InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Home for the Holidays ❯ Best-Laid Plans ( Chapter 3 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: kokoro no miko 
Exactly where did Inu go, and what did he do there?
Anime/Manga: InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance / Angst | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.22.2011 | Pages: 2 | Words: 2.9K | Visits: 453 | Status: Work In Progress
Exactly where did Inu go, and what did he do there?
Anime/Manga: InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance / Angst | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.22.2011 | Pages: 2 | Words: 2.9K | Visits: 453 | Status: Work In Progress
Disclaimer: I don’t own Inu & Co., nor do I have any intention of infringing on the rights of the brilliant Rumiko Takahashi, et al.
A/N: For all of those who celebrate Yule, have a wonderful one. The Beatles said it best, “Here Comes the Sun!“
In a way, he was more than glad to pay the price, especially as it had allowed him to secure a few additional items for his planned evening. Even with the things that he had bought from the old youkai with the pain in his jaw, he would have to stop in a village on the way back to trade for a couple of other items.
Glancing into the west, he saw the sun begin to dip toward the horizon. Glaring at the rump of the creature below him, he growled faintly at the youkai that had chosen to accompany him. It had been a nerve-wracking wait while the old fart had rummaged through his stinking workshop before finally leading him out to their mode of transportation.
As always, the old youkai seemed totally unaware of the turmoil going on around him. Also as always, it was driving the young hanyou to distraction.
----------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
Perhaps it was fortunate that Kagome had had such a difficult time while trying to reach the village--she only awoke briefly a few times, staying conscious only long enough to consume a bowl of the restorative broth the elderly miko had made before returning to her healing sleep.
It was, Kaede thought to herself, going to be an interesting evening. Looking out of her door, she was enormously pleased, though not at all surprised, that the villagers were happily going along with the plan that had been explained to her by Miroku, Sango, and Shippou. While many of the village men labored to clear the gateway well of snow, it soon became clear that this would take days at the very least, more if another storm were to strike.
The village women had been working tirelessly since daybreak, each of them preparing their finest dishes for the planned festivities later that evening. Kaede herself was carefully roasting a chicken that the hanyou had brought to her before his departure. From the hints that the taijiya had been dropping, there was some significance to this particular meal in the girl’s world, and she would do all in her power to make sure that all went well.
Even the village children played a part. Shippou had parted with some of his precious supply of paper and crayons, and they were producing dozens of brightly-colored strips of paper that would be fastened into colorful chains. Some of the older children were using pieces of the colored paper to fashion origami cranes and flowers.
It was, the old miko thought to herself, going to be quite an evening.
--------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------
Inuyasha hated to admit it, but the old fart he had been traveling with did have some good ideas. Among them was the bag he held resting against his back as they traveled--no matter how much he put into it, it never grew full or got any heavier. It was certainly going to make things easier for him to carry out his plan.
The village at which he had stopped to trade had already been having a hard season. Youkai attacks had destroyed much of the villagers’ livestock, and had begun to pick off any of the humans who strayed too far from their homes. It had been quick work to dispatch the nest of snake youkai. When he also provided them with food in the form of a couple of deer and some fish from the nearby river as well as a few live goats and young boars, they had offered him anything in the village in their gratitude.
Realizing that they had little enough as it was, he only accepted a few items, and nothing that would create more hunger. Since the village was noted primarily for the quality of their woven fabrics, he quickly selected several bolts of the warmest materials he could find as well as one of a fine white silk. With the addition of a few household items, a large ceramic bowl, and a jug of sake, he was on his way.
Pausing only to hunt as he neared his destination, he carefully wrapped the cleaned carcasses of the animals in their skins before placing them into the bag along with the rest of his treasures--except for the small bundle of bright blue silk he kept inside his haori next to his skin.
------------------------------------------------------------ ----------------------------------------------------------------
K aede had stopped allowing the young miko to drink the broth she had made early in the afternoon. In her opinion, the girl had slept for long enough, and she had been requested to see to it that she was awake by nightfall. Still, it pained her to watch the normally smiling girl as she stared at the floor, radiating a pain that was almost a physical thing.
