InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Requiem of Time ❯ Thawing ( Chapter 4 )

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

 

As the night dragged on in the village, it grew apparent that Sango wanted to know everything, and that was splendid, because Kagome wanted to blather, so they were the perfect conversation couple. The evening was passing blissfully. Miroku said he didn't mind sleeping with the children alone that night if Sango wished to be in Kagome's room. They giggled and whispered and screeched with delight until the wee hours of the morning, and the years between them just seemed to melt away to leave Kagome feeling not only younger but also bedraggled by sunrise.

 

“Darn it,” she hissed at her little hand mirror, trying to tame her hair. She had brushed the mass out once when it was still damp, and it had dried as she and Sango chattered. Hours later, trying to brush it into submission only made it all the more poofy, so she eventually gave up before she turned into a hideous poodle.

 

“You look fine,” Sango tried to reassure, her hair also a tad kinked.

 

Fine isn't good enough, Kagome thought to herself, ready to break that useless brush in half. She tucked it away before she did something regrettable, and glanced at the metallic glint of some makeup. It was a ridiculous thing to admit, but she was half tempted to dig for some gloss and eyeshadow. She wouldn't do anything major, just tint her face a little to see how Sesshomaru would react to some future fashion after years of being back in his own time. Just a little. It wasn't like she would dip her face in a jar of baby powder, paint her eyes and lips and call herself a geisha. Just accent.

 

Despite her itching desire to feel pretty, Kagome had a feeling he wouldn't be too receptive towards it, which was in complete contradiction to how she was raised. Then again, Sesshomaru did have the great potential to be completely backwards. Who knew, to him she might look her best after a fresh roll in the mud. A bit of the wild side. She highly doubted it, but she'd see. After all, this was experiment time, right? She wasn't going to even consider being his mate until she was absolutely, horrifyingly sure she could tolerate him for the rest of her days, and despite the fact that she would be a very happy girl after tackling him in any relatively comfortable place he still had a lot of torn up ground to cover between them.

 

Better start soon.

 

----------

 

“Don't say it,” a scruffy Kagome warned Sesshomaru sternly, walking out of the village to greet him. Rin was running almost recklessly over the ice to say hello, “I know, I didn't 'groom' myself very well.”

 

He enjoyed the sarcastic note she put on that word. And she indeed did not. It was actually nice to know that Kagome didn't mind walking into the light of day looking like she just rolled out of bed, so long as she didn't make a fond habit of doing so. He'd have preferred if she expressed her interest in him by fixing herself up, but as things stood he was in no position to make such requests. It wasn't that he felt he should restrain from asking, it was simply the fact that Kagome had the potential to be hard headed to the point of doing the opposite of what he'd ask. Besides, he could sense that she was still holding a few big things against him. On the other hand, Sesshomaru found her sudden fussing over her appearance to be quite charming, with how she went defensive first thing in the morning. As far as he presumed, she never had done much with herself to a great degree before, and would allow the bath maids to have their fashionable way with her if she felt a need to look better. He was perfectly fine with that, too, because he enjoyed seeing her dressed up and blushing wildly at him before shuffling off with all those embroidered layers on.

 

He swore, the only real reason any female wore layers was so that some lucky male could enjoy removing them, decorating the room in colorful splashes of shimmering silk and casting her scent all over the place to get an aroma fix.

 

Sesshomaru reined in a smirk he hadn't noticed was there, and lo and behold there was a certain eager child standing so close that her neck would surely break at the angle required to look up at him. Apparently she believed she could be revived a third time, which could not happen. The happy little death wish was running on her last chance, and she was very fortunate for a human to have had three so far.

 

“Hello, Lord Sesshomaru!” Rin chirped happily. “How are you?”

 

His eyes flickered to Kagome for an instant, then back down at Rin. Sesshomaru's instincts insisted that he ignore the girl and go for the more mature, pined for variation or feminine delight, but he had a feeling that Kagome would shun him like the plague if he did that to 'the poor and cute little dear'.

 

“I am fine,” he offered the proverbial response, keeping his thoughts all to himself. “And you?”

