InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Tale of Sesshoumaru ❯ Worship Me ( Chapter 10 )

Disclaimer: I do not own copyright to any of the Inuyasha characters. Wish I did. I make no profit off of my fan fiction. Wish I did.

 

Disclaimer #2: I do own the character of Akanesuji and Smart Ass. If you would like to use them, please contact me at skycladstrega@yahoo.com

 

 

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The days were roughly scheduled. In the mornings Akanesuji gave riding lessons to Rin, teaching her to control her pony and care for it. They would come in and warm up, eat a hearty brunch and then study reading and writing. After lunch Rin was sent to take a nap, though most days she contented herself by playing on her bed with wooden dolls and Akanesuji and Sesshoumaru would spar in the courtyard. After Rin's lunch Akanesuji would teach her the bow or some other useful way to hunt for food and on really cold days they would stay inside playing the shamisen.

 

When Rin got bored with her studies, they would paint pictures of dragons and demons with ink or chase rats in the storehouse. Occasionally they would practice tea ceremony. Once dinner was done for Rin, Akanesuji set to write poetry or sewing and embroidery. Rin would sit in someone's lap and pat their cheeks until she fell asleep.

 

On the night of the full moon, Akanesuji put Rin to bed, only to find Sesshoumaru sitting in her room on the Persian rug instead of going to bed in his own room. He had stoked the coals well and added more wood to warm the room and add more light. The days had been passing by quickly for him even though there was still an underlying tension beneath it all. He savored the quiet, quaint atmosphere that had taken over the place. Akanesuji enjoyed it too, often thinking back to the loneliness she felt while in exile amongst distant kin. This place with him and Rin was a far cry from that.

 

Akanesuji sat down next to him and laid her head on his arm. She closed her eyes and sighed. A gentle truce had settled between them and she was glad to see him visiting her room once again. “Akanesuji, I must know. Do you carry our child?”

 

“Hai.” she murmured softly.

 

“When will it be here?” he asked, rubbing her hair between his fingers.

 

“In many winters.” Akanesuji protectively put a hand over her stomach. “Mama told me that I will know when it is ready to leave. Every pregnancy is different. It will go quicker than we realize.”

 

“Hai. Will you leave in the spring?”

 

“Do you want me to leave in the spring?”

 

“I want you to stay.”

 

“I will only stay if you stay.”

 

“I cannot. I must tend to things.”

 

“Then I will leave. There is no point in me being here without you.”

 

“You would be safer here.”

 

“Your point?” she asked, lifting her head to look into his eyes.

 

“I love you and I want you safe.”

 

A big smile covered her face. These were the words she so desperately wanted to hear, but she wanted to make sure she understood him correctly. “Do you tell me that you love me to make me obey?”

 

“I tell you I love you because I do.” Sesshoumaru gently kissed her mouth with sweet, tender kisses. “I have thought hard about what you said. I will try to improve.” He pulled her hair back and started kissing her neck and the space behind her ear. “I know I am a moody bitch. I also know that thoughts of you and this baby are always in my mind.”

 

“Do you plan to declare this child as yours to the courts?” she asked, knowing that if he said no, the child would be without rank or station. If he did, the child would be his first official son or daughter and heir.

 

“Yes,” he said, pulling her kimono open to expose her collarbone. “And you shall be my first wife.” He licked along the line of it, working slowly.

 

Akanesuji felt total relief. The betrothal contract would not be broken. Not only would the child be his, but she would have ranking above any other women he might choose in the future. She would not be his concubine or lover, or just a passing fancy. Her place in the universe was now settled.

 

“Do you tell me this to make me stay past the spring?” she asked in a joking tone.

 

“No my love, but I suspect you will be prisoner here soon enough.” Sesshoumaru curled a finger into the wide obi she wore and pulled her ever tighter to him. “When you are big and round and I can feel it's feet kicking, I don't think you will find traveling the countryside so amusing.”

