InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Price of Vengeance ❯ Chapter Forty-One: Bitter ( Chapter 42 )

Disclaimer: Sob...I do not own InuYasha, etc. Rumiko Takahashi does.

WARNING: Language and Dead Miko Present

Chapter Forty-One (Bitter)

He had spent two days guarding that infernal blade, fighting off the pettily insignificant demons who had come to investigate it, attracted by the evil aura the damn thing exuded.Only one bear youkai had given him any real trouble; the Tetsusaiga was still too damn heavy for him to wield easily, and he had had to resort to his claws in shredding the stupid bear apart. The youkai had been surprisingly strong, but the Jewel shard that had popped out of its bony forehead had explained a lot.

So his time wasn't totally wasted. He at least had a Jewel shard to show for it.

*Damn it, anyway.*

Scowling at the stupid sword that kept him here, he paced back and forth. But he wasn't being totally honest. Toukijin was just an excuse. He was wasting time, not wanting to return to the village where he would have to see Kagome again and confront his failure to protect her. More than two months had passed since he had left Kaede's village, and the wound of his heart was still too raw.

*Damn.*

Closing amber eyes, he almost missed the faint shift in wind that brought an all-too-familiar scent to his heightened senses.

Nose twitching, his eyes opened in shock as a white ribbon hissed on the slight breeze.

*Kikyo...*

He watched silently as the miko, wrapped in the protective embrace of her escorting Soul Collectors, descended to the earth. Her brown eyes, so sadly distant and yet so coldly direct, locked with his own, and InuYasha felt the familiar clench of his heart and the aching sadness and faint sense of defeated failure that was always with him now when he thought of either of them, Kagome or Kikyo.

He could not, now, seem to seperate them in his mind...

Kagome's fragrance had always seemed to be of early spring flowers, an almost painful reminder of what had once been so promisingly familiar in Kikyo, when he had first met the pure-hearted miko who was so innocently determined to guard the Shikon no Tama entrusted to her care by the demon slayers who guarded Midoriko's cavernous tomb. Unlike Kagome's freshly sweet scent, there had always been the hint of early spring rains in Kikyo's---a hint, perhaps, of the sad loneliness that had drawn him to her. He, himself, had been so sad and lonely then, eschewing the company of both ningen and youkai, who hated, feared and despised him for his halfling heritage. He could understand her separateness, her guarded heart that ached for companionship and normalcy.

The scent of her now was far different from before. Even after she had been recast into the body of clay and ash by the witch Urasue, he had still caught the fragrance of early spring blooms, overshadowed by the suggestion of dusty age. Now, Kikyo's scent was that of dying flowers, weighted down by the watery onset of a cold, early winter.

Nostrils flaring, he had to hold back the flinch that would curl him away from it.

*My Kikyo, what has changed?* His mind cried.

A white serpent curled around him, hissing, and then returned to its mistress as her sandaled feet settled softly on the grass. The other Soul Collectors unwound themselves from around her, their red eyes glowing faintly as they streamed on either side of him and curled back to hover around the dead miko, ribboning in and out and around each other in a slow dance above their heads.

Kikyo's face was so familiar, he could trace each line of it from memory. Even her cold, assessing eyes were so familiar now that he saw them in disturbed dreams. Usually, her features would have been over-lain with the image of a far warmer pair of deep brown eyes, a friendly smile touching the stiff miko's lips as he thought of Kikyo's reincarnation, Kagome.

"InuYasha." Her voice was even cold and dead to him now.

What in all the hells had changed?

He simply stared at her, unable to say her name. Or that of another...

A faint sneer marred the sweet mouth of memory. "What is this? You have no welcome for me, then?"

She was so bitter and hateful.

*Kikyo...* His mind despaired as he remained silent.

Tapered nails drummed on her forearms as the cold miko crossed them, regarding him with aloof disdain. "You have changed."

His mind echoed her words. He couldn't recognize this haughty shadow as his first love anymore. He could not delude himself any longer that what he felt was anything more than regret, a consuming sadness and haunting sense of failure.

