InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Sesshoumaru's Baby ❯ Chapter Four: Inu-Yasha and Miroku ( Chapter 4 )

Sesshoumaru's Baby

 

Four: Inu-Yasha and Miroku

 

Miroku was watching Inu-Yasha. Or rather, he suspected he was watching Inu-Yasha watching him some of the time, because the hanyou's stare had moved from the fields to the trees where the monk was sitting several times. The peeved look on his face remained wherever he was glaring, so Miroku suspected it was a general mood, rather than a reaction to being spied on.

 

He was supposed to have gone jewel-hunting. Miroku reckoned that decision was pressured by the look in Kagome's eyes that promised as many sits as she could say without her mouth going dry, and because Inu-Yasha always walked away when situations got tense. If Kikyo turned up, rather than have it out with her right then and there, he always walked off to find her. Hiding his guilt, unable to face everybody else. And Kagome, of course - the person who made him feel his guilt most keenly.

 

Perhaps Inu-Yasha was watching Sango? wondered Miroku. She was working off some frustrations on the far side of the village, clearing some of the trees. Much the way Inu-Yasha did when Kagome went home at inconvenient times, when he'd much rather have been jewel-hunting.

 

…Which brought Miroku right back to where he started. The facts, he decided, stood thus: Inu-Yasha had said he was going to look for shards, or rumours of shards as he couldn't see the bloody things. “Don't let my brother bugger off,” he said. “I won't be long.” Yet he was still here. Perhaps his fears of Sesshoumaru doing a bunk in his absence were well-founded? Had he done something like that before?

 

Odd that Inu-Yasha's paternal instincts were keeping him in the realm of the female ire, Miroku mused. Sango and Kagome would both be out for his blood by the end of the day. He could understand it.

 

“Will you stop staring at me, monk!” Inu-Yasha shouted.

 

Miroku jumped. “What?”

 

“If you're going to stand there, say something! Don't just look at me with those stupid cow-eyes and expect me to be sorry!”

 

“What makes you think that's what I want?” Miroku said, meandering out from the trees. “You think I want an apology from you?”

 

Inu-Yasha subsided back into his branch. “What else would you want?”

 

“I want lots of things, Inu-Yasha,” Miroku pointed out. He propped himself up against the base of the tree, staff jingling, and settled himself to look out across the rice paddies. “I want to kill Naraku. I want to marry Sango and have lots of small children to annoy me by waking me up too early every day. I want to live a long life, instead of the short one I seem to have got. I want happy endings for all my friends.” Inu-Yasha huffed. “I also want to prove I'm an excellent lover by racking up as many girls as possible, but still…”

 

“Pervert,” said Inu-Yasha, with some amusement.

 

“Some people might say that's what you are,” Miroku said delicately.

 

A branch crashed down a foot away from where he was standing. “Missed,” he said. “And there's no use throwing things at me. It won't make this go away.”

 

“I am not a pervert.”

 

There was a long pause. “Perhaps we should examine that claim, Inu-Yasha. We all know samurai often take boys as lovers. It seems to be part of the culture for an older man to mentor a younger one in the combat arts - and in bed.” Inu-Yasha growled. “And I'll ask you to promise not to say this to the girls…”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“…But I'm no stranger to sleeping with other men either, you know. There aren't any girls in a monastery, and you and I both know that men have high sex drives. When you're young, you experiment. Most men grow up and prefer girls, others stay with the preferences of their youth. Nothing wrong with that. I believe I even read something from a philosopher once, that suggested it was more manly to bed another man than a woman…”

 

“I get what you mean, Miroku. But it's not like that.”

 

“I confess I don't know much of youkai morality. By all accounts, on your human side at least, you can't be penalised for what you've been up to.”

 

Inu-Yasha felt pushed to comment. “But he's my brother.”

 

“Don't you know how common incest is in country villages? People often intermarry in their own families, cousins or brothers or sisters together. You can ask Kaede. Most of these people won't have left this village in their lives. After a few generations, it's impossible to avoid marrying people you're related to without a steady influx of people coming in and settling from other areas, which you can see doesn't happen - or this would be a town by now. People may not talk about it openly, but it happens. I admit I don't know of anybody - from personal experience or from stories I've heard - who was sleeping with their own brother - ”

 

“Half-brother.”

 

“I don't see how that makes any difference just because you didn't have the same mother.”

 

“Feh.”

 

“Anyone ever tell you that your manners are appalling?”

 

“All the time,” Inu-Yasha said grumpily. “You do it too.”

 

“Only when sorely tried.” There was another brief silence. “Why haven't you gone looking for jewel shards like you said you would?”

 

Inu-Yasha hesitated. “I think Sesshoumaru will disappear if I do.”

 

“So he knows you're still here?”

 

“He's got a better nose than me. And he can probably sense me, unless that's being screwed up by - you know.” There was another noticeable hesitation. “And I think - I think Kagome might do something stupid, too.”

 

At last, a little consideration for the most put-upon person in his little melodrama. “Like what?”

 

“I don't know,” Inu-Yasha hedged, unused to contemplating the length and breadth of other people's minds and sanity. “She might hurt herself. She might go away and not come back.”

 

“I wouldn't be surprised if she did go home.”

 

The wind blew softly through the trees. The clink and tap of farm tools and carts rose up from the village, a calming background symphony. “I don't know what to do, Miroku,” he said at last. “I don't know where to start.”

 

“You could start with talking to Kagome.”

 

Inu-Yasha snorted. “She'll only sit me. And she won't come near me now.”

 

“That's not my opinion,” said Miroku, stepping away from the tree and making towards the forest. “She's coming this way right this minute.”

 

A/N: The big showdown - Inu-Yasha explains himself to the irate Kagome in possibly the most awkward talk they could ever have about their relationship. Meanwhile, Sango broaches a topic with Sesshoumaru…