InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Shards of Koharu ❯ Better Than Nothing ( Chapter 3 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Title: Better Than Nothing
Original Publication: 06/10/05
Character: Koharu
Theme: #10 Weapon
Rating: [T/PG-13]
Word Count: 262
Summary: A weapon isn't always a sword…

Better Than Nothing

Those who held weapons held power. Those who held power ruled over those who did not. And Koharu - who had neither weapons nor power - was but a speck of grime beneath their feet.

Perhaps weapons were overrated; they certainly hadn't done her father and older brother any good. One battle was all it took to kill them, their corpses tossed across the field like twigs snapped by a storm. Her mother had retrieved her father's sword and armor, but it proved useless to her as well; within the month, she and Koharu's younger sister were carried off by a spring plague.

But as she heard the labored breathing of the man who was chasing her in the dark, Koharu began to consider the possibility that a weapon - any weapon - was better than nothing at all. It was a pity she didn't have her father's sword, for she'd rather bury the blade in her own chest than surrender to the twisted lusts of the one who hunted her. But she had nothing, not so much as a -

She tripped. Scrambling around in the darkness, her hand brushed across a heavy stick. As the heavy body of her pursuer fell on top of her, Koharu swung her newly acquired weapon repeatedly, damning the man with each blow. And when his movements ceased, she fled into the darkness.

She kept the stick, however. It would do her little good when the oil-merchant's guards came looking for her, but she found immense comfort in keeping it. After all, any weapon was better than no weapon.