InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Another Opens... ❯ The Choices ( Chapter 10 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Chapter 10- The Choices


No, Inuyasha isn’t mine. The Hamayami is.


Recap: Miroku’s captured, Ayami plans now to restore Naraku, and the Panthers want their Master back. Except one. Loyalties are tested and Sango tends a wounded Kirara. What happens now? Read on!


“Sango!” she looked up, she hadn’t dared move Kirara, couldn’t leave her or risk-losing her too. Kneeling beside the injured neko, now sleeping fitfully in a ball, she saw...thank kami! Kagome! But, that was Kouga??


“Oh no!” Kagome hurried forward, she’d smelled Sango as they had been traveling back to the Keep. But Kirara! Poor, dear thing.


“Hm. Looks bad,” Kouga noted, frowning down at Kirara as they approached. Kagome could fix her up though, he was sure.


“Kouga? What are you-Kagome, what’s going on?” Sango asked, bewildered, reaching for Hiraikotsu. The truth was, she’d been half expecting something different at the end of the search for her, perhaps to have to fight to free her from the wolf, not to see the pair together.


“A long story, Sango. What happened? Who did this?” the hanyou asked, stunned as she set to work on another friend.


“Inu. Kokuzoku’s pack, I think...” Kagome gasped.


“Talk to me,” she instructed, and Sango, worried, grieving, even she shivered at the look on Kagome’s face as she told her what had happened last night and now. Fury, rage...and something else.


Guilt.


“I ought to have been there. This is my fault,” she said. Kouga winced at the look in her eyes, at the way her posture warned him off saying anything at the moment. A leader too, he understood. She would not welcome comfort now, she had no time for any weakness. Amazing. She had changed so.


“Kagome...I don’t care why, but they have Miroku,” it was barely a whisper, and Sango hardly heard Kagome‘s self-accusation. She didn’t care, not with her hoshi gone. The hanyou looked up, and laid a now bloody hand on her friend’s shoulder, making Sango take notice. Golden brown eyes bored into the tajiya as Kagome spoke. Their expressions spoke of long friendship and understanding.


“Not for long, Sango. Not for long. You have my word-we’ll get him back safely, no matter what. I promise you that.”


A grim nod answered her.


***


“Sons of Inutaisho, I wish a parley.” A voice from the ridge above the brothers, one that made both Inu reach for weapons. Kokuzoku. “Now, put those down, please. Let us be civilized. After all,” an amused smile crossed the traitor’s face, “a child is present.” He lifted something to let them see. A small, bound and gagged form. Sesshomaru’s eyes blazed at the sight, and Rin whimpered.


“Release her,” the Lord said coldly. Hiding behind his child! How dare he?

“No, my former Lord...I think not.”


“You filthy coward! Come fight with honor, you bastard!” Inuyasha snapped, Tetsusaiga still free in his hand-until Sesshomaru shook his head and sheathed Toujikin.


“Sheathe it,” he said. Rin could not be risked. Inuyasha growled, and it was met by a very soft, warning one from Sesshomaru. Reluctantly, the hanyou put the sword away, eyes locked on the youkai who approached them, Rin tucked under an arm like a valued bundle. “You have your parley, Kokuzoku.”


“Very wise. I do find it regrettable I had to resort to this, you know. But you left me no choice, Sesshomaru, consorting with hanyou filth like your new...packsecond, and the murderous little bitch who shamed my pack. Necessary.”


“What the fuck do you want, asshole?” Inuyasha snapped.


“Very well, we shall dispense with niceties. I wish to arrange a meeting. You will come to this Temple, within two days.” Directions were given. If they left now, they would barely have time to reach it in the time given. “When you do...why, the child will be returned to the Keep, unharmed. Simple, is it not? My-ally would much rather feed the child to her friends, but I would prefer not to do this. I mean her no harm, after all. A mere mortal is beneath me, a true son of the Clan. Should you fail to do this, well, you will have harmed the little one by your decision. The choice is yours, Inutaisho‘s son, as it was his. Decide quickly,” Kokuzoku smiled, and shifted form. He lifted the child in his teeth, his action a calculated insult, a reminder Sesshomaru now could not do this...and ran.

