InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Edge of Resistance ❯ Sesshoumaru, Jaken, and Rin ( Chapter 12 )

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

By: Lalieth

The Edge of Resistance

Book One: The Dreaming World

Chapter 13: Sesshoumaru, Jaken and Rin

"I know what conscience is, to begin with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in us. Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more, -at least not before me. I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being hideous." -Oscar Wilder

***

Sesshoumaru had gone with Tamotsu to track the spider demons, but Rin and Jaken knew nothing about it and they remained in the Hyouden alone. Rin was more than capable of occupying herself, but Jaken crawled through the time at an agonizing pace. On the second day, when the summer afternoon sun was white in the sky, Rin ambled in the fields close to the house where she picked handfuls of the delicate white flowers that covered the plain to the north, giving the Hyouden its name. Jaken looked rather like a grotesque Buddha statue, sitting cross-legged on the parapets, from which he kept a close eye on his charge.

His ennui evaporated when an astounding BOOM rang in his ears and knocked him back onto the terrace. He scrambled to his feet and saw that Rin was still standing below, but she was holding her hair away from her face and gaping at a tall, grayish-brown column that towered above the blue Hakasun Mountains. It must have been at least seventy miles away.

They did not have much time to wonder at it, for no more than a minute later the sky changed from a calm blue to a terrible and inky gray. Great clouds like black hands gripped the sky and ripped it apart; a torrential downpour belched forth. The change in the atmosphere was shocking, and Rin let out a startled yelp and ran back to the house. Before she had reached it Jaken realized that the rain was poisoned.

He ran to the threshold, grabbed her arm as soon as she came through the door, and began dragging her through the house.

“Jaken-sama!” she cried. “What's the matter with you?”

He pulled her down some steps and through another door. He had brought her to the baths; sunken pools fed by springs from the mountains. Without a word, Jaken brought Rin to the edge of one and pushed her in.

Rin came up sputtering and laughing.

“Is this a new game?”

Jaken paid no attention to her, but watched as the water around her began to gray.

“Give me your clothes!” he ordered.

Rin pulled off her yukata, drenched and quite heavy, and threw it to him without question. He let it land with a wet plop on the stone floor before he bent over it, sniffed at it, and then picked it up. Carrying it as though it were a live snake, he took it back upstairs and threw it out the nearest window.

“Jaken-sama!” he heard Rin calling. “I'm cold!”

“Why should I care, stupid girl!” he yelled back at her.

Despite his tone, he went to her room to fetch another robe. He was returning to the stairs when he sensed his lord's approach and turned to see Sesshoumaru coming down the hall, accompanied by that nomadic, no account “cousin” of his.

“Jaken, where is Rin?” Sesshoumaru spoke first.

“Greetings my lord! Welcome home.”

He waited a few moments for some perfunctory acknowledgement of traditional salutations, but as nothing came but silence, he answered.

“Rin is down in the baths.”

Sesshoumaru, followed by his cousin, walked past Jaken without another word. Jaken jumped up.

“Oh!” he exclaimed, remembering how he had left Rin. “Wait for me, my lord!”

He tried to get in front of the two dog demons, but he was unsuccessful. As they entered the room, Rin let out a cry of joy and came to the edge of the pool, leaning out as far as she could and waving.

“Sesshoumaru-sama!” she exclaimed. “I'm so glad you're back! Look what Jaken-sama has done to me.”

Sesshoumaru shot a sidelong glance at Jaken. Jaken flinched.

“She was outside!” he managed to blurt out.

“I see,” was his lord's only reply. “Rin, cover yourself.”

Rin looked around. “But…”

Jaken threw the garment at her and it landed on her head. She stepped out of the pool and wrapped herself in a green yukata.

“Tada!” she spread her arms to show how she had obeyed.

Tamotsu chuckled softly.

“You've grown, Rin no Reijin.”

Without warning, Jaken came from behind Tamotsu and pushed him in the water. Tamotsu did not sputter, but when he rose from the water his face was wrathful.

“You nasty little vermin, what is your problem?”

“You looked like you need to cool off,” Jaken answered, unruffled.

“The water is hot, you imbecile!”

Rin laughed. “Don't be mad, Tamotsu-sama,” she said. “It's just Jaken's new game.”

“Jaken-sama,” she turned to her caretaker. “Aren't you going to push in Sesshoumaru-sama?”

Sesshoumaru turned his gaze to his vassal, and Jaken blanched.

Attempting to change the subject, Jaken asked, “My lord, did you see the explosion? Do you know what has happened?”

“Oh yes, that's right!” Rin exclaimed. “The earth shook, and this cloud rose high above the mountains. It was…awful…”

Her voice trailed away, and her face became pensive.

“Rin-chan?” Tamotsu looked at her.