“What troubles you, child?”
Looking up at the old miko, Kagome forced a smile that would never have convinced anyone who knew her. “I know I’m just being silly, but I had such hopes for tonight. I wanted….” Her voice trailed off as she realized that it probably wasn’t the best idea to talk about exactly what she had been hoping for.
“It’s no one’s fault, child. This was a natural storm, and the men from the village will be able to have the well cleared in a day or two. I’m sure your family will wait to hold their celebration until you can return to them.”
“That’s not it,” she blurted out, then flushed red and looked down at the floor once again.
Though she was an old woman who had never married, Kaede had seen that very look on hundreds of young girls over the years. “The others will be along for dinner soon,” she said, silently praying that the hanyou knew what he was doing.
----------------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------
Though she was by no means fully recovered from her close call in the snowy forest, Kagome leaped to her feet as well as she was able at the sounds of a disturbance out in the village. Though she would not have chosen it for herself, she found that she was warmly dressed in a spare set of Kaede’s miko robes--apparently, the unfamiliar fastenings of her own clothing had proven too much of an impediment in the necessary task of keeping her from being further chilled. Wrapping a thick blanket around herself, she walked carefully to the door, heedless of the residual pain in her feet.
Pulling back the woven mat that served as a door, she stared in pure disbelief at the sight before her.
Most of the population of the small village was present in the open area in the middle of the grouping of structures. Drawing back as the tiny figure began to descend into their midst, the villagers seemed to accept the bizarre sight before them with a certain degree of tranquility: they had certainly had the opportunity to grow accustomed to strange sights in recent months.
As the figure drew nearer, certain details began to appear. The animal was fairly large, brown in color, and had some kind of protrusions growing from its head. The real surprise, however, lay in the smaller figure colored a brilliant scarlet and white that sat upon its back.
The scene took on a surreal air as the animal lightly touched down, revealing itself as Toutousai’s three-eyed youkai bull, the hanyou sitting casually on his back carrying a large sack. With a sort of detached sense of wonder, the young woman recognized the spindly form of the ancient youkai smith half-hidden behind the young inuhanyou.
‘Could this be the start of the Santa Claus legend?’ she thought, realizing full well that the legend in question already existed in Europe. Still, the red-clad figure distributing gifts of food and lengths of fabric that could be fashioned into warm winter clothing to the villagers, accompanied as he was by the elfin-eared youkai and his flying bull brought a hint of a smile to the girl from the distant future. Obviously, she thought, she hadn’t fully recovered--the idea of the often surly hanyou in the role of Santa Claus was just too ridiculous to contemplate.
Still, it was true that he had always done a little something behind the scenes to benefit the inhabitants of the human village that he had come to think of as the center of his territory--destroying hostile youkai that threatened, cutting firewood, or hunting for food. Shaking her head to rid herself of the warped images, she moved forward a few steps, realizing that in fact the villagers were bowing in thanks and offering small tokens of their own in return.
When the last of the crowd finally dispersed, the hanyou turned to focus on the human girl standing on the steps leading into the village miko’s hut. Piercing amber eyes glowing in the semi-darkness, ears up and forward on full alert, nose twitching furiously in an effort to determine just how well the little miko had recovered, he stepped forward, grabbing her and throwing her over his shoulder with a glance at the old woman standing behind her.
The last thing she heard before being whisked away was the voice of the elderly miko whispering, “All is prepared as you asked.”
---------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------
As the youkai smith and his bull rose from the middle of the village and returned to their home in the active volcanoes well away from any human habitations, Kagome realized that she was once again being set carefully down on her feet. Watching in silence as her companion pushed open the mat and gestured for her to enter what she had always thought to be an abandoned hut on the far side of the village, she nodded wordlessly and entered. Truth be told, his odd behavior was starting to worry her: he hadn’t cursed at her, or called her “wench,” or “bitch” since his return from wherever he had gone earlier.
