InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity Redux: Metempsychosis ❯ Changes ( Chapter 12 )

"So, this is something you do for fun?" Ashur asked, making a face as the horse he rode—a brown beast who had the unfortunate name of Stomper—seemed to be delighting in his ill attempt to knock Ashur off onto his arse.

"All the time!"  Jessa laughed softly, carefully holding onto the reins of Penny, a pretty and apparently calm sorrel horse.  Kells giggled, too, as he held onto the reins just below Jessa's hands, content to believe that he was guiding the animal.

He'd taken them out of the city a little early.  They were on their way to Quebec City to look at a few properties, but Ashur had found a listing for a local stable outside of New York City where one could rent horses for anywhere from a day to a week, to ride their trails up to a small campground where they could stay, along with other various horse trails that ranged from easy to more advanced, but in order to take the more advanced routes, one had to pass a general dressage course.  Jessa, not surprisingly, had passed the course with ease.  Ashur hadn't even attempted it.  When one was done, one rode the horses back down and returned them, which he'd thought she might enjoy.  Somehow, it never really occurred to him that he might not, though . . .

He stifled a sigh.  It had only taken about twenty minutes to locate the campsite and to put their sparse gear in the small cabin.  Both it and the stable were outfitted with basic gear: cooking instruments, plates, cups, silverware, a few metal pails for water, an old but solid fish trap, and a small grate grill that could easily be set up over a campfire, all kept neatly in a couple small cupboards just inside the door.  The only somewhat modern convenience was a very small bathroom, complete with fully flushing toilet and a forced-water shower, but no hot water.

After spending a little bit, checking out the cabin and putting away the bag of feed for the horses, Jessa and Kells had wanted to try out one of the beginner's trails, and, being the glutton for punishment that he was, Ashur had foolishly agreed . . . After the last hour and a half on the creature, Ashur was more than a little ready to call it good for the day, and he might have, too, if she weren't thoroughly enjoying herself . . .

"This is fantastic!" she called back to him, the smile in her voice clear and apparent.  "Do you need to take a break?"

"No," he replied, silently cursing his misplaced pride.

'I'm . . . going to be really sorry for this tomorrow . . .'

His youkai snorted.  'Probably.'

"Daddy, I want a horse of my own!" Kells hollered.

"God forbid," he muttered under his breath.

Jessa turned to look back at him, frowning thoughtfully as she slowly shook her head and clicked her tongue to stop the horse.  She swung down, but left Kells up there as she grasped the reins and led the horse along the path.  "It wouldn’t be nearly as bad if you could let him gallop," she said, raising her voice to carry to him as he slid off the beast to walk, too.  "Some horses just walk rougher than others.  We could trade if you want . . . Penny's pretty smooth."

Glancing at the much smaller horse, Ashur snorted.  "I'm fine," he lied, thankful to have his feet back on the ground again.

She slowed down, allowing him to catch up to her, to walk beside her.

"I’m . . . I'm just not a horse person, I guess," he admitted.  "If you want to ride awhile, I can take Kells back to the cabin . . . Take him fishing or something . . ."

She shrugged.  "I think this trail just circles back to the cabin," she said.  "I . . . I've never fished before . . ."

He lifted his face, scanned the trees, the skies . . . From the position of the sun, he could tell that it wasn't quite noon yet, and that was fine.  He didn't really care how long they stayed out here.  "You don't really strike me as the fishing type," he allowed.  "Do you really want to touch fish?  I mean, if you catch them, you’d have to kill and skin them, too."

She wrinkled her nose, and he could feel her spirit rising to the perceived challenge.  "I could do that," she insisted a little too casually.

"I like fishing!" Kells exclaimed.  Quickly, though, the excitement dulled as his little face screwed up in a thoughtfully exaggerated scowl.  "Daddy?  Do I know how to fish?"

Ashur chuckled.  "No, you don't," he said.  "I can teach you though."

