InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity Redux: Metempsychosis ❯ Headway ( Chapter 65 )

Rubbing his forehead as he read through the slim-file that he'd downloaded earlier, he grimaced at the images that were attached to the case information.  They weren't pretty.  An entire family, gutted and mutilated—Kent Seabourne, 34, a marine biologist living in Nova Scotia, along with his wife, Krissy Seabourne, 29, a kindergarten-teacher-turned-stay-at-home mom to Karl, aged four, and Kiley, nineteen months . . .

According to the file, Krissy had just returned home around two in the afternoon from the supermarket with the children.  Kent got home around half an hour later, give or take, and he helped Krissy bring in the groceries.  Somewhere in the next half hour or so, three youkai broke into the house and cut them all down, starting with the children, who were playing in the living room.  Krissy was next in an obvious and pathetic attempt to save her children.  Kent was last, but the interesting part of the file, according to police reports, were the very large quantities of salt that someone had apparently flung around the room.  The reports seemed to dismiss it as incidental damage in the wake of the struggle, but Ashur had to wonder if there weren't something more to it.

'What?  You think that the guy—Kent—that he somehow thought that he was being attacked by . . . by what?'

Frowning at his youkai's words, Ashur rubbed his chin as he considered that.  'It's entirely possible that he thought he was being attacked by something . . . unnatural . . . I mean, if he could see through concealments . . .'

'You mean, like what happened to Drevin and his family?'

It was possible, he had to allow.  He hadn't actually talked much to Kurt, but Bas had filled him in on the higher points of that situation when he'd told him about the file.

"There's something strange about the incident," Bas said when Ashur answered the call while he was downloading the information into the Slim-File.  "It almost reminds me of what happened to Sam's husband, Kurt . . . When he was little, a group of youkai attacked his family, killed everyone but Kurt because he hadn't come inside.  They knew that the dad could see them—could see through their concealments.  Kurt grew up, thinking that we were demons—monsters . . . Spend his life, trying to hunt them down.  He can see through the concealments, too, by the way, so if he looks at you weird, that's why—although you don't really appear much different, do you?  Anyway, it's just a thought . . ."

"So, you think that maybe this family could see through the concealments, too?  That they were targeted because of it?"

"I . . . don't know.  It's just a guess.  Maybe not the whole family, but it's possible.  Some of the lesser-youkai have a tendency to fear being outed for what they are.  Dad said he thinks maybe it's because they've always lived in a circle of fear, even before we went into hiding—like it's ingrained in them or something . . ."

"I see . . . So, this whole thing might be something or it might not be anything?"

"Well, I don't know about that.  The human authorities tend to pin the blame for things on something they can try to reasonably argue, even if it isn't the case.  What we do, though . . . If there were youkai involved, we try to figure out who and what and why, and then we eliminate the threat if it still exists."

Heaving a little sigh, Ashur frowned as he scrolled through the images, the carnage.  It was horrible, really, just how much destruction had been left behind.  That entire family was wiped out on that afternoon, and somehow, the cops had chalked the whole thing up to some kind of bear attack.  Ashur wasn't sure how they were able to make that fly, but, given that the case occurred in the early 1970s, he figured that might have something to do with it.  It had made its way onto Cain's stack of open cases, and from there, it had ended up in Bas and Gunnar's office.  Since they hadn't quite gotten to it yet and since it was from Ashur's region, they'd sent it up as the first case for the Canadian branch of the youkai special crimes office . . .

The trouble with the file, though, was that there were no witnesses, no real leads, and about the only thing he could see to go on was an address, and even that was a stretch.  The house itself had been entirely renovated and sold off, only to be destroyed in a fire some thirty years later.  It was a total loss and had been knocked down, so it was gone, too.

'It almost seems like something that you'll never be able to solve, doesn't it?  They sent you a file—your first case—and there's nothing at all to go on . . . It's almost like they want you to fail, don't you think?'

He sighed, setting the file aside to rub his forehead instead.