 

“I learned how to make snowmen!” she spontaneously exclaimed. “I'd show you, but Ah-Un tried to get a piggy-back ride from one of them and it broke.”

 

The temperature of the air rose as though the sun was suddenly favoring a certain spot, and glancing up he noticed that Kagome was red and trying not to laugh. The sight of her made him smile, and upon seeing it she glanced away from him and put a hand to her flaming cheek, giggling and then covering her mouth.

 

“Oh!” Rin piped, looking between them. “Are you friends now?”

 

Kagome went from trying not to laugh to just blushing, retaining her shade and crossing her arms stubbornly under her breasts, lips twitching and eyes darting. Sesshomaru loved it when she blushed. It heated her skin and made her scent run thick through the air.

 

Rin never got her answer, but could make an educated guess that left her giggling and touching her face in a show of 'I've got a secret'.

 

For the next two weeks, every other day, Sesshomaru and Kagome met some distance from the village. Rin was there to -as Kagome put it- suck up the attention that she has been unjustly deprived of for two months. Sesshomaru saw no point to that, and would have had none of it, save for the unexpected benefits. The first one was that neither of them had the lack of grace to lose their temper in front of a child, and the second being that Kagome seemed to enjoy Rin's presence. Even though this required Sesshomaru to acknowledge and, with a little elbowing from the miko, compliment a wide variety of snow sculptures, he reveled in the way Kagome tended to Rin in any manner a mother or a fond caretaker would. Seeing such helped to assure him that Kagome was the woman he wished would eventually bear him children as well as stay at his side. So despite the oddly supervised visits which came after quite a bit of physical play, Sesshomaru enjoyed the time he had with his intended, and each day she was opening more and more to him.

 

There was another interesting change slowly showing in Kagome. As they conversed in the background of Rin's stomped flat play arena, Sesshomaru witnessed a gradual transformation in his love interest's manner of speaking. Usually, her tone was aimed at being condescending while her body language screamed something else at him, and it had all been rather confusing. With Rin around, she spoke more gently and even extended her vocabulary so that they could discuss 'adult stuff' without Rin becoming involved beyond the level of curiosity. Sesshomaru learned that 'adult stuff' referred to certain conversation topics, such as harems, mating, flirting, breeding, and all sorts of other fun things children began asking about at the age of seven. Sesshomaru never questioned outright what the term meant, but it became apparent with Kagome's excessive reply to Rin “it's nothing, sweetie, just adult stuff”. It was fun to broaden their conversation topics and add to the censored list through experimentation.

 

Fifteenth days after they balanced out their differences, Sesshomaru saw Kagome walk out of the slayer village alone. Her arms were crossed, and he couldn't decipher whether she was on her guard around him or if she had something on her mind.

 

“Rin's a little sick,” she informed while still approaching, her wrists showing as the sleeves of her white miko haori were bunched towards her elbows. She was wearing the traditional red hakama though, and Sesshomaru noted through the lack of wear and tear that she was in newer garbs. It was good to see. She had refused that he bring her more clothes to compensate for the weather, since her very attractive jeans didn't block the cold much, but she had flat out refused that he do such a thing.

 

He frowned when his thoughts looped back onto her words. “Sick?” He didn't smell anything coming from the village, nor off of her yesterday. When it came to illness, there was typically a day's warning in one's scent, if not more. Maybe her head was hurting again, like the infrequent aches she had whimpered over while traveling with him a long time ago.

 

Kagome nodded. “Well, not sick-sick, just a little under the weather.” Sesshomaru freely offered a confused look. Was every living being not always under the weather? Kagome perked her attentions, momentarily curious before she made a connection. “Oh! Um, you know, congested, stuffy, tired looking, that sort. I told her to stay in bed today, and told the twins to leave her alone. She also has a hibachi to keep her room hot, so hopefully that'll make her groggy enough to stay under the covers and sweat it out. Sango's also going to keep an eye on her.”

 

After a moment he accepted this with a nod. Sesshomaru had never been sick before, so he trusted Kagome's judgment on the matter and decided not to worry. Humans got ill. That was almost a required experience in their lives.