*I'm sorry...*

For everything.

The cold brown eyes narrowed, a malicious gleam sparking in the darkened depths. "Have you found your miko, then? Have you seen how useless she is now that she can no longer use her sacred powers?"

*What have you become Kikyo? You were never so bitter and hateful.*

The usually composed miko became agitated at his continued silence. "Have you nothing to say to me, InuYasha? You have never been so quiet in my presence!"

Shifting his weight from one leg to the other, InuYasha slightly bowed his head in acknowledgment of her snapping words. Feeling empty, amber eyes as sad as Kikyo's could be, he repeated her words. "You have changed."

Bitter laughter curled between them and sent an icy dagger down InuYasha's spine. How could he have deluded himself that this vengeful spirit could ever be his pure-hearted miko? He recalled, suddenly, the taunting voice of the witch Urasue, who had stolen a part of Kagome's soul and raised Kikyo's body from the ashes of her grave.

*That damn witch was right. This Kikyo is only a shadow of her former self, driven by hate and vengeance.*

The shadow stepped forward, raising a cold hand that she would have pressed against his cheek, except he recoiled abruptly from any contact between them. He would not have been able to stand it.

The dead miko's hand whipped back, and her dark eyes sent him a look of sparking hatred and loathing. "You would recoil from ME?" Her words were low and sharp. "How DARE you!"

"You are not my Kikyo." InuYasha's voice was strained, as his heart ached in longing for the return of his first love.

"You half-breed bastard!" Kikyo-who-was-not-Kikyo hissed at him. Two Soul Collectors joined her in silent reproof, their narrow mouths snarling a whispered cry as they twined protectively around her. "I despise you! I have always despised you!"

"Kikyo..." He said, heart truly mourning her loss.

Her lips curled in a sneer as a look of loathing filled the cold eyes. "You stupid half-breed! Do you think I could have ever loved such a one as you? I was---am---a miko! A shrine priestess! I have been trained to hate youkai, and I always despised your demon blood! You might---might---have been acceptable to me if you had become a normal man..."

He blinked in shock, the sharp dagger of her words cutting him to the soul.

Her taunting laugh sounded on the faint breeze. The cruel aura that covered Toukijin in malevolency flared and pulsed with the chilling bitterness of her voice. "Stupid hanyou! I sought release, pure and simple, from my confining duties as the guardian of the Shikon no Tama. I did not know, when first I was given that hell-spawned gem, that I would be as a slave to it..."

She paused, dark eyes narrowing on his left sleeve. "You have a shard of the Jewel."

InuYasha stepped back away from her, one hand touching the hilt of his Tetsusaiga in reassurance.

Eyes coldly intent, she said with an arch to her brow. "You have no need of it. You have no intention---now---of becoming a mere human."

She could still read him so easily. He cursed the Fates that would allow her to know him so effortlessly. He had trusted her, opened himself to her...

No. If he was honest with himself, he had never truly trusted her. He had never trusted anyone...until Kagome. And even with Kagome's truly giving heart, her sweet gift had been overshadowed by his faint distrust and the boiling memory of Kikyo...

To whom he had, actually, given his heart...

Bitter with the pain of her rejection, he nearly snarled at her. Kikyo just looked amused at his defensive posture and the hard glint in his golden-amber eyes.

Persuasive, the dead miko said softly, "Give me the Jewel shard, InuYasha. You have no true need of it."

"Why?" He did snarl then, unable to help himself. "So you can give it to Naraku?"

"Perhaps." She smiled enigmatically to herself.

"I still don't understand WHY you gave Naraku all those Jewel shards, Kikyo! Don't you realize just how much power that damn demon has now?"

"You could never understand what I am doing, InuYasha. You were always too ignorant and simple."

"Don't you realize how much terror and death Naraku has caused with the Shikon shards YOU gave him?"

"Hmm. Perhaps I should feel regret for that, but I don't." There was no emotion in the cold, dead eyes.

