InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Metamorphosis. ❯ Coming to Terms ( Chapter 13 )

~~Chapter 13~~

~Coming to Terms~

 

“Couldn't you have just caught them a rabbit or something?”

 

Kagome rolled her eyes as she leaned against Goshinboku. “And the rabbit would take the place of a baby?”

 

“Keh. It'd make less noise,” he countered from around the other side of the tree.

 

“Spoken like a true baka.”

 

“Maybe.” He sighed. “I don't understand. How can you say it ain't your pup?”

 

Kagome sighed, too. “Well, it isn't, not really . . . I mean, it's Sango and Miroku's.”

 

“Well, Sango's, at least. I may have to kill that fucking Miroku.”

 

“Why Miroku? For your information, we had to talk him into it.”

 

“'Course you did. He's a man. It's you women that have the fucked-up ideas.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Well, Kagome, you gotta admit, this is not one of your best plans.”

 

She sighed. “I think it is.”

 

InuYasha snorted. “We're talking the same brain that allowed Ichisaru to steal the jewel out from under your nose, remember?”

 

“That was completely different.”

 

“Keh.”

 

“It was . . . Ichisaru tricked me.”

 

She didn't have to see his face to know he was rolling his eyes. “Kagome . . .”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“Are you sure? That you can give up your pup?”

 

She sighed again. “I'm sure, and I told you, it isn't really mine.”

 

“Yeah, but . . . you get attached to everything. Take Shippou, for example . . .”

 

“Shippou is completely different.”

 

“Keh.”

 

“Did you find what you were looking for on your trip?” she asked to change the topic.

 

InuYasha wrinkled his nose. “Not that I don't know you're just trying to change the subject, but sort of.”

 

“What were you looking for?”

 

Thinking about that cave was enough to make InuYasha scowl. “Just something.”

 

“InuYasha? I thought you said that I'm supposed to tell you things, even if you don't want to hear them.”

 

He grimaced at the reminder of the first thing he'd said to her this morning. “You are. I don't get stupid ideas.”

 

Her answer was a pronounced snort. “So trying to block the well with a boulder wasn't a stupid idea? Shoving a tree down the well to keep me here wasn't a stupid idea? Kaze no Kizu'ing the school auditorium wasn't a—”

 

“Damn, wench, beat a dead horse, why don't you . . . ?”

 

“I rest my case. Now tell me what sort of answers you were looking for.”

 

“Hey, you two. How about a snack?”

 

InuYasha peeked around the tree trunk to see Mrs. Higurashi approaching with a tray of food. Eyes bulging out at the sheer amount heaped on the platters, he snorted. “Snack?” he echoed as he reached for a cup of instant ramen.

 

“Well, I wasn't sure what Kagome might like, so I made a little bit of everything, though, darling, I'd prefer if you didn't eat the ramen. Very little nutritional value, you know.”

 

“Thanks, Mama,” Kagome managed as she stared at the copious amounts of food. She swallowed hard.

 

“You're welcome,” Mrs. Higurashi said with her gentle smile in place. “InuYasha? Will you be a dear and make sure that Kagome eats something?”

 

“Keh.” Rolling over onto his side to prop his head on his hand and shooting Kagome an entirely too-smug grin, InuYasha set his cup on the ground and used his other hand to feed himself as Mrs. Higurashi disappeared back into the shrine. “Hear that, wench? You gotta do whatever I say.”

 

She narrowed her eyes and wrinkled her nose. “I don't. She just said that I was supposed to eat something, not that I had to do whatever you said.”

 

“Same thing.”

 

“Not hardly!”

 

“Keh! When I leave you to your own devices, you always get in over your head, wench. Maybe you ought to listen to me more often, don't you think?”

 

Kagome rolled her eyes. “Dream on, dog-boy.”

 

InuYasha fell silent as he polished off the rest of his ramen. Staring down at his haori, he couldn't help but feel a strange sense that something was missing as he gazed where his kotodama rosary used to be. He didn't really miss the beads so much as he missed the significance of the visual reminder, the physical embodiment of the promise he'd made to protect her, and while removing the rosary didn't change the fact that he was still honor-bound to do that, it did remind him, too, that other than that promise, there wasn't a damn thing binding her to him . . . and that was something he didn't like, at all. “Oi, wench. What did you do with my beads?”