“I don't know,” she said, her eyes distant. “But when I think of it, I feel bad…kind of scared and well, like I'll never be content again.”

Everyone in the room was rather taken aback, and stared at her. Sesshoumaru walked to her side.

“Do not fear, Rin,” he told her.

Rin smiled at him, though he thought she looked rather gray and lifeless. “Of course, my lord!”

He suggested that she seek her bed soon, and told Jaken that he and Tamotsu were going to the source of the disturbance.

“Keep a close watch over Rin,” Tamotsu said to him. “She may have been affected by the toxin, whatever it was.”

“Oh I know what it was,” Jaken declared as they were leaving. “I'd recognize that foul stench anywhere.”

After his lord had gone, Jaken returned to the front room to repair the disorder left by his quarrel with Kagura. He ran his hands over the scorch marks he had left on the wall, and believed that the demoness was dead. The notion was so sudden and so certain that he took it for a premonition. Finally, he too sought his bed. As he tried to calm his mind, Jaken realized he understood what Rin meant. When he closed his eyes he saw the great plum of destruction again, and he felt an unexplained sense of fear and dread. In the night he dreamed he saw a great chasm before his feet, so black that it devoured light. Behind him he heard the light patter of Rin's bare feet, but he could not turn. He heard himself saying, “I'm not blind. I can see it coming.”

***

Sesshoumaru and Tamotsu arrived at the center of the destruction before sundown. The devastation was unbelievable. Even Sesshoumaru, whose own life had been a tornado, carving ruin into the earth, had never seen anything like it. This place had been a flat plateau settled among the mountains, but now it was battered and dented like an old shield. There was not a tree standing for almost a mile in any direction.

“It looks like an enormous foot just came down out of the sky and squashed the place like a bug,” Tamotsu commented.

Sesshoumaru had to admit the analogy was accurate. He had hoped to be able to discern what had happened, and, more to the point, to track down the demon he knew had to be at the center of it.

He certainly could smell Naraku; the scent was everywhere, which was just the problem. It had become the air, the clouds, the rain, and the dirt. It was impossible to pin it down. Amongst the gray gloom, a glint of gold nearby caught his eye and he went to it.

It was a monk's staff, lodged in a tree. He would not touch it.

Tamotsu wandered about, sniffing.

“I smell something else here,” he said. “But I can't tell what it is.”

“It's Inuyasha,” Sesshoumaru told him. “I think he died here.”

Tamotsu looked at him. “Should I congratulate you?”

“Don't be absurd,” Sesshoumaru snapped. “That such a person would kill him. How despicable. Even in death, that half-demon is so utterly worthless.”

Sesshoumaru noticed that his cousin was carrying something.

“What is that?” he asked, indicating with a glance what appeared to be a boomerang as tall as a man.

“I'm not really sure,” his cousin answered. “I think it's a weapon. It's made of demon bones.”

“Yes,” Sesshoumaru mused. “I remember one of them carried that. I suppose that means they were all here, and are all dead.”

Tamotsu nodded.

“It seems upset,” he said, meaning the weapon.

Sesshoumaru raised an eyebrow, but did not comment.

They stood in the quiet ruin, drenched by the foul rain but indifferent to it.

“Do you feel that?” Tamotsu asked finally.

“What?”

“Like Rin said,” he answered. “It feels like something really bad happened here, like…the sun will never shine again.”

Sesshoumaru snorted.

“I did not think you the type to entertain sentimental melancholy. Perhaps next time I should pass your hovel without stopping.”

“I certainly wouldn't complain,” Tamotsu muttered under his breath.

Sesshoumaru looked at him.

“You only want me to come along when it's on or near the Hyouden,” he complained. “I never get to go anywhere interesting.”

“Are you suggesting you never travel without me?” Sesshoumaru demanded, incredulous.

“No, but of course it would be more interesting with you, dear cousin,” he smirked.

Sesshoumaru looked bored, and turned away.

“Who would want to be seen anywhere with you?” he said over his shoulder.

“Where are you going?” Tamotsu called after him.

“Home,” Sesshoumaru answered. “I cannot track Naraku. It is enough to know that Inuyasha and his companions here met their end.”

The matter appeared to be closed. Tamotsu strapped the extraordinary weapon across his back and followed his cousin through the air, heading south again.

“What is that?” he exclaimed only a few minutes later. He veered away and landed on the ground again.

They had come to a river, a small one, which used to snaked around the plateau. Now its banks were already swollen with the deluge, and parts of it had turned into waterfalls where the rain was pouring over fallen rocks and ruined trees.

Tamotsu made his way toward something that lay on the banks, half submerged in mud.

Sesshoumaru was annoyed, but his curiosity got the better of him. He went to the riverbank.

