InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Crescent Moon On The Brow Of The Sky ❯ Part II: Spring (When All is Born Again) ( Chapter 9 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

This chapter is dedicated to BlueAngel_InuMiko. May you, Jen, and your big sister rest in eternal peace.

Sorry all for the delay. A lot of things have happened, not at all good (a.k.a projects, tests, a death in the family), so I will be brief.

This chapter is the beginning of the second part of my story! Whoo hoo! So it will not be the longest. In other words, IT WILL BE SHORT! Not much angst in this chapter, but there will be some. Lots to some standards, but not by mine.

Review (thank you all!) Replies:

Media Miner Replies:

DarklessVasion: Yay! My loved reviewer! I'm glad you find Kagome to be very rawly emotional in the last chapter, I made her that way. I'm glad you like my villains too! There's gonna be some angst on their part, a little... (wink) Yep! You saw it! I saw it! We ALL saw it! A little fond regard! YES! HERE COMES THE SPRING!

Miko_Snow Godess_Me: I'm glad you appreciated my half-asked attempt to tell everyone on Ffnet about my chapter being on mmorg! As you know, I couldn't upload it, what a terrible thing it was. Thank you for dropping by the site and leaving a review! Hugs!

Mystic Hanyou: Ah, yes. I am full of unexpected surprises! MUHAHAHAHA! I was leading you all along, making you think that Inuyasha wrote it...boy were you wrong! Heh heh heh. Sesshoumaru's stoic facade is slipping a bit, not much, but it's coming off!

Part II: Spring

Sesshoumaru stood in the glowing morning light, all his silver features burned into gold, his carapace fastened tightly over his boredom as he stared out at a slurred world. The rain had started weeks before; it had cleansed away the snow from the eaves of the forest, creating rivers of icy melt laced with debris. The sun now shone, a blinding eye in a sky overfull with rain. The sky carried a lid of storm clouds as the sun boiled the water away.

The taiyoukai felt a chill in the air, an exchange of warm and cold winds that danced circles in his hair. Spring, however early, had come; it brought its cleansing scent with the wind, with the rain, with the earth as it thawed. The human miko's scent grew stranger with every brilliant day that passed, and the irksome fact that he could not place the difference stained a mood behind his beautiful mask.

Birds began to call softly as the sun rose ever higher, the violet of dawn lost in the cerulean that eclipsed before it. His lips parted, fangs glinting in the light. A demon, hungry, that glowed with the dawn. The light splintered over his teeth, reflecting his blood lust in red eyes. Then, in the midst of starving want, came a voice like the coo of a dove.

“Sesshoumaru-sama?”

The Taiyoukai bit back his fangs, folding his aura into himself, closing his lips firmly over his teeth. “Ningen.”

She still clutched the Tetsusaiga to her breast, wary of him, though she was different, now, somehow: was there a glimmer of trust in her eyes? No. There was no trust, just the loneliness of the chasm between them. Their gazes mixed, and held, before her blood rushed to her face and she lifted her gaze away.

“Foolish miko, foolish onna,” the youkai whispered, “to think you could stand in presence of a youkai without any fear.”

She seemed unsure of herself, an emotion among many others that he had never known. “I am afraid.”

There was the faint glimmer of contempt in the youkai's eyes, a smirk about his lips, before he turned his radiance towards the sun and the expression melted away in the pale heat. “You are not. I would have sensed it- it would diminish you in the presence of this Sesshoumaru.”

“I am frightened,” she insisted, some of her old dead stubbornness returning in her chin as she clutched the weapon tighter to herself. He turned the coolness of his eyes onto her face. A pretty one, for a ningen, but not holding any of the beauty that he knew was in him.

He reached out an elegant hand towards her face, but dropped it to hover over the hilt of the sword that had commanded his lusts for years. Even now, its aura repelled him, as did the aura of the miko who held it. She curved her body around the blade, taking a few steps backward, throwing her face into the rainy shadows of the trees.

“No,” he said, a sliver of firmness entering his voice, keeping his eyes on her as she went much farther. Suddenly, he caught her hand in his, and it was then that he smelled the fear again.

The foolish girl tried to rip her hand out of his grasp. Her hand, so full of the clumsiness of mortality, trapped between his elegant fingers. He nearly smirked, feeling the rush of power that came to him; soon, the desire to squeeze and to hurt became overwhelming.

Kagome could sense this, feeling his death-dealing hands tense upon her skin, the snarl play about his lips. She could feel the fear building up in her, knowing that her bones were fragile- she was fragile, and she could snap underneath his pressure.

“I could break you right now,”he murmured, almost a seduction. He squeezed her hand harder, so that her face was marred with a wince. “I could tear you to pieces.”

She lifted her eyes to his face, hand tensed in between claws.

She opened her mouth, a beautiful parting of lips.