 

She randomly giggled and looked up at him, her fingers toying with one another unconsciously. He found her show of uncertainty to be adorable. “Well. This is our first time alone in a while.”

 

Her scent laced itself with a twist of desire. Heavy, with a twang of uncertainty that screamed for rectification. Sesshomaru forced himself to ignore the delicious spiciness as she teased her lower lip and went to worrying the hem of a helpless left sleeve, looking up at him from under her lashes almost innocently, otherwise he'd probably be licking her to see if her actual flavor had also changed with the thoughts running through her mind. It was frustrating to have to remind himself that Kagome had an indecisive head atop a fairly decisive body. No matter how much his instincts yelled at him to curl her into his arms and let her know the world didn't have to be so confusing, he knew they were still a long way from that stage. How aggravating. She was never a simple woman though, and he liked that. Minus the lack of physical attention...

 

“It is,” he affirmed, looking away from her neck, which she was now touching with her indecisive hands, to meet her searching eyes. For some reason she never liked him paying attention to any other lovely feature she had other than her cerulean gaze. It was difficult to keep visual contact when she allowed that particular scent to overwhelm the atmosphere like it currently did. It made his fingers twitch, and if he had any less control then she would definitely be pinned someplace of very close proximity. The snow would have been fine.

 

She hummed, and in a quick move she held her hands together behind her back to make her breasts quite prominent. He couldn't stand it, and looked at the sky instead, wondering if he could learn to weaken his sense of smell without every other prudent sensory component shutting down along with it. It seemed innocent enough, but he would not render himself helpless simply to avoid some mild discomfort. Not even in old territory could he take that chance.

 

“Fine, don't look at me,” she scoffed playfully and crossed her arms.

 

His chest rose and fell with a silent sigh, the clouds looking quite sparse today. This was horrible for his patience. “If you insist.”

 

She gave a defiant sniff and looked away from him as well, creating a one second lack in her guard. He took the opportunity almost greedily, looking her over with both a critical and an appreciative eye. She was in perfect health today, both physical and emotional, and was beautiful no matter the angle in which she held her nose up at him. Sesshomaru enjoyed reading her body language as she pretended to be offended. As a casual way of holding herself, she always showed strength, confidence, and the qualities of a loner. He valued this, and would take her quick temper and sarcasm as fair exchange.

 

She had not always been that way though. She had hidden behind Inuyasha a lot when she was younger, letting him feed her the submissiveness which didn't belong in her. He would yell at her, insult her, never look happy or be happy, and protect her obsessively and excessively. The mutt deserved his sits, and then some, for subconsciously trying to suppress her into a weak and simpering female to compensate for his being an outcast in both societies which he still skirted by blood right. She hadn't deserved that, and would have broken to him in time, turning into some shadow of a woman who would cling to the false sense of security Inuyasha forced upon her. She might have even mated him, which was a thought Sesshomaru immediately abolished. If Inuyasha even tried it now, Sesshomaru would kill him, revive him, and then beat him half to death.

 

Sesshomaru's eyes tightened slightly at the last thought as he stared at Kagome, but relaxed when she shifted her feet. She wasn't going to fall into that ancient psychological trap, because she was Sesshomaru's, whether she was ready to admit it or not. She teased him, entertained him, kept him company, and secretly sought all of that in return along with much, much more. She wanted him, and he wanted her, but for now he was resigned to admire from afar until she wanted to go further. No matter how good she smelled, she'd make him wait.

 

“Is spring coming?” she randomly asked, the question being a courtesy warning that she would be looking back at him.

 

It was hard to mentally fan away the slight fog in his head before replying. “It is.”

 

She frowned at him, which completely grabbed his attention. “That's the second time you've given me that answer. What's on your mind?”

 

She was giving him an inquiring look, and a smile tugged at his lips. Did she really want that answer? Spring was coming, after all.

 

She blushed, and he was content.

 

“Stop that.”

 

“Stop what?” he asked, hearing the hint of a tease in his voice. She drew good moods out of him without even trying.