Tamotsu carefully turned over the object of interest, and then let out a startled oath.

“Look at this!” he exclaimed.

Sesshoumaru bent over the form. It was a human, a woman. Beyond that, he could tell little else about her. Her body was covered with blood, so much so that one could not discern the location of her wounds. He was forced to lean very close to her.

Thus he learned two things. The first was that this woman was the companion he had often seen with his half-brother, the one who could use sacred arrows. The second was that she was still alive. Tamotsu gaped at him.

“How can that be? How can she possibly live?”

“I do not know,” Sesshoumaru answered. He stood up and turned away.

“You're surely not going to just walk off and leave her here!”

Sesshoumaru looked genuinely surprised.

“Why would I not?” he asked. “This woman is no concern of mine.”

Tamotsu stood up to face him, glaring.

“I really had no idea you were so stupid.”

Sesshoumaru answered only with an icy stare.

“Your enemy still lives. I think we can be sure of that. He clearly wants this woman dead. Therefore, you don't want that. It's really quite simple.”

“I will defeat Naraku,” Sesshoumaru shrugged. “This woman has nothing to do with it.”

“Just out of curiosity, Sesshoumaru,” Tamotsu retorted. “How long have you been saying that now?”

“Saying what?”

“I will defeat Naraku,” Tamotsu replied, imitating Sesshoumaru's cold and level voice.

Now it was Sesshoumaru's turn to glare.

“Well,” Tamotsu went on. “I was just curious. Because it seems to me that you've been saying that for about five or six years.”

“So?” Sesshoumaru still sounded indifferent. “What is that to me?”

“Don't you ever get tired of saying and doing the same things, all the time?”

“That is ridiculous. I will defeat Naraku.”

“Sweet bounding buddhas, are you really still saying that?”

Sesshoumaru did not answer.

“Fine,” his cousin said at last. “I'll take her myself.”

He moved to pick up the miko.

“In the first place,” Sesshoumaru interjected. “If you attempt to move her, you will most likely kill her. In the second, what do you intend to do? Nurse her in that ratty shack of yours?”

“If need be.”

“You will do no such thing.” Now Sesshoumaru's voice was threatening. “If you have her, Rin will hear of it.”

“So?”

“She will insist that you bring her to the Hyouden.”

“Well, at least there's one person of intelligence in that house. Thank you, Sesshoumaru, you comfort me.”

“I'm warning you, Tamotsu.”

“Oh, give me a break,” his cousin said. “Since when does Rin-chan rule the Hyouden?”

He went to the miko and began lifting her head.

“Stop right there,” Sesshoumaru ordered. “I will not listen to your crying for the next century about how you killed a defenseless priestess.”

“She's a priestess?” Tamotsu was surprised. “How do you know? And I would not cry!”

“I know,” Sesshoumaru walked to the woman and bent to pick her up, “because she has shot sacred arrows at me.”

“Oh,” Tamotsu considered that. “So, I guess…it's complicated?”

“Not really.”

“Why are you allowed to pick her up?”

Sesshoumaru shifted the miko in his arms, taking pains to avoid getting blood and filth on his clothes. He had limited success.

“Because I know how to handle wounded.”

“Where did you learn that?”

“My father tried to teach us both,” Sesshoumaru answered pointedly. “I paid attention. You chased women.”

Tamotsu leaned back and looked up at the rain, rubbing his belly.

“Oh yeah,” he remembered, leering. It was clear he believed he had come out the better.

“Those were the days, eh, Sesshoumaru?”

Sesshoumaru ignored him.

“It's a good thing that you sent Rin to her bed,” Tamotsu commented as they flew away from the wreckage of the plateau.

Sesshoumaru glanced down at the mangled mess he was carrying, and had to agree.

When they arrived at the Hyouden, it was late, and a dismal night had taken over the land. Sesshoumaru laid the woman on a bed in an unused room on the upper floor. It took most of the night to disrobe and clean her, and to dress her wounds. Not knowing anything specific about humans, Sesshoumaru tried to give her a medicine that would ease the pain of a demon, but it evaporated as soon as it touched her lips.

“What the…” Tamotsu wondered, bent over her.

“She is purifying it,” Sesshoumaru said.

“Without even knowing it?”

“So it would seem. How bothersome.”

He rose and left the room.

Tamotsu stayed next to the woman, speculating if Sesshoumaru would get bored and not return. He leaned closer to her, trying to ascertain what she looked like. Now that the blood had been cleansed away, her wounds did not appear as bad as before. Her face was still bruised and swollen, and her breathing was labored and shallow. She looked as though she might have been passably pretty, for a human. With great care, he lifted an eyelid. The eye was rolled back and she did not respond.

