A/N: I don't know what's going on with the alert systems around here BUT this is the first new WOAWO chapter since my hiatus. I wrote it in about 24 hours...if you have a weak stomach BEWARE! some of this chapter is not pretty. I have been known to freak people out (just read Was It All A Dream? which was so creepy even for me the writer that I quit it) Anyway...there's your warning.
Disc: Nope, not a single claim on him or the rest of them. But Shimofuri, Koinu, Kohimu, Tisoki, Kasai, Tsukiyume, and Taikokajin, they're my inventions, though the world they belong to is not mine either. :-) simple enough for ya?
Chapter Review: Last chapter: Shimofuri was rushing toward his homelands and was waylaid by sentries from his great uncle Nishiyori, who is currently revolting against Taikokajin's family rule. While Shimofuri was running from them he ran into Kagome and Koinu who are escaping from Taikokajin's hold. Kagome whooped some butt and continued on her way, Shimofuri was unable to bring himself to chase her when he heard his mother was dying. Kagome is possessed by the undead demon Garou. Garou in Kagome's body attacked Taikokajin who is now dying...(I WARNED YOU!). Inuyasha and Tsukiyume are trying to make it back to rescue Kagome and Koinu, Tsukiyume is currently IY's collateral that Shimofuri will be loyal as he runs ahead. They stopped and visited Rin and Sesshomaru. The royal couple sent a message with Inuyasha and Tsuki that Sesshomaru and his armies in the Western Lands support Shimofuri and not Nishiyori.
Bargains and Last Wishes
A harsh wind had sprung up out of the northwest, bringing a few rogue snowflakes, round and bitterly cold, to fly through the silent forest. Inuyasha and Tsukiyume didn't break that eerie silence with wasted conversation. Both were wrapped in separate miseries, worrying about family and loved ones whose lives were in danger.
On the way out from Sesshomaru's grounds, a few maids had stopped Tsukiyume and offered her some clothing. Warm, thick robes and pants to keep her warm in the miserable early spring weather. That was compliments of Rin of course; Sesshomaru probably would've preferred that Taikokajin's hanyou daughter got frostbite. Of course he didn't provide Inuyasha with shoes—the hanyou's feet should have been a defiance of nature they were so calloused and insensitive.
Inuyasha kept a swift pace, rushing through the trees, but Tsukiyume slowed him down. The girl was not accustomed to intense travel. She huffed and panted behind him, but she never complained. Urgency was just as important to her as it was to Inuyasha. As a hanyou she was worthless to the inuyoukai clan. If Shimofuri and Taikokajin both died it would leave her with nowhere to go, no one to protect her. She'd be thrust into much the same circumstances that Inuyasha had after his mother was murdered. (A/N: she was murdered, wasn't she?)
It was late in the night when he picked up the scent, and he almost missed it as it was.
The forest was deathly quiet. Except for the whisper of the tree branches together as the wind stirred them, Inuyasha could hear absolutely nothing. The loudest sounds for miles were their own feet pounding the earth. The moon was shrouded off and on by a few wispy clouds that looked ominously like the stuff that produce snow.
Wrapped up in his worries, fears for Kagome and Koinu, it was only a stumble that let him accidentally bring his nose close enough to the chilled ground to take in the scent. He stopped so swiftly after smelling it that he stumbled and fell, rolling a short distance before catching himself with his claws.
Tsuki, trailing by a short ways, was able to see his accident and stop in time easily. She was panting as she came to stand beside him, offering a hand to lend him up. Inuyasha ignored her, ears flattened and scowling fiercely. He kept low, on his hands and knees, sniffing. Crawling a few feet back up the steep hill he soon found the scent again: blood.
Blood itself was a strong scent in his mind—but this was no ordinary few drops of blood. It was Kagome's blood.
His stomach tightened up inside him like a fist. He froze over the spot, on all fours, staring at it and fighting back his nausea.
Tsukiyume at last found the courage to break their long silence. "What is it, Lord Inuyasha?"
The hanyou would've bristled at her formal address, but all other coherent thought had been erased by the blood. He ignored her yet again and pawed at the ground, searching for more blood…there was none. It was a tiny spot, but where there was one there should be more. And Kagome didn't leave any shortage of scents these days. There would be the scent of milk with her, and Koinu's scent as well.