The Inu Lord didn’t follow. He had no choice. Rin was too important to him, a gentle, kind little mortal girl, one he’d failed to protect. He headed in the direction indicated, at speed.


“You know damned well this is a fucking trap!” Inuyasha scowled, after he caught up. His half brother could move!

“Of course,” Sesshomaru said. the flat, cold answer made the hanyou stare for a moment even as he ran.

The Lord tried not to remember...but he couldn’t help it. Snow, a meeting by the shore...Father, going to another trap that had been set. By the mortals...for the sake of his mortal and the hanyou who ran alongside him. Mother would not have done this. She would be more cautious in his place, calculate things and decide to sacrifice Rin, then strike hard from a position of strength when least expected. He knew that too, but he was Sesshomaru, and had to do as he thought best. She had taught him that as well, really.

Sesshomaru flew, and remembered...

"Better, my son. You will one day hold great weapons, you must be ready to use them." The slim, graceful Inu held her sword, poised and perfect in the practice court of the Keep.

Her steel colored hair, those piercing eyes, the refined, delicate features, Lady Kumori. His beloved Lady Mother. An assassin, and a truly skilled one. Lead female of their Pack, mate to Lord Inutaisho...a remarkable female, ambitious, formidable, fearless, implacable. His parents, he had strived to be worthy of them. Sesshomaru had inherited his Father's looks, and his Mother's nature. Her poison coursed through him, an occasional peculiarity of her birth pack, from the distant north. She had trained him in the art of killing with silent skill...mated to his Father out of mutual interests and admired strength, not love...respect and understanding, not love. She loved her son, but expected no less than perfection from him, he was her hope of the future, had taken her mate to bear a Clan Lord to be...


A battle had taken her away, he'd been hardly more than a half-grown child then. Father and Mother had been away defending the Clan lands...and Father had returned alone, given him the sword as she'd requested. Sesshomaru had grieved deeply, if discretely. He'd believed his Father did as well...until his folly. He learned then, it was foolish to waste time protecting someone. The day he’d practiced with his Father for the last time-he’d challenged him in outrage, refused Father aid when he fought, taking the wounds that killed him, and he found it-regrettable that it was so.


Regrettable his half-brother looked so much like the cause of that choice.


Until Jaken. Rin. And now Kagome...and Inuyasha.


He would not lose another female dear to him. Kagome, he knew would keep things together until they returned, and if not-would avenge them.


***


“Tell her they come,” Kokuzoku ordered the Samiyousho, and the insect flew off. He glanced down at the child he’d set down, looking up at him with startlingly calm eyes. He knelt, looking into them. Fearless, he realized.


“Orders, Lord?” No watchers on him now, with the insect gone. He had spoken the truth, this child was of no interest to him. Sesshomaru was on the way, to Ayami, already gone with the Panthers to collect her cursed Dokueki and await them. But the hanyou, curse his bones...was right. This act had no honor. It was beneath him.


“Take the child back to the Keep lands. Leave her there where she will be found easily, and go to the holding to await my return,” Lord Kokuzoku ordered them. They obeyed.


He and his pack were not going to serve her as errand runners anymore, or objects of her ire. He was untouchable, but his pack would have to wait for him in safety, for when he returned in triumph to lead them into the Keep that would be his by right soon enough as Clan Lord, invincible master of all he surveyed. As for the child, she would be sent to humans to find her way when the deed was done, safe from him as a mere human lacking a packbond-as he was from her. Rin was not an Inutaisho, only a ward, and thus, could not ever harm him. Kokuzoku freed her-to both pay back Ayami with something that would annoy her, and to reassure himself that he was his own being, and still had the freedom to act as he willed.


That he had some scrap of freedom left, even trapped in the box he‘d placed himself in.


***


“Excellent! Most pleasing,” Ayami cooed, her dearest little ones, the faithful Samiyousho. They had saved her, after all, months before...when she’d lost him. When Naraku had died...


