InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Simple and Clean ❯ Love and War ( Chapter 32 )

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

Naraku�s cold eyes surveyed Kikyo, his features a wall of unchanging stone. The woman who penetrated his every thought, every action, stood before him for the taking, just in reach. There was no more love for another man; this desperate woman held an empty heart that filled with that fickle emotion called hate. He knew she would waver, and when she did he would be the one to catch her this time. There would be no escape.

Anime/Manga: InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Romance / Comedy | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 12.04.2005 | Pages: 1 | Words: 2.8K | Visits: 478 | Status: Completed

Hey all! I hoped you all liked the last chapter! If you have a chance, after you're finished reading this one, check out my artwork (on Media Miner)! I just figured out that I can upload a certain amount of stuff before I have to pay… so yeah, if you're interested, check it out and let me know what you think! Also, you Fanfiction .net people better get a move on it, the Media Miner reviewers are whooping your butts!

Recap:

A simple answer to the simple question of the warriors of good and the devils of evil must seem easy enough, but who is to judge and by what comparison can we say one is better than another by the choices they make? Kagura knew that she could not be good, for she felt no sadness at all for the dead girl who used to be her sister. But there was a certain longing to be better than she was, and in that, a sense of good that no one could deny. So where did that place the in-betweens? That place, the grey region between white and black. The miasma that is entered by everyone, of whom no one is spared.

Chapter 32

Love and War

Thank you to

Kittencutie14, xYour_Last_Chancex, xobabygurl4lifexo, and Princess-in-Training who reviewed

The scene before him played out like a soap opera on cocaine. Sesshomaru just sighed inwardly. He had enough experience with a highly caffeinated child that this literally seemed like child's play. And like a television show, the four actors seemed completely detached from the world as it watched, interested in only what was happening to them. This made it quite easy for Sesshomaru to slip by unnoticed and enter the castle alone.

Once inside, his senses screamed their warning at him as his nose was buffeted by the putrid smell of decaying flesh and fear. Almost blinded, he did not see the woman behind him who closed the shoji door with a snap. Nor did he turn when she spoke, just tilted his head slightly, the only thing that assured her that he had even heard.

“I know what you've come for,” She purred softly, the blades of the concealed fan clinking faintly against each other like wind chimes, “But how bad do you want it?” Sesshomaru blinked slowly, “I don't know what you're talking about, but be warned woman, let me pass through this castle or you will die like the girl.” The woman laughed quietly, and withdrew the fan from her kimono, letting it open, each slat chiming in turn. “You can ignore my words, but if you kill me how will you hope to find the girl before Naraku kills her?”

Sesshomaru smiled. So his name is Naraku, is it? Women were so easily manipulated. He stepped aside gracefully as a blast of wind whizzed by, whistling menacingly in his ear. In one fluid motion he snapped the whip from his belt and sent it slithering through the air to wrap itself around the woman. He did not turn around to look at her. “Tell me where the girl is or you die here.”

Kagura scowled deeply, her heart dropping. It was bad enough that she couldn't even distract one enemy, let alone that she was the one who was ultimately being distracted. Seeing no other way out of it, Kagura hissed through clenched teeth, “Fine, just get this thing off of me.” Wriggling out of the whip, she froze as her assailant turned to look at her.

The two stood there for an eternal half-second as the wind whistled through the cold corridor. The woman was barefoot and clothed in a traditional kimono used for dances of the wind. Fitting, Sesshomaru thought. She caught his eyes and held them there, blood-red and amber meeting in a clash of auras. The feeling Kagura had been blocking out had finally taken over. These travelers did not belong here. There was a wrongness about them, a wrongness that tinged her heart whenever she looked into Naraku's eyes. Something deep within her, its dormancy too prolonged, began to wake.

Casting her eyes down, she felt the man's eyes still boring into her. “She is in the last room down the corridor, but don't blame me when she's not what you were expecting. That is none of my concern.” Her footsteps echoed along the corridor away from the man, and in her empty chest.

-II-

Naraku's cold eyes surveyed Kikyo, his features a wall of unchanging stone. The woman who penetrated his every thought, every action, stood before him for the taking, just in reach. There was no more love for another man; this desperate woman held an empty heart that filled with that fickle emotion called hate. He knew she would waver, and when she did he would be the one to catch her this time. There would be no escape.

“Kikyo,” He said softly, the coldness almost gone from his voice, “Look at what I am now, what I have to give you: an entire world, ours for the taking. You know where your heart belongs, so choose the easy path, choose to live here with me and you'll never long for the life you left behind.” Kikyo's body was slack and lenient as he pulled her up to face him. She looked into his eyes and he knew the lost look in hers was beginning to settle. A harsh voice cracked the moment.

“Get you're filthy hands off her you bastard!” Inuyasha growled as he advanced on Naraku. Letting Kikyo slump to the ground, Naraku faced the bristling young man. “You never knew what was good for you did you? How could you have appreciated a woman such as Kikyo? How could dirt like you love her?” Kagome watched in horror as hate began to boil from Inuyasha. And then she had a genius idea.

