InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Spellbound Destiny ❯ Prologue: Discovery ( Prologue )

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

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.  Only Takahashi Rumiko has that right. ^_^

Pronunciations:
Avaren – Aa*var*in (a as in apple, var like far but with a v)
Haedai – Hay*dye

Spellbound Destiny

Prologue: Discovery

The full moon shimmered blood red in the reflection off the lake, mirroring the color of cold eyes.  Naraku stood by and waited for the right time to act.  Just a little bit longer and he'd have it, the power he had always dreamed of: the Shikon no Tama.

After looking for forty-four years, he had finally found it again.  The key had been in the miko Kikyou's family blood line.  Once he had found her all those years ago, it had been easy to taint her and thus taint the Shikon no Tama that resided in her care.  She was suppose to purify it but instead, as Kikyou's heart became corrupt, so too did the Shikon no Tama.  Until, that is, his carefully laid plans had been ruined on the unaccounted for hanyou.  That damn hanyou had interrupted the process only a few short months after it had begun.

Naraku's right fist clenched at the remembrance.  At least the offending inu hanyou got what he deserved.  Naraku smiled cruelly with satisfaction.  The inu hanyou had been played for a fool once Naraku found out about him.  Naraku had manipulated Kikyou into believing she wished the hanyou dead and made her attack him.  

That plan hadn't work out as well as he had intended either.  But though the inu hanyou wasn't dead, he was sealed on a tree, forever locked in a time bubble where age, sickness and death could not touch him.  It was just as good as dead.  The only one who could unseal him was Kikyou or another miko just as, if not more, powerful than her.  And that wasn't going to happen.  In her over zealous fight with hanyou, Kikyou died from a grave injury to her chest and subsequent loss of blood.  No one as powerful as her had been born since her death.  Not even a decedent of her's.

Naraku's eyes narrowed.  His vision blurred and only his memories appeared before him, the scene of her death clearly imprinted forever in his mind.  Again, his plan had been thwarted.  On her last dying breath, Kikyou wished her family to burn the Shikon no Tama with her body so nothing could touch it ever again.  Naraku lost his chance to get it with her death.  The damn bitch had struggled through his corruption at the last minute and tried to redeem herself.  Now he was stuck out in the dark,  hiding himself from his enemies whiling he searched for where the Shikon no Tama would reappear and planning how to get it instead of basking in the glory of his power.

But that would soon change.  The cruel smile returned to his face.  It was a good thing he had stumbled onto that black miko only two years after Kikyou's death or he never would have figured it out.  Because of her wishes, the Shikon no Tama would reappear in the body of one of Kikyou's descendants.  In the Royal House of Avaren.  This young woman would possess strong miko powers and a pure soul.  The black miko could feel it.  Something as powerful as the Shikon no Tama could not leave this world alone.  And he believed that descendant had finally been born into the world.  She was still just a child, easily taken away from her protectors and corrupted.

Naraku looked up at the sky and watched as the moon finally took its place at its zenith.  The time was right for him to move.  He called out to the surrounding army of youkai and began the attack.  

Mayhem ensued as the inhuman screams, screeches and growls followed his command in pure ecstasy.   Blood-lust took over and lent a hand to their cruelty.  Naraku grinned happily at the beginnings of the carnage.  Any one who stood in his way would die.

O o O o O o O o O

Higurashi Yuichi pulled Mitsuko, his wife, to him as they gazed over the back gardens.  The moon shown with a deep  and eerie red, almost like blood, down on the couple.  It made Mitsuko shiver with foreboding.

“Anata, something doesn't feel right,” Mitsuko whispered to her husband.

“What do mean, koishii?”

“I'm not sure.  That moon doesn't feel right.  The color reminds me of blood and feels so wrong.  Maybe we should check on the children?”  Mitsuko turned as if to go inside their palace.

Yuichi stopped her with a hand on her arm.  “They should be fine, koishii.  It is an ominous sign but nothing is wrong.  There hasn't been a war in years and the people are prospering.  Come, lets-” Yuichi was cut off by the sound of a shoji door.  Small pattering footsteps followed and then a small head covered in blue-black hair which framed wide chocolate brown eyes peeked out of the shoji leading to the gardens.

