she could even avoid some of his attacks. Some of his attacks did hit the target, but it only managed to rip apart some of her armour and clothing.
'This is getting so annoying…' she thought, 'I'll just have to blow this miasma with wind infused with my magic… someone thing I've never done before.' She thought bitterly, and sighed, 'Here goes nothing.' She childishly thought.
She lifted her hand up above her hand and started to form a ball of wind energy. The air around her started to circle and form a tornado. The tornado was circling her and was taking the air around them along with Kakiya's powers that leaked from her body into its swirls. Kakiya then shaped the tornado into a huge gust of wind and blew it around her, blowing away the thick miasma. Although the move itself seemed and looked simple, it left Kakiya almost panting since it was her first time doing something like it, the tornado had gathered a bit too much moisture in the air, so it was harder to move even though her powers had been infused with it; moving water or ice was not her main power choices.
She quickly looked in front of her, trying to spot Naraku, who's scent was still everywhere, 'Damn…' she mentally cursed.
Kakiya then heard a slight rustle of clothes and spun around to find Naraku in the air, just a metre away from her, ready to attack her with his poisonous claws. He tried stab her, but she quickly brought her sword up and sliced through the claw. He smirked as he landed behind her; he made the cut off claw come back to life and it lunged at Kakiya's leg. She quickly brought her sword back down and stabbed the claw, skewering it to the group while the flesh of the claw burned with the unfamiliar poison from Kakiya's sword. Naraku took this chance and jumped at her again, trying to catch her off guard, but Kakiya was still quick to react. She pulled her sword out of the ground, but didn't move out of the way fast enough, so she blocked his claw with the flat side of her sword.
Naraku's claw started to burn from just touching it, he pulled back and growled, "Damn it." He cursed.
He jumped back and tried to stab her again. Kakiya moved to the side and chopped it off, continuing to charge at him, running along side the clawless tentacle.
She finally reached his and pulled back her sword over her head, preparing for a full power swing, "Die!" she yelled out.
She swung at him, but saw him smirk. She didn't let that bother her and continued her swing. Suddenly, she felt an immense pain through her body. Her sword had stopped only inches away from his head.
"Quite the contrary actually." He lightly tapped the sword away from his head.
Kakiya staggered back and dropped her sword, making it disappear. She looked down at her stomach and saw the tentacle she had severed off before she charged at him had stabbed through her and was now poking out of her stomach like a dead log.
"How…could I…" she reached for the tentacle, but stopped when it started to move.
She screamed out in pain as the tentacle forced its way out.
"You like that, don't you Kakiya? I didn't hurt your face this time." he walked towards Kakiya, which didn't take a long time, and reached out towards the tentacle in her.
Kakiya struggled stepped back; to avoid his touch, "Don't… touch me…" she roughly told him in between pants.
She placed her hand on the part of the tentacle that was sticking out of her and grabbed it. With excruciating pain, she managed to pull it out, leaving a large hole in her body. She used her other hand to cover up the hole and began healing the wound.
The tentacle in her hand suddenly came back to life once more and wrapped around her body, making her crash into the ground. She tried to free herself, but the wound was draining her of her strength, since it was so big and her blood was spilling out everywhere; along with her energy(1). She wriggled within the bonds, to try to loosen them, but that action only brought pain upon her body. Naraku made his way towards her again and tightened the bonds on her so she would stop moving around.
"Lord…Sesshomaru…" she struggled to call out.
Naraku smirked and knelt down beside her. He rolled her over so that she was now facing him. She turned away, but he once again, grabbed her chin and forced her to look at him.
"Calling for your lover?" he sneered, but then frowned at the thought if it was actually true, "No, that's not right. The Great Lord Sesshomaru has no room in his heart to love. Even I have more room in my heart to love since I wasonce human." He stared at Kakiya and smirked, "Your just his play thing, like you are too me right now."
