InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Bloodlust ❯ Dawning Peril ( Chapter 24 )

The night air was thick and heavy, empty of sound and motion, and old man on his death bed watching a shadow fall across his life. Sesshomaru felt that wariness in the air as a physical presence, nature's knowledge that violence was on its way. He could tell that even asleep, Kagome felt it, as he felt her, day by day their mating bond strengthening - sharing emotions, power, strength. He traveled swiftly through the close pressing folds of night, venom grey instead of black, as if to spark a memory of poison. A party of humans returning from the hunt passed across his path, but caught nothing but a flush of silver and gold eyes. The moon seemed to slow its travel, reaching the apex of its motion and staying there. A shaft of pale light moved across Kagome's face, and she stirred slightly in his arms, yawning slowly and showing her fangs.

"There are several hours yet until we reach the human village, my Kagome. You should rest while you can."

She wriggled out of his arms and stood in front of him, forcing him to stop.

"I am not the one who goes to fight a war, Sess-chan. It is you who should be resting, not me."

He felt a surge of worry from her, met it with his own perpetual well of calm. She recognized it for what it was, and her eyes opened wide in startled surprise.

"How can you do that, Sess-chan?"

"In the same manner that you do. It is mostly involuntary, and hardly ever this strong."

"But I have done nothing like this, have I?"

He looked down at her curiously.

"You were asleep, when Kasuka and I spoke, yet you lent me your power without knowing how - that should not be possible."

Kagome smiled and shook her head.

"Will you please tell me what you're going on about, before you continue going on about it?"

"The mating bond. It allows us to share feelings, images, power. I have never heard of one that became this strong this fast - but it may have something to do with the manner of our mating…your miko…our pup. There are unusual things about us, my mate."

"Well, I suppose it doesn't really matter, but I am glad to know I'll be able to feel what you feel."

Her eyes reflected, became liquid and drew him in.

"You must promise you'll be careful, Sess-chan. You are the strongest of all of them, but that poison makes nothing of your strength - and I…I will not live if you do not."

Sesshomaru grabbed her wrists, almost angrily, and her sharp gasp of pain made him loosen his hold in chagrin.

"Do not speak of such things! You will live, we will live, there is no danger of anything else. You are life, Kagome…do not consider anything else."

She nodded slowly, and the heat left his eyes.

"We linger here too long, my mate. Our scent betrays us to any who seek to harm us. Let us continue onward."

She nodded even more slowly, and followed him in her own blur of speed, but even as fast as they moved, time crept up on them. Sango and Miroku, Rin and Kaede slept soundly, no expectation of danger flirting with their dreams, but Shippou sat awake, the sensitivity of his youkai nose aroused by the quickly approaching awareness of familiar scents. Quietly, so as not to wake the others, he scampered out the woven door, and waited in the moonlight. A wave of wind washed over him from no discernable direction, and left in its wake Kagome and Sesshomaru.

"'Kaasan! `Tousan!"

"Shippou! What are you doing awake at this hour, and where are the others?"

He leapt up to her shoulder, and she laughed and reached up to bring him down into her arms.

"I got your scent, so I came outside to wait. The others are all asleep. What happened at the council?"

"The dragon lords refused judgment. There will be war now, like no war since that of the Four Lords in the days of my ancestors."

Sesshomaru's words struck the kit with a sense of impending doom, but he was too young yet to feel the mortality of all things in the world, but despite this his eyes widened in remembered fear, and he trembled.

"But that war destroyed everything, castles, lords, human villages, forests…I learned about it when I was little."

Kagome let him snuggle closer to her chest, and Sesshomaru looked up at a gradually lightening sky.

"I must return to the castle, Kagome. The levies must be raised from my lands - a defense of energy is not of much use on the attack."

Kagome let Shippou down gently, and nudged him towards the door.

"You go inside now, and let me say goodbye to your `Tousan."

Shippou nodded and looked up briefly at Sesshomaru, unworried about the fate of his Otousan, secure in his knowledge of his new father's strength.

"Goodbye `Tousan, make sure you get all the dragons!"

Kagome waited until he ran inside, and crushed herself against Sesshomaru's chest. She breathed his heartbeat, and it was a long moment before she could convince herself to let go. Quickly, she untied her obi and cut a length of the strip of fabric carefully with her claw before she retied it.

"In my era, when a woman's….mate…is sent off to war, she gives him her handkerchief as a keepsake….I don't have one of those, but I thought this might work just as well."

She blushed slightly and tied the length of silver fabric around his upper arm, beneath the sleeve of his haori. He kissed her, and her eyes brimmed with tears.