Her anxiety grew as she recognized his behavior as similar to that after she had seen him promise his protection to Kikyou, when he had made a difficult decision and would not be swayed from it. The sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach grew as she realized that her sleeping bag had been set out near the brightly crackling fire pit and that her monstrosity of a bag rested casually in one corner of the room. Was she being ejected from the group for some reason she didn’t understand?
Following the hanyou’s curt gesture, she moved to the sleeping bag, sitting on the thick surface in silence as the hanyou moved about the hut, locating a few lamps that he then proceeded to light from the central fire. Finally, removing a large leaf from his haori, he stepped into a shadowed corner of the hut and placed it at the top of a large dark form that her human eyes simply couldn’t discern in the level of available light.
Instantly, the darkened corner of the room came alive with sparkling fireflies in shades of blue, green, red, white, silver, and gold. As per the spell placed on the leaf, the lights remained clustered around what was revealed to be a fair-sized tree parked at the very edge of the firelight. Moving closer in wonder, she could see that the fragrant pine was liberally festooned with chains of brightly-colored paper loops and masses of origami cranes, butterflies, and flowers.
“What on--”
Noticing that the hanyou had returned to the fireside and was now opening a covered pot, releasing the succulent odors of roast chicken, she followed, sitting as close to him as she dared while he pulled many of the food items he had received from the villagers from the large bag he carried.
“I know you wanted to be back with your family for this festival. There just wasn’t enough time to get the well cleared, so I asked the others about the customs. The whole village helped.”
Suddenly remembering what she had told the rest of their group about the holiday, she blushed furiously and asked, “What exactly did they tell you?”
He shrugged, dividing the chicken into the two waiting bowls and handing her one. “It was Shippou who told me about Sandy Claws. I couldn’t find any of those ‘rain deer’ youkai you told him about, so I had to settle for Toutousai’s bull. Miroku told me that it was an important day for friends and family, so that’s why you wanted to go home so bad. Sango was the most help--she told me why it was so important for young wenches like you.” He shook his head, not wanting her to misunderstand. “Hell, I know this isn’t what you wanted for tonight, but there’s no way we could manage to get you to whoever you wanted to be with, so--”
His voice cut off instantly at the sudden surge of irritation he could feel coming off her in waves. “Baka,” she snarled in a very respectable imitation of an annoyed inuhanyou. “You couldn’t have sent me back to who I wanted to be with tonight, because he isn’t back there.”
Hope surged briefly in the young hanyou, causing an unfamiliar but not unwelcome fluttering sensation in his chest and stomach. “It’s not that damn pervert, is it?” Though his words were jealous, his tone was light, almost teasing. “I’d hate to have to kill him, because then Sango would come after me, and Hiraikotsu hurts.”
Looking down at the hands moving aimlessly in her lap, she whispered, “No, it’s not Miroku.”
Realizing suddenly that this was just as hard for her as it was for him, the hanyou stood and paced briefly across the floor, having reached the inescapable but unpalatable decision that it would be up to him to speak. Dropping back to the sleeping bag next to her, he said softly, “Hell, I know that. I’ve known it for a long time, at least since we met Jinenji. Not that I understand why in hell you would want to be around me half the time, but the truth of the matter is that there’s no place I’d rather be right now.”
Not wanting to scare him off with any potentially embarrassing show of strong emotion, she nodded slowly. There were a lot of questions she wanted to ask, mostly about some of his actions in the past, but decided that this was perhaps not the best time to do so. Looking around, she asked, “How did you manage all this?”
Understanding that she was using the seemingly unrelated question to give herself time to process what he had said, he shrugged. “Lots of help,” he said. “I found the tree, but the pups in the village made the decorations, and Shippou enchanted the leaf to make the lights. The villagers are always offering me stuff in return for the meat and firewood I bring them--that’s where I got the chicken and most of the stuff here. Kaede-babaa cooked the chicken for me after Sango told me that it’s a traditional food in your time. In fact,” he said, gesturing at the meal in question, “Maybe we should eat the thing before it gets cold…”
She smiled as they dug into the food. There would be plenty of time to talk after the meal, and she was thrilled that they had made more progress in the past few minutes than they had in the whole two years they had been traveling together.