He stood up, sniffing futilely at the wind. Which way had she gone? He changed direction abruptly and leapt downhill, searching the ground with his eyes for tracks, stains, anything that might give away another scent.
Tsukiyume knelt at the spot where he'd been sniffing and did the same, gingerly. She was younger than Shimofuri and sheltered as a daughter of nobility, even if she was a hanyou. Using her senses wasn't something she'd had ample opportunity to do. And yet her nose worked well enough.
"A human female's blood." she called after Inuyasha, "Why have you stopped for this?"
For the third time, Inuyasha completely ignored her. He'd found a few places where leaf litter was scuffed, where saplings and old decaying ferns had been bent or scattered. Kneeling low to the ground, Inuyasha sniffed at it, taking it in. There was the stink of decay, of the usual host of worms and other earthy bugs, feces, mold, urine from small deer and rabbits…
In a small hollow, beside a few scuffed leaves, he found the biggest score yet. There was a tiny trace of blood, but masking that was the clear odor of Kagome's milk, of Koinu's urine. The scents were almost normal as far as he could tell, relatively healthy and alive. Kagome's scent distressed him slightly; there was something off about it. He hoped it was just stress. The pattern of the footprints told him that they'd been traveling up the hill.
And the scents were less than an hour old.
"Lord Inuyasha?" Tsukiyume called, timidly, from near the top of the hill. She was shivering, fearful, confused, and alone.
Inuyasha stared up at her, scowling. Could she make it back without him? If he could reach Kagome and Koinu he'd be out of the whole mess without ever looking back, yet he wasn't cruel enough to leave the young hanyou girl all alone in the wilderness.
He leapt up the hill in two bounds to face her. "Do you know the way back on your own?"
Despite all of her formal training, her political background, Tsukiyume blanched so much at his question that Inuyasha wanted to slap her. She was helpless. "On my own?"
Inuyasha ground his teeth together with irritation. "Come with me then." She'd been so smart earlier, right after they'd rescued her. Maybe the shock of being abducted and abused by an ancient, homicidal youkai had finally caught up with her.
Turning his back on her, Inuyasha leapt back further up the hill, in the direction they'd been traveling from before, as if he wanted to head back to Sesshomaru's lands. Tsukiyume frowned as she followed him, but she moved without questioning her hanyou cousin at all.
They ascended another hill and then began descending another when the silence of the forest abruptly shattered with spine-tingling laughter. Inuyasha slid to a stop, scuffing the leaf-litter and dirt up beneath his feet. Tsukiyume came to a stop just behind him, blinking and pushing the hair out of her face.
The sound echoed through the trees, bouncing off them and through the twisting maze of hills and valleys. The sound intimidated Tsuki, but it actually horrified Inuyasha.
He recognized the laughter, at least part of it.
The laugher was feminine, at least partly. Inuyasha could hear the same notes in the sound that had, in many happier times, eased his mood no matter what the day had held. It was a sound he'd worked to hear before, saying something he hoped was nice rather than something obnoxious or sarcastic.
Now the sound was bone-chilling, sickening.
It was Kagome's voice, Kagome's laughter.
But there were darker undertones to it, something that he faintly recognized as well. As the wheels in his brain began to turn it didn't take him long to realize who else he was hearing.
Tsukiyume was shivering behind him. "What's going on?"
"You're about to die, that's what's going on!" the voice that was neither Kagome's, nor quite the demon Garou's announced. The words echoed off the trees again, sending Inuyasha's ears twitching this way and that, searching. His heart was rattling in his ribs, as if ready to break out and go on its own search for Kagome.
"Kagome!" Inuyasha shouted, not knowing really what else to do, "You're stronger than this! Kick that bastard out of your body!"
"Kagome," Tsukiyume murmured behind him, at last understanding. She drew in a sharp breath and began looking around with her own eyes and ears, trying to locate the aforementioned woman.
"You fool! She's gone. I am all that exists in this frail bitch's body! I've been waiting for you, hanyous."
Panic tried to bloom inside Inuyasha, but he fought it back. No, Kagome wouldn't give in. Koinu is alive still. She was feeding him. Garou would never have done that…
"Kagome! Snap out of it!" he rushed forward into the valley ahead, trying to force Garou to make a move to reveal himself. He sniffed frantically with his nose, seeking the scents he'd grown so accustomed to, scents of the two people that mattered most in his world since his mother had died…
Tsukiyume fidgeted alone, suddenly weak again. Without the help of her priest father's spirit she was intimidated, uncertain. The shadows around her seemed huge; her normally unused nose was bombarded by earth scents. It was difficult for her to distinguish any one scent from another yet. She realized, with crushing certainty, that she was helpless here, and with Inuyasha as clearly distracted as he was Garou could pick her off at any moment.
She raced after Inuyasha, the dead leaves rustling beneath her feet like dried bones.
Just as Tsukiyume came up behind him, Inuyasha sensed a presence ahead of him, just up the next embankment. The trees were smaller there, tiny evergreens and pines that clung to the edges of the small rock faces at the bottom of the hill. He paused, tensing, searching the clump of trees carefully with his amber eyes.
Something leapt out from the clump, rolling away through the leaves. A clap resounded through the stoic, otherwise silent forest. "Die, Inuyasha!"
A dark substance that only glowed around its fringes raced toward Inuyasha and Tsukiyume. The hanyous fell together, leaping and then rolling away. The blast, or energy, or whatever it was, acted more like slime when it hit the forest around it. The stuff coated the tree trunks, the leaf litter, the small saplings littering the little valley floor, and made them glow a sickening purple. Most of them shriveled, as if touched by acid.
A rank, rancid stink of burning protein floated up from the mess to Inuyasha and Tsuki's noses.
"A shame! I missed!" the voice cackled, gleefully, "Tell me Inuyasha, who would you like to die first? You, or the hanyou bitch you've come with?"
"You're the only one that's going to die here Garou!" Inuyasha snarled, snatching up Tsukiyume's hand and pulling her away from the stink of the destruction Garou's blast had left.
"Oh, but I don't believe that's possible, is it?" the voice was quieter now, but full of masculine courage. The rough, gravelly sound of it overwhelmed Kagome's gentle female vocal cords, making the sound very ugly, very dirty. But when it spoke the next time the voice was much more recognizable as Kagome's. "You can run, Inuyasha, but you can't kill me, you know that don't you?"
Sheltering Tsukiyume behind him, Inuyasha at last turned to regard the monster that had taken his mate's body, and froze, instantly feeling a lump of pain forming in his throat, the burn of tears in his eyes. The creature that was stalking him was Kagome. As far as he could see, though it was dark, there was nothing to distinguish her from any other time he'd seen her. And yet when she moved it was slowly, not like a woman or a human, but like an animal, stalking slowly up on its prey. And she seemed to have no weight, almost to float over the leaves. Her delicate feet—bare, he realized with a jolt—hardly rustled the leaves.
She wasn't carrying Koinu with her.
"Kagome…" he whispered, almost whimpering, "Where's Koinu, where's our son? Snap out of it! This isn't you!"
The figure halted briefly, silent and unmoving as one of the trees around them. But then she laughed, not Kagome's laugh, but Garou's throaty, gravelly cackle. "Hanyou bastard! How many times do I need to tell you? This little bitch is gone. Gone for good. But even so, you're too stupid to kill me and save the whelp, are you? You can't—you're weak because you're attached to this body." He cackled again, triumphantly, "And that's why I choose her! Revenge!"
Tsukiyume was shivering again behind him, "You have to kill her!" she rasped.
Inuyasha's ears flattened, his mind raced, desperately seeking a way out…I can't kill Kagome, I can't kill her…
"Shimofuri." A tall, fair-skinned and blue eyed inuyoukai bowed to the young heir of the Middle Lands. His hair was white like snow, much like Taikokajin's, but unlike her this male possessed some pigment—his eyes were not pink but blue. "Welcome home. I wish I could say that the news was better—"
"Uncle." Shimofuri interrupted him, bowing. He didn't have time for pleasantries and courtly banter. Besides, he and his uncle, Sasugainu, were on friendly terms. Sasugainu was the only male that wasn't a son that Taikokajin thought of kindly of, her younger brother. "Tell me what's happened."
The two inuyoukai moved together, falling in line. Although Shimofuri was deeper in color, with blue-black hair and blue eyes, it was clear from their movements that they were related to each other. They walked with confidence and grace through the long halls of Taikokajin's castle. Sliding doors, fusuma, lined both sides of the wall, painted with birds and flowers, pheasants, peacocks, maples with their leaves draped over into the water.
The scenery might've been beautiful but the scenes inside were gruesome, as Shimofuri soon learned.
"Nishiyori had amassed his armies; he'll be marching on us soon. His plan was likely to have you killed. He would storm this castle, capture Taikokajin and have her and Tsukiyume take their own lives. Without you to worry about the Middle Lands are heirless…"
"You would be the heir." Shimofuri pointed out.
"Nishiyori does not consider me a serious contender. I am allied to him by marriage. Either that or he would kill me of—"
Shimofuri closed his eyes, giving his uncle this short, quiet gesture to silence him. After a heavy, lengthy pause, he finally asked, "What about my mother?"
Sasugainu's face changed, becoming cold and stony, detached. "I understand Lady Taikokajin was holding a certain woman hostage here. A miko. The miko broke loose and attacked Lady Taikokajin. There was a child involved, some dispute. Lady Taikokajin was injured, badly."
Shimofuri didn't open his eyes. "She lives?"
"The Lady Taikokajin lives. She is…"
When Sasugainu's voice drifted off Shimofuri at last opened his eyes and faced his uncle directly. "Speak."
"She is not sane, Nephew. Your mother…I should have taken her life myself to spare her this humiliation." Sasugainu stared Shimofuri down with a hard, unflinching gaze. "As you are the heir to the Middle Lands, Shishi-sama, I will still take her life for you if you wish it." He dropped the formality for his last words, "Seeing her in such a state—it should not be a son's last memory."
"I will see her, Uncle." Shimofuri answered, sighing once. The rest, deciding who would put her out of her misery; it would have to come later.
Sasugainu ducked low in a bow and turned, heading down the hall. Shimofuri followed him, slowly.
"Die!" the Not-Kagome monster lifted its arms, palms outward and shot the same dark, purple-glowing energy out at Inuyasha and Tsukiyume.
The couple ran in different directions this time. Tsukiyume skirted up one of the steep hill, leaping and bounding. Inuyasha ran back towards the previous spots that Garou-in-Kagome had blasted. The clump of trees stayed in his mind prominently. She'd been hiding there. The place was well covered, likely a little warmer there than any other place here. It would shelter from the wind, from prying eyes, and from a small breeze carrying away scent…
"Run, run, run Inuyasha!" No-Kagome cackled behind him.
Instinct propelled Inuyasha to swerve, narrowly ducking and missing the blast of purple glowing energy that she hurled at him. The clump of trees sat in front of him. He leapt high, overshooting it slightly but letting the slope of the hill and gravity slide him backward into the thicket of saplings.
It was exactly as he'd suspected—the Garou monster had hidden Koinu in the thicket, leaving him relatively safe there but cold and whimpering to himself alone.
"No!" the monster was shouting, frantic, desperate. "No! Not the whelp!"
Koinu, shivering and curled into himself, started to cry when Inuyasha grabbed him up. The baby fought a little, kicking and showing his little mostly toothless mouth, and then he recognized his father's scent and immediately fell limp and started cooing. He clutched at his father's haori with as much force as his little body possessed and his tiny white ears flicked against Inuyasha's chin.
Garou-Kagome had stopped its approach and was staring with wide, horrified eyes as Inuyasha reappeared from inside the thicket, clutching Koinu against him. The expression was not befitting a demon like Garou, it was one that fit a mother worrying over her child, though.
Kagome stretched out her arms, they shook wildly. "Please, not the…" her voice changed, softening and rising in pitch and losing its otherworldly qualities. It was almost completely Kagome's voice now. "Not him—not Koinu. Please! I'm begging you…"
"Kagome," Inuyasha felt his ears flatten on top of his head, "It's me, it's Inuyasha. Snap out of it, I'd never hurt Koinu."
In the darkness Garou-Kagome's eyes gleamed wildly with fear. "Give him back. I'm his mother—please!"
Koinu whimpered, hearing his mother and the stress in her strange, altered voice. Seeking comfort, he dug with his tiny clawed fingers, pulling aside Inuyasha's haori slightly until he could press his lips against the bare skin of his father's throat. He tried to suckle on this exposed skin.
Inuyasha's heart sank, twisting as it fell. "I'm his father, Kagome, please—snap out of it!"
Garou-Kagome was shaking, stepping back from him. The stink of salty tears hit Inuyasha and made him scowl. The urge to rush forward and comfort her was huge and purely instinctual. He knew that if he raced forward the demon inhabiting Kagome's body would exert control again and would touch him with the toxic, noxious purple energy—black magic, ancient evil magic, not Kagome's purifying priestess's energy. But the sight, smell, and sound of the monster's reaction told him one thing with absolute certainty: Kagome was still in there.
If Kagome was still present and intact then Garou's hold over her could be broken and the spirit banished for good.
"Please, my baby…"
Her tone drove Inuyasha mad, and for a moment he took a step forward, as if to comfort her. But then there was a shout from the opposite side of the small valley, "Don't listen to her! Inuyasha—it's playing with you! It just wants you to get close enough so it can touch you!"
Inuyasha ignored her, but he did take the advice. He already knew that that was what the demon inside Kagome wanted. But what he hadn't considered yet was whether or not Garou was purposefully pretending to reveal Kagome to him. Was it possible that she wasn't there anymore?
His knees felt weak at the thought. How could he know for sure?
"Little bitch!" Garou-Kagome shouted, staring back at Tsukiyume. "You can't take him away from me!"
The voice was Kagome's at the end, an angry, hurt shout. It was all the proof Inuyasha needed. Garou's spirit had taken advantage of Kagome while she was under stress, it had lied to her and manipulated her with its powers, deceiving her and deluding her…but it had not destroyed her. Beyond the monster's inhabiting spirit Kagome was intact.
While his possessed mate had turned away from him, Inuyasha rushed away, climbing uphill. He clutched Koinu to him protectively; cringing each time he landed and jarred the pup. Koinu, understanding danger and the need for haste instinctually, held on tightly. The only sounds that escaped his throat were tiny grunts as his father bounded over the forest floor.
"No! You can't take him!" the beast was shouting, desperate. Both voices were desperate. Garou needed Koinu alive—but why exactly? Garou ate hanyous but technically Koinu was not a hanyou, he was mostly human…
With his stronger body and heightened senses, Inuyasha quickly lost Garou-Kagome in the gloom. He ducked behind a large tree trunk when he thought he'd gained enough of a lead, and then paused, holding his breath as he listened. Garou-Kagome was screaming and cursing in a language that Inuyasha couldn't recognize. She was making no effort to hide herself as she searched for him.
"You think you can hide from me, Inuyasha?" it cackled, sounding distinctly un-Kagome-ish. "You think you're clever, taking the whelp and hiding from me? Hah! You fool…"
Suddenly Inuyasha heard Tsukiyume cry out, screaming with fear.
"That's right you filthy little bitch! You thought I couldn't see you skulking around here, watching us? I'll have my revenge against you too!"
A maid scurried to the door when she heard the heavy but careful tread of the inuyoukai lords approaching. Despite her great age she knelt easily and slid the door open, bowing to one side as the youkai lords entered. Sasugainu entered first, nodding briefly to the maid and then stepping aside to allow the younger, more hesitant Shimofuri into the room.
The smell was what reached the young heir first: a burning stink, thick and reeking. It was a complex stench, for underlying the cloying smell of burned protein there was an odor of illness, blood, urine and other bodily fluids. A thin stink of disinfectant, linens, and herbs also lingered.
Shimofuri tried to keep his face from showing the emotions fluttering deep within him. He pretended to stare straight ahead, at the futon bed with its lavish furs, dyed white as Taikokajin liked them. The bed was a place of fond memories for him. As a pup he'd shared it with his mother, enveloped in her warmth, in her scent. For a moment he almost imagined he could scent milk in the room again, as if he were passing not through a doorway into the bedroom, but through time itself, into a much friendlier, simpler past.