"I don't understand you Kikyo." He said sadly, claws tightening on the sheathed sword at his side, ears flattening against the silver-white mane.

"Did you ever?"

He refused to answer that taunt out-loud. Instead, deliberately, he turned his back on her, rejecting her in the inu youkai way she might not understand but that meant so much to him.

Even if she did not understand the deeper meaning behind his gesture, she was not unaffected. Cold hands fisting at her sides, she screamed at him. "Don't turn away from me, hanyou!"

Bowing his head, he walked away from her.

She was suddenly there, beside him, her stiff fingers clawing at his red sleeve as she hissed in his ear. "I will never let you forget me, InuYasha!"

Even now, he could not hurt her, but he turned his head away. A hand, cold as death, snaked around his neck and he tensed under it, waiting for her to call the sacred energy that might well end his life.

Instead, the miko's fingers curled around the prayer-beads that encircled his neck. Jerking back in shock, he heard Kikyo give forth a triumphant cry as her twisting fingers pulled on the strand and snapped it free.

*NO!!!*

Snarling, he jumped away from her, landing in a defensive crouch, red sparks of fury flashing over his outraged eyes. Beads fell between them, lost among the deep green grass that covered the hillside. Behind the cruel smile of the miko, Toukijin's malevolent aura glowed brighter, as if taking delight, like Kikyo did, in his shock and horror.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?" He roared, his claws reaching for the naked flesh of his throat, seeking the beads that had encircled there for the past three years, a symbol of his tie to Kagome.

"What need do you have of them, InuYasha? It's not as if you had ever truly loved her. You only loved ME." Kikyo mocked him. "I have freed you from her influence. You should thank me."

Rage intensified inside of him, and he could only snarl at her as the blood crept further into his glowing eyes.

Kikyo merely laughed, that hard, mocking snicker that disgusted him to the core.

That bitter laugh was actually what brought him back into control, dampening the fires of his inu anger. Golden amber returned to his eyes, and he stared at the shadow of his dead love with coldness.

*You are nothing to me.*

The mocking laughter was abruptly cut off, and the dead miko surveyed him through narrowed eyes, as black as obsidian. She was still beautiful, but it was a cruel beauty that could not touch him.

"I should kill you." Kikyo hissed, eyes like black ice.

He stood his ground, crossing his arms, expression impassive.

She sneered at him. "That would be too easy."

He couldn't contain the faint snort of derision at her haughty words.

Eyes tapered to slits, the dark miko trembled slightly with the burning rage of her soul. Three Soul Collectors, their white bodies gleaming like untouched snow in the brilliant yellow sun that crowned the day, swirled around her, hissing slightly. Red eyes glowed, and Kikyo seemed to draw strength from them, calm detachment returning to her cold body. Her dark brown eyes still spat ice at him, but her voice had returned to the smug mockery of her hatred of him.

One delicately white hand came up to softly caress a hovering Soul Collector as her words cut between them like a katana. "You have failed me, InuYasha. Just as you failed my foolish reincarnation. You are worthless to me. I have no more use of you."

A growl came from the hanyou as he tensed under her pointed attack. Claws reached for the hilt of Tetsusaiga, and he bared his fangs at the evil spectre of his former love who knew how to wound him as no other by the sharp sting of her mocking words.

More youkai came to encircle their mistress, her silent call to them gathering them around her like a shielding barrier. Her voice was as cold as death as she sneered her pronouncement. "Now you will know the price of my vengeance, InuYasha."

She rose slightly as the encircling youkai tightened their hold, pulling her up. Her cutting words sent a dagger to the very heart of him, to the very center of his lonely soul who had only ever sought acceptance and only found rejection, to the nagging self-doubt that plagued him and he hid behind a brash armor of mistrust and argument.

"You are damned to wander the world alone. Forever. As you have damned me. No one will ever, could ever, love a weakened half-demon such as you. You are a pathetic excuse for a half-man hanyou bastard. I sentence you then, to what you deserve."

