InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Reflected Past ❯ Lessons ( Chapter 2 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Chapter Two - Lessons

"Sesshoumaru-sama!"

"What?" came the toneless reply, voiced by one who sounded fit to expire from boredom.

Myouga hopped into the room, burdened by a string-tied package that was several times his size, huffing the entire way. Sesshoumaru spared the little flea demon a glance of irritation before returning to his reading, perusing the letter sent from one of his father's many watchful allies. It contained warnings about more tiger youkai having been spotted prowling the southwestern border of his father's lands, gave reports of what the south was doing in response to the growing problem. Sesshoumaru was almost gleeful at the idea of getting another go at those rabid, brainless bastards. They think they can storm their way through this region as they have the others? Heh.

"Sesshoumaru-sama!" Myouga prompted again and, not getting the attention he was aiming for, bounded onto the mahogany desk, carefully shifting the package that threatened his precarious balance.

"You're bothering me, Myouga," Sesshoumaru warned mildly, eyes moving to scour another page, fighting the urge to flick the annoying creature out of his sight.

"Inutaisho-sama wants you to deliver this," Myouga pressed on, dropping the package beside the young demon's hand.

At that statement, Sesshoumaru glanced down at the offending bundle, noticing immediately the bitter, medicinal smell wafting from it. Its contents had clearly come from the cellar of their home, where Inutaisho kept such ingredients. "Why and to whom?" he inquired with offended dignity.

Myouga's sense of danger kicked in then and he propelled himself off of the desk and safely out of range of any wayward fists. Sounding nervous, the flea coughed into one tiny hand and quickly replied, "It's for the human girl in the village. An antidote for poison.” Not waiting for his young master's reaction to that declaration, Myouga fled the room.

An antidote, eh? All the more reason not to deliver it, Sesshoumaru thought, conjuring the image of that wretched child that had inserted herself into his battle. Drop dead, you filthy creature. Now supremely annoyed, he grabbed the package of herbs and left the room, intent on locating his father.

It only took a quick, storming inspection of the house to track him down. Inutaisho was in the process of cleaning his sword when Sesshoumaru materialized, youthful features calm as marble, but radiating a smoldering irritation that Inutaisho felt certain was being aimed in his direction. The young demon held up the package of medicine, holding it between two claws as though insulted by even having to touch it.

"Why am I to be a delivery boy to a human village?" came the frosty question.

Inutaisho was silent for several moments as he placed the sword back into its sheath and laid it carefully on the table. It was a purposeful quiet, as he often found that Sesshoumaru needed to be reminded at times of precisely who had the authority in this household. Sesshoumaru's venomous disposition and penchant for cruelty often disturbed Inutaisho into wondering just how he had managed to raise such a quiet, curious child into someone whose heart was often alternately consumed by a festering rage or a chilling dispassion.

Such anger could only lead to self-destruction, of the body or soul. But Sesshoumaru's heart, struggling though it might be, was capable of other things, he had seen it, and so Inutaisho often tried to do what he could to enforce lessons of kindness and restraint and charity on his son. 'Manipulate' would be the better word, he thought wryly. Just as I am doing now.

Finally, feeling that his silent reminder of dominance had been clear, he turned to regard Sesshoumaru. "You'll do it because I asked you to. I have other matters to attend to, as you saw in the letter."

"Those are matters that I should be helping you with, if not taking care of them on your behalf entirely," came the dark response.

"Sesshoumaru," Inutaisho said calmly, "your assistance is invaluable to me and that is also why I ask you to stay. I will not be drawn to the southwestern border and leave everything else undefended, nor will I sit at home like an old man and send my son to do what is still my responsibility."

"And this?" Sesshoumaru gestured to the package again, which he dangled between his fingertips with marked distaste.

"It was something I promised to Midoriko. Please see that she gets it and knows what to do with it."

"Father, don't involve me in one of your human...distractions," Sesshoumaru complained, disgust dripping from each word. Inutaisho’s overt fondness for humans was something that his son heartily disapproved of. In Sesshoumaru’s mind it was undignified and a disgrace to their family, particularly when that fondness escalated into something more. He was lucky that thus far he had been spared a trail of bastard hanyou siblings, but at the rate his father was pairing up with human women, it would only be a matter of time.

Inutaisho shook his head, but couldn't help smiling at the expression of revulsion on his son's face. "She's just a child, Sesshoumaru. My intentions are to help her only. I will ask you to do the same in my absence."

"Truly, your sympathies for humans are misplaced," Sesshoumaru stated. And pathetic, came the mental addition.

