InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Price of Vengeance ❯ Chapter Twenty-Four: Down ( Chapter 25 )

Disclaimer: I do not own any of Rumiko Takahashi's characters or stories. This story is for private entertainment purposes only.

A/N: I started this story when I had only seen up to episode # 42 in the series (stupid, slow CN! Grrr!). I first based this fanfic on only those episodes, but I have incorporated other bits into this fic since then (i.e., when Sango mentions InuYasha not killing Kohaku when she was ready to). I am picking and choosing among different pieces of the anime plot-line to pull into my story, to maybe give them a different feel. Be warned, this is where my story will twist away from the original...not that it hasn't already... :P

Special Note: (This was posted on S'Spark, but I forgot to put it in aff.net) Tom, I'm glad you're okay. "Fi" was a nickname of mine...a play on my real name, and I appreciate what you Marines are doing for us.

Chapter Twenty-Four (Down)

"You can put me down now, you know."

InuYasha barely spared a glance for the irritated taijiya he held tightly in his arms. Wind snapped the sleeves of his haori, and thudded the large boned boomerang strapped to his back. Daylight had long since crept its way over the now-steepening hills of the Western Lands, and he had kept a quick pace, carrying the slayer as she slept. He was determined to reach the fortress by nightfall---rescue Kagome, chop up SesshouMaru a bit, and head back into the forest before the coming of storms he felt brewing on the wind.

"InuYasha." There was a low warning in Sango's voice, and she squirmed imperceptively. She didn't like being held like a baby---she felt helpless and...well, she just didn't like it.

InuYasha growled back at her, ignoring the woman's protests. If only she would stop squirming like that. It threw his balance off, and he had had to make minor corrections all damn morning long. At least she had slept---and soundly, too---for most of the night and well into the morning.

Sango tensed again, and InuYasha really growled. "Dammit, Sango! You keep throwing off my---"

Slight nails dug into his chest as she pulled the red fabric of his haori. "No...InuYasha, I sense something. Something strong. Some type of demon aura..." He could barely pick up her low whisper on the whistling wind of their passage. The taijiya's brown eyes were fixed straight in front of them.

InuYasha sniffed delicately. "Demon...and blood..."

"There's something..." Sango actually shivered, and InuYasha looked down a moment, his amber eyes surprised at the usually-strong slayer's reaction. Sango raised her eyes to his, the longer bangs of her black hair feathering in the breeze of their passage. "Let me down, InuYasha. We must fight."

InuYasha nodded, sharply, even as his mind growled with impatience over it all. *Damn it, anyway! This journey is already taking too long, and now we have to go and fight some stupid youkai trash, delaying us even further! Damn it, anyway!*

His legs automatically braced as they arched back down to the dense forest below them. The craggy foothills of SesshouMaru's lands were heavily forested on this side of the castle, and the youkai could be anywhere in that thick green jungle. He felt a limb snap under one foot, and he could hear branches scratching across the unforgiving surface of Hiraikotsu.

"Careful with my weapon!" Sango actually growled at him, and InuYasha glared back at her, but the taijiya's attention was drawn further into the trees and not on him. *She's the one that demanded to come along!* InuYasha harrumphed to himself, even as his feet hit the leaf-littered dirt. His hold loosened over the girl, and Sango wasted no time scrambling out of his arms. She was jerked back by her long hair tangled in one of his claws, and InuYasha cursed as he freed her hair. Sango's glare wasn't pleasant.

She held her hand out for Hiraikotsu, and InuYasha shook his head, grumbling, as he unstrapped the accursed boomerang off his back. Sango took the heavier weight with practiced ease, and lifted it over her shoulder. "Come on." She said, turning her body and stalking through the inter-twining underbrush.

InuYasha gave the taijiya's back a sour look, but his claws were already grasping for the hilt of his Tetsusaiga as he followed her into the brush.

He ended up taking the lead, his sensitive nose leading him right to the spot where he smelled blood. Old blood, dried blood. *Why are we wasting time on this stupid demon! The blood I smell is hours old! Damn all youkai to hell!*

"InuYasha." Sango's harsh whisper was right behind him. One of his ears perked back in her direction, although he kept his attention ahead. He could hear something rustling in the trees, something large, and foul. He tensed, claws tightening on Tetsusaiga.

