InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Thicker Than Water ❯ Uphill Battle ( Chapter 6 )

Chapter Six: Uphill Battle

Kagome stood poised at the door to Lady Usei's room, a sudden upwelling of awkwardness causing her to hesitate momentarily before rapping at the door. An invitation to enter came in quick response to her knock, its reedy tone clear through the shoji. Kagome slid the door aside and stepped forward into a small room, bright with the sunlight falling through a door left half-open to the courtyard. To her left, Lady Usei rose from a low desk, a flurry of paper stirring and sighing in her wake.

"Kagome-san? Is something wrong? Do you need anything?"

Seeing the concerned expression on Lady Usei's face, Kagome felt slightly guilty that she had come only to pump her for information. Inuyasha's cousin had made a good impression on her in their previous brief meeting. Kagome had before found her shy and painfully well-bred, and now could not help but feel touched at the apparently sincere anxiety for her well-being. She wondered if Lady Usei was lonely - there was no one else in the room, and aside from the erstwhile maids of the day before, Kagome had seen no one in Shiroyama who might serve as her companion.

"No, nothing's wrong." She bit her lip lightly before she continued, wanting to find out about the mountain and its inhabitant without seeming cold about it or unnecessarily worrying Lady Usei - after all, what if she didn't know there was something living there?

Besides, she wanted to get to know Inuyasha's cousin better.

"I was just curious about Shiroyama, and I was hoping you could tell me a bit about it, if it's not too much trouble."

A weak excuse to talk, but Lady Usei seemed to welcome it anyway. Her features relaxed, and she sent Kagome a tentative, slightly relieved smile. "Oh, it's no trouble at all. If you like, we can sit by the door and talk, since there's a nice breeze today."

Kagome felt herself smile in return. "That sounds good."

Silence held as they made their way to the other door and sat, uncomfortable not with the tension of hostility, but rather with the awkwardness of not knowing each other.

Lady Usei was the first to speak.

"What did you want to know?"

Kagome, now decided on asking about the mountain in a more circuitous fashion than she had first intended, had to think for a moment before she came up with an innocent-seeming question that might conceivably lead in a profitable direction.

"Shiroyama is beautiful place - how long has your family been here?"

"As long as anyone can remember, though I think it was my great-great-grandfather who built the castle." Here, Lady Usei paused and frowned, suddenly looking wistful. "I'm sorry - if you're interested in history, Lady Hoshiyo could have told you more, but she died last winter."

"Oh… I'm sorry." Kagome gave a mental wince. She had not meant to bring up a painful topic.

Lady Usei smiled weakly. "It's all right. She had been sick for a couple of years, so it wasn't unexpected, just…sudden."

"Oh."

Lady Usei's face was sad and contemplative, her eyes bright and unfocused with the sheen of remembrance. Kagome watched her for a moment before asking gently, "What was she like?"

Her companion gave a thoughtful pause before speaking, picking through her memories in search of the right ones to tell a stranger.

"She was my nurse when I was little. She was very old - I think she might even have been my mother's nurse when she was little." Lady Usei smiled fondly. "She knew a lot about Shiroyama - she used to tell me stories all the time."

Kagome felt a further pinch of sympathy for her. Lady Hoshiyo sounded a bit like her grandfather. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to lose Jii-chan.

"What kind of stories did she tell?"

Lady Usei suddenly giggled, the shift in manner surprising Kagome. The solemnity of the conversation and the careful politeness of her speech patterns made it easy to forget that Lady Usei was about her own age. Now she suddenly looked the fourteen or fifteen years she had to be, all the formality stripped away momentarily at what must be a good memory. Kagome gave her a smile in return, relieved that the conversation seemed to be moving in a happier direction. Perhaps they might become friends.

"Well, there was the one about the tanuki who used to play the same trick on the villagers every year - everyone was used to it by then, so it didn't bother them much, but I can only imagine what a stir it must have caused when they first did it. What would happen was that, a few nights after every rice harvest, someone would go to check on the crop and find that all the rice grains had been turned into pebbles."

"Oh dear. So what did they have to do to get their rice back?"

