InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Metamorphosis 2: Legacies ❯ Mysterious ( Chapter 7 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Jirou scowled as he watched Kiri disappear into the trees, unsure exactly what to make of the girl's hasty departure.  He didn't know why she had suddenly decided to take off, and he didn't know what he should do about it, either.

"Do you think she'll be okay?" Marisaiko asked, also staring into the direction that Kiri had gone.

"I don't know," he replied, crossing his arms over his chest.  "She said she would be."

Marisaiko didn't look convinced as she bit her lip and slowly, slowly shook her head.  "Then I guess . . ."

Drawing a deep breath, Jirou shrugged and turned back.  "Come on," he said, striding forward once more.

"You're not worried about her?"

Sparing the taijya a sidelong glance, only to find her frowning at the dirt under their feet, Jirou stifled a sigh.

It wasn't any of his business, was it?  If she wanted to take off alone, there wasn't much he could say or do about it, even if he wanted to, but even so, why should he?  "Nope," he replied without missing a step.

Marisaiko sighed, frowning unhappily at the dirt path.

Jirou said nothing, but he knew that look.  He'd seen it way too many times over the years.  Usually, it meant that she was considering doing something that would mean more work for Jirou.  This time, though, she didn't suggest anything, and he refused to open his mouth to ask her, especially since he already had a good idea, as to what she would say, anyway.

"She . . . She didn't leave because of me, did she . . .?" Kuro finally asked, breaking the silence that had fallen and grown.

"I doubt it," Jirou replied.  Then he stopped, turning to eye Kuro for a long moment.  "Where are you going to stay?"

Kuro blinked, as though Jirou's question made no sense to him.  "Well, I can stay anywhere, really.  I mean, I don't need a bed or anything.  I can make do."

Shaking his head as Kuro patted the bedroll he had slung behind his back.  "That's not what I meant," Jirou clarified, casting Marisaiko a surreptitious glance that she studiously avoided.  "No one's allowed into the village unless they've earned the right or are known to visit the taijya—and you are neither."

He looked duly perplexed for a minute.  Marisaiko sighed.  "Kiri was invited," she stated bluntly, though not unkindly.  "You . . . You weren't.  To be honest, I have no idea who you are or what you want."

"Well, I want you to be my—"

She waved her hands quickly to cut him off.  "I know that," she said, scowling at her overeager, would-be pupil.  "I'm not saying that I'll agree to any such thing, but why?  Why are you so desperate to learn how to fight?"

About fifty emotions seemed to flicker to life on the man's face, only to disappear before they could rightfully be discerned.  In the end, a weird sense of determination took its place.  "I just need to," he replied.  "I have lots of reasons, and none are more important than any of the others."

"I don't know if that's going to be enough to get you into the village," Jirou pointed out.  "Strictly speaking, taijya aren't 'fighters', per se.  They learn to kill youkai.  It's an art created to protect humans from beings that are stronger, tougher, more ruthless . .  . It isn't meant to be used to beat on other humans."

Kuro scowled at the ground, kicked his feet a few times in the dust.  There was something altogether miserable about the way he stood there, about the way he frowned at nothing in particular or at everything in general, and in it all was something vaguely familiar about it, too.  "I just want to learn how to defend myself," he muttered.  "That's all."

The rawness in Kuro's tone gave Jirou pause.  Somehow, there was a vulnerable truth in that statement—a truth that Jirou recognized because he knew it himself.  The things that drove Kuro . . . How much of his feelings were similar to the ones that Jirou lived with every day?  Oh, the circumstances were different of course, but the underlying emotions . . .

"Okay," Marisaiko said, offering Kuro a tentative smile.  "I'll do it.  I'll train you."


'Why?  Why did I take off?  Why did I just leave them?'

Wandering through the dense wood, trying to ignore the strange and foreign sense of melancholy that had crept over her in the hours since she had broken away from Jirou and Marisaiko, Kiri wrapped her arms tighter around herself, but kept moving.

'It's stupid!' she berated herself.  'I don't . . . don't need anyone, and I don't want to be around them, either!'

It was true, wasn't it?  It was something she'd lived with for so long, had, in fact, cultivated it.  Funny, really.  She hadn't realized that it was something that one could learn.

