XI.
Of Woman, And Her Charge
For the first few days, Sesshomaru allowed Kagome to do what she had been doing before - resting, sleeping - more than he had ever seen anyone, human or youkai, sleep; she came downstairs for mealtimes with Rin, bathed in the basement springs...and she avoided him like the plague. He would not have made the comparison himself; he had never encountered human sickness, was barely aware of such possibilities. What he was aware of was her distance, even when she was undeniably close; what he was aware of was the continuous tug of her presence, an internal tug that told him of her well-being, her solitary anxiety, and the occasional spark and flutter when he was close to her, not only in his thoughts, but in flesh.
The fifth day after he had changed her, he came down the stairs intentionally earlier than was his custom, and interrupted her evening meal with Rin.
The girl only looked up at him and smiled a milky smile; he smelled honey in her cup, dairy thickness. Beside her, Kagome was looking down at a bowl of rice and a plate of sliced fruit, her face wrinkled in something like confusion, and then...something else, as her eyes turned towards him. He was more confused, however, than she was. What...was she eating? Rin's food? Why would she do that?
"Kagome. You - "
"Sesshomaru-sama, Kagome-sama is not eating!"
His eyes widening just the tiniest bit, Sesshomaru turned so that instead of Kagome, his focus was on Rin. It was the first time in his memory she had interrupted him - not that he truly minded, but it was more than unexpected. He saw her freeze under his eyes, her mouth still partly open, and spoke softly, knew there was no need to chide.
"Rin."
She folded into herself like a crushed origami figure, and, seeing that, he raised an eyebrow. She had given him useful information, and truly - he did not want her cowering in fear of his every word.
"Rin is sorry, Sesshomaru-sama -"
She stood and took a step towards him, bowed. Sesshomaru noted Kagome's attention on them, her features thoughtful as she took in this interaction.
"Rin, I have told you to speak correctly."
She stiffened and stood straighter; he would not have believed it possible. He felt a faint twinge of amusement.
"I am sorry, Sesshomaru-sama-"
He nodded once.
"Better. But you do not need to apologize, Rin. It is good for you to tell me this."
As easily as that, her anxious expression faded and was replaced by a beaming grin.
"Are you finished, Rin?"
She nodded.
"Yes, Sesshomaru-sama."
"Then go now. I will send Kagome to you tomorrow; she and I have things to do tonight."
Rin skipped away happily, said her goodbye to Kagome, just a word over her shoulder as she was passing through the doors of the Hall. Sesshomaru stood still where he was, looking at Kagome; there was tension in her, and that was understandable, but there was also...
He allowed himself a smile and was rewarded with her shudder as she turned to look at him.
"Kagome."
"Sesshomaru -"
Her voice was hesitant.
"Why don't you eat?"
He did not bother to ask if it was true; Rin would not, could not lie to him. He saw defiance, deferral, and then defeat cross her face, and she shrugged, stood and brushed out the wrinkles in her robe.
"I don't know. I just...can't. I've been trying, so Rin wouldn't worry...she seemed so upset, at first, and then..."
"She knows better than you do, to tell me. Kagome - "
There was an odd inflection in his voice.
"You are youkai now. You cannot eat human food."
She looked at him, wide-eyed, and took an unsteady, rattling breath.
"Human - food - "
"Yes. These - plants. They will not sustain you, Kagome, will do nothing to sate your hunger."
He saw her swallow, her eyes shifting.
"But - Sesshomaru, Shippou always ate whatever I was having, he even insisted on it. And Inu - Inuyasha - "
She tried and failed to keep the tremble out of her voice. Why was it so hard, just to say his name? Sesshomaru's voice gained a sharpness she had not heard there since she had come to this place, since she had begun to accept the strangeness that was - him.
"Inuyasha is half-breed, half human. Shippou - that is your kit?"
"My - yes. I suppose he's mine."
"Kitsune...they are not like Inu in all ways. Some ways, yes; but even if he eats human food you must have recognized certain other...hungers in him."
"Well - "
She had never said anything to anyone - of the time she had gone to the river, seen Inuyasha, showing Shippou how to wash out the bloody carcass of his latest kill. What had it been? She didn't remember. But she remembered the stains on their faces, the bloody meat in their hands - Shippou's smile. It had reminded her that Shippou was youkai; that despite how sweet and childlike he was, he was not human. And Inuyasha -
No. Stop. Don't -
Her thoughts cut themselves off, looped around and returned to Sesshomaru's question.
