Sorry for the long delay in updating. I haven't forgotten about this story and I know many of you were worried that I had dropped it. I'm sorry for scaring you.

I owe many thanks to my dear readers, I really appreciate that you stuck with me.

Many hugs and enjoy the story.

Ties of Blood

Chapter 14

Plotting

Rin plopped herself down on her bed with a sigh. Being around Sesshoumaru wreaked havoc on her senses. He made her bold in ways that were both disturbing and exhilarating and she blushed as she remembered him leaning over her as she stared up at him from his bed. To be sure, he was menacing but, at the same time, she was more aware of herself as a young, unattached woman whenever he was around. There was such a contrast between the two of them and yet…she closed her eyes and let out a sigh.

'I don't like him,' she reminded herself but she knew it to be a half-truth. She didn't know him well enough to like him but he'd shown her enough of his good points that it was unfair for her to write him off completely.

'He hasn't hurt me, though he could,' the young woman thought. He'd comforted her in his own way as well and he had no idea how much that meant to someone like her.

Shifting to her side, she stared at the hand where she'd cut herself on his claws, remembering the feel of smooth skin that gave way to sword-calloused palms. That had been a surprise since she thought that, like human rulers, he would be the type to let everyone else do his working and fighting for him. His pretty face didn't help matters but, now that she thought on it, his face wasn't that feminine. When he was close and glaring at her with those intense golden eyes of his, there hadn't been a single question in her mind that he was a male in every sense of the word.

She sighed again and rolled over onto her back. Being around Sesshoumaru was draining at best and she wasn't doing herself any favors by dwelling on him in the solitude of her room. What she wanted and needed, even though her stomach was beginning to rumble in a most un-ladylike way due to hunger, was rest. Besides, she had a feeling that she wouldn't be going anywhere for quite a while and figured she had plenty of time to work out a course of action.

However things turned out, she was beginning to see another path opening up before her. Yes, she could attempt an escape but she had the craziest feeling that Sesshoumaru wouldn't let her go easily and, oddly enough, some of her eagerness to leave him and his castle full of bitter subjects had waned.

If she examined it from a different and, admittedly, more selfish angle she was free of the constraints placed upon her by her adopted father for the first time in years. There was no one for her to be paraded in front of for the purpose of auctioning her off like some kind of horse. There was no reason for her to curb her tongue, except in the interests of self-preservation, and she had the protection - whether he would admit to it or not - of one of the most powerful beings in existence.

Opportunity was everywhere and she found herself grinning as she examined a mural of a giant dog that had been painted on a sheet of wood and affixed to the ceiling. She missed her parents, of course, but there wasn't much she could do to fix that and she wasn't about to waste the chance she now had.

Rin admitted to herself, as sleep was claiming her body, that she also wouldn't mind getting to know the Taiyoukai a bit better before her stay ended. Who knew what the future held?

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Hiten sat in a tree and brooded. His arm felt as if it were on fire and he knew it would take days for his body to finish purging the lingering traces of purifying energy from his wound so that it could heal properly.

His pride had taken a serious blow and he seethed with anger as he ran the events leading up to his injury over and over in his head. Logically, he knew that it was more-or-less his own fault but that did nothing to sooth his temper.

The Thunder Clan had always been a proud lot. Unfortunately, that same pride was what led to the demise of all but three of its members - his younger brother, sister, and his self were all that was left. As the eldest sibling, and also the strongest remaining member of the clan, he was the shining example they looked up to. He was the one who needed to guide and protect the only family he had left and the thought of becoming less in their eyes because he'd been injured by a human girl, who was really little more than a light snack to him, was painful.

Though his clan had been a vicious lot, conversely, they were fiercely loyal to members of their families and the trust and loyalty of his siblings was more valuable to him than life itself.

Sitting back, he rested his head against the rough bark of the tree and brought forth an image of the little human girl from the depths of his memory. "Little" was an accurate description of her, she barely reached his shoulders, and she was pretty enough that Manten would have loved to use her in a tonic to bring back his missing hair. As for himself, she was a tasty-looking morsel and he had no qualms about ignoring Sesshoumaru's dictates and using her as a snack.

The taiyoukai was a laughing stock among many of his noble subjects due to the scandal with his father and he hadn't done himself any favors by bringing in a human male and now a human female. Kuroko was all but ready to snatch his power away.