A tap on the open doorway frame drew his attention, and he shifted his gaze, only to find Devlin, slouching casually against the frame.  "I heard you were back . . . and other things . . ."

"Yeah, well, the, 'other thing' you're talking about is in the kitchen with that woman who showed up yesterday," Ashur grumbled, mostly because those, 'other things' were Jessa and most likely, the impromptu mating, and Jessa had spent the whole night, closed away with that woman—the new housekeeper—in the basement, in the small maid's quarters down there.

Devlin nodded slowly.  "You should be nice to her," he ventured, flicking a bit of lint off his sleeve.  "Irish said that she worked for her family from well before she was born—better than a century, I believe she said.  Might know a good thing or two about Irish, I'd wager.  In any case, it can't hurt, can it?  I mean, if she likes the woman, then you might score some points with her if you're nice to her—Irish said her name is Nora, by the by . . ."

Settling back in his chair, Ashur nodded.  "So, you're saying that you think I should formally offer her a job?"

Shoving himself away from the door frame, he ran a finger along the bookshelf and looked at his fingertip with a frown.  "You could use a housekeeper," he allowed, brushing his hands together to knock away whatever dust he'd come up with.  "And just why are you closed up in here, anyway?  I'd think you should be trying to come up with ways to convince Irish that your mating wasn't an accident—you do realize, don't you, that she thinks it was?  Something about a ripped condom, she said."

He snorted indelicately.  "Funny thing when there was no condom, to start with," he grumbled.

"So, you did do it on purpose.  Good for you.  Well, kind of . . ."

"All right," Ashur sighed, rolling his hand to speed things along.  "Let's hear it.  Get it out of your system."

Devlin chuckled, sinking into the chair across from him and nabbing the slim-file in one fluid motion.  Ashur nearly reached for the file, but sat back instead.  "I'm not going to—Oh, hell, I am.  Did you think that was a good idea?  Taking a mate without asking her about it first?  You realize, don't you?  Irish hasn't a clue that you're her mate, though, to be honest, I'm not entirely sure why she doesn't.  Seriously, man, you should know better than to do something like that.  You're old, aren't you?  Probably older than—"

"Say, 'dirt', and I just might kill you."

"—Me . . . Which isn't nearly as great an analogy as the original would have been, but you get the idea here, right?  Now, not only do you have to convince her she is your mate, but you have to convince her that you wanted her to be your mate on the night in questions—or day, whatever.  Not my circus, not my monkeys."

"And you're stating things that I already know," he grumbled.  "If you're not going to be helpful—"

"Hang on . . . What the hell is all of this?"

Glancing over in time to realize that Devlin was actually looking through the file, Ashur sighed.  "They asked me if I'd be interested in working in a new office for the special crimes department," he explained.  "That's the first file . . . and there's not a whole hell of a lot to go on.  Human family, all murdered, obvious youkai involvement, but . . ."

Devlin shook his head, grimacing as he leafed through the photos taken at the crime scene.  "They're not human," he said.  "Well, he isn't, anyway . . . The woman—the children . . . She's human.  Those children are hanyou . . ."

"What?"

Letting out a deep breath, his gaze shifting to the window, Devlin slowly shook his head.  "He . . . He's light-youkai."

"Wait . . . What?  How do you know?"

Devlin didn't look at him as he closed the file and set it back on the desk.  "You're joking, right?"

"But he doesn't look anything like you."

He did look at Ashur for that, his expression darkening as he narrowed his gaze.  "Because we're all supposed to look the same?  He's a diluted lineage, but he's light."

"How do you know?"