He doubted then that she would live through the night. The worst, by far, was her right arm. It was so blackened that it appeared charred. He wondered if she would be able to keep it.

After some time, Sesshoumaru reentered the room, carrying a stone bowl and a black, wooden box. He kneeled beside the woman, and mixed several things in the bowl. Tamotsu tried to pay attention.

“This is a more natural tincture,” Sesshoumaru told him.

He gave this mixture to her and it did not evaporate. After a minute or two, her breathing came easier.

“That is all that can be done,” he told his cousin. “The rest is up to her.”

“What about this?” Tamotsu asked, indicating the black lines that ran throughout her body, seeming to flow under her skin and to pool in the mortifying arm.

“That is miasma—Naraku's filth. A miko could remove it, but I cannot.”

Sesshoumaru stood watching the priestess for a few moments, then shrugged and rose to leave.

“Rin-chan?” Tamotsu glanced toward the door.

Sesshoumaru turned to see that Rin was standing in the doorway, clutching her robe closed and carrying an oil light. Her feet were bare and her hair, loose and unkempt, fell to her shoulders.

“Why are you here?”

Rin did not answer. She walked past them without looking at them, and went straight to the woman's side. Then she turned and faced Sesshoumaru.

“This is your doing!” she cried, leveling a finger at her lord.

Tamotsu gaped at her.

“You had the power to stop this! If no one else did! Do you see now what your pride has done?”

Jaken had followed Rin into the room and he was standing in the doorway, rubbing his eyes. When he heard what she said, he began hopping up and down.

“Rin!” he screamed. “What are you thinking? Insolent girl!”

“Jaken, be still,” Sesshoumaru's voice seemed unconcerned. “That is not Rin.”

Jaken stopped short, and stared at the girl. He noticed her eyes were as wide as the full moon, but they seemed unaware and empty. He watched in horror as whiteness flowed over her. Already, the tips of her jet-black hair had lost all color. She was filled with a cold light, like the winter moon, and she brought an icy breath into the room.

Tamotsu was transfixed. He could not help staring at the bracelet around her wrist. A scarlet star-stone was set in the middle of a silver clasp, and it was throbbing. He felt the need to tear his eyes away from it and behold the possessed girl, but he could not do it. He needed to see if the stone would actually grow.

“You think I should feel guilt for this girl?” Sesshoumaru addressed Rin, or whatever was inside her.

She did not answer.

“Who is she?” Sesshoumaru went on. “Who is she, that I should suffer a prick of conscience?”

Rin laughed. The sound was hollow and far way, and not like the adolescent girl at all. Jaken shuddered.

“You will learn, my son.” Rin answered.

She had grown taller and her hair was almost completely white. Markings appeared on her face.

Tamotsu tore his eyes from the bracelet to look up at her, and immediately he dropped to his knees and put his face to the floor.

“Oh, dear spirits in heaven!” he cried. “Chiyoko-sama!”

Rin's possessed mouth continued.

“Your perceived control over your destiny is a lie, Sesshoumaru, one you will unlearn in bitterness. You cannot now imagine the suffering you have brought upon yourself.”

The spirit's expression softened on Rin's features. She reached out a hand to him.

“I would spare you of it,” she said, her tone more gentle. “If I could. Just because you do not believe it, does not mean that I do not mean it.”

Sesshoumaru said nothing.

“Worry not my daughters,

Worry not my sons.

We will all go bare and swim in the air,

When all is said and done.”

“Sesshoumaru-sama…” Jaken murmured nervously.

The room became warm again, once more filled with the light of the fire. The moonlight drained away from Rin, and she drooped like a flower, sagging to her knees.

“Sesshoumaru-sama?” Rin's breathing was rapid and heavy. “Sesshoumaru-sama!”

Sesshoumaru went to her and took her hand. He removed the bracelet and threw it into the fire.

Confused and frightened, Rin looked around the room. For the first time, she noticed the woman lying in the far corner and she let out a low cry, running to her side. She knelt beside her and began weeping.

“Kagome-chan!” she cried. “Oh, Kagome-chan!”

Tamotsu's eyes went from Rin to Sesshoumaru and back again. A dozen questions leaped to his lips, but nothing came out. It was Jaken who broke the silence.

“Sesshoumaru-sama, those were Shinme-sama's words!”

Sesshoumaru remembered the letter, tied to his door with horsehair only a few days before.

“Shinme? The Horse-Queen?” Tamotsu asked. “What does she have to do with this?”

“That is indeed a valid question,” Sesshoumaru mused, half to himself. He turned to leave.

“Jaken, you will go to the horse demons and bring their queen here.”

“Ah! Yes, my lord!” Jaken bowed, though Sesshoumaru had already left the room. He turned to Tamotsu, who was still staring wide-eyed at Rin, who was still weeping.