 

She rolled her eyes and failed to suppress a smirk, receiving the satisfaction of instilling him with happiness. “You know what I'm talking about.”

 

He rolled his shoulders, glancing a little to the side. “I have no qualms with expressing some merriment.”

 

“Oh, yeah. Merriment my ass,” she grumbled under her breath.

 

With Kagome feeling they had nothing better to do, they found themselves sparing near the village. She seemed to be amused when several children showed up. To watch, they had to exit the front gate and walk a good two hundred feet to the side of the village for the small field and peer past the trees. How they had heard the clash of steel, gotten so far, and not have been noticed by their parents was a bit of a mystery. Even Inuyasha had the decency to leave them alone. Unless, of course, he was gone. In fact, he probably was, since the hanyÅ's and the monk's scents were weaker that day.

 

Sesshomaru didn't fancy the company, but children were children and there was nothing he could do about that. The parents eventually discovered the haunting silence left in the village and came after their young, and as the slayers began to gather to see how Sesshomaru wielded a sword he stopped and sheathed it.

 

“Not willing to put on a show?” Kagome teased, looking odd for the halted attack as it stole a good portion of her balance. Brushing her damp hair back with her fingers and panting, she slid her own curious blade into its scabbard with a practiced motion. She needed something lighter.

 

Sesshomaru spared a glare to the audience, and although the adults puffed their chests defiantly they were soon deflated when the children went screaming past their knees to flee and get lost. They trailed behind, shouting.

 

Kagome snorted none too prettily, chewing on some snow for water as her fingers raked her hair back to re-tie it in an weird stretchy string which merged with itself to create a hoop. “That was creative.”

 

He offered a small smile in response, and thusly Sesshomaru learned the barbaric delight behind a snowball fight. Really, it was not fair that she was at liberty to express any emotion which fancied a stroll through her thoughts, yet he had to keep a straight face or else risk disturbing her. Not that he was complaining. It was awful nice of her to tumble willingly, mouth first, into situations only he could handle with certain measures of grace.

 

“Ow!” she cried again, having failed to dodge yet another clump of snow. The weather really was warming, which made it easy to pack the little balls. “I said to stop targeting my ass!”

 

“It is difficult to miss,” he quipped, stepping fully behind a tree just in time to avoid a quick miko-charged attack right for the face.

 

“Oooh!” she seethed, smiling nonetheless. He knew her facial expression only for the strain in her voice. “If you weren't so damn agile I'd stuff your pants with snow, you cocky-” She faltered and almost fell when Sesshomaru appeared mid-threat not more than a foot in front of her. He set his freshly made snowball in perfect balance on top of her head and was gone before she blinked. After a heartbeat she grabbed it and threw it to the ground to stomp it into the rest of its kind, her annoyance letting her energy become hyper. “SESSHY!!” She did not like to be impressed, which was too bad because he was going to do it anyway. Anything else would be unnatural.

 

He had been standing not ten feet behind her, and couldn't help but to chuckle. He was caught off guard by getting hit in the shoulder without even being looked at. Kagome gathered up and shot a barrage of snowballs at him while using only her energy, trying to plaster him into the tree. He darted to the side without being touched again, and- And wound up on his back.

 

“Got you!” she yelled from his chest, her powers subsidizing before smacking a snowball right down into his face. “HAH!”

 

He wiped it away in a controlled motion. It hadn't been packed in as tightly as it could have been. She was being too nice, which was no fun when seen in a certain light. “You win.”

 

She lifted her fists straight into the air, still straddling him, and began to emit an immature and triumphant cry, forgetting a very important fact. She was trying to claim victory over an alpha male who's current goal in life was to impress and woo her.

 

Kagome's utterance was cut short when Sesshomaru unceremoniously -and easily- pushed her off him. She landed on her side, rolled to her back, and found his face right above hers.

 

She froze, and he smiled just to make her heart race.

 

“Are you a sore loser?” she asked testily, doing a decent job of keeping her voice level while her throat jumped and hitched with irregular breath and a quickening heartbeat.