 

Light heartedly she asked, “Will you?”

 

“Of course not. I plan to be here for a while, at least until it is old enough to take on travels like Rin.”

 

“Oh Sesshoumaru.” she sighed, rolling her eyes. “You would have us living like vagabonds and traveling performers.” They both laughed and when she finished she asked, “Have you told Rin?”

 

Sesshoumaru bowed his head and his face changed solemn. “You know Rin will be much older when the baby is born. She might even have babies of her own. I don't want to tell her now and make her angry when there is no baby next winter.”

 

Akanesuji noticed that he had stopped kissing her and had seemed to forget all about her warm body getting closer and closer to him. “You already miss her don't you?”

 

Sesshoumaru nodded his head. The thought of Rin growing old and dying had hurt him more these last weeks with Akanesuji here. Their little family life had grown on him and he secretly, greedily, he wanted it to last forever. “She really makes my life bearable Akanesuji. I never wanted to be married, or to have children. I never wanted those responsibilities on my head until Rin showed me how good it could be.”

 

“I do understand Sesshoumaru. All of the humans who serve me are like my children. When they grow and get married and have children of their own, I weep for joy. When they die, it breaks my heart. They are not like us. Their lives are like the cherry blossoms in the spring.”

 

“So that is why you do not wish to stay....”

 

“Yes my love. I must make sure the goods they produced over the winter get traded well, help the elders plan the crop rotation and get good rice seed this year. Last year our crops only half sprouted. I even have a few marriages to arrange.”

 

He thought this was very low work for woman born to be a noble lady. “Why are you so involved with them? Can't they take care of themselves?”

 

“I'm sure they could Sesshoumaru, but they have grown to depend on me, and I have grown to depend on them. They have even built me a lovely shrine.”

 

Assuming then that she did it for the power and not for the love of them, he felt her even more low. “You are not a goddess Akanesuji. It is not your responsibility to take care of them like that.”

 

Akanesuji was mildly insulted, but not deeply hurt. “The Gods can be aloof and uncaring, but I am not that way. These are the people who accepted me in when I was exiled. These are the people who adopted me like you adopted Rin. Don't you understand Sesshoumaru? I am their noble master and it is my duty to cherish them.”

 

There was that word cherish again. Sesshoumaru stared at the floor in utter stillness thinking. She had a valid point, that a master should do his duty...was she quietly insulting him because he ignored the goings on of his own lands and people? If any ruler was aloof, it was he. His father had told him once that he needed someone to protect and he had twisted that to mean their holdings. He certainly protected his land from being acquired by another. One could not be a powerful demon lord without land to lord over.

 

He really didn't want to get into this conversation with her right now. The truth be told, he did not want to get into this conversation with anyone, ever. It was easier to dodge than to confront. He looked back to her. “Will you choose them over me?”

 

“Oh Sesshoumaru, I will always pick you.” Akanesuji slipped her arms around his neck and with her body weight forced him to lay back on the bedding. “Can't you get it through your thick ass skull that I adore you?”

 

“You do seem to worship me...”

 

Akanesuji playfully slapped at him, Sesshoumaru catching her flying wrist before the palm could ever touch his face. Roughly he jerked her into a position where he could mash his lips to hers and did so. “You know my love, I don't have to worry now about getting you pregnant. The deed is done and I can have you how ever I wish,” he said in a sultry, deep and guttural growl.

 

Akanesuji smiled so hard that all of her teeth seemed to be showing all at once. Her nails grew, her ears did too. Hair seemed to pop out from everywhere. Clothes could not be wiggled out of fast enough. Sesshoumaru laughed the fullest, richest laugh he had ever heard out of himself.

 

In the far distance, humans could hear demon dogs howling in the moonlight as they played chase in the fields. They bolt their doors tight and kept inside for safety. When morning came, large prints were everywhere in the winter mud. Red and white dog hair was found stuck to fence posts and pine trees and the grass of a horse pasture was laid down flat.