She growled and snapped at him, attempting to bite his hands, "Let go of me."
"Not happening. Watching you writher in pain is too much fun."
Sesshomaru ran over to Naraku so quickly that he left after images of himself, like he usually did. He pulled out Tokijin and attacked Naraku with it. Naraku ducked and jumped away with Kakiya. He held her in front of him.
He reached down to Kakiya's now partly-healed wound and coated his fingers with her blood. He lapped up the red liquid on his fingers until they were clean. As soon as the blood touched his tongue, he instantly felt rejuvenated, like he had never fought with Kakiya before and was now full with new replenished energy.
"It would seem that your blood has immense healing properties." He mused.
He covered his fingers with her blood once more and smeared it on her face, then forcefully stuck his blood-covered finger in Kakiya's mouth.
Naraku waited for her reaction, but got none, "But it would seem that it had no effect on you yourself." He said as he removed his fingers from her mouth.
Kakiya attempted to free herself again, but failed again to break free. Kakiya stopped struggling and focused on healing her wound, which was now closed inside her body; you could no longer see though it anymore. She was healing it inside out, starting from the inside since that was where most of the damage laid.
She suddenly thought of another idea, 'But it would consume a lot of my energy,' she thought bitterly, 'Stupid wound.'
Reaching out with her mind and no longer caring what Sesshomaru had said about reading his mind, she found it, 'Lord Sesshomaru!' she screamed in his mind, 'Attack Naraku and don't stop if he uses me as a shield, I'll be fine.'
Sesshomaru slightly frowned and gripped his sword, 'You had better be ready.' He replied.
Although he really did not want to do this, he started to charge towards Naraku none the less. Kakiya saw him coming and started to work her magic, once that would allow something she wanted to pass through her. She could not pass through a lot of things yet, so she couldn't get out of Naraku's multiple binds, so she decided to let the sword pass through her and let Sesshomaru's sword cut her way free. Sesshomaru was finally upon them; he held his sword above his head and swung at Naraku.
"Lord Sesshomaru, you are truly foolish." He put Kakiya's body in front of him, as a shield, "I'll let your precious Kakiya take your blow."
Sesshomaru didn't stop his sword for even a moment, trusting Kakiya's words. Sesshomaru watched in amazement at how Kakiya suddenly seemed to fade as his sword cut though her faded image, cutting the binds away from her and slashing at Naraku, leaving his body almost cut into two pieces with his head still attached to one side of the almost split body.
"How…" he stuttered out and fell to the floor.
Already, he was starting to regenerate. Sesshomaru quickly used this chance to scoop up Kakiya before she collapsed onto the ground and take her away from Naraku.
"Thanks." She softly muttered, only loud enough for him to hear as he gently set her down.
She could now entirely focus on healing her wound. She touched her wound with her hand and started healing it, which she finished after a few minutes while Naraku was still recovering.
He finished recovering and stood up and looked at the two and growled, "I see there are many things I have yet to learn about you." Then he smirked, "I wish to use you for my experimentations, to see what other things you can do. Oh don't worry, my dear Kakiya, I won't harm your face, you are far too beautiful for that. So, I must apologize for scratching your cheek earlier."
"You are just sick." Kakiya snarled in reply.
"Now, if you would excuse me, I must take my leave before your idiotic brother comes sniffing around for me." He forced out a dramatic sigh, "I'm getting rather bored with that InuYasha, if the truth be told, but that doesn't matter because I have you to play around with."
He put up his barrier again and flew away.
"Oh no you don't…" Kakiya created two fire dog demons and sent them after Naraku, "Sick him." She growled.
She watched her dog-shaped flames get deflected by Naraku's stupid barrier, which she noticed that he had made stronger than before. She scowled as her dogs disappeared.
Sesshomaru looked at Kakiya, who was beside him, and looked at her now-healed stomach, "I told you to pay attention." He said simply.
