InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Daimyo Inutaisho ❯ Seven ( Chapter 7 )

CHAPTER SEVEN

Inutaisho stood at the door of his wife's apartments, his eyes were wide with shock. "What the hell happened here?"

The room was completely demolished. Even Seshiko at her worst temper tantrum wouldn't cause this level of destruction. Inutaisho shot an accusing look at the two guards who were stationed at his wife's quarters. They looked nervous as did his own bodyguards. The senior of Seshiko's guards swallowed hard. "Sire, I swear on my honor, no one has entered or left since you were here this morning."

Inutaisho cautiously entered the rooms, wondering if the tsunami that had come through had left any survivors. Ordinarily, his guard would have alerted him immediately if it were one of Seshiko's outbursts, but they assured him it had been quiet all day. That's when he smelled the blood and felt his heart freeze up in his chest. "Shit," he said softly, picking his way carefully through the debris of shattered furniture. At the bedroom he prepared himself for the worst and kicked open the door, one hand on his sword hilt.

Seshiko's servants were all dead, he immediately recognized each of the corpses laying on the floor. The bedroom was a war zone. Gritting his teeth, he forced himself to make the long walk across the floor to the cradle beside Seshiko's demolished bed. His two week old son was there, sleeping peacefully, one pink fist wedged in his tiny mouth. Inutaisho realized he'd been holding his breath and let it out in a slow exhale of relief. His son was alive.

Tenderly, the demon lord lifted his infant son and held him, cradling the child against the soft fabric of his kimono above the spiked metal of his breastplate. His nose twitched, Seshiko's blood was mixed in with the rest but her body was missing. It was clear that the servants had not died easy deaths or quick ones. He frowned, too much blood for the dead servants and some of it he didn't recognize. Intruders.

Snarling with suppressed rage, he stormed back into the main receiving room of the apartments. "Izitaki!" he shouted. The guard came running. "My lord!"

"We have guests," he snapped, so angry that foam actually flecked from his lips. Izitaki turned pale at the sight of his lord's red rage. Inutaisho's face had become more demonic, the stripes on his cheeks were bloody gashes against his skin and his teeth seemed too large for his mouth. "Alert the household guard. I want the bastards responsible brought to ME! Alive, you understand?"

Izitaki fled, his voice echoing back as he ran down the corridor, raising the alarm and calling the guards for his orders. Inutaisho growled to himself, it was unthinkable that the sanctity of his fortress had been breached. He felt his fury start to override him when a tiny mew of protest from the baby caught his attention. He looked down into his son's face and deliberately let the youki building inside him lighten. The baby calmed almost instantly and reached out to capture a few strands of white hair to stuff in his mouth.

Inutaisho's face softened somewhat. Even at two weeks the boy was already displaying a remarkable sense of self-possession, rarely crying and seemingly far more alert than he'd thought pups this age could be. Of course he was already being treated as a little prince by all of the staff and most of the court had begged for the opportunity to present themselves to the Daimyo's new heir, even if it meant braving the company of the child's overprotective and unpredictable mother.

Seshiko, he thought, gently rocking his son against his neck. She would never have killed her own servants like this, most were people who'd been with her from childhood. Nor would she have abandoned the baby. She had to have been taken by the intruders. A hostage? It made no sense. The logical choice would have been the baby, as his son could be used both against him and the Azaryu clan. It was a mystery to him. As soon as his guards arrived he would have the child taken to his own rooms and no, scratch that. Inutaisho headed out the door, suddenly needing to take his son to his own secure quarters himself. Left there, he could trust in the boy's safety as well as he could trust in his own and he'd be able to devote his full attention to tracking down and punishing the bastards who had dared provoke him by invading his home.

At the door of his own apartments, he nodded curtly to his bodyguards who took one look at their lord's face and immediately snatched open the door. "No one enters or leaves without my express permission," he snarled menacingly. His own servants hurried forward, anxious for orders. "We have intruders in the fortress," he told them. "I need you to secure the service entrances at once. As of this moment, this apartment is locked down. No one gets in, under pain of death."

He proceeded to his own bedroom door and found it bolted against him. "What the hell," he whispered as the blood scent again filled his nostrils. "Seshiko!" he shouted.

The door opened slowly and his wife stood there, her face pale and literally drenched in blood. He stared at her, stunned to silence and took in her battered appearance. Her arms were caked with gore, blood and tissue hung limply from her claws. Seshiko blinked at him, seemingly having trouble focusing her eyes. He could tell that no small amount of the blood was her own. "My lord," she said regally and collapsed on the floor at his feet.

The room was a bloodbath, far worse than Seshiko's rooms had been. He could see that Seshiko's supposed abductors had met a quite gruesome end. He knelt next to her, still holding their son in one arm while his other gathered her head into his lap. "Seshiko," he murmured, stroking her hair, no longer bright and shimmering, but soaked and darkened with blood.

Her eyes opened, finding his. One stained hand reached up to lightly touch his face. "My lord, the assassins…"

"Hush," he said, alarmed at the weakness in her voice. "Don't try to talk, you're safe now. The healers are on the way."

She smiled at him, a very soft and sweet smile. It scared the hell out of him. "It's too late, I've lost too much blood. I won't be able to heal from this, my lord."

"Don't say that. I won't allow you to die," he said, already knowing that he couldn't prevent it. Female youkai were very vulnerable after giving birth. The stress on their bodies interfered with the natural healing ability as the body had focused all its energies on the delivery of a healthy pup. Women often remained in seclusion for three months after a child's birth, both to bond with and nourish the newborn as well as to keep risks to a minimum. At three months, a child would be named in a formal ceremony. Then would the mother and child emerge from their self imposed exile and become part of the clan's daily life again.

Seshiko coughed and flecks of blood splattered Inutaisho's face. He barely noticed them, he was so focused on holding her to life. She smiled that sweet unseen before smile again. "I must speak. I have things I need to tell you now, as I do not have much time left."

"No," he said, denying that her time was short and she should conserve her strength.

"I must," she told him and her tone was firm. "These assassins were sent by my father, lord Kashikoto. He is already moving against your forces in the west. He means to take them by surprise."

He was very aware of what the Azaryu clanlord had planned. Thanks to his preparations over the past two weeks, Kashikoto was in for a surprise of his own. "I know," he said simply.

Seshiko looked relieved. "I knew you did," she murmured, her voice soft and fierce. "My father believes that your forces will be unable to resist without you there to lead them. So he sent these assassins. I was to have given them access to my rooms until they were able to trap you there alone. I refused. My father's men are well trained and tried to persuade me by murdering my personal staff."

"You were not persuaded," he whispered.

"I was not," she replied, a grimace of pain crossing her features. Seshiko swallowed hard and continued. "They felt they had no choice at that point but to dispose of me also, since I had betrayed my clan. They left me for dead." She gave him a bloodthirsty grin. "The fools should have made sure, my lord. I trained them better than to leave an enemy alive."

He was startled. "You trained them?" It made perverse sense suddenly. Kashikoto had intended this betrayal from the beginning, using the treaty to get his own agents inside the Daimyo's household. "Seshiko, you followed them here to finish them off? How did you…" He trailed off, noticing for the first time that the dead assassins were wearing his own personal livery, indicating their status as trusted servants. No one on the household staff would have challenged them. New faces came and went all the time in a fortress this size, but that livery was sacrosanct and no one would dare question the lord's own personal service.

Seshiko watched the expressions flowing over her husband's face. "The livery was provided, as was access to your personal quarters and mine. The service entrances are well guarded but there are some members of your household that no one would ever suspect and the guards passed these assassins through on his word alone."

He closed his eyes, trying to deny the truth. "Inoki."

Her fingers caressed his cheek again. "Don't punish yourself over Inoki, my lord. He did not turn against you willingly. It was my spell that made him betray you. Between the paranoia I induced and his own insecurities and jealousy, he's hardly accountable for his own actions. He has become consumed with anger and hatred, he does not know himself anymore."

"You did this," Inutaisho breathed. "You turned him against me, made him hate me, hate his wife." It was suddenly so clear to him, how Inoki had pulled away from everyone he loved. It was too easy to see where he'd gone for all his long and unexplained absences, straight into Kashikoto's waiting hands. He cursed himself for not seeing the truth sooner, in time to save Inoki. And he cursed himself for bringing Seshiko into his household where she had ample time to twist and manipulate his gentle, kind natured brother into something unrecognizable.

"Seshiko, you miserable bitch. Do you have any idea of what you've done?" She looked up at him, as blissful as if his curses were endearments. "I do now," she said softly. "What I didn't know was how I'd feel when the time finally came and I had to choose for myself that it was time for you to die. I found I couldn't do it, I could do anything else, but I couldn't do that."

"Why?" he asked, curious in spite of his anguish. She'd cost him his brother, she'd damn near cost him his life and the lives of his men. And still he felt compelled to understand her, dig beneath her unforgivable actions and come up against the real Seshiko, the woman inside the manipulative viper, the one who'd given him a son.

Seshiko regarded him soberly. "You can't guess? I've fallen in love with you, my lord. I don't know why, but there's no other explanation. Azaryu warriors are expected to put the needs of the clan first. It seems I've failed my father in choosing to put my own desires above his plans."

Her eyes fluttered shut at last and Inutaisho held her harder, crushing her against his armor. The baby whimpered at the tightness of his hold on them both. "Damn you, damn you," he told her, tears starting to slide from his eyes. "You betrayed me and ripped me apart inside and now you want to die on me after telling me that. Damn you Seshiko!"

He felt her smile again and looked down at her. He could hear the sound of her heart slowing, stumbling and the fierce, vibrant light of her was growing dim. "Tell me something," she whispered.

"Anything," he muttered, blinking back more useless tears.

Her voice was so soft. "Did you always intend to betray the treaty? My father was convinced of it, that's why he sent me to you. That you were moving against him, trapping him into a treaty that only gave you room to crush him absolutely when you wanted. I need to know the truth for myself, I need to hear it from you."

He let out a sharp bark of chagrin and tenderly traced her lips with his finger. "Of course I was going to betray your father. There was never any doubt of it. It was a trap and I forced his head into it. He knew my intentions when he signed the treaty." He held her gaze with his own, forcing himself to be as brutally honest as she desired. "I wanted it that way, you should know that. There's nothing quite as satisfying as destroying an enemy and having him absolutely know there's no way out, no matter how hard he struggles."

She smiled faintly. "I knew I understood you from the beginning. I'm glad for it means that I truly do know the man I fell in love with. You will always be my most beloved enemy, my husband Inutaisho." And she gave a soft sigh and died in his arms, her face damp with his tears. He threw back his head and howled his pain until the entire fortress was brought to a standstill, silent in observance of their lord's unbearable grief and loss.

END CHAPTER SEVEN