"Well - yes - but - "
"No, Kagome. If you do not eat, if you have no blood, no flesh, you will die. Youkai are not like humans."
Her eyes widened, dilated, that beautiful golden color almost washed out in the expansion of her pupils.
Youkai are not like humans.
She blinked.
I'm not human. Not -
Swallowed.
Youkai are not like humans. Not like - I'm not - like -
She took a deep breath, and found that suddenly Sesshomaru was in front of her, his eyes scanning her face, his fingers, delicate, on her cheeks.
I am - not – human!
"Sesshomaru - "
Kagome stopped herself from speaking as she heard her voice begin to break, but he waited, crouched in front of her, one hand on her face. There was something - a question? - in his face, and she felt his fingers on her lips then, very faint, impossibly gentle.
In a way that she knew she would never be able to explain, she was...comforted.
By Sesshomaru.
Suddenly, instead of crying, she wanted to laugh.
"Sesshomaru, will you - teach me?"
There was definitely a question in his expression now.
"Teach you?"
There was more than a little of his remembered coldness in the words, but she knew, knew, that it was only a facade; that beneath the ice, he was all heat. The knowing broke part of his power over her. Confidently, she pushed forward. He had said it, hadn't he?
"Yes. To be - youkai."
He was silent, but he also had not moved. She was...encouraged.
"I am yours, you said. Who else...is there for me to ask?"
For a moment, he looked startled.
"You do not know. You do not know any of what it means. How do I -"
It sounded almost like he was talking to himself. He stood slowly; his eyes moved suddenly from her face, to her plate, and back to her face. Abruptly, he pulled her up from her seat and down the hall towards the great door.
"Sesshomaru, where are you taking me?"
"Hunting. You have never killed your own food, have you?"
"No, Inuyasha or Sango -"
"I did not think so."
He stopped just outside the door, looked down at her critically.
"However -"
So quickly, so easily that she didn't even know what he was doing, Sesshomaru stripped off three layers of Kagome's robes.
"Wha - outside?"
He stared at her oddly for a long moment, and she flushed.
"I thought - we were - hunting..."
As she finished speaking, what she must have been thinking clicked in Sesshomaru's thoughts.
"Ah - "
So that she could see it, because only she could see it, he smiled; before she knew it, her hands were reaching up for him, and he was untying another robe...
He wrapped it more tightly around her, tied it more tightly, and stepped away, pulling on her again, leading her through the gate.
"Did you think I would bring you into the forest dressed that way, Kagome? Or is it that you were too distracted by - lust?"
He made the word come out coldly but she had seen desire in his face - she had felt it, his desire for her.
"It won't work. I know you - want me."
Her cheeks were heated, but the words were quite clear. She was not prepared for the casual caress of his eyes; she felt suddenly as if they were weighing her, those eyes, assessing her -
"Yes. Tonight, you will sleep with me, Kagome."
There had been protests forming, hovering on her lips, but the curve of his mouth, his emphasis on her name, destroyed them.
Kagome -
Kagome -
Kagome-
Kagome -
"Yes."
"Run with me now, Kagome."
She looked up at him, felt his fingers tugging at her hands, pulling her along, and she ran - and then realized, as if it was something she had always known, that she was not - not really running. Not really. She pressed her feet against the ground, and moved away, quicker, felt a...shift, a change come into the rhythm of her run, felt a flicker of memory, dark, blurry, flutter across her awareness. She had run faster than this...before.
When he was...chasing me.
And she saw that he had recognized this, too, that he was pulling her still, urging her, teasing her, challenging her with his eyes. Catch me, they said; so she did, every time he pulled away from her, until they were a twin pair of winds on the wide, grassy plains that crept up the side of the mountains. When he stopped, quickly, reaching out to touch her, she stopped beside him, stumbled a little but did not fall.
"Good. Now - quietly, look."
"I don't see - oh!"
She let out a soft exclamation, because even as she had been saying it, she had seen what he was pointing at; a rabbit, almost the same color as the grass. It was browsing warily, but not warily enough. Sesshomaru saw that she had noticed, and sat back, crossed his arms.
"You are lucky, Kagome. That took no effort at all; now - catch it."