Kakiya growled in frustration and looked down at her stomach to see a large hole in her blood stained kimono, along with a number of small and large tears from when Naraku attacked her within his miasma.
'There's too much damage to them, so I guess I can't mend them this time.' she thought bitterly and sighed, "We should go get Ah-Un, I need to find new clothes and I need to bathe myself." She muttered at the end.
"Let's go then."
They walked towards Ah-Un and Kakiya jumped on, Sesshomaru following close behind. Ah-Un snorted when he smelt her blood, his way of asking what was wrong.
"Don't worry, I'm fine." Kakiya gently told the dragon.
Sesshomaru took the reins and they lifted into the air. He sat in front this time while Kakiya sat behind him, leaning on his back for support as her body regained its lost energy.
Looking at the sky, she saw that the sun was raising, 'Morning already?' she though bitterly.
Kakiya took in the morning air and noticed a strange scent that had caught her attention, "Half-breeds."
She looked down and saw three half-breed children running around, playing with each other. She saw a hut nearby and saw a young human mother and her demon husband sitting together talking.
"Lord Sesshomaru, could you take us down?"
He landed Ah-Un a few yards away from the hut, so they could just walk there and not surprise the family. As Kakiya and Sesshomaru neared, the demon father had finally sensed them coming. He quickly called to his children and told them to hide inside their hut with their mom. Kakiya walked behind Sesshomaru, to hide her bloody clothing, so she wouldn't scare them, as they came into view.
"What do you want with us? Have you come here to kill my children, like other demons and humans had tried?" he unsheathed his sword and pointed it at Sesshomaru, "The scent of blood is coming from you and I sense that there is another demon nearby. Where are they hiding?" he demanded.
Although he disliked demons and humans baring their fang at him, he ignored it.
Kakiya stepped out from behind Sesshomaru, revealing her torn and bloody clothing, "Right here." She looked at him, "We simply came in seek of new robes for me, since we can't go back to our house since it is a very long way from here and we wish still to travel elsewhere."
The human mother poked her head out of the door because she had not heard any fighting going on and thought it was strange. She gave a gasp of surprise to see Kakiya in her damaged and bloody clothing.
"Oh my… What happened to you?"
The demon looked worried, "Get back into the hut! They might kill you!"
'And I would love to too.' Kakiya thought, detesting humans and their ways, 'But I guess I have to put up with them for now…'
"You can't be serious, look how badly she was hurt," she rushed over to Kakiya and grabbed her arm, Kakiya slightly growled, but then held it in, and started to pull her towards the hut, "You two men stay out here, don't you dare come in!"
She and Kakiya disappeared into the hut. She quickly told her children, two males and one female, to go outside.
"My name is Rein, my mate's, that you had met outside, name is Jino. What is yours?"
"It's none of your concern." She replied bitterly, still trying to resist the urge to kill her.
Rein frowned, "Then… is that your mate out there?"
Kakiya stared at her with an expression that read: are you stupid or something?
"Of course we are n –" she began.
The human mother had cut her off, "I know, I know, I understand too." She sighed heavenly, "Isn't love romantic? Now, I know we both love talking with each other, but now is not the time for chatter," she smiled, "He's waiting for you right?"
'This woman is starting to annoy me…'
Kakiya watched her walk towards a hanger that had several kimonos that hung on them. She picked one up, a while kimono that was decorated a similar way like Sesshomaru's except it the flowers were purple.
"There, now you will be matching!" she giggled happily, "Do you want to change here or wash up first?"
"I'll be leaving." Kakiya looked up at the robe in her hand and took it from her and started to walk out the hut, but then stopped, halfway out and turned back, "I'll cast a barrier around your hut as payment." Kakiya made a white jewel appear in her hand.
"What is that?" she asked.
"A barrier crystal; as long as you keep that in your house or with you: it will protect you from demons and humans. You may let someone, other than your family, in your barrier if they have permission from you or your mate, Jino." She replied.