“Who is Chiyoko?” he asked.

Tamotsu was barely able to understand him. He answered in a dazed and distant voice.

“She is my aunt. Sesshoumaru's mother.”

Jaken did not have much time to waste being astounded, and he rather doubted Tamotsu's account of things. At any rate, Shinme was clearly involved somehow and he believed that, in her wisdom, she would be able to shine a light on the matter. He respected her most among living things that were not Sesshoumaru. He took up his staff and left without carrying anything else.

Meanwhile, Rin still wept.

Tamotsu finally shook off his bewilderment and went to her.

“Rin, look here.”

She raised her swollen eyes. He showed her the ingredients Sesshoumaru had brought into the room and how to mix them.

“I would give that to her at least once a day, as much as you can get her to swallow.”

“Are you leaving, then?” she took the bowl from him in slow, stunted movements.

“Yes. Your lord said a priestess might be able to help her. I'm going to find one and bring her back here.”

Rin managed to smile. “Thank you, Tamotsu-sama.”

“Goodbye, Rin-chan,” he went to the window, and was gone. Rin did not see him again for almost three months.

She sat beside Kagome for the rest of the night. Dawn crept upon the house almost unnoticed, as the light grew with imperceptible slowness amongst the gray ruin of the cloudy sky. She managed to give Kagome medicine two more times that day, while she herself did not leave the room to drink or to eat. Jaken was not there. Sesshoumaru was occupied. Rin waited.

***

Jaken's journey took him twice as long as he had expected. The weather was abominable. He spent two days looking for the roaming Karauma, and in that time the rain did not cease once. At first, the toxin slowed him. He tried not to show it (even though no one was around), but it sickened him and made him feel weary and hopeless.

“…like I'll never be content again…”

Jaken shook his head. Silly girl.

By the second day, the rain became more pure. Traveling was now not so burdensome; it was just unpleasant.

He did not find the horse demons where he had last seen them, at the foothills of the Shikoku. He searched high and low for the Karauma, or for a demon or human who could tell of their comings and goings. The land, however, was in disarray. The earthquake seemed to have maddened beasts, some of which charged recklessly at anything that moved. The human settlements on or near the Hyouden had already been thinned, and now the people ran and hid themselves at the mere hint of the non-human.

Jaken arrived at one village that had been abandoned altogether, though he spotted someone moving among the wreckage, turning over barrels and shaking out jars.

“Hey!” he called. “You there!”

The person turned in surprise. It was a young man, but when Jaken came closer he saw that it was an adolescent hawk demon. The Youshun took one look at Jaken and bolted.

“No, wait! I need to ask you something! Wait!”

The youth jumped and transformed into a hawk in midair. He flew away with as much as speed as possible.

“Damn it!” Jaken shouted.

He beat the staff against the nearest tree, shrieking curses.

Finally, exhausted by his tantrum, he sat with a plop on the wet ground. He was considering what he would say to Sesshoumaru, should he return empty-handed, when he noticed a mark in the ground, directly in front of his feet. It was the impression of a horse's hoof.

Doesn't mean anything, he thought. There were plenty of horses in the area, not connected to the Karauma. He noticed that the tracks continued, leading into the forest.

Having no other lead, Jaken followed the tracks through the trees—tangled, dark things that grew close to the sea. The tracks wound on and on through the woods, until at last the trees thinned and gave way. Jaken had arrived at the shore.

He saw upon it many horses, running wild among the breaking waves. Some were mere horses, but others were horse demons. Some of the demons were in horse form and ran alongside their charges; others walked about clad in leather, with long black hair and deep-set eyes.

As his feet touched the black sand, a tall demoness approached him. Her hair was pulled back severely and tied with a leather thong at the nape of her neck.

“Jaken-sama,” she addressed him. “I have been waiting for you.”

“In that case, my lady Shinme,” he answered. “I'm sorry it took me so long to find you.”

“We had to cleanse away that rain,” she said, nodding her head toward the misty sea. “It sickened the horses.”

“Speaking of `sickening', there's a human at the Hyouden…er…another one, I mean.”

“Yes,” she said sadly. “I know.”

Jaken waved his arms.

“What? What do you mean, `you know'? How do you—?”

“This is why you've come, is it not? This is why Sesshoumaru has sent you for me?”

Jaken stopped short.

“Ah, right, that's right. Well, let's go then.”

As they walked, Jaken related to her the events of the previous day, including the possession of Rin.

“It wasn't you, was it?” he asked her.

“Of course not,” she said firmly. “I would never take such liberties.”

Jaken inquired about the affairs of the Karauma. Shinme told him that in some ways they remained the same, but in others there had been changes, and little for the better. Conflict surrounded and hounded them, and humans in the area ran at the mere rumor of their coming, though they had never meant any harm to humans, or to any living thing.