“Mama, I had a bad dream,” came a shy whisper from the small girl.  Mitsuko looked at her eleven year old daughter with clouded eyes.  Kagome had a strange sixth sense about any misfortune that was about to occur.  She hoped this was not one of those times.  

Mitsuko walked towards her daughter.  She bent in the intent to pick Kagome up and comfort her when inhuman cries echoed around them.  They were followed shortly after by very human screams, some cut off in mid scream, silenced no doubt due to death in some form or fashion.  

Mitsuko grabbed Kagome to her and gazed at her husband wildly.  She asked with her eyes what she should do.  Yuichi gestured to his lips in a sign for silence.  After Mitsuko placed her hand firmly over Kagome's mouth, Yuichi gestured to the right most side of their room.  Mitsuko nodded her understanding and rushed for the hidden door that led to a secret passage to the wing her children slept in.  She knew the plan her husband wanted her to enact.  She was to head for her  youngest child, Souta, and take both her children out of the palace to the meeting place Yuichi had secured that only their family and a select few of their personal guard knew of.  It was their only hope of being safe..

On silent feet, she made her way to the hidden door.  Worry clouded her mind.  Yuichi was strong, a true warrior with a kind heart, but whatever creatures made those cries were not human and did not posses a human heart of mercy or kindness.  She believed they were youkai.  It was the only explanation for why Kagome was affect by a bad dream only moments before the attack.  Her senses were always much sharper when youkai intended harm to them than just a normal human.  Mitsuko hoped with all her heart that Yuichi would be alright.

Yuichi watched his wife and daughter walk through the secret passage with intent eyes.  Only after they were gone did he then grab his katana that lay against the wall.  It was his job to distract the monsters outside his room until the ones he loved could reach their meeting place.

With his katana secure in his hand, Yuichi ran out of his bedroom, turned left and skidded to a halt.  He stared in disbelief.  The two guards who had patrol duty in the western wing of the palace hallways had been massacred.  

One guard's head lay three feet away from his body, his intestines spilling out from a horrible gut wound, an arm thrown against a wall so hard it had wedged itself into the wall from a hole the hand had created.  Blood coated the walls like paint.  

The other guard was far worse off.  His eyes had been eaten out of their sockets, his legs pulled out of his body and thrown towards the ceiling with such force that the stringy masses of the muscles from his thighs dangled, torn and shredded, to drip blood onto the floor.  Neither death had been painless and he felt sorry for their horrific end.

Yuichi, though a seasoned warrior, had never seen carnage like this before.  Whatever the creatures were, they had one thing on their minds: total annihilation.  No one would be spared.

He turned his head away from the blood sight, tears in his eyes, and tried to hold back the bile that rose up in his throat.  At the same time, Yuichi saw a trail of blood that lead to the eastern part of the castle.  His children's rooms were in the eastern wing.  His eyes widened in horror and he ran from the western hallway in a direct path following the path of blood.

Rounding a corner right before Souta's room, Yuichi saw a beast bash in the delicate paper shoji doors.  The thing was huge, a giant, with eerie green glowing skin.  Two horns adorned his head while giant four fingered hands topped off with claws were coated in blood and fiery hooves left distinct foot prints in burned wood.  A snake like tail slithered back and forth as the beast scented the air, slowly turning his head to meet Yuichi.

Yuichi took a slow step, held his breath, and hoped that the beast had not noticed his wife or children so close by.  A scrap of light caught his eye in the periphery of his vision, a light of gold shot through with orange ending in red.  The colors of Mitsuko's yukata.  His wife was still in the room, trying desperately to save their children.

Grabbing a firmer hold on his katana, Yuichi sounded a war cry to gain the full attention of the beast and lunged forward.  The creature turned fully to face Yuichi, taking its attention from the room and lifted up a hand to bat away the offending katana.  Yuichi managed to slash down on the creature but his katana seemed dull against the creature's skin.  It managed only to make a tiny scratch on its arm.  It wasn't even deep enough to draw blood.

