Chapter 19

Author's Note:

Sooooo, ready for my long excuse as to why this is so very, very late? Okay, here goes, I had graduation parties, I had warped tour, I had college orientation, I had camping, I had the Renaissance festival, I had to...clean stuff? Yeah, I had shit to do. Plus, I was just being lazy. I do it a lot. Sorry. I actually had this written, but I haven't been home for more than like five minutes the past month so I'm updating now. Deal with it.

My head isn't screwed on right, Kagome argued with herself. That has to be it, a blind man with one hand screwed on my head and he did it all wrong. That's the only explanation for this.

"Miko, stop your fidgeting," Sesshoumaru growled as Kagome wiggled in an attempt to find a more comfortable position.

"I can't help it! You're shoulder is like a rock!" She huffed, poking said shoulder for emphasis. She continued to poke and, miraculously, it continued to be rock solid.

"You complained that walking aggravated your injuries, and now you complain that my shoulder is too hard. Will you never be satisfied?" He drawled.

"I'll be satisfied when we take a break," she mumbled petulantly.

Sesshoumaru fought back another growl of frustration. "We have already wasted enough time."

Kagome rolled her eyes and played moodily with the white fur of the pelt that adorned his shoulder. The same shoulder that she was currently draped over. The same shoulder that was jabbing her liver.

It was fantastically uncomfortable!

They had left the kitsune palace that morning after a few heartfelt goodbyes to the three women who had become her fast friends, and had been walking South ever since. At first she was fine, but her back began to bother her after awhile. Even though Sesshoumaru had chivalrously insisted on shouldering her backpack himself - something Kagome thought was uncharacteristically sweet of him - her back still wasn't completely healed and simple movements still upset it. She probably could have done with another day's rest, but she had decided that she didn't want to wait any longer and so, Aiko had sent her on her way with more than enough of that healing cream to last her for at least another week or two.

But healing cream or no healing cream, her back was on freakin' fire! All she wanted to do was sit down on a nice rock and glare at her shoes until the pain went away. Was that so much to ask?

Apparently it was.

She had told Sesshoumaru she needed a break, but he had merely scoffed at her and hoisted her over his shoulder much like how Izanagi had done back at the bone eater's well. And that's how she found herself in this position: tossed over Sesshoumaru's shoulder, playing with his fur...thing, and seriously trying to resist the urge to purify his ear in retribution.

She was also very adamantly ignoring the warm, clawed hand that firmly rested on her upper thigh, holding her in place. Yup, she was completely ignoring it. Hand? What hand? There obviously wasn't a pale, striped, taiyoukai hand squeezing the backs of her legs and making her feel very funny inside. No, of course not. Ridiculous.

Just a little higher and he'd practically be groping you, her brain added absentmindedly. She told it to shut the hell up and do something useful...like wipe out all the teenage hormones from her system.

"What is this anyway?" She asked to distract herself, gesturing to the white fur that he never seemed to be without.

He sighed tiredly. Sesshoumaru was not daft, he knew that his...unsociable nature was not tolerated by the miko. She would simply keep repeating herself like a mockingbird he begrudgingly could not kill until he answered. "It is a symbol of status in the house of inu," he told her. "When a inuyoukai of noble blood reaches maturity, they receive a ceremonial pelt from the eldest member of their family."

"Oh, like a birthday present!" Kagome said brightly.

"It is not a 'present'," he scoffed. "It is a most sacred custom, passed down since they very first inu families conquered these lands."

"If someone gives it to you, it's a present," Kagome argued. "Just like in the future when someone turns sixteen, sometimes their parents get them cars. It's a custom, but it's still a present."

Sesshoumaru remained silent.

"Aren't you going to ask what a car is?" She wanted to know.

He shrugged. "I do not particularly care."

"Of course not," she sighed, "because cars are actually interesting and you being interested in something is against the laws of physics...not that you know what physics is, but I guess you wouldn't care about that either."

Sesshoumaru turned his head to glare at her. "Are you quite finished?"

"Yes."

"Good, now silence."

Yup, my head is totally screwed on wrong, I should probably get it fixed, she sighed inwardly.