“Did you know about the spider demons?” she asked him.

Jaken thought back to their survey of the lands, but had to admit he knew little about it.

“It is said that they left their caves, though they had never done so before, and everyone knows how much they hated the outside world. They raided and terrorized the human villages along the ways, and took many humans with them as captives.”

“Where did they go?”

“No one knows for sure,” the queen answered. “Northwards, I think.”

“Sesshoumaru-sama should never have allowed them to stay on our lands in the first place!”

“Our lands?” Shinme sounded amused.

“You know what I mean,” Jaken flushed.

She also told him that the Youshun had turned savage once the spider demons had departed. The Karauma were forced to fight an almost constant battle to simply maintain their herds and lands.

“Is there a connection, between that and the spider demons?” Jaken asked her.

“I believe so.”

As they made their way along the trail it came to a steep slope, and one of Jaken's feet slipped on the slick mud. Shinme caught him before he landed on his back and helped him set himself right again.

“Damn this rain!” he fumed.

“Worse things are coming,” she said, her tone enigmatic.

“Now that's the sort of thing that's starting to give me the creeps. What do you mean?”

“We must make haste,” was all she would say.

They reached the house within an hour or two, just as the sun was setting on the second day of Jaken's errand. He took her into a large room on the bottom floor and offered her hot tea, which she humbly accepted. He left her there and went looking for Sesshoumaru.

He found the lord of the West in a pensive state, standing in the rain on a balcony on the second floor.

“Ah, Sesshoumaru-sama, Shinme-sama is here.”

Sesshoumaru cast him a sidelong glance, but did not move.

“Jaken,” he said at last. “Am I to blame?”

“My lord?” Jaken turned. “For what could you bear blame?”

Sesshoumaru did not answer; he turned and reentered the house.

When Shinme saw Sesshoumaru come into the room, she set down her saucer of tea and bowed low, her long ponytail falling beside her face.

“Sesshoumaru-sama, it is an honor.”

Sesshoumaru sat across from her and wasted no time.

“You will tell me what you know about that woman upstairs, about the explosion that occurred yesterday, and about my mother.”

Jaken thought that Shinme appeared to be a trifle nervous, something he had never seen before. She took a deep breath.

“I tried to warn you,” she said in almost an inaudible whisper.

Sesshoumaru rose to his feet so quickly that Jaken jumped, spilling his tea.

“I will not listen to that again, certainly not from you!” Sesshoumaru declared with uncharacteristic heat.

Now there could be no doubt that Shinme was nervous. She looked down at her hands and licked her lips.

“Yes, my lord,” she said. “I should not have said that.”

“But not because it isn't true, correct?” Sesshoumaru's tone was acid.

Shinme did not answer.

Sesshoumaru sighed.

“Speak.”

“Lord Sesshoumaru may remember that I have had the faculty for prophecy in the past.”

Sesshoumaru's expression did not give an indication either way, so Shinme went on.

“But these visions are not certain, are not always clear, and though I can feel that others are out there—others who see the same things, who can feel the same…”

She floundered for a moment.

“It feels like lightening, about to strike—a terrible storm is coming. I know of others who can feel it. Indeed some are moving against it, some are moving to help it. But I do not know all of their identities.”

Sesshoumaru continued to stare at her and say nothing.

“Therefore,” she continued, “Your mother may be one, and she may have seen the same visions as I. But I have no knowledge of that.”

“What do you know?” Sesshoumaru demanded testily. “Anything at all, for certain?”

“I know I have come here to behold the everlasting light.”

“What light?”

“It's not a `what',” she answered. “It's a `who'. I have come to lay eyes on the Everlasting Light.”

Sesshoumaru stared at her.

“She is laid in the chamber upstairs,” Shinme explained.

“You cannot be serious.”

Shinme did not answer.

“Did I not also receive a prophetic title?” he asked, not concealing his mocking tone.

Shinme's voice became quite again.

“I have seen and heard you called `Son of Death' and the `General'.”

Sesshoumaru expression was icy.

“I can see that this is all nonsense and therefore a waste of my time,” he said. “If you so desire to look upon a dying woman, Jaken will show you the way. Then you have leave to depart.”

Shinme bowed low again.

“Yes, Sesshoumaru-sama.”

Sesshoumaru rose to leave the room, but when he got to the doorway he half-turned.

“Have you nothing else to say?”

Shinme hesitated. Then her expression became one of resignation.

“Do not fight it, Sesshoumaru. When the time comes, when your path is laid before your feet, do not fight it. You would only add to your misery.”

Sesshoumaru scoffed and left the room without another word.

After he had gone, Jaken turned to their guest.

