InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Of Gods And Demons ❯ Chapter 5 ( Chapter 5 )

Author's Note:

Kagome and Sesshoumaru finally meet, woohoo.

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The dawn was breaking over the horizon, spreading the pinks and oranges of the morning sky across the land. There was a gentle breeze that blew through the long, summer grass, making the dew sparking just as pink and orange as the sky. It gave everything a warm glow, a sense of serenity.

Sesshoumaru scowled.

It was not his surroundings that made him scowl, but the uneasy feeling that had suddenly settled in his gut. It was not a feeling he had often, nor one that he enjoyed, but it was undoubtedly what he felt at this particular moment. He could not hear anything unusual, could not see anything unusual, nor could he smell anything unusual, but something was amiss. He just knew. It was a strange prickling at the back of his neck, an abnormal tingling of his senses.

He was being watched.

Meanwhile, the inuyoukai's observers were hovering in the air just out of sight of their prey. "You're sure he can't hear or smell us," Kagome whispered nervously as she clung to her godly companion. He had allowed her to hang onto his arm for their trip instead of being thrown over his shoulder like a pack.

"Of course not, I am a god, I can turn you into a rock if I wished, do you not think I would be able to do something as simple as hide our presence from this inferior being?"

Kagome had come to realize that for a god, Izanagi was awfully...fickle. He seemed content to be imposing and arrogant one minute, pouting and grumbling another, and when all else failed, he would crack some wise-ass joke. Very un-godlike behavior in Kagome's opinion, but perhaps that was what it meant to be a god - to have so much power that you could choose whichever emotion you wanted and not care about the consequences.

Well, Kagome wasn't quite that expressive, but she was a little irritated. She rolled her eyes, something she seemed to do a lot in his presence, and threw another dubious look towards the dog demon. He was still walking, looking bored and impeccably clean like always, and didn't look like he noticed them.

Kagome still wasn't convinced.

"It doesn't seem so simple to me," she muttered. "And I wouldn't call him inferior to his face if I were you, he's a little...touchy sometimes."

If by touchy you mean prone to fits of murderous rage, that is, Kagome mentally added.

"I could turn him into a rock as well," he said scathingly, as though insulted by the very idea of having to be polite to another creature.

"Yeah, yeah, you're all powerful, whatever," she groused. "All I'm saying is that when he goes all crazy-psycho-killer, I'm the one that'll end up running for my life. And I don't like running for my life."

"You don't? How strange," he smirked.

"Oh, stuff it."

"I will do no such thing," he grinned even wider at the miko, who narrowed her eyes into an icy glare.

I am so not a morning person, she noted to herself as she continued to level her icy stare at the god.

He cleared his throat and looked away, forcing his expression into a serious one. The look that she had given him, though he would never admit it, chilled him to the bone. She was quite terrifying when she was mad, she must be a hell cat in bed, he mused.

No, the whole point of this was to reunite him with his wife, he should not be thinking such thoughts...however badly he wanted to. "Now, I think we've let him walk long enough, let's get this over with shall we?" He said brightly, forcing himself away from his fantasies.

"Wait, will you do something for me, please?" She pleaded, her previous sour mood all but forgotten as she clasped her hands in front of her like a beggar and pouted out her lower lip. Her wide, brown eyes reminding him of innocence and beauty and all things delicately feminine.

He couldn't refuse even if he wished, and that look she was giving him was definitely not helping to purify his thoughts.

"What is it that you desire?" He said, trying to sound disapproving, but only succeeding in sounding slightly less entranced than he felt. What was it with men of power and their inhibiting affliction with females? He should rid the world of their bothersome presence...he would put it on his to do list.

Kagome smiled wickedly, her eyes no longer looking innocent, but positively devious. Ah, now that was a look he could appreciate.

"Scare the crap out of him," she grinned. "The guy once tried to melt me, he's long overdue for some payback."

Izanagi gave the girl an amused look and nodded his head. "As you wish."

"Really? Thanks!" She squealed and clapped her hands excitedly before turning back to the god with a sheepish grin. "Just, uh...don't let him kill me, okay? He's about as agreeable as an angry cat and I wouldn't put it past him to try and take off my head when he finds out I had some part in this."

"I will not let him harm my future bride," he said indignantly.

"Okay, good, " she said and then added as an afterthought, "and I'm not your future bride anymore, remember?"

"That depends on the success of this plan of yours, my lady," he pointed out.