 

He cut off his growl when he realized he was making it. It hadn't been a threatening one. “That all depends on the prize.” It took a lot of will power to get off of her, and the look of disappointment which crossed her face both delighted and confounded him. She'd been feeling let down of late when their obvious flirting would lead to nothing.

 

Offering her a hand up, she accepted it and stepped into his personal space and remaining there.

 

“I don't like a poor sport,” she said confidently up to him, expressing her lovely stubborn streak.

 

“Sport?” he asked, barely lifting an eyebrow and watching as her eyes unfocused for an instant. “To which little sport of ours do you refer?”

 

She frowned, trying to put his subject fractured sentence together. Realization dawned on her, and shock passed quickly. “... Both?”

 

He kept his face straight. “Now, now. Which of us has a problem with expressing merriment?”

 

She blushed wildly up at him and refused to look away. He was enjoying this more and more. “You...” Her mouth twitched with the need to grin as the sentence trailed off. She shook her head, looked away, and sighed as her scent spiked his instincts again. “You're impossible.”

 

He needed to touch her. Kagome was in a good mood, so he felt safe with the simple gesture of brushing a stray strand of hair from her cheek to behind her ear. He heard her breath catch again, the sound caressing and soft against his ears, and her face leaned fractionally to his touch.

 

He took his hand away before she could subconsciously ask him for more, his fingers warm where they had made contact. Kami, but she was temptation in the flesh.

 

She gave him an inquiring glance.

 

He lifted and dropped his shoulders.

 

She frowned.

 

He smirked.

 

She bit her lip and poked him with irritation.

 

He didn't reply.

 

She pushed him slightly.

 

His teeth showed in a small grin, wondering what she was getting at.

 

Frustrated, she scaled the social wall between them by tackled him for the second time that day to the ground.

 

Sesshomaru thought two things. One, that she was getting a lot better at this, and two, that he was going to get snow in his face again.

 

Grabbing his shoulders, Kagome pulled herself mercilessly up his front, the motion nearly making him shiver with a wave of sensation, and she pressed her delicious lips demandingly to his.

 

“Dammit, Sesshomaru!” she yelled in his face after pulling back, leaving him to blink and think over the last second. Did he imagine it? If so then he was becoming pathetic. And why was she yelling, he hadn't even touched her yet. His hands up to do so though, waiting. Women were overwhelmingly confounding creatures. She smacked his left shoulder with her hand, her scent sweetening the air on top of everything else and driving him up the wall of his restraint. “Will you go ahead and make some of these decisions for me!”

 

He stared, taken aback. Her lip popped back out of her mouth, red after being crushed between her little teeth, and her fingers flexed in patterns where they lay on his shoulders.

 

... Well, sure, if she insisted.

 

She moaned against his mouth when his left hand embraced the back of her head and slowly drew her down to him, her body relaxing over his and giving him her weight. His fingertips ducked through her hair and slid down, stroking the side of her neck as his right palm moved up from the dip above her buttocks to between her shoulder blades, holding her tightly to himself. He relished in the feel of her body as she shifted anxiously over him.

 

“This is a mistake,” she groaned between kisses. “I'm still mad at you.”

 

“M-hm,” he offered halfheartedly, not really paying attention. Her left hand tucked past the collars of his haori to feel his rapidly heating skin as her right stroked his face in fond reunion.

 

“Mm... Damn you,” she whispered, breaking away to look at him. Everything was brighter and she was staring at his eyes in a manner of fascination. “Oh, kami, why me?” A longing sigh escaped her and she fell to him again, her breath hissing through her nose as her mouth bore hungrily down on him, arms around his neck in a show of temporary abandonment.

 

“Because I chose you,” he replied honestly, admitting that his voice was a tad rasped with desire. His hand stroked the arc of her back and down to her bottom, grabbing it softly and making her groan and grind against him in an pleased squirm.

 

“Bastard,” she muttered, and her attention went from his chest down to his side in a long and savoring rub, the pressure of her touch making individual muscles spasm briefly with anticipation. “You should have asked first.” His blood began to thin, flowing faster and easing him into a blessed, heady daze. He loved it, and wished it were a warmer day so that a few layers of clothing could be removed. “You had no right to do this without my permission.”