Inutaisho ignored the comment, walking away to peer out into the inky blackness of nightfall that hovered outside their house. The chirping crickets fell into silence as he stepped outside the room, finally addressing Sesshoumaru. "Give her the medicine and keep an eye on her. Make certain she doesn't try to hunt down the wrong youkai. That will only bring more problems."

"Then why would you give her such a weapon?" came the incredulous inquiry.

Inutaisho turned to glance back at his son, eyebrows raised as though it should be obvious. "Beyond the fact that she tried to help you, you mean?" He laughed lowly, head shaking. "I may not know precisely what that girl is, but I can sense that she will be powerful one day. Would it not be best to ensure that she is securely on our side?"

"We don't need a human's aid."

"No, perhaps not, but having that girl out there armed with that sword means she'll be able to take care of some of our smaller...annoyances, simply by protecting her own village. That's always useful. If she proves that she cannot be trusted with the weapon, it will have to be taken from her."

"If you're worried about her becoming an especially powerful exterminator, then why not just kill her?" Sesshoumaru inquired darkly, more than ready to volunteer for the job.

Exhaling a heavy breath as he stared ruefully back at his single-minded son, Inutaisho admonished, "Because that's not how you repay a kindness, even if it is undesired, and even if it comes from a human."




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Midoriko's sense of danger was throbbing warningly long before she finally went to the door and pulled it open. Looming at the threshold with an icy, unhappy expression was the dog demon, Sesshoumaru, the temperature dropping several degrees just from his arrival. He made no move to enter the house, instead inspecting her through shrewdly narrowed eyes, lording about at the front door as though he was doing her a favor by deigning to grace her with his presence, and she quickly discovered that he was.

"You don't appear to be dying," he stated, voice ringing with complaint, as though she should apologize for her good health. Without further comment, he tossed a crumpled package at her.

With an inhalation of surprise and a hopeful, pounding heart, Midoriko untied the string, the paper falling open to reveal a small pile of dried leaves mixed with some strange, moldy-smelling powder. Abandoning her guest there with the door flung wide open, Midoriko hurried over to the cooking fire, quickly setting some of the mixture to boil in a pot of water, then carefully re-wrapping the remains, intending to take it into the village. Her nose wrinkled faintly at the smell, like pickled radishes trying to converge with something undefined. She hoped it would work, because the odor was terrible.

"And this will cure my brother?" she finally asked cautiously, brown eyes lifting to study Sesshoumaru.

"Not it alone."

Appearing dismayed, she cocked her head at the impassive demon who still had yet to step a foot inside the front door. "What else do I have to do?"

"Be patient!" he spat angrily, finally stepping inside and shutting the heavy door with a slam. The wall shook violently at that action and he sneered at the shoddy construction of this tiny human hovel.

"Don't be so loud!" Midoriko hissed the reprimand, eyes sparking with warning. She cast a look toward a door that was slightly ajar, left so in order for her to be able to hear Shijin. "He's trying to sleep."

"He'll live," Sesshoumaru stated, sounding regretful. Moving with a fluidity that spoke of his battle prowess, he pulled the bubbling pot off of the flames and poured the concoction into a bowl Midoriko provided, ready to flee this dismaying hole as soon as was possible. He thought it entirely possible that he had never so resented his father as he did in that moment, shut into close quarters with these aggravating humans and their petty problems. And that was saying something, considering the list of grievances he could easily summon to mind from decades of living with him and obeying his various whims and commands.

Standing back a few steps, Midoriko watched as Sesshoumaru's right hand lifted to hover over the steaming liquid, the flesh taking on a sickly green glow. A noxious odor filled the air and she instinctively covered her mouth and held her breath, eyes watering painfully. Something dripped from his claws into the bowl, reacting with the medicinal herbs by sizzling and popping into an angry, yellow ooze.

"Poison," she gasped, practically choking on the fumes.

He withdrew his hand, which instantly reverted to its normal coloring, and wordlessly handed her the bowl. She accepted it hesitantly, her eyes flickering up to his cold face. "You want me to give this to him?"

"If you want to save his life, then yes."

"But you just..."

"Idiot girl. If I had come here to kill you and your brother, the both of you would already be rotting, scrap pieces of flesh. And though it's tempting, more so every time you open your mouth, my intention is to follow through with my father's requests so that I can return to things more worthy of my notice." He averted his eyes, looking on the verge of sighing his impatience as he added, "Those herbs will do nothing if given to him on their own; the venom has spread too far. Giving it to him in this manner will force the ingredients to react and destroy the poison that came from me, and in that manner, it will greatly lessen the effects of the other demon's attack, enough so that his body will no longer be overwhelmed and will be able to heal on its own."