She waved her hand dismissively. "Don't worry about it. This is going to work, I can just feel it."

"Oh, if you're so sure..." he said dryly, his voice dripping with so much sarcasm Kagome was tempted to tell him to get a bucket.

But she didn't. Because she had already jumped out of his arms and landed unceremoniously on the ground in front of the youkai lord, falling on her butt with a squeak of surprise. And then she was not only laying on the ground, but being held there as well. By a clawed hand. A clawed hand grasping her throat.

"...can't...breath..." she wheezed.

Sesshoumaru simply stared down at her with a look of mild distaste.

"I would let her go if I were you," Izanagi's more than welcome voice said as he magically appeared at the youkai lord's side, looking down at Kagome with a slight frown as though observing an injured kitten. "I believe humans need air to continue living."

And suddenly Kagome could breath again. Air! Glorious air! She celebrated in her head as her mouth was too busy gasping to celebrate out loud.

"Hn," was Sesshoumaru's only response as he released the priestess. That was one of many disadvantages to having on ly one arm: you couldn't strangle the life out of two people at once. And now there were two people with him, though, he still wasn't quite sure how either of them had got there.

She had dropped from the sky without warning, as if she had just all of a sudden blinked into existence and fallen at his feet. He had not sensed her miko powers, nor smelled her vile human scent, he hadn't even heard her approach. But the second creature...he had casually materialized right beside the inuyoukai, arriving with a power so vast that it nearly burned him to be near it.

Something strange was going on, and though Sesshoumaru detested anything mundane, he loathed not being in the know even more. He was always the one with the answers and the solutions, never the questions. So, he narrowed his eyes and waited for the world to drop down at his feet and explain itself, as it should.

Kagome, meanwhile, was rubbing her abused throat tenderly. "You tried to kill me! Again!" She yelled at the dog demon and then rounded on Izanagi without missing a beat. "And you could've gotten here a little quicker!"

"You are not dead, do not whine," he shrugged.

She growled at him before turning her fiery eyes back to Sesshoumaru, waiting for his explanation.

He remained silent.

What a jerk, she thought viciously. He's not even going to say anything! Not even a 'sorry I just tried to crush your throat' or a 'whoops, my bad'. Nope, nothing!

"Fine!" She huffed, scrambling to her feet and brushing off her backside. "You two are impossible! You deserve each other!"

Sesshoumaru gave her a withering glare, vaguely recognizing her as the obnoxious wench that always trailed after his filthy half-brother. He remembered - with a slight pang of irritation - that hehad, in fact, attempted to slay her on a few occasion before this particular meeting. Something which irked him, to say the least. Usually when he set his mind on killing someone, they died. No questions asked. But not this miko...he wondered how such a weak human could manage such luck.

"Kagome, that is quite enough," Izanagi said sternly and placed a hand on her small, silk clad shoulder. His servants had taken quite a liking to using the girl as their own personal canvas and she had begrudgingly allowed them to outfit her with several yukatas and kimonos, though, she insisted on keeping that putrid bag of hers.

Of course, he didn't mind too much, it didn't really distract from the view on a whole. The yukata she now wore was nearly as short as her previous garments had been, and the neckline was unusual revealing. The doing of his servants no doubt.

He would have to give them a raise, well, he would...if he paid them anything to start with.

Wait. His thoughts were straying into dangerous territory again, he best get this moving or he would end up doing something...unwholesome.

"Now, Lord Sesshoumaru," he said commandingly as he willed the clouds to darken above them and the wind to pick up an unnatural fury. He had not forgotten his promise to 'scare the crap out of him' as Kagome has so elegantly put it. "I, Izanagi, creator of worlds, master of all that you see, require your services!"

Thunder boomed overhead as hair and leaves were thrown every which way in the crazed wind storm. Sesshoumaru eyed the strange weather and the man that seemed to be controlling it with an air of...mild curiosity. There was no doubt this man was a god, though, Sesshoumaru found his choice of company rather disappointing for a being that was even more powerful than he. What was it about the strange miko that seemed to coerce her into keeping such unusual company?

"What is it that you ask of me?" He responded. His lack of emotion seemed to deflate the godly being before him and the winds began to die as the clouds once again turned docile.

"Oh," Izanagi said rather anticlimactically. He was sure that would have at least had some effect on the taiyoukai, but the stubborn beast seemed more likely to yawn at his antics, than to yell. "This miko tells me you wield a sword with the power to slay the undead, a power I find myself in need of."

