Chapter Eight

The bear-clan village looked deserted, all the houses were empty. A fire that had recently been fed with new wood was a good sign however that the demons who inhabited the village wouldn't be too far away. A faint sound of drums could be heard, playing in a trance-like rhythm. If one followed that sound they would walk towards a higher levelled ledge on the northern side of the village. There was a large cave entrance. If one stood at it's opening they would be able to overlook the entire village. The drumming sound resonated against the cave walls. It was dark, but a dim light could be seen in the distance from a corridor in the cave tunnel, and if you didn't have the sharp eyes of a yokai you would nearly miss the two guards standing in the shadows. They were humanoid bear-yokai with hairy arms and legs, sharp fangs and round ears sticking out of their deep brown or black hair which they wore in many small braids decorated with beads and feathers. They carried spears and armor in their muscular hands and on top of their buff chests and stared out of the cave opening with focused eyes under a bushy brow. In the back of the cave the walls were hung with terracotta colored tapestries, giving it a tent-like feeling. A young woman was nursing a baby while two children sat around her legs. The drums sounded louder here and were accompanied by a chanting voice. More clan members were standing alongside of the tapestried walls, perhaps two or three dozen of them. The few torches burning cast long shadows across their grave faces. A messenger had entered the cave, he had been running and was panting. He nodded at some faces he knew and his eyes crossed with those of his wife, who was holding their two-year old. She parted her lips and frowned worriedly, he had a large cut in his right arm and the blood was only half dried, how did it happen? Were things going to be okay? He had been injured recently. His eyes told her not to ask questions, he had important news to deliver to the Wise Woman. The two guards that stood besides the cloth that formed the entrance to the tent where the Wise Woman was chanting let him enter. The heavy scented smoke from incense made its way to his nose, stinging his eyes. The Elders were besides the Wise Woman playing the drums whilst sitting on pillows. Her daughter held her hand which was bleeding, an offering to the Gods. There was a milky shine on her eyes, which were rolled back. She had gone blind throughout the years. Her gray hair fell on her back and shoulders in long dreadlocks, decorated with brown and green beads and the feathers from the southern Paradise Bird leader which she had single handedly killed years back in her youth. She wore a leather tunic with green and red tribal paiting and a silver bracelet adorned her left upper arm. Her arms were painted with brown henna. Her face was deeply wrinkled. She chanted loudly, her voice so old, picking up speed. The drums followed. Suddenly she gasped for air.

"Sa'keeth... Sa'keeth... The banished ones are free..." her hoarse voice croaked in a half-whisper. She continued chanting and her body shook. Her daughter looked at her worriedly.

"Our tribe has lost strength over the years, our blood ran thin... We may not survive the changes about to happen..."

A woman near the entrance started sobbing next to the messenger. His worried frown got deeper and he decided to sit and wait until the Wise Woman had spoken.

"The dog-clan and the Order..." she continued. She suddenly woke up from her trance and her hand searched for the bowl of salt that lay close to her, her daughter brought it within her reach. Her fingers dug into the salt and cast it into the small fire before her. A green cloud whooshed up from it.

"Five nights ago the seal in the West broke and the banished ones are once again free. The Order that had protected it for years has been unable to produce enough members able to renew the seal. In the Forbidden Land a stronger Lord has risen than any in past ages, equal to the legendary Unghar, which was ultimately defeated by priestess Midoriko and the former Inu no Taisho's grandfather, Gyakusatsu, and caused Unghar's tribe to be cast into the Realm of Shadows."

She gasped for breath and her eyes rolled back in their sockets again. Her body began to shake as though she was having a seizure.

"Mom?" her daughter asked insecure while holding her hand.

Suddenly her trembling stopped and her glazy eyes widened.

"They are nearing... They are nearing... They are among us!" she croaked while gasping for air. The Elder stopped drumming.

"Run, now, now, run!" she spat.

The few people in the tent sobbed in horror, their eyes filled with fear. The stories that had been passed down about Unghar of the Sa'keeth had frightened them, but they regarded them as scary campfire stories. But now the legend was coming close to become very real to them.

"Aaargh...!" A shout from the distance. The cave entrance!

"No normal weapons can save us now," the Wise Woman said with deadly coldness.

Frightened, everyone turned their heads towards the entrance to the tent. The messenger didn't wait and hurried outside to join his wife.

"Pakumaru!" she sobbed while stretching out her free arm towards him. They peered at the darkness of the tunnel in front of them while holding onto each other with their oblivious two-year old between them. A child started crying in the distance, closer to the cave entrance and out of their sight, and a woman hushed him.

"No! No! Waaaa!-" the woman's scream resonated against the cave walls until it abruptly came to an end. A deep gurgling roar could be heard, evil, and then a high pitched screech that chilled him to the bone. Pakumaru could feel his wife trembling and pulled her closer to him with one hand while he drew his sword with his other. She burried her face into his neck while their child clamped his tiny arms around hers. Pakumaru had ran back to report he had seen the beast, but it seems it discovered them. Another child near the Wise Woman's tent was starting to cry but someone quickly covered her mouth with a hand. Everyone was staring into the darkness too scared to even breathe. All the male adults and female fighters were holding onto their weapons, ready to defend their tribe. From the dark they could hear something slithering. In the dim light of the torches a deep black shadow appeared from the darkness of the tunnel. They watched it grow and horror filled their eyes. Their agonizing screams could be heard all the way down in the village.

Sesshomaru was going in the direction of Kaede's town. He was planning to drop off this woman there who had decided on her own to climb on Ah-Un. Rin had mentioned once she wondered how this girl was doing, he would offer them the chance to meet. His nose suddenly caught a penetrating stench.

Blood!

He quickly looked down to his left side. A smoke was rising in the distance, his sharp eyes could make out houses near the steep mountain. A few tufts of trees and bushes in a clearing and bamboo huts. He squinted his eyes. No movement, no bodies, nothing. But the scent betrayed a massacre had occurred. He changed his course and Jaken followed his new direction with mild surprise.

"A demon village!" he exclaimed.

"Where?- Oh, there," Haruna replied from behind Jaken, looking past Ah-Un's heads to where they were going.

"I can sense an auracoming from there," she said. This alarmed Sesshomaru who felt it too, though outwardly he showed nothing. Were there possibly survivors? Or was it someone... or something... else?

They landed into the middle of the village, close to the smoldering fire that caused the smoke to trail up.

Silence.

"Stay with Ah-Un, Jaken," Sesshomaru told his servant.

"Uhm y-yes milord."

The deserted village was making Jaken nervous and he was relieved he didn't have to come. He too smelled death. But Haruna was too curious to stay back. She hopped off Ah-Un's back and took a look around. The houses looked so... normal... but they were made of bamboo, not wood. And their roofs were coated with leaves which camouflaged them.

"Is this a yokai village?" she asked out loud.

"Hnn," Sesshomaru responded. He looked up to the path that let to the cave entrance. The smell of blood was coming from there. Haruna walked up besides him.

"I can sense something coming from inside that cave," she said.

He started walking towards the cave entrance and Haruna followed after. When they stood at the opening she had difficulties adjusting her eyes to the lack of light. She peered into the dark. The metallic smell of blood and rot even entered her nostrils now. Sesshomaru could see what was going on inside, but Haruna had not noticed yet the two severed bodies that lay against the wall of the cave. Their blood was sprayed across the walls. Sesshomaru and Haruna entered. Suddenly she too became aware of the dead around here, she could feel their presence with her spiritual power, but her eyes weren't used to this darkness. She almost tripped over someone's arm and bumped into Sesshomaru. She hold onto his fur not to fall over. He gave her a quick glare but tolerated that she held onto the fur until they had reached a corridor where a nearly finished torch offered her eyes some light. She placed her hand over her mouth and scanned the floor and walls. Everywhere was blood... guts spilled across the ground... the bodies of women, men and children.

"This is horrible," she mumbled.

