InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 7: Avouchment ❯ Insomnia ( Chapter 42 )

~~Chapter 42~~

~Insomnia~

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

“Kami, it reeks in here.”

 

Isabelle groaned and rolled over, jerking a pillow over her head as she tried to block out the sound of her cousin's voice.

 

“Why are you still in bed, anyway, Izzy? You're always up annoyingly bright and early, you know.”

 

“Shut up and get out, Mamoruzen,” she grumbled, her voice muffled by the mattress. “I don't remember letting you in.”

 

“Of course you didn't,” he shot back. “You didn't even have the decency to answer your door.”

 

“Because I was sleeping—or trying to,” she mumbled. “Go away, will you?”

 

She heard the distinct sound of the curtains being drawn back, and she groaned, squeezing her eyes closed and wondering how hard it would be to cast an everlasting curse on her irritating cousin.

 

“Get out of that bed. I'll take you to lunch.”

 

She groaned.

 

He snorted, pulling the pillow off her head despite her protests. “Come on, Izzy. Get moving, will you?”

 

“I could have sworn I told you to go away,” she mumbled, waving a hand around wildly in a vain effort to regain her pilfered pillow.

 

“No,” he stated flatly. “Is this what you've been doing since you left that bastard?”

 

Grimacing at Gunnar's cryptic commentary, she pushed herself up on her elbows long enough to pin him with the blackest scowl she could muster. “Kick me when I'm down, why don't you?” she asked him pointedly. “And I'll thank you not to refer to him as a `bastard'.”

 

He rolled his eyes and shook his head, cocking an articulated eyebrow at her. “I beg to differ, Izzy. Any man who would make you leave is, indeed, a bastard.”

 

She heaved a sigh and shook her head, pushing herself up and refusing to meet Gunnar's gaze. “Did you just come over here to rub my nose in it, because if you did—”

 

“Calm down. I did no such thing. On the contrary, I came over to cheer you up.”

 

That finally earned him a look though it was one full of suspicion. “Really.”

 

“Get out of that bed and go brush your teeth,” he commanded brusquely, heading toward the bedroom door. “You smell like a bottle of cheap wine.”

 

“Fat lot you know,” she grumbled back, rubbing her forehead as she willed the dull throbbing in her skull to stop. “It was moderately priced wine—I do have my morals.”

 

Gunnar shook his head and kept moving while Isabelle seriously considered the idea of burrowing under the covers once again. With a disgusted sigh, she shook her head and swung her legs off the bed. Even if she tried it, Gunnar, she knew, wouldn't let her get away with it. `He's a fine one to talk,' she mumbled, wrinkling her nose as she waved her hand around in an effort to snag her clock to see what time it was. `He's worse than me about getting up at the crack of dawn, and so help me, if he is here to gloat, I swear I'll shove my foot so far up his—'

 

“Drink this,” Gunnar demanded, breezing back into the bedroom again with two steaming cups of black coffee in his hand. Shoving it under her nose, he snorted indelicately and shook his head in abject disgust. “Seriously, Izzy, when's the last time you took a shower?”

 

“I took a shower yesterday morning and night, the same as I always do,” she informed him, taking the coffee from him before he got it into his head to bullying her into drinking it.

 

“Did you use soap?” he countered.

 

She kicked him—hard. He didn't even flinch, the ass. “Go away if you're just here to pester me,” she sulked, sipping the coffee and making a face at the bitter brew. “I have sugar in the cupboard, you know.”

 

“Beggars can't be choosers,” he insisted, stuffing his left hand into his pocket and lifting his coffee mug to his lips with his right one. “Now be a man and drink that.”

 

That comment earned him a blackened scowl. He intercepted the look and cocked an eyebrow at her. “Was it something I said?” he asked baldly.

 

“Not at all,” she muttered, shifting her gaze to the murky liquid in the mug. “It's my day off. If I want to sleep until noon or later, then I should be allowed to.”

 

“Stop pouting, Izzy,” he chided. “It doesn't become you.”

 

“Hmph,” she scoffed, setting the coffee aside and reaching for the covers. Gunnar was faster, neatly plucking them away from her before she could burrow under them once more. She whined in protest, earning her a decisive snort designed to let her know that he thought she was being ridiculous.

 

“So you going to tell me why that bastard kicked you out?”

 

She winced at the carelessly worded question, bunching up her shoulders as she tried to summon a measure of bravado. “It's not like that,” she said, her voice much smaller than she'd been hoping for, “and don't call him that. I mean it.”

 

“Keh! There's no better word for the likes of him, and you can't convince me that you left of your own accord,” he shot back. “So tell me the truth.”