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A/N: For all of those who celebrate Yule, have a wonderful one. The Beatles said it best, “Here Comes the Sun!“
3. Best-Laid Plans
The hanyou sat stiffly upon the broad surface that sailed placidly through the air, rubbing at his aching jaws. He should, he realized, have known that the ancient youkai would have demanded a price for his assistance, but he decided that it would be more than worth it if it could ease some of the pain that Kagome would be feeling at the revelation that she would be unable to be with her friends and family in her world on this special night.In a way, he was more than glad to pay the price, especially as it had allowed him to secure a few additional items for his planned evening. Even with the things that he had bought from the old youkai with the pain in his jaw, he would have to stop in a village on the way back to trade for a couple of other items.
Glancing into the west, he saw the sun begin to dip toward the horizon. Glaring at the rump of the creature below him, he growled faintly at the youkai that had chosen to accompany him. It had been a nerve-wracking wait while the old fart had rummaged through his stinking workshop before finally leading him out to their mode of transportation.
As always, the old youkai seemed totally unaware of the turmoil going on around him. Also as always, it was driving the young hanyou to distraction.
----------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
Perhaps it was fortunate that Kagome had had such a difficult time while trying to reach the village--she only awoke briefly a few times, staying conscious only long enough to consume a bowl of the restorative broth the elderly miko had made before returning to her healing sleep.
It was, Kaede thought to herself, going to be an interesting evening. Looking out of her door, she was enormously pleased, though not at all surprised, that the villagers were happily going along with the plan that had been explained to her by Miroku, Sango, and Shippou. While many of the village men labored to clear the gateway well of snow, it soon became clear that this would take days at the very least, more if another storm were to strike.
The village women had been working tirelessly since daybreak, each of them preparing their finest dishes for the planned festivities later that evening. Kaede herself was carefully roasting a chicken that the hanyou had brought to her before his departure. From the hints that the taijiya had been dropping, there was some significance to this particular meal in the girl’s world, and she would do all in her power to make sure that all went well.
Even the village children played a part. Shippou had parted with some of his precious supply of paper and crayons, and they were producing dozens of brightly-colored strips of paper that would be fastened into colorful chains. Some of the older children were using pieces of the colored paper to fashion origami cranes and flowers.
It was, the old miko thought to herself, going to be quite an evening.
--------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------
Inuyasha hated to admit it, but the old fart he had been traveling with did have some good ideas. Among them was the bag he held resting against his back as they traveled--no matter how much he put into it, it never grew full or got any heavier. It was certainly going to make things easier for him to carry out his plan.
The village at which he had stopped to trade had already been having a hard season. Youkai attacks had destroyed much of the villagers’ livestock, and had begun to pick off any of the humans who strayed too far from their homes. It had been quick work to dispatch the nest of snake youkai. When he also provided them with food in the form of a couple of deer and some fish from the nearby river as well as a few live goats and young boars, they had offered him anything in the village in their gratitude.
Realizing that they had little enough as it was, he only accepted a few items, and nothing that would create more hunger. Since the village was noted primarily for the quality of their woven fabrics, he quickly selected several bolts of the warmest materials he could find as well as one of a fine white silk. With the addition of a few household items, a large ceramic bowl, and a jug of sake, he was on his way.
Pausing only to hunt as he neared his destination, he carefully wrapped the cleaned carcasses of the animals in their skins before placing them into the bag along with the rest of his treasures--except for the small bundle of bright blue silk he kept inside his haori next to his skin.
------------------------------------------------------------ ----------------------------------------------------------------
K aede had stopped allowing the young miko to drink the broth she had made early in the afternoon. In her opinion, the girl had slept for long enough, and she had been requested to see to it that she was awake by nightfall. Still, it pained her to watch the normally smiling girl as she stared at the floor, radiating a pain that was almost a physical thing.
“What troubles you, child?”