With a protesting groan, the large tree in front of them was ripped out by its roots. InuYasha jumped backwards, free of the flying earth, one clawed-hand hauling Sango with him. Sango ducked behind her Hiraikotsu as dirt and rocks flew down on them. InuYasha covered his face with the red fabric of his fire-rat robe, even as his other hand jerked Tetsusaiga free, the fang flaring into white fire.

*What the hell...? What sort of demon can DO that?*

A hoarse, disharmonic chuckle reached his ears, blocking out the sounds of the giant tree being flung like so much matchwood to the right by a purple, three-clawed hand. InuYasha's amber eyes narrowed as he took in the huge form in front of him.

Easily three hanyou's high, the monster was a dark purple in color, fanged teeth grinning below blood-red eyes. Two horns, almost pearlescent in color, sprouted just above a greyish-white mane. The youkai actually seemed hump-backed, as if the weight of his massive arms and chest caused his lower body to curve under to support them. The thing crouched atop a small pile of human corpses, the remains of its earlier feast cracking under the hugh claws of its feet. A tail whipped back and forth, casually uprooting another, more slender tree with a swipe of its powerful tail.

"Inu-Ya-sha." A thin tongue, although easily the size of his whole head, slid out between sharply pointed rows of teeth. The voice came as if from the belly of the monster, the deep resonances actually making his ears flatten.

"Yeah? What? Who the hell are you?" InuYasha was never one to sit back and wonder when the fight would begin. He stepped forward, his clawed toes seeking purchase in the uprooted dirt, the fanged sword whistling as he brought it to bear, two-handed, in front of him.

"Ahh...you think to chop me in half with your Tetsusaiga." The youkai's grin widened, and the red eyes glowed. "You think that I am too big and should be cut down to size, is that not so?"

*Wh-What?*

"Now, you are wondering what I am." The laugh huffed down from nearly twenty feet above him. The red eyes blinked. "I am Goshinki. Sent by Naraku to kill you, half-breed."

"Naraku!" Rage tore through the hanyou's mind. His nose told him the right of it. The purple youkai was covered in Naraku's stench. With a yell of fury, InuYasha raised his gleaming sword up and raced at the monster, his legs kicking him up toward the demon's chest. As he whipped around, bringing Tetsusaiga to bear, ready to cut a neat swath down the demon's right shoulder and into his chest, a huge, clawed hand batted him aside as if he weighed nothing. InuYasha's yell continued as he flew back through the air, smacking into the trunk of a tree. His eyes widened at the pain of the impact and with the sudden thought, *He knew exactly what I was going to do! He can read my mind!*

"Stupid hanyou." The resonant voice snarled at him. "You think to cut me with your pitiful sword. I can hear your thoughts even as you think them."

There was a whoosh of forced air between them, and Sango's voice began its yell. "Hirai---"

"Taijiya." Red eyes glowed, focusing on the angry woman in pink-touched black armor who stood between them, her boned boomerang beginning its first swing before it left her tensed hand.

Sango jerked, her weapon stopped in mid-motion. She had overheard Goshinki's smug words to InuYasha, and she wasn't foolish enough to let go. Her mind desperately worked, trying to think of something to slip past the hideous monster. One of its claws scraped against the dead bones his foot rested on, and a hollow skull, most of its flesh neatly wiped clean by devouring youkai jaws, clattered down the pile.

"Little taijiya. So alone. You think to trick me with your hidden blades? Or, perhaps, your poison powder?" A huffy laugh made Sango's eyes narrow in controlled anger. "You forget. I am made from Naraku, and your pitiful poison will have no effect on me!"

"Hey, you! Ugly!" InuYasha yelled, brandishing his sword again. He had used the youkai's preoccupation with Sango to pull himself from the tree and rush forward again, to stand beside the slayer. He could feel a few ribs broken from the tree's impact, but it didn't slow him down. Injuries that would have a mere human groaning in pain only made him angrier. "Why don't you pick on a real demon?"

The hollow laugh bellowed down from above. "A real demon! You!" The monster jumped up with incredible speed, his clawed feet spraying bones and rotting flesh in all directions as he launched himself in the air.

"Run, InuYasha!" Sango called out, diving for the underbrush. InuYasha hesitated a moment, before the darkening shadow of the descending youkai made him lunge to the other side. Twigs snapped in his hair as he dove through them, cursing as his body rolled out of the way of impending flattening.