"Well, the first time it happened everyone was really worried - it was an entire harvest, after all. They were going to ask the priest to do something about it, but then someone left a couple of jugs of sake unattended. When he came back, the sake was gone and the rice was rice again. After that, everyone pretty much knew what they had to do to get their harvest back."

Kagome smiled, imagining a younger, more mischievous version of Miroku's friend Hachi seizing eagerly upon an unattended bottle. "So does this still happen?"

Lady Usei shook her head sadly. "No, it stopped in my great-grandmother's time."

"Oh…"

"There are no youkai in Shiroyama." Inuyasha's words came back to her. Had the thing on the mountain moved in when the tanuki left? Had the tanuki left because it came?

"What other stories did Lady Hoshiyo tell?"

Lady Usei thought for a minute, folding her hands in her lap and absently smoothing the fabric of her kimono. "Well, there were some hazy ones about the mountain, but those aren't the most interesting…"

Kagome felt her heart give a jump and rather frantically motioned her to continue.

"No, please tell me. I'd love to hear them."

"There isn't really much to tell," she said apologetically. "The mountain used to have a kami - there's still a fane halfway up the slope. It was the tradition for the lord and his heir to perform a rite in his honor there once a year, but after my great-grandfather and his son were killed on the way there, that stopped."

"Were killed?" Kagome's heart drummed at her ribs. In the time of her great-grandparents…didn't she say that the tanuki left then?

Lady Usei gave her a curious look, but shrugged. "I never heard much about it. I suppose they must have fallen over the edge at some point - the trail can be dangerous during some parts of the year."

Silence fell over them as Kagome tried to make sense of the story. Had the kami grown angry with humans for some reason? Lady Usei's great-grandfather and his son had been killed on the mountain… But then why would it drive out the youkai? Maybe it wasn't really the kami after all… but a mountain-dwelling kami seemed too much of a coincidence.

A hesitant question from Lady Usei broke the lull in the conversation.

"Um…Kagome-san? Is Inuyasha… doing all right here? I saw the audience with the lords…"

Kagome shook herself out of her reverie with a slight wince at the thought of the audience and the following disastrous confrontation with Inuyasha. Setting aside the unpleasant memories, she pulled up a smile for the other girl's benefit.

"It could have been much worse." That much was certainly true. "Nothing really went wrong - it was just rather uncomfortable." She smiled again, this time more genuinely. "I don't think you have to worry about anything - Inuyasha's common sense may seem to be lacking sometimes, but he's stubborn and usually manages to get things to work out right in the end."

Lady Usei nodded silently, still looking rather dubious. Kagome, on seeing her face, gave a mental sigh. She would have liked to give some further assurance, but there really wasn't much she could say with things in their present state and Inuyasha in his current mood. Any hopes she might have held for ipso facto family bonding between the cousins were rapidly eroding.

A sudden gust of wind ruffled their hair, distracting Kagome from the glum bent of her thoughts. She noticed with amusement a few rebellious wisps of Lady Usei's hair had fallen out of her coiffure and into her face as they had on their previous meeting. With a childish pout and snort, Lady Usei blew upwards to clear them out of her eyes and immediately afterward looked mortified that she had done so. Kagome spared her dignity and did not comment on the action, choosing instead to inspect the slightly rumpled sheet of paper the breeze had blown into her lap.

The gentle tan sheen of the rice paper was broken by the stark blackness of ink, splotched and dashed in clumsy kana. The words' edges wavered erratically as the brush's load was depleted and replenished, the lines occasionally blotting as the writer's hand pressed too heavily or drabbling off into stuttering dashes as the strokes grew unsure. Kagome squinted, trying to make some sense of the messy scrawl. When she did decipher it, she could not help but give a mental wince. 'Spring has come, but the scent of flowers inspires only sneezes.' Even twentieth-century absentee high school student Higurashi Kagome knew bad poetry when she heard it. Darting a glance to her companion, she noticed that Lady Usei's fingernails were rimmed in black and that her right sleeve had a still-damp, suspiciously inky-looking stain along its edge.

"Did you write these?"