Yuichi jumped back from the creature in wary surprise, and looked the creature over again.  He tried to find a place, any place, on the creature's body that was its weakness.  The monster did not give him much time.  It took the initiative and slashed his own claws against Yuichi's upper chest.  Yuichi wore no armor since he was in his own home and not expecting an attack.  The monster's claws dug into Yuichi's thin flesh like a knife through butter.  The force of the blow hurdled Yuichi through the air to land against the the wall at the end of the hallway.  His hands released his katana to drop uselessly to the floor.  

A sickening crack resounded throughout the hallway and blood began to drip down his face into his blurry deep brown eyes.  The monster lumbered slowly to Yuichi and licked the blood off his claws.  Yuichi slid to the floor and immediately tried to stand again, finding his katana on the way up.  He gripped it desperately and lunged at the creature again.  But his katana didn't even hit the monster.  In defense, the monster raised his right arm and punched him through the stomach with his claws extended.   Bone and organs were dragged out through Yuichi's back and his spinal cord was severed instantly.     

Mitsuko covered her mouth to keep the instinctive cry silent, her eyes huge for her face and her skin pale as ash.  Yuichi was dead.  Shaking, she scrambled over to the hidden door on Souta's floor.  The tears flowed unchecked from her sorrow filled coffee eyes.  Unable to stop the tremors that wracked her frame, she closed the secret door and traveled through the stone tunnel to the point where she had left her children.  

“Come, children, we must leave now,” Mitsuko whispered to them, unmindful of her tears.  Her heart was broken.  Her love was dead and she wouldn't even be able to bury him in a proper grave.

“What about papa?” Kagome asked in confusion.  She looked behind her mother to where the secret door should have been.  It was too dark in the tunnel for her to see where the opening was now that it was closed.

“Papa...will meet us at our secret place,” Mitsuko chocked out.  She had to lie to her children to get them to go without him.  “Come, we must hurry.”

She bent down and picked Souta up.  She knew his small little legs couldn't carry him the quick pace they would have to travel to get them to the safest location in the whole of Avaren.  

Kagome slipped her hand into her mother's right one and looked up into her sad eyes.  “Don't worry, mama.  It'll be alright.  I know it will.”  Kagome's confidence was somewhat reassuring.  Mitsuko smiled wobbly at her daughter.  She was grateful that Kagome had not suffered much from this tragic night.

“Yes, Kagome, you're right.  It'll be alright.  I have you and Souta with me.  We can make it through this.”  

With a subtle resolve forming in her heart, Mitsuko tightened her hold on Kagome's hand and began to run down the rest of the tunnel.  Her husband was gone, and she grieved desperately for that, but her children were still with her.  She had to be strong to raise them as her husband had wanted.  They would survive to fight another day, eventually, when her children were older and able.

O o O o O o O o O

Naraku stepped without a sound down the hallways of the Avaren Palace, unphased by the blood and body parts that painted such a macabre scene.  His youkai companions kept themselves to the shadows as Naraku's anger increased with each step.  He had specifically given orders to kill everyone except the young girl.  The scents that kept wafting up to him allowed him to discern that three individuals had been left alive.  Their scents were the only ones that didn't reek of death and decay.  One was the girl he was after, the other two where related to her.  

Perhaps her mother...and brother? Naraku thought and scented the air again.  The three scents all converged in a single room where Yuichi, the father and ruler of Avaren, had been slain outside of.  Stepping around the blood stains, Naraku walked into the room for a closer inspection.  The scent trail ended abruptly by the wall to the right of him.  He couldn't see anything amiss.  He looked down at the floor, paying close attention to every detail.  He tried to see if a trap door was hidden somewhere but the only lines he could discern were from the regular tatami matting.

He silently cursed the fates.  The girl had gotten way.  However, everything is not lost.  I now have a kingdom I can rule over and it's resources to search for the girl.  The game is still on and I will have the Shikon no Tama soon.  The girl can't hide forever.  She will show herself and when she does, I'll be waiting.

Naraku chuckled to himself as he exited the room.  He called for his more civilized youkai servants to clean up the palace.  It was now his and he would take great pleasure in informing the people of Avaren they had a new King.  His eyes shone deep wine red with his excitement.  He had not thought to become King before the attack.  Only the girl mattered.  Now, things had changed.  He had gained more power this night, a power he had never thought to try to obtain.  At least, not before he possessed the Shikon no Tama.
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