"Just how much farther do we have to go before we find the lord who has the spear?" She asked. "Inuyasha is probably freaking out, he's kind of dramatic when it comes to me."

"The whelp knows not patience," Sesshoumaru said distastefully. "I would expect nothing less from a-"

"Yeah, yeah, I know," she rolled her eyes. "He's a filthy half-breed, a stain on your reputation, a disgrace to youkai and human alike. Blah, blah, blah! But he's also my friend and he is going to be worried about me."

"It is of no consequence to me."

"Okay, but if you don't answer my question, I'll just keep talking on and on and on and on and on and on-" Kagome paused to take a breath "-and on and on and on and on and on-"

"Enough!" He growled in an exhausted manner that a parent might take with an overzealous child. "We must cross the thunder plains to reach the Southern lord's fortress. We should arrive in three days time if I do not kill you by then."

Kagome gulped. "T-thunder plains? That sounds...yucky."

"It will not be a pleasant three days," he concurred, giving her an odd look for her vocabulary and not to mention her complete disregard for his threat on her life.

"Well, does that at least mean we're finally gonna get out of this forrest?" She asked, trying to look on the bright side.

He gave her a curt nod. "Though, the forrest is a great deal less dangerous than the plains. I do not think our departure is anything to celebrate...at least from your perspective, miko."

"Great, just great," she said sulkily. "I go from shiny, silver palace, to dark, stuffy endless forrest, to danger riddled thunder plains. Awesome, what's next? The stinking, alligator-filled, mud pits of doom?"

Sesshoumaru rolled his eyes. "Now it is you who is being dramatic."

"My life is the definition of drama - I can be dramatic if I want to be," she huffed.

"Just because one has the potential for something, does not mean they should pursue it," he intoned.

"You know what?" Kagome sighed. "I think I liked it better when you ignored me. All your sagely wisdom is kind of annoying."

Sesshoumaru leveled her a hard glare. "Do not speak of annoyances, miko," he said dryly. "Or you will surely be guilty of hypocrisy."

"I'm going to be guilty of homicide in a minute," she whispered to herself.

Sesshoumaru blinked at her as if in surprise, and then chuckled despite himself.

Kagome was so taken aback she almost fell off his shoulder.

***

"It feels weird sleeping under the stars again," Kagome commented as she spread out her sleeping bag in the plush grass that surrounded them and plopped down. They had finally found their way out of the forrest around midday and hadn't seen a tree since. Nothing but open skies and endless fields of grass as far as the eye could see.

Sesshoumaru shrugged and continued to look at the sky.

"What're you lookin' for?" She wanted to know. He had been staring at the clouds for at least five minutes now; anything that captured his attention that long was probably worth noting.

"They are called the thunder plains for a reason, miko," he said blandly. "We must me vigilant for storms."

"Oh," she frowned. "Do you think we'll get caught in one?"

He remained silent, which Kagome figured was his way of saying he didn't know. Super.

"I don't like storms," she muttered when she was sure he had nothing else to say. She peaked at him from under her lashes, hoping for...well, she didn't know what she hoped for. Maybe a comforting word, some small reassurance, a simple acknowledgement of her existence, but he just stood there and continued to stare at the sky. She didn't know why it made her feel so terrible that he was receding back into his silent shell. After all, she was used to his silence. She guessed she had just thought they were past all that. Perhaps she was wrong...

She focused her gaze back to her lap and wondered if things had ever really changed between them at all. Maybe she had just imagined all those words he had said to her in the kitsune palace, maybe he had only talked with her this afternoon to mollify her, maybe he still wanted to kill her when this was over, or maybe they would part ways after this journey and he would never talk to her again.

And deep in her chest Kagome's heart constricted and she didn't know why. It was an aching hurt, one that she felt down to her very core, one that she had felt much too often for someone so young.

The pain she felt was heartbreak, and though it was a familiar pain, she was completely befuddled by it. Her heart only broke for Inuyasha, not Sesshoumaru, definitely not Sesshoumaru.

"Miko, do not cry," Sesshoumaru commanded, sounding vaguely horrified. He had smelled the salty tang of tears beginning to form behind her eyes and he had no intention of allowing them to fall.

She sniffed and looked up to find him watching her with piercing eyes full of apprehension, revulsion, and concern. Kagome smiled weakly -maybe he did care after all.

"Sorry, I'm just tired," she shrugged and watched as he lifted an aristocratic brow and continued to observe her with the air of someone attempting to diffuse a nuclear warhead. Geez, are tears really so bad? You'd think they were anthrax the way people - well, youkai and half-youkai - in this era react to them.

"Oh, don't look so terrified," she scoffed and rolled her eyes. "I'm not going to cry, okay?"

Oh no! Emotions? Run away, run away! She thought scathingly.

"Miko, This Sesshoumaru was not-"

"Yeah, whatever," she sighed airily, interrupting him mid-sentence. "Just wait until Rin hits puberty. You had better get over your ridiculous aversion to tears because no one cries more than a teenage girl. Just warning you."

He gave her a dubious look and she could tell that he thought she was trying to deceive him. If only he knew how true her words were...

"And would you sit down? You're making me nervous just standing there," she told him.

Well, now that she thought about it, would he sit down? She had never seen him sleep against anything but a tree and there certainly wasn't any trees here...unless he had magic tree conjuring powers, which she was pretty sure he didn't. Still, he couldn't stand there all night, could he?

He gave her a glare that clearly said he was not appreciative of her less than respectful tone, but lowered himself to the ground nonetheless, sitting in a perfect lotus position. Kagome thought it looked terribly uncomfortable.

"Come to think of it, how did you even...you know...meet Rin?" She wondered. In retrospect, a self-professed human hating demon lord and a little human girl were a very unlikely pair. Perhaps even more unlikely than a taiyoukai and a miko.

He shrugged stiffly. "She discovered me injured in the forrest, I later found her dead. I revived her wishing to test Tensaiga's abilities."

"Oh," she said lamely. "How come you let her follow you?"

"She had no kin," he responded.

"Okay...but why didn't you just pawn her off on some village?" Kagome continued to pry. "Why keep her with you all this time?"

He slid her golden eyes to hers and stared at her for a long moment, his gaze hard and guarded. Kagome wanted to look away, but she couldn't, not when his eyes were holding her in place. "I believe you know the answer, miko," he said quietly and his stare returned to the stars.

The miko blinked, confused, for a few moments before the meaning of his words finally hit her. The reason he kept that little human girl with him, the reason he hadn't left her at some strange village to become someone else's problem, perhaps the reason he had revived her in the first place, was so painstakingly obvious that she had completely overlooked it. She had asked him a question that she did, in fact, know the answer to. Sesshoumaru kept Rin because he loved her.

Well, in Sesshoumaru's mind, he would probably explain it as he didn't hate her, but it was the same difference really. It was always obvious that he cared about her, but to have him admit it was something that Kagome had never thought she would live to see. Miracles do happen! She thought giddily.

Kagome grinned. "Awwwww, that is the cutest thing I think I've ever heard," she giggled, throwing the taiyoukai a sly grin.

She found that he was adamantly refusing to look at her. "Miko, be mindful of your tongue, or I will cut it out," he growled, dark and dangerous.

"No you won't," she teased, giving his shoulder a playful nudge. "Because you're just a big softie, aren't you?"

A feral growl escaped his lips, almost as though he were trying to prove just how much of a terrifying monster he truly was.

"Oh, calm down," she giggled. "I'm just joking. I know you're a great, powerful, terrible demon. You don't have to get all primal on me."

He stubbornly turned away from her, his eyes closing as he attempted to make the world - and more specifically, her - disappear.

Deciding that she had probably taken things a little too far and that she really was very lucky that he seemed to have determined that she was worthy of his leniency, Kagome set about the task of getting ready for bed. She had already eaten dinner courtesy of the supplies princess Aiko had fitted her with, and now all that was left to do was change into her pajamas...and rub the healing salve on her back.

Hmmm, this could be tricky, Kagome concluded as she fished out the medicinal jar from her pack and gave it a long, calculating look.

Deciding to tackle that particular hurdle later, she grabbed her pajamas. "Well, I'm going to change now," she said loudly, giving the demon lord a significant look. His eyes were still resolutely shut. Kagome cleared her throat nervously and really wished that there was at least a bush or something that she could change behind, which of course there wasn't. "Soooo, nobody better be looking," she hinted.

Sesshoumaru lifted a brow, but otherwise remained completely motionless, his back to her, his silver hair fluttering in the wind.

Kagome gave him one last look before turning around and quickly scrambling out of her yukata and practically vaulting into her flannel pants and cotton tank top. She was pretty sure she set some sort of record for briefest period of nudity in between wardrobe transitions. She felt accomplished.

"Okay, I'm done," she announced to her sleeping bag, grabbing the jar of salve off of the ground and giving it another glare as though a solution to her now very pressing problem would suddenly materialize.

She had never put the medicine on herself, someone had always done it for her because, obviously, she couldn't really reach her own back all that well. But now there was just her and Sesshoumaru, no helpful maids to tend to her...why was life so hard? Her back was killing her and she had no way of spreading this stuff without making a complete and utter mess! What was she going to do?

Kagome had a vague suspicion she knew just exactly what she was going to have to do, she also knew that she didn't like it one bit.

"Uh...Sesshoumaru?" She said hesitantly. She waited long enough that he actually opened his eyes to look at her. "I can't...um...I can't reach."

Silence.

"I'm supposed to put this on my back," she said awkwardly, playing with the lid of the jar to distract herself from the blush slowly working its way onto her cheeks. "I think I need...you're going to have to help me. If you want to, that is. N-not that you would want to. But I really do need to do this and normally I wouldn't ask, but I don't see any other way..."

"Miko," he sighed, "stop your mindless blabber. I will assist you."

Her mouth shut with an audibly click and she nodded at him, her jaw set in a line so tight she thought her bones would surely break. Neither party made any attempts to move...they just stared at each other...for a long time. It was awkward, Kagome decided, very awkward, maybe the most awkward moment of her life.

"I believe..." Sesshoumaru began, sounding more hesitant than she had ever heard him. "It would be pertinent for you to...undress."

Never mind, that was the most awkward moment of her life. "Oh...right," she agreed, turning a shade of red so violent that she was sure she had invented a new color. "I guess I'll do that."

He looked away as she stood up and walked over to him, setting the jar of salve by his side before turning her back to him and quickly lifting her shirt over her head. She hugged the shirt to her chest as she sat down in front of him and carefully pushed her hair over one shoulder so that it wouldn't be in the way. She was calm. She was cool. She was collected. She was totally fine with this whole situation...

I'M HALF NAKED IN FRONT OF SESSHOURMARU AND HE'S GOING TO RUB STUFF ALL OVER MY NAKED, NAKED, BACK!!! She inwardly screamed, feeling as though she may just actually be glowing from the intensity of the blush that she now wore.

He heard him shift behind her and a quiet, strangled sort of noise - something between a growl and a gasp - caught in his throat.

Sesshoumaru stared at the four, angry red lines that marred the young woman's pale, ivory skin and felt his eyes bleed red. Before she had been placed under his protection she was whole, unharmed, she was beautiful. But now she was flawed, she was flawed like him and it was all his fault. He had left her, he hadn't been quick enough to save her, he had failed. Would she hate her scars if she could see them? Would she hate the youkai that had given them to her? Would she hate him for not protecting her?

No, Kagome did not hate. She was incapable of such emotions, but for once, he wished that she wasn't. He wished that she would hate him, he wished she would hate him as much as he hated the scars he now had to mend. He was accustomed to being hated, he was not accustomed to the horrible guilt he felt deep within his chest, a burning ache so intense that he wanted to rip out his own heart simply as a distraction.

Pushing back all conscious thought, Sesshoumaru dipped one clawed finger in the salve and carefully ran it down the length of one scar, watching with morbid fascination as Kagome's muscles shivered beneath her skin. He wondered if others would hate her scars as much as he did, he wondered if they would hate her for having them.

Would they reject her? Would she become a damaged woman - a lady neither wanted nor loved? A growl built in his throat at the thought. Yes, he hated her scars, but only because he had indirectly been the one to put them there. They reminded him of the pain he had been unable to prevent, but he could never hate her for having them. She was Kagome, no matter how bruised or battered, and the wounds on her back were a symbol of everything about her that he found so admirable.

