InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ A Mother For Rin ❯ A Mother's Fear ( Chapter 21 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
It was another week of Kagome being awake only long enough each day for her tea to be prepared and for Inuyasha to give it to her through a kiss as he had when she had first awoken. Her bruises had begun to fade after a while and her ribs and chest, though still sore, were well on their way to being fully healed.
Shippou too was recovering rather nicely as well. Two times a day for three days, Tiynoko had prepared a tea for the kit, the brewed herbs used for healing and pain relief. By the fourth day he no longer needed the tea, his headache completely gone and the kit was quickly returning to his old self again. Rin too was doing well; well enough in fact that Inuyasha was able to convince his brother to leave the child in the care of Mitsunaro and his mate while he and Sesshoumaru took Shippou hunting.
Inuyasha stepped outside the hut with Shippou held in his arms and his brother standing next to him. The sun shone bright and clear and the light breeze blew down wind. All in all it was an excellent day for hunting.
“If you want to hunt pup,” Inuyasha said as he and his brother walked to the edge of the dense forest. “Then we're gonna teach you how to do it right. Now tell me, what do you smell?”
Sesshoumaru and his hanyou half-brother watched as the kitsune kit hopped up to perch on Inuyasha's shoulder and braced himself with one hand wrapped in the hanyou's silver white hair. Inuyasha felt the tug on his mane but instead of being upset about it as he normally would have a strange feeling of rightness came over him. He felt…like a father.
Shippou stood as tall as he could on Inuyasha's shoulder and lifted his face to the sky, taking in a deep breath of the late autumn breeze.
“Rabbits and squirrels,” the kit said with closed eyes and took in another deep breath. “A d-deer,” he stammered and shuddered as he tried to keep his voice steady and tamp down on his fear as he fought against the impulse to hide underneath Inuyasha's thick mane.
“It's alright pup,” Inuyasha said bringing up a hand to the kit that had chosen to leave his hair down that day. “We're here this time. We won't let anything happen to you.”
“Rest assured pup,” Sesshoumaru spoke, his voice deep and smooth. “You are safe in our care under our tutelage.”
Shippou looked at the taiyoukai and nodded, still holding tightly to Inuyasha's hair as they moved into the forest, the canopy of the trees darkening the forest. A buck nearly larger than the one the kit had tussled with turned his great antlered head and looked up. Shippou locked eyes with the buck and try as he might he was unable to fight his fear or ignore his impulse. In an instant there was a trembling kit on the hanyou's back between his shoulders tucked underneath his hair.
“Is it too soon for him?” he asked his brother softly as he looked at the buck.
“I know not brother,” Sesshoumaru said and gently retrieved the kit from under his brother's thick heavy mane of waist length hair. “It is alright pup,” the youkai said as he held the fox child in his arms.
Sesshoumaru walked slowly toward the buck, keeping his eyes on the male deer, their gazes locked. A deer was notorious for not turning away when their gaze was locked with something else's. It was a precaution with the animal; hunters were rarely able to kill something if they looked it in the eye. But once whatever had its gaze locked with the deer's turned away the deer would flee. Knowing this Sesshoumaru kept his unblinking gaze on the deer and walked until he was directly in front of it.
The taiyoukai smelled the intense fear from the kit but was unwilling to back down on this. The kit would be no good as a hunter once he was grown if he were afraid of the very thing he was hunting. Respect was good yes, full out fear was not. Looking up from the youkai that held him Shippou saw that they were directly in front of the huge buck now and turned swiftly burying his face in Sesshoumaru's haori. The taiyoukai's hold with only a single arm was too tight for him to break away and run and that made the kit all the more fearful.
Sesshoumaru raised a single clawed hand up to the deer slowly until he was able to rest his hand on the buck's muzzle and pet the great hoofed beast.
“Pup,” Sesshoumaru said keeping his voice low and soothing in much the same manner as he did when calming Rin down from a nightmare. “Look upon him,” he commanded gently. “Turn and look upon this buck.” Sesshoumaru kept his gaze locked with the deer's as he felt the kit slowly, hesitatingly turn in his hold until he was facing the buck. “Stretch out your hand and touch him,” he commanded and waited for the kit to do so.
He could hear the child's heart thundering as fast as a great stampede of wild horses and although he felt bad for adding to the child's torment, knew it must be done. Sesshoumaru saw Shippou's trembling hand stretch out slowly from his peripheral vision and watched silently as the pup's fingers barely grazed the deer's black nose before moving up the coarse fur. After a moment Shippou began to slowly relax and became bolder, moving closer to the deer and bit his bottom lip as he continued to pet the beast.
For whatever reason, that would be unknown to the duo, the deer's gaze moved from Sesshoumaru's to Shippou's and the buck studied the child quietly. Shippou's green eyes widened but he kept himself from pulling away and hiding in Sesshoumaru's clothing as he so wanted to do. Perhaps the deer sensed the child's fear, or maybe it was Mother Nature adding in her help, whatever the reason, the deer moved closer to the pair and turned so that his side faced them, though his gaze remained on the pup in the youkai's arms. It was as if the deer was offering to be the child's stead.