She'd amassed an army right under Sesshoumaru's nose and those who had been on the fence about joining her were inexorably moving towards her cause because of this latest debacle with the human girl. After the insult the taiyoukai had dealt his subjects in the courtyard and the disrespectful way the girl had treated Kuroko, Hiten knew that the female Raven-youkai's pride wouldn't stand for much more.

He personally preferred to watch from a distance, staying uninvolved with either side because, in his experience, nothing good ever came of political coups. Either the rebels were crushed or a new regime was established that was bad as or worse than the former one. Very rarely did the "subjects" - in this case the lower youkai and lesser nobility such as himself - actually benefit. Too, he had to think of his siblings.

Souten was too young to truly understand the concept of overthrowing an established ruler and Manten wanted to join the rebels in order to have a good fight, not because he had a particular dislike for Sesshoumaru.

Hiten was wise enough to know when he was outclassed - he'd seen Sesshoumaru fight - but it hadn't prevented him from making his recent error in judgment regarding the girl. He had thought that she was easy prey, like most of her race, but he should have known that Sesshoumaru would take it one step further and bring a miko, the most hated of humans, into his domain. And she was a powerful one at that.

It was suicidal and utterly unheard of but brilliant nonetheless and he could respect the taiyoukai's boldness and power. If the young lord could get the girl to obey him, he'd have a formidable weapon on his hands. There were few youkai didn't know of the other miko, the one called Kikyou who had turned the tide of the war in the humans' favor. Entire hordes of youkai had been wiped out by her alone and there were whispers that she was something more than human.

He wouldn't have put stock in such tales, except he'd just learned firsthand what an angry miko could do and it wasn't a lesson he would soon forget.

"Rin," he said her name quietly and knew that he would never forget her or what she had done to him.

He would also never forget the sight of her staring at him wide-eyed and tearful as she apologized to him, her attacker - he smirked at that.

'Odd girl,'' he thought as he swung his legs over the branch and slid off, gracefully landing on the ground some fifty feet below. As he contemplated his next move he had a fleeting image of the little human girl again, but this time her body was haloed in blue as she glared at him like some sort of avenging goddess. A single word rose up in his mind as he made his way back to the castle.

"Beautiful."

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Kuroko paced from one end of her chambers to the other. Her kimono whispered behind her as it trailed across the stone floor and the silk fairly crackled whenever she turned, belying her agitation.

Her mind was a seething mass of anger and hurt pride and she was itching to kill something or, more specifically, someone - preferably a certain impudent human girl.

Across the room hazel eyes, that were a match to hers, watched. A frown creased their owner's brow and he let out a sigh of annoyance, resting his head on his hand.

The female youkai caught the tiny sound and she halted her strides, whipping around to glare at her older brother.

"Do you have something to say, Kuromaru?"

The other watarigarasu youkai blinked and slowly shook his head. He knew his youngest sibling well enough to know when to let her stew and when to speak up. She obviously needed to let off steam so he kept quiet while she vented and muttered under her breath about Sesshoumaru and his pet human and how they had humiliated her and how she was going to get even and blah, blah, blah.

He held back a yawn.

Though, there was no mistaking his kinship to Kuroko - he looked just like her thought he had no markings around his eyes and his height and build proclaimed him a male - his temperament was vastly different.

Whereas his sister had delusions of grandeur - delusions that had carefully been nurtured by his father - he was of a mellower sort. He was content to allow things to progress naturally in regards to obtaining power. His father was the head of their clan and he was next in line but Kuroko, to their father's way of thinking - which was rather old-fashioned in his opinion - was primarily on the planet for only two things. She was fated to be married and have children.

Naturally, their father had never expressed that particular opinion of women around his daughter. He wanted her to fly fairly high up the ladder of eligible suitors before clipping her wings, so he'd allowed her to more-or-less do as she pleased as long as she brought more power to their family.

Their father, Kuromaru had decided a long time ago, was rather power mad - much like his predecessors. Their clan had always been one of the lesser ones. They were numerous but weak and they were carrion eaters, just like their animal cousins, the ravens, were. The Watarigarasu clan was also well known as a group of opportunists so there was little trust between them and other youkai. It made moving up in the world much more difficult.

Honestly, if Sesshoumaru hadn't sent out the call for his subjects to join his war against humanity, they would have stayed home and things would have stayed the same. He would inherit the title of Lord over his clan and Kuroko would have been married to someone powerful enough to appease his father's pride.