 

Letting her shoulders slump, she slowly shook her head and sighed. “I don't . . . know . . .” she admitted. “Griffin just sort of . . . freaked out, I guess . . .”

 

“Freaked out?” Gunnar echoed, retrieving her coffee and shoving it into her hands once more. “Define `freaked out'.”

 

She thumped the cup down on the nightstand for the second time and rolled out of bed since she knew damn well that this particular cousin wouldn't leave her alone until she complied. He was just a little too stubborn that way . . . “I mean exactly what I said,” she said, stomping across the bedroom to her closet and throwing the doors open. Grabbing the first outfit she laid hands on—a pair of jeans and a mauve blouse—she kicked the door closed and headed behind the folding screen to change. “I suppose I should have known,” she admitted, more to herself than to Gunnar as she stripped off her nightgown and tossed it across the top of the screen. “I mean, I knew that it was too soon . . . he's only kissed me once before that, but I couldn't help it; not after—”

 

“Wait,” Gunnar cut in, a hint of malice entering his tone. “That bastard kicked you out after you slept with him?”

 

Grimacing since she hadn't actually meant to admit as much to Gunnar, she leaned to the side to peer around the screen. “Don't even try to say that he took advantage of me, Inutaisho Mamoruzen, or I swear on all that is holy, I'll neuter you the hard way.”

 

The infuriating man simply chuckled at what should have been a dire threat. The laugher didn't last long, though. Dying away as suddenly as it had started, he leveled a no-nonsense scowl at her and crossed his arms over his chest in a decidedly brusque way. “Did he?” he demanded.

 

She rolled her eyes and heaved a loud sigh as she pulled the blouse over her shoulders. “You'll leave him alone. I mean it.”

 

“So do I.”

 

She'd figured it would come to something like this, hadn't she? That was the real reason she'd avoided Gunnar for the last two weeks since she'd returned to her home only to discover that the home she used to love somehow seemed lonelier than it ever had before.

 

No, the truth of it was that she had tried to avoid her family—all of them; not because she thought that they'd be unkind or anything but because it seemed like they were so happy that it made her heart ache just thinking about it. Even Gunnar—baka that he was—was content with his life, and she supposed she could appreciate that. She'd been happy enough with her own life, hadn't she? At least, she had been until she'd met Griffin . . .

 

Her grandfather had always told her that she shouldn't mess around when she found her mate; that she should make sure that she let him know that she'd chosen him, and who would know better than Cain? After having almost lost his current mate, he'd never made any bones about it to any of his children or grandchildren, and she used to think that he was simply being overly cautious, but . . .

 

She made a face, jerking the jeans over her feet. But she was starting to wonder, wasn't she? After all, she was certain that Griffin really was her mate, and yet she couldn't honestly say that she felt any different than she had the day she'd walked out the door at his behest. Physically, at least, she was . . . fine.

 

`You should be glad that you are fine, you know,' her youkai chided as she ignored whatever it was that Gunnar was saying.

 

`I am,' she insisted.

 

`No, you aren't.'

 

Isabelle plopped down on the stool behind the screen to tug on a pair of socks. `So I was wrong, after all. I don't . . . I don't care,' she scoffed.

 

Her youkai voice sighed. `That's not entirely true. You might not have been wrong.'

 

`And just what does that mean?' she snapped.

 

`It means just that. It also means that if he hasn't quite come to terms with the idea that he's your mate then he can't have fully accepted you as yet.'

 

`Oh, well, that's much better,' she thought sourly. `Anyway, it's not true. I mean, Grandpa said, himself, that he hadn't figured it out until it was almost too late.'

 

`No, what your grandfather said was that he knew it long before that; he simply thought that if he didn't say the words out loud that it wasn't a done deal. With as messed up as Griffin can be at times, do you really think that he's even come close to realizing it on his own yet?'

 

That made her feel a little better, though in actuality it wasn't by much. Even if her youkai's words were true, she just wasn't sure how she'd be able to make him understand, anyway. He was just a little too stubborn, and she . . . well, she was pretty strapped as far as ideas went.

 

“—Are you listening to a damn thing I've been saying?”

 

Blinking quickly to pull herself out of her reverie, Isabelle pushed herself to her feet and stepped out from behind the screen. “I was trying not to,” she admitted. “Is it still the same drivel?”

 

“I'll pretend you didn't just say that I've been talking drivel,” he remarked mildly.

 

“If you say so, Mamoruzen,” she quipped, heading out of the bedroom to brush her teeth.

 

He followed her, leaning casually in the bathroom doorway with his hands stuffed into his pockets and a `don't-mess-with-me' expression on his face that Isabelle did her level best to ignore. “So what you're telling me is that your bear is a liar and a baka.”