"Make him sicker in order to heal him," Midoriko murmured suspiciously. She did not like that prospect at all. If this had come from Sesshoumaru alone, she would not have even thought of giving it to her brother, but the aid had been sent by Inutaisho-sama and he had been nothing but kind and respectful, oddly so given his position, and she felt better about trusting him than his easily-aggravated son. And that was when she remembered Sesshoumaru's other revelation. "His 'requests'?" Midoriko repeated the words, hoping for more detail.

"Yes," Sesshoumaru replied acidly, "one of which has now been fulfilled. The other is to make sure you use that damned sword properly and don't run around waving it at far less patient youkai."

"Less patient than you?" she inquired in mock amazement, clutching the bowl in her arms as she turned her back to him and slipped into her brother's room.

Sesshoumaru glared after her. Father, I will remember this...



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"Sis, you can't be serious," Shijin said carefully, eyeing Sesshoumaru with a wary stare. A brilliantly sunny day poured down around them as the demon moved to stand several feet in front of Midoriko, looking infinitely calm, a sword clutched in one hand.

Despite the brightness of day, there was an irrepressible early autumn chill hanging in the air. A cool breeze ruffled Midoriko's long dark hair as she studied her opponent. Shijin was right. She was crazy to be doing this. In any case, hadn't Inutaisho-sama told her the sword would teach her how to use it properly? Though Sesshoumaru's rather rudely stated point about how ridiculous she would look attempting to take on her first demon by just pointing the blade and hoping its ability to purify would magically switch on did have some merit.

"I can teach you to wield a sword," Shijin said quietly to his sister, feeling a heavy dread settle in his stomach. He had been fighting with the exterminators for nearly a decade, was more than adept at using such a weapon, and so he could not understand why Midoriko would prefer her training to be left in the hands of a youkai who clearly thought she was a waste of his precious time.

"Fool," Sesshoumaru said disdainfully, displaying that he was perfectly able to hear their conversation. "Do you think a demon opponent will lower his standards to accommodate a pathetic human girl?"

Midoriko looked over at her brother and recognized that hard set to his face, saw that he was gearing up for a fight, so she quickly calmed him with a placating hand gesture. "He's right, Shijin, who better for me to practice on?"

"Purify the bastard," Shijin muttered, moving away to situate himself wearily at the base of an aged tree that leaned precariously toward their house. In the week since he and the other villagers had been given the medicine to combat the poison, all had made a great improvement, enough so that the village headman had approached Midoriko with the possibility of growing the herbs themselves. Midoriko had not broached the subject thus far with Sesshoumaru, but she had a good idea of what his reply would be: an obnoxious statement followed by an emphatic "no" was most probable. Perhaps that was something best left for when Inutaisho-sama returned....

"If you hurt her, demon, I'll be glad to go inside and get my own weapon. An actual exterminator versus a youkai ought to be a more interesting fight," Shijin called warningly, prompting the visiting youkai to look his direction, sneer sliding firmly into place.

"Don't make it any more tempting," Sesshoumaru replied, bringing his blade up as though readying to attack. "If I were you, I would raise that sword," he warned Midoriko an instant before he leapt at her.

Midoriko's reflexes barely responded in time to bring up the blade and block the swing. Her wrist stung from the impact, arm trembling slightly from the reverberations of the clash of metal against metal. She stepped back uncertainly, hand clutching the hilt with nervous fingers. Sesshoumaru started to circle her and she turned with him, feeling as though she was being stalked by a predator. She watched his hand carefully for signs of impending movement, but had serious doubts that her sight would be able to match the speed he was capable of summoning. She listened as his voice rang out in the cool air, empty and bored.

"You are not going to win a battle with brute strength," he informed her, wearing the expression of one who had been surrendered to martyrdom. "I would suggest you try to figure out exactly what power it was that my father saw in you and use it."

"He told me not to purify you," she argued quietly, eyes lighting on Sesshoumaru's face as she recalled the day Inutaisho-sama had brought her the sword.

"We're here for a reason. Do something," came the insistent, icy demand.

Midoriko eyed him reticently, then glanced down at her sword. The shimmering metal gleamed back up at her, reflecting daylight. She felt her hand move to a more comfortable grip. There was definitely something about this sword; holding it, she could feel a slight thrum running from the blade to her fingers, a sort of tingling awareness that reminded her of the sense that warned her of danger. She wondered how she was supposed to use this thing, thinking longingly of her comfortable bow and arrows poised next to the door, just inside the house. But if what Inutaisho-sama had told her was true, then what made her arrows special came from her. She didn't have to rely on them.

Bringing up the blade, she swung it at Sesshoumaru, who side-stepped it effortlessly. Midoriko did not step back from her assault, relaxing some when she saw that he indeed was not fighting back to harm her. He lazily blocked her attacks or simply stepped out of the way, all the while watching her with an intensity that unnerved her. He looked as though he was waiting for something.