As it was, when he told his father he was going to join Sesshoumaru's cause for his own reasons - reasons that had everything to do with Kuroko and the huge secret she was keeping from their father and the rest of their clan - his father had sent his sister along.

Much to his dismay, the lord had also given her the order to secure power for herself and the rest of the clan. Kuromaru knew his father well enough to know that, in the leader's mind, "securing power" for any female child of his meant he wanted her to marry a man of stature. He'd bet his left wing that his father was angling for the all-powerful Lord of the West.

Unfortunately, the old man had miscalculated in one vital area - his daughter herself. Apparently, she'd figured out their father's plans for her and had decided to do things her own way. Granted, he had seen the attraction she immediately held for Sesshoumaru - as most women did the first time they laid eyes on him.

However, Sesshoumaru was one those men who was beautiful...until he opened his mouth. Any attraction Kuroko might have held had taken a flying leap from the nearest window the moment the young lord had ordered her to stop throwing off her scent like a *female-dog* (not his exact words) in heat and do something productive.

Hence, Kuroko had decided to "productively" take his kingdom out from under him and keep it for herself. Wounded pride was a terrible thing and everything Sesshoumaru did seemed to irritate her no end. It was at the point that she sincerely believed that she had the right to steal someone else's land and that she could do it with impunity.

Kuromaru sighed and his sister's glare deepened. She folded her arms across her ample breasts and said coldly, "Is there something you would like to share with the rest of us?"

He gave her a lazy smile in response and rose to his feet, walking over to her. His sister was tall but he had her by a good head and he delighted in towering over her because he knew that it irked her to have to tilt her head to look back at him.

Kuroko was such a joy to tease and he fondly recalled a time when she used to toddle after him and he could do no wrong in her eyes. 'Well, we know what happened to change that, don't we?' he thought and his amusement slipped away like a fleeting spring breeze. As easygoing as he was, he was also protective of his family, which was practically unheard of in his clan, and his protectiveness made him a formidable enemy when roused. And nothing angered him more than thinking about that man.

His sister had always been a bit spoiled but now she was bitter and twisted because of a human man. He harbored no great hatred for humankind but he despised one member of the race in particular and he'd pursued him all the way to Sesshoumaru's lands under the pretense of offering himself up for the young lord's cause. Kuroko had issues that had existed long before they left their lands and she was insulted by Sesshoumaru. Personally he was torn between forcing her to give up on her plans because Sesshoumaru was no one to be trifled with and she was liable to get herself hurt and using the political unrest to seek out that man who had ruined his sister's life. He didn't know the human's name but he knew his face very well. He'd seen it in miniature for the past six years. Speaking of which....he had news for his sister.

"Kuroko, I received a letter from Sanae-San. She wanted to report on his progress."

His words had the expected effect and he bit back a curse as her pale face flushed red and she shoved away from him, sitting herself down in the chair he'd abandoned and pointedly looking away from him. He should have known better than to broach such a sensitive subject but she was living with denial and he didn't like seeing her so unhappy. She needed to get used to her position in life, otherwise she was just going to make herself, him, and certain other individuals unhappy.

"Kuroko, you can't keep running away. He's made incredible strides and he's shaping up to be something special. Don't you want to see…?"

She shot him such a glare that he automatically shut his mouth and said coldly, "I don't want to hear his name. I don't want to hear about his 'progress.' I want him to disappear and stop haunting me. I want to be left alone. Stop trying to stick your beak in my business."

Silence fell and he allowed a few moments to pass before he spoke again.

"You don't have business Kuroko," Kuromaru said quietly. Though his voice was low, she knew him well enough to detect the fury contained therein.

"He affects the clan just as much as you do. What do you think father would say or do if he knew?"

"Hopefully he would take care of my problem," his sister muttered under her breath.

That was too much for him, he strode over to where she sat and bent down so that they were almost nose to nose.

"Don't try me, girl. You may be my sister but I am stronger and I will be your lord one day. I have put up with your self-pity. I've allowed you to follow a course that I personally feel is foolish and suicidal. But I will not allow you to run away from your mess. There are far worse things than his existence and if you don't stop acting like a child, I can and will undo all the work you've put into stealing a kingdom you have no right to."

She glared at him and he matched it with one of his own, daring her to utter another disparaging word about his charge. Even he had his limits and she knew better than to push him past them.