Looking up at the old miko, Kagome forced a smile that would never have convinced anyone who knew her. “I know I’m just being silly, but I had such hopes for tonight. I wanted….” Her voice trailed off as she realized that it probably wasn’t the best idea to talk about exactly what she had been hoping for.
“It’s no one’s fault, child. This was a natural storm, and the men from the village will be able to have the well cleared in a day or two. I’m sure your family will wait to hold their celebration until you can return to them.”
“That’s not it,” she blurted out, then flushed red and looked down at the floor once again.
Though she was an old woman who had never married, Kaede had seen that very look on hundreds of young girls over the years. “The others will be along for dinner soon,” she said, silently praying that the hanyou knew what he was doing.
----------------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------
Though she was by no means fully recovered from her close call in the snowy forest, Kagome leaped to her feet as well as she was able at the sounds of a disturbance out in the village. Though she would not have chosen it for herself, she found that she was warmly dressed in a spare set of Kaede’s miko robes--apparently, the unfamiliar fastenings of her own clothing had proven too much of an impediment in the necessary task of keeping her from being further chilled. Wrapping a thick blanket around herself, she walked carefully to the door, heedless of the residual pain in her feet.
Pulling back the woven mat that served as a door, she stared in pure disbelief at the sight before her.
Most of the population of the small village was present in the open area in the middle of the grouping of structures. Drawing back as the tiny figure began to descend into their midst, the villagers seemed to accept the bizarre sight before them with a certain degree of tranquility: they had certainly had the opportunity to grow accustomed to strange sights in recent months.
As the figure drew nearer, certain details began to appear. The animal was fairly large, brown in color, and had some kind of protrusions growing from its head. The real surprise, however, lay in the smaller figure colored a brilliant scarlet and white that sat upon its back.
The scene took on a surreal air as the animal lightly touched down, revealing itself as Toutousai’s three-eyed youkai bull, the hanyou sitting casually on his back carrying a large sack. With a sort of detached sense of wonder, the young woman recognized the spindly form of the ancient youkai smith half-hidden behind the young inuhanyou.
‘Could this be the start of the Santa Claus legend?’ she thought, realizing full well that the legend in question already existed in Europe. Still, the red-clad figure distributing gifts of food and lengths of fabric that could be fashioned into warm winter clothing to the villagers, accompanied as he was by the elfin-eared youkai and his flying bull brought a hint of a smile to the girl from the distant future. Obviously, she thought, she hadn’t fully recovered--the idea of the often surly hanyou in the role of Santa Claus was just too ridiculous to contemplate.
Still, it was true that he had always done a little something behind the scenes to benefit the inhabitants of the human village that he had come to think of as the center of his territory--destroying hostile youkai that threatened, cutting firewood, or hunting for food. Shaking her head to rid herself of the warped images, she moved forward a few steps, realizing that in fact the villagers were bowing in thanks and offering small tokens of their own in return.
When the last of the crowd finally dispersed, the hanyou turned to focus on the human girl standing on the steps leading into the village miko’s hut. Piercing amber eyes glowing in the semi-darkness, ears up and forward on full alert, nose twitching furiously in an effort to determine just how well the little miko had recovered, he stepped forward, grabbing her and throwing her over his shoulder with a glance at the old woman standing behind her.
The last thing she heard before being whisked away was the voice of the elderly miko whispering, “All is prepared as you asked.”
---------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------
As the youkai smith and his bull rose from the middle of the village and returned to their home in the active volcanoes well away from any human habitations, Kagome realized that she was once again being set carefully down on her feet. Watching in silence as her companion pushed open the mat and gestured for her to enter what she had always thought to be an abandoned hut on the far side of the village, she nodded wordlessly and entered. Truth be told, his odd behavior was starting to worry her: he hadn’t cursed at her, or called her “wench,” or “bitch” since his return from wherever he had gone earlier.
Her anxiety grew as she recognized his behavior as similar to that after she had seen him promise his protection to Kikyou, when he had made a difficult decision and would not be swayed from it. The sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach grew as she realized that her sleeping bag had been set out near the brightly crackling fire pit and that her monstrosity of a bag rested casually in one corner of the room. Was she being ejected from the group for some reason she didn’t understand?
