InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity ❯ Paler Dawn ( Chapter 20 )

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

Kagome sat on the ground with her back against a stout tree trunk as the pink edges of dawn crept over the horizon. She'd not been able to sleep. Too many fleeting images, too many inane thoughts had assailed her. None of them had been more than a glimpse into something she didn't understand. Her friends were all sleeping soundly. To avoid waking them, she had crawled out of the tent and then hobbled over to the tree that she sat under now.

The dull clunk of the beads in her hand whispered to her. Her gaze dropped to the necklace. InuYasha wanted it.  She understood that, even if she had no idea why that was so. "It reminds me of . . . of something that I lost . . . something that I loved."

The vision she had seen, though, had stopped her from letting him take them. InuYasha, hitting the earth with force enough to make tremors reverberate around him, the beads glowing with a strange power. His sharp hiss of pain as his face smacked into the ground. . . She shivered. That vision was all too vivid, far too poignant, not to be real. Why had she seen that?

She shook her head at her own thoughts. Something in those beads had the power to hurt him. Yet why did simply staring at them make her sad?

Kagome stretched the beads between her hands and stared at them thoughtfully. Silver and crimson . . . A streak of color and a muffled scream too distorted to discern. Slowly she sat up and dropped the necklace over her head.

Settling back once more, Kagome idly played with the beads as she watched the sun peep over the horizon. Ribbons of color streaked the skies. She'd seen this sunrise before, in a time and in a place that was veiled in her memories. Sitting next to a figure that she couldn't distinguish, the scene was real to her yet just beyond her grasp. Why did she keep seeing these things, whatever they were? Almost as though they were someone's memories, the disconcerting knowledge somewhere deep inside that she really ought to know what the images meant, but why did she see them?

It confused her, things she knew but hadn't been taught, the things that she couldn't explain, the questions that always spoke to her, especially in the night. How many times had she awoken with the remnants of her dreams still hanging onto her mind yet stubbornly refusing to let her remember? The hidden knowledge that whispered to her, the eyes that bored into her skull, the husky tones of a man's voice, always the same words, the same plea, `Remember me, Kagome . . . Remember us.' The voice always sounded like InuYasha . . .

She could feel eyes on her. They probed her mind, beckoned the chronicles she couldn't reach. Her gaze rose slowly. InuYasha sat, cradled in the branches of a tree high above. His stare locked with hers and though he didn't smile, Kagome couldn't help but smile at him.

He stared at her for a minute, his expression inscrutable. Almost as though he was trying to read her mind, he narrowed his gaze as he took on a fierce scowl. Kagome watched as he dropped neatly out of the tree and knelt beside her. "There's a better place to watch the sun rise," he said softly as he pushed a lock of hair behind her ear.

Kagome didn't hesitate to climb on his back. She held on tight while he leapt into the trees. He held onto her with a firm yet gentle grip, and to her surprise, she wasn't frightened at all. He jumped from branch to branch with the grace of a cat. She hid her smile against his back. Half dog youkai? He almost seemed more feline than canine . . .

"Are you all right back there?" he called over his shoulder as he lunged toward another tree.

"Fine," she assured him as she leaned back to get a better view. The world flew past her as InuYasha quickened his pace, and Kagome threw her head back in laughter.

He lit on a strangely familiar tree, and Kagome blinked in surprise as she slid off InuYasha's back to sit on the branch. He sank down next to her, shoulders slumped forward and an incongruously guarded look on his features.

It was the barren tree, the same one she'd seen before in her mind. But she'd never been up in it before. Or had she?

Kagome tilted her head to the side and bent forward to look into his face. "Are you all right? InuYasha?" She reached out to brush his hair back. He caught her wrist and pulled her arm back a little roughly, his eyes shining like jewels in the half-light. She whispered his name again as her heart threatened to explode into a million pieces. Desperation in his scowl, his heart spoke to hers, and she knew the sound of the echoes. Did it matter how long she'd known him when, in her heart, she'd known him forever?

He dragged her forward, his arms circling around her and trapping her beside him. She didn't care. Her cheek rested against his shirt. She could hear the erratic beat of his heart under her ear. He smelled of woods and wind. She closed her eyes and breathed deep. His heartbeat increased. She lifted her hand, settling it between her cheek and his chest, feeling the pulse beat under her fingertips as she smiled in absolute and complete contentment.

"I like this," she admitted in the quiet.

He sighed as his heartbeat slowed with the sound of her voice. It was as though she had the power to offer him solace. The idea was enough to widen her smile. "Kagome . . . you belong right here, with me."

His arms tightened around her. She sighed happily. Something about being with him made her forget about the pain in her ankle. He offered her a sense of security, of well-being. Kagome reveled in the emotions. They were enchanting.

"If I slip, will you catch me?" she asked quietly, craning her head back to look at him.

He chuckled but his arms tightened just a little more. "You won't, Kagome. I'll never let you go."

His words thrilled her. She smiled to herself as she cuddled against his chest again. Was she the only one he'd ever held like this? She deliberately shoved that thought away. She wanted to believe, at least for the moment, that it had always been just InuYasha and her.

"You confuse me," she mumbled vaguely, a beautiful lethargy slowly seeping over her.

"How is that?"

She shrugged. "You're all gruff and serious . . . then you bring me up here to watch a sunrise? Who are you, InuYasha? I mean, really, who are you? Why do I feel like I've always known you?  Why do I feel like . . .?"

He didn't answer her. Instead his finger caught under her chin, and he gently raised her face as he stared into her eyes. He stared at her with a tender smile twitching the corners of his lips. Then he pressed his lips to her forehead and pulled her close again.

That odd rumbling growl issued from him again. Kagome relaxed in his arms with a happy sigh, her arms wrapping around his waist in silent acceptance. Her eyes drifted closed as his contented sounds lulled her into a deep sleep high in the boughs of the barren tree.

InuYasha could sense the change in her breathing, the steady shift that signified that Kagome slept. She was nestled in his arms, cradled against his chest. A complete contentment settled on him. InuYasha buried his nose in her hair as he watched the sun rise.

Unable to sleep in the tent with the restless boys, InuYasha had retreated to the sanctity of a tree instead. He wasn't able to let his guard down. After years of tense awareness, it was hard to relax enough to sleep anywhere, even in the relative safety of this time he chose.

He sighed and grinned at the woman in his arms. Giving in to the desire to kiss her again, InuYasha let his lips linger on her forehead, in her hair. He'd wanted to hold her like this so many nights . . .

Unbeknownst to her, InuYasha had spent so many nights up in Goshinboku, unable to stay away.  Those nights when he'd been able to silently slip out of Sesshoumaru's mansion, anyway . . .  Now that he was living in a house a bare stone's throw from the shine, though, it was easier—so much easier—just to slip into the yard, into the tree . . . She was like a flame, and he was the moth that would flutter precariously at the edges, hoping not to be burned. Some nights, when he was lucky, she would leave her window open. The temptation was too great, and he always found himself inside her room, kneeling beside her bed.

Watching over her as she slept, InuYasha had wondered more than once what it was she saw in her dreams. Those things would bring a vague, secretive smile to her lips, and he would content himself to simply watch over her, as he had done for so long. It had become second nature to him, and he couldn't remember a time when she hadn't been by his side. She made him stronger, pushed him to realize the person he was inside wasn't defined by his human nature or his youkai abilities but by his choices, and though he had failed her time and again, she had always looked at him like he was the greatest being on earth.

There were so many things that he longed to tell her, he thought as he idly lifted the prayer bead necklace and felt the instant comfort they offered him. He wanted them back in the worst way. Maybe it was a little strange. After all, the beads gave Kagome an interesting bit of power over him. In truth, though, after the initial indignation of being harnessed, InuYasha had to admit that he really didn't mind them. He'd gladly let her osuwari him as often as she cared to, if she would only remember those rare quiet moments they'd shared. Those memories gave InuYasha determination when his sometimes faltered. When he doubted that Kagome would ever regain her memories, these were the images that he held on to. She would remember. She had to.

He needed her so badly that when he was away from her he felt like he was dying. All the nights he'd sat up to watch over her, the pain in his heart as he had tried time and again to tell her how he felt had been excruciating. In that time and in that place, he hadn't known how to tell her what he knew in his heart was truth. In the end, words had seemed so inadequate, as though words alone were empty, meaningless. He'd meant to show her how he felt. He just wasn't sure where he'd failed in that . . .

He winced. He had failed. He knew it. The proof of it was here, in his arms, and yet somehow just beyond his reach. Her heart might know him, as his did hers, but her mind did not, and that was a huge obstacle. What if she never remembered? What if she never recalled the times he'd saved her, the times he had come in and defended her? What if she never knew how surely she had saved him, even if it was in a wholly different way?

It was unacceptable, damn it.  She had to remember him—she had to remember them.  He'd left behind everything, just to have one chance to be with her.  Surely she'd realize that eventually.  Surely she'd know . . .

'I'll never fail you again, Kagome; I swear it . . . Just let me prove it to you.  That's all I want . . .'

She whimpered softly. His grip tightened around her shoulders but he reached up and gently smoothed away the lines furrowing her brow.

"M'roku," she mumbled.

InuYasha froze. "Miroku?" he repeated, his voice barely above a whisper. Was she remembering that perverted monk? And if she was, did she remember anything else, anyone else? `Remember me, Kagome,' he pleaded. `Remember us.'

Kagome didn't stir. He rested his cheek on her head and stared over the top of the trees at the rising sun.