Lady Usei glanced at the paper, gave a start and a blush, and turned her gaze down to her lap, one hand going up to tug absently at the recalcitrant strand of hair. "Yes," she mumbled, nearly inaudibly. "They're not very good."

Kagome felt her heart go out to her and gave her the warmest smile she could muster. Perhaps blood did tell after all - the reaction reminded her of Inuyasha's usual awkwardness in similar situations. Granted, Inuyasha's embarrassment often manifested itself in somewhat more uncouth fashion, but something about her attitude just then made Kagome half-expect to hear a "feh" out of Lady Usei's mouth.

"I'm supposed to be practicing them, but I don't think I'm getting any better."

"Oh…" Kagome frowned. She didn't know much about medieval poetry, but wanted to offer some comfort. "Studying is always hard… I have lessons to do, too."

Lady Usei's expression turned hopeful. "You do? Really?" Her hand released the lock of hair and came down to clasp its twin. "We could study together sometime. If you want to, that is."

"Sure. It would be nice to work with someone." Kagome could not help but smile at Lady Usei's barely suppressed animation, thinking that she really must be lonely. The worry of how she would explain her geometry homework to a feudal aristocrat belatedly crossed her mind, but she wouldn't let it dampen her mood - there would be time enough to deal with that later. For now, she had some clues on the mountain, and had gotten to know Inuyasha's cousin a little better - which counted in her book as an unqualified success.

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Sango had never been overly fond of kitchens. The smoke from the hearth in her home had always made her eyes water and her nose run, and for that reason she had avoided indoor cooking whenever possible. In comparison to the chaos of the castle's kitchens, however, her house's smoky, quiet fireside was an earthly paradise.

The roar of the fire competed with the hoarse calls of the rushing people who circled it like ships caught in a whirlpool, and the heavy, fetid mixed stink of sweat and myriad foods good, bad, burnt, raw, and rotting choked the air. Sango squinted against the burning itch of her eyelids, searching for Miroku.

At last she spotted him seated in a relatively out-of-the-way corner, ostensibly watching Shippou. It looked more to her like Miroku was watching the pantrymaids while Shippou, using his distraction and the general chaos to good advantage, tried to nab what morsels he could without attracting attention. His success was considerable, since of the pantrymaids who should have been watching the food, most were occupied in the frantic bustle of cooking, and the others either in avoiding Miroku or making eyes at him. For his part, the monk just smiled blithely from his seat in the corner, his expression not changing when Sango came to stand beside him.

The corner of her mouth twitched. After the seriousness and candor of their talk that morning, it somehow annoyed her that he could so cavalierly return to his ordinary routine.

As if sensing her thoughts, Miroku turned his head to look up at her from his seat.

"Why, Sango. What brings you here?"

"Houshi-sama. Inuyasha came back."

"Ah." Miroku's face took on a curious expression. "Where was he?"

Sango's lips gave another minute twitch, this time in exasperated amusement as she recalled what she had caught of Kagome's conversation with the hanyou.

"Out."

Miroku also had to give a small, tight smile at that. "I take it you talked to him, then."

"No, Kagome-chan did." Sango's expression darkened and she sighed, resisting the urge to rub her temples against an impending headache. "He thinks there's something powerful living on the mountain. He asked Kagome-chan to check, and she confirms it."

Miroku's face was thoughtful. "'Something powerful?' Not a youkai, then?"

"No. Inuyasha says there are no youkai in Shiroyama."

A brief pause, as Miroku absorbed the information.

"I told Kagome-chan we'd ask around the village and see if anyone knew anything about the mountain."

Miroku pursed his lips. "It's a good idea. If it's been up there any length of time, there are probably scores of stories about it. The temple we passed on the way in may know something about it too."

"I thought it might be a kami, but Kagome-chan wasn't sure."

Miroku got to his feet with a sigh and a stretch. "Only one way to find out, I suppose." After a brief scan of the room, he located Shippou, whose fingers were inches away from a bowl someone had carelessly left unattended. The monk deftly caught his hand before it could reach its target. "You shouldn't do that, Shippou; it's not polite to steal from your benefactors," he scolded absently.

