InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Harem ❯ Chapter 11

DISCLIAMER: Inuyasha belong to Rumiko Takahashi and not to me. The AU world this story is set in, the plot and any additional characters do belong to me though, and so please don't try to take them without my permission. I make no profit of this story, and am doing it only for my own enjoyment (and hopefully yours too).

 

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This chapter is different than the rest of the story so far, and is shown in a kind of flashback sequence for both Sango and Miroku. I'm sorry if this confuses anyone, but I consider it an important part of the story so it's not going anywhere.

 

WARNING: Strongly implied rape, and mention of suicide in chapter. If such material offends you, please do not read. You have been warned.

 

CHAPTER 11

 

Lord Bourkan was born forty-three years ago. His father, Lord Rafiq, was a fairly low-level lord, not for lack of worth but for the simple reason that he never tried to be more than that. Lord Rafiq was far more interested in ensuring the welfare of the common people living on his lands than acquiring his own wealth or more power at in the court, and his people loved him for it.

 

His son did not. Although growing up Bourkan was far from hard done by, whenever he would visit over lord's lands or the Royal Palace, as all of noble blood do on occasion, he would see how much more richly most of the over noble families lived and even more the Royal family. This always filled him with jealousy when he those things he felt he should have been afforded but had not because his father choose to spend his funds else where and had little interest in procuring more. Bourkan confronted his father about this on several occasions growing up, demanding to know why his father wasted their money on commoners and not on themselves. His father would only laugh and say that it was what a true lord should do and that he would understand one day.

 

But Bourkan never did learn to understand. He could never grasp the concept that there were people out there who needed money and support more than he did, and that sometimes to was better to give than to receive. He never wanted to learn. All he knew was that almost all of the other noble boys his age had more than he did and he wanted what they had. Every time he heard about another noble child getting a new horse or having a fantastic birthday party, he was filled with jealousy and anger towards his father for not giving him the same. The anger and jealousy only grew as he did, so that in time he hated his father and was filled with greed and a thirst for power. By the time he was fully-grown, he no longer cared for anyone save himself and was willing to do anything to ensure his own happiness.

 

When Bourkan was nineteen years old, his father died. This was fairly young as lords go in Inu, most lords not taking over from their fathers until they were maybe thirty, often even older. But Lord Rafiq waited for some time after becoming lord himself to have children, so he far into old age by that time and his death came as no surprise to his people. Although many mourned the death of such a wonderful lord, they were comforted by the fact that he had lived a long and good life and hoped that his son would continue his legacy by being as wonderful a lord as Rafiq had been. It was not to be. His father's funeral pyre was not even cold before Bourkan began to show his true nature as a greedy wannabe tyrant.

 

Over the next several years, Bourkan's wealth increased dramatically, along with his power as through bribery and intimidation he won the support with the other nobles at the court. At the same time, the lives of the people under him grew steady worse as their greedy lord taxed them into poverty with little concern for their well being.

 

Life for those close to Bourkan was not much better; in fact some might say it was even worse. Bourkan never married, and many doubted had the ability to love anyone let alone a woman. He certainly lusted over women though, and had one of the largest harems in Inu. Most of his concubines were common born women whom he forced into service. If he saw a pretty young thing that caught his attention he would see nothing wrong with threatening her life or the lives of her family in order to force them into his service. Bourkan's concubines were given anywhere near the decency that those in Prince Inuyasha's harem were either. Bourkan didn't treat his concubines like people, only toys that existed for his pleasure only, something which he never returned either. The fate of becoming his concubine was probably one of the worst his lands had to offer and more than one of the poor women forced into his harem committed suicide after it all became too much. This never bothered Bourkan, as there were always plenty more women where they came from.

 

It was from this same harem that he also produced six sons as well, each from a different concubine. He cared little for his sons. He saw that he would eventually have a need for an heir and so allowed them into his life for that reason and that reason alone. He gave them all the material wealth they asked for, having by that stage gained so much money that he didn't miss what they took from him, but he never showed them any love. In fact, he encouraged them to be ruthless and to scheme against each other. In this way five of the six boys grew up to be as cruel and vicious as their father, and as for the sixth… well, we'll get to him later.