"Thank you. I hope you and your mate have a safe journey…" she took a look at Kakiya's clothes again, "Although I guess he got a little rough, good thing that you're a demon strong enough to handle it!" Rein laughed.
The crystal almost broke in Kakiya's hand out of pure annoyance, "Take it." She handed over the crystal, and immediately left the hut, not trusting herself to keep her composure any longer. She found Sesshomaru waiting for her, leaning against a tree while the children were running around him and the tree. Sesshomaru looked up at her when she came out of the hut and smirked to himself; he had heard their conversation inside the hut.
"Let's go." She told him and looked back at the family, "Thank you." She whispered.
She turned back towards Sesshomaru and walked towards him. Together, they gracefully made their way back towards Ah-Un, who was waiting for them at a nearby spring.
Sesshomaru looked at the spring and back to Kakiya's clothes, "Good thing that you are a demon, so she says." He almost laughed.
"Please, not you too." Kakiya walked towards the spring, "I'll take awhile, you could leave if you want to, I'll catch up with you later."
The spring was mostly surrounded by rocks, except for the sandy and rocky part that lead to the shallower parts of the spring and into the deep parts. She stripped and burnt her ruined kimono. She neatly folded her new robe and placed them on a rock, under the sun so that when she wore them, it would be nice and warm for her. She made a large basin made of dark energy and scoped up water from the spring. She poured the warm water over her body to wash away all the dry blood and dirt on shore.
'This feels good, after all that fighting.' She thought happily.
She stepped out into the water and slipped underneath the surface, after it got deep enough, and began diving through the warm, blue waters. She surfaced and flicked her hair, slashing water everywhere around her. She went underneath again and again, exploring very inch of the spring under water since it was so fascinating.
'Such a place is so peaceful and relaxing, even to a demon." She mused as she floated above the water, watching the clouds.
She dove below once more, but then heard a bunch of laughs and snickering. She slowly surfaced, only showing her head, and saw that a group of human bandits were looking at her robe.
"Look! There she is!" one of the pointed at Kakiya.
"It's a demon!"
"My… what a find. Even for a demon." Another snickered.
"Hey, demon lady, why don't you come out of the water and play with us?"
One of them picked up her robe, "We'll give you back your robe if you listen to what we say!"
Kakiya didn't listen to them and swam under again only to resurface once more when she heard screaming. She had found Sesshomaru standing near the water, holding her robe and the dead bodies of the bandits were behind him.
"You spent too much time here. Let's go."
Kakiya quickly swam to the shore and got out of the water, her long silver hair clinging to her body and hiding the majority of it from his sight.
She took the robe from him, "Thanks." She muttered.
Sesshomaru turned away and walked towards the forest, leaving Kakiya alone to clothe herself, 'It seems that Kakiya was right, men always seem to find her and want her for their own, whether they are demon or humans.' He thought, disgusted, 'Although, I see why…'
Drying herself with magic, she quickly slipped on the robe. She mended the robe so that it was similar to her other one, shortening it so that she could move around easier. She caught up to Sesshomaru shortly afterwards.
'Only two more nights, huh…' She sadly thought, looking up at the sunny sky.
…
The flowers were already starting to wilt.
Rin started at a petal that drifted down onto the desk, longing for her mommy and Lord Sesshomaru to come back, "Mommy…"
She stared at the flowers for a while longer. She sighed and picked up the wilted crowns and went to throw off her balcony.
"Come back soon." She said as she threw the flowers into the air.
The flower crowns were picked up by the wind and were blown away, separating it. The flowers drifted off into to the forest, until there were no longer seen. Rin looked up at the bright blue sky and decided to spend the next few hours, watching the clouds drift apart.
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(1) If she left it to heal normally, it would take around five days, but she doesn't have time for that, so she's using excessive amounts of energy to heal the wound.
"In sleep he sang to me,
In dreams he came…"