Her head whipped around and he saw her eyes wide, her comprehension...vague.
"It is your prey, Kagome. Catch it."
She turned back, stared at the rabbit, felt her fingers twitch. She...wanted to catch it. A tiny voice in the back of her head yawned, waking louder than she had ever heard.
Hunt. Prey, kill. Feed.
There were no words, not really; it was a feeling, suddenly as familiar, as deep as hunger. Or - was it hunger?
I'm not human. Not human.
"Yes."
It seemed simple enough, his instruction. Catch it.
The rabbit was totally unaware of her existence. She did not step towards it, she was suddenly beside it, as if moving were an act of will, not separable from the thought. Her hands darted out, and pinned it. Her fingers contracted around the soft body, feeling the fur, downy, the rapid pulse against her thumb - one eye glimmered at her, wet, fearful -
"Kill it."
Her fingers twitched, but she- but she -
She didn't let go of the rabbit, but she couldn't kill it, either.
"I can't."
Sesshomaru took the ten steps necessary to stand beside her, and looked down at the tiny creature that was her prey. He did not...understand.
"Rin has expressed no such difficulties, those few times I have required her to fend for herself. What is it that disturbs you, Kagome?"
"It's...it's just so small, and - "
"Weak?""
She had expected scorn from him but there was a thoughtful set to his face.
"Yes. Weak. It's hard for me to kill a defenseless creature like this, Sesshomaru."
His head tilted slightly to the left.
"You want to eat...a predator? A wolf, maybe - "
There was a glint of sudden, humorous viciousness in his eyes that dissipated almost immediately.
"No! I - that wouldn't be much better, would it."
"You don't want - not - a human - "
"No!"
She heard him, heard him, let out a sigh, and then he sat in front of her, shifted his gaze between the rabbit pinned in her hand, and her face.
"I don't understand."
She laughed a little.
"You - you wouldn't, of course you wouldn't. And you're right, anyway, it's silly - if you were to kill it, and I ate it, it would be the same thing. It's still dying for me to live. It has to be that way, it's just, I don't have to - "
She paused, turned to face the sunset. The sun had vanished behind the mountains; they cast a purple shadow across her features. The wind was suddenly heavy, coming thick from the southwest.
"I smell - I smell -"
Blood. Mine! Blood -
Sesshomaru turned into the wind, scented it carefully. His face darkened with surprise. His brother was in that wind, and the scent of his brother's blood...and other blood. He turned back to Kagome, and his eyes opened wide, wider.
"Kagome!"
She was...gone.
"Sango, hey, Sango!"
The woman stooped to miss hitting her head on an overhanging tree branch, and came out of the edge of the forest with a trio of fat birds slung over one shoulder. She looked up and squinted into the sun at the boy running towards her.
"Hey, Shippou! What is the hurry for?"
The kit leaped an impressive chunk of the distance toward her and slid to a stop with a grin.
"Miroku and I have been watching Tetsusaiga for a while now. It keeps twitching…and it's a sword, so that's not really good, is it?"
She frowned, the amusement fading out of her expression. The lines of her forehead tightened, and she looked down at him seriously.
"What kind of twitching, Shippou?"
"Just…twitching. Sometimes it feels strange, and….pulses a little."
"Mmm…then I will go and see. I have some experience with demonic weapons, though not a sword as powerful as this one. That's all we need, a problem with Tetsusaiga now that Inuyasha is…gone."
Lost in thought, Sango was already half-running towards the village, and Shippou almost turned to follow. But the run out to find her, while not long, had been hot under the sun, and he flopped instead on his back and lay inhaling the sweet scent of summer grass – far from twitching swords.
Shippou sighed, stared up at the sky, late-autumn blue. He wondered sometimes if he would end up alone again; he had had no mother, and then Kagome had come...
Now he had no mother again, and even Inuyasha had gone. Kaede was old, old, old, and Miroku and Sango had plans for a life together somewhere, each in their secret selves. It was hard to be nine years old and wise, but life had just come at him that way, and there was nothing to be done about it now.
It the reaching tree-shadows, it was growing chilly now, but it was still bright. The sun worked slow magic on him, pressed his young senses into the sweet scented grass and the blue sky, and he felt his mind opening to encompass the great expanse above him, opening until he was flying with the clouds on adventures strange and mysterious. His father was with him in the clouds of his dream – he always was - and he learned secrets of the soul and sky in a dangerous doze.