 

It was six years after he took the throne that Bourkan received something that he never expected, nor wanted, to have. One of his concubines was a young woman named Batul whom he made his concubine after he threatened the lives of her parents and younger sister should she refuse. She was a very pretty young woman when he first saw her, but to Bourkan's disgust she did not live up to his expectations. Bourkan had two preferred kinds of concubine. There were the sluts as he thought of them, the women who would offer themselves to him and do anything and everything he wanted for the chance to have some kind of gift thrown their way. Those were his favourite, but he sometimes had trouble finding women like that as time went on. Then there were the screamers, who would shudder at the sight of him, and scream and beg him to stop when he took them. He liked those too; they added a special kind of spice to the sex, their pleas and cries of pain enhancing his own pleasure. He'd even taken to using special `toys' when he took those ones, like whips and chains. It was quite the rush. But Batul was neither. When he took her, all she would do was lie there and cry quietly. Cry! With little almost silent sobs and tears running constantly down her face. How was he supposed to get his pleasure out of that? Just the sight of those pathetic tears made him loose his hard one as time went by, sometimes before he even got started. It was so damn annoying and Bourkan was considering having her `disposed' of her when he discovered she was pregnant with what was to be his third child. So, he decided he would let her live until the brat was born, and then recogniser her fate. After all, he guessed he could always use another son.

 

When the child turned out to be a girl, Bourkan was not pleased. What the hell was he supposed to do with a girl? Women were so useless. He probably couldn't even use her to secure an alliance with some other lord by arranging a marriage, since King Inutaisho had been making it no secret in recent years that he held arranged marriages in distain, thus making most nobles wary of them least they offend the King. So what the hell was he supposed to do with the brat? He would just drown her, but their religion condemned those who would harm children in the gravest manor, and he had not wish to bring the wrath of the Gods down upon him. They might very well curse him into losing his wealth!

 

The solution came to him, like an answer from the Gods themselves, when barely two days after the brat was born that the news arrived that one of King Inutaisho's concubines had born the kingdom's second prince. Instantly Bourkan had an idea, and if he said so himself, it was absolutely perfect! The Inutaisho may be against arranged marriages, but he certainly seemed to like concubines, much like himself, and so why not promise his newborn daughter as the King's newborn son's concubine when the boy came of age. It was probably a better match than the brat could hope to achieve on her own anyway, and it would help to get him into favour with the Royal Family. Yes, this was certainly a good idea, if he did say so himself. By the end of the week a letter was sent to King Inutaisho from Lord Bourkan, congratulating the King on his newborn son, and with the promise that as soon as the young prince came of age he would have his own newborn daughter, Sango, as his concubine.

 

And so Sango's fate was seal almost from the moment she was born. Growing up knowing you were destined for the life of a concubine was not a nice thing at all, especially since living in her father's house Sango had the opportunity to see how some men treated their concubines first hand. Once Sango was old enough to truly understand what her father had promised her as there were many a night when she was cry herself to sleep, mourning a fate which she felt offered her nothing but pain and misery. She also contemplated running away several times, but fear of what her father would do to her if - when - he caught her always kept her from acting on that idea. She'd already long ago learned that it would be useless to ask or even beg her father to change his mind, as he still considered her somewhat of a burden and to put it bluntly didn't give a fuck about what she wanted. There seemed to Sango to be no way out, and no happy ending in sight.

 

That was far from the only problem Sango had growing up. In fact, it was barely even the tip of the iceberg.

 

Sango was alone for most of her childhood. Her relationship with her father was almost non-existent. He'd spend most of his time pretending he didn't have a daughter, occasionally turning up in her life when he heard she was doing something he didn't agree with and order her to stop or else. Her feeling in the matter never were never considered, she would either obey him or suffer his wrath. Other than that, the only contact Sango had with her father at all was when on of the neighbouring nobles turned up, at which point she was expected to sit near him at the dinner table and act the part of a perfect submissive daughter, so as to better show what a wonderful leader and father Lord Bourkan was. What a joke. But as bad as her relationship with her father was, her relationship with her mother was even worse, seeing as there wasn't one.