Shippou scowled, resentful at being chastised only now and already feeling half-guilty and defensive. "You didn't say anything before! Besides, it's all Inuyasha's food now, anyway."

Miroku wearily massaged his forehead. He didn't need Shippou to go into a temper now. "If I had noticed you doing it before, I would have stopped you. Anyway, Inuyasha's not the one who's going to be eating most of it, so it's not really him you're taking it from."

Shippou sulked wordlessly. He knew Miroku was right, but that didn't mean he was going to admit it.

Miroku was apparently satisfied with his silence. "Do you want to come to the village with us, Shippou?"

Shippou was quiet for a moment as he pretended to think. He didn't want Miroku to think he was off the hook yet. At last, he replied, sure to inject the proper amount of snootiness into his tone. "Fine. There's nothing to do here, anyway."

"Good. Let's go," said Sango, though Shippou's inclusion in the excursion troubled her slightly. Of course they could not leave him unattended in the uncertain, politically-charged climate of the keep, nor could they send him to Kagome or Inuyasha at the moment. But she wondered how the villagers would react to his presence.

----------------

Sango might as well have been prescient. Their inquiry was so far a resounding failure. Though none of the villagers were outright rude, they were succinct, and extremely unwilling to talk about anything that might or might not be living on the mountain. They had all darted quick looks at Shippou before returning further questions with blunt denials of knowledge - which made them wonder if youkai were at the heart of the mystery after all.

Finally, tired and frustrated, they came to a halt.

"Houshi-sama, this isn't working."

"This is a waste of time," groused Shippou. "They won't tell us anything!"

Miroku frowned. They were all dusty and slightly sticky from the day's heat. The unsuccessful questioning had left none of them in the best of moods, and they had barely begun in earnest. They had yet to talk to any of those in the marketplace or temple, where information might be most plentiful.

Sango gave Shippou an apologetic pat on the head and voiced her suspicions.

"Actually, I think they might be nervous about talking to us because of you, Shippou-chan."

Shippou squirmed excitedly for a moment and puffed out his chest. "You mean they've heard of me?" Then the downside of his apparent notoriety struck him. "And they're not telling us anything because of that? That's not fair!"

Miroku glanced at the sun and sighed. They had already wasted a lot of time. "Perhaps we should split up?"

Reluctantly, Sango agreed with him. "It might not be a bad idea. You should probably be the one to ask in the temple anyway, Houshi-sama."

"Very well. If you and Shippou will see to the rest of the village, I'll ask in the marketplace and the temple."

----------------

An hour later, Miroku sat in an out-of-the-way corner of the marketplace, in no way encouraged by his investigations. Though it was true that the villagers had been much more willing to talk to him alone, he was not feeling any more enlightened on the subject of the mountain and its inhabitant.

The townsfolk almost always identified the thing on the mountain as a kami, but the reports on its exact nature were confused and diverse. They seemed to divide roughly into two groups, people as readily citing tales from one as from another.

In one version, the mountain's kami was Shiroyama's protector and steadfast ally. He preserved the territory from invasion and calamity, and gave his seal of approval to each successor to the lordship. He was described only and always as "white" - it was allegedly from him that Shiroyama - "white mountain" - took its name.

The other group of stories was grimmer by far. In them, the kami was a vengeful, capricious entity, easily offended and cruel in taking its recompense. Though it protected Shiroyama, its price for doing so was always high. Miroku could not help but wonder at the difference - it had not escaped his notice that the kami of the second version was never given a descriptor.

Were there really two different entities? Had one chased the other out? Were either of them really kami? What - if anything - did they have to do with the complete absence of youkai in Shiroyama?

Miroku sighed and began to make his way to the temple at the other end of the marketplace, stepping carefully around the peddlers' displays of goods. Perhaps the priest knew something more.

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The temple itself was an unimpressive building. It seemed too small for the market that had grown up around it, and its timbers too worn and dingy. Nevertheless, it was well-kept, its entrance swept clean and the implements of faith worn by long use but spotless with care. The temple's priest blended perfectly into his environment, an old man with a slight hunch and a bald pate as brightly polished as one of his incense bowls.

"Excuse me, sir."

"Afternoon to you." The priest squinted a bit and leaned forward. "A man of the cloth? Come to pay your respects?"

Miroku bowed and spoke in his smoothest, most professional tone. "Yes, a humble servant of Buddha passing through."

Once again, the priest inclined forward in inspection, looking him up and down. "Not an e-toki houshi are you?"1 A snort. "We got enough of them cluttering up the doors. It's all well and good to tell the fables and show the stories, but not when it prevents the faithful from entering the temple."

Miroku put on a solicitous expression, inwardly amused. It was true that he had had to sidestep a few of the traveling holy men on his way in, but they had not taken up so much space or drawn so many people as to block the entrance to the temple proper. The priest was most likely just irked that his parishioners chose to patronize frivolous storytelling monks of dubious origins over his more sober and familiar establishment.

"No, I'm an exorcist by trade."

At this, the priest's previously blandly welcoming expression took on a new spark of interest. His eyes opened wider and he resettled his staff to stand a little straighter.

"Ah, now that's an honorable service to provide. I used to do a bit of that myself before I came here. Tell me, what do you think of our humble realm?"

Miroku saw the opening and seized his opportunity. "Shiroyama seems to be a most remarkable place. Not once have I felt a demonic aura here."

The priest nodded firmly, unsurprised. "And you won't, either." He stepped closer, craning his neck up conspiratorially. Miroku cooperatively leaned forward in his turn, taking on the pose of a fellow conspirator.

"You're an exorcist - you know the tricks of the trade. Some ghosts - even some demons - will go away quietly if you offer them the right things. But some of 'em don't go unless they're scared you can call on something stronger to kick them out."

"So it is," remarked Miroku, nodding politely, hiding his excitement at this turn of the conversation behind an unruffled demeanor. The priest nodded back to him and resumed the tale, flying over the break in his narrative as if it had never happened.

"Normally for those you got to use your own power or invoke the Bodhisattvas. No matter what, the thing is, you have to call on an outside source." Now the old man grinned a little, but dryly and without humor. "See, here, there's something in Shiroyama itself that keeps the demons out."

"Really? I've never seen anything of the like. What is it?" asked Miroku, genuinely curious.

"It's Lady Chinatsu. Her husband and son were killed by 'em over fifty years ago. She died soon after and she's been pushing them out ever since." The old man paused, his expression regretful. "We don't like to talk about it too much - don't want to disturb her and get her any more riled - but didn't want you to try exorcising her without knowing who she was."

Miroku nodded gravely. "I can certainly understand your concern."

So that's what's kept the youkai out. A vengeful ghost…

The idea was unsettling. A spirit powerful enough to render an entire state youkai-free was nothing to sneeze at. Unappeased ghosts were powerful and difficult to deal with - and this one had apparently been allowed to go unappeased for almost half a century.

How long before she turns her attention to Inuyasha and Shippou? And if she were laid to rest, how much trouble would it invite from youkai looking to move in on Shiroyama?

"Has nobody tried to appease her?"

The priest shook his head sadly. "Don't go thinking we're so cruel as to let her stay angry just because she helps us out a bit like that. We've been trying to calm her down for years, but… The priest who was here before me was the last one to try and lay her to rest. Went up the mountain…"

Miroku froze. "Up the mountain?"

The priest nodded. "That's where she's buried. Wanted to be near where her husband and son died. He went up there and she blew him off like he was nothing. Came back down dazed - couldn't remember anything in the last three days - and was never quite right afterwards. Saw strange things in plain daylight right up till the day he died." The old man shrugged, looking resigned. "I'll someday try to lay her to rest too, but I'll wait until I have a successor ready. In the meantime, it seems like there's no way to calm her down and she provides a valuable service - no reason not to let her do it for a while."

"I see."

Miroku let out a long, slow breath, now even more worried. Though they now knew beyond any doubt the mountain's inhabitant, it left them - more specifically, it left Inuyasha - in a dangerous, difficult position. The duty of pacifying Lady Chinatsu should fall to him both in his capacity as Shiroyama's lord and as her descendent.

Unfortunately, the fact that he was hanyou would undoubtedly complicate matters immensely.

The priest's dry voice broke into his thoughts. "What's your name, exorcist?"

"I am Miroku. May I ask your name in return?"

"I'm Doppo. Do you need a place to stay the night? The temple is always open to travelers."

"Thank you for your kind offer, but since I may be in Shiroyama for some time, I've already made arrangements to stay at the castle."

"At the castle?" Doppo's interest visibly perked. "Have you seen the lord? Is it true that he's a youkai?"

Miroku's lips gave a twitch before tightening minutely. They would all have to face such questioning soon, once Inuyasha and their group became commonly known. Best to make a start in dealing with it.

"It is true that he has some youkai blood - I came here with him."

The priest's eyes narrowed. "You came here with him? I thought you said you were an exorcist," he questioned flatly.

"I am," answered Miroku, his tone equally level. Doppo gave him a hard, considering stare and seemed to mull over the information, his fingers tapping absently at the staff he leaned on in slow, irregular rhythm. Miroku remained calm under the inspection, his expression pleasantly neutral. At last, the old man seemed to come to a conclusion.

"I suppose," he said slowly and deliberately, "you must have your reasons. Just watch your back. Lady Chinatsu won't like it. I'm amazed she hasn't kicked him out already."

Miroku bowed. "I will. Your concern is much appreciated."

Again Doppo paused in contemplation before speaking. "If you need any help, come and find me."

Miroku was unsure whether the help he referred to was intended as an offer of aid to himself and Inuyasha, or simply as an offer to exorcise Inuyasha should the need arise, but thanked Doppo anyway and hurried out of the temple to find Sango and Shippou. The rest of the group needed to be told at once of Lady Chinatsu.

-----------------

The three quickly reconvened in the village to compare notes before heading back to the castle. Though Sango and Shippou had found nothing further of note in the village's fringes, Miroku's tale more than made up for it. After hearing it, they made no delay in hurrying back.

No sooner were they in the gates than they met Kagome. She was waiting for them to the side of the main entrance, her face alight with a triumphant expression.

"Sango-chan! You're back! Did you have any luck?"

"Shippou-chan and I didn't find much, but Houshi-sama did."

Miroku nodded in confirmation. "I talked with the temple priest. It seems fairly sure that a vengeful ghost on the mountain is keeping the youkai out."

Kagome's eyebrows rose in surprise. "A vengeful ghost? Lady Usei said that there was a kami on the mountain…"

"The villagers talked about a kami too," said Sango. "We had just thought they were confusing the ghost with a legend."

Miroku pursed his lips in thought, tapping his fingers against his staff. "Is it possible that the kami and ghost are both on the mountain? It seems strange that a kami would let an unappeased spirit take up residence in its home, but… Kagome-sama, what exactly did Lady Usei say?"

Kagome launched into a brief recounting of the tale, but was quickly stopped when she reached the death of Lady Usei's great-grandfather and his son.

"Wait - Kagome-chan, this happened in the time of her great-grandparents?"

"Yes."

Miroku had also caught the connection Sango had made. "Lady Chinatsu wants to avenge her husband and son. The priest said they were killed by youkai."

"Oh." Kagome bit her lip. "Do you think…?"

Sango nodded. "It's possible that it's the same incident."

Shippou, who had been growing impatient at the conversation, finally burst out, "So which is it? The kami, the ghost or a youkai?"

Kagome sighed. "I don't know, Shippou-chan."

"Whatever it is, we need to tell Inuyasha about it as soon as possible," said Miroku. "Especially if it's his great-grandmother's ghost."

Kagome nodded sharply. "You're right. He's probably still brooding in the garden."

"Let's go, then."

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They found Inuyasha in the courtyard as predicted, leaning up against a tree trunk and absently whittling a twig down to nothing with his claws, his expression tense and dark. The guards at the courtyard's doorways eyed him warily, but he was paying them no mind, making Kagome wonder if he were so completely lost in thought as to not notice them. On hearing their approach, however, his head snapped up, and he tossed the twig away before crossing his arms and settling into the habitual, closed stance he used in arguments.

"What is it?"

Kagome held back a sour expression at the curt tone. She still hoped that this might show him that it would be best to accept their help, but wasn't naïve enough to think he would concede the point without a fight. They did have some leads on the mountain, though, and if Inuyasha wanted to know about them - as she was sure he did - then he would have to hear them out. She doubted he would do it quietly, though, and accordingly took a deep breath to steel herself before beginning.

"We asked around a little about the thing you found on the mountain. Nobody knows anything completely certain, but there are a lot of things that…"

"Wait," Inuyasha interrupted, an unpleasant sinking feeling settling behind his ribs. "You told them?"

Kagome lifted her head defiantly to meet his eyes. "Of course I told them. They're our friends. Don't tell me you expected me to stay quiet about it and let you keep brooding over it."

Inuyasha scowled hard and his voice rose as he replied. "I didn't want you to drag them into it!"

Kagome sighed. "It's not classified information, Inuyasha."

"It's not gossip, either!" he spat.

Sango interrupted them, her tone of voice deliberately level as she attempted to prevent the altercation from getting out of hand.

"I would hardly call it gossiping, Inuyasha. Kagome-chan did the sensible thing by telling us and asking us to help investigate it."

Inuyasha opened his mouth, but before he could protest, Miroku overrode him.

"Sango is right. If Kagome-sama had not taken the initiative as she did, we would still know nothing about the mountain. Now, thanks to her, we at least have some clues. She was doing her best to help you, and in fact has helped you quite a bit by this."

Inuyasha still looked mutinous, plainly unwilling to be moved by reason. Miroku resisted the urge to knock him over the head. While it was entirely like Inuyasha to be unreasonably stubborn in a general sort of way, the specific brand of hardheadedness he was displaying in this particular matter was really getting on Miroku's nerves. His own recent conversation with Sango had done nothing to dull the edge of his irritation at the hanyou's behavior. Inuyasha had a great opportunity in Shiroyama, and if he couldn't be persuaded to do the sensible thing and take all the help he could get, the idiot stood a good chance of losing it. His breath hissed through his teeth, and his next words came out more sharply than he intended them to.

"Inuyasha, you can either take it or leave it, but if I were you, I'd do the smart thing and accept her help."

Inuyasha bristled at the reprimand. If they thought they could meddle in his problems and have him just keep quiet and let them lecture him, they had another thing coming.

"You shut up, bouzu! I didn't ask for any fucking help in the first place!"

Kagome's expression suddenly darkened and she put her hands on her hips, all thoughts of logical persuasion and reasonable conversation flown at the harsh rebuff.

"You jerk! I was trying to do you a favor!"

"Well, you should have just kept your favors to yourself!"

"What am I supposed to do?" she snapped. "Just let you muddle through it on your own and make stupid mistakes that could be avoided if you'd just quit being so pig-headed and stop pushing us out of it?"

Inuyasha's scowl deepened even further and he practically snarled his next words.

"I'm pushing you out of it because it's none of your business!"

"It is our business!"

"No it's not, and you all -" he hissed, directing a glare and pointing to include the other three"- need to stay the hell out of it! So just drop it and keep your noses out of my problem!"

And with that, he stomped off toward the courtyard's exit, the guard at the door stepping hastily out of his way.

A moment of quiet while they stared after him, and then Miroku's staff rang a harsh clash of discordant notes as he tapped its end firmly on the ground. "This," he ground out, "is ridiculous." With a sharp, precise movement, he lifted the staff again and moved to follow Inuyasha, the flat slaps of his sandals punctuated by further angry cacophony from the shakujou's rings as he strode toward the door.

Somebody in this situation had to be an adult and knock some sense into their wayward friend.

1 - E-toki houshi - "Picture-explaining priest." Itinerant priest. On coming to a town, they would settle down in the marketplace (usually in front of a temple) and tell religious parables with the aid of illustrations. The female equivalent were called Kumano bikuni. Generally speaking, traveling religious practitioners (along with more secular traveling entertainers) had a reputation as a somewhat scruