Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha

Co-author: Tokahlia

Reviews reponse:

Inulover385: No Naruto is not the father and I choose the name Hinata on random so sorry if confused you. No hard feeling I hope. Thanks for the review.

Veraozao: She needs Kagome because she wants to kill her. She thinks that by doing so she will be able to take her soul and live on. I hope that I did not give away too much. Thanks for the review.

Tsuirakuangel: Yes, it was Haku doing. Thanks for reviewing.

Darksilvercloud: I do agree with you that Kikyou is mean for saying that. What a way to hit on a woman's pride huh? About Inuyasha: well,... love is blind. Thanks for the review.

A White Rose_A Kiss of Desire

Chapter 10

'Come to me...my bride...come.'

"Haku?" Kagome rose abruptly from her bed and whipped her head around the room. She did not find what she sought. Then she felt a tug at her aura and knew that he was calling for her. She could not help but smile. She briefly wondered if this was how InuYasha felt every time he ran of to see Kikyou but quickly flushed the thought away.

She knew that he, Haku, was not here and so she closed her eyes and concentrated on the string that he tugged an invisible connection between them. She had never tried anything like this before but she had a want and a need. Kagome tried to remember how he felt when she was near him; his presence could not be mistaken for anyone else's. She felt elated when she found the string; it hummed in power and love that were soaked in his grace. She moved to follow. Her feet glided as she moved along the path that would lead her to him.

The night was dark; a perfect night for stargazing as there was no moon. Kagome stopped on the bank of a pond, this particular pond was connected to one of the many streams that branched off Haku's river. Kagome was barely able to see her reflection staring back at her as tonight was a new moon. Moments passed as she tried her hardest to wait for her eyes to adjust to the night's low light exposure. She finally thought that her eyes were adjusted as the water and aquatic plants came into view. She frowned when she found out that it was not her eyes but because there was something shining in the water. A shape came more into focus and recognition lit up in her mind; the source of her light was a seal within the water.

'This must by my...ride,'she thought, her head tilted slightly in wonder as she studied the glowing seal. Kagome was unaware of her unconscious movements as she moved closer to get a better look and stepped onto the water, directly on top of said seal. Magic reacted as soon as both of her feet were planted on the seal and a gust of power rushed up. An unnatural wind flustered her thin sleeping yukata and hair. Kagome gasped.

A White Rose_A Kiss of Desire

Midnight was when Sesshoumaru was rudely awoken by a triumphant aura spiking through his lands. Before his guards or any of his staff could react the inu-lord was already at the origin of the foreign matter. His eyes were red in his temper, though he fought to control his body's impulses to rip apart the forest as he all but teleported himself through it.

The miko was calf-deep in water, blue energy surrounding her. Sesshoumaru stood, eyes slowly turning clear, at the eastern bank. Seeing him she modestly stopped the edges of the yukata from flapping around her, through the power of the spell still had enough strength to make her hair whip about above and around her.

"Well, well, it seems the girl has made her choice, milord." The voice, an unnatural presence, floated around in his mind. 'The water god.' Sesshoumaru stared into Kagome's azure depths and at once determined that she was obtuse. She was obtuse, naive, infuriating, innocuous, oblivious, ignorant and, even worse, she had no idea. She had no idea that she had no idea. A dark smile flickered on his lips.

"Sesshoumaru..." The drop of the honorific made Sesshoumaru prouder, in some minute way, though her face was the perfect representation of innocence. He should be angry, he should be furious that she was trying to leave him. Of course, almost in response to this thought his shoulders lowered, his hands unclenched. He closed his eyes as thoughts bombarded his mind.

Couldn't she tell the reasons behind his declaration? She truly was an idiot. But, then again, so was he. All Sesshoumaru could tell was that they were both fools; she didn't understand that she didn't understand and he was clueless about himself, her, his lands, everything. They really made a sorry bunch. When he opened his eyes he was surprised to find her fading into the spell, getting ready to jump to some other place. With a cold face and a hammering heart Sesshoumaru blurted out the first thing that came to his mind.

"One week."

Kagome's eyebrows shot up in surprise, her mouth a perfect 'o'. "Eh...?"

"Return to This Sesshoumaru in one week." He would rather lock her up in his castle, forbid her from ever disappearing again. But, dammit, her words had gotten to him. 'What has scarred you so much, Sesshoumaru, that you cannot trust me to leave and come back again on my own will?' The miko placed her trust where it fell; Sesshoumaru trusted nobody. If he wanted the same treatment she had given everyone else he would have to be the one to initiate it.

Kagome's eyes opened even wider and a peaceful smile fluttered onto her face. She was a little more than a shade, her voice a whisper on the wind. "Ariga-" She was gone before she could finish saying her thanks.

Sesshoumaru let out the breath he hadn't realised he had been keeping. He told himself that it was temporary, that she would return to him and wouldn't abandon him. 'She is honour bound, like This one. She will try.' Feeling along the telepathic thread the entity had contacted him on Sesshoumaru made his statement.

"He who knows does not speak; he who speaks does not know." Before the god had the time to retort Sesshoumaru cut the string that connected them, stalking back to his castle, shrugging off guards on his way. After all, he had given the girl permission to leave, there was no need for them to find her, yet.

A White Rose_A Kiss of Desire

Haku almost grimaced when the telepathic connection was brutally cut but he only lipped the frown slightly. It would not do for one of his stature and power react too strongly for something so insignificant. There was certainly something brewing within the Inu taiyoukai, evidenced by the strong reactions Haku had felt coming from the lord caused by the summoning of his bride. 'Surely, his heart is not swaying.'Haku did not like the forebonding emotions he was feeling at the thought.

Anymore thoughts were interrupted as the aura of his bride quickly approached. Haku spreaded out his arms and caught his beloved. He embraced her and kissed her soft lips, greeting her in the most intimate way. "Welcome home, beloved." His eyes slowly opened as he spoke. Haku smiled when he saw the pretty blush on her cheeks. 'So innocent still.'

His kisses were so warm. Kagome felt her heart melt a little more each time. She could feel the heat on her cheeks and could hear the wild beating of her heart. His eyes held her own captive and her hands moved on there own as one settled in his thick, silky hair and the other rested on his cheek. His skin felt soft and smooth under her fingertips. She did not know when she closed her eyes again but soon she threw away all thoughts and let herself melt again into his kiss.

The soft cushion of mattress tactile against her back and her head was placed gently on the ultra soft and fluffy pillow. The cool fabric contrasted greatly with the heat emanated on the front of her body from Haku's masculine form. Goosebumps began to form on her exposed chest, though only her cleavage showed, as she vaguely felt the silk of her sleeping yukata slip down her shoulders. Breath of hot air from the male above her spiked her skin sensitivity and caused gasps and moans to come from her lips.

"Haku-sama!" Every kiss and touch stroked her like electric ecstasy, thunderous and wild storms in April that would bring blooming flowers in May. So lost she was that she did not see ribbons of water snake up her legs, though she felt them; the cold liquids brought her more pleasure. She cried out when cold aqua entered her nether maiden entrance. She was so confused and fear of the unknown. "Haku?" She screamed out his name over and over, her minded wanted answer at one time only for any more thoughts to vanished like dust when the almost unbearably cold liquid touched her chastity barrier and she nearly choked. She was finally able to breathe when she felt the cold liquid leave her and her entire body cooled down. A content sigh passed her lips just before she felt her betrothal's smooth lips kissed her cheek and her body melted into his embrace just beside her.

The silence was comfortable and too serene, Kagome felt, to be interrupted. She wanted to ask what he had done and his reasons for doing so but could not bring herself to speak. She yawned and fell at sleep with a mental note to ask her secretive dragon for his actions once she woke next. 'Dragon? Since when have I referred to Haku as a dragon?'

'Such temptation,' Haku thought as he ghost the silky-soft skin of his bethrothed's shoulder while his eyes moved across her exposed skin. He had never thought about these things before; never had his mind exercised thoughts of humanly intimacies nor had he ever had a wanting like he did with her. She looked so peaceful, so trusting, which was why he had placed the spell on her. He did not trust the Inu as far as he could throw him. It had irritated him to learn that the demonic Inu had developed an attraction to his bride and so early on just after she became his betroth. He almost felt like his heavenly father was testing him. 'Hm, it may just be.' The thought made the river god frown. 'No matter, I will not lose.'

Haku focused his gaze on the face of his sleeping bride. She smiled when she unconsciously reached to him in her sleep; her small hand rested over his heart and clawed slightly at the silk fabric of his sleeping yukata. Kagome wiggled closer and rest her head on his chest and purred. 'No, I don't think I can let go.'

A White Rose_A Kiss of Desire

Kikyou was dieing again. She abhorred dieing. Well, she mused as she watched a human InuYasha mutter things above her, uncomprehending; was it possible for one dead already to die?
InuYasha... his hair was obsidian, his eyes, violet. She had never seen him in his human form before, didn't know he had one. He had never been very open to her when they had their time, always running away to heavens-knew-where when he thought that something would happen.

Kagome sure had changed him. Kikyou would allow her incarnation that much at least. He had friends; unlikely, strange, bent-on-revenge people but friends nonetheless. InuYasha had always been gruff. Kikyou had accepted it as a part of him but, as shown by Kagome, it was obviously an act. She felt so useless...

"Kikyou! Stay with me!" InuYasha picked up her head, heavy as it was with her inanimation. Kikyou wished for a time when she could have felt the heat from his palms, wished for a time she could have felt anything but her hollowness inside. She was an abomination, not meant to be alive.

Kikyou could feel her soul trying to detach itself from her body. No, that wasn't how it felt. She could feel herself trying to get free from the bones and clay that provided her golem existence.

Her eyes closed, her limbs felt suddenly heavy.

As she drifted slowly,

yet surely away,

one thought made itself clear in her mind.

No.

Eyes flung open she tightened her grasp on the closest thing to her, which happened to be the sleeve of InuYasha's suikan. The monk and the demon slayer both jumped back in surprise, each holding their arms close to their rapidly pounding hearts. InuYasha blinked.

Kikyou refused to re-die. Thoughts of the darkness and unwillingness of her years waiting to be reincarnated ate away at her. It scared her more than the fact that she was an abomination herself ever did.

Her soul-collectors swarmed around her, whispering her sweet nothings in their melodic talk. 'Get me every sort of soul you can; pure, dark, old, young, male, female; there must be one that works. Even youkai or hanyou if need be.'

Kikyou let herself be pulled up by InuYasha; he knew when she wanted to get up and assisted her to do so. The miko stood herself steadily on her feet, keeping her bow hand loose. After-all, letting the humans know that she was putting all her weight on the wood via white knuckles was going to make them insist that she sat down.

"Kikyou-sama, are you sure you are okay?" Asked the monk. Kikyou nodded.

"I wish Kagome no harm," yet, "I only wish to know how she has changed. I thought she might be with you but," Kikyou looked around once again, making sure that there were no signs of sudden grief etched onto their faces. She couldn't have her reincarnation dieing on her, could she? "it appears that she is no longer here."

InuYasha looked sourly to the side. "She was being rebellious." He mumbled, kicking half-heartedly at the dirt by his feet. "Said I didn't treat her good or something."

Kikyou smiled a little. InuYasha was still hers, didn't Kagome realise that he was rubbish at showing his emotions? Or, perhaps, he had been to harsh on the girl. Kikyou winced. She knew what that felt like. Kagome was compared to Kikyou, who was compared to the woman she had been fifty years ago. Kikyou was a clay-pot; she was not the Shikon-miko, a kind and caring priestess of Edo, a woman. Kikyou felt a twinge of guilt. InuYasha didn't realise any of those things, but it would only be a matter of time.

Kikyou was weak, emotionally exhausted and on the verge of crying with frustration. It was time to leave.

"I will search for her then." Kikyou put on her usual blank face, trying to suppress the tight feeling at the back of where her throat would be. She needed to find Kagome. "Don't try and stop me, I promise not to hurt her," 'If I don't have to.'

"Kikyou!" InuYasha grabbed her hand, violet eyes boring into her brown ones. "Please, stay longer."

Puppy-dog eyes had never worked on her. "I'm sorry." With that Kikyou pulled her hand from his grasp and strode towards the surrounding forest. It was time to try and find Kagome.

A White Rose_A Kiss of Desire

A nearly silent sigh of frustration passed Haku's lips and his eyes slowly opened. 'Freewill.'
The gift of The Lord is truly amazing. Haku was surprised at first that the creature that was called Kikyou still possessed the grand gift. She was no longer human per se, but he guessed that the fact that she had once been a human was good enough for her to hold on to that gift. Another reason could be because the anchor that held her to this realm was that of a living soul, a pure soul at that, that she was able to utilize freewill.

Another failed attempt to call back Kagome's soul; he could feel her, the bubble of Kikyou's consciousness washed over him like a wave. He was so close this time but the abomination was too greedy for life, a stolen life. She lived a half-life, a walking curse. Sympathy for the soul clawed at him. She knew not that she was tainting her soul more with each moment she remained in this realm; her name written in dark ink multiple times and burned into the many pages of the book of sinners in the devil's hands. Kikyou was right to fear her re-death for what awaited her would not be kind in any way.

A part of him wanted to prolong her time on this land just so she would not have to face the horrors that awaited her but he knew better. If he were to do so, her punishments will only be worst. 'No, the kindest thing to do is to return her to death's hand as soon as possible.'

"How long have I been here?" His words were a soft whisper in the nearly silence of the bed chamber with only the soft tranquil sounds of underwater symphony. His eyes closed again as he ran through misty memory lanes. Once upon a paradise he lived. His home was the utopia that every mortal wished to reach upon death.

"Why am I here?"