 

She never knew her mother in person. She barely even knew of her even, just a few facts some of the servants had slipped her over the years, which barely even covered her name. Not that Sango could really blame them for that, it was likely all they knew and would no doubt get them into trouble if her father found out they'd told her even that. After all, it was by Lord Bourkan's orders that Sango's mother was kept from her in the first place. Sango might be a burden to him, but she was still his daughter and she was still important to him gaining favour with the Royal Family. There was no way he was going to allow her to be sullied by association with a common concubine, mother or not. In fact, especially then, then he needed to work especially hard to erase as much of that part of her history as possible for her to become a good bargaining tool. Then when Sango was seven, she lost any hope of maybe meeting and getting to know her mother one day. One of the harem maids found her in her room one morning, having hanged herself during the night. On her pillow was found a suicide note claiming she couldn't stand living as Lord Bourkan's concubine any more. Bourkan didn't much care either way, but when the news came to Sango she had cried for the mother she never had a chance to know.

 

Then there were her brothers. Four of her brothers, Adham, Duha, Husam and Yasir, were hardly in her life that much. She'd see them at dinners with her father's allies, pass them in the halls on occasion, but that was pretty much it, for which Sango could only be grateful for none of them were what you would call nice. `Rejects from Hell' was what the servants called them behind their backs when they were sure neither they nor their father could overhear, and Sango couldn't help but think that it was a pretty accurate observation. Every one of them was basically a miniature version of their father, completely self-absorbed and power hungry. They all wanted to gain power of their own, and more than anything wanted to be their father's heir and spent most if not all of their time scheming ways to make that happen. They were so caught up in that that they had no time for their sister whom they knew was no threat to them and would be leaving in a few years to become Prince Inuyasha's concubine anyway. Her fifth brother, Sakhr, was different story. Although he was also classified as a `Reject from Hell', and with good cause, he was at the bottom of the pecking order in Lord Bourkan's house, being born a month early and as such always being small for his age. His father considered them just a step above worthless for that, and as such had even less time for him than he did his other son, which wasn't really all that much to begin with. Sakhr never gave up trying to gain his father's favour, but because of his treatment was filled with anger and took his anger out on the one person considered lower than him in his father's eyes; Sango. He would tease and torment her mercilessly, and did everything he could to make her life an even bigger Hell than it already was. As time went by, it became one of Sango's biggest missions in life to avoid Sakhr as much as humanly possible.

 

Her sixth brother was different, so different in fact that if it not for the fact that his eyes and nose were almost exactly like Lord Bourkan's, many would not believe he was the Lord's son. Kohaku's personality was almost the exact opposite for his father's and brothers. He was kind and gentle and generous, so much like his late Grandfather was, and many servants wished that he would become Lord after Bourkan's passing, although they didn't have much hope of that. Barely a year younger than Sango, Kohaku was one of Sango's few friends growing up. The two siblings were very close, having bonded over the harshness of their lives under their father's roof, and looked out for each other as best as they could. Kohaku meant more to Sango than anyone else in the world. That is, until the day he was killed.

 

Sango would never forget that day. She was twelve, Kohaku eleven. They were supposed to meet for breakfast, but Kohaku didn't show up. After a while Sango figured he'd just overslept and went to his room to wake him up. Instead of finding Kohaku still in bed asleep like Sango had expected, she found him on the floor with a knife in his back, having been dead for at least a couple of hours already. Sango's scream of horror and grief was loud enough to bring half the manor running, but of course it was already far too late as far as Sango was concerned. Her beloved brother Kohaku, the only family she had whom she gave a damn about, was dead. Sango had always suspected that one of her other brothers had murdered Kohaku, in order to help pave the way to their own power, but of course she could never prove it. All she could do was grieve and curse her father when he barely batted an eye to find his son's killer. If she ever needed proof that her father didn't care about his children, she had it in the calm approach he took with his second youngest son's murder.

 

After Kohaku's murder, life was fairly bleak for Sango. She never forgot about Kohaku, but after a while the pain started to fade slightly, at least enough so that she felt she could go on with her life, although sometimes she wondered why she bothered. Her relationships with her other brothers became even more tense after that, and she could never look at any of them without wondering if one of them in fact killed Kohaku. The sons and daughters of other nobles started avoiding her around this time as well, as word had gotten out that she was promised as future concubine to Prince Inuyasha, and their parents encouraged them to believe that this made her beneath them. Granted the only noble children Sango had much contact with were generally the children of her father's allies, who were primarily greedy men who shared her father's ideals, but still... The girls were often even worse than the boys too, so Sango was never able to make friends with any of them. She did make a couple of friends with the servant's children over the years, but none of those friendships ever lasted long, as her father would always find excuses to send their parents away if he got word of their friendship. Part of his plan not to allow her to be sullied before she went to Prince Inuyasha, Sango guessed.

