InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Interludes ❯ We Are Still Confused ( Chapter 5 )

Chapter 5 - WE ARE STILL CONFUSED

(Vol. 13, Scroll 5: Death Wish)

 

Kagome

 

“Don't tell me Kikyo tried to hurt you too?” InuYasha was looking like he didn't really want to know the answer to that question. I didn't say anything.

 

I had come to save her from Naraku, had actually destroyed Naraku's monkey-puppet holding her, but she'd turned on me. She hadn't actually hurt me, although she had violently taken the jewel shard from my neck, which still ached where the chain had broken, and she had told her demon soul skimmers to drop me towards the bubbling ichor below. I felt like a real idiot, thinking back on all this. I should probably have told him everything, answering his question whether he wanted to know it or not, but somehow that didn't feel right. I didn't trust my reasons for wanting to tell him the truth, and so I resisted my desire to try to make him hate her. It felt too much like tattling. His determination to find her and help her was touching, even though it made me jealous. I didn't want him to see me being so mean.

 

I remembered seeing his face tensed and helpless as we watched Naraku carry Kikyo's limp form away only yesterday. Suddenly, an impulse hit me. I realized what that expression on his face probably meant, and I just had to know. “InuYasha, you still love Kikyo, don't you?”

 

His face went blank, and I knew I was right. I felt like I could hear his heart skip a beat, but I think it was really my own. My shoulders slumped unconsciously as the truth sunk in. Two betrayals, one by the woman I had come to save and the other by the boy who had saved me, was just too much for one afternoon. I sighed and started to turn away.

 

“You idiot!” InuYasha's face looked hurt and almost pleading, “it's because I thought about you that I'm here right now. This forest is poisoned with deadly illusions. I was almost trapped by …,” he looked away briefly, “by Naraku's spells. I was trapped by them until I remembered that you needed me.”

 

InuYasha reached down and grabbed my hand. He clenched it firmly in his fist and looked into my eyes. My heart skipped a beat again. “So would you please try to trust me a little bit more?”

 

Part of me realized he had managed to avoid answering my question about Kikyo, but the rest of me knew that he was generally so inept at hiding his feelings when was talking to me (as opposed to when he sulked), that he had to be telling the truth.

 

I held his hand between both of mine and squeezed it hard, taking its warmth and strength into me for support. I almost lost it and had to choke back a sob. “Oh, InuYasha! I was so scared! I think she tried to kill me. And I couldn't stop her from taking the jewel shard!”

 

He didn't really look surprised. His jaw tightened and his gaze turned inward. I'd lost him as he puzzled over what her actions meant, but he didn't let go of my hand. He seemed to need our contact as much as I did.

 

As we sat together lost in thought, her words came back to me as she looked down on my high wire act over the precipice, and I felt a wave of dread. It seems that Naraku also, sees you as the greatest threat, she had said it with no trace of emotion in her voice. Also!? She really had tried to kill me! I involuntarily squeezed InuYasha's hand, and he squeezed back.

 

Looking at InuYasha's face, his thoughts so far away, questing after her, the dread deepened. He had said he came here to save me, but already his heart was off after her again. If she really tried to hurt me, could he bring himself to stop her? Could he let himself hurt her, even if it was for me?

 

Shippo had told me about the time that Kikyo was brought back to life, when Kaede said my soul had been fully hers. InuYasha had had the chance to kill her then, to set her - our? - soul free to return to me. He couldn't do it. He couldn't see past her delicate face and flowing hair; even though it could have meant my soul was trapped in her body forever.

 

My heart sank and I let go of his hand. He might think I mattered to him, but I would never be as important to him as she was. Tears weren't far away. Damn him!

 

 

InuYasha

 

“You still love Kikyo, don't you?” Kagome's words stuck in my brain, searching for an answer. No. It wasn't love exactly. Maybe the remains of love, the spell of devotion yet unweaved, the bonds of duty. All powerful ties. But not really love.

 

Kagome's hand was still shaking as we sat together, each silently trying to puzzle out what Kikyo could be up to. I wasn't even sure that the priestess I'd seen standing over Kagome was real. Maybe she was part of Kagome's illusionary nightmare too. That didn't seem too probable - why would Kikyo be in Kagome's nightmare? Why would I be in Kagome's nightare? -- but I wasn't sure of anything at the moment. My heart still ached from the place Naraku's illusory Kikyo had stuck me with the arrow. It was just an illusion, but the pain had been real.

 

It scared me how easily I'd fallen back into the trance Kikyo had put me under when she had tried to drag me into the earth before. This time, it had just been the memory of her - with Naraku's spells helping out, that asshole - that brought a death wish into my heart. I felt a chill. Was I so vulnerable to her mere memory that I had almost thrown away my life twice in the past few months?