“You forget yourself, Shinme-sama,” he said. “And you do not know to whom you are speaking. It is not in Sesshoumaru-sama's nature to surrender.”

“Yes,” she said sadly. “I know.”

She rose to her feet.

“I apologize, Jaken-sama,” she said. “Please, would you bring me to her?”

Shinme entered the room where Rin still kept a constant vigil over the injured woman. When Jaken saw her, he scowled.

“Rin!” he shouted. “Why are you still here? Have you slept? Have you eaten?”

Rin shook her head, her expression numb and dazed.

“So you are Rin no Reijin,” Shinme said, looking at her. “I have heard reports of you, but they do not do you justice.”

Rin and Jaken stared at her, uncomprehending.

“Your beauty is renowned throughout these lands,” she explained. “`Rin no Reijin' and `Yukionna no Hyouden', they say.”

Rin did not know what to say, and Jaken sputtered.

“What?” he cried. “This girl?”

Shinme only laid a hand on his shoulder and looked at him with tender pity, then she went to Kagome's side.

“Can you help her, my mistress?” Rin pleaded.

Shinme laid a gentle hand on Rin's head.

“No, my dearest. In fact, I must admit I have come more for my own benefit.”

Saying that, she laid her hand on Kagome's forehead. She stayed that way for a few minutes, staring at the girl. Jaken thought she appeared to be listening for far off sounds. Finally, she rose again.

“A terrible time of strife and woe is before you,” she said to them both. “And I cannot spare you. My people will endure their own sorrows, and I will be hard pressed. Still, send for me if you have great need.”

Jaken and Rin could think of nothing to say. The events of the past two days had left them in a trance, like people who walk in their sleep. Shinme left them there.

The full significance of Shinme's warning would become apparent all too soon. The rains fell without mercy and Sesshoumaru, Jaken, and Rin became besieged in a kingdom of death. Over the next few weeks the faint hint of decay was carried in on the cold, misty air that blew through the house no matter how tight they barred the doors and windows. By the end of the first month, Rin could look from her window and watch dead cattle and horses float into the basin. Jaken feared that Rin would catch a pestilence, and he dosed her liberally with herbs and tonics.

Kagome's breathing became easy, and her wounds closed. But the miasma remained and she did not wake up, and Tamotsu had not returned.

Sesshoumaru did not appear concerned. It was unusual for him to be at the Hyouden for so long, but he did not even notice. He told himself that the rain would make traveling a bother, and he might as well wait until it cleared.

But it didn't clear. After the second month, when the stench of death was beginning to seriously irritate him, a deep rumbling heralded a new catastrophe. At least once a day the house would shudder, as some bit of earth in the surrounding hills surrendered at last to the torrent and crumbled into the valley below. Jaken reported that the cellar area was about halfway submerged, that most of the food was not fit to eat, and that the structure itself was in danger of sliding off the mountainside.

One day Jaken awoke to find water encroaching upon the main floor. A thin sheet ebbed from the rear door and down the main hall and lapped at the threshold of the kitchen. Sesshoumaru found him in a panic, piling sacks of sand in front of the doors.

“This is terrible!” the toad demon cried. “For centuries this house has stood here, and it will fall to fucking water!”

Sesshoumaru observed the activity of his vassal in a detached manner, until the wind of the words somehow reached him across a continent of pride. The house was not really all that important to him, but was he prepared to surrender it to the weather?

“Where did you get these barriers?” he asked.

“Out in one of the outbuildings, the larger one. It's not flooded, yet. I think they were for a fortress of defense at some point.”

Jaken huffed and puffed while he tried to lift sacks over his head and talk at the same time. When he did not receive any response, he looked over his shoulder and saw that Sesshoumaru was gone. He shrugged. It did not surprise him that Sesshoumaru was bored with the situation, however dire it might seem to him.

Less than five minutes later, however, he was surprised when a sack sailed over his head and landed with a loud clap in the watery hallway. He looked up and, to his amazement, he saw his lord—stripped to the waist and hauling and tossing sacks along the doors. Jaken stared at him in open surprise for a moment, not just that he was performing a labor so banal, but that he did it remarkably well with one arm.

The two demons struggled against the encroaching water, while it insisted on rising anyway.

“Rin and that miko will need to eat,” Jaken announced unexpectedly, amidst their labors.

Sesshoumaru stopped and stared at him.

“I will go down and salvage what food is left, before the cellar is lost completely.”

Sesshoumaru followed him without comment.

They made it about a third of the way down the stairs before their feet landed in water. Sesshoumaru lifted his hand and whipped a line of green light around the room. Everywhere it reflected on water below, dancing in a rippling mirror.