He took a deep breath, steadying himself from within.
A young woman approached Sashugainu cautiously, bowing. She was the healer, dressed in ceremonial robes and carrying water for rites of purification.
"Lord Shimofuri has come to see his mother." Sasugainu informed the healer.
The woman bowed again, acknowledging them both. "The Lady Taikokajin is—"
From the bed there was a sharp sound, an indrawn breath. A croaking voice rose up, demanding, "Haiseishoku!"
Shimofuri slipped wordlessly past the healer woman and his uncle and moved slowly toward his mother's bedside. Again he fought the urge to show his emotions in his face. His movements were stiff and slow. Though he pointed his eyes in his mother's direction he let his focus drift. He saw the white furs bunched up over his mother's body, the matting he was kneeling on at her side, not his mother herself.
"Mother." He murmured, cautiously. The urge to look at her was great but Shimofuri doubted he could see her directly and not break his stony expression. "I…I've come with good news…"
There was movement, another sharply indrawn breath. The stink of burned flesh rose more powerfully with her motion. Shimofuri was unable to stifle the urge to cringe.
"Haiseishoku…" she rasped again, weakly. "Leave me."
Again emotion broke through Shimofuri's attempt at the classic stony mask of a proper ruler. A frown took form over his features. "I am not Haiseishoku, I am your son."
The furs moved, shifting. The stink rose again but this time Shimofuri barely noticed as his mother's hand, once smooth and white as porcelain, appeared from under the mass of covers. A mottled gray, charred mass of flesh, some bits burned down to the sharp point of finger bones, reached out toward him.
"Shimofuri…?"
It was impossible for the young heir not to see this thing before him, stretching its skeletal, burned self out to touch him. As his eyes focused first on the hand, they then flew back to the shadowy space between pillow and white, luxurious furs.
Taikokajin's once smooth, beautiful skin was now gray and raw. She looked more like she'd grown a tree's bark instead of skin. But between the cracks and furrows of her broken skin Shimofuri could see red meat and muscle between. Puss and blood oozed around her neck, apparently the most injured place on her that he could see. Bandages covered over some of her neck, but they were moist and soaked through with red-brown blood.
But her eyes were still pink. They were wide open, as if frozen that way, and burning with an expression of horror. As he stared at them, Shimofuri saw them refocus squarely on him.
"Shimofuri!" it was a sick thing—her tear ducts worked. Her eyes clouded with tears. The destroyed hand groped more desperately for Shimofuri's face and neck.
Her tongue was black, her lips swollen and cracked. The skeletal tips of her fingers touched Shimofuri's collarbone and clutched at it.
Disgust and fear melted away, plunging the young heir instead into grief and pity. He took her hand in his, feeling the way her muscles shook and convulsed as she tried to hold onto him. He closed his eyes and felt the burning heat of tears behind his lids. "I'm sorry, Mother. So sorry."
"Tsuki…"
"Tsukiyume is alive, Mother. She's coming home."
Her hold on him relaxed slightly. A slow breath passed out of her charred lips. "Forgive me…"
"Don't talk, please." To his shame his voice was shaking.
"Forgive me." Taikokajin repeated, her fingers twitched, trying to squeeze his hand again, for emphasis.
Shimofuri risked opening his eyes up again and saw that his mother's eyes were no longer wide and horrified. She had nearly let them drift closed. "Mother, you're suffering. Forgive me, I must ask…who do you wish to end…" he choked and scowled angrily, full of shame and frustration.
"Forgive me, Haiseishoku." She murmured weakly.
"Mother, please…who…?"
She moved her head slightly, blinking once. "Haiseishoku."
Sasugainu approached then, startling Shimofuri as he sat down at his sister's bedside, heavily. "Sister, Lady Taikokajin. Haiseishoku is dead. Shimofuri asks if it is your wish that he be the one to end your suffering."
"Forgive me…" she croaked, "Kokoro."
"She has lost her mind." Sasugainu muttered, lowering his gaze. "You should end her suffering now."