Somehow Shippou seemed to understand this and ever so slowly he moved from resting in Sesshoumaru's arms to perching on the deer's back. The buck looked at the child as if to say `hold on' and Shippou moved up onto the buck's shoulders holding tightly to the hint of mane that grew in a straight line down the back of the deer's neck. The deer moved slowly at first, nothing more than a slow walk away from the taiyoukai and then suddenly turned and sped off like bolt of lightning into the thick forest.
“Pappa!” Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha heard the kit scream mad with fright. “Tou-san! Pappa! Uncle help!” Shippou screamed again.
He was deathly afraid to be on the deer as it raced but too afraid to let go. Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha bolted into the forest after the racing deer hoping, praying that no harm came to the child who had just finally healed. They heard a loud shriek come from the child and as they neared they saw a doe standing off to the side as the deer that held Shippou on its back was locked in combat with another grown buck. Each time the antlers slammed together the kit was rocked and nearly thrown off the deer.
Seeing a safe opening the brothers neared and watched in horror as the kit was finally thrown off the deer only to have the competing male turn its attention onto the child dwarfed by each deer's girth. Two screams suddenly tore from two different directions at once. One from the kit and another from behind the brothers.
Shippou closed his eyes as the competing male neared him and reared up, he balled himself up as tightly as he could and screamed the one word that had always brought him salvation in the past. “MAAAMMMAAAA!”
“SHIPPOU!” screamed Kagome as she came upon the sight and the weakened human woman threw out her miko powers as much and as hard as she could.
Her child's life was in jeopardy and the desperation made her powers that much stronger though her body was near collapsing. She had been up and out of the hut in seconds when she had asked where her pup was and had only been told that he had gone hunting. There had not been made mention that he had gone with the brothers of the west, nor that he was safe and she had bolted up to her feet her body screaming in protest and made a wild dash out of the hut and to the forest. Her bare feet carried her as quickly as they could into the forest, her maternal instincts giving direction to her wild flight.
When she saw the predicament her pup was in, all hell broke loose. Her eyes began to glow a furious pink and her body was lifted off the ground with the force of her raging power. The blast of her power, though protecting of her intended mates did burn them a bit, but more importantly it flung the three hoofed animals to the opposite end of the forest. As she saw that her pup was safe at last, she pulled her power back into her body and heart and gave a soft wave to her would be mates before promptly collapsing.
The adrenaline still pumping madly through the child's body allowed him great speed and he was the first to reach his mother, tucking himself up under chin and holding onto her neck and shoulder tightly. Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha reached her at the same time though the hanyou appeared to have been hurt when he was thrown by Kagome's magic. He was limping slightly, but his injury did not slow him as he made his way to Kagome's side.
Thankfully the miko was only unconscious, the spiritual and physical as well as emotional exertion had over come her and now she lay simply sleeping on the forest floor, her kit tucked into her chest. Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha both breathed a sigh of relief at the discovery and the taiyoukai lifted her gently into his arms, the kit still clinging tightly to her.
“So next time we take them both hunting with us?” Inuyasha asked his brother as he limped slightly the pain in his foot burning like mad.
“Hai. What is wrong with your foot?” Sesshoumaru asked his brother noting the blood that was leaving a trail behind his brother as the hanyou limped next to him.
“I don't know, but it fucking hurts,” he growled out as he tried to hide the pain.
Inuyasha watched as Sesshoumaru moved in front of him, his back to the hanyou and knelt down on one knee. “Get on little brother,” he instructed Inuyasha.
Grudgingly grateful the hanyou climbed onto his brother's back and hung on as the youkai carried both him and Kagome and her pup back through the forest and into the meadow near the hut of Mitsunaro and his pack.
“I couldn't stop her,” Tiynoko said by way of apology as he came rushing toward them.
“Fear not healer,” Sesshoumaru said. “She sleeps and is not wounded. If not for her though, her pup would have died this time. Take my brother back to the hut and tend to him,” Sesshoumaru said having felt his brother slip into the darkness of sleep as he had been walking through the forest. “He injured his foot when our mate intervened on her pup's behalf.”
Tiynoko nodded and removed the unconscious hanyou from the taiyoukai's back and carried him inside the hut as Sesshoumaru sat with Kagome on the porch. He held the woman in his lap and kissed her soft lips as he held her wrapped tight in his powerful arms. His attention turned back to the hut when he heard a frightened cry and saw Rin come running toward him.
“Pappa, Uncle Yasha,” she cried her words rushed and breathless. “There is a tree in his foot pappa.”
A concerned frown marred Sesshoumaru's stoic face and he stood and turned away from the hut. He carried Kagome out into the lawn and ever so gently laid her in the plush soft grasses amongst the wildflowers.
“Stay out here with her Rin,” Sesshoumaru said as he walked back to the hut and moved to the door. “Do not leave her side.”