 

Kagome peeked over the rice ball she was nibbling to blink at him curiously. “Beads? What beads?”

 

He snorted. “Keh! My rosary! What did you do with it?”

 

She shrugged. “I have it. Why?”

 

He held out his hand and wiggled his fingers. “Give it.”

 

Raising one of her eyebrows as she continued to eye him dubiously, Kagome slowly shook her head. “I . . . don't think so.”

 

“Why the hell not?”

 

“You don't need them. I don't need them.” She shifted, drawing her legs up beside her as she set the rice ball down and shrugged, as though it were all so simple. “I'd rather know that you're with me because you want to be, not because I can say `it'.”

 

InuYasha digested that as he reached over and swiped up her rice ball. She didn't comment but did smile as he took a huge bite out of it. “Fair enough,” he intoned around a mouthful of rice. “Jus' keep it, `case you need it, `kay?”

 

She grimaced at his deplorable lack of viable manners. “Ugh, InuYasha . . .”

 

He swallowed his huge mouthful and stuffed in the rest of the rice ball. “So `fess up. Where did Sango and that fucking pervert go?”

 

Kagome shook her head. “I'm not saying, and you're not really going to attack Miroku or anything, are you?”

 

“Hells, yes,” he grumbled, “and don't try to stop me; it's the principle of the thing.”

 

“The principle of what thing?”

 

He felt his cheeks heat up under her scrutiny and stubbornly shook his head. “Nothing. It just . . . he never should have . . . Damn it.”

 

“InuYasha?”

 

He sighed. “What?”

 

“I'm sorry . . . I should have told you.”

 

“Would it have changed your mind? That I don't like it?”

 

She winced. “Uh . . . no.”

 

He nodded. “I didn't think so.”

 

Popping open a bottle of apple juice, Kagome sighed softly.

 

“Kagome?”

 

She turned her head to gaze at him as she lowered the bottle and waited.

 

“Just . . . the one pup, right?”

 

She smiled slowly and nodded. InuYasha sighed.

 

 

::0::0::000::0::0::

 

 

`Foul things are rising . . .'

 

Staring out over the lands with a narrowed gaze as the early morning breeze whipped through his long silver locks, Sesshoumaru could feel the tension rising off the land. An evil aura, a whisper in the darkness, a vapid pall of something wicked . . .

 

Stealing through the land with a silence that was tainted, he could feel the presence of evil, the malignant stench of something vile . . .

 

`What manner of thing would dare intrude here? A fool's wish for death?'

 

A wan smile, no more than the turning of the corners of his lips though the emotion did not reach his cold stare surfaced on the tai-youkai's face. `So be it. Let them come.'

 

“Sesshoumaru-sama!”

 

He heard the imp calling his name. He didn't bother to turn. Jaken always knew that Sesshoumaru could hear him.

 

“Sesshoumaru-sama!” the imp gasped as he skidded to a halt beside his lord. “Pardon me, Sesshoumaru-sama! They've taken Rin!”

 

No outward change in expression came, no twitching of his jaw, no tell-tale signs of any real anger. “Who, Jaken?”

 

“I don't know, my lord! Hideous beasts, half-man, half . . . other. Impossible to tell, and they reeked of decaying flesh.”

 

Sesshoumaru turned on his heel, lifting his face to smell the air. Heading off toward the south, Sesshoumaru stalked off leaving the imp behind to catch up.

 

“I tried to stop them, my lord!” Jaken blubbered, wringing his hands as he scurried along beside Sesshoumaru, taking four strides for every one of the tai-youkai's. “They have a dust . . . it rendered the Staff of Skulls useless!”

 

“Enough, Jaken.”

 

Jaken swallowed hard, seeing the unmistakable signs of his master's fierce rage surfacing at last. The burn in his amber eyes, the shifting in his stance, the crackling of his claws as he flexed his fingers . . .

 

“Jaken . . . if Rin is harmed in any way, I will hold you personally responsible.”

 

A huge sweat drop rolled down the imp's green face. “Aye, my lord!” he squeaked as he hurried along in Sesshoumaru's wake.

 

 

::0::0::000::0::0::

 

 

“Kiss me.”

 

“ . . . I . . .”

 

“Don't think, just do it.”