Slowly, she lowered her eyes and said quietly, "I still won't acknowledge him."

"Whether you choose to do so or not, I intend to when I take over headship of our clan."

"You'll be a laughingstock."

"Our clan is already the butt of every youkai joke. I could care less what others think and you obviously didn't care at some point otherwise you wouldn't have gotten yourself in the predicament you're in."

"So, you're saying it's my fault, is that it?" She narrowed her eyes as him as her voice raised once more. He took note that her long nails were slowly morphing into talons, a sure sign of her agitation. He was nothing if not a smart man and he knew when it would be prudent to relent, if only because he didn't want to hurt his sister if she forced him to defend himself.

Kuromaru deliberately kept his voice calm as he replied, "I am saying you are not entirely innocent of all blame. I know you sister. Whether you like it or not, I know you. I knew what you were doing. Father never bothered to know the real you and I understand why you wanted to rebel against him. But that ploy backfired and now you're stuck. It's no longer about you, Kuroko."

If possible, her glare grew even harder but she said nothing and he knew she had nothing more to say to him on the subject. He was right and she knew it.

Stifling a sigh at how stubborn his sister was, he backed away and ran a hand through his long hair black hair. He supposed now was as bad a time as any to tell her his plans. His sister wasn't going to happy with what he was about to say but his mind was made up.

"Kuroko, I'm planning on going home for a bit."

That got her to sit up straight and take notice. Her eyes widened a bit before she pasted a bored look on her face.

"And why should I care what you do?" she asked with a nonchalance that didn't fool him one bit. His sister hadn't changed in one respect: she hated doing things by herself. She liked to hide her need in the guise of giving orders and the like but the long and short of it was that she needed to be surrounded with people, whether they were servants or peers. He had no idea where that part of her personality came from but it had never quite disappeared, even after all she had been through.

Hiding a smile, he replied, "I'm going to pay father a visit. I don't think he's much longer for this world. I also want to see you-know-who since you can't be bothered to check on him."

Kuroko snorted and said, in a voice laden with sarcasm, "I'm sure Sanae-San will enjoy having you visit. That's probably the only reason she took him in, because it was her precious Kuromaru-Sama asking her for help."

"Careful, Kuroko-Chan, your claws are showing," he matched her sarcasm with his own.

"Besides, sister, there's no longer anything between Sanae-San and I," he continued, "We are merely friends at this point in time. She's more than happy to help me out and I am grateful to her for that." What he didn't mention was that he planned to bring a surprise back for his sister and he had every intention of seeing that his surprise wouldn't come to harm when Kuroko caught on to what he was trying to do.

"Well, whatever you do, brother, make sure it doesn't come back to me. I'm at a crucial stage in my plan right now and I don't need anything that could upset the balance of power."

"But of course…" he said mildly, adding a silent "not" on the end of his sentence. He not only planned to upset the balance of power, he planned to remove it completely from his sister's clutches before she got them all killed.

She nodded curtly and turned to leave his room.

He allowed her to depart in silence before reaching up and rubbing his temples. He had a plan and if all went well he would catch the human he'd been hunting and, hopefully, help his sister to find peace at last. If not…well, he'd probably lose his life, leaving the little one he sought so desperately to protect defenseless.

It was a disquieting thought and he sat down once more to brood over the wisdom of his chosen course.

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Sesshoumaru watched from his window as the sun rose and slowly closed his eyes, wondering how the night had passed him by. Of course the question fell under the category of "rhetorical" because he knew full well what - or, rather, who - had been on his mind and why.

If he rolled his tongue he could still taste the faint bittersweet copper of her blood and he frowned. He'd spent an entire night thinking - and regretting his lack of a need to sleep for the first time - about Rin and he was still no closer to figuring out why she acted the way she did. Frustrated didn't begin to describe him.

There had been one benefit, however, of his long night of contemplation. He had concluded that the only way he could even begin to understand Rin was to watch and wait. And while he waited, he would look into finding someone to train his young human girl. Though she was obviously unskilled, her power was real and he wanted it to be at his disposal when Kuroko finally made her move to dethrone him. Her brother had informed him a few weeks before his capture that he intended to visit their ancestral home for a bit and Sesshoumaru had been more than happy to let him go – knowing that Kuroko probably wouldn't make her move unless her brother was there. It gave him more time to finalize his plans for cleaning up his kingdom and ridding himself of the rebels, like Kuromaru's sister, who threatened the harmony of said kingdom.

