Deidcated to Queenie, as usual, and TheLostPrincessOfTheEast, who's response to my PM made me laugh. Nice try, Sara!
Kagome looked down on the infant in her arms with a growing sense of tenderness and awe.
"You seem to have a way with him." Arashi murmured. The child she was holding had quieted almost completely, and his little amber eyes were closing slowly, as though they were too heavy for him to hold open. Kagome melted at the compliment. Hana turned green with envy.
"I guess he likes me. I certainly like him." She whispered, careful not to wake the now-snoozing baby.
They went to put Sesshoumaru down, but he started awake and began kicking up a racket as soon as Kagome made to put him down, so she kept hold of him, rocking and murmuring calming gibberish until he fell back to sleep. When she finally had to put him down, Arashi looked at her with not a small amount of respect.
"That was very well handled of you. Sesshoumaru usually can't stand anyone other than myself, or Hana, his nanny. Even his own mother, he dislikes."
"Where is she? I mean, not to be rude, feel free to refuse to answer if I'm being nosy." Kagome blushed at the question that slipped past her guard.
"We had a contract that she would provide me with a child, and once she did, we seperated. Neither of us loved the other, and she was too scheming and power-hungry for my tastes. She gladly left us both as soon as my little warrior was born, and I've been looking after him ever since." He looked glad to be rid of her, to be honest. "She dodn't approve of my political stance, and only wanted an opportunity to have a political link to my house, through being the mother of my heir. Once she found Sesshoumaru didn't adore her, and wouldn't be bent to her will even as an infant, she left without a second glance." He sighed deeply. "While I'm glad she isn't around, I do regret Sesshoumaru not having a mother, you know? It can be hard, to raise an infant all by yourself. Well, I have help from Hana, but she isn't the same, you know? There's nobody else to offer input into how he's raised. Hana is a wonderful nanny, but every time I enter it's always 'yes, my lord, no, my lord, how may I serve you, my lord?', and she isn't a mother to my son."
Kagome nodded sympathetically. Her own father had left when she was six, and Souta was only still an infant, so she knew from watching her mother that the lack of a partner could be the hardest thing about raising a child by yourself. Her mother had never had any problems with the practical aspects of raising children, but had often felt lonely, for lack of a better term. Perhaps 'alone' would cover it more comprehensively. Having someone to turn to to say how proud you were, or someboddy to listen when you needed to talk.
She suddenly wished she could be that for Arashi.