Sesshomaru gave no sign of his thoughts about the cruel display before him. He could sense a life form at the end of this tunnel. His keen eyes peered into the distance, there was a tent-like construction there, or used to be. It was ripped apart for most of it, cloth hanging loose from the ceiling. He thought he could see movement behind there. His hand glided down to his sword Bakusaiga. Haruna squatted down. There was a man and a woman laying half on top of each other with a young child between them, possibly two-years old. Their hands were still holding each other. The woman was nearly unscratched and her eyes betrayed the fear she had felt before she died. Haruna placed her fingers in her neck to check if there was any pulse against better judgement. Nothing... dead...

"Who would do something like this? Was it a vendetta?" she said under her breath.

Something scraped over a surface. Haruna quickly looked in the direction of the destroyed tent. Someone was there... They proceeded towards the tent, Haruna with her sheathed sword in one hand and Sesshomaru loosely holding the hilt of his, both prepared to fight. Sesshomaru drew his sword and slashed down the rest of the cloths. When they fell down they revealed an old woman laying with her side on a big pillow. She emitted a weak barrier. She arduously lifted her eyes to see the stoic demon in front of her and the worried girl two steps behind him. She coughed and blood ran down the side of her mouth. Her barrier slowly disappeared.

"Y-ou... have... c-come..." she said softly with a scratchy voice. Haruna looked at her throat, the shape was abnormal and covered with blood. It must be extremely painful for this old yokai woman to talk. She rushed forward and sat down next to her to examine her face.

"Please don't talk, let me see the damage." She started to check up the woman and carefully brushed her fingers passed some of her wounds. This woman's throat had been half collapsed by a powerful thrust. Her leg was broken, the bone protruding the skin. It appeared she also had internal damage to her organs. She coughed another time and her face twisted with pain.

"I'm...be-beyond...saving...gi-rl..."

"Who did this?" Sesshomaru spoke, more like a command than a question.

"Saaah...keeth," the old woman answered. She looked up to Sesshomaru. Silver hair... blue crescent moon on his forehead... purple stripes... honey-golden eyes... She sperred her own brown ones open. She was getting excited about something.

"Inu... Inu no Taisho... the seal, find the artifacts... the seal is broken!" She tried to lift her hand and reached to Sesshomaru as though she was begging for his help. Then she turned her eyes to Haruna and slightly frowned.

"You-You're a mmm-miko... the Order...you must-" her eyes lost their focus, her voice trailed off, her muscles relaxed. Her head sank backwards, hanging in a uncomfortable position and fully exposing her crushed neck. The Wise Woman had passed away. Haruna repositioned the woman and closede her eyes.

"Sesshomaru-sama..." she whispered and looked up at him. He glared down on her. The old woman had mistaken him for his father and had spoken of a seal, but he knew of nothing like that. And this woman that he had endured in his company, apparently she was no ordinary priestess after all. Haruna looked around her and noticed a strange black puddle behind her. A tarry fluid.

'What's this?' she thought to herself while she dipped one finger in it. The fluid stuck to her fingers like a glue. Suddenly it bubbled and began to run up her finger and across her hand.

"Ah!" Haruna exclaimed while sending her spiritual energy through her hand. The pool lit up white as she purified it. With a puff of gray smoke and a hiss it disappeared.

"I never came across something like that," she told Sesshomaru, looking him in the eyes as she stood up.

"Hnn," he responded and briskly turned around to leave the cave again.

A seal was broken, something that had to do with his father. He couldn't remember his late father ever mentioning something like that. But there was possibly someone who could know, someone he rather not speak to however. It was the flee-demon Myouga, who hung around that abomination Inuyasha, his half-brother. He had intended on going to that village anyway and decided he would continue this plan. He was going to speak with Myouga, drop this girl off and seek out this seal that was mentioned in one breath with his father's name.

A/N: Hmmm... I made the bear-clan suffer a lot ^-^'', but now it's clear to Sesshomaru and Haruna they are both in some way connected to this. What did you think of it? Hope it's all getting a little more exciting.

- Demiyah