Opening his eyes once again, he turned from the window and walked to the wall next to the door. Concentrating, he gently roused the youki dwelling within the stones and breathed deeply as he joined his own power to it and prodded it along the network laid out over his castle. Filtering out the various sounds and scents native to his home he sought out Jaken's room and sent just the tiniest spurt of his energy through the network, just enough to make the youki spark and deliver a not-so-mild shock to his noisy servant.

His sensitive ears picked up Jaken's squawk of surprise as he was unceremoniously roused from his slumber and he almost withdrew his hand, knowing that the first thing Jaken would do was seek him out. However, a thought occurred to him and he sent another thread of power out in a different direction, to Rin's room in particular.

Allowing his senses to meld into the network, he cast his hearing outwards and tuned it in on her room. He could hear her heart beating slowly and rhythmically, telling him that she was still asleep. He could have easily withdrawn then but his curiosity got the better of him and he concentrated even more. This time, in addition to using the residual youki to listen, he decided to see if he could use it to see as well.

There was a faint twinge in the back of his head but it wasn't enough to alarm him. Concentrating hard and closing his eyes he waited.

Slowly, the darkness behind his eye lids and in his mind's eye began to lighten - going from gray, to white and gradually adding colors until he had an extremely fragmented view of his former room and its occupant. It was dizzying because he was looking in so many directions at once, rather like the compound eyes on an insect and he concentrated even more. Forcing the youki scattered across her room to collect into one specific point so that he could see properly.

Colors broke apart and rippled before crashing together again and reshaping themselves into a clear picture of the room and the girl occupying it.

Rin lay curled up on his old bed and he couldn't help but marvel again at how little she was. It was so strange for a fragile human to have so much power. He allowed himself to briefly remember how very soft and fine her hair had been and the sight of her liquid eyes staring at him in a way that an acknowledged monster like his self would never have imagined was possible.

The taiyoukai was tempted to see if he could extend his youki once more and modify another one of his senses – maybe touch - but another twinge in the back of his head told him that wasn't a very wise decision. He slowly withdrew from the room and allowed the extra power he'd harnessed to drain away. Rin's image faded from his mind and his hearing returned to normal. He opened his eyes and immediately shut them again as a wave of dizziness washed over him. The gray stone beneath his feet heaved – though it was his body that was unsteady - and he knew that he'd been in danger of hurting himself by tapping into so much power when he hadn't nourished himself for weeks. He could go for quite a while without eating but he hadn't taken in sustenance for quite a while, the human blood back in the town was of little help besides helping his body to heal.

A knock sounded at the door and he took in a few deep breaths, calming his nerves, before saying in as normal a voice as possible, "Enter."

Jaken hustled in and bowed low as he said, "Ah Sesshoumaru-Sama, your faithful servant has awoken fit and ready to serve."

The young lord inclined his head and replied, "I have work for you. First, have food sent here to me. Second, I want you to look up every miko who's squatting on my territory."

"Every miko, my lord?" Jaken looked up, his wide in shock.

Sesshoumaru raised an eyebrow at his questioning tone and Jaken wisely snapped his mouth shut and said, "Yes, yes. Of course. Every miko."

"I want the latter assignment done by noon."

"Yes, of course, by noon," the tiny toad parroted back.

"That is all, Jaken, leave me," he turned his back on the tiny youkai, dismissing him.

The toad wisely did as he was told and Sesshoumaru waited until the door closed behind him before he sat down on his bed and gripped his head between his hands. He had the makings of a serious headache and he needed food in the worst way. The taiyoukai made a mental note to refrain from using his experimental ability to cast his sight outwards using his youki and that of the castle's without taking in additional energy first. Still, and a tiny smirk touched his lips, he definitely wanted to test it out again, perhaps see if there was a way to do it without draining himself too much.

He was confident that there wasn't anyone alive who could best him in battle but he had also never done something as potentially dangerous as raising a miko in his own household. If the girl somehow got it into her head to escape or turn on him, he wanted to have as much of an advantage as possible.

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I apologize again for the long delay and the slow chapter. I can't have pure Sess/Rin all the time. No worries though, they'll interact with each other again, soon enough. New characters coming up in the next chapter maybe and we'll find out who's going to train Rin and what our favorite monk and his slayer are doing. As always, please read and review.