Gradually the sun began to sink into the muddy horizon, setting the tinted leaves of the forest on fire, casting a smoky crimson haze across the red-and-yellow world of the day. In the forest, night was quickening faster in a few souls that reached for it with unquenchable thirst. A chill breeze with the scent of rain drove up quickly from the south, made the fallen leaves whirl across the ground and shook the grass to the roots. Wild things scampered back to their burrows, avoiding the scent of the hunt and worse.
Shippou woke in the chill, tasting change on the wind and the beginnings of a familiar scent.
He shook his doze from heavy limbs, and ventured onto the forest path, seeking the who of his what and rubbing his nose in confusion. It was Inuyasha's scent, but Inuyasha had been gone for weeks and weeks – there was no reason for him to come back now, Kagome had not returned. For reasons that he could not understand, he was angry, angry at Inuyasha for making Kagome leave. Kagome had been with him, and then she had been gone. That was all there was to the story, and so it must be his fault. He had decided that the first day, and had not approached Inuyasha because of that decision, but -
Abruptly he was running, running and crying and trying to find Inuyasha, trying to find him so he could hurt him, too – because he had been hurt. He ran into a pair of red-clad legs, and fell backwards, staring up, wide-eyed.
"I - know you."
Despite its flat tone, its dullness, that voice was instantly familiar. Shippou's tears dried up, his grief and anger tempered with surprise and then fear. There was something wrong with Inuyasha's face, with his scent- there was something wrong with Inuyasha's face -
The wrongness leached the anger from him.
"Inuyasha! I - I miss…I…miss…Kagome…"
Tears were welling up fresh again; there was a bawl in his voice, just waiting for an excuse, but the eyes above him were red and wide with suspended darkness.
"Ka - "
Shippou looked up through his tears, saw a brief, shining moment of clarity, a flash that lasted, in Inuyasha's face.
"Kagome -
There was a whisper, a step; behind him, Shippou felt someone standing, heard two words in a low voice he could not immediately identify.
"Inuyasha; remember."
There was suddenly a scent around him that made no sense because it filled the wind, and then vanished - it was - it was Kagome! But - but -
He whipped around, peering into the bushes, the trees, turned again to face Inuyasha and sucked in a deep breath.
"Ki - Kikyou - "
She ignored him, didn't even look at him, but Inuyasha was still staring at him. The flash of his former self was gone, replaced by the red madness, and the voice of the madness was a terrible thing to hear.
"Kagome? Kagome…"
It was an experiment in sound. Then:
"That name, that scent was light - I hate that scent! I hate it!"
The words were more than enough to daze Shippou, to make him angry. How would anyone ever explain to Kagome, if she were to hear, or find out -
"How…how could you hate Kagome, Inuyasha? How could you ever say that? I know you love her, even if you never admitted it! I know you - "
One clawed hand came from nowhere and struck the side of his head, sent him spinning, and he stumbled backwards, blinking with pain. Slowly, he began to back away, seeing the edge of the village so far away now, so far - angry with himself for his own anger, for falling asleep out here where he knew it was not safe – for not running with the first sight of those eyes.
Inuyasha was smiling, smiling so that all his teeth were showing, his fangs glinting sharply, cruelly, in the early darkness. Shippou's small sturdy courage ran out, and he turned and ran towards the edge of the forest, screaming at the top of his lungs. Inuyasha' ears flattened with the noise, but his smile did not change. He leapt straight up into the trees above him, and leaped noiselessly from branch to branch, hunting, waiting.
Behind him, on the ground, Kikyou stood staring up into the trees, her features pursed in annoyance. She had brought him this way on the off chance that the girl with her soul had returned here; she had not expected Inuyasha to be so distractible…
Shippou did not hear any pursuit, but it was not enough to assuage his terror. He ran out into the flood of darkness, felt a shudder of relief.
His left side exploded in agony that ripped him to the ground. The blood flow was swift and immediately weakening.
"Shippou! Shippou!"
On the edges of his blurred vision, he saw, quite suddenly, Sango, running, and felt the whoosh of air as Hiraikotsu flew by him, burying itself in the ground by his side. He heard a solid thunk, twice, and the boomerang shuddered, cracked alarmingly.