 

When it became time for Sango to go to the Royal Palace to become Prince Inuyasha's concubine, she was actually almost looking forward to it. She didn't expect it to be a great life, or even a good life, but at least it would get her away from the devil she called her father, and her monsters of brothers.

 

But when she arrived at the Palace and meet Inuyasha for the first time, she found he was nothing like she'd expected. She'd thought that he would be like her father, as he seemed to a model for all men of noble rank she had meet, save Kohaku. She thought she would hate him, that he would ignore her for the most part and then force himself on her when the mood took him. What she didn't expect was that he would be a good man who would be kind to her and care about what she thought. He didn't ignore her, and in fact went out of his way to get to know her, her likes and dislikes, and made sure that she had everything she wanted or needed. He took her with him for day trips horseback riding, or to the city market, or any other such places just to spend time with her and so they could have some fun together. The first time they had sex, he went out of his way to ensure that it was as pleasant for her as possible. It had still hurt, but nowhere near as much as Sango had thought it would and Inuyasha had apologised profusely for any pain she did feel. Sango was sure that it wasn't Inuyasha's first time like it had been hers. She didn't think he'd had many lovers before her, maybe two or three at most, so he was still somewhat clumsy, but even then he knew how to ensure that she was satisfied as well, something she hadn't even known a woman could feel before then. Sango never expected any of that. She never expected that Inuyasha would become more than her master, that he would become her friend. But he did, and for that Sango was forever grateful. He somehow took what she had been sure would be a nightmare come to life and turned it into the best thing that had ever happened to her. As a result, Sango promised herself that she would be forever loyal to Inuyasha, so as to one day maybe be able to thank him for making her happier than she could ever remember being. She didn't love him as a women is supposed to love a man, but she never thought she would feel that way for anyone, so that didn't bother her. What she did feel for him was deep gratitude and real friendship, and in her mind that was enough.

 

Two years passed in the harem. She started of being one of two concubines, Dalal being made Inuyasha's concubine on Inuyasha's sixteenth birthday, same as her. Muna joined a year later, followed a few months later by Kikyo. When Kikyo had shocked everyone and tried to kill Inuyasha, Sango didn't hesitant to protect the prince as best she could until the guards arrived. Sango dealt with Dalal and Muna as best she could and enjoyed the attention Inuyasha gave her. She especially loved it the day she turned eighteen and Inuyasha gave her Kirara as a present. She was the best and most thoughtful present she had ever received and Sango adored her immediately.

 

But then something happened that she never would have thought in a million years could happen to her. Sango had meet Miroku shortly after first joining Inuyasha's harem. Being Inuyasha's best friend, not to mention his Spiritual Advisor, it was enviable that he and Sango would spend some time together over the course of the two years. At first, Sango though Miroku was just a dumb lecher, willing and waiting to jump into bed with every pretty woman who caught his attention, so naturally she didn't have all that much respect for him. In fact, she spent her fair share of time wondering how someone as nice and wonderful as Inuyasha could possibly be best friends with someone like Miroku. But then time went on and Sango got to know him better, and she started to see that the side that Miroku shows to the world is only the smallest part of who he really is. Under that playful, lecherous attitude, is a kind and gentle man who takes his duties seriously and is always willing to stand up for those who needed his help. Slowing this newfound knowledge started working away on Sango's opinions of Miroku, and said opinions started to change. First she developed a grudging respect for him, which developed into true respect and finally friendship. But her feelings didn't stop there and one day Sango realised that the impossible had happened and she had fallen in love with Miroku. Even worse, it became clear to her that he had fallen in love with her too.

