Hi all. I'm back again? Wow. That was fast. This chapter was actually part of the last chapter, but it was becoming way too long and so I cut it into two separate parts. Which is why I was able to post it right after the last one.

Enjoy, you wonderful people.

Chapter Eight

Death and Life

Every part of her was burning – her fingers, her toes, her stomach, her heart. It seemed as though fire had trickled underneath her skin and was burning her insides. The fire worked its way into her muscles and bones, biting at her until she was blazing everywhere. Rin had seen birth, had felt the pain sitting in the air like fog, but she had never imagined that it could be this way. She understood now how much Kagome and Sango had sacrificed to give their children life.

Yet the pains had started again and she could no longer think.

Rin wanted to reach out, to scream for someone to help her, but her arms would not move when summoned and her voice died in her throat. She was in pain. Great, immense pain as though there was too much of it for her body to possibly hold. When Rin found her voice, she screeched out for someone. She called for Jaken and Kagome to appear and take this pain away. She found herself calling Sesshomaru's name more often than any other's. Rin shouted for him, begged for him, pleaded for him.

"Please," Rin gasped. Her hand grabbed onto something and her fingers squeezed around it in desperation. "Please, protect my baby."

The great demon stood stoically over her. His face was impassive, yet inside he was feeling unusually perplexed. The events over the last few months had left him unsettled. And now, watching Rin's pain-wracked body, her small, frail human hands clutching onto his sleeve, caused an odd stirring in him.

It was simply the thrill of danger from an unknown demon, he reasoned.

"Okay, Rin." Kagome smiled encouragingly. "Now push!"

Rin nodded; her grip on Sesshomaru's sleeve tightened. A power she was unaware she possessed pulsed through her. Her body knew without question that the baby was to come and she could only help the progression, not halt it. She met Sesshomaru's eyes during her frenzy and though his face was much the same as the first day she saw him, there was a dishevelled look to his body. She realized he was wishing nothing more than for her to deliver this baby safely. She would bring it into the world. Rin could endure anything.

With one final heave, the baby slid out of her.

Rin was not so dim or uneducated that she did not immediately know something was wrong. Terribly wrong. There was a quiet in the air that simply should not be after the birthing of a baby. Out of all the babes she had helped deliver herself, almost each and every one of them had screamed themselves scarlet when they had escaped into the world. It was rare, but not too rare, that there were some who were born dead, taken before their time by the gods or by some cruelty of fate. When they were delivered dead, they had a certain eerie silence to them as though Death stood in the shadows of the room. Rin's own baby had that unnerving silence that landed on her heart as a crushing blow.

Kagome bent down without a word, her eyes on the baby at all times. She turned it in her arms, and landed a thudding smack right between its shoulders. They waited in anxious silence, Sesshomaru's fist clenching in. When the room remained deathly silent, Kagome repeated her action again and again, allowing a few short seconds to go by before she smacked it another time. Rin was shaking and aching everywhere, however, despite her pain, all she could focus on was the baby's patch of brown hair.

Suddenly, the baby made a guttural noise from the back of its throat and a flow of liquid spewed out of its mouth. Then it began to cry.

"It's a girl," Kagome announced, sounding strained but happy.

She had tanned skin and hair as dark brown and thick as her mother's, one blood-red stripe on each side of her face and bright ember eyes. Upon closer inspection, Sesshomaru was pleased to see two perfectly pointed ears hiding beneath her dark thatch of hair.

A perfect mixture of demon and human.

It was his child.

His suspicions that it was Kohaku's offspring faded. He allowed himself a second, one mere moment, to marvel at the tiny, squirming creature in her arms. Why had Rin not given up the child? Why had she kept it? There was a strange warmth flooding inside him while he struggled to understand the inner workings of this complex young woman.

After Kagome had fast cleaned it with a cloth and water, Rin could not reach for her child fast enough. With her daughter cradled against her breast, she could feel the baby's breathing and the heat of her small body. Rin could now know with all her being that the baby was alive, real, and the most perfect thing she had set her eyes upon in her life. Though only a few minutes old, her daughter watched her with an odd intelligence that she had seen on Sesshomaru and his brother. Rin looked at her baby as she cooed, immediately knowing what she should be named.

Before Rin could speak to Sesshomaru and tell him the wonderful, perfect name on her lips, his head swivelled around contemplatively, listening to the air. As swift as a breath, Bakusaiga was in his hand.