Arrows! Kikyou - Sango, run, Sango - run away -
Inuyasha jumped back, growling, his prey snatched away at the moment of the kill. His claws tightened in the earth, pulling up the rich smell of bloodied loam to dance in the air with the scent of fear and pain. Earth was a clean scent, a good scent to kill with.
"Inuyasha, I am sorry. I never wanted to see you like this again; I had hoped that it would not fall to one of us to…to do this."
He strode toward Sango, and she dove for Hiraikotsu, but the sight of her weapon, cracked, studded with a pair arrows, startled her so much that for one, infinitesimal moment, she was vulnerable. At the last moment, she felt her danger and turned, but it was not swift enough. She had her sword half out of its sheath, but Inuyasha caught his claws against the shining blade tight in her two hands. Her words died.
As she turned, her eyes took in the slowly approaching figure of Kikyou, easily recognizable even in the dark end of dusk.
When she was close enough to be easily heard, easily seen, Kikyou stopped and looked down at Sango's face.
"Tell me huntress, why you do not kill this hanyou?"
"I don't kill my friends!"
Kikyou smiled.
"Ah. And this kitsune, that is the same? How strange, that you, a Taijiya in an honorable tradition, should fall so low as to keep such company."
"Like you should talk!"
Kikyou's smile did not change.
"I should; I know the dangers of the company you seek. For my lack of discretion in life, the kami saw fit to curse me with undeath; I was not allowed the peaceful rest that I desired above all other things. The relaxation of my vigilance, the momentary disruption of my heart - ahh, how I have paid. And you, Taijiya - do you also wish to pay?"
Sango was frozen in the position where she had stopped, parrying the thrust of Inuyasha's claws with the half-drawn blade of her sword, feeling the steel bending under his strength. Her face grew hard.
"Is that your excuse, is that how you live with yourself?"
Sango allowed her words to drip with contempt. This unnatural woman -
She spun quickly, feeling the dry ground grate under the heel of her boot, and swung without stopping to aim, feeling flesh and then nothing. Inuyasha howled at the scent of his own blood, and raised his arm to lap at his parted flesh. The taste was soothing, flowing, restoring the focus of his mind's spinning splinters.
"Where is she? Tell me, woman, where is she?"
"Inuyasha!"
Sango's eyes flickered back and forth between them - Inuyasha, and Kikyou - Inuyasha...and Kikyou -
I knew it - I knew it! But without Tetsusaiga - without Kagome here -
Her stubborn faith, her belief that everything would be alright, flickered and died under the red glow of unleashed youki in Inuyasha's face.
She knew instinctively that Kagome's name, by itself, was not enough; if it had been, Shippou would not be bleeding in the grass. Out of the corner of her eye, she tried to watch him, but her view was mostly blocked by the angle of her stance and Hiraikotsu. If she hadn't thrown it in time -
The image of Shippou, dissolving into dust and a puff of miko light, sprinted across her thoughts.
"You! You - Kikyou! What are you doing? What is it you intend?"
"What do you think I intend, Taijiya? Tell me, where is the girl who possesses my soul and the jewel that is my charge?"
"Your soul? Your charge?"
Sango was vibrating with rage now; she held out her sword so that the bloody tip pointed directly at Kikyou.
"You died, and almost took Inuyasha with you fifty years ago, and that was not enough. You were brought back, given a chance to undo some of the pain you caused, and that was not enough! Your enemy, the one who murdered you, is dead - by the hand of your reincarnation, the hand of good girl - and not only was it not enough, but now you are going to seek her out, and do her harm?"
Her eyes flashed, turned to Inuyasha.
"And you - Inuyasha! What did you do to Kagome? What did you do to her, Inuyasha? Why did she leave?"
There were a thousand bloody thoughts playing runaround in her head; Shippou's silence and stillness behind her was all the proof she needed that despite appearances, the one who stood in front of her now was no longer Inuyasha. He had smacked Shippou around a thousand times, but he had never once hurt him, and now the smell of his blood was so strong even she could smell it.
"Kagome..."
There was blood in the word, dark, flowing blood. His eyes widened just a little, and she saw the infection in them, darker than when he had attacked her, as if something deep inside him were wrapped up in that word, the name of her friend, the one she had called sister in the privacy of her thoughts. This was the one - this was the one who had driven her away, and now it sounded like he wanted her back. For what, for what? For blood?