He heard Jessa's soft gasp, but didn't really think much of it until he glanced down at her, only to find her staring at him in a wholly strange kind of way, eyes wide, transfixed, the reddish hue seeming to flow, to undulate like molten lava, like shimmering scarlet pools, as a slow flush rose in her cheeks.  For a long moment, she didn't seem like she realized just what she was doing, but suddenly, she gasped again—this time, a little softer— as she quickly shifted her gaze away, as her already pink cheeks deepened into a dusky hue that almost matched her rosy lips.

"Jessa?  Are you all right?"

She cleared her throat, managed a husky laugh.  "That's the first time I ever saw you smile," she admitted quietly.

For some reason, her statement surprised him.  Was that true?  Really?  He supposed that he didn't really smile as much as he used to, but surely, he'd smiled before around her . . .

Heaving an inward sigh, he shook his head.  No, maybe he hadn't . . .

"It's a nice smile," she concluded, tucking a few flyaway strands of her ridiculously fine hair behind her ear.  "You should wear it more often."

He smiled slightly despite himself.  "Should I?"

She nodded, her tongue darting out to moisten her lips before she smiled back.  "Da always told me that a smile was the best accessory one could wear."

Forcing his eyes off of her and upward, toward the treetops so high overhead, Ashur frowned.  He'd thought it before, hadn't he?  'Smile so that no one sees your pain . . .'  He used to be fairly good at it, too.  Somewhere along the way, though, he'd forgotten how to do it, and he'd discovered that building a wall around himself might well be far more effective . . .

"Where are you from?" she asked, interrupting his thoughts.

"Where am I from?" he repeated with a thoughtful scowl.

She reached up with one hand, placing it against Kells' back to correct his posture.  He immediately sat up straight, and Jessa gave him a quick little rub to let him know that he’d done well.  "You have a slight accent," she said.  "I noticed before, but I kept forgetting to ask."

"Oh . . . Uh . . . Japan," he allowed.  "I just moved here shortly after Kells was born."

"Ah . . . So, that's why you're so good at using chopsticks," she concluded.  "It makes sense . . . Why'd you move here?"

He sighed, not really wanting to answer her questions, not really interested in playing the, 'get to know you' game.  Even so, he supposed he could understand her curiosity, even if it was sorely misplaced.  "I just thought it'd be nice to live closer to Ben and Charity," he said, hoping that it was enough to appease her.

“But they’re moving, aren’t they?  And so are you.”

He nodded slowly, gaze slipping over the path ahead, around them.  “They moved to New York City when I moved Kells here,” he admitted.  “It was easier for me to take care of some things from here than it would have been from Maine . . .” Making a face as he tried to brush aside the heavy sense of foreboding that always accompanied discussions regarding that particular point in history, Ashur shrugged.  “It was just a lot at the time.”

The look she sent him told him that she knew that there was more to it than he’d said, which was true.  Still . . . Even so, she didn't press him further, which suited him just fine.

Jessa squealed as she yanked the huge fish out of the water, holding onto it tightly as she hefted it high.  "That makes four!" she hollered triumphantly.

Ashur slowly shook his head as Kells hopped up and down in the shallows, clapping in his excitement.  "And there goes my manhood," he muttered to himself as he swung his arms wide to stretch, wading over to her as she turned that ridiculously brilliant smile on him.  "Is that enough for dinner?"

"Yes, it is," he said, taking the fish from her after retrieving the slatted fish trap he'd found inside the cabin.  He added the fresh catch to the trap along with the other three huge fish were still flopping around inside.  Counting the ones Ashur had caught, they had a grand total of four . . .

"Since I caught them all, does that mean you have to clean them?" she asked, bouncing along on the balls of her feet to keep up with him as he strode toward the shore.

"All right," he conceded, albeit, with a measure of ill grace.  "It was beginner's luck," he scoffed.

She rolled her eyes.  "It wasn't a contest," she pointed out reasonably.  "Of course, if it was, then I'd have won."

"Daddy's a loser!" Kells hollered happily.

"Thanks, son," Ashur grumbled, casting Kells a withering look that somehow just made the boy giggle.  Considering it for a moment, however, Ashur shrugged.  "You know, I taught you how to fish, so if you think about it that way, I'm kind of the winner."

"That . . . doesn't even make sense," she told him, shaking her head as she plopped down on the shore to watch him gut and clean the fish.

'You know damn well that the reason you didn't catch a single fish is that you were way too busy, staring at Jessa,' his youkai-voice pointed out a little too reasonably.

'I was not.'

The voice grunted.  'Don't worry.  I rather like that bathing suit myself, if it makes you feel any better.'

He didn't bother replying to that, but he did shift his gaze to the side—and was immediately sorry for it, too, given that the girl in question had stretched out her long legs, heels on the soft ground, knees bent slightly, as she leaned back on her hands, her head tilted back, eyes closed as she savored the heat from the late afternoon sun.  The length of her hair—fiery in the light—dragged in the dirt, but she either didn't notice or didn't care, as the rise of her breasts lifted and fell with every breath she drew, the barest scrap of black fabric covering them . . .

'That girl has damn fine nipples . . .'

'You . . . You need to be quiet.'

'But she's cold!  And that means that certain things—like her nipples—are very prominently on display there!'

He heaved an inward sigh, dragging his eyes off of the girl as he carefully scaled the first fish.

He had no business at all, looking at her, now did he?  Holy hell, eighteen years old . . . She was closer to Kells in age than she was to him, damn it, and that ought to mean something.  But it didn't, and how could it, when she was sitting entirely too close, wearing entirely too little . . .?

"The evening's going to be chilly," he said, hoping she didn't see right through what he was about to say.  "You might want to get dressed before the sun goes down."

"It'll be a while before it does," she countered mildly.  "I've decided that I want to get a tan this year.  Ma always fussed about it before . . . Said it would be a shame to ruin my complexion . . ." Twisting her waist, she brought her far hand around to lean on the dirt, bringing her breasts to even more of an incredible vantage point that Ashur had to bite his cheek to ignore while she peered down at the fish as he cut it open, hoping that she didn't notice, just how badly his hands were shaking.

"Oh, that's so gross," she murmured, leaning in to get a better look.  "Oh, eww, eww, eww . . . Is that caviar?"

He shot her a raised-eyebrow-ed look and slowly shook his head.  "Looks like it," he replied.  "You want to try it?"

She shook her head quickly.  "Never did like that stuff," she admitted.  "That's really disgusting . . ."

He snorted.  "It's entrails.  It's supposed to be disgusting," he told her.

She made a face.  "I want to try doing that."

He blinked, hand stilling as he shot her a questioning glance.  "You want to scale and gut a fish?"

She nodded.

"All right," he said with a shrug.  "But if you start one, you have to finish it.  Here," he went on, grabbing a fish from the trap and quickly cutting the head off so that she wouldn’t have to do that for herself.  To his surprise, she didn’t even flinch as she watched him do it.

She rolled her eyes and took the fish he offered her.  "Okay, I scale it first, right?" she asked, grabbing a short piece of wood that was relatively flat to use as a cutting board.

He tossed the first fish into an empty bucket and reached for another.  "Just carefully use your claws . . . Like this . . ."

She watched him for a moment before mimicking his motions.  She wasn't very good at it, but she did manage to remove the scales without mutilating the fish skin too badly.  "This would be okay if it didn't stink so much," she remarked.

"Yeah, and your hands might end up smelling fishy for a day or so," he told her.

"I'm washable," she quipped, flipping the fish over to scale the other side.

"It has been my experience that most females don't like doing stuff like this," he pointed out.

"Okay, so I don't want to do it every day," she admitted.  "But I like to cook, so it just seems right to learn the other stuff, too."

"You cook?"

She nodded, concentrating on getting the last of the scales off the fish.

"You could have told me that sooner."

She smiled at him.  "If I cook for you, will you pay me more?"

He shrugged.  "Depends on how good you are."

She sighed, pushing her hair out of her face with the back of her bent wrist.  "I could cook these," she offered.

"Okay," he agreed.  "Now, you just run your claw up the belly and take out everything that looks . . . disgusting."

She did it, impressing him just a little when she managed the task with minimal squeamishness.  Even so, he took pity on her, finishing up the fish he was working on and grabbing the last one before she finished the one she was gutting.

When he was done, she took the fish over to the water to give them a good washing before laying them out on a towel to dry as she gathered the things together to make dinner.  He'd brought along a few staples, but the website had boasted about the fish being the best in the area, and as the smell of frying fish over the open campfire filled the air, Ashur had to admit, however grudgingly, that she absolutely was surprising, that girl . . .

Jessa awoke with a start, smashing her hand over her mouth as the nightmare she couldn't quite remember slowly loosened its hold on her.  The cabin was dark, quiet, and she pushed herself up as she blinked, trying to make out anything in the room.

She could tell by the sound of Kells' and Ashur's breathing that they were still sleeping.  Bringing up her knees, she wrapped her arms around her legs, letting her forehead fall against them as she struggled to steady her raging emotions.

Funny how something she couldn't even recall could have such a firm grip on her: funny and a little sad, too.  Yet, the walls felt like they were closing in on her, and even if she tried to tell herself that it was okay, that it was all just a dream, well . . .

Before she could stop to think about it, she tossed the blanket aside, stumbled to her feet, only to creep as quietly as she could across the bare plank floor of the single room cabin, letting herself outside into the night.  She needed to breathe, needed to . . . to escape, even if that notion was entirely nonsensical.  It was the sense that she could outrun whatever it was, that maybe, if she could just distance herself, maybe she’d be all right . . .

She had no idea what time it was as she skittered across the porch, down the two steps to the stone path that led to the pond.  The campfire was still smoldering, and she stopped, leaned her head to the side, let her youki stretch out around her.  The half-burned wood flared to brilliant light once more, and she spared a minute to toss another few logs onto the fire before stepping back to examine her handiwork.  It was probably easier since the fire hadn't completely died out.  Even so, she'd take the victory, she decided.

If only she could remember that dream . . .

She'd had it before in the time since her mother's death.  She never could remember it, though, and maybe it was for the best.  After all, what good could possibly come of it?  All she knew what that she invariably woke up, feeling scared and lost and alone . . . She didn't know how she knew that it was always the same dream, but she did . . .

Letting out a deep breath, she turned, wandering down the path that led to the pond, not really paying too much attention to where she was going.  In the back of her mind, she heard the horses they'd rented, nickering softly.  She'd picketed them out in the fresh grass to enjoy the cool air until morning even though the small cabin rental also included a little stable to shelter the animals during inclement weather.

The moon over the water looked so lonely, so fragile: like just the right sound or the right word could shatter the precarious serenity that balanced so precariously on the cusp as the night shadows played.  She knew that feeling, didn't she?  It was so easy to fake during the daytime, easy to preoccupy herself with Kells, with . . . With Ashur—Ashur and his secrets that he held so stubbornly, guarded those secrets with a viciousness that she couldn’t understand—Ashur, with the eyes that were as warm as the summer sky, as cold as the winter's gale . . . and yet . . .

And yet, there was something about him, too: something she didn't really understand.  For all of his standoffishness, there was something that seemed almost vulnerable, even though he tried so desperately to hide it.  There was a certain melancholy, a level of sadness that dug so deep in him . . .

'Sadness?' her youkai-voice asked.

She nodded to herself a little vaguely.  Yes, it was sadness, though how she knew that, she wasn't certain.

'He's sad . . . and maybe a little lonely . . . and . . . and hurting . . . like . . . like me . . .'

And that thought brought everything so sharply, so vividly into focus . . . Her father's last words to her on that awful day . . .

The room was dark, somber, almost stifling in the pale and stunted light that seeped through the heavy, blue damask curtains.  Daylight was too bright; it hurt his eyes, he said, but she wondered how much of that was true and how much was that he just didn't want her to see his condition for what it was.  Bad enough, she supposed, to see the gauntness in his face, in his arms and hands, in the shadows—the owlish way his eyes seemed to be sunken into his skull, the way that the coverlet on the grand bed did not rise and fall the way that it used to as her father slowly and painfully wasted away . . .

Reaching out to her, grasping her hand, he had trouble focusing on her face.  His breathing was harsh, reaching, as though he couldn't properly do it, and she gritted her teeth, tried not to let him see the despair she felt deep inside.

"Jessa . . . My beautiful Jessa . . ."

