InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Bishies Without Shirts ❯ Her name was Tsukikage... ( Chapter 31 )

Chapter 31: Her name was Tsukikage…

Sesshomaru sat down on the sofa while he waited for his brother's return. He laughed to himself when he heard the sounds of Inuyasha rifling through the things in Sota's room as he searched for the shirt Kagome had slept in. Sighing, he realized he would be away from his little Rin-chan yet another day as things sorted themselves out here. He looked down as he fingered the obi that he wore draped around his waist. It was old and it no longer carried her scent as well as it once did since Higarashi-sama washed it. It did however carry just a trace of it and besides the faint floral scent that it now carried reminded him even more of its former owner. He was so wrapped up in his memories of her that he never heard his brother return.

"Maru-chan? Onii-chan? Hello?" Inuyasha was feeling much calmer now that he had Kagome's shirt on, but he was puzzled by his brother's behavior. He had never seen him so unaware of his surroundings before and that worried him. "Sesshomaru…are you alright?"

"Hunh? Oh you're back." Sesshomaru said stating the obvious and Inuyasha couldn't help but think, "And he calls me an idiot!"

"Sit and I will tell you a story about a woman…" he gestured for his brother to sit down so Inuyasha sat obediently at his feet. Waiting until he was sure he had Inuyasha's attention, he took a deep breath and started his story.

"The reason I know wearing the Wegome's shirt will help you is…I know from experience. I lost my mate through death…and I can only hope that she didn't suffer too much when she died. If only Haha-ue hadn't picked that moment to announce it was time for me to find a suitable mate, she might still be alive…." He looked so sad at that moment that Inuyasha had a moment of fear for this person sitting here before him was so different from the brother he knew. Then it hit him.

"Wait a minute….didn't you tell me your mate made you choose between me and her??"

"Shut up Inuyasha while I tell you this story. Besides that was just something I made up just to shut you up. You know… so I could impart some of my wisdom to you concerning your behavior towards the Wegome. But I swear on her memory this is true."

Closing his eyes Sesshomaru went on. "I was little older than the Wegome when I met her. Chichi-ue had gone on a raid and had added to our lands. Just as he did many times before as well as after, he took some of the women back with him. She was….she was about a year younger than myself and Chichi-ue took a liking to her and had her educated for some reason. I suppose he had hopes of making her a courtesan, for as it turned out she had brains as well as beauty." He paused and fidgeted with the obi again, before continuing. "Anyway, I met her when Chichi-ue brought her to my tutor and told him she was to learn everything I was. I was not the best student and no it wasn't because I was stupid." He shot Inuyasha a pointed look and got a smirk back for his troubles. "I just wasn't motivated to learn much. That changed when she came…."

"What was her name Onii-chan?"

"Her name was Tsukikage….Moonlight. We forged a friendship of sorts as we came to know each other better. Go make me some more tea and I will go on…."

"NANI??? You can't stop there! Hey make your own tea! What do I look like? Your slave?" Inuyasha cried before he realized his brother was only teasing him. "So what was she like?" He asked as he calmed down.

"She had fire in her just like you do. You know I think you learned that from her….She looked after you when you were a child."

"I thought Ofukuro looked after me??" Inuyasha interrupted. "I remember Ofukuro playing with me…."

"Your Ofukuro did play with you at times Inuyasha, but as it is in all families such as ours…your daily looking after was performed by someone else. It was no big deal as I too was looked after by another woman besides my Haha-ue. Anyway I thought I was telling you a story and just as usual you have to interrupt me a thousand times with your stupid outbursts! Now shut up and listen!" he glared at his younger as he remembered they way it was when they both were young whelps.

Sighing he went on, "Ok…we fell in love." A snort of amusement from Inuyasha earned him a cuff to the head before Sesshomaru continued. "We didn't realize at the time that that was what it was until that afternoon in the tea house. I found her painting in the orchard near the back gardens where it was. It was an old tea house that was never used in Chichi-ue's time, for when we entered it, it was covered in dust and there wasn't much of anything left inside. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself here. Anyway, I forget why I was looking for her, but I found her there and suddenly there was a burst of summer rain. You know those heavy storms that come up from nowhere and rain down for hours. We were soaked by the time we had made it to the shelter of the tea house. So we took off our wet things and…"

"You were sitting there naked with a girl?? And you didn't do anything??" Inuyasha laughed.

"Look who's telling this story, me or you? Now stop interrupting me! Where was I?" he thought for a minute and Inuyasha remained quiet this time while he did. "We took off our wet things and we sat there trying not to look at each other and all… That's when she saw the spider." He frowned at his brother as he knew another outburst was coming. This time Inuyasha fooled him and remained silent.