The youkai was incredibly fast, almost as fast as his stupid half-brother, SesshouMaru. InuYasha dodged a swipe of curling claws, and jumped over the whipping tail as he faced behind the crouching monster. He could see the darker marks of a purple spider---the burns matching the ones on Naraku's very back---crawling across the humped arch of the demon's spine. That very mark set him to grinding his teeth, and with a yell of fury, he brandished his Tetsusaiga once more, his feet giving him a running start as he leapt to slice the spawn of Naraku across his wide back.

Goshinki merely stepped out of the way, as if he was casually avoiding the sting of a small flea, and his massive hand once more batted InuYasha out of the air. InuYasha could not help the angry holler of pain that followed his spinning crash into more trees.

"Hiraikotsu!" Sango took the chance to fling her boomerang, and her braced arm forced an extra kick into the spinning weapon. Goshinki merely laughed again, and a clawed foot nearly smashed the taijiya into the brush---except that she did an acrobatic leap back, away from the weighty claws.

The boomerang sang its way back. Goshinki merely avoided the spinning death, and it crashed into the trees, away from Sango. InuYasha growled as he heard the demon's taunt. "So pathetic, taijiya. I would expect better from you. Your thoughts do you no credit. Your concern for the hanyou is rather touching. Do you think I should tell the insipid half-breed just what you really think of him?"

The slayer's katana was out of its sheath and she screamed a resounding battle cry as she crashed out of the brush. InuYasha took the opportunity to jump from his own crash-site, his sword humming. He could sense the vortex of winds that made up the purple youkai's aura, and he nearly laughed in delighted anticipation as he felt his own demonic winds rising up.

*I'll kill you, you stupid spawn, with the Wind Scar!*

Goshinki turned to meet the oncoming hanyou, a taunting chuckle on his fanged lips. "You think to use the Wind Scar, InuYasha. How pathetic you are!"

The demon was momentarily distracted as the taijiya's blade bit into his tail, and his shout of rage and pain trembled the trees around them and echoed off the craggy hills above. Red eyes flashing, his tail jerked up, taking Sango with it. She cried out, wrenching her blade free, and did a graceful flip in mid-air to avoid the whipping return of his snaking tail.

*There!* InuYasha nearly howled in triumph at the brilliant flash of light that formed between the two glowing winds of youkai aura---Goshinki's a sickly green, his own a flaring blue-white with touches of red. *Sango's distracted him enough for me to use the Wind Scar!* He leaped up, his father's fang humming with resonating power.

"Foolish hanyou! Think you I am so easily distracted!" Goshinki roared at him, and InuYasha's amber eyes widened as the demonic winds dissipated between them.

*What? How?* Determination scoured through him. *All right, hellspawn! If I can't use the Wind Scar, I'll just cut you into tiny pieces!*

Both hands clenched on the flaring sword, and he reversed the downward cut into a sweep that would split the youkai's fanged mouth in two, neatly severing his head in half.

His arms were nearly jerked out of their sockets as sharp teeth caught the curved blade of his Tetsusaiga in a steely grip. As the fangs ground into the sword, the sword let off a moaning ring of dissonance.

InuYasha's eyes widened in shock as a fine crack appeared in the fanged blade.

*~*~*~*~*

"Koharu." Miroku shook his head in disbelief. "I still can't believe that you are here, in Lady Kaede's village." His blue eyes stared at the pretty girl---woman---who was still plastered to his side. Koharu would not let go of him, as if she needed to keep in touch with some part of him at all times. She had urged him to walk with her, into the fields beyond the village, where they could talk in private. She had kept to his side, her small arms around his waist, her head tucked on his shoulder. She felt warm and solid, and very womanly.

"Houshi-sama." The black-haired woman giggled. Miroku idly noted that her trilling voice had deepened a little over the past three years.

*Quite nice, really.* A part of him wondered how that giggle would sound if he tickled her in certain spots over her tender, young flesh. Would it turn husky with need? Or would it squeal in outrage?

He allowed his robed-wrapped hand to casually slide down the trim waist to rest lightly on one flaring hip. If he had even tried that with Sango, she would have whacked him over the head with a bucket by now. Or Hiraikotsu.

Koharu merely giggled again, her voice going husky.

*Ahh...* The blue eyes brightened momentarily.