 

“ . . . But . . .”

 

“InuYasha . . . don't you want to?”

 

“Kagome . . .”

 

“Then just do it. Kiss me.”

 

“You're carrying—”

 

“Fine, then I'll kiss you.”

 

Rising out of the water, naked to the hips that disappeared from view under the ebbing current, Kagome reached for him. Sitting on the rock watching over her as she bathed, InuYasha never had the strength to resist her, couldn't ignore her, didn't really want to. Wet hands slipping into his hair, she pulled herself up as he wrapped his arms around her, as he accepted the passion behind her mouth, as he dragged her closer to his body.

 

Bathed in moonlight, her body was veiled only by dark shadows, glimmering planes, droplets of water like diamonds on her skin. She pulled him into the water, shoved aside his haori, his shirt, forcing him back against the rocks, she trapped him with her body, hands running up and down his chest, fingernails scratching over him as her heated mouth scorched him, as he gasped her name. Every part of her called to him, tugged at him, as though her body was able to speak to his, as though nothing mattered but the moment, the time, the tide of ignited passion.

 

“I want you,” she whispered, hands rubbing against him through his hakama. “Please . . .”

 

“K-Ka-go-me,” he rasped out, unable to think as she touched him. She'd managed to slip her hands into his hakama. His body reacted to her touch. Fire. Intense, burning, unyielding fire . . . Shuddering under her fingers, powerless to stop her, terrified yet accepting, something . . .

 

Something . . .

 

“ . . . Something wrong?”

 

InuYasha jerked awake, eyes flying open as his gaze lit on Kagome's worried face. Gently, she reached out to push his bangs out of his face. He shied away from her, unable to bear having her touch him. If she did, he'd combust. Shifting his position where he sat beside her window, he could only be thankful that the room was pitch dark and that she certainly couldn't tell what was going on with his out of control body.

 

“I'm fine,” he managed, his tone a little gruffer than he'd have liked. Under the circumstances, it really couldn't be helped. He winced as she quickly pulled her hand away from his face.

 

“Are you sure? You were moaning, and you said my name . . .”

 

“Uh . . . I said I was fine, didn't I?”

 

Kagome sighed. “All right,” she finally agreed but hesitated before she stood up and returned to her bed.

 

InuYasha glared into the darkness. Those dreams . . .

 

He was pretty sure that the only reason he hadn't had one of those the night before was because he was too exhausted. For that matter, he might have had one, anyway, and just didn't remember. He sighed. He couldn't trust himself anywhere near her. He couldn't stand the idea of leaving her, either. He shook his head. There really wasn't any way he could win . . .

 

The other immediate problem was that his body, embarrassed or not at having been caught during one of those dreams—at least this time he hadn't stripped off any clothes—-wasn't relaxing at all. In fact, being fully conscious and remaining this close to her was playing hell on his nerves. He could smell her, and every time she shifted even the tiniest bit, the assault on his senses was absolute torture.

 

Still, something about those dreams seemed weird, unnatural. There was a strange undercurrent in Kagome's actions, almost a desperation that he didn't understand. Her boldness in his dreams scared him, shocked him, her abandon was too complete. Separating the Kagome he knew from the one in the night was becoming harder and harder to do. `What the hell is happening to me?'

 

“InuYasha?” she whispered as she leaned up on her elbow.

 

“What?”

 

“Are you comfortable there? I can scoot over . . .”

 

“Keh. I don't fucking think so, wench. Go back to sleep.”

 

“ . . . Okay.”

 

He heard her lie back down, felt the shifting in her aura as she rolled over, smashing her face into her pillow. It was a long time before he could tell that she was asleep.

 

He sighed as he realized just how his words had probably sounded to her. `That's not what I meant,' he thought with a wince. `I didn't mean I didn't want to . . . I just meant . . . I don't dare . . .'

 

His body still hurt, and with her so close, he had a feeling that it would be a long time before that went away. InuYasha sighed. `Doomed,' he thought with a shake of his head. `Fucking doomed . . .'

 

 

 

~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~ *~=~*~=~*~=~*~=~

A/N:

== == == == == == == == == ==

Final Thought from Kagome:

InuYasha . . . Will you listen to me now?

==========

Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Metamorphosis): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.

 

~Sue~