Amber eyes widened in shock and fury even as his inner being shivered under the damning words that could actually affect him the most.

"Know my price, InuYasha! You will never find happiness! You will always be what you are now..."

"ALONE."

*~*~*~*~*

Someone was calling to him.

Wearily, the hanyou tried to dismiss it. But the call persisted.

*Damn it. WHAT?* Irritated, the hanyou's amber eyes lit on the angry miasma that swirled over the evil sword he refused to leave. Toukijin's aura remained unchanged, glaring back at him with fuchsia-streaked bitterness.

He sat huddled on the ground a bit away from Toukijin, his own sword cradled in his arms. Sighing in discontent, he dropped his eyes from the evil blade and bent his head against the wrapped hilt of Tetsusaiga. The cold steel of the cross-bars dug into one cheek, and he actually took some familiar comfort from the contact.

There was a tiny prick against his left arm, rousing him from his dark thoughts. Growling faintly, he ignored it. The pressure returned, and he jerked his arm out, shaking the red sleeve loose, hoping to get rid of whatever it was that was biting him. Jumping to his feet, he glare around him.

There was a soft pfft on the ground, and InuYasha blinked in shock at the Jewel shard that glowed bright white and pale pink in a brilliant flash of radiance. Nestled in the grass, the Shikon shard flared and pulsed with its own light, a purer glow than what surrounded Toukijin in a miasma of hate.

*Just what in all---*

Dropping to his knees, white claws reached tentatively for the pulsating shard. Cupping the slight warmth of it in his palm, he stared at the small jagged piece of the Shikon no Tama in confusion.

*What the hell is going on?*

His ears twitched, seeking any noise or presence that would have sparked the Jewel shard to life. There was nothing in the darkened twilight of early night that would set him on edge. But that gem was acting damn strange right now, and he didn't like it.

"Damn it, anyway!" Impatience nipped at his heels, and he snarled at the Jewel, his claws fisting over the stupid shard that was annoying him and acting plain crazy.

"Huh?"

The fist covering the Jewel shard swung, suddenly, to the left, pointing slight south and east. Of its own volition. He tried to jerk his hand back, a growl welling up out of him, his eyes swirling with the red of agitated impatience.

The Jewel's radiance brightened, so that he could see the glow of white and pink through the clenched claws of his fist. Amber eyes widened as Tetsusaiga, held sheathed in his right hand, pulsed in answer.

"Damn it! What's going on!"

He was needed. Somewhere. Someone was calling him...

He was suddenly filled with the urgency to be there, get there, help...

His clawed feet were running away with him even before his mind could catch up with them. Growling his discontent, he clawed to a stop long enough to tie that stupid fang to his side. The Jewel shard was now pulsating, and Tetsusaiga was bubbling with unleashed power at his side. The sense of urgency was filling him, consuming him. He could delay no longer.

Feet slipped across the dampened grass as the cold of night surrounded him. Ignoring it, the hanyou was up and away, the powerful movement of his legs carrying him up into the air, the pure white light of the Jewel shard his only guide, the evil aura of Toukijin forgotten in the distance as urgent need drove him on into the night.

******************

A/N - Okay, this was SUPPOSED to be a Sessy chapter, but InuYasha kept banging around in my head. Sessy soon, promise. The votes are tallied, and the stays have it. Thank you so much for all of the encouraging reviews sent for the last chapter, and all the many ideas sparked by those same supporters. Fairia, huggles, you don't know what it means to me to have you actually dreaming about my fic! Awn! Some of my best plot twists come out of dreams...heehee...loved the email and your ideas are REALLY inspirational! Thank you everyone for your support of this fic, I'm having a WAFF attack. A few side-notes: Jazngurl, miss your guidance through Japanese names and lore! Vyncent, miss you too! Pallas, sniffle, haven't heard from you in a while, hope you are okay. Thanks, Belle, for more sexy anime, and Kilala81, for some great humor in SesshouMaru's Advice Column and for the Jaken WWE smack down...lol. To all else, thank you thank you thank you!