Sesshoumaru raised an annoyed brow at the young girl who laughed nervously. So, this was her fault? He would skin her.

"Yeah, and you're not allowed to kill me because he needs me too," she added as though reading his mind. "We've got to travel to the underworld and slay the minions his, er, wife sent after him. I'm sure you know the tale?"

Sesshoumaru gave her a cold stare, but otherwise ignored her. He had no desire to mention the irony of encountering this particular god only a day after he had revisited Izanagi's tale.

"So, what say you?" Izanagi demanded. "Either agree to aid in my quest, or face an unpleasant death. I'll pull your bones from your body one by one, or something to that effect," he added unnecessarily after a second's thought.

Sesshoumaru did not revel in the idea of being threatened and told what to do, but he also knew that when a god asked you for something, you did not refuse. "You have my sword at your disposal," he said in a tired sort of way, as though this kind of thing happened to him all the time and it was growing tedious.

"Alright, it is settled then," the god said happily. "Now, off you two go, come back when you have the spear," he said, making a shooing motion at the pair of them.

"Uh...what?" Kagome said stupidly as he pushed her towards the dog demon. She quickly adjusted her course so that she would not run into Sesshoumaru, and turned to face her assailant.

He was looking at his nails.

She cleared her throat and his head snapped up to meet her thoroughly confused expression. "Oh, did I forget to mention that?" He said more to himself than anyone else. "Yes, you two must go find my famed, jeweled spear of legend before we can go to battle. I cannot fight eight thunder gods without my weapon."

"Uh...WHAT?" Kagome repeated a little more frantically. Was he serious? She was supposed to travel with Sesshoumaru? ALONE? "Aren't you supposed to have the spear?" She nearly yelled.

The god shifted uncomfortably and turned away from her. "Well, it's a funny story, actually. You see, there was this tortoise and this hare, and my eldest brother told me that he would bet his summer palace that the tortoise could outrace the hare. So, naturally I took the bet; who had ever heard of a tortoise outrunning a hare? But it turns out that the hare was quite fond of naps and the tortoise was exceptionally motivated..."

"You bet the spear, didn't you? You bet the spear and you lost, didn't you?" Kagome said through clenched teeth.

Izanagi backed away from the seething girl with a defensive look in his eyes. "I couldn't very well pass up a chance at my brother's palace! It's under the sea, girl, under the sea!"

Kagome was about to shoot him with another one of her arrows only to realize that she had left them back at the well when he had almost scared her to death. So, she bent down to pick up a rock and threw it at his head.

Sesshoumaru watched placidly as the god turned the rock into a harmless butterfly and gave the girl an apologetic look. What power did she have over a god for him to actually be repentant towards her? Surely she was a curiosity.

"Where are we to find this spear?" The taiyoukai decided to ask, seeing as the miko was too busy looking for more rocks to be of any help whatsoever.

"I believe my brother gave it to a rather powerful demon lord, saying something about the havoc the lord would reek with such a weapon would entertain him for centuries. He always was my least favorite brother, has a nasty streak a hundred miles wide," he said conversationally as another rock aimed at his chest grew feathers and flew off in the form of a sparrow.

Sesshoumaru nodded, ignoring the miko's indignant curses as the god continued to avoid her wrath. He knew exactly whom the elder god had given the spear to, it surely explained why the Southern lord, Ryuuji, had been so adept at conquering foreign lands - he had a god's power at his disposal.

"Come, human, we depart," he ordered as Kagome threw her last rock at the god, briefly watching as it simply disintegrated in midair, and then turned on her heal to follow after Sesshoumaru.

She didn't really appreciate being ordered around by the youkai lord, but it sure beat sticking around with that idiot. "You know, for a god, he sure is a baka," she said sourly.

Sesshoumaru gave her a hard glance for her bold words, but realized he could find no fault in them. "Agreed."

It was the first, and possibly the last thing the two would agree on for a very long time.

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Chapter Notes:

So, in summary: Izanagi is kind of an idiot. He lost his spear to his brother, who gave it to some southern lord in hopes that he would do something entertaining with it, and now Kagome and Sesshoumaru have to go get it back. Fun times for all, yes? Well, fun times for us, maybe not so much for Kagome or Sesshoumaru, at least, not at first lol.

So, review please