One Hundred and One Nights

Story Thirty-Three- The Dreary Nights, Part I

A/N
This chapter has a few minor suggestive themes. They will be marked with ST if you want to skip.

"Come now, no pouting, you kill people for a living," His wife chided, smacking him on the shoulder with her fan. For such a small woman, her arm was deceptively strong. His glare went unseen as she graced the gathered noble-born. A few placed chaste kissed on her painted cheeks but more chose to glance at her once, as if she were some piece of clothing they would rather not see. When she moved from the herd of mewling men and women, she laced their arms and walked with him as he made his rounds.

"I do not pout," He pointed out, his chin tilting up to give off the full display of his chiseled jaw. She gave a very unladylike snort and hid it wonderfully behind her fan. A single raised eyebrow was all she received as they mingled with a pack of tittering women Kagome recognized easily as concubines. She was only mildly surprised when a lovely woman with rich dark hair and onyx eyes locked her gaze with Sesshomaru. A favorite than.

She was concerned at the sick feeling swirling in her gut and politely untangled their arms. She watched the other women bow at her retreat but the woman just smirked, the confident tilt to her full lips like a splash of water on Kagome's good mood. Her beguiling husband watched her leave and took note of the tightening of her posture.

Kagome blended beautifully into the party-scape and it was only late into the evening when he excused herself for some fresh air. Her mind was so sluggish she failed to notice the footsteps that trailed her to the closest private balcony that happened to be in her room. She threw open the doors and walked to the windows, throwing them open too.

Her fingers hitched on the cords keeping her strapped into the gown and when the laces finally came unraveled, she let out a sigh of relief. The chill of the night danced pleasantly across the exposed curve of her spine. When the brush of fingers joined it, she hissed in outrage and swung her fist around, nailing her visiter in the nose. The sickening crunch of cartilage rang out and Kagome watched with wide eyes as her husband stumbled back, blood leaking into his palm.

"Aptal!" She cursed, grabbing her trembling stomach and placing a shaking hand on her forehead. She hissed a few more choice words before thrusting a rag into his hands and smacking him across the head. He growled at her but her rage was overshadowing her self-preservation instincts at that moment. "I have been shaken since the incident with the King, what in the gods name could have convinced you your stunt was a rational idea?"

"Do not reprimand me, girl," He growled, baring his teeth in a mild display of authority. Kagome hissed back at him, her teeth a bright flash of white in the darkness of their unlit chambers. He moved quicker than she had thought possible.

His talons grasped her neck and he shoved her backwards, her bare spine hitting the carved pole supporting the canopy to their bed. Her breath was coming in shorter and shorter spurts. She pulled at his fingers but they were dug into skin so hard, her blood trickled down his fingers, staining his pristine robe sleeve crimson. His still bleeding nose only made him look all the more sinister in the moonlight.

"You are nothing more than a passing whim on which I am splurging. Do not overstep your bounds," His voice was nothing more than a sibilant whisper, his guttural tone making his words twist into a living things that seems to choke her more.

Kagome huffed in anger, he raised her a little higher and her heels tumbled off her feet. She could feel the rivulets of blood pooling in the hollow of her throat, the clenching of her lungs as they struggled for breath. Her choked gasps the only sound besides the muffled music radiating from the ballroom.

She might die here. In the hands of this monster of a man with sharpened nails and rage in his eyes. Her back arched against the poll and she found no traction, her feet slipping on the polished wood. Her vision was going blurry and her voice failed her, her mouth trying to form words but only managing to flap as if their were gills on a fish.

Her knee rammed into his chest and he dropped her with grunt. She growled, low in her throat. He was taken back by the sound, so accustomed to hear it from a man in the throws of death, never did he expect to listen to it be produced from the mouth of his wife in their bed. She came at him like the lioness she was, quickly and with more speed than she looked to posses.

Her fighting style was efficient and fast. Her fingers dug into is neck and he could feel the breath whoosh from his lungs. Her leg shot out, her dainty feet he had watched twirl effortlessly around on the dance floor, caught his heels and his feet came out from under him. With a deadly efficiency, her legs locked around his hips and her fingers, one on which his crest was placed in her marriage band, pressed into his throat. It was not a move he had expected of her.