 

That earned him a menacing glower that would have been much more effective if she didn't have a toothbrush sticking out of her mouth. “Ut up,” she grumbled.

 

Gunnar snorted. “Keh! Any man who would be fool enough to let a woman like you out of his sight is a baka,” he insisted with a shake of his head.

 

She supposed she ought to be flattered at Gunnar's obvious praise, but she just couldn't muster that sort of emotion. Still she couldn't help but feel irritation toward her cousin and his less-than-enthusiastic assessment of Griffin's behavior.

 

She'd spent the first couple of days after the forced separation being angry as hell at the bear, of course. She hadn't really done anything to warrant his absolutely unfathomable behavior, after all, had she? She sighed. It had taken a couple more days before she was willing to listen to her youkai and the chiding that she knew deep down she deserved. After all, she knew damn well that Griffin really hadn't been ready for everything that had happened, and as wonderful as it had been, she also had to admit that maybe she'd expected it, at least on some level when she woke up in the morning only to find that he was still gone . . .

 

And she really couldn't fault him, could she? She knew deep down that whatever it was that haunted Griffin—whatever had befallen his family—it wasn't a pleasant memory for him, and after having lived with it for more centuries than she cared to consider, maybe he'd made it into a much larger thing that it ever should have been. But she knew, too, that her kind—youkai in general—tended to take certain incidences far worse than humans. The perceived inability to protect one's own . . . it was one of the gravest, one of the most wretched things to deal with, and Griffin . . .

 

She grimaced, spitting toothpaste into the sink and deliberately taking her time rinsing her mouth thoroughly. She knew full well that he did blame himself for whatever had happened, and it didn't really matter to her in the end so long as she could eventually make him understand that he was certainly not to blame.

 

But how to do that when he'd stubbornly forced her out of his life? She'd already tried banging on his door for nearly an hour just yesterday, and she'd known full well that he was home at the time. She could sense him there, but in true Griffin-fashion, he refused to open the door. That was the main reason she'd gone home, only to find Froofie sitting three feet from the door where he refused to budge for longer than it took to let him outside to do his business before he returned to his vigil, whining softly now and again, as though he wondered just when Griffin was coming to get them.

 

So she'd ended up drinking almost three bottles of wine and flicking a laser pointer around the living room, much to the pleasure of the kitty that Isabelle didn't have the heart to give a proper name. She'd tried, damn it. She'd tried for nearly three hours to come up with a suitable name, but all she could think of was the one Griffin had suggested, even if it was entirely inappropriate . . .

 

Hell, she'd even ignored the phone call from her father. She'd reached for the cell phone only to stop as she frowned at the name written in kanji on her caller ID. He'd have been understanding, certainly, but . . .

 

But she also knew Izayoi Kichiro well enough to know that he would also feel badly; probably badly enough to want to try to `fix things' for her, and as much as she hated the awful truth, there were things that she just couldn't rely on her father to fix.

 

Heaving a sigh as she dried her face with a soft, fluffy towel, Isabelle studiously avoided Gunnar's apt gaze, dropping the towel on the counter before rummaging through a drawer for her hair brush.

 

The standoff had to end sometime, didn't it, and when it did . . .

 

Eyes darkening as a new resolve entered her expression, Isabelle yanked the brush through her hair, ignoring the snarls and tangles inspired by yet another sleepless night.

 

When it did, the stubborn man was going to listen to her whether he liked it or not.

 

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

Bas rubbed his forehead and sighed as he tried to figure out exactly why the documents in front of him didn't make sense. It was as though something was missing: something simple that he just kept overlooking, and that sort of feeling was enough to irritate the crap out of him.

 

He'd been staring at the same documents for the last three days and hadn't figured it out, and normally he'd ask Gunnar to take a look at the file to get a fresh set of eyes on it, but they'd had unexpected leads in about four of the unsolved cases that they'd been working on, and because of that, they were already spread thin enough. Besides that, Gunnar would very likely make some off-color comment about Bas being all brawn and no brain which would only lead to Bas' offer to take it outside, and of course, Gunnar never backed down from a challenge of that nature. By the end of it, they'd have spent the better portion of the work day beating the hell out of each other and without cracking open the file even once.

 

He sighed, gaze shifting to the snapshot of Sydnie, and he smiled. At least she made him feel better, he supposed. `Maybe,' he thought, checking his watch with a flick of his wrist: nearly three o'clock in the afternoon, `I should call it a day . . .'

 

The peep of his cell phone cut through his musings, and he reached for it, grateful for whatever distraction it would offer. “Zelig,” he said without bothering to check the caller ID. It was his private number, so whoever it was, he figured it'd be good enough.

 

“Hey, Bas.”

 

Bas sat back, dropping his ink pen on the open file as a trace smile broke over his features. “Gavin. How's Jilli?”

 

Gavin sighed. “Jilli? She's fine . . . fine . . .”

 

His smile faded at the wariness in Gavin's tone coupled with the fact that the youkai was trying to keep his voice down, too. “What's going on?” Bas asked cautiously.

 

“Well, see—Just a second.”

 

Bas grunted acknowledgement as the sounds on the other end of the call were suddenly muffled, undoubtedly by Gavin's hand over the telephone receiver. “Jilli, why don't you go take a bath? Relax a little . . .”

 

He could hear Jillian's intonation even if he couldn't make out the words.

 

“Yeah, I'll come in when I'm off the phone,” he promised her. “Sorry about that,” he apologized, uncovering the receiver once more. “Anyway, I was just wondering . . . I mean, I know you said before that you can't really trace Avis' restraint, but . . .”

 

Bas scowled when Gavin trailed off. “But . . .?” he prompted.

 

Gavin sighed. In the background, Bas could hear the scrape of a sliding door opening then closing again, and the sounds of a busy city filtered over the line. “But,” Gavin went on slowly, “We've been here for two weeks, and he hasn't been home once.”

 

“Really,” Bas mumbled. It wasn't a question.

 

“Nope, and, well, you know Jilli . . .”

 

Bas grimaced, gripping his forehead with his free hand and rubbing furiously. “I'll have Dad check into it, but like I said before . . . those things aren't designed to keep him from leaving his home. They're only set to alert us if he were to try to leave the country.”

 

“And if he had, then I'm sure that Cain would have heard about it by now.”

 

“At the very least,” Bas agreed, “and if he did try, well . . .”

 

Gavin cleared his throat, understanding exactly what Bas hadn't said. If Avis had tried to leave the country, he'd be dead by now . . . “Yeah.”

 

“Maybe he went on vacation or something. Did you guys tell him that you were flying in?”

 

“To be honest, no . . . I mean, Jilli left a few messages on his voicemail, but she never talked directly to him.”

 

“Mm,” Bas intoned. “Maybe you should see if you can't get her to come back home, at least until we ascertain Avis' whereabouts.”

 

“Easier said than done,” Gavin said with another sigh. “You know how stubborn she can be, right?”

 

Bas smiled wanly. It was more that he knew how big a sucker Gavin was whenever Jillian turned those big blue eyes of hers on him, but he kept that to himself. “Let me make a few phone calls. You'll be waiting, I presume?”

 

“Thanks, Bas,” Gavin intoned.

 

Bas let out a deep breath as he clicked off his cell and stared at it for a long minute.

 

It was strange, damn it, and Gavin had been right to call, and it was true enough that Avis couldn't have tried to leave the continent: he'd have been hunted down immediately, and Bas knew well enough that they would have heard about it long before now. Still, something seemed odd, didn't it, and in the back of his mind, he couldn't quite let go of the nagging feeling that something was out of whack . . .

 

But what . . .?

 

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

Tapping the end of the silver pen against her lips, Myrna frowned at the neat stack of papers that she'd put in a binder for ease of reference. Slipping a slender claw under the next tab and flicking back the pages, she scanned that page, too, reading through the notes that she'd gathered together as one thing and one thing only crystallized in her mind. Attean Masta knew this man—this bear-youkai. He had to. He'd been around that region far too long not to have run into him, at the very least, and while she would be the first to admit that the legends that she'd found couldn't be called concrete evidence, the story Gunnar had regaled her after his return from New York City was . . .

 

Attean was lying to her, plain and simple, and if there was one thing that Myrna couldn't tolerate, it was being lied to. The problem was getting him to admit as much without going into detail as to why she needed to know.

 

There was only one reason that a man like Attean would cover for Griffin Marin, as far as Myrna could tell. He had to be a damn good friend. Why else would he stick his neck so far out for Marin?

 

Masta was born and raised around Quebec, if memory served. Maria had mentioned it once before in passing, and Myrna knew damn well that Attean preferred to stay in that area.

 

Confronting Attean, however, would be a stupid move. She'd already talked to him once, and she'd gotten nowhere. There wasn't a reason to believe that it would be any different if she tried again. If anything, it'd just make it worse, and that was something that Myrna really didn't want . . .

 

Biting her lip, she reached for the telephone. `There's more than one way to skin a cat, isn't there?' she mused, hooking the receiver between her ear and her shoulder as she flipped through the Digidex for the number that she was looking for. She read it over once, twice, then punched it in with the tip of the pen.

 

“Hello?”

 

Breaking into a little smile as the warmth in Maria's voice reached her through the phone line, Myrna chuckled. “Hello, yourself, Maria.”

 

“. . . Myrna?” Maria said, a hint of incredulity evident in her tone. “Myrna Loy?”

 

She laughed again. “The one and only.”

 

“Oh, my! It's been awhile, hasn't it?”

 

“A little too long, if you ask me. How have you been?”

 

Maria laughed softly. “Attean and I are just fine, and you?”

 

“Eh, well, you know . . . still paying my dues, but not so bad.”

 

“Oh, right . . . Attean mentioned that you'd been . . . detained . . .” she said, trying to find a delicate way to describe Myrna's incarceration.

 

“No need to doll it up for me.”

 

“Hmm,” Maria drawled. “So is there a reason that you called?” she asked though not in an unfriendly way.

 

“Actually, there is,” she allowed, biting her lip for a moment before pressing on. “I've been looking into some legends lately.”

 

“Legends? Aren't those a little fanciful for a just-the-facts-kind of woman like you?” Maria teased.

 

Myrna laughed, pushing herself out of her chair and shuffling off toward the kitchen to fetch a bottle of water. “Oh, I think I'm mellowing in my old age.”

 

Maria laughed, too. “I'd hardly call you old, Myrna, but why would you call me about legends?”

 

It took a moment for Myrna to organize her words well enough to give the overall impression of nonchalance she was gunning for. “Well, interestingly enough, they seem to originate up near Quebec, and I know you'd said once before that you and Attean were originally from that area . . .”

 

“Legends around . . . Quebec?” she repeated. Myrna thought she heard a hint of reticence in Maria's tone but couldn't be sure. “I . . . I don't know how much help I'll be, but I can try . . .”

 

“Well, it's a long shot, of course, but there are a couple that I read that seem to contradict themselves . . .”

 

“Oh?”

 

“Mm,” Myrna said, breaking the seal around the water bottle's cap and taking a sip. “It's about this . . . this mountain man, I guess you could say. I mean, the description was just that he was a giant of a man, and according to the one legend, he lured a group of unsuspecting children into the forest and ate them.”

 

“Ate them,” Maria repeated tightly. “And you honestly think that one is true?”

 

“No, not really, but there was another that described a similar man who would come in the night and take away naughty children, and they were never heard from again.”

 

Maria uttered a terse little laugh. “Sounds a bit farfetched, don't you think?”

 

“Maybe,” Myrna agreed lightly. “Interesting, though . . . They say that this man could transform into a beast—a great, hulking beast absolutely covered with shaggy fur and crisscrossed with these hideous, jagged scars.”

 

“That's just . . . that's crazy.”

 

“I thought so, too, at first, but then I got to thinking about it, and it's possible if the man were youkai or something, right?”

 

“. . . Youkai . . .”

 

Narrowing her gaze as she hurried back to her desk once more, Myrna felt the strange sense of triumph starting to creep into her psyche. She really was right, after all. Maria knew something, and Myrna was determined to find out what it was. “I mean, think about it: if the man were youkai, he would absolutely be able to transform into a beast.”

 

Maria forced a high-pitched laugh. “I think you're grasping at straws,” she said.

 

“Possibly. Still, the thing that confuses me is that there is another legend, too, but it's so different from the others that it makes me wonder whether it's even more of an exaggeration . . .”

 

“What's the other one?” Maria asked slowly, reluctantly.

 

Myrna took a moment to swallow more water before going on. “Well, there's one about a group of children who got caught in a cabin while the forest burned around them.”

 

“Cave,” Maria said quietly.

 

“Come again?”

 

She cleared her throat. “I said it was a cave. W—they—were being suffocated by smoke . . .”

 

“I think you might be right . . . I think it was a cave . . .”

 

“It was,” Maria insisted.

 

Myrna nodded. “Mhmm . . . Anyway, they say that this huge . . . animal . . . broke through some burning trees that were blocking the entrance just in time to rescue the children. Almost makes him out to be a saint, really . . . but you know, I've got to admit, that story seems even more farfetched than the first one. He'd have to be a mighty big animal . . . maybe a bull-youkai or a—”

 

“A bear,” Maria ventured.

 

“Or a bear,” Myrna allowed. “Still, is anyone ever really that good? That selfless? To rush headlong into a burning forest just to save some children . . .”

 

Maria didn't answer right away. “Why? I mean, I-I would believe that story before I'd believe that he was a monster. Maybe someone he . . . he cared about was trapped in there, as well. Maybe that's the reason he wanted to save them . . . Those other stories were just . . . things that mothers tell children to make them behave; that's all.”

 

Myrna arched an eyebrow at the absolute hostility in Maria's voice; at the complete strength of conviction. “You almost sound like you knew this person,” she mused.

 

“Well, I—no,” she blurted. “It's just a story, after all, but even so, the version of it that I heard was . . . was that the bear saved the woman and children and who was trapped inside the cave.”

 

“Right, right,” Myrna said quickly, positive beyond a shadow of a doubt that Maria did, indeed, know the youkai in question. “I never said there was a woman trapped in the cave.”

 

“Oh, w—I . . . There was. In the version of the story that I heard, there was.”

 

Myrna uttered a soft laugh. “It's just a legend, right, Maria?”

 

Maria gripped the receiver so tightly that it groaned in her hands. “R-right . . . just a . . . a legend.”

 

“Hmm.”

 

“You know, I-I hate to cut you off, Myrna, but I just remembered that I had a few errands to run this afternoon . . . But I'm glad you called, and I'll be sure to give Attean your regards.”

 

“You do that,” Myrna agreed, satisfied that she'd gotten the proof she'd been after. Dropping the receiver into the cradle, she sank down in the desk chair as an absolutely smug smile spread over her features.

 

She was still grinning as the security lock on the door released seconds before Gunnar stepped into her quarters. “You're smiling like the cat that ate the canary,” he ventured, eyeing her carefully before picking up the file off her desk and sifting through the pages. “Why?”

 

Shifting her gaze to the size, she licked her lips and shrugged. “I think I've gotten a break on the Marin case.”

 

Chin snapping up, eyes brightening, burning like molten gold, Gunnar tossed the file back onto the desk and crossed his arms over his chest. “What do you mean?”

 

“I found someone who knows him.”

 

“He admitted it?”

 

“She, and not exactly.”

 

Gunnar sighed and shook his head, his cautious optimism fading quickly. “Damn it-”

 

“However, she did verify one thing.”

 

Rubbing his forehead in a completely exasperated sort of way, Gunnar didn't even bother to glance at her. “What's that?”

 

“The story your girlfriend's mother told her is true, and what's more? I think this woman I just talked to . . . I think she might have been in that cave, too.”

 

“Really.”

 

“Mhmm . . . it makes sense, doesn't it? Her mate was covering for Marin when I talked to him before, and he wouldn't do that if he didn't have a vested interest in Marin, to start with. If she was in that cave, and Marin was a good friend of theirs, it stands to reason that he would do everything within his power to save her, don't you think?”

 

Gunnar thought that over for several seconds before pinning Myrna with a probing look. “What else can you find out?”

 

Her grin widened just a trace as she leaned back in her chair. “I'll see what I can do.”

 

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

Griffin let out a deep breath and squeezed his eyes closed against the throbbing cadence that echoed through his head. He'd lost track of time as he sat at the desk trying to plod through the translation. For reasons that he didn't quite understand, he felt driven—absolutely compelled—to complete it quickly.

 

Maybe it was the feeling that everything in his life had come down to this, and maybe it was the deep-rooted understanding that his time was running out. He'd known that from the moment he'd read Isabelle's name on his student roster, hadn't he? Somehow he'd just . . . known . . .

 

And that was fine, too, wasn't it? Being called forth to account for his actions was something that he'd known would happen one day, and if he were truly honest with himself, he'd have to admit that he was ready—more than ready. Tired of hiding and dwelling in the shadows, trying not to draw any notice . . . it was wearing thin on him. He'd always known that it eventually would, but if he could do this one thing for her—for Isabelle—then it'd be worth it in the end.

 

The incessant tick of the clock on the mantle was his only solace in the quiet that her departure had left behind. The void that engulfed his home never failed to make him wince whenever he stepped through the door after spending the day at the University or with the children in the preschool . . . Spending countless hours sitting at the desk as he tried to make sense of the garble of languages and dialects, he'd somehow believed that he could immerse himself in that. He'd tried to lie to himself; to tell himself that he wouldn't miss her nearly as much if he wasn't thinking about her, and yet . . .

 

And yet that was impossible when everywhere he looked, he could see lingering traces of her youki; could hear the faintest stirrings of her laughter. It had managed to permeate the walls, filling the infrastructure of his home with the very essence of her until it wasn't just his home any longer but had become their home; their place, and now . . .

 

And now it felt so desperately empty.

 

Grimacing as he shoved away from the desk and hauled himself to his feet, he grasped his shoulder and extended his arm, rotating it slowly as the grimace gave way to a grunt of pain.

 

Glancing at the clock, he shook his head. Not quite midnight yet. Though his body was weary, his brain was not, and therein laid the crux of his trouble. As exhausted as he may be physically, he would not go to sleep no matter how hard he tried. No, he'd just spend hours staring at the darkened ceiling trying not to think about Isabelle—the feel of her lips on his, the caress of her skin, the soft little sounds that still clung to his mind . . .

 

Jerking on the faucet handle with a trembling hand, Griffin filled a glass and gulped the water down. He'd told himself over and over that dwelling on that night was the worst thing that he could do. Too bad his thoughts weren't complying. Every day seemed to get just a little worse in that respect.

 

He'd almost broken down the first night after she'd gone. He'd been foolish enough to think that he could go into her bedroom without being tormented by memories, and the lingering smell of her—of them—that hung in the air like perfume. He hadn't really thought about it at the time. He was drawn to the room like a moth to a flame, compelled by the debilitating need to be reminded of the beauty that was out of his reach. Sitting on the edge of the bed as he had done so many nights in the past, he'd almost panicked at the idea of never seeing her again. He couldn't remember a time when he'd felt so despondent; so alone, and he'd almost given to the desire to go to her, to drag her back if he had to.

 

It was telling, wasn't it? Try as he might, he really couldn't recall having quite this way ever before. He'd only recently come to realize that even after the loss of his family so very long ago that the other emotions he'd felt at that time had overshadowed the loneliness. The guilt, the anger, the consuming desire to visit his revenge upon those who had done them ill hadn't even come close to this; not really. Didn't they say that anger made a strange bedfellow? He supposed that there was a measure of truth in that. This time, though, there was no anger to buffer away the more hurtful emotions, no sense of anything other than the bleakness of inevitability that pained him more than the righteous indignation that had carried him through centuries at a time.

 

Then she'd showed up, standing outside for what had seemed like hours, and God, he'd wanted to open that door if only to see her face. It had taken every last ounce of willpower that he possessed to keep himself in check. He'd stood there, fingers curled around the door knob and trembling in his effort to resist, but when he'd finally given in and thrown open the door, he'd been too late. Standing there watching as her car disappeared around the corner, he'd told himself that it was better that way, and he'd almost believed it—almost.

 

The grating sound of the telephone cut through his reverie, and with a start, he set the empty glass on the towel beside the sink and frowned at the sudden way his heart lurched in his chest. Despite the deep-seated knowledge that it couldn't be Isabelle, he couldn't brush aside the need to hurry to intercept the phone call.

 

Grabbing the receiver in the middle of the fourth ring, Griffin hesitated before lifting the device to his ear. “H-hello?” he mumbled cautiously.

 

“Griffin, how are you?” Attean Masta greeted.

 

“Oh, uh, fine, I suppose . . .”

 

“You sound disappointed.”

 

He made a face. He really hadn't meant to sound so transparent. “N-no, not really.”

 

“Can you speak freely?”

 

Scowling at the strange sense of foreboding in Attean's almost reluctant manner, Griffin rubbed his forehead and stumbled toward the recliner. “I guess.”

 

“Good . . . good . . .”

 

“What's this about?”

 

Sighing heavily at Griffin's blunt question, Attean took a moment to compose his thoughts before speaking. “Maria got a call today from an old acquaintance. You wouldn't know her, but she works for the Zelig, in a manner of speaking.”

 

“The same woman who called you before?”

 

“Yes. Anyway, she suspects that we know you. Maria didn't confirm her suspicions, but . . .”

 

Dragging a hand over his face, Griffin drew a deep breath. “It doesn't matter,” he remarked. “Just . . . just do me a favor and hold her off for a week or two.”

 

“A week or two?” Attean repeated. “I'll tell her nothing, but appease my curiosity. Why the timetable?”

 

Staring into the rollicking flames dancing on the hearth, Griffin bit his lip, considered his options. There weren't many, and Attean was far too clever to bother with trying to cover everything up. “I told you about the research, right?”

 

`The uppermost part of the flames . . . It's the same color as Isabelle's eyes . . . her hair . . .'

 

“Griffin?” Attean's voice cut into his musings.

 

He shook himself and shifted his gaze off the fireplace as unwelcome heat crept into his cheeks. “What?”

 

Attean uttered a terse grunt. “I said, you're talking about the research you've been translating for your Isabelle, yes?”

 

Letting the `your Isabelle' comment slide for the moment, Griffin nodded. “I think I can finish it up in a week, maybe two.”

 

“And then?”

 

“And then, what?”

 

Attean clucked his tongue in reproach. “What will you do after you finish this translation?”

 

“That's all she needed me for,” he mumbled, wincing at the callousness of his own assessment.

 

“So she is not special to you,” Attean concluded in a tone that stated that he didn't believe Griffin.

 

“It doesn't matter,” Griffin muttered, his voice low and harsh.

 

“How do you figure that?”

 

Griffin sighed, letting his head fall back against the chair. “It just doesn't,” he insisted.

 

“Why?” Attean challenged. “Because you don't want it to matter?”

 

“No,” Griffin growled then grimaced. “It's only . . . She's just . . . we're just . . . too different.”

 

Heaving a long sigh, Attean's response was slow. “That's what I used to say,” he admitted softly. “Maria . . . Maria believed otherwise.”

 

“Isabelle isn't anything like Maria, and even then . . .” Griffin trailed off, raking an exasperated hand through his shaggy hair. “She's . . . she's an Izayoi.”

 

“Izayoi . . . ? You don't say . . .”

 

“Yeah, I do say,” he said then heaved a heavy sigh.

 

“Afraid that you will not measure up to her family?”

 

Attean's bald statement only served to darken Griffin's already formidable scowl. “That's hardly the issue,” he grumbled.

 

“Then what is?”

 

The scowl gave way to an exaggerated grimace, and he shook his head. He hated to admit it; he really did. It wasn't as if he were afraid of her family, but the truth of it was that he just didn't really care to come face-to -face with certain members of it . . . “Her grandfather . . . one of her grandfathers . . . is the tai-youkai.”

 

“Which tai-youkai?”

 

Griffin snorted. “The only one that matters.”

 

“I see,” Attean uttered. “She's the Zelig's granddaughter . . . Well, that does put a bit of a spin on things, doesn't it?”

 

“Anyway, just . . . I need a couple weeks; that's all.”

 

Attean considered Griffin's statement as though he were trying to decide what to say. Clearing his throat, he sighed softly, drumming his claws against a table. “You know I never asked you anything about your past or where you came from. I'm not asking now, for that matter, but . . .”

 

Grimacing—he'd known that this day would eventually come—Griffin rubbed his eye and waited.

 

“But,” Attean went on, carefully measuring his words, “it seems that whatever it is has come back to haunt you, no?”

 

“It isn't . . . It's not like that,” Griffin mumbled. “I don't want you to cover for me. I just need another couple weeks.” He swallowed hard. “Please.”

 

“To finish translating the research, yes?”

 

“. . . Yes.”

 

The clink of shifting ice cubes followed by the definite thump of a glass being set aside filtered through the telephone line. “I see. You know, I do not believe I ever properly thanked you,” he remarked, a hint of nostalgia creeping into his tone.

 

Griffin grunted, unsure what Attean was getting at and even more uncertain as to whether or not he really wanted to hear it. “For what?”

 

“You saved her, if you'll recall,” he said. “The burning forest . . .”

 

`The cave,' Griffin realized suddenly. “Oh, that . . . she was the only one who could cook,” he grumbled.

 

Attean chuckled. “Cooking. Of course,” he allowed. “Maria always felt badly for that.”

 

“For what?”

 

“You burned your hands, remember? You couldn't properly use them for weeks afterward.”

 

“Oh, that,” Griffin allowed. “I . . . I forgot about that . . .”

 

“Yes, well, she has not.”

 

“It's fine,” he insisted, uncomfortable with the praise. “It wasn't a big deal.”

 

Attean's chuckle seemed to contradict Griffin, but he let the subject drop. “So what will you do after you finish the translation?” he asked instead.

 

The question gave Griffin pause. It was something that he had been trying to avoid, wasn't it? “I don't know,” he lied, unwilling to voice the thoughts that had been creeping into his head of late.

 

“I see,” Attean remarked, but his tone seemed to say something entirely different: `That's isn't true. . . what is it that you don't want to say?' He sighed instead. Attean had never been one to pry. “You'll figure it out, I'm sure. Anyway, I'll see what I can do about stalling Myrna for time if she calls again.”

 

“Thanks,” Griffin said, hauling himself to his feet to hang up the receiver.

 

That was the million dollar question, wasn't it? What would he do once the research was translated? As much as he'd like to think that he could simply go back to living his life the same as he had done for years, he wasn't so certain that it was possible.

 

It wasn't the first time in the past couple weeks that he'd felt like a trapped animal. No, he felt like the invisible walls were closing in, didn't he . . .? He felt like those walls were slowly but steadily collapsing on him; that the box that he called his security was slowly falling apart . . .

 

It really was just a matter of time, and he knew it, even if he didn't want to think about it. Just a matter of time before everything . . .

 

He winced, dropping the receiver into the cradle and shuffling over to the window.

 

It was just a matter of time before his lifetime of hiding came crashing down on his head.

 

 

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Final Thought fromGriffin:

…My … Isabelle …?

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Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Avouchment): I do not claim any rights to InuYashaor 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~