"please, I could come with you, Sess-chan, I could fight with you."

He shook his head and touched her tears with his fingertip.

"You could, but you will not. You will stay here and take care of the little ones, and yourself, and…our pup."

He lay the flat of his palm against her belly, and she smiled through her tears. She nodded, and pressed her lips against his, and he could feel the desperation in her kiss. He pulled away, but her fingers stopped his words with their soft pressure on his lips, and she closed her eyes.

"Don't speak, Sess-chan, no more words now. Go, so I can remember you like this. I will not say goodbye."

He left in silence, and when Kagome was sure he was gone, she dropped slowly to her knees and covered her face with her hands. Dawn pulled itself over the horizon tentatively, and shone on the tears that slipped between her fingers. Shippou heard her sobs, and peeked around the door at her, still kneeling on the hard packed ground.

"'Kaasan?"

Kagome turned quickly, wiping her tears away in a belated attempt to keep him from seeing her grief.

"I'm alright, Shippou…I'm alright. I am only hoping that he will be the same."

Shippou went with her when she started to move, and followed her to the Goshinboku. She leapt up into the tree and sat carefully on the branch that had so often been InuYasha's place. Shippou watched her with concern, but she stared fixedly into the west, and he turned to go back inside Kaede's home. He met Miroku at the door, and the monk looked at him curiously.

"Are you alright Shippou? A felt a youkai presence…"

Shippou nodded.

"'Kaasan and `Tousan came back…I caught their scent….but `Tousan is already gone again, and `Kaasan is sitting in the Goshinboku. She cried a lot when he left, I haven't ever seen her cry so much before."

Miroku looked startled, and he caught a glimpse of silver hair amidst the branches of the sacred tree. The way she sat made it like seeing a ghost, a silver haired demoness clothed in red silk in the place where InuYasha had so often been seen, replacing the silver haired hanyou and his fire rat haori. Miroku walked silently to the base of the tree and called up to her through the branches.

"Kagome?"

She leapt lightly down beside him, and Miroku was struck by the unconscious grace of her motion, newborn of her demon capabilities, taught to her by instinct.

"Hello Miroku. You awakened early - I am sorry if I caused any commotion."

He shook his head.

"No, it was a youkai presence that woke me, though I suspect now it was only you and Lord Sesshomaru."

He watched her carefully, and the glistening in her eyes was clear.

"Where has he gone, Kagome? What were you doing up there?"

She ignored his first question, and sped her steps back towards Kaede's house.

"I was watching the sunrise."

"But you faced the opposite direction."

"My heart is in the west, Miroku. Where would you have me look?"

"I would have you tell me why Lord Sesshomaru has left you here and gone off alone. Did something happen at council?"

Kagome sighed and the weight behind it was no comfort to her troubled friend.

"Sesshomaru has gone to raise the levies from his lands. The dragon lords refused the judgment of the council, and that acts as a declaration of war. Sesshomaru will fight, he must…but he would not allow me to risk myself or our pup."

The blood drained out of Miroku's face, and nerveless fingers clutched at her arm.

"A youkai war? This does not bode well at all - the presence of evil that Kaede spoke of is now fulfilled. There has been no war like this for hundreds of years. The bloodshed is enormous, and alliances are broken in youkai wars, Kagome. Nothing is safe: no youkai, no human, not even the land itself."

Kagome shook with the effort of holding back her tears.

"Do you think I do not know this? I spent a lot of my time in the castle reading about youkai history, youkai magic…so many things I would never have though I had a use for. I found in one set of scrolls an account of the War of Four Lords, written by Sesshomaru's ancestor. The war itself lasted for seventeen years, and only stopped when only two of the Lords that had begun the War survived - Sess-chan's ancestor, and the Lord of the East. I do not think this war will be as prolonged as the other - it is the dragon clans alone against the force of the four lords together - but it will still be bloody and fierce."

A quiet expression stole across her face with the strain of memory.

"Before any of this happened, before we left for council, Sess-chan knew that they would refuse. He told me then I could not fight with him; I did not know that it would be such a trial."

Miroku picked up his pace to walk beside her, and when she did not speak further he hesitantly pulled his thoughts into words.

"Did you find an antidote for the dragon poison, Kagome?"

She shook her head.

"I do not think there is one. Sess-chan knows they have it, knows they will use it…he has promised me he will be careful."

"Kagome, do not become this way. I can see your grief in your eyes, and yet you try to keep it from your words. You were always so open with your emotions, you have changed your mate to be the same way. Do not become like he was, for the sake of your children at least."