 

“Are you disappointed with the results?”

 

With nails digging lovingly into him, Kagome hummed and moaned for attention, shifting restlessly as she teased his body into a frenzy of need. Pheromones laced thickly through her scent, heavy with her body heat and strong with primal drive. He could almost taste them, breathing deeply to let them have their way with his senses. Her touch tickled from his cheek down to his neck, playing with both his skin and his hair. A groan escaped him, dragging behind it a low and satisfied growl from the depths of his chest.

 

“On the contrary,” she kissed him again, “I think I'm the luckiest girl in feudal Japan.” She grabbed the sides of his face and angled her mouth, strengthening and deepening their contact, and her tongue teased against his teeth, stroking his fangs and shifting and calling with guttural noises to the point that she was barely human anymore.

 

He loved it, her actions pulling him to her like he were on a leash. He welcomed it, almost purring.

 

Kagome broke their intimacy with a sudden and very misplaced giggle, feeling the vibrations of his utterances, and with his eager encouragement they continued. At a milder pace. They didn't stop until she remembered that he was laying in snow, a treacherous gust having sent some flakes against her cheek and shocking her out of their lustful trance. It frustrated him to have to stop, and she gave him a somewhat apologetic grin before pecking his lips again and levering to get off.

 

He felt cold without her. Damn the person who said that all good things must come to an end.

 

“Wow...”

 

Both of them gave a start, and Sesshomaru glared up a nearby tree, Kagome following his gaze. He could hear her heart stop when their sights lighted on Shippo.

 

“So it IS true!” the little fox exclaimed, his excitement frosted with lingering shock as he shot from his bottom to a standing position on a fairly high branch, pointing at them. He left while laughing gleefully, and Sesshomaru gave a humored hum when Kagome flopped into his chest with embarrassment, nonverbally asking him to pet her hair reassuringly. He was impressed that he hadn't sensed the young fox kit, and made a note to not get so enthralled in an uncertain location again.

 

Heh. Yeah, right.

 

Although their session had been short, it did coax Kagome out of emotional confinement. They quickly spent less and less time in front of Rin, who giggled when their hands touched let alone when Sesshomaru briefly nuzzled his cheek to Kagome's or stole a quick kiss when Rin was supposed to not be looking, and more and more time was carved out of visits for the two of them to be alone. The catch was that the more relaxed and carefree Kagome became around Sesshomaru, warming up to the level of intimacy they used to know, the more annoying Inuyasha was. About three days after their little intimate tussle -and two days, twenty three hours and fifty minutes after the whole village was informed of what Shippo had witnessed- Kagome got so frustrated with the hanyÅ that she sat him and asked oh so sweetly that Sesshomaru take them quickly to some more private place. He had been exceedingly happy to oblige, and she was specific that she wanted a nice warm building with no one around.

 

Shrines could be wonderful places...

 

A few days after that, seeing as the snow was melting substantially now in the last week's heatwave, Sesshomaru asked if she would mind doing something unique. Such as go to visit Edo. He hadn't asked the like before over feeling that she was more secure the closer she was to the slayer village, but Kagome hadn't hesitated a moment in comfortably seizing his arm in reply to the question. It was her official sign of being ready to be lifted into the air, and after a few necessary trips away from a sore hanyÅ it was just easier to have a signal rather than involve a variety of phrases for every occasion.

 

“So,” she began, leaning against his shoulder and not worrying about being on a 'cloud'. His arm was freed, and it went behind her back to rest on her hiding hip, “anything special planned?”

 

“You might say that,” he replied, gently pulling her closer and almost into his lap.

 

“Really?” she asked, looking up at him with delight.

 

He smiled softly down at her, making her squirm and snuggle into him a little more. In all actuality, he had no idea how she would react to the specially planned thing, but he had been meaning to get it done for a long time. The snow levels were lower in Edo anyway, making it easier.

 

“The shrine grounds?” she asked, still trying to figure out what the surprise was since she hadn't gotten an answer. He waited for her to notice, the change obvious to him since he knew. It wasn't until they were ten feet above the earth and descending that her jaw dropped in shock. “Oh...!”

 

Her feet alighted, and her little hands went over her mouth as she stared at the Goshinboku tree, towering dark and leafless in the square plod of earth which had been moved with it. It had required much planning, and the first vertical stakes of a short wooden fence to frame the border of the foreign ground were in place.

 

The scent of tears reached him, and glancing down he met gazes with Kagome.

 

“Oh...” she said more softly this time, looking between Sesshomaru and the tree. She hugged him tightly before walking over to examine the tree in its new location. “Oh, I can't believe it!” she exclaimed with more awe than volume, reaching up into the tree's scar. “Sesshomaru, it's even in the right angle!”

 

His mouth eased into a small and satisfied smile. She liked it. “There is one problem, which does not seem too problematic. Because of the used tactics, I have been told that the tree will change its nature.” She looked at him inquisitively, seeking an example. Sesshomaru shrugged to that, but offered his best. “It may grow its leaves later in the season, shed bark, or something else. Time will tell.”

 

“It blooms rarely,” she said with a smile, holding her arms by the elbows and looking up at the spreading branches. “How was it moved?”

 

'With much difficulty,' he thought, looking up at it with her, watching it give a pulse. He supposed that the plant was resonating with its energy as a means of associating itself with the new place and identifying the well as a part of itself, which reminded him of something. “It was Shifted. It is a very rare practice, though Sheng was more than happy to do most of the preparation.” The man had nearly taken over the whole project. “To put it simply, it traded places with the earth which once lay there in an instant.”

 

Kagome blinked at Sesshomaru. “Magic?”

 

He shrugged, and walking over he slipped her left hand into his. “Sure. Would you like to come and see if the Well is working again?”

 

She looked ready to leap away and madly off into the shrine, but with a resigned hum and a tightened grip she walked with him, grinning joyously. He loved it when she was happy.

 

“It's working,” she confirmed as she stared down into the well's depths. He could never looked at the bottom without recalling first waking up down there and perceiving Kagome as a wrong-time-wrong-place enemy.

 

Her hand quivered a moment in his, and Sesshomaru gave it a squeeze before letting her go. “Would you like to go home for a while?”

 

She giggled. “I think I'd better. I promised Soto that I'd watch him graduate after all. And it's been so long since I've been back. Months. Where does the time go...”

 

It wasn't a question, so he didn't answer. Sesshomaru gave her a reassuring nod with his head, and after opening the well's doors she sat on the lip and turned so her legs would hang down into the energized depths. Staring for a moment, she looked back to find his eyes. “Are you coming?”

 

He was a tad surprised and hesitant, but considering that Sheng still refused to give Sesshomaru full control over the o-shiro and lands -which was nigh unacceptable- he couldn't see the harm in leaving for a short while.

 

Kagome gave a high shrill of a giggle when Sesshomaru picked her up in his arms in the manner she called 'bridal style'. She reached up and kissed him fondly, and after their lips parted she rested her left cheek against the slope of his neck, her brow under the edge of his jaw. “I'll take that as a 'yes'.”

 

With a smirk he easily jumped over the well's wall and descended into its depths. Their mass was taken from them, energy swirling in a watery current, catching at their clothes and hair. She leaned into him closely, as though she would lift right from his arms, and seemed content. Something literally smelled funny though.

 

They landed soundlessly, the energy subsiding, and it was dark overhead. It wasn't a roof they were looking at though, unless Kagome's bizarre family recently installed an abyssal depth to it and added stars.

 

Her grip on him tightened, and he knew that something had gone wrong.

 

A/N: I leave you now to think about everything that just happened. XD I'll continue writing, no worries, but I'm still taking a while. Sorry! I'll get better about this over Christmas break and summer. I hope I gave you enough to chew on for a while though, at the very least.

 

Plot solvers, eat your hearts out. I'm not swirling things up too much, but it's fun to leave all of you curious.

 

I'm glad everyone's sticking with the story, and I hope the chapter was worth the wait.

 

Reviews, please! ;) I wuv dem. Enough to baby talk.

 

Thanks for reading!

 

~AD