Shimofuri pressed Taikokajin's hand between both of his own, refusing to give up yet. "Mother, please. It's Shimofuri. It's your son…"
She made a tiny sound, like a whimper. "You look like him."
That admission was one that she had never acknowledged willingly before. A few teardrops slipped away from her eyes, running out the corners and dribbling unevenly over her cracked skin.
"I know, Mother—tell me, may I release you?" the words came more easily now, though the shameful tears had yet to stop.
"I must see Tsuki." Taikokajin's eyes drifted closed, her hand fell away limply.
For a moment Shimofuri panicked, reaching for her, ready to find a pulse, but then he caught sight of the furs, rising and falling slowly and evenly with her breaths.
"You should end it for her, now as she sleeps." Sasugainu murmured, his head still bowed. "You do her no favors by letting her live."
Shimofuri replaced his mother's corpse-like hand into the warmth of the furs as carefully and gently as he could. Only then did he answer his cousin. "I will do only what she asks." He closed his eyes, "She must be at peace at the end, that is a universal right."
Sasugainu ducked his head in a small bow, hiding his face. "As you wish, Shishi-sama."
Inuyasha raked his brains, trying to decide what to do. It wasn't right for Tsukiyume to die at the hands of the monster, and yet he also suspected that the hanyou girl would have no qualms against defending herself from attack. She would kill Kagome, uncaring of Inuyasha's wellbeing. He remembered Garou's last psychic words to him just before Tsukiyume had killed him: "Submit to me now, or I will use what you love most to ruin you…"
Koinu whimpered quietly in his arms, frightened and exhausted.
Tsukiyume was making frantic, incoherent sounds of fear and pain, Garou-Kagome was still cackling grotesquely. The forest around Inuyasha was still deathly silent and frozen, except for the sounds of sadistic glee and suffering. Moonlight pierced the trees high in the sky, lighting the gloomy woods slightly.
"I'll make a deal with you, hanyou Inuyasha!" Garou-Kagome yelled, letting the sound ring and echo through the trees, the hills and the valley around them, "You may even call it a favor! Your name is famous, or so I have heard. I can do the same for your whelp, only better. I can make him immortal…"
Inuyasha's ears flattened, he snarled at the darkness, forcing himself to remain silent. Koinu followed suit, pressing his little lips again to the base of his father's neck, trying to suckle.
"Of course it will come at a price—but what doesn't? But I would leave this body, Inuyasha. That is what you want isn't it? I would leave this body free to raise your whelp, and I would make the whelp invincible, immortal. He will live on long after your enemies, long after the other pathetic dogs that turned their back on you when your mother died. He can destroy the inuyoukai clan for you; conquer it in your name, anything you want…" Garou-Kagome chuckled once, his voice deep and completely unfeminine now, "I will do all of that for you, and all I ask is that you do as I say, give your soul up to me." Tsukiyume squeaked and cried out with fresh pain then, making Inuyasha wince, "This little bitch will be the meat and the blood sacrifice I require. Your soul, it is unique. That is what I require. Both of you must die—but your human bitch and the whelp, they will live…"
"Don't listen!" Tsukiyume cried, but for her effort she must've received another blow because what followed next was unintelligible and filled with pain.
"It is more than an equal exchange! More than any of you dirty inu-hanyou deserve!"
Inuyasha closed his eyes, straining his memory, trying to clear away the emotion that clouded his thoughts. If this was the only way that he could free Kagome and save Koinu than Inuyasha knew he'd willingly sacrifice himself for them. But Tsukiyume was an innocent bystander. It was wrong to send her to her death as well—not that he would choose her over Kagome and Koinu. When it came down to it Inuyasha could not be so noble, preserving his mate and offspring was first priority over everything and everyone else, including himself.
But there was a hidden catch in what Garou was saying. There was something sinister about it that in the rush of things Inuyasha couldn't quite grasp. Immortality?
And then, suddenly, Tsukiyume and Garou-Kagome were screaming together as one.
Ah yes, I know you hate me. ;-) I haven't seen many people reviewing. I've been updating and working like crazy but so far nothing. Am I being punished? (not that I don't blame you...) I hope this lives up to your expectations. I'M BACK!