“I know,” came the whisper, absent of fear, heavy with feeling. “And I am not afraid.”

She squeezed his hand, capturing it in between both of hers and the sword. Their auras mixed and warred, for they were forever worlds apart.

The sun goldened them both, and they watched it rise further into a spring-blue canopy, breaking the silence of forever, breaking through gentle rains. Sesshoumaru did not reclaim his hand, and instead captured her frame with his arms. He tightened his hold around her, in case she would fade away. In his caress, she was fragile, and human, and close to death, for she was truly never very far away.

Kagome found herself trapped in the arms of a monster- silver and gold, and lovely. He was always lovely.

His embrace was cold, fake, and yet she did not deserve it.

Oh, what a dangerous path she traveled- to love all, but loved not.

For it was clear he did not love her. Then why did he hold her?

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In a field of long grasses and bright flowers, Rin played and sang. Butterflies, with wings of every possible shade and hue, circled her footsteps and movements. She giggled with delight as they landed upon her face and arms. Her lord was watching, and under the golden gaze she felt safe; she hoped he was proud.

Lady Kagome kept her distance from her lord, and Rin knew it was a distance that was very shy. Also, that old sword never left Kagome's side- even when Kagome played with Rin, smiling empty smiles, that sword remained, fastened to her kimono. Jaken never took curious eyes off of it, or off of the miko.

Rin was disheartened that Kagome would not laugh, not even when Rin tripped on purpose and made faces. Kagome stared out into the sky, framed by branches dusted with flower buds of cherry. She breathed deeply, a gasp, and watched tears fall onto the cupped flower in her hand. She was beautiful, reflected with admiration in the chocolate-coloured eyes of the little girl, so pretty that Rin had to reach out and grasp a rough corner of her kimono. She did this very gently, very slowly, as if afraid that she might crumble to dust in the palm of her hand.

Then, Lady Kagome turned her face to the little girl, and there bloomed upon the pink mouth a glorious smile that made the girl gasp, confused and surprised. For how could someone who was weeping so deeply be able to smile so radiantly?

She was so surprised, she called quickly and loudly for her lord.

When he came, he came framed with blossoms, soft, cool words curling out from his mouth. “Why do you call, Rin?”

“Sesshoumaru-sama!” she murmured delightedly. “Look at how Lady Kagome smiles!”

And so the golden eyes came to rest upon the smile that a miko was trying very hard to hide behind a hand. Almost angered, the Taiyoukai tugged the hand away, and saw something he had never seen upon her human face.

Something made him feel extremely perplexed. Something hot, burning in his chest like a wound. A scowl, barely formed, bloomed across his face, and he turned towards the fragrant shade and moved away, pink darting across his silver shadow.

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The cool red eyes of a monster gleamed in the deep fragrance of a spring night. Crickets breathed somewhere, but were quickly silenced by the deep malevolence of this place.

Naraku cradled in one arm, breathing softly and unevenly, his son, who was mangled by the evil sword of a mighty Taiyoukai. Naraku stroked his black hair, sweeping sweaty hair back from his eyes, murmuring his name absently. “Hitsumaru...”

His brother sat upon his feet, hands clenched in his lap, eyes downcast while bloody tears fell from them. These stains fell upon his hands, which clenched all the harder.

The wind witch, Kagura, stood in the darkest corner of the room, the moon's light silvering her profile. She held a fan to her lips, tapping against their cherry-coloured softness. Kanna sat against a wall, colourless and silent.

“My son is dying.” Naraku said without emotion, though his other son gasped and bit his lip hard. Hitsumaru clenched the fabric of his father's clothes, his blood seeping through the white of his own, his eyelashes fluttering on the brink of wakefulness. Naraku crushed his son against his chest, whispering a promise in his ear. “Do not worry, my child; you will breathe again, you will see again. You will come from the womb of a miko woman, tearing her from the inside out.”

Naraku ran a finger along the side of his dying child's cool face, along his fluttering eyelids. “For you are destined for far greater things.”

At these words, Naraku kissed his child's face, and swallowed him back into the chasm that was himself. Tsusimaru cried out as the ravenous devouring occurred, covering his mouth. Soon, there was nothing left of his brother save a memory, and a burning hate deep inside. Naraku sat languidly, full after wolfing down a meal, and watched his only son with red eyes.

He watched as his son's eyes narrowed, and his hands shook as he bent under the weight of sorrow. He clenched the skin over where his heart would have been, beads of sweat gleaming upon his forehead and among his midnight hair like stars.

“The Taiyoukai,” he heard his son whisper harshly, unbearable rage straining his words, “will pay harshly for what he has done!”

And the beauty in black stood, his eyes burning with the red fires of hate, and stalked like a panther towards the night, sword in hand. The fragrance of cherry blossoms followed him, petals falling in the deep silence of a high moon.