A strange sort of darkness passed over Devlin's face—a kind of darkness that Ashur had never seen in the man before.  "I was taught at home, not that it matters much, but . . . but I was.  I was given the regular curriculum—history, science, math, language.  I was also taught ancient lore at my father's behest.  I did tell you he liked to collect rare things, right?  And what was rarer than my mother?  Than me?  That aside, I learned things—lots of things.  Back in the old days, there was a legend that eating the heart of a light youkai could grant powers to the . . . diner.  Now, most of the lore stated simply, 'creature of light', so you can draw your own conclusions from that, but most of those who were aware of the existence of youkai gleaned that it referred to the light-youkai, which was why my kind were hunted, and, in some cases, captured.  From what I read in my research, the pure lines are the ones that look like Mum—like me—and, as far as I can tell, we're the last of them.  Now, some of the youkai were captured and held in what could only be described as . . . as breeding factories, and this guy . . . He looks like one of the ones that came from that . . . atrocity . . ."  Making a face, he slowly shook his head.  "I thought . . . I thought that those were just rumors—fairy tales . . ."

Ashur considered everything Devlin had said, frowning as he tapped a claw against his chin.  "But . . . But he left his body behind . . ."

"If a light youkai's heart is ripped out while he's still alive, the body remains, too," he said.

"So, you're saying . . ."

Deliberately taking his time as he rubbed his eye, Devlin sighed.  "The lore is wrong," he said, his tone a little more hostile, a little angrier, than Ashur could credit, though maybe he could understand Devlin's unvoiced feelings on the matter.  Just how disgusting, how despicable . . . "The lore . . . It led one to believe that it could be the heart of any light-youkai, but that's not true.  If you dig a little deeper, read a little longer . . . If you learn to comprehend the old texts . . . It's an infant they need.  An infant because their life energy—their youki—is more concentrated, purer."

"And someone was trying to create them?  To what end?"

Devlin shrugged.  "Who can comprehend the minds lost to madness?" he countered, slipping back into the much more familiar, almost philosophical tone of voice.  "My logical guess would be that, whomever was doing it craved power, though what kind of power they could harness from the light-youkai would be marginal, at best—maybe a slight boost to their already phenomenal ability to heal . . . We're not really that strong—not physically.  There were other legends that spoke of powers far beyond that which should ever exist.  I just thought that they were little more than legend or stories told to children at bedtime . . ." Suddenly, he shook his head.  "Who knows?  Maybe there's more truth to it all than I thought . . ."

"You're afraid they're still looking for you—for your mother."

The look on Devlin's face was far more telling than the simple, almost sarcastic, quirk of his lips.  "Anything's possible, right?  That file proves it . . ."

Jessa stood in the archway of the living room, lips pursed, held to the side, as she stared at Ashur's broad back while he poured himself a glass of cognac.

It was late.  Kells had been tucked in hours ago, and she'd just been shooed out of Nora's room, much to her own irritation.  Not surprising that Kells had taken to Nora pretty much right away, and Jessa?

She'd dissolved in tears the very moment she'd spotted the old housekeeper—a sorely needed familiar face who had smiled, just a little as she'd opened her arms, as she'd held Jessa close as she sobbed against her shoulder.  Funny how Jessa hadn't actually thought about the woman in weeks—months . . . Funnier, still, just how welcome, how familiar she was . . .

How often had she run to Nora for comfort, for the loving embrace when she'd fallen and scraped a knee or when her nanny was being too rough with her hair?  How often had Jessa sat on the counter, chattering away at the woman, interrupting her work time and again, and yet Nora had never chastised her, never told her that she was being a bother . . .

Orlaith had told her that many times, anyway, catching Jessa in the kitchen when the nanny would say that she'd managed to give her the slip.  Then she'd been forced to go back where she belonged, always with that look of exasperation on her mother's face . . .

But she supposed that it was natural, in a way.  As she'd gotten older, was sent off to boarding school, she hadn't spent nearly as much time at home, hadn't really been around Nora as much as she had when she was nothing more than a small child.  She was ashamed to admit as much, but the woman had kind of fallen away in her life, nudged aside by other things . . .

Even so, she'd come all the way here, just to find her, and Jessa couldn't be happier about it.  She wasn't sure if it was simply that Ashur realized that Jessa would want Nora near or if he'd just decided that he might as well offer the willful woman a job, but he'd told her during dinner that he'd asked Nora to stay on as their housekeeper—a position that Nora was more than happy to accept.

She supposed on some level that she ought to thank Ashur for his thoughtfulness on the matter.  Too bad she was still quite irritated by his other bit of finagling for the day to be bothered with such trivial things as a gratitude at the moment . . .

"Devlin Broughton isn't yours, Ashur Philips," she stated as she stomped forward and took his glass, only to drain it before handing it back.  "He's mine.  If you want your own bloody redcoat, go find your own.  That one belongs to me."

"He belongs to you, Jessa?"

She nodded and flicked a finger at the now-empty snifter.  "Aye, mine," she informed him with a haughty little 'hrumph'.  "Ye canna have him.  I found him.  I befriended him.  That makes him mine, right?  Oh, and fill that up, while ye're at it."

Ashur rolled his eyes, but refilled the snifter and handed it to her before filling another for himself.  "You can keep him.  He's just going to be working with me in special crimes."

She snorted, waving around the snifter as she turned her back on Ashur and headed for the sofa.  "He can't do that kind of work!  He's too squirrely for all t’at!  He's probably at home, curled up in a fetal position right now, thinking of all those horrible things . . . poor lamb . . ."

"I'll make sure to tell him you said so," Ashur parried.  "You've just utterly emasculated him, you know."

Jessa rolled her eyes.  "He saw a snake while we were out riding today, and he screamed like a girl," she pointed out.

Ashur blinked.  "That was him?"

“Like.  A.  Girl.”  She nodded very slowly, eyes wide as she stared over the rim of the snifter at him.  "Still think it's a good idea?"

He chuckled.  "Actually, I do."

She sighed.  "Why do you want to work in something so dreadful?" she asked quietly, scooting over as Ashur sat down beside her.  When she tried to scoot a little farther away, he caught her, held her against his side.  She gave him a little shove, but it didn't do a thing, and she gave up, at least for the moment.

'I mean, it's not like I want to be sitting here, crunched up against him.   Of course, not . . .'

Her youkai-voice remained conspicuously silent, and she stifled a sigh.

"It can't be anything worse than the things I've already seen—things I've lived through," he said quietly.

"Like what?" she prompted, downing the rest of the cognac in her glass and setting it on the coffee table.

"I've told you," he said with a simple shrug.  "My childhood was just not what others were, like yours, for example . . . Although yours wasn't nearly as perfect and beautiful as you've led me to believe, was it?"

Jessa frowned as a half-forgotten conversation sprang to mind—one she hadn't really given much thought, not since the night it had happened . . . Charity's voice, telling her . . . telling her part of Ashur's story—part of it that she felt that she could share without interfering . . .

"A couple years ago, there was an uprising back home, back in Japan . . . We found Kyouhei in the basement, tied up, beaten . . . It was . . . It was horrible . . . Their father, the great and mighty Hidekea . . ."

"But . . . But they hurt you, didn't they?  Your . . . Your parents . . .?" she asked quietly.  "That's . . . That's what Charity said . . ."

The look he shot her was almost surprised, almost a little . . . guilty?  "I turned against them," he replied.  "What they were doing was wrong—I thought it was wrong, anyway—plotting to overthrow the Inu no Taisho, and yeah, okay, it was wrong, but . . . But then, I ask myself, were they right?  I mean, isn't everyone fundamentally doing what they feel is right, even if you disagree?  Just because something isn't right to you doesn't mean that it is wrong to them . . ." He sighed, shook his head, and suddenly, he seemed much older than he normally did . . . "In their minds, they were right, and I was wrong, but in mine, I know that they were wrong.  It's just . . ."

She winced.  "Charity said . . . She said they . . . that they beat you . . ."

"They . . . They did," he allowed in an almost clinical tone of voice, as though he'd rather state the facts than to try to think on it too much, too hard, and she supposed that she could understand that.  Maybe he needed that slight separation in his own head, just to keep from going mad . . .

"Because you released Manami . . ."

He nodded slowly, drained his drink and grabbed her glass to refill them.  His hands were shaking just a little, and Jessa winced.  As much as she might want to know, did she really have a right to ask when he, quite obviously, didn't really want to talk about it, and she knew that, too.