 

I felt Kagome squeeze my hand in hers. Almost as if she knew what I was feeling. I squeezed back. If the memory of Kikyo was enough to make me walk happily into hell, it was the presence of Kagome that could bring me just as happily back. Shit, that doesn't make any sense. I'm better than some yo-yo toy. What am I supposed to do here? How the hell can I get some control over this situation?

 

My thoughts turned back to what had happened between Kikyo and Kagome. Kikyo had to be real, I had smelled her dead body when I'd jumped the earths' rent to bring Kagome up out of danger. Kikyo's actions were more and more confusing. She had - at least for the time being - stopped trying to kill me, had saved me in fact from Naraku's poisonous imp. But now she had taken the jewel shard. Was she trying to kill Kagome? Why would she do that? What had happened between her and Naraku?

 

Thinking back on my old life with Kikyo, I had to be honest with myself. I'd been infatuated with her, had longed for her, had come to love her, but I had never truly known her heart. She was the Miko, the quiet one who knew more than most and was entrusted with great secrets she was not allowed to share. I never questioned her reserve, accepting it as normal, just as I expected her to accept my cool countenance and distrustful nature, bred from a lifetime of rejection. Thinking back on our mutual caution with each other, for the first time I realized how very little I knew about the woman I had thought I loved. And I knew even less about her now. Maybe she was capable of things I did not understand.

 

I had to find out. I had to know what the hell she was up to. Kikyo! When will this ever end?

 

Kagome sighed and dropped my hand. I looked at her face and was surprised to see tears brimming there. Now what?

 

 

Kikyo

 

Naraku reached out and grasped the half reconstituted shikon jewel shard, never taking his eyes off me. “I am he who fifty years ago made you seek your own death,” he chanced a quick glance at the shining object in his hand. “Knowing that, you would still …?”

 

“Feh.” I cut him off. I did not plan to stay in this fetid place of Naraku's. In the past weeks since learning of Naraku's existence, many things had become clear to me. I was here to set a trap with seeds of doubt and greed, nothing more. “That day my body perished. But now, animating this construct of others' flesh … I feel more alive than ever.” I stepped toward the door. I knew the spell I would use if he attempted to come after me. “I can now love and I can hate … my soul is freer than in its mortality.”

 

As I passed through the curtain and out of the room, I paused to make sure he was not coming after me. Calling my soul skimmers to explore the paths before and behind me, I left the castle as quickly as I could. As I had told Naraku I would, I headed to the temple, following the open road. Just before sunset, I walked off the road twenty paces, chose a large tree with large roots and erected a barrier.

 

I did not sleep, I had no need of rest as long as I had enough souls to sustain me, for I did not feel tired. I did not feel anything with my body, only with the ghost of my old heart, the one that carried the memories of my life. And a feeling heart without a feeling body was a dull thing indeed.

 

The only thing alive about my dead heart now was the throbbing hatred for you that was transforming itself into my plot against Naraku. I had guarded the jewel for so long. I knew its temptations, and I knew its power. I knew that it was most powerful when the bearer cared not for his own life. Or her life.

 

Midoriko had scarified her earthly existence to infuse that power into the jewel and only I knew how to use it with the same intensity. In the battle against Naraku when the jewel was complete, I would have the upper hand - even over you. For I was the only one among us all who knew life as the illusion of non-death, and I would bring you both with me out of this illusion. You and I would force Naraku out of earthly existence and trap his soul in the jewel where we two would guard it for eternity - together. My ghostly heart would be appeased, and the world would be cleansed of the betrayal and pain we three had born. It was clear to me now that my rebirth had only this one purpose.

 

Habit brought a deep sigh to my lips, ironic for one who did not breathe. Despite my protestations to Naraku, I did not feel more alive. Only more dead. One thing I told him had been the truth, I did feel freer in my new state. Free to set my own goal and pursue it, whether any other being agreed with me or cared for my task. Free not to have to explain myself. Free. And alone.

 

As they often did, my thoughts turned to you, for you were the center of my new existence and the thought of our reunion in death helped my shadowed heart remain content. You were the reason for my death and the reason for my “life.” You were there at my rebirth and would be with me at my last death. As I expected, you had not guessed my reason for taking the jewel from Kagome. Your look of shock when I told you I'd taken it was burning in my mind. You had looked … betrayed.

 

You would, of course, be wondering if I'd betrayed you … again. And when you found out that I had given the jewel to Naraku, you would feel certain of my betrayal. It was possible that Naraku would use the jewel's power to hunt you again. While it saddened me that I could not tell you of my plans - for their success rested in my secrecy, especially from that little witch, Kagome - a small bit of my lingering, irrational anger at you was satisfied.

 

I envisioned you standing before me, surrounded by that swirl of unique power that you brought up from your very soul to manifest in the world around your. I imagined you looking angry and then softening your gaze as you saw me.

 

Would you do that if you were here? Would you trust me today as you could not before?

 

My anger at you dissipated entirely with this thought. I could not worry about your trust for my plan to succeed. But I could warn you.

 

I am sorry, InuYasha.