The anger she showed, the rage, had told him she would be untrained at the acts of war, that she was unexperienced and thus not a threat to him. As her nails drew blood from the soft skin of his neck, he wondered how he could ever have been so wrong. The fire in her eyes was that of battle.

"You dare lay a hand on me?!" He watched the flames shine in her eyes. Her hair had slipped from its intricate braid at the nape of her neck. It spilled around her face and for some idiotic reason, one of her past stories swam to the forefront of his mind. One about an ugly witch that had cast a curse on her suitor who wished for only beauty. He vaguely wondered if Kagome had such abilities. "You seem to forget your place, milord."

She jeered, the thick contempt layered in her voice as heavy as the rich syrup she liked. Blood splattered his robes as the small streams from her neck fell onto his clothes. With her teeth bared, her hair wild, and her dress slipping off, he could see how she might be called a witch.

"You needed reprimanding," He let his fingers claw at the hardwood, his nails leaving deep grooves in the floor as her grip tightens. The flimsy excuse held no water between the tight press of their bodies. "You wish for me to coddle you? You are even more childish than I first thought."

"I need none of your affection. You seem so assured that you can lead your people that you have no idea the magnitude the rebellion against you has spread!" She snarks at him, her snarls sounding less and less human. "I wish to keep innocent women safe and you want information. Only I can give that to you. Your pathetic spies don't even know!"

"You lie," He could feel the churning in his gut, the kernel of doubt that was building every time he saw the burning hatred in her eyes. She had no reason to lie, her life was assuredly over after attacking the Lord like that. He nodded once and she pressed into his neck for a second, a warning, before standing.

She fastened her dress with her molten gaze locked on his as she did so. Her gait was off kilter as a result of their fight but when she wound a scarf around her head and neck to hide the bleeding, he thought over the way she so easily handled her eminent death.

After he changed and they rejoined the party, Kagome was applauded for her fashion sense and he was the nights entertainment seeing as in the eyes of others, he had changed at his wife's urging. He had no interest in telling them the truth.

When he caught the eyes of a concubine, her sultry smile and suggestive bared hips made him raise an eyebrow. She ran her eyes across his person and a smirk curved his lips. He was glancing around trying to see if anyone had noticed when he caught Kagome. Her body was facing the concubine, her posture too ridged to be comfortable. The cruel twist to his mouth was back and with a gesture to the woman eyeing him from across the room, she followed his path.

"My love," He gestured away from the gaggle of girls she had surrounded herself with. Her polite smile was back and she hid her twitching upper lip behind her fan. "You will need to find other sleeping arrangements."

"Excuse me?" She smiled and nodded at a passing dignitary. He did the same and caught the sly gaze of the concubine, her black hair and thick paints making her look almost ethereal. She sipped delicately at the clay cup in her hands. Kagome followed his gaze and the fury he expected was only a sharp anger. The cool frustration that was shown on her face was not nearly as satisfying as he had hoped. "I see."

"Do not pout," He mimicked, his smooth voice taking the words she had said as a farce became twisted in his mouth. At the hardening of her already prominent features he bowed close to her ear. "Now everyone will now you can not even do something as simple as pleasing your Lord."

"Take the concubine to bed, Milord," She replied coyly, her whole demeanor changing after her anger passed. She leaned in close, her deep voice making his own temper spark to life. "But know this, when the rebels and the betrayed come for your throne, they might just take your head too."

Her mouth was pinned up, every hair in place and as put together as every lady was thought to be. She grabbed two glasses of some kind of liquor and strutted over to a man in a rich navy robe. He watched her hand him the glass and when the man followed Kagome's finger his way, the man toasted his glass in his direction before lacing their arms and making their way into the bowels of his palace.

With renewed ferocity, he grabbed the concubine by the arm and made his way to his room, hoping he could eradicate the smell of Kagome from his sheets.

()()()()

"I was ignorant of the Lord's new gifts to the visiting kings," The man muttered, the alcohol was making quick work of his mind and body. When he closed the door to his room and reached for her dress fastenings she recoiled and cursed herself. She was pretending to be a prostitute and she had to act as one until her additives to his drink began their effects.

"Yes...the King wishes all in his care to be as relaxed and at home as possible but you must understand that we must keep this between us, the others might become fidgety?" She asked, moving a few steps back until her thighs bumped the bed frame. He leaned over, his breath a mix of drugs and alcohol. He preened at her dress.

"He dresses his whores well?" His fingers trailed the subtle curve of her waist and she just forced her smile to remain unwavering. It slipped off her face the second his eyes went cloudy and his body sagged backwards. She reached a strong arm out and grabbed the front of his tunic to stop the fall of his body. With a shove, the man tumbled into a pile on his bed.

She looked at him with pity.

"Your Lord is a pathetic man," She hissed, pulling his shoes off and tugging the buttons from his shirt. He would have to think they did more than nothing. With an angry ripping, his pants came away and she curled her lip in distaste. "I sure hope not all men are as pathetic as you."

Her eyes watered and she yanked her soft under gown up to her face to dab at the tears that were threatening to ruin her makeup. She spotted a glass of strong liquor placed inside a small gift basket. With nimble fingers she pulled the cork off and poured herself a drink. She threw a little on the man before giving in and taking the whole bottle over to the bed. She leaned back and took a swig.

"You know, I only wanted to get revenge for those girls. So many girls," She went quiet, noting the line of drool pooling on the expensive linens. She huffed in annoyance and took another drink. The harsh burning at the back of her throat filled her stomach with the heat of false courage. Another glance at the man and she could almost pretend he was listening to her. She thought maybe she needed that. "How can so many people look at him as if he is a god? He is more mortal than many I've met. Why did such a monster of a man have such a clean heart?"

Another glare at the man.

"I will never even get the chance to find love. If I try hard, I can almost be bitter about that," She laughed and it came out more sharp than she had hoped. The tender feeling of warmth was spreading throughout her body and she could almost believe that this was like her past birthdays where her sister was going to sneak into her bedroom in the early morning hours and they would split a fanciful bottle of wine she had stolen from a room similar to this. "I know I could find it in my heart to love him and I think that is what I fear most."

The drunken snores were the only sound that accompanied her thoughts.

"He finds me stupid and dull. I can see it in his eyes every time he looks at me," Her fingers turn white from the pressure on the bottle and she grunts. "I find myself so furious at my emotions because I somehow care about him, even if it is not in the way he would like. You have no idea what I'm saying and may I inform you, it is wonderfully refreshing."

Another swig and an added snore.

"I fear that once my plan is set in motion, neither of us will ever rise from our bed," Her words echoed around the room along with the swish of liquid in the bottle. Her escort fell silent, as if even in his state, he could understand the death and blood such words meant. "He seems to think that all women are lost to the fire but he fails to forget that few are born from it as well."

The door opened on well oiled hinges and she slipped out of the room with ease, her heels clasped in one hand. The wood clanked together as she walked, her bare feet making slapping noises as it connected with the floor. Every window she passed only heightened the fact that she had not said her story tonight. She idly wondered if he would have her hanged but promptly stopped that train of thought. She still had work to do.

She slipped into Rin's room with little noise but the small girl woke up anyway.

"May I sleep with you tonight?" Kagome asked, placing her shoes at the foot of the bed and crawling up the mattress before the girl could respond. The child nodded sleepily and raised the covers up as high as her little arms could reach and Kagome slipped under them, the warmth of the girl's body along with the liquor lured her to sleep.

()()()

ST

The woman currently occupying is bed was neither interesting nor appealing to him. She lacked the fire she had shown on the ballroom floor and he found her words unappealing and vulgar. After she finished, he stood and promptly shoved her out the door. The scoff of outrage from the half dressed woman was not as funny as if could have been if he would have had someone to share it with. Namely a someone whom he had just asked to make herself scarce.

Even the books held no appeal if not read with her voice. He could feel the anger at her climb. She was not at fault here but he could not help the rise of fury at the thought of her warming another's bed.

He sat in his chair and waited for her to come to him. Surly she would never lower herself to the level at which the escort she took was at. It was only a mater of time before she came to him, begging for a second chance. He hoped.

It was only when the sun started to rise did he realize she was not returning. He rose from his chair, his sore muscles tight from the rigid position he had maintained throughout the night to strip the bed of their sheets and toss them into a pile at the door.

They no longer smelled like Kagome.

A/N
This is a darker story, a thousand girls had to die to get here. Please keep that in mind as the story progresses.