Following the hanyou’s curt gesture, she moved to the sleeping bag, sitting on the thick surface in silence as the hanyou moved about the hut, locating a few lamps that he then proceeded to light from the central fire. Finally, removing a large leaf from his haori, he stepped into a shadowed corner of the hut and placed it at the top of a large dark form that her human eyes simply couldn’t discern in the level of available light.
Instantly, the darkened corner of the room came alive with sparkling fireflies in shades of blue, green, red, white, silver, and gold. As per the spell placed on the leaf, the lights remained clustered around what was revealed to be a fair-sized tree parked at the very edge of the firelight. Moving closer in wonder, she could see that the fragrant pine was liberally festooned with chains of brightly-colored paper loops and masses of origami cranes, butterflies, and flowers.
“What on--”
Noticing that the hanyou had returned to the fireside and was now opening a covered pot, releasing the succulent odors of roast chicken, she followed, sitting as close to him as she dared while he pulled many of the food items he had received from the villagers from the large bag he carried.
“I know you wanted to be back with your family for this festival. There just wasn’t enough time to get the well cleared, so I asked the others about the customs. The whole village helped.”
Suddenly remembering what she had told the rest of their group about the holiday, she blushed furiously and asked, “What exactly did they tell you?”
He shrugged, dividing the chicken into the two waiting bowls and handing her one. “It was Shippou who told me about Sandy Claws. I couldn’t find any of those ‘rain deer’ youkai you told him about, so I had to settle for Toutousai’s bull. Miroku told me that it was an important day for friends and family, so that’s why you wanted to go home so bad. Sango was the most help--she told me why it was so important for young wenches like you.” He shook his head, not wanting her to misunderstand. “Hell, I know this isn’t what you wanted for tonight, but there’s no way we could manage to get you to whoever you wanted to be with, so--”
His voice cut off instantly at the sudden surge of irritation he could feel coming off her in waves. “Baka,” she snarled in a very respectable imitation of an annoyed inuhanyou. “You couldn’t have sent me back to who I wanted to be with tonight, because he isn’t back there.”
Hope surged briefly in the young hanyou, causing an unfamiliar but not unwelcome fluttering sensation in his chest and stomach. “It’s not that damn pervert, is it?” Though his words were jealous, his tone was light, almost teasing. “I’d hate to have to kill him, because then Sango would come after me, and Hiraikotsu hurts.”
Looking down at the hands moving aimlessly in her lap, she whispered, “No, it’s not Miroku.”
Realizing suddenly that this was just as hard for her as it was for him, the hanyou stood and paced briefly across the floor, having reached the inescapable but unpalatable decision that it would be up to him to speak. Dropping back to the sleeping bag next to her, he said softly, “Hell, I know that. I’ve known it for a long time, at least since we met Jinenji. Not that I understand why in hell you would want to be around me half the time, but the truth of the matter is that there’s no place I’d rather be right now.”
Not wanting to scare him off with any potentially embarrassing show of strong emotion, she nodded slowly. There were a lot of questions she wanted to ask, mostly about some of his actions in the past, but decided that this was perhaps not the best time to do so. Looking around, she asked, “How did you manage all this?”
Understanding that she was using the seemingly unrelated question to give herself time to process what he had said, he shrugged. “Lots of help,” he said. “I found the tree, but the pups in the village made the decorations, and Shippou enchanted the leaf to make the lights. The villagers are always offering me stuff in return for the meat and firewood I bring them--that’s where I got the chicken and most of the stuff here. Kaede-babaa cooked the chicken for me after Sango told me that it’s a traditional food in your time. In fact,” he said, gesturing at the meal in question, “Maybe we should eat the thing before it gets cold…”
She smiled as they dug into the food. There would be plenty of time to talk after the meal, and she was thrilled that they had made more progress in the past few minutes than they had in the whole two years they had been traveling together.
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