Jaken stripped off his clothing and jumped in. He was obliged to swim to the shelves. Once there, the problem of swimming and carrying food presented itself. He hung on the shelf, treading water, and cringing at small things that floated or swam past him, when something heavy and hard nudged him in the back. He turned and saw a wide and flat piece of wood floating in the water. He began piling various items (mostly dried meat, and some rice) on top of it.

Sesshoumaru watched as Jaken rescued everything that was worth saving, paddling his webbed feet behind the miniature barge and pushing it to the stairs again. The little demon swam around it and pulled it as close the stairs as possible. He was trying to secure it, when Sesshoumaru reached over him and lifted the wood, barters and all, up out of the water with no effort.

Jaken placed the goods on the highest shelf in the kitchen, knowing that if the water reached that place, it would not matter anyway.

In the meantime, Rin maintained her vigilance over Kagome, and for a long while showed no outward signs of concern except for her patient. But the gray, the death, and the privation began to wear on her, and Sesshoumaru thought he could watch her age. Her customary bemused and indifferent self was also fading away. Her eyes were always red and swollen because, unbeknownst to Sesshoumaru, she wept often.

Out of depressed listlessness, Jaken wandered into the sickroom one day and caught her sobbing.

“What is the matter with you?” he demanded.

Rin jerked her head up, and her eyes widened. She was bent over Kagome.

“I don't know, Jaken-sama,” she whispered. “Sometimes, when I look at her, I feel so dreadful, as if the whole thing is my fault!”

Jaken stared at her, then looked at Kagome. She appeared almost whole, except for her right arm that bore an angry red and white scar, drawn from her shoulder to her wrist like a lightning bolt. Traces of miasma still remained, like black serpents hidden here and there beneath the skin.

“Empty-headed little girl,” Jaken scolded her. “How can this possibly be your fault?”

“I can't explain it, but I know I can't bear it,” tears fell from her cheeks again. “Her scars are marks in my soul, and I can't bear the thought of my soul—scarred and hideous!”

She continued to sob, and Jaken said nothing. He waited, and wished for dry air.

There had been intermittent periods of drizzle, but never for more than an hour or two, and then the deluge would start again. Then one day, after about three months, the rain lessened to a gray mist that lasted all day. Sesshoumaru had the notion that, since he had seen the event that seemed to announce the rains, he may see something that would proclaim their end. He stood all day on a gallery overlooking the northern plains, which were now a vast marsh.

Nothing occurred. When the light of day had long disappeared, Jaken joined him. He complained that Rin would not listen to him and was refusing to seek her bed.

“Kagome has stirred today, and so Rin will not leave her side.”

“Stirred?” Sesshoumaru could not hide his interest.

“Yes, and her eyes have fluttered a bit, like they're trying to open. She's muttering too, but she's still out of it.”

Jaken held out his little hand.

“And look at that,” he said. “The rain is barely coming down at all. Do I dare hope that—

He stopped and looked up at Sesshoumaru, who was looking down at him. A flame ignited in both their eyes.

“You don't think—”

But Sesshoumaru was already ahead of him. He went back into the house and made his way to the sickroom at almost a dead run. He burst in, causing Rin to jump violently. She had been sitting beside Kagome, swaying and nearly falling over from exhaustion.

“Sesshoumaru-sama!”

Sesshoumaru went straight to Kagome's side and took hold of her shoulders.

“Kagome, wake up. I'm ordering you to wake up.”

Rin was alarmed, but she did not dare intervene.

“No more delay. You must wake up and you must do it now.”

He lifted her to a sitting position, and Rin lost her restraint.

“My lord, please!” she exclaimed.

Sesshoumaru ignored her.

“Kagome, I will not tell you again.”

He shook her, and, without warning, her eyes flew open. He watched as gray clouds withdrew from her gaze.

“Kikyou…” she mumbled. “Kikyou, love is all you need…”

Then she saw him.

Kagome let out a startled cry and threw up her arms. A rosy light began in her chest and traveled to her hands. Sesshoumaru stepped back.

“What's happening?” Kagome cried, covering her head with her bandage-wrapped arms. “Where's Inuyasha?!”

Jaken, meanwhile, had gone to the windows. They were barred against the rain. He dismantled the covering and yanked the window open so hard that he tore it out.

“Sesshoumaru-sama!” he cried, panting. “Look, stars! Blessed kami, stars, stars!”

They looked out. The sky was clear, as if there had never been any such thing as clouds. Not only were stars revealed to the earth, but also it seemed as though there were millions more than before, and that they were closer and brighter than ever.

Jaken turned to Kagome, who was staring at them, speechless and wild-eyed.

“If I had known that,” he declared. “I would have set fire to your ass to wake you up, months ago!”

***

[End of Chapter 13]

[Next chapter: Kagome]