"He is here," he announced and the three words spoke of the calamity outside.

Sounds of sword-fighting and incantations being muttered floated into the isolated room. Something crashed against the side of the house, splintered the wood and ripped a hole as wide as a body. A person groaned, though the three could not decipher who it was, and then came the sound of footsteps scraping on rock. Meiko was nowhere to be found.

"We have to get Rin and the baby out of here!" Kagome screeched at Sesshomaru, all intention of being quiet and composed gone. This was no time to be composed. She spun around to the girl. "Rin, you're going to have to stand." She did not ask if she could stand, but simply stated that she must stand. "No, no. Hold onto your baby. Here, take my sash…"

Somehow she stood. Somehow she found the strength to move. As Kagome wrapped the baby girl in the sash, carefully, as if she were her own, Rin leaned her weight on Sesshomaru and he almost shuddered at how small she seemed to be.

"Why have these demons attacked you?" he asked.

Kagome glanced up from her tying and said, "They're led by a demon called Ishoyuki. He's after Rin."

Suddenly what the old woman had said earlier that day made a vague sense to him: Ishoyuki has held off his followers, waiting for this moment. He will strike now. Still, he was at a loss as to why this demon would be demonstrating such force for a single human.

"For what purpose?"

"He eats half-demon children."

The words chilled his heart. He had heard stories of such demons that took human women as wives only to use them as food sources. Supposedly, the flesh of the offspring between a human and demon was so tantalizing, so delectable, that it drove a demon mad if they were to consume it. This demon would stop at nothing to have what it desired and Sesshomaru knew that something had to be done. Carrying her himself would not be wise. He was barely informed along the lines of human birth. He understood, though, that Rin would be damaged.

"I can run," she gasped in his ear.

A fast nod of his head was his affirmation. She would have to go on alone. He would join her when he could; for now, he would stand against Ishoyuki.

"Go," he told her.

She ignored Kagome's protests. She ignored the fear inside of her. She ignored everything.

Rin took off at a sprint and was surrounded by trees in a matter of moments. Moonlight was shining above yet she was bathed in the darkness of leaves and branches. She remembered once when she had lost Sesshomaru and Jaken in a snowstorm while they were in the mountains – she remembered the cold and the panic and blinding darkness of the storm. After she had spent an hour of puzzled wandering, Sesshomaru had found her, given her his fur, and berated her for getting lost.

She prayed that he would be here for her now.

When she stumbled once more on a fallen log, Rin cursed her humanity for the first time. She had been trapped in a similar situation only hours ago - it had felt like a lifetime. Kohaku had sent her away while he had taken a stand so she could flee for she was not strong enough to fight. As far as she could push her memory, she had not wanted to be anything more than human. Jaken described her as he did all mortals: weak, emotional, flawed. Her humanity had practically defined her. Now she wished painfully that she were a demon, strong and fast.

Her thoughts were then with the village and the people who had befriended her. She pictured each of them - Kohaku, Miroku, Sango, Kagome, Inuyasha – and prayed that they would survive. She had lost so much in her life that she could not afford to lose them. They were not only friends or guardians, they had become her family. Rin wished for them to be safe. She hoped the gods' wing of blessing extended over them.

Something reached out and grabbed her, knocking her over, and she landed hard against the ground on her back. Her head spun with the collision, the jolt punching the air from her lungs. Rin sat up, her hand on her newborn baby, and froze.

In front of her stood the demon Ishoyuki.

He was indeed beautiful – perhaps more so than Sesshomaru. His face was strong and regal, his skin porcelain white. Golden hair as bright as sunlight floated airily around his face, gentle and lovely, and Rin could almost reason why a woman would marry such a man. He had a power about him that made her thoughts hazy and entreated her feet to go to him.

His eyes, however, were cruel and hard, with no more warmth or soul to them than two shards of blue glass. There was no smile on his face but a long scowl across his perfected lips.

When he spoke, his voice was sharp and precise: "I have found you at last."

Rin's scream was so terrified, so heartbroken, that it caused Ishoyuki to take an unwilling step back. He then shook his head and leapt out at her, his hands wrapping around her arms.

"CEASE THIS AT ONCE!" he bellowed, shaking her until she could no longer think and her eyes glazed.

