First submitted to IB4Y.2. Won second place.
For the past three days, Inuyasha had been sneaking off to visit Kikyou. Kagome's faith in him was taking blow after serious blow.
Images had seeped in through her half-lidded eyes as she had pretended to be asleep – Asuka and Kochou coming for Inuyasha; his running off without a backward glance; his return at the crack of dawn with a look of guilt upon his face.
She did not want to know if they had been intimate or if it was even possible to make love to a clay zombie. The act of betrayal lay in the abandonment itself. All her senses revolted against his voice and touch.
That day they were travelling through the woods when she caught sight of the familiar whirlwind hurtling in their direction. Fierce, malicious pleasure soared through her heart as she rose to greet Inuyasha's rival in love.
'Can't I have them both?'
Words heard long ago echoed inside her raging mind.
'Exactly, Inuyasha, no reason why I can't have both of you.'
Revenge was sweet.
'Kagome-chan, you are playing with fire.'
Perhaps, but that fire was nothing compared to the boiling inferno, which was blazing and twisting night and day inside her scorned and trampled heart. It had become a black hole now – love collapsed upon itself.
Casting a satisfied look at her hanyou's miserable face, she willingly submitted to Kouga's waiting embrace.
A burnt child dreads fire – but in her case, the opposite was true. She had been burnt into asbestos.