Naraku sneered at Inuyasha, a hand resting on Kikyo's shoulder. Inuyasha watched with malice as he gave her shoulder a slight squeeze. “I couldn't have such an unfit man be the one Kikyo ended up with, she deserved so much better, so I took it into my own hands to inform Kikyo in what would have eventually happened anyways.” Kikyo's head snapped up, a look of horror on her face as she stared at Inuyasha.

“I guess all if fair in love and war.”

His face slacked for a minute before a look of pure rage and hatred replaced it. Lashing out, his claws met flesh, and in a spray of blood he had dislodged Naraku's jaw from his skull. Naraku raised an eyebrow as they watched in horror as the skin began to meld back together again as if someone had pressed `rewind'. “Now that's no way to act, now is it?” Naraku smiled slightly, “Now be a good boy and die!” Lashing out himself, his hand melding into a gruesome tentacle of flesh, Naraku pierced through Inuyasha's stomach. Inuyasha let out an anguished cry as the man pulled his appendage sharply from the boy's body. He felt hot blood as his hand went to the wound. Searing pain shot through his body as he collapsed on the ground.

He dazedly remembered the hands of a woman on his face before he lost all consciousness.

-III-

Kagome frantically shook Inuyasha calling his name. Everything seemed to dissipate around her as if it had truly been just an illusion. She was now in utter blackness, just Inuyasha and herself, her voice echoing in the void. “Come back to me! Don't die now, not yet… not ever…” her eyes stung as her tears fell, though she had thought there were no more tears to cry. For a moment she saw the view of the hospital room through the tear in the void, but it was gone as soon as it had come. A voice called out around her, softly at first, then crescendoing to a stinging roar.

“It is not your time Inuyasha,” Kagome thought the voice, female if she wasn't mistaken, was oddly familiar, “The eyes of fate have not closed just yet.” The voice began to fade as the scenery that she wished had been gone sharpened once again around her. Inuyasha groaned, opening an eye. “You're getting my shirt wet.” He said, motioning with some effort at the dark splotches left by her tears. Kagome let out a gasp as he lifted himself from her hold and stood up unsteadily.

Beginning to make his way towards Naraku again, He stopped in horror at the scene before him. Kikyo stood, the bow and arrow that had lain on the ground now firmly clenched in her hands. It pointed unmistakably at Naraku. Her eyes had settled, and Naraku now knew that there was no more love left in those eyes for him. Trying to stall the woman from shooting the arrow that quivered as she kept the bowstring taught, he asked, “Why is it that you aim for my head, and not for my heart dear Kikyo?”

Kikyo answered through clenched teeth, “What would be the point dear Naraku? You have no heart.” At this Naraku chuckled as though he didn't have a weapon aimed at his head. And then a multitude of things happened at once. Kikyo let the arrow loose, Kagome screamed, and a blur came between Kikyo's arrow and Naraku. The wind swirled furiously, before suddenly dying out. Everything was deathly quite now as the dust settled.

Kagura lay gracefully on the ground, her hair loose from their bindings, Kikyo's arrow buried deep within her chest. She was smiling as tears welled in her eyes. She was looking up at Naraku; her eyes losing the unmistakable love that she had always known could never come to pass as she saw the emptiness within Naraku's own eyes. There was nothing for her and that was just the way it had always been. And in her dying moments, she did not whisper her words, or voice anything at all. No, she was savoring the feeling of freedom as the life seeped from her body and left entirely. There was no need for the love of her keeper when she was free from her cage.

In the commotion, Kagome had made her way to Inuyasha and felt her heart sink as she saw the wound in his stomach. It had not stopped bleeding and he leaned heavily on her for support. She heard his breathing becoming short and labored. She turned her face away as the woman she did not know was still.

Naraku, Kikyo, Inuyasha, and Kagome watched almost sadly as the woman's body disintegrated into tiny pink petals, blown away by the wind. Kagome thought she heard a whispered word as the wind brushed her cheeks, blowing her hair back from her tear streaked face. She did not hear what it had said, but a feeling of hope welled within her, despite her sadness, and the tears stopped fleeing from her desperate eyes.

The sound of a bow stringing taught again reached their ears as Kikyo raised her bow once more. And as she did so, a light from within her, shining through her skin like tears in paper, began to cover her body. She attempted to release the arrow from her bow but her fingers were lost in the light and as she disappeared, Kagome saw Kikyo smile slightly, as if she knew she had never meant to let the arrow go to begin with.

Far off in the distance at the base of the mountain, the wind whistled through a ravaged village that had been abandoned whispering `freedom' to the flowers.

-End of Chapter Notes-

In writing this chapter I have come to realize that Kagura is my favorite character in this story, and I felt that she needed a happy ending… so I hope you can appreciate it, I didn't want to see it as me killing a character off. I thought of it as more of setting her free… right. On a different note, the review response was really sad from you fanfiction .net people! Thank you to the one person who did review. Please keep reviewing you guys, it really helps me to want to keep writing because I know people actually go in and read my story then… Anyways, to the people who did review, my heartfelt thanks to all of you! In a review someone asked if the story was done or not, but I just want to make it clear that I haven't finished yet, so don't worry!!.