 

This was awful. She couldn't be in love with Miroku. Such relationships were forbidden to a concubine, on pain of death to both her and her lover. Even if it were not for the punishments, she could never be with Miroku the way she now realised they both longed for, for both were loyal to Inuyasha and such a relationship between them would hurt the prince in ways neither of them wanted. There were so many reasons why she could not allow her feelings to continue, but none of them meant anything as far as her heart was concerned. Sango continued to love Miroku from a distance, living for the times when she could see his face, all the while knowing that she could never touch, never hold him the way she was sure they both wanted. Inuyasha, unknowing of her growing love for his best friend, continued to sleep with her which just made everything worse in Sango's mind, for even though Inuyasha continued to ensure that her body was pleased by their time together, such encounters only made her feel dirty inside and made her long for Miroku even more.

 

When a new concubine, named Kagome, joined the harem, Sango rejoiced. Not only did Kagome become Sango's first female friend since her father had sent her old maid Aisia away nearly three years ago, she quickly took Sango's place as Inuyasha favourite in his life and in his bed. And since Kagome seemed to enjoy Inuyasha's attention as much as she once did, she felt free to enjoy the relief that came from knowing she had been reprieved from the emotional burden that had come to be associated with that duty. Even better was when she realised that Inuyasha still wanted to maintain his friendship with her, something which even now she didn't want to loose, and continued to take her with him on his day trips sometimes allowing her to see Miroku, and even secure a few moments alone with her secret love sometimes. Although they would likely still never be allowed to be together, it was probably the best Sango knew she was likely to get, and so she was grateful.

 

But still, deep within her heart she hoped and prayed for the day she and Miroku might be able to fully act on their love, free of the fear of consequences, all the while knowing that it may, and probably would, never happen.

 

***

 

Miroku was born and raised in the Royal Palace of Inu. He was the youngest son in a long line of priests. In fact, his family was more than priests, they were the Spiritual Advisors to the Kings and Princes of Inu, and had been for generations. When Miroku was born, his Grandfather, the great Abdullah, was serving as Spiritual Advisor to none other than King Inutaisho himself, while his father, Jabril, was destined to become Spiritual Advisor to the Heir to the Throne, Prince Sesshomaru, in a few years when the Prince came of age. Miroku himself was thought destined to become a Spiritual Advisor himself one day, though who to at this point was still in question. Perhaps to Prince Sesshomaru's first-born son, or maybe to a second child born of King Inutaisho. The King still had quite a few years left in him after all, and was in great shape for a man half his age. It was a question that was answered only a few months after Miroku was born, much to his father's delight. One of King Inutaisho's concubines - his favourite concubine actually, Lady Izayoi - was pregnant. Should the child be born alive and was male, it would be the second Prince of Inu, and Miroku would become his Spiritual Advisor. So when Prince Inuyasha made his entrance into the world nine months later, Jabril was almost as proud as the prince's father, for it also secured his own son's destiny, to follow in the footsteps of his ancestors.

 

Miroku was raised by his father and his grandfather from a young age to take over as Prince Inuyasha's Spiritual Advisor when the time came, it was the only life he had ever known. Not that he ever complained about that though, as he had great respect for his father and grandfather's positions and felt honoured that he himself would take over such a responsibility one day. Miroku's mother, Fizza, on the other hand wasn't so keen on the life of a Spiritual Advisor, especially after Jabril took over as Prince Sesshomaru's. When Fizza had married Jabril, she'd had the idea in her mind that a Spiritual Advisor would live a life of luxury and that his word would be critical in the way a ruler decided to rule his country. She'd thought that a Spiritual Advisor would leave for an hour or two each day, talk to the King or Prince about various matters where their word would be considered as good as if spoken from the mouths of the Gods themselves, before returning to a beautiful and extravagant apartment within the palace filled with wealth and servants willing to fulfil your every whim, and that naturally the wife of a Spiritual Advisor would also be able to experience such luxuries. What she got instead was a small house off to the side of the palace grounds, barely big enough for the four of them (Her, Jabril, Miroku and Abdullah), humbly decorated and without a servant in sight. For four years she grumbled and suffered through life like this, until Miroku was three and the provable straw that broke the camel's back was added. Up until this point Jabril had been working as a general Advisor to all those in the palace who needed spiritual advise while waiting for Prince Sesshomaru to reach the age when he needed and could benefit from a full time Spiritual Advisor of his own. Fizza had been waiting for this day, thinking that once her husband started working directly for Prince Sesshomaru it would finally give him, and by extension her, the respect and wealth she believed he deserved. Instead she was horrified when she discovered that Prince Sesshomaru seemed to view having a spiritual advisor as more of a burden than anything else and that her husband couldn't even get his point of view across to a fifteen-year-old brat. She was even more upset about the whole thing when her husband told her, very philologically, that his job was to advise only and that it was up to Prince Sesshomaru himself to decide what advise he would and would not take. Jabril could not force his hand in this, and it was not his place to judge Prince Sesshomaru, only the Gods could do that. Fizza was not happy about that idea at all, and as the months went on grew even more resentful about the whole thing, until one day the family came home to discover all of Fizza's things gone and a one word note on the dresser, `Goodbye'. The family grieved for a while, especially Jabril who loved Fizza dearly despite the fact that she apparently couldn't love him enough to stay, but eventually life moved on for them all and they started to look towards the future.