“Hai pappa,” Rin said and curled up next to the sleeping Kagome.
Sesshoumaru watched his young pup for a moment before moving inside the hut and into the room that held his unconscious brother. Rin was not joking he discovered dreadfully, for there lay his brother with a broken stick as thick as his wrist imbedded deeply in his foot and he could just barely see the bark under the skin through the top of his foot.
“Healer,” he questioned as he moved closer.
“Please my lord, Tiynoko,” the inuyoukai healer asked to be called.
“Tiynoko, what is the difficulty in removing the wood from his foot?” Sesshoumaru asked as he drew closer to his brother.
“The piece of wood broke off inside his foot Lord Sesshoumaru. His flesh is trying to heal around it. Not only that but, right now, that piece of wood is the only thing keeping him from bleeding out…I'll need you to hold him tightly while I extract it. It's going to hurt him a hell of a lot as I'll have to pull it out slowly to make sure not leave any pieces inside the wound.”
Sesshoumaru nodded and moved to sit behind his brother and lifted his brother's torso in his arms. He wrapped his arms around his brother's waist, pinning the hanyou's arms to his sides and then tucked on leg underneath both of his brother's knees and held the other tightly over his thighs. For now his brother would be immobile.
Sesshoumaru nodded to Tiynoko and Mitsunaro came in and held the hanyou's uninjured ankle in a tight grip as his son held the other ankle with one hand and with the other, embedded his claws as deeply as he could into the wood and began to slowly extract it. Inuyasha jerked violently and screamed bloody murder as the piece was ever so slowly removed. For the first time that he could remember, Sesshoumaru saw his brother sob in pain, tears flooding the hanyou's eyes and rolling down his cheeks.
“Stop, oh Kami make them stop!” he cried desperately the pain too much, it was slow torture.
“I'm sorry brother,” Sesshoumaru whispered to his harshly panting brother as the hanyou sobbed and screamed in pain. “This must be done.”
Sesshoumaru rocked his brother ever so slightly as he held the sobbing boy in his arms and the next thing anyone knew was that the brothers, both brothers, were wrapped up tight by the arms and body of a softly glowing, barely conscious Kagome. She had heard the hanyou's cries and told the children to stay outside as she stumbled her way back into the hut, her power coming out once more in a desperate need to end his suffering.
Kagome found Sesshoumaru and Mitsunaro restraining Inuyasha, though Sesshoumaru was doing the most restraining and saw what was going on. She had caused this, the girl thought sadly and moved to the brothers' side. As her need to end Inuyasha's pain became greater, she moved and sat on the floor next to them, her skin slightly glowing with her power as she wrapped her arms around them both and was just barely holding onto consciousness as she did her best to take away his pain.
Her aid to the hanyou lasted only a few minutes before she completely blacked out once again, but it was enough. One more gentle tug after she had fallen into an exhausted slumber and Inuyasha was free of the wooden tormentor. Inuyasha was still crying though more quietly now as his wound was probed for any slivers and then cleaned with a cold herbal tea. The liquid stung terribly and felt like it was acid poured into his wound, or perhaps salt water, whichever would cause him more pain, he thought bitterly.
Inuyasha's attention was diverted though, to the precious miko that lay sleeping, her head against his stomach as she breathed heavily. The exhaustion from her powers and the physical exertion on her still weakened body was too much for her. Inuyasha yawned tiredly, a headache forming from his tears and the after effects of the painful extraction. He tugged on his arms and his brother loosed his hold enough to allow his brother to free them but did not let his brother out of his embrace.
Inuyasha wrapped Kagome in his arms and brought her up into his lap, holding her to him like a child would a teddy bear as he buried his face in her thick dark mane and fell asleep. Mitsunaro and his son both gave a soft chuckle at the sight and moments later Tiynoko had the hanyou's wound cleaned, treated and bandaged.
Sesshoumaru moved Inuyasha and Kagome until all three were lying on their sides and then he too curled himself up around his brother and fell into a light slumber as well. Moments later Tsukina brought the children in and she and her mate watched as the tiny children curled themselves up I the cradle made by the slight bowl made between Inuyasha and Kagome's bodies.
“Perhaps that pup should just not learn to hunt,” Tsukina said as she and her mate exited the room and closed the shoji door quietly behind them.
“How will he provide for his future mate if he cannot hunt?” her mate asked.
“Perhaps he will meet a female that hunts.”
Mitsunaro's laughter followed her down the hall as they moved into the common area of the hut and told the monk and taijiya of what had transpired and that the brother's, their intended mate and their pups slept peacefully. Perhaps choosing to bring Kagome here, though an escape would not be the best bet concerning the courting. Perhaps though, she did not need to be courted. The gentle care the brothers had taken with her and her pup seemed to have proven to the woman all she needed to know.
The cursed monk opened his mouth and gave a tired sigh while scratching the back of his neck and said the words that always proved to be a curse, no matter what situation they were said in.
“What could possibly happen now?”