In her scars were strength, loyalty, and a power that was only threatening because of the shear will she placed behind it. She was no longer an innocent, soft girl, and her scars made her look dangerous. They made her look like the powerful miko he knew she was. And Sesshoumaru realized that maybe scars did not have to be imperfections at all, maybe some creatures were never meant to be whole until they were damaged, maybe some wounds were meant to be apart of you all along.

And with that thought in mind, Sesshoumaru dipped his fingers back into the medicine jar and continued mending the miko that was never really broken to begin with.

Meanwhile, Kagome was having a fit. Yes, that must be what was happening to her because all of her limbs suddenly felt like jello and limbs did not spontaneously melt into gelatinous, useless appendages without a reason. And so, Kagome logically concluded that this reason had to be that she was having a fit. Obviously.

Except that she wasn't having a fit. She was simply being stroked by a very beautiful demon lord...wait, that sounded sort of dirty, didn't it? Revising her internal statement, Kagome announced very firmly that she was being stroked in a purely platonic way, by a very beautiful demon lord.

And she wasn't enjoying it at all. Nope, not at all, but don't ask the traitorous butterflies in her stomach because they were damn liars. They were all fluttery and happy and dangerously close to making her moan every time his deceivingly delicate fingers carefully slid over her skin. Stupid butterflies! Sesshoumaru was just doing this to help her out, there was no need to get all worked up!

But his fingers are like magic, her suddenly less-than platonic mind reasoned. She mentally locked that part of her brain in a metal cage and sent it off to the arctic circle. His fingers are not magic, they're just normal fingers! Even if they do feel amazing...

Kagome tried very adamantly to concentrate on breathing...it was a lot harder than she remembered. He was too close to her, he was touching her too intimately (even if it was only to treat her wounds), she was too exposed, and her tummy felt too funny. It was all too much. His touch that sizzled across her skin, his breath that whispered behind her like a forbidden song never meant to be sung, the glow of a cloudless night sky that left her completely exposed on this tree-less plain, the strange stirrings of some foreign feeling deep within her...it made her want to melt, made her want to fall back into Sesshoumaru and wrap herself around him until she never had to let go, but mostly it made her scared.

Kagome, for the first time in a long time, was terrified. This is Sesshoumaru, this is Inuyasha's brother! She screamed to herself. Remember Inuyasha? The boy you love? You can't be having these thoughts for Sesshoumaru! He's not really the one you want to be making you feel this way...is he?

She didn't know and that scared her even more.

"Um, I think t-that's good," Kagome said shakily, leaning away from him and quickly throwing her shirt back over her head. "T-thanks for your help."

Sesshoumaru nodded his head curtly and wiped salve from his fingers in the long grass.

"Okay...well, goodnight," she smiled tentatively, still trying to chase away the butterflies in her stomach, but not particularly succeeding. She turned back to her sleeping bag when she received nothing but silence, and began to settle herself between the worn, tattered folds of fabric, but suddenly something warm and a incredibly heavy was being draped over her shoulders.

"Wha?" Kagome managed to say before she was completely engulfed in a sea of soft, white fur.

"We have no wood in which to make a fire, you will be cold," the pelt-less taiyoukai told her stiffly, giving her a cold glare that clearly said he would have no comments about his nice gesture and that he still was an almighty killer that would bathe in her blood if he felt the urge.

Kagome smiled. "Thanks, I guess I didn't think about that."

"Hn, I am not surprised," he said in his infuriatingly condescending tone.

The miko rolled her eyes in amusement and collapsed onto her stomach, wrapping the fur pelt around her bare arms and feeling as though she would wake up entirely consumed by the white fur. She would undoubtedly have to fight her way out come morning, but that was hours away, right now she had some sleep to catch up on.

"And miko..." Sesshoumaru hesitated, startling Kagome from the brink of sleep. "...sleep well, you have earned a good night's rest."

"Uh, alright," she said slowly, wondering why his compliments were always so...weird.

Kagome let sleep take her as Sesshoumaru stood beside her and watched the stars.

Chapter Note:

I'm going to college.

This whole summer just flew.

My schedule is fucked up.

But please still review.

Yup. True life.