Yet nothing happened. Midoriko continued to lunge at him, settling into what she assumed was some sort of fighting stance. She tried to recall her brother's training when their father had taught him swordsmanship, remembering small amounts of their sessions together. She had been just a little girl then, making small bouquets of flowers from the wild fields that grew up around their house, heedless of the fact that one day she would be trying to swing one of the things at an opponent who would be capable of crushing her to pulp with one unrestrained fist. Now she wished she had paid more attention.

Appearing to have grown weary of the lack of progress, Sesshoumaru surprised her then by starting to fight back with more aggression. He smashed his sword repeatedly against hers, using more strength to power each blow until Midoriko found herself stumbling back under the onslaught. She vaguely heard her brother yell a warning above the swishing sounds of metal slicing through empty air and tried to regain her footing. Distracted by her aching arms and back, Midoriko failed to fend off one of the swings and felt cold metal slice through her stomach, the impact expelling the air from her lungs and bringing flashes of white to her vision. She fell to her knees, her mind numbly registering that that would surely be a fatal wound.

Time seemed to freeze as she knelt on the muddy ground, drawing painful breaths, heart pounding ferociously. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Sesshoumaru come into view, and she sensed that he was about to lower the sword once more. There was a rush of blurred movement as Shijin ran to tackle the demon, but he was shoved away easily with an absent, one-handed push, landing with a heavy thump off to the side. At that, a strange instinct overtook Midoriko and she grasped the sword with a grip so hard her knuckles audibly cracked. That agony faded away, her breathing slowed. She pushed herself unsteadily back to her feet and took a wild, angry swing at her opponent, feeling certain now that the worst mistake she had ever made was interfering in that battle, trusting Inutaisho-sama, believing this horrid creature....

A sudden gathering of energy began whirling about the blade and a flash of lavender-tinged light shot outward. Sesshoumaru pulled up his own weapon, attempting to block the bolt of energy which still hit him with enough force to knock him backward several steps. His eyebrows rose thoughtfully, watching her as though she had just now become worthy of his interest.

"You bastard!" Midoriko raged at him, sparing a glance over her shoulder to check on Shijin who was just exiting the house at a run, his own weapon grasped firmly in hand, face bent on murder. Not at all liking the idea of him actually trying to fight the offspring of a taiyoukai in a weakened state, she pulled back and swung at Sesshoumaru again, who raised his sword in a purely defensive posture, appearing curious and expectant.

This time the attack hit him harder and he could feel the hair on his arms stand on end, his muscles spasming under a sensation that felt like sharp teeth were biting at every nerve, rattling his bones. It was not a comfortable feeling. His demon instincts craved to claw the girl to shreds, but he restrained himself, thinking again that his father must have been insane to give such a weapon to a human, particularly one who would apparently be able to wield it.

Midoriko, tensed and ready for him to start tearing into her again after that assault, was surprised to see Sesshoumaru suddenly sheath his sword, blade snapping into place with a snap of finality. Shijin moved to stand in front of her, his back blocking most of her view as he extended his own weapon to point threateningly at their youkai guest.

Looking supremely unconcerned, Sesshoumaru spoke his conclusion. "It seems as though the sword will respond to you after all, brat."

"This was supposed to be training!" she grated back fiercely, voice sounding raw to her own ears. "Why did you...?!," she paused then, aware once more of the complete absence of pain. Her eyes roved downward to inspect her body, noting the complete and astonishing absence of any visible wound. It simply wasn't there, no trace of blood, no torn clothing. Nothing. She looked back up at Sesshoumaru, confusion overwhelming the anger. "I don't understand. I felt it..."

Sounding bored, Sesshoumaru explained, "I could cut your head from your shoulders with this sword and it would do you no harm." His clawed hand moved to grasp the hilt resting at his side. "Tenseiga is a healing sword."

Shijin lowered his own weapon at that revelation, wearing a look of amazement that was mirrored on his sister's face. "Incredible..."

"Useless," Sesshoumaru corrected. "But I would suggest that you find a way to keep your temper at the ready when you attempt to use that sword, girl." His disdainful gaze flickered briefly to Shijin's dark-eyed mistrust. "Or perhaps try throwing your brother into harm's way. That seems to make the blade respond." He folded his arms over his chest, gaze settling once more on the still-awestruck Midoriko, weighted with sincere warning. "Kill those that attack this village, but I warn you not to search out an opponent on your own. If you cause too much trouble, I'll have to come take that sword back."

Midoriko's ears registered the words and the relaxed manner, wondering if Sesshoumaru was teasing her in some way, but he watched her with a sort of bland annoyance, and so she decided to take his warning seriously.