Disclaimer: Inuyasha does not belong to me.

Saligia

Heart of Hearts

She woke to the soft crackling of a fire and to the flickering shadows of a dark bedroom where moonlight streamed in from wide, crystal clear windows. It didn't take her long to realize this wasn't her room or her bed and that the soft sheets so warm beneath her weren't a pale yellow but a stark white. As her dull memories sparked to life, Kagome snapped up, wild panic grabbing a hold of her heart…her heart…

She glanced down at her naked chest and felt for the deep knife wounds that should've been there but weren't. Her fingers, shaky and clammy, skimmed across her skin and found no lingering signs of injury. Her frantic mind worked to put all the hazy pieces together as she grew increasingly alarmed.

She should be dead.

Her hands came up to grip her midnight hair, crisscrossing emotions inundating her every sense until she felt like screaming. She was on the verge of losing it. Everything was blurring, closing in, sucking the very breath from her lungs. The pounding in her head…louder and louder, as if she was being ripped apart from the inside out.

It took her a moment to realize that she really was screaming. That the heart wrenching, soul deep cry was coming from her lips and not from a nightmare she was trapped in. A pair of arms suddenly clamped around her like steel. Kagome struggled like a madwoman, knowing in her heart of hearts just who this man was. Her hands pounded on his bare chest, refusing to believe what she knew to be absolute truth, what was conveyed to her the moment his soul touched hers.

"I want my life back! I want my home, my family!" she cried. "I don't want this…I just want to go back…" Kagome looked up, fraught with hopelessness and deep loss. Though she knew she should be struck breathless by his silver, ethereal beauty, she couldn't find it in herself to be swept away. His gold eyes were so cold…an icy world apart. It left her yearning for sunshine, for warmth. What had she done?

"You wanted to live. This is the price you pay."

She was a means to an end. His way back into heaven where he would finally obtain his vengeance, feel and taste the blood he so craved. There would be no stopping him. Not even she would get in his way.

Sesshoumaru's long, tapered fingers whispered down her tear stained cheek as she slept a fitful sleep. His Seraphima Solare. His promised bride and the one he'd been searching for for the last five hundred years. She'd been a beacon in the dark the night of her almost death. Her soul had been so bright. The pull magnetic as he found his way to her just in time to claim her as his. They were soul bound. His very essence scorched across hers in the most angelic of ways.

But she had always been his to begin with. Had he not been unjustly banished from the skies, they would be celebrating their union with the others. They would be—his hand clenched and he stood, inherent grace in every movement he made. Everything had been taken from him. His home, his very way of life in the heavens had been ripped away because of some lying guardian and the Arc Noblesse's refusal to see through her devilish schemes.

Anger simmered just beneath his iron tight control. They would all feel as he had. Cast from the skies, forced to walk alone among these fleeting mortals...Sesshoumaru reined in his inner turmoil and let his greed for retribution take its place.

Kagome stirred and drawn to her small movements, he rested his eyes on her, feeling the tension slowly leave his body.

She was a means to an end.

Kagome met him in the dining room the next day freshly showered and clothed in a pair of form fitting jeans and long fluffy sweater she'd found on the bed. He stood by the floor to ceiling windows, a cup of tea in hand and casually dressed. The scene was oddly mesmerizing, peaceful even. Broad-shouldered with a tapered waist, he was breathtaking in the morning glow. But then what fallen angel wouldn't be?

His existence had been burned across her soul. What he wanted her to know told through lips and touch. She knew what he was. It was an uneasy fact, one she was still grappling with but couldn't deny. Her heart knew and she'd never been one to ignore the trappings of her heart. Her mind might've been telling her one thing, but inside, weaved within her soul, there was no doubt. He'd brought her back from the brink of death. It occurred to her that this seemed incredibly surreal. Just days ago she was a university student about to graduate. Granted, her life had never been normal, but she'd gotten past that, or so she thought. She should've known better.

"I want to go home."

Sesshoumaru tossed her a glance from over his shoulder. "Eat." He motioned to the decadent display on the cherry wood table.

"I want to go home," Kagome repeated with more force. As intimidating as he was, she refused to bow down.

"What do you expect to find when you get there?"

"My life…the way it should be."

His eyes hardened before he placed the ceramic cup down and walked towards her. He stopped right beside her, caressing the side of her face with the back of his hand in a deceptively gentle gesture. "You will not find what you are looking for."

Kagome took the shrine steps two at a time, every emotion and thought bent on reuniting with her family. Emerging on the shrine grounds, a smile curved her lips as she breathed in the familiar scent of incense and wood.

"Okaa-san…jiijii…Souta…" she breathed excitedly, taking a few steps forward.

Someone ran past her dressed in a blue uniform. "Okaa-san! Ojii-san!"

The shrine door rattled open and jiijii stepped out, followed closely by her mother whose warm brown eyes flooded with happiness.

"Kikyo!"

Kagome took a step back in stunned silence, her world tipping on its axis while she watched her mother hug a daughter who wasn't her. "Okaa-san…" Her throat tightened, shock ripping an inconsolable hole in her very human heart.

As the wind whispered through the trees she knew so well, Kagome could only stare brokenhearted.

"Are you visiting?"

Kagome tried to hold back her tears. Souta. She turned to him, her control slipping. You know me right? Please say yes..please don't make this even harder. "Yeah…"

He smiled. "Don't forget to buy a souvenir from my jiijii. He's the old senile coot over there. He sells a bunch of worthless sutras, but he means well."

She nodded and felt this world around her fall away. He waved goodbye before running off.

Their laughter swayed with the leaves. Their voices played on the wind. And Kagome fell deeper and deeper into despair. This was her family. This was her home. She felt so incredibly wronged, so angry and grief-stricken that she wanted to scream. To tear her heart out because what was life when she had nothing? What was life when it had all been taken away in the breadth of a moment? All because she wanted to live…

A gentle hand touched her shoulder. "Can I help you?"

A tear escaped. Kagome hurriedly wiped it away. "I…I was just leaving." She stifled a choking sob as her mother gave her that encouraging smile she cherished so much.

"Come back soon then. The shrine is always open."

Kagome nodded, her blue eyes blurring with unshed tears. "Good bye…" Giving her mother a watery smile, she turned around and fled down the mountain of stone steps.

Sesshoumaru waited for her at the very bottom but he was the last person she wanted to see. Kagome sped past him, the back of her hand over her mouth to stifle her sobs.

"It would have been better had you just forgotten," he said after her. "And then this could've all been avoided."

Kagome spun around, furious with him and with herself. All this could've been avoided too, had she just accepted death. "I don't need you to tell me, Sesshoumaru. Just…" She couldn't hold back her crying anymore and no matter how much she wiped her tears away, they kept falling.

"…just leave me alone. You've done enough." She hurried away, a crumbling mess and barely able to stand.

Kagome didn't know how far she wandered, but coming across an old playground she wearily slid onto the dusty swing. Sobs wracked her body and she tried to stop, tried so hard to smother the pitiful sounds but it hurt. Everything hurt so much. As if someone had reached into her chest…

Her hand fisted over her beating heart, hating it, wanting to rip it out herself because then she wouldn't have to feel the pain of losing everyone she loved.

'You wanted to live. This is the price you pay.'

Everything came with consequences. Would she able to handle hers? Kagome leaned her head against the chain, gently swinging back and forth. She had wanted to live so desperately that night. Nothing else had mattered so long as she got to live.

But what was life without others to share it with?

Kagome struggled to stem another onslaught of tears. She inhaled, breath hitching and emotions conflicting. She was alive though, wasn't she? And regardless of how angry, how devastated she was Kagome couldn't deny how grateful she was either. Sesshoumaru had saved her and though wary of what the fallen angel had planned for her, she was indebted. An irrefutable, terrifying thought.

Her pathetic self-consoling didn't ease the stinging blow of loss however. Hopefully the stifling sorrow would ease into a dull ache and then that too, would eventually fade. In time…Kagome closed her eyes. In time everything would heal. Face upturned to the clear winter sky, lingering tears traced paths down her face, her emotional pain still so very sharp and bittersweet.

Footsteps sounded behind her. "Your memories of them…I can make it all disappear."

Kagome swung around, incensed. "No…never."

"Why?" Sesshoumaru whispered, a hand reaching out to brush away a stray tear.

"Because…" He looked genuinely curious, making Kagome wonder how long he'd been on Earth and if he bothered to mingle with and understand humans at all. He's a fallen archangel. It probably wasn't by choice either. Her anger deflated a little as she realized this was probably his misguided attempt at making amends. But why would he even bother?

Sighing, she glanced at the sky. "Because I'd rather have something than nothing at all."

Sesshoumaru didn't question her further, yet she had a distinct feeling he understood what she meant.

"Come." He held out his hand, so elegant and much larger than hers.

"Where are we going?"

"Home…"

Kagome caught his gaze and for a moment, she thought she'd glimpsed a small crack in those hard, distant eyes. She didn't know what was going to happen. Couldn't even fathom what was in store for her now that her heart and soul belonged to an archangel. But with him around, maybe life wouldn't hurt so much.

With nothing left to lose, Kagome took his hand.

to be continued…

-demimonde