"Tsuki-chan was the bravest woman I know except when it came to spiders….so as the stupid thing crawled closer to her, she panicked and next thing I knew she was sitting in my lap." He smiled at the memory until he heard his brother snickering at his feet. "What's so funny? This is a true story you know!"

"A spider? You mean to tell me that all it took for you to get a naked girl in your lap was a spider? That's soooo fake! You're bullshitting me again, right?" he sat there laughing.

"Are you through interrupting me now? And no I'm not bullshitting you. I swear by her memory that it's true! Anyway, we sat there talking for a while and then I took her, right there on the cold hard floor of that tea house. That was the first time I had ever been with a woman and it was her first time too with a man. So we continued our relationship and I thought I was a big man…bedding one of my oyajii's women right under his nose. So you see I also know from experience that isn't exactly a smart thing to do."

"Oh really?? Then why does it sound like you're so full of shit your eyes are brown?" Inuyasha smirked.

"Asshole, my eyes are the small color as yours last time I looked! Now can I finish this story before Higarashi-sama and the Wegome come home or must I wait and let them hear it too?"

"Ok, ok I'll be good this time. I promise Onii-chan!"

Sesshomaru shook his head as he looked at his little brother. This was so much like the way things were when he was little and his Tsuki-chan was alive. So taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly he continued. "Anyway, I spent a most enjoyable time bedding my Tsuki-chan every chance we got. It was around the same time as your Ofukuro conceived you that I found out Tsuki-chan was also with child. I remember she came to me frightened because your Ofukuro was very ill at first." Sesshomaru raised is hand and made as if he were going to backhand his brother again for interrupting. Inuyasha saw it and quickly closed his mouth.

"So I found myself in the position of being the father of a child everyone thought was Chichi-ue's. Not only that both Chichi-ue and Haha-ue refused to give her to me as my wife. No mater how much I begged or pleaded I was told 'no I couldn't have her'. I was also told that if I wanted a wife that badly they would find a more suitable one for me. So Oto-chan I learned to keep my mouth shut and I saw her as much as I could. For no matter what anyone said she was my mate, and anyone else would be less than second best."

"Hey! What happened to the child? I mean thanks for making me an Uncle and all, but it would have been nice to now this child!"

Sesshomaru looked at his brother with such naked pain on his face that Inuyasha wished he kept his mouth shut for once. "I'm…uh... I'm sorry Onii-chan. It's just that it's another family member that's all….." he trailed off. "I'm really sorry…."

Sesshomaru swallowed and nodded at him. "It's ok. You asked and I will tell you. It seems that as time went on someone became unhappy at the thought of two new whelps in the household. I really don't even know if my own Haha-ue had her hand in it or not. All I know is one day when their time of whelping drew near, someone sent both women a plate of dried fruit. They had a weakness for it and someone exploited that weakness. I suppose it could have been worse and both women could have died… However they both became ill possibly because they both ate very little of it. Anyway, your ofukuro whelped you first. She was a bit frightened of you as you were such a hideous whelp…. OI! What did you do that for?"

"I was not a hideous whelp and you know it Sesshomaru! My Ofukuro was not frightened of me! Bastard! How could you say such shit like that to me??!!!" Inuyasha glared at his older brother and punched him again in the thigh, this time a bit too close to Sesshomaru's lap and he nearly lost his arm as he raised it again to strike him.

"That's enough! I'm sorry if you don't like it but it's true! You're a hanyou! Not only that, you are lucky to be so pretty! There are plenty out there that that make you look…good. Your Ofukuro must have seen one of those…. Anyway, my Tsuki-chan fell gravely ill from the poison and she nearly died. However she didn't but she suffered a great fever like the one you had the other night. It was too much for the whelp she carried and it died. Then she had to endure the pain of whelping a shizanji. Do you have any idea how sad that was, how awful it was to see her crying over the poor thing as it lay lifeless in her arms? That's when Chichi-ue along with Babaa-chan came up with the idea of Tsuki becoming your wet nurse. So now I was not only left without a son, my mate was effectively taken away from me as she had a duty to stay whelp-less as she nursed you. Let me tell you that really endeared you to me, Oto-chan."

"That's so… sad…Onii-chan. So you mean I could have grown up with my nephew as if we were brothers? That would have been something, hunh?" He gave his older brother a half smile. That's when he noticed it.

"You asshole! You're crying! Stupid Baka Sesshomaru bawling like a baby!!! Oh that's too funny!!!!" he laughed himself silly while Sesshomaru stared at him.

"I am not! I most certainly would not sit here crying in front of you Shit-head! You're an idiot!" He looked at the laughing figure on the floor as if it were crazy, while trying to wipe the tears off his face without said figure noticing.

"You are! I never thought I'd see the day!!! That was the best present you ever gave me!!! But ok; truce." He sat up and wiped the tears of laughter off his own face. "But you never told me how she died."