Kagome pressed her palms against her eyes, and when she pulled them away, he could see the tears collecting against her lashes.

"I don't want to lose him, Miroku. He h as taken the place of everything I lost when I chose to stay here, in this time, he is my whole heart. I have been alone before, but now I am not with him and I have only the strength of our mating bond to tell me how he feels, to tell me that he lives."

"He will return to you, Kagome…you know his strength, there is nothing that could keep him from you."

Kagome nodded slowly and followed him inside, where Sango was stretching and pulling herself from sleep. She pushed her bangs out of her eyes, halfway between annoyed and awake, and was immediately assaulted by a wave of mixed excitement and anxiety that dropped into her belly like a lead ball when she saw both that Kagome had returned and the expression on her face.

"Kagome! You're back!"

The demon lady smiled and sat on the floor near her friend.

"Yes, I am. I have a feeling I will be with you here for a long time, Sango. Sesshomaru has gone to war."

Sango was wide awake instantly, and she hugged her friend.

"I'm sorry, Kagome. That was the outcome of the council?"

Kagome nodded.

"The council decided upon a sentence of death for the lords of the dragon clans, in atonement for the crimes of their clans - but they did not agree. This war is less of a war and more of a hunt and kill, from what I have gathered."

Sango crossed her arms over her knees and looked over at Kagome worriedly, letting her concern show in the lines on her forehead.

"If they came to the council and refused the judgment that was laid on them, it is possible that they have been preparing this for a long time, which would make it more dangerous."

Kagome shook her head in silent worry.

"I don't know, I am not very knowledgeable about preparations for youkai war. Until this morning I did not even know that Sesshomaru had an army. All I know is that there will be fighting and I am not with my mate. It clashes with my instincts to stay here, knowing he is going into danger."

"I understand. I feel the same way about Miroku, though there aren't any instincts involved."

Kagome nodded and smiled slightly.

"I have a feeling that it has more to do with love than with instincts. Which reminds me - now that we're - I'm - here, we'd better get your wedding on the way. I think Miroku might go crazy if we don't hurry it along a bit. It will help to keep my mind off…things, too."

Sango blushed brilliant pink, and avoided Kagome's eyes, mumbling incoherent arguments against her folded arms, resting across her knees. Kagome laughed slightly, and patted Sango's hand.

"You know that you want this just as much as he does! Where did Kaede go? And Shippou? He was awake early this morning, when I came with Sesshomaru."

Sango looked around in slight surprise.

"I'm not certain. Shippou will be with her; perhaps they were called to one of the houses in the village."

Kagome nodded and searched for the scent of the kit, finding it tumbled around Miroku's scent, and she relaxed.

"No, he is with Miroku outside."

Sango looked over at her quickly.

"How did you - right…demon senses."

Kagome smiled.
"It's alright. I'm still not used to it myself. A few months as demon Lady of the Western Lands does not quite make up for nineteen years as a human girl."

Sango grinned across at her.

"I suppose not. Its been so strange trying to get used to you this way that I nearly forgot that it must be almost as strange for you, more strange, perhaps. So what about it, demon lady, where is Kaede? Let's get this wedding on its way before I changed my mind."

Kagome smiled and attempted to push her worry out of her thoughts.

"I think the first thing is to wake up Rin. Has she been alright here without Sesshomaru? She is very attached to him."

Sango nodded while Kagome bent over the girl and shook her gently.

"She has been alright; we have tried to keep her mind off of the separation, and Shippou has been the most help. They've both need a playmate, it's good for them to have each other now."

Kagome smiled her agreement, and Rin yawned and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

"'Kaasan?"

She sat up and tossed her arms around Kagome's waist, hugging her tightly.

"You came back! Where is `Tousan?"

Kagome pulled the girl into her lap and smoothed her claws through the sleep mussed tangles in her hair, fixing the golden comb that now she always wore.

"'Tousan has gone back home, Rin. Things happened at the council meeting, and some very bad youkai have started a lot of fighting. Your Otousan has to make sure the castle is protected, so that we'll be able to go home when the fighting is over."

Rin smiled brightly.

"Otousan will win all the fighting, he is strong! Rin was saved from lots of bad demons because `Tousan fought them!"

Kagome let the girl tug her out into the warming morning, and she studiously avoided looking towards the west. A rising swell of demon energy moved sudden and swiftly over the village, leaving nothing behind but a flutter of worry running over Kagome's skin and a tingle of miko that rose unconscious through her youkai as a warning to her mate of impending danger.