"Inuyasha!"
Disregarding Kikyou, the threat of the strung bow in the undead woman's hands, Sango took a step backwards, sword at the ready - and then another. In a moment she could feel Hiraikotsu against her fingers, the smooth demon-bone surface reassuring - and in a flash, she was feeling more than she wanted to feel of that smoothness, felt it pressed against her entire back, felt herself being pushed backwards. Inuyasha was over her, his nose at her wrists, her throat, in her hair.
"You - "
His breath was hot, metal-scented. She swallowed as he pressed closer to her, tried not to breathe, to turn her face away. She tried to remind herself that this was Inuyasha - Inuyasha - that he would never -
"Inuyasha, do you want that woman? How crude."
What -
Sango shook her head violently, tried to tear herself out of Inuyasha's grasp and failed. Hiraikotsu behind her would not let her move back; he had trapped her arms over her head, bent sideways; her sword hung almost limp in her fingers from the angle of her wrist, and try as she might she could not turn it forward.
"Kagome."
The word was confused; she felt his hand on her face, the claws digging in, turning her; blood slipped down her cheek and she winced. Warm, moist roughness dragged up her cheek, stung, rasping at the open scratches, and she struggled again, suddenly, sharply - his hands shook her, once, twice, so hard she felt her brain rattle in her skull. Suddenly she was dizzy; the world seemed to spin, and a few dry petals blew over her face in a wind she couldn't feel.
The hagi blossoms have fallen...the flowers...have fallen...
She looked up, saw red blossom across the moon and then realized that it was blood, her blood, slipping down her face, distorting her vision.
"Inuyasha! We have work to do, still. This woman, you can bring her with us. She will be helpful to us, if she is close to that girl. Perhaps it will be easier than I thought, retrieving her."
Sango felt a sharp pain at her temple, and slumped against her weapon. As her eyes closed and she fell forward into Inuyasha's grasp, she saw a dark trickle drip off her face and onto the grass, but it was invisible in the general darkness, in the stain of Shippou's life.
Shippou...
Her last, fading thought was one of guilt. Once again, she had failed, failed in her task, her responsibility. They were the last words Kagome had said to him - the very last thing she had heard her say.
"Sango, take care of Shippou - I have to do it now - Now! -"
And then, like now - the darkness. Then, like now, the world falling away...
A/N:Sorry for the wait; in apology, extra-long chapter! Something I suppose I should make clear, for story purposes: at this point, despite what the blood urge has driven them to do (I.e, the tasty lemon :D), neither Kagome or Sesshomaru is "in love" - maybe subject to some more tender thoughts, but not in love. It should be obvious, but I want to say it and make it so in case it wasn't obvious; Kagome still has to deal with Inuyasha, and what has happened between them( which still hasn't fully been revealed), and Sesshomaru has to overcome himself; he is not a happy puppy when he is forced to do things that he hasn't logically considered and decided for himself yet. I think a blood-matched mate taken under the influence of instinct sort of falls in that category…:D.
So! Coming Soon: some angst bits, some new people, some old people, and some OLD people! Now: Reviews! Let me see, here...first, a slight apology to...vampgirl210, because a certain thing I hinted would happen was only hinted at in the chapter...next chapter, promise! mwaha. Okay, and...it was a review EXPLOSION. EXPLOSION, I tell you...many, many thanks to Ichisakuraki Reiosamuka (I am 99.9% sure I spelled that right...) for a review for EVERY chapter! Awesome! I get way too excited, but still. AWESOME! Also thanks too...Anime Lady PIMP; Inuyasha is aware that he has a past, but doesn't really know what it is - he knows there was a woman and that she was (not to quote kouga or anything) 'his woman', but he doesn't remember Kagome specifically. And not only that, but now, he is aware that his woman is...his brother's woman. And he ain't happy. Umm...let's see...more thanks too...lunarcat12, and IamDimples; I should have a poll for how Kikyou should die, but I have no idea how to set one up and...well...eh. but seriously. HA! I know she's tragic, but there are times when she just pisses me off...
MORE SOOON! PLEASE REVIEW!
Final Revisions...DONE! Yee-haw – that's right people, yee-haw. For definition, see The American West. Anyway...R&R!