"No," she said shakily. Tears dripped from her eyes onto her daughter's hair. "No, please. Please don't hurt my baby. I beg of you. I will give you my life, but please don't harm her."

"I see my spells do not work on you." A smile worked up his face despite his words, the grin crazed and wicked. "No matter. You will become my wife and you will feed my hunger for centuries!"

A ferocious snarl broke out into the night, a giant paw swatting Ishoyuki aside as though he were a rag doll. Sesshomaru's human-like form had vanished and in its place stood a towering dog demon missing its left front leg, his lips curling up viciously in a growl. Ishoyuki's handsome exterior had also melted away, showing not his beautiful face, but a portly one rimmed with ugly green scales. His mouth opened to reveal thousands of fangs as sharp as knives and when he smiled, it stretched from ear to ear.

Sesshomaru moved, barrelling headfirst into the other demon's massive body, his jaw snapping and biting at any limb or piece of flesh his teeth could sink into. Ishoyuki let out a frustrated growl. No matter where he struck, the dog demon was there to block his way to Rin.

While Sesshomaru grappled with Ishoyuki on the ground, Rin made to run but was met with the rocky resistance of a tall cliff. She was now trapped between two fighting demons and panic choked at her insides. Ensnared, she pressed her back against the mountainside, a rock jutting into her shoulder as she watched the struggle unfold in front of her. Sesshomaru was wielding Bakusaiga, now once more clothed in his human form, striking out in blinding, cutting movements. Ishoyuki deflected each strike and managed to steal the sword when a blast of red demonic energy caused Sesshomaru to drop it.

That was when Ishoyuki heaved the sword heavily and drew its tip across the demon lord's skin. He managed to evade the strike a little, but Ishoyuki had possessed the element of surprise and had made a clean cut that clearly hit him. The blade slid into his side. Ishoyuki pulled it out slowly, the other demon's flesh making a sucking sound as the blade slipped out. An alarming amount of blood was on his face but it was not his own.

Sesshomaru knocked the sword from Ishoyuki's hand, flinching with even that simple action. A dark pool of red began spreading across his side, staining his white clothes with his blood. The red pooled down his leg to soak his shoes and streams of it, mixed with rain, dripped from Bakusaiga to the ground. Rin was paralyzed by this sight and sunk down when her knees went weak.

Despite his wound, Sesshomaru dived for the sword that had fallen in the tussle. Ishoyuki saw it at the same time as he did and realized what he had planned. They stared at each other in an electrical, tense silence, both either too injured or too stunned to make the first move. Sesshomaru took the opportunity to reach for the sword, stretching and crawling to finally get to it. His clawed fingers just closed around the hilt as Ishoyuki leapt forward. He jumped on the dog demon and they began their own fight, but unlike the last attack, where their goals had been to maim, they were aiming for the only weapon they possessed: Bakusaiga.

After a few minutes of trying to twist him off, Ishoyuki grew tired of this tug-of-war. He saw his chance, a break in the other's defences, and he swung his arm and cracked the dog demon across the jaw with his fist, a powerful red glow burning from his fingertips. Grunting in pain, Sesshomaru landed on the ground with a definite thud. Bakusaiga careened to a stop many feet from his reach and, to Rin's horror, he did not move to pick it up.

Rin got to her feet, gasping for air she could not seem to find, and lunged for the fallen sword. Long fingers gripped her arm like death and she spun around. Ishoyuki wrenched Bakusaiga out of her grip and tossed it far over his shoulder. His face loomed close to her and he smiled triumphantly, his teeth gleaming in the moonlight.

Thwack.

Ishoyuki stared at his stomach, looking blankly at the purifying arrow sticking grotesquely out of him. He was confused as to where it had come from. The girl? No, no. She was too obviously human – she was no priestess. Besides, she was holding that child so close, she did not have the hands to wield a bow. The dog demon? No. Not him, either. He was still reeling from the wound on his side. So where had it come from?

It was that moment, that second of bewildered hesitation, which wrote out his fate.

Rin reached upward, grabbing the shaft of the arrow, and yanked it down with all her might, splitting Ishoyuki's giant stomach open. From the cut spewed, not blood, but dozens of glowing white circles that floated sluggishly through the air. Then, in a blink, they morphed into little creatures with stick arms and legs, bulging eyes and stringy, greasy hair. From their mouths dripped a brackish liquid, spewing without end, as they began crawling around the demon's feet.