"Well now that you're through carrying on like a drunken monk, I'll go on with my story. You know I had to endure five years of you getting in my way whenever I wanted to be with my Tsuki-chan. I couldn't even share her bed without you pushing your way in. And I don't think I would have minded so much if you didn't wet the bed all the time! I believe I could have drowned in your pee! I mean no matter how many times I took you out back to that tree and made you go, you still managed to pee all over me as I lay there sleeping!"

'Keh! That's such a lie and you know it!!! I knew better than to soil my bed! You're just saying that cause you're mad I wouldn't let you fuck Tsukikage……"

Sesshomaru gave his brother a pointed look. "Anyway, for five years you were there pushing you way in when you weren't welcome and making it most difficult for me to satisfy my needs as well as my mate's. By the way not only have you peed on me, but you have wiped your filthy shit filled hands all over my pants as well as my hair, split food and drink all over me, thrown up on me, kicked me in places I never want to be kicked in again while you were sleeping with us….which is probably why I never managed to father another whelp! Let's just say this, Inuyasha, when you were a young whelp, you were one the biggest pains in my ass I ever had to deal with! All I can say is you should be glad Tsuki-chan loved you or else I would have killed you off years ago!" His eyes flashed an eerie red before Sesshomaru calmed down enough to go on with his story.

Inuyasha sat there fuming while he took that all in. "I was not a pain in the ass, Sesshomaru! If you weren't such a selfish shit-head you'd have known that! I was a little whelp, for Kami's sake! Now look who's the one who couldn't stay out of bed! Geeze at least I had an excuse for keeping you apart; I needed your mate to look after me! You're far too old to want Kagome to do that for you! You're just jealous I have a mate and you don't! That's why you're acting like such prick…."

"Shut up!" Sesshomaru yelled as he backhanded Inuyasha. "I don't need to hear that crap from you! It's not true at all! I fail to see one reason why I should be jealous of a useless piece of shit like you! I treat the way you want to be treated, I help you get over your anxiety of being separated from your mate, and this is how you repay me?! Now you will sit there quietly while I finish telling what happened to my mate or I swear you will know what I have gone through when we get back! And I promise you I will not lift a finger to help then!

"Now you wanted to know what happened to Tsukikage, well I will tell you. She died shortly after Chi-chi-ue did. It was also if I remember correctly a few days after your Ofukuro died. What I never told you then, because I chose to spare your feelings at the time was this: your Ofukuro did a very brave thing, something I never would have believed she had it in her to do. She chose to commit seppuku so that she could follow Chichi-ue in death. Not only that, she did it by herself without a second to speed her on her way. It was a few days after that Tsuki-chan decided that you needed something to cheer you up. It was hard on you to be so young and orphaned. I really didn't have the time to be with you either as I now had to run Chichi-ue's empire without the proper training for it. So Tsuki-chan decided that a picnic was in order. Since I was now in control I figured I could now openly claim Tsukikage as my mate. In fact I had stopped to discuss this with Haha-ue. So I was delayed by her insistence that I choose another more suitable mate than a concubine. I finally gave up and left, only to come upon the remains of a picnic. It was then I heard you crying or maybe I spotted her obi first, or was it her broken sandal….? Anyway, all I remember now was finding you alone, thankfully hidden and unhurt. You are very lucky she hid you Inuyasha, as your life might have been much harder than it was in many ways, had they known who you were. Anyway, that was when I knew she was carried off…I also found out they raped her as I found bits of her kimono later on in the area. But I never found her body….and that was the worst part of it. Anyway, they came and took back what was once theirs and it took me years to wrench it back from those filthy Wolves! That is also why I abandoned you in the forest as I had to find the Tetsusaiga on my own so I could get revenge on them! It was and still is a never ending drive to get back at them for what they did to me. Time however did beat me to it as they only had brief reign before their empire collapsed and I was able to regain the lost lands. But I still feel the need to go looking for her….I know she's been dead these many years and still I wander… But I have no more desire for your sword Inuyasha now that I possess one that surpasses it…"

"You son of a bitch! You swore up and down you hate Ningen with a passion and yet here you tell me a lovely story all about how you fell in love with one and took her as your mate! What a lying shit you are!"

"Nani? I never said any such thing! Tsukikage was as Youkai as I am! You idiot!!! So her hair was as black as night the same as your ofukuro's! That doesn't mean she was ningen! Asshole!!! You've mixed her up with your stupid ofukuro! That's who you remember playing with! BAKA KUSOTARE!!!"

They argued like that back and forth for a few minutes before Inuyasha froze. Sesshomaru did too and they managed to avoid a great deal of trouble by doing so. The strange sound they heard stopped and it was followed buy an even stranger clicking noise and two quick bangs. Then they heard the sounds of two people walking up to the front door of the house