"Miroku..." The girl shook her head at him, her freckles dancing across her nose in the sunlight. She withdrew from his side, even as one hand slid down his muscled arm to hold his hand. She showed no fear when she touched the prayer-beads that kept his Wind Tunnel under seal. Her fingers laced with his, and she tugged significantly. "This is a pleasant place to talk." She flashed him a brown-eyed smile, and the monk allowed her to lead him up the small incline of a hill, the deep grass soft under his sandaled feet. A spreading tree---young but strong---provided a bit of shade for them to duck under.

Koharu sagged to her knees, and Miroku followed her soft tug on his hand. He sat cross-legged beside her, and Koharu let go of his hand, only to lean comfortably against him. Her soft black hair tickled his nose, and he breathed in the spicy, herbal scent of her.

*Must think of something else...must think of something else...*

"Why are you here?" He asked bluntly, seeking anything to keep his mind from the lovely specimen of womanhood who clung to him.

The girl giggled again---truly enchanting. "Houshi-sama, I have been looking for you."

Miroku's breath caught. "You...you have?"

"Of course!" Koharu turned her head, flashing him an enigmatic smile out of the corner of her laughing brown eyes. "You know that I have loved you since I was eleven years old, since the time you first were nice to me. Me! A lonely orphan-child."

"Um...uh...yes..." Miroku felt a bit lost at her blunt words. Koharu had never been anything than bluntly honest about her feelings regarding him.

The head turned back to face the road they had walked down. The fine black hair tickled under his chin. "Remember? You asked me to bear you a child, then."

*Must think of something else...must think of something else...*

A faint blush heated the white cheeks. "And then I saw you, again, at fourteen. When I was running away from the Keeper of the Oil's lecherous son."

Miroku's shoulders tensed, and he tightened his arms around her slight frame of his own accord, trying to offer some comfort. That bastard had tried to rape Koharu, but the helpless little girl had beaten him over the head with a stick of firewood. *Not so helpless, hmm, Koharu?* His amused sense of the ridiculous teased through his mind.

"You saved me, again, from that man's clutches."

*Well, not precisely. As I recall, it had been Sango and InuYasha who actually did the rescuing...*

Koharu turned in his arms, her brown eyes full of tender light. She clasped his hands in hers, her fingers lacing through his. "Miroku...I was ready, then...to bear you a child. And yet..." She looked down, her expression hidden by her carefully-cut bangs.

*The Wind Tunnel.* Miroku's hands tightened on hers, the prayer-beads digging into the small palms.

"I...I was afraid, houshi-sama." Koharu kept her head down, refusing to meet his eyes.

"Koharu..." Miroku began, but she cut him off.

"No, wait. Let me finish." A brief flash of brown eyes, and then her head fell down again as she stared at their entrapped hands. "That demon...that little girl with the white hair and the black eyes..." A slight shiver went through the girl, but her hands tightened on his, not wanting him to comfort her yet. "She took my soul, and made me do things...awful things..."

"Koharu." Miroku forcefully freed one of his hands---the unwrapped one---to touch his fingertips to her delicate chin and raise her head up to meet his warm, forgiving gaze. Tears sparkled in the brown eyes. "Kanna is a powerful youkai. She was created from the Void by Naraku, the same demon who cursed my family with the Wind Tunnel three generations ago..."

"You do not understand." Koharu whispered.

"I do. I understand it was not your fault." Miroku said tenderly.

A watery smile greeted him. "I know that, Miroku. I regret my actions that day...I almost killed you." A shiver went through her, and Miroku tried to hug her comfortingly against him, but she squeezed his wrapped hand, making him pause.

"No, houshi-sama. It is besides that. I hated being so easily controlled...so easily violated...it was almost like the Oil Keeper's son, but different...I was so fearful and afraid, and you left me with some protection, but...but..." She rushed on, blinking a bit and ducking her head. "But it wasn't enough."

Miroku's fingers tightened on hers. "Your village...it was attacked again?"

Koharu shook her head, although her words were different. "Many times. But we fended them off. The youkai are restless in that part of the province."

"Than what was it, Koharu? Were you not happy there, with the headman and his wife?" Miroku asked softly.

"They were wonderful." Koharu smiled softly, her eyes distant. "They treated me as a treasured daughter. I learned so much..." Her eyes closed on sweet memories that Miroku ached to share. His own memories of a drunken priest and a tortured father were not always comforting to a lonely monk.