"Always such a busybody, Jessa!  You need to stop asking so many questions!  If someone wants to tell you something, they will, so take what they give you and be satisfied with that . . ."

Blinking away the echo of her mother's voice, Jessa took the glass of wine he offered her instead of another glass of cognac, though he had refilled his with the same thing.  "There was just . . . a lot that happened . . . really fast," he admitted as he sat back down and pulled her against him again.

"If . . . If you don't want to talk about it, I . . . I understand . . ."

He sighed.  "It's not that I don't want to—I mean, I don't, but . . . But it's not you.  I . . . I want to tell you.  You should know.  You have the right to know.  It's just . . ." Trailing off with a grimace, he seemed to be trying to figure out how to say whatever it was he was struggling to put into words.  "That was over three years ago, and . . . and a lot of it still doesn't make sense to me, so trying to explain it . . . That's all.  Just . . . can you be patient with me?  I'll tell you . . . everything . . . Just . . . It may take me a while."

Jessa shifted, turned her body to look at his face, into his eyes.  Those swirling blue pools were churning as he stared back at her, as though he were trying so hard to reach her, and something about that . . .

Reaching up to cradle his cheek in her hand, she couldn't help herself, couldn't stand that look of confusion on his face.  "You don't have to tell me anything you don't want to tell me," she said.

For some reason, her statement seemed to bother him even more, and he sighed.  "My . . . My father chained me up in the basement—a special basement that he'd built of solid iron to make it harder for me to manipulate the earth.  I've been in that basement before, but never quite like that . . . Otou-san called it my training room . . ."

She flinched at the cynical laugh that escaped him.

"He flogged me with one of okaa-san's cat-o-nine-tails.  Whips were her specialty, imbued with her cruelty, in the form of poisons—never fast acting poisons, though.  Her poisons were ones designed to make you suffer for a good, long time, until you just wished you were dead . . ."

"Okaa-san . . .” she repeated, as though she were considering, what he’d said.  “Your . . . mother . . .?  But—"

He sighed.  "Even from the start, I was never the son they wanted.  The son they wanted was Ben, but he . . . He chose his own path—followed his best friend to America—and they . . . They never forgave him for that.  So, they had me.  I was supposed to be better than Ben, more powerful than Ben, more obedient than Ben . . ." Suddenly, he chuckled, but there was a sadness in it, a sense of inevitability . . . "But I was a failure, and . . . and they never missed an opportunity to remind me of that, either . . ."

"That's no' true," she said, brows drawing together as she scowled at the very idea that he presented to her.

He chuckled again, only this time, it actually sounded closer to what it should be. " Well, I never said I agreed with them," he allowed, brushing aside her umbrage on his behalf.  "It did teach me to have a thicker skin than that, I guess."

"So . . . it didn't bother you?"

"I'd be lying if I said it didn't," he told her.  "It's more like, I grew to expect it—like I knew that it was coming."

"A fine thing to get used to," she muttered, unable to brush aside her own feelings as easily as he did.

"What frightens me most is . . . in a way, I'm like them—just like them . . ."

"You're . . .?  No, you aren't."

He shook his head, caught her hand to pull it away from his face, but he didn't let go of it, either.  "I am," he said again.  "When I think about everything—about how it all went down . . . I'd be lying, too, if I tried to say that a small part of me is sad, and yet . . . Most of me . . . I'm glad.  As horrible as it sounds, I . . . I'm glad . . . because if they were still alive—if they were still here . . . When I think about the way I was raised . . . If they had lived, if they had inflicted their twisted views on Kells?  I can't stand that.  That . . . That little boy . . . He's my son . . ."

She had nothing to say to that.  When she thought of Kells, thought of the easy laughter, the joyous child . . . and the echoes in her own head—the lessons her mother had taught her early on . . . She understood what he was saying, didn't she?  Understood it because . . .

And yet, it seemed like the most natural thing in the world as she leaned up to kiss him.