Lifting his hand to cradle against her cheek, she stubbornly bit back the tears that she felt rising.  "Da?"

He tried to smile.  "My lass, don't cry.  I'll be with your ma soon enough, and you . . . you’ll be right as rain."

"Save your strength, Da," she pleaded quietly.  "Please . . ."

He rasped out a couple more shallow breaths.  "I don't have . . . the luxury . . . of time . . . I need you to . . . to hear me now."

". . . Okay . . ."

"Watch out for . . . him . . ." he said.  "Pro . . . mise . . ."

"Da?  Watch out for who?" she asked.

His eyes slipped closed, and the one word he tried to say was lost in a flash of light, in a vortex of wind, as her hand closed on emptiness, as the first sob rattled out of her despite her father's wish that she not shed tears . . .

The memory of that moment gave way to another one, a gauzier, more gossamer one of her father, of watching him as he stood alone amidst the ring of torches, sparked to life in her mind.  At the time, she was so small that the memory itself was hazy, softened by the edges of passing time.  But she'd watched as he lifted his hands, as he closed his eyes for just a moment.  Focusing his youki?  She didn't know.

And all those torches flared around him, surrounding him in brilliant, dancing flames . . .

"Jessa . . .?"

Her eyes flashed open, flaring wide at the sight of the flames—her flames—as they danced upon the water.  A moment later, she gasped as Ashur's arm closed around her wrist, turned her roughly, only to let go, to catch her as he pulled her toward him, crushed her body against his, as his lips fell on hers.

Pure fire.

That's what it was.  In the haze of her mind, the only thing that made sense was the absolute burn wherever their bodies met.  His kiss was rough yet tender, wild and controlled, a kiss meant to scorch her through and through as he grasped her hair, tugged her head back, his tongue burning like an inferno against her lips.  A trembling passion ignited, spread rampant, like a brushfire as his free hand caressed her back through the thin tee-shirt she'd worn to bed.

He groaned softly, the sound captured in her mouth as she sighed, and when he started to pull away, she reacted on instinct, lips pressing against that throbbing pulse of his throat as a ragged moan slipped from him, as he pulled her closer, letting go of her hair, grabbing her ass as he jerked her against him hard . . .

The shockwave that shot from him to her unleashed a series of tremors that rattled through her, straight to her very core as a foreign surge of absolute desire rocked her.  Her hands sank into his hair, holding onto him so tightly that she could feel every shattered breath he drew, every thump of his heart, beating in his chest.  The combustion of a near-painful, searing heat deep down was akin to standing too close to a raging fire, every touch of his hands resulting in a need so deep, so engulfing, that it left her reeling, spinning out of control as a passion she'd never felt before overwhelmed her, shocked her, frightened her, yet left her feeling as though she wanted—needed—more . . .

Lips finding hers once more, the stroke of his tongue against hers was electrifying, the swirl that raged faster and faster, dizzying, inebriating.  The stir of his hand, sliding over the fabric of her shirt set off another spire of rapid-fire explosions, as every single nerve in her body reacted on pure instinct.  Her mind shut down as pure sensation took over, as instinct pushed her, prodded her, as the sense of light and dark jumbled in her head, focusing instead on the silent demands of her body and of his.

"Damn," he murmured, his voice rough, thick, harsh.  "Jessa . . ."

"Ashur," she whispered, more of an exhalation than an actual sound.  He groaned again, let go of her, only to grasp her face in his hands, only this time, the kiss he gave her was infinitely sweet, heartbreakingly tender, and, with another stuttering breath, he sighed, kissing her forehead as he pulled her into a gentle hug.

It took a long moment before he trusted himself to speak, and before he did, he cleared his throat.  "You . . . You're not alone," he told her, his voice barely above a whisper.  "You'll never be alone again . . ."

"I . . ."

"Don't be afraid," he told her.  "I . . . I'll protect you . . ."

And something about his words touched her, held her, drove back that loneliness that she'd grown accustomed to during those cold and dark hours of the night.  She hugged him back, clung to him, as though she were afraid to let go, and it took her a minute to realize that the dampness under her cheek, against his skin . . .

It was her tears.