There was a time when she had tried to find a place to belong.  When her mother had died, she had tried to find a place that would accept her.  Even as a child, she'd learned quickly enough that it wasn't possible.  No one trusted her—an outsider—and they hadn't wanted her around.  She was an oddity, labeled as an outcast because of the way she looked.  Back then, she'd tried to dull her hair, to darken it, dying it with berry juice or smearing mud into her locks, and it had worked, to a point.  One family had almost taken her in, at least, until she was bathed and the color all washed out.  The polite and friendly smiles had turned to frowns and shaking heads.  They were sorry, but they didn't have room, didn't have the means to support another mouth to feed.  The mother of the home had given her a few dry biscuits and a skin of water before putting her out of their hut, and she'd moved on.  It was the last time she'd tried to find a new family, though she did try harder to darken her hair, but there wasn't a damn thing she could do to mask the color of her eyes.  She'd learned to avoid meeting people's gazes, and then, she'd learned to avoid people completely.

Eventually, she'd decided that she didn't care if people accepted her or not, had stopped trying to stain her hair, had stopped meekly averting her gaze as she'd adopted a new belligerence, as she'd convinced herself that she didn't need anyone—something she'd believed without question—at least, until she'd met Marisaiko and even Jirou.

And yet, the resentment that had come with the confusion that riddled her—confusion as to why she was so unwelcome, the temerarious grasp of a child's skewed logic—had grown, and ultimately, it fed her ability to put aside the whispered voice of her dead mother, the lessons taught to a child who hadn't yet realized that the world wasn't a beautiful place.  That resentment had allowed her to squelch the feelings of guilt when she'd stow into a village in the silence of the dead of night, allowed her to carefully, quietly pick through those faceless villagers' belongings, to take the things that she needed to survive.

So why did it bother her so much?  Why did it matter to her, the disbelief on Jirou's face when he'd caught her, had dragged her back to their camp . . .?  Why did she care that he'd so casually told his mother that she was a thief?  It shouldn't matter to her.  She was past caring what anyone thought of her.

At least, she thought she was.

Heaving a sigh, she gave herself a little shake, tried to remind herself that none of it mattered anymore.  The sun was hanging low in the sky, and she really needed to find some kind of shelter.  One good thing about having spent most of her life on the move and out of doors: she'd learned how to read and predict the skies, and, as she shielded her eyes and turned her face upward, she could smell it in the air: the storm that was coming.

"You . . ."

Her chin snapped back down at the rasping, harsh word, eyes flaring wide in recognition as the eel-youkai that had tried to pick a fight with Jirou on the road stepped out from behind a tree.  Arms hanging limply by his sides, dried blood smeared carelessly from the still-open wounds, he glared at her as his all-encompassing rage seemed to flicker around him, distorting the very air, like heat waves rising off the earth.  Head lowered, gaze fixed on her, he watched her like an animal stalking its prey.

"What do you want?" she asked, her voice low, steady, despite the tattering beat of her heart that thundered in her ears.  Even injured, there was still an overwhelming sense of danger surrounding the youkai.  Stepping back, as though she needed to put some distance between herself and him, she tried to think of something—anything—that could get her away from him.

The chuckle that rumbled out of him was devoid of humor, full of irony.  "You're one of them," he hissed, his voice little more than a rasp, a rumble.  "You'll do."

"I-I'm not," she countered weakly, recoiling at the rage so thick in his tone.  It occurred to her in an oddly detached kind of way that reasoning wasn't going to work on him.  "I . . . I barely know them . . ."

"Yet you were traveling with them—with him," he hissed, "with the pathetic son of that tainted hanyou!"

"You don't even know him.  Why do you hate him?" she heard herself ask, grimacing inwardly at the unvoiced challenge in her question.  Antagonizing he eel-youkai wasn't exactly the smartest course of action, and she knew it, especially if she had any hope of getting out of this encounter alive.

The eel-youkai erupted in a low growl.  "His father—InuYasha—killed mine!  He spared no thought for my family, just cut him down because he could!"  Uttering another terse laugh, he took another step toward Kiri.  "I'm just returning the favor."

She swallowed hard, willed her pulse to steady.  It didn't really work.  "Then there's nothing you want with me," she replied.  "I just met them.  We're not even friends or anything."

A strange expression entered the youkai's gaze, and his slight grin widened as he prowled closer.  "You lie."

Stepping back again, she didn't take her eyes off of him.  Moving slowly from side to side, he was closing in, albeit, slowly, cutting off any means of escape, if she were inclined to try.  Fighting to ignore the basic instinct to flee, she forced herself to stay her ground.  Somehow, she knew—just knew—that if she did, he'd cut her down without a second thought.

She yelped when he lunged at her, his claws cutting through the air, as she barely managed to stumble back, far enough to avoid them.

Laughing as a maniacal grin widened on his features, his hand shot out, the backside of it connecting with Kiri's cheek.  She grunted out a half-cry, half-groan as her body flew back, as she landed hard, as the world went black.


"Kaze no Kizu!"

The deafening scream that escaped the eel-youkai as the flames of the attack engulfed him forced Jirou to flatten his ears against his head as he jammed Shinkoukage into the scabbard and dashed forward toward the fallen girl.  Lying in such a tiny heap, she looked so much smaller than she was, and he dropped to his knees, hands shaking as he slowly, cautiously, felt her limbs to make sure nothing was broken.

He still didn't know why he'd followed her.  That hadn't actually been the reason that he'd stopped in only long enough to say hello to Sango and Miroku before setting off once more.  Marisaiko had given him a rather curious glance, but she either didn't see anything amiss with his hasty exit or she figured he wouldn't 'fess up to anything, anyway.

He hadn't set out to find her.  That would have been dumb, after all.  He didn't really know much of anything about her, and most of what he did know wasn't exactly positive.

So, why had he veered off the path when he'd ventured across the lingering smell of her?  Why had he altered his course, following her scent deeper into the forest?

He still didn't know the answer, but he grimaced as he gently turned her head, saw the already livid bruising that marred the pallor of her cheek.

With a soft groan, she scrunched up her face, but didn't open her eyes.

"Kiri-chan?" he said, his voice oddly harsh as he gently touched her unblemished cheek.

At the sound of his voice, she slowly blinked, her gaze seeming to have trouble, focusing on him.  "J . . . Jirou . . .?"

Only then did the breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding rush out of him with a heavy whoosh.  "Can you sit up?"

It took a moment for her to gather herself enough to try.  He reached out, helped her sit up.  She winced as she reached up to gingerly touch her face.  "Ow . . ." Suddenly, though, her eyes flared wide, sitting up a little straighter, and she grasped his arms tight.  "Where?  Where is he?"

"It's all right," he assured her.  "He's . . . He's gone."

She stared at him for several seconds, as though she were trying to figure out if he was lying to her.  Then she nodded.  "He said your father killed his," she said quietly.  "He said that he killed him for no reason."

Jirou frowned.  "He wouldn't," he stated flatly.  "He's never killed without a reason."

Kiri sighed, letting go of Jirou's arms as she melted back onto the ground once more.  "Tired," she muttered, closing her eyes.

"What?  No," he retorted a little more sharply than he meant to be.  He didn't know if she'd hit her head, but the blow to her cheek had to have been hard enough, and if she had a concussion, then she really didn't dare go to sleep, either.  With a grimace, he hopped up, grasping her hands and tugging until she finally complied, her expression mulish, at best, as she swayed on her feet.  "Come on," he said.

"Where?" she demanded.  He could tell from her tone of voice that she was dangerously close to tears, and he grimaced.  He supposed that she probably did want nothing better than to lie down once more, but that was the worst thing she could do at the moment.

"Oba-chan needs to look you over," he replied with a sigh.  "It isn't that far."

"Oba-chan?" she echoed with a sniffle.  She was scowling when he glanced at her, angry at her own perceived weakness, he figured.

"Mari's mother," he clarified.  When he was a child, Kagome had gone to school to earn her nursing certificate, figuring that it would be most helpful in the past, where she and InuYasha spent most of their time, and she'd taken the time to teach Sango and Miroku everything she'd learned.  In fact, the only real difference was that Kagome had tested to earn her certification, while Sango and Miroku could not, though, in this time, it hardly mattered.  She'd also tried to teach InuYasha, but he was far more adept in breaking bones than he was in mending them, after all.

Kiri stopped in her tracks.  "I . . . I don't want to go there," she said.

Jirou scowled at her.  "Here," he said, holding out his hand.

She shook her head.  "I'm fine," she insisted.  It struck him, how she used that one simple phrase to hide behind, and for some reason, it seemed a little sad.

He sighed.  "I'll carry you," he offered.  "It's going to be dark soon, and we'll get there faster if I do."

She shook her head again, crossing her arms over her chest stubbornly.  "Can't we look for a cave or something?  And you can go.  I just . . . just need to rest for a few minutes."

"You took a good hit," he reminded her.  "You were out cold when I got here.  You could have a concussion."

"A what?"

"A concussion," he repeated.  "It could be bad, and I'm not as good with treating stuff like that.  Sango or Miroku could—"

"I'm fine," she stated once more, "and they won't let me in there, anyway."

"They will," he insisted.  "You're with me, and Mari—"

"I'm—"

"—Fine, yeah, so you've said," he growled, then heaved a sigh as he rubbed his face and struggled to control his rising irritation.  "Don't be so stubborn.  Let me take you there.  Maybe it's nothing, and if so, then I apologize, but if you aren't, then they can help you."

"What do you care?  I'm just a thief, remember?" she ground out, wincing as she tentatively reached up to cradle her injured cheek.

"Don't be stupid," he argued.  "Besides, Mari likes you, and she's worried about you, taking off on your own again."

"Then go back and tell her that I'm okay," she retorted, her face paling just a little more as the seconds ticked away.

Scowling at her since he knew damn well that she wasn't going to comply with his wish to return to the taijya village without incident, he reluctantly gave in.  She really did need to lie down, and standing around, arguing, wasn't doing her any good, either.  Maybe she didn't have a concussion, he didn't know, but he couldn't really force her to go anywhere she didn't want to, either.  There wasn't much that Sango or Miroku could do, aside from giving her some aspirin or something like that, anyway, and he could keep her awake until the danger passed as well as they could.  "All right," he finally allowed with a sigh, "but you can't go to sleep for awhile, so you're going to have to humor me, okay?"

She sighed, too, but let him lead the way as he searched for an open enough area to make camp.

"I'm going to gather some wood," he told her when he located a small clearing in the midst of the trees.  He could tell from scent that there was a body of water nearby, and, with a little luck, he'd find some clay close, too—at least, enough to make a poultice for her cheek, anyway.  "You can sit here and wait, but keep talking."

She looked like she wanted to argue with him, so he was relieved when she sank down on a large rock, instead.  "The youkai . . . You killed him, right?"

Letting out a deep breath at her softly uttered question, Jirou shook his head.  "It was him or you, Kiri," he replied, picking up a few fallen branches.  They may not burn long, but they were plentiful enough that he wasn't worried about running out of fuel during the night.  "He wouldn't have just left you alone."

"I . . . I know," she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.  "He was going to kill me . . . so thanks."

The almost pouty way that she'd offered her gratitude made Jirou smile vaguely.  It kind of reminded him of the way that he and Ai would apologize to one another when they were children, fighting over the last box of pocky.  Those grudging words were only offered after Kagome had insisted, after she reminded them that they should love each other.  Nope, he knew damn well that Kiri wasn't at all pleased that she felt compelled to offer her thanks, in the first place.

"You're welcome."

She wrinkled her nose.  "Why did you follow me?"

Dropping the armload of wood he'd gathered, Jirou reached for a long stick to break it up.  "I . . . I don't really know," he confessed, deliberately focusing his attention on the branch in his hands.  "But I'm glad I did."

She seemed surprised by his admittance.  To be honest, he kind of was, too.  Dropping the wood, he stepped a few paces away, far enough to start clearing a space of dried and rotting leaves that covered the forest floor.  "Me, too," she said quietly.  "You, uh, you don't have to stay with me, though," she went on.  "I'm used to taking care of myself."

His scowl darkened.  He could see it in her face: the pride that she couldn't squelch, that she hid behind, that she wore like a second skin.  Yet, there was something else, something beyond that, and he could see it, too.  Did anyone else?  Is that what Marisaiko had sensed all along?  Behind the tough outer shell, underneath it all, there was a vulnerability, and maybe Kiri didn't sense it herself, and if she did, she probably tried to kill it off.  She hated that part of her, didn't she?  That part that hated being alone, that wanted to belong somewhere—anywhere—with anyone . . .

"Maybe you shouldn't be," he finally said, inflicting enough nonchalance into his tone to cover up the hint of pity that she'd hate.  "I don't think anyone should be alone."

"How would you know?" she countered, though she wasn't as belligerent as she could have been.  "Your family . . . I've met your family.  You wouldn’t know—you don't know."

Giving a little shrug as he knelt down, as he arranged some wood in the middle of the small clearing he'd created.  "No, but my father does," he replied.  "His father died the night he was born, and his mother died when he was still a child.  No one would take him in, no one took care of him, either.  Half-youkai, half-human—the humans were afraid of him, and the youkai hated what he was—and he grew up on the outside . . . and there was no one for him, either.  So, he knows, and he told me before that the reason he fought so hard was so that he could create a place where we could live, where we would never know the kind of life that he'd lived, up until he met my mother."  Looking up from his task of starting the fire, he let out a deep breath, a little smile.  "You can let yourself belong, if that's what you want . . . with us.  With me . . ."