"They're dead." Koharu faintly frowned. "Nature's time. They were elderly." She looked back at him, her brown eyes focusing and intense. "I had an offer of marriage---"

"You refused?" Miroku's brows went up in surprise, and Koharu shook her head at him, smiling at his chagrin.

"I have only ever loved you, Miroku. No one else will ever do."

"Koharu---" A note of warning came into the monk's voice. He had warned her before, that in loving him there was too much risk for sorrow, more than any woman should have to bear. With his cursed hand, and Naraku still un-avenged, he would never be free to love anyone...to protect anyone...

The girl put a finger to his lips, her eyes warm and full. "Shh...I know what you would say, and hear me first." Her finger stroked softly along the firm line of his mouth, and Miroku almost quivered in reaction to the tender caress.

"I am stronger than I was. I have sought out the teachings of the priestesses, and I have presented myself to the Lady Kaede. She is growing older now, and while I might not have the powers of the miko, I have a deft hand with herbs and healing. My adopted okaa-san, the elder's wife, taught me many things in the short time I lived with them. It is my wish to stay here, and to help in any way that I can. If I cannot protect the village with any sacred power, at least I can heal the hurts and be the hands for the old priestess Kaede."

"You...you are truly giving, Koharu." Miroku said, his voice warm with pride in the young girl---woman---who sat with him. She had matured and grown from the fearful, hungry little girl in the faded green kimono that he had met six years ago, into a strong, giving young woman with pride in her accomplishments and determination to see her way through.

Koharu's other hand pulled out of his, until both of her palms cradled his strong face. Her fingers traced the outline of his firm jaw, tickled across the sculpted line of his lips. Her eyes were deep and trusting, the gift of her love shining in her warm brown eyes as she softly pulled his mouth down to hers.

What was a poor monk to do?

*~*~*~*~*

Sango watched in horror as Goshinki's massive jaws trapped the curved blade of the Tetsusaiga. The sword rang with protest as the teeth ground down. InuYasha was jerking on the hilt even as the first cracks appeared in the blade.

*He's breaking the Tetsusaiga!* Sango couldn't believe her eyes. The mighty sword, forged from the powerful fangs of InuTaisho, was splitting into two pieces under the mighty press of Goshinki's sharp jaws.

"InuYasha!" She called out, her nerves frozen in horror as the powerful teeth snapped through the blade. InuYasha went flying down from the force of release, gripping the smoking, broken Tetsusaiga as it flared once and then died into the bent, rusted sword that hid its powers. The other point of the blade fell on its side, diminishing even as it flew down to the ground far below.

"INUYASHA!"

The scream tore from her throat as a huge, clawed hand ripped across the stunned hanyou as he flew backwards. The hilt of Tetsusaiga fell from wide-splayed fingers as the amber eyes widened in shock and then emptied of awareness. Blood, bright and red, splattered across the upturned forest floor. Sango could only watch in horror as InuYasha's dying body fell down into the torn brush with a solid thud of impact, the broken hilt of Tetsusaiga falling beside his outstretched arm.

"NO!" Sango screamed, clutching her katana. She backpedaled into the trees where she had seen Hiraikotsu fall, and she frantically searched for the tell-tale arc of her weapon. Seeing a curved white edge laying inside tangled limbs, she clutched the end of her boned boomerang, heaving sobs of relief as she dragged her Hiraikotsu out of the torn brush.

"You are foolish, taijiya, if you think you can slay me with that pitiful weapon." Goshinki's voice thundered around her. Sango's hands held tight to the straps of her boomerang and the hilt of her slender katana. She might die in this battle, but she would die with honor!

"Honor." There was a mocking, resonant laugh. "Honor is for the weak."

"You will die, demon!" Sango screamed back at him, her sword tip pointing at the purple monster who towered above her, even as she whirled Hiraikotsu over her shoulder with her powerful right arm.

"Sango."

She froze upon hearing that voice. Her mind cried out in agony as her body tensed, stopping the action of her swinging boomerang.

*No! No, oh no, oh no! Not him...anything but him..please...not him....*

"Little taijiya..." Goshinki's mocking laugh made her spine tingle in dread. "Have you no greeting for our brother?"

Sango's head turned, her brown eyes widening. A shaft of daylight sparkled on the wicked hook of a chained blade even as she breathed his name in searing pain and anguish.

"K-Kohaku!"