Chapter 29
He didn't like it.
Not one fucking bit.
After dropping Kagome back in her bed at the village, he'd gone for a long run. It was an attempt to vent the chaotic energy clamouring inside him and also to check for any residual youkai lurking about.
He didn't not want an encore, thanks.
As for helping with the inner turmoil, it did absolute jack.
Inuyasha slowed to a jog nearing his favourite tree in the area, a giant that towered over all the rest. The humans labeled it sacred, but Inuyasha only knew its boughs to be extremely comfortable, being so wide even up high.
With a few easy bounds, the hanyou made his way up and draped himself on a particularly nice crook, propping his head against the trunk.
For a while he quieted, listening to the light breeze rustle through the leaves. The sky was slowly brightening to a clear blue as the pinks of dawn faded with the sun moving higher in the sky.
It was an insistent nagging at the back of his mind and the more he ignored it the louder it got.
In the privacy of his own mind, Inuyasha could admit that the events of the day prior knocked him off balance.
He'd never quite felt that way before, his youki rising to such uncomfortable fervour, as if his own blood was scorching him from the inside out.
The intensity of that protectiveness was equal parts disturbing and exhilarating in the power boost it provided. Like he could bring down twenty oni if he had to, if they stood between him and what he needed to get to.
What was by far the most unsettling, was what drove this need.
An instinct he'd never felt rise before.
And that what is apparently a slip of a human woman, who wasn't even from his world.
He growled in frustration, rubbing his face harshly with one hand.
What was it about Kagome that made it so easy for her to get under his skin? He'd spent most of his life alone, keeping far from humans who held no love for his kind and from youkai who would try to kill him on sight if they were strong enough.
His indifference to his life of solitude lasted until this village stayed his steps. Its priestess was unusually accepting of a hanyou milling about and somehow he'd develop a bit of a routine living near the settlement.
He'd underestimated how nice it was to speak with someone that wasn't hurling insults with every other sentence. And when Kikyou spoke to him, he felt a semblance of being normal.
Even so, that first month and a little bit, he'd been keeping a healthy distance, observing and not so much involved. But then came the day he had the bright idea of fishing a stupid girl out of a dry well after he watched her jump in herself. And all of his careful indifference went out the window.
Kagome was so different from anyone he'd encountered— not that he'd met many humans that weren't either screaming running away or towards him with a pitchfork. She was chirpy and bright, easy to smile and easy to please. Even now, many moons later, she still beamed so wide at him when he offered to cook her some fish.
He had a suspicion that she was used to bigger and better things in her life before but her enthusiasm always smelled genuine.
What threw him was she never seemed to treat him any differently than anyone else. The blatant display of his inhuman capabilities that others balked at, she took in stride. And sometimes, even seemed to admire and encourage.
The way she hardly batted an eye now when he offered to carry her on his back. And how she would squeeze his shoulders excitedly when he sprinted high in the trees and she spotted something particularly interesting under them.
As if it was even possible, they were getting closer the more they spent time together. She confided in him and he hesitantly did the same, however awkwardly he knew how.
And they got more at ease... physically as well. Just thinking about it made his face heat. He didn't understand her. Sure, he had few bites taken out of his neck, but how could she just touch him without a second thought, sweeping her fingers across his skin like he wasn't the tainted creature he'd been deemed by literally everyone else? How she felt so comfortable just falling asleep near him… and now apparently on him.
The stickler—Inuyasha was appalled to find—was that he didn't mind this at all. Obviously, because in his instinct driven craze he'd taken things one step further and went and hugged her. No.. not just hugged, like grabbed and smothered against his chest, desperate to get her as close as possible, so that his youki would be appeased with the evidence that she was unharmed.
(Never mind that Kagome is apparently not as helpless as she looks.)
Even harder to wrap his head around was that it was blatantly obvious that she felt the same concern for him. The pure distress on her face when she surveyed his wounds was unmistakable.
He'd been trying so hard to not consciously acknowledge that he'd been following her doggedly, involving himself in everything that involved her. But after yesterday, it was impossible to deny that Kagome had become someone very important to him.
He had no idea what to do with this uncomfortable revelation.
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Oni – mythological demonic ogres; usually portrayed as giants
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha. However, this plot, the exact sequence of words and any original characters described therein, I reserve all rights to.