A giant tear split the ground in two and a sucking wind pulled in leaves, dead grass, and an unsuspecting mouse running by. Rin's scream was lost in the air as she wiggled backward as fast as she could, the fear of having herself and her child sucked into the crack urging her on. She cried and crawled, tears streaming down her face from the pain, and still she relentlessly went on.

Something then slid around her waist and tugged her backward, her dry throat only allowing her to squeak in protest as she fell. Her cheek brushed against something soft, a thing so white and pure it looked like snow. Through the confusion, she knew exactly who held her.

Somehow, Sesshomaru had dragged himself over to a tree and had tied his body to it with his sash, and so his one arm was free to catch up Rin and their child protectively to his chest. He could feel the pull of the tear in the earth and the sash strained against him. It bit mercilessly into the wound in his side but he pushed back his agony and simply tightened his grip around Rin's shoulders.

They both looked back to the scene in front of them, no longer a part of the flow of events, but observers. Rin's eyes burned and her body protested in pain, and yet she could not look away. She watched, dazed, as the sickly creatures fell one by one down the crack, their bodies partially moulding together so that they still held some of their grotesque forms. Their ghostly hands stretched towards Ishoyuki, their thin fingers wrapping around his ankles and wrists, pulling him in.

"Come with us," they called in eerie, scratching voices. "Come with us, Father."

Rin looked then to Ishoyuki, and found in his eyes not the bloodlust he once had, but black pits of stagnant, vicious fear. He struck out blindly at whatever he could see, but he was challenging powers far stronger than his own. His fists passed through the creatures and his kicks struck air.

He sank down further still.

"Help me!" he called out, thrashing around in the grips of the dead children. From the edge of the forest his eyes met the old, wise ones of his wife, and a glimmer of desperate hope sprung into his face. Reaching out his hand, Ishoyuki shouted, "My love, save me!"

She did not listen to his pleas. Though she stood so close to the crack, the wind did not pull her in, but looked to be no more than a gentle breeze that shifted her grey hair. For a moment, in Rin's eyes, Meiko's old form seemed to fade and she became a young, raven-haired beauty with soulful deep green eyes. The years had melted from her face, as well as the strife and hardships, and she was once more an innocent fifteen-year-old young woman.

And then Rin blinked, and the image was gone.

Meiko regarded Ishoyuki with the level certainty of an executioner: without feeling and without compassion. "Your journey is over. You will be hungry no longer." And then, quietly, she added, "My love."

As the words fell from her lips, the hope in Ishoyuki's eyes died. Rage grew in its place and he tried to lunge forward, however the ghostly creatures wrapped their arms around his chest and his legs, preventing him from moving. Yanking and coaxing in their chilling, childlike voices, a fiery heat sprung from the pit and loud moaning and ungodly cries could be heard from the very darkest depths. With a single sickening jerk, the demon sunk down into the fires, the crack healing the earth shut, and the last of Ishoyuki to be heard was his one hollow, helpless scream.

The child in Rin's arms ceased her crying instantly and the world around them fell silent. No bird sang, no animal moved, and the forest held its breath. Slowly and wincing, Sesshomaru let go of Rin in order to untie himself from the tree that had saved their lives. Above them, on a ledge no one had noticed until that moment, Inuyasha leapt down, Kagome in his arms. He breathed a long sigh of relief. Miroku, Kohaku, and Sango rushed out from the protection of a boulder, Kohaku limping, and they froze in the clearing.

They all exchanged uncertain looks, glancing at the area where there had been a tear in the dirt only a moment ago. They had followed Sesshomaru in hopes of being of some help, but had drawn back for cover so as not to be pulled into the pit themselves.

"Is it…?" Inuyasha began, then fell short. Kagome's hand slid into his and the four parents sighed tiredly but their faces glowed with delight knowing that their children would be able to return to them.

"It is over," Meiko whispered, looking to the sky above her.

From across the way, Sesshomaru stared down at the human woman at his side. He reached for her and Rin held onto him and their child as though they were her life.

(Note: I'm perfectly aware that Sesshomaru owns two swords, not just one, but Tenseiga is kinda useless in a giant fight like this, so it made more sense to write about Bakusaiga.)

The epilogue is coming up, people. Keep your eyeballs open for it, because it's sort of important even if it's an epilogue.