A grieving female lay on the floor in a ruined hut. She had no wish to live. Her mate, Naraku, was dead. They’d had so very little time together, mostly because of her own foolish fear, her weakness...and now she was alone. Bereft. Wolves mated for life to a single mate. Ayami, once a member of that Tribe-was no exception. Binding her to him forever.


Now he was gone. Killed by a mortal miko...and her damned allies. Grief washed again through the slight, red-haired form. Half-mad with her loss, she’d traveled to the place he’d gone to collect the last shards of the jewel. The wolf mating bond had already told her, but she had to see. There hadn’t even been a body! Nothing to mourn or honor with death rites. Only bare earth and a ruined hut, alone, she’d howled her pain as her people did, giving voice to her loss, waiting to die and to follow him.


Then, the faithful Samiyousho had come. They’d whispered to her, spoken of what they had seen and heard. That the hanyou Inuyasha had indeed used the jewel-to save his mortal bitch. The same bitch who’d denied her Kouga and the role of Lead Female and Princess of the Wolf tribes, and then slew her chosen and beloved. Kagome. A hanyou now...


She had no right! She had no right to live! To use the jewel her Lord had needed so desperately, to breathe air he would never breathe again...Inuyasha had done it to claim the female he loved so devotedly. Ayami was sure of it. They would love, and live, and breed children...this would not be. She would show Kagome’s still beating heart to the hanyou bastard, and kill him slowly afterwards. All of them. The monk, the tajiya...Kouga. The neko and the miko. Especially the miko bitch! Avenge herself and her beloved. Somehow. Some way. So, she sent the insects out again, to watch and spy as they had always done.


“What? Sesshomaru and the bitch? You lie!” Ayami demanded. Denial. This...was a problem! A large one. She knew little of her new enemy, of the changes in her...Lord Naraku had always said you must understand an enemy to fight them.


So. She tried to calm. Ayami decided-she would learn. She would wait...and then she would extract revenge of them all. Then...she’d gone to collect her widow’s portion, what he’d charged her to look after while he collected the shards....his backup plan, though she didn‘t known that. The Dokueki.


But soon...her mating mark would again signify her union to a living youkai, not be a reminder of her loss...Ayami smiled again.


***


But when Kagome and Sango returned to the Keep...they heard the last orders left by Lord Sesshomaru. To remain there, and await him. Kagome did explain to Yotogi, as she sat in her rooms again, Sango looking after Kirara for the moment, but Yotogi had to be restrained from killing Kouga for his attack on the Inu in getting there.


“It was Ayami!” Kagome yelled, and Lord Yotogi growled. But he did subside when Lady Atae agreed with her.


“That would simply be granting the wolf’s wish. Kagome is correct. For now,” she noted flatly, eyeing Kouga like an old, dead fish. Kagome heeded their council, to wait for them, and convinced Sango that her packmates would bring Miroku home with them soon. She had to trust Inuyasha and Sesshomaru as she did, to bring him home with them when they came back. At least, at first. Kagome busied herself with dealing with things that had come up of late, Clan work...and worried.


But when Rin was found later, and brought safely home without her adopted father, Kagome trembled in private. She could feel something was wrong. Something strange...not danger precisely, but something odd. It set her teeth on edge and filled her with fear, even as Kirara slowly recovered and Sango worried over her neko-and her husband.


Then, three days later, three sheathed swords were brought to her, left by Samiyousho and lesser youkai that looked to Ayami.


Tenseiga. Tetsusaiga. Toujikin. There was a note, but the message in the Swords alone was clear. Their wielders still lived. But were not intended to return to her. Ayami. Dokueki. Kokuzoku. The lesser ones...and...rice paper crumpled in her hand as she cradled the swords in her arms.-Come, if you dare- it was signed...Tohan. It was a challenge, and though she didn’t know it, a warning. An announcement that the Panthers were involved.


Kagome held them...and gave an order.


“Get me Totosai.”


Author’s notes-Whew! Tough to write. A lot had to be covered, it’s nearly the end of the story. A long road, but a great ride. In any case, thanks for reading, I hope you enjoy it!-Namiyo