a/n: Hey yall! It is currently 5:42am here in Texas and I am thouroughly exhausted. However, I did manage to write an extra super dooper long chappie for yall as well as write a 6 or 7 page long one shot for a Naruto story that I just decided to write. If you like Neji/Ten then you should go check it out, if not then totally ignore what I'm talking about ^.^ Neways, this should be the last chappie of Sesshy dream of the past. Next chappie will be back to present time again and I just hope that this is a sufficient enough background story for those of yall who think that Sesshy would only get with Sango if somethin huge happened. Well mine aint huge it's just called time and kindness! Muahahahah!!!!....sorry, I've had to have alot of sugar to stay up this late and finish this chappie.... NEWAYZ..... ON TO THE CHAPPIE!!!

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Inuyasha..Blah...blah...snore...blah *-*

Chapter 19- The Burning Flame of Love

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Eight Years Ago~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sesshomaru was awoken shortly after he'd fallen asleep by the sounds of Rin's desperate screams and the smell of burning wood reaching his nostrils. Awake in an instant, Sesshomaru was up and standing on the branch in the tree just outside the village where he could clearly see that there were a number of various demons attacking the already decimated village and one of them, a fire breathing mini-dragon demon, had lit the hut that the female woman had been staying in on fire.

The demon lord wasted no time in leaping from the branch, over the wall, and into the village where he easily sliced his claws through the fire-breathing demon; thus preventing the demon from lighting anything else on fire. Not pausing to acknowledge his minor victory Sesshomaru drew Tokijin and sliced through the burning wood that had fallen in front of the door and prevented the women from escaping the burning hut.

Once inside the hut Sesshomaru swiftly looked around trying to locate the position of his charge since the burning wood dominated his sense of smell and the child's minute scent was not enough to pinpoint her location. It didn't take him long to notice that the slayer had pushed the priestess and Rin into the corner and was now holding her Hiraikotsu up to prevent the burning wood from collapsing on them and burning their vulnerable human flesh. There was already a large wooden beam that had fallen down and was now on fire pushing down on the slayer's weapon and threatening to crush them all.

Moving swiftly Sesshomaru sliced the offending beam in half before grabbing the weapon and pulling it up to reveal the slayer covering the other two females with her own body. Easily he bent down and grabbed the slayer's arm and hoisted her up; she holding Rin in one arm while clutching to the priestess' wrist with the other. Without checking to see if the priestess was coming or not Sesshomaru dragged the woman who held Rin, wearing Sango's slayer mask, out of the burning hut and to the wall of the village where he sat them down and turned to deal with the rest of the demons.

He made quick work of the few low class demons that had been stupid enough to remain after the Lord of the West had arrived and easily made his way back over to the three women who now sat, soot covered and weary, exactly where he'd put them when he'd dragged them from the hut. Sesshomaru first looked Rin over completely to be sure that no harm had come to her. Once satisfied that she was unharmed he quickly ran his eyes over the slayer in a much similar and protective way; the priestess he did not look upon once, he had no interest in Inuyasha's wench and it was not his job to protect her.

It angered him that he'd once again felt protective over the slayer that had, for the second time, saved the life of his young charge. He eyed the mask that still hung loosely around young Rin's neck and knew that it was the reason that she was not coughing like the other two women were right now.

'Yet again she puts Rin's life over her own. Could this human woman actually be different from the rest?' Sesshomaru thought as he began to see the human woman before him in a new light, 'She cannot be wholly human. No human would repeatedly sacrifice themselves for a child that is not their own. What is she then? I sense to demon blood within her.'

Silently he observed the slayer who now had tears building in her eyes. Slightly alarmed, Sesshomaru took a quick glance around to see what could have possibly made the woman cry. It then occurred to him that this was the second time she'd had to watch her village desecrated. He watched as one lone tear fell from the slayer's eyes before she swiftly swiped it away and put on a big fake smile for Rin who'd asked her what was wrong.

"Oh nothing Rin. I just got some soot in my eye but it's gone now,' Sango lied smoothly, "How are you feeling?"

"Rin is fine Lady Sango! Your pretty mask kept me from coughing just like you said it would."

"That's good Rin I'm glad to hear it," Sango said with a genuine smile, "but I think we're going to have to work on some speech lessons for you pretty soon. If that's alright with your Lord Sesshomaru that is."

Sesshomaru was shocked that Sango not only wanted to protect Rin but was also interested in teaching the young girl how to speak properly as well.

"We shall discuss such arrangements later demon slayer. Now we should move to a small clearing a short distance from here and you humans shall get to sleep," Sesshomaru said as he turned to make his way out of the slayer's village and towards the clearing that he'd seen on his way back from the stream.

"Hold on just a second Sesshomaru. I need to get my Hiraikotsu first," Sango said as she ran towards the charred remnants of the hut that was no longer burning and called for Kirara to help her find her weapon.

While Sesshomaru was watching the slayer pick through the ashes trying to find her weapon Jaken and Ah-Uhn made their appearance and the toad began to complain at once.

"Lord Sesshomaru! Thank goodness you came my lord! I had thought that I was going to have to save the pathetic human child myself."

Sesshomaru's foot quickly met the imp's face and sufficiently shut him up. Rin giggled at the common occurrence between her master and his annoying toad vassal. This happened all the time and she was not at all shocked at her master's actions. Sango laughed as well as she returned with Hiraikotsu, slightly charred but otherwise ok, on her back.

"Quite effective if I do say so myself Sesshomaru," Sango said with a slight giggle in her tone.

Sesshomaru quirked a brow at the way the slayer was regarding him so nonchalantly. Did this human woman see him as her friend simply because he'd saved her twice as payment for her saving Rin each time as well?

"How dare you speak to Lord Sesshomaru so casually wench!?" Jaken screamed from the place that Sesshomaru had kicked him to moments earlier.

"I'd shut up if I were you you stupid ugly toad! I will do much more than kick you a few feet," Sango threatened as she half growled at the toad.

Sesshomaru smirked at the interaction between his vassal and the slayer but chose to ignore it as he made his way out of the village and towards the clearing. He could hear that the others were following closely behind and out of his peripheral vision he could see the slayer and Jaken giving each other dirty looks; Jaken's being ugly and deformed looking while Sango's was much more menacing and fierce.

While Sesshomaru was immensely amused by the slayer's actions you could not tell it by looking at him. His emotionless mask remained in place except for the small smirk that had sneaked its' way onto his face as he watched the two bicker like children.

Upon reaching the clearing Sesshomaru made his way over to the base of a large tree and settled himself between its' roots. He would not make the mistake of falling asleep again tonight, but from that position he had a beautiful view of the starry sky above them and he chose to sit and watch it while the others lay down to sleep again.

It was not long before the sun began to rise but Sesshomaru did not expect the humans to be waking up any time soon. They were exhausted from their battle with the fire and their weak human bodies had to rest for longer to recuperate from such an event. It was because of this thinking that Sesshomaru was mildly surprised when the slayer awoke and after a moment made her way over to him.

Catching the slightest whiff of her scent, the demon lord immediately shut down his sense of smell as he watched her approach him.

"Good morning Sesshomaru. I wanted to thank you for getting us out of the hut last night," Sango paused to await his reaction, a cool nod, before continuing, "Also, I wanted to talk to you about letting Rin come visit me at Kaede's village every now and then so that I can teach her how to speak properly and some of the other things that she'll need to know as a growing woman."

Sesshomaru stopped to contemplate what the woman was saying for a moment before mentally agreeing that Rin was growing and would need to know things about her body and other various things that human women usually do.

"Alright slayer. I shall bring Rin every other week to visit you at the old hag's village. During such times I expect you to fully devote your time to teaching Rin everything that she needs to know. I will be watching to make sure you do such," Sesshomaru said coolly.

He half expected the slayer to be angry with him after what he'd said but once again the woman surprised him by smiling happily and agreeing to his terms before making her way back over to Rin and the other woman.

'I can not figure that woman out,' Sesshomaru thought, annoyed, 'but I do know that she is no ordinary human and I do intend to find out exactly what she is.'

The more Sesshomaru watched her the more confused he became. The slayer rarely ever did what he expected her to do and during the rare times that she did it was not in a way he'd imagined she would have done it. Catching fish for lunch, for example. He had expected that she would be the one to catch their food seeing as Rin was too young and the priestess was absolutely useless, but he'd also thought that she would use some kind of net or weapon from her village. Instead she had hiked up her kimono, a motion that definitely didn't go unnoticed by the demon lord, and waded into the water. After a few moments of standing bent over with her hands in the water the swiftly grabbed one of the fish that had been lazily swimming between her hands.

Sango had quickly caught them each a fish and she was even kind enough to catch one for Sesshomaru, Jaken, and two for Ah-Uhn. Sesshomaru simply nodded in acknowledgement when Rin had brought him the freshly cooked fish. Jaken, however, had adamantly refused to eat anything cooked by the slayer and was forced to watch as everyone else ate their food graciously.

Sango even took the time to give Ah-Uhn its' food first before eating her own. She'd cooked its' fish just enough that it was tender and had given each one of the dragon's heads its' own fish. After being sure that everyone else was taking care of Sango finally sat down and ate her fish that had almost started to get cold from what Sesshomaru could smell. She didn't complain, however, and if she did notice that it was no longer hot she didn't acknowledge it in the slightest.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Time Skip (One week)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The first time that Sesshomaru brought Rin to the slayer for their promised lessons Sango acted as if she was happy to see him. She'd even taken it upon herself to ask him if he'd like to stay with her and Rin for dinner since she'd be cooking in her own hut away from Inuyasha and the others. He'd debated for a moment but Rin's pleading and Sango's urging eventually made up his mind.

He stayed and watched as Sango taught Rin how to make a traditional Japanese meal of rice and beef curry, a stew-like substance made with meet from a deer that Sango had killed in preparation for the meal. Rin had been quite interested and learned very quickly. It seemed that the slayer would be a good teacher after all.

The meal was eaten in a comfortable silence and Sesshomaru was surprised to find that he actually quite liked this meaty substance. The rice he was not particularly fond of, but his dog demon nature preferred meat to vegetables and fruits anyway. Sango had smiled at him as he finished his meal and, leaving an empty plate, told the two women that he would be close by.

Each time he brought Rin to see the slayer Sesshomaru seemed to become closer and closer to her. His initial suspicions of the woman were long forgotten and slowly his hate for her as a human melted away to show his respect for her as a warrior and as a teacher for Rin. The child, herself, saw the slayer as a mother figure just as he knew that she saw him as a father figure. His feelings for the slayer, however, were simply respect and admiration for her skills and her kindness, nothing more.

It was only after he witnessed the monk shatter her heart that he truly realized the extent to which his feelings had spread. He'd once again come to drop of Rin for one of her "training sessions", as the child had come to call them, and had left Rin at the slayer's hut while he went to find her since she was not there. He had not expected to find the slayer in the middle of a heated argument with the monk. In fact it had never really occurred to him that she was even still seeing the monk after Naraku's death.

Jealousy flared up before he had a chance to recognize the feelings that the thought of Sango with the monk had stirred within him. His distress was undue, however, as the monk had promptly dumped her saying that she wasn't good enough for him and that she was ugly and scarred. This, however, brought forth an anger that was unexpectedly fierce and were it not for the breaking woman before him he might have killed the monk before he had a chance to leave the village. Instead, Sesshomaru walked forward and gently picked the slayer up before taking her to Inuyasha's priestess' hut. She needed emotional support that only the priestess could give her but before he'd entered the hut Sango managed to sob out a broken apology for not being there when he brought Rin.

"Foolish woman. Do you not think that I am understanding to your current state?" Sesshomaru had said before he entered the hut and left her in the care of Inuyasha and Kagome.

After that the demon lord found more and more reasons for being around more often and soon he rarely ever left the village. Rin had taken up nearly permanent residence in the hut with Sango, and dinner every night was cooked by Sango and shared by just the three of them. They had become an unspoken family and it was not long after that Sesshomaru finally discovered that he had fallen in love with the beautiful slayer who he and Rin had become so close to.

It had taken him a while after that to come to terms with his feelings and even longer to express them to Sango. She had eagerly returned them and, despite Inuyasha's hesitation to trust his half brother, they had gotten married some time later. Rin was absolutely ecstatic to finally have an actual family and Sango had truly raised Rin as if she were her own; training her in the art of demon slaying, teaching her how to cook and do housework, as well as introducing her to healing and helping her with whatever "homework" that Kagome gave her during her studies under the priestess.

The couple had been happy to raise Rin and watch her grown up. Sango surprising him more than a few times during their relationship with the reforming of his arm, and the news that the process had merged some of his demon blood with hers giving her many demonic abilities. It was not until Rin had grown and married Shippo that the couple had gotten the happy news that Sango was expecting.

Those were some of the happiest days of his life and Sesshomaru was immensely glad that Sango had saved his life in the forest that day and had started the spark that had eventually led to their burning flame of love that now existed today.

a/n: OMG I just realised that I am SUPER hungry!!! Uncool... . ...Neways, another chappie in the past that's really not all that eventful but hey, you gotta have a background and at least it wasn't a cliffie. Come to think of it I haven't ended in a cliffie in a long time! Aren't you proad of me!?!?! -.- you're not, are you?....*Tear!*

PLZ READ AND REVIEW OR I'LL CRY SOME MORE!!! (*note huge anime tear marks T.T *)