 

Growing up, Miroku was a rather happy child, despite his mother walking out on the family. He made friends with everyone who he felt was worth being friends with, regardless off what rank they came from. But his best friend was always none other than Prince Inuyasha, the very one he was to one day become Spiritual Advisor to. The two boys had always been very different, even from the very start. Miroku was more happy-go-lucky, with a calm and thoughtful nature. Inuyasha on the other hand was more serious, with a vicious temper which was easy to set off and a habit of leaping before he looked. That said, the two boys were always together growing up, and would do almost anything for the other. Whenever one was in trouble, the other would inevitably turn up to help them out of it… well, try to help them out of it anyway, often they just seemed to make things worse.

 

Miroku grew up happy and healthy, for the most part, though when he hit thirteen and started seeing girls as more than cooty-carriers, things got a little complicated. Over night the boy became girl crazy and would chase every pretty girl he saw, commenting on her body and asking her to bare his child. It was a habit that made many laugh and many furious, and made Jabril hang his head in shame and swear he didn't get it from him. Abdullah was of the mind that it was Fizza's abandonment and Miroku subsequent lack of female contact growing up after that that did this to him. Maybe he was right, maybe he wasn't. But whatever caused Miroku's lecherness growing up only seemed to get stronger as he became older, until both Jabril and Abdullah both despaired him ever settling down and having a family, although Miroku still maintained that if he ever met the right woman he could make it work. Maybe.

 

Anyway, back to Miroku and Inuyasha. The two remained close growing up. When Miroku's father started courting new women, and the relationships inevitably broke up due to Jabril's inability to forget Fizza, Inuyasha was the one Miroku told about it. When Sesshomaru or his mother put Inuyasha down and tried to make him feel worthless, Miroku was the one who was able to cheer him back up. When Inuyasha decided he wanted to be head of Inu's armed forces one day, Miroku was the first one Inuyasha told about his decision. When Miroku got in trouble for flirting with the wrong women, Inuyasha was the one to bail him out. When Sesshomaru realised how wrong he'd been about Inuyasha all those years and tried to re-establish a relationship with his brother, Miroku was the one who convinced Inuyasha it was okay to trust his brother again and let him try.

 

When Miroku was sixteen and Inuyasha fifteen, Miroku officially took over as the younger prince's Spiritual Advisor. Not much changed in their relationship, as even before then Miroku, having been raised by two Spiritual Advisors himself, couldn't help but act in this kind of role long before then anyway. Pretty much it was just a formalisation of the relationship the two already had. That, plus it gave them a chance to get away together for some fun without anyone bothering to question their motives or where they were going for a while.

 

A year later, on Inuyasha's sixteenth birthday, he received his first two concubines and moved into the harem. As you can imagine, Miroku was almost drooling with jealousy over this, and couldn't resist the urge to tease Inuyasha mercilessly over it. It seemed so unfair to Miroku back then, Inuyasha had always been so indifferent when it came to women, compared to him anyway, and he was the one with a harem? Not, him, Miroku, who had been worshiping the female form for years with very little to show for it? What was wrong with this picture? Miroku tried not to get too upset over the whole thing though. It was what was expected from of a Prince of Inu after all. Much faster than one would have expected, Miroku adjusted to the idea of Inuyasha having a harem, although he still couldn't resist the urge to tease him every now and then about it. But for the most part, everything was fine between the two boys again.

 

Then everything turned to crap in Miroku's eyes.

 

It wasn't anything big at first. It was just that Inuyasha seemed to take a certain liking to one of his concubines, which was fine. It was expected that Inuyasha would have his favourites in the harem after all. Then Inuyasha started wanting to take said concubine, Sango out with him on a couple of day trips, and he wanted Miroku to occasionally go with them. That was also fine with Miroku. It had seemed somewhat cruel to Miroku that the poor concubines were locked away from the rest of the world after all, so the days trips actually seemed like a good idea to Miroku and he didn't mind going along at all, it was actually pretty fun a lot of the time. Sango was a nice girl after all. When Miroku started to form a friendship with her, he actually thought this was more than fine, it was a good thing in his eyes. After all, the way he saw it, if his best friend was going to be surrounded by women vying for his attention - which even Miroku, lecher though he was, was smart enough to see was what harems usually were - he should at least have one or two truly nice girls in the mix, so the fact that someone like Sango was Inuyasha's concubine only seemed like a good thing for his friend.

 

No, everything was fine for a long time. Then Miroku started to find himself getting jealous of Inuyasha again, even more so than he had been at first. He also started having truly lustful dreams about Sango, something which he knew was completely forbidden. Miroku tried to hide it and pretended everything was fine, not wanting to loose his friendship over this, but for some reason the feelings just kept getting stronger. Miroku figured maybe it was just because he wasn't getting enough female attention himself, and so started flirting with ladies all the more in the hope that some random sex would drive out his sudden feelings of envy towards his best friend and lust towards said friend's concubine. Instead all it did was make it worse, as each time he fucked some other woman he found himself comparing her to Sango in his mind, with the other woman coming up less in his mind. Before long, Miroku found himself unable to take any woman because of this comparison, and he had no idea why.

 

Then one day it hit him right in face, with enough force to leave him stunned for the rest of the week. Without even realising it, he had somehow found himself falling in love with Sango. He had fallen in love with his best friend's concubine, with the favourite concubine of the younger prince of Inu. This was awful. So many years chasing girls who meant basically nothing to him, and when he finally fell in love for real it was with a girl he could never hope to have. Even without the laws of their land - which were by themselves a damn good deterrent against this kind of thing happening, what with the whole punishable by death thing - Sango was bonded to his best friend, the one who had always been there for him through the years. He couldn't hurt Inuyasha by inciting his own concubine to betray him like his heart wanted to. This couldn't get any worse. Or at least that was what he thought until that day when he happened to look into Sango's eyes and see within what he was sure was the same longing he himself felt, and in that moment realised that she was as much in love with him as she was with him. Then, he realised that it was in fact worse. He could almost convince himself that he would have to learn to deal with it when he thought his love was forbidden and unrequited. When he discovered that it was just forbidden, it changed from being just extremely painful to full on torture.

 

After that, Miroku had trouble going on like nothing had changed. He still loved Inuyasha like a brother, but the truth was part of him wanted to hate him for keeping Sango away from him. Every time Inuyasha would unknowing twist the knife in a bit more by mentioning him and Sango together, he would barely be able to resist the urge to punch him. Every night when Miroku went to bed, he couldn't help but wonder whether Inuyasha would take Sango that night. He found some comfort in the fact that he was sure that unlike many other men in their land, Inuyasha would never take his own pleasure and leave his partner unsatisfied, that he would do everything in his power to ensure that Sango enjoyed their time together too, but the idea still left a bitter taste in Miroku's mouth.

 

Many a night Miroku would look up at the sky and curse the very Gods he and his family had worshiped for so long, demanding to know if all of this was some kind of punishment for his earlier attitudes towards women. Other times he would quietly weep and beg the Gods for a chance to truly be with Sango, offering anything they asked if they would just make it so. Sometimes he managed to resign himself to his fate of loving a woman he could never have and simply asked the Gods to grant Sango a happy life, though these times were very rare.

 

When Kagome turned up and took Sango's place in Inuyasha's heart and head, Miroku rejoiced and thanked the Gods for this, as it took at least one heartache away from him. But still left another, even larger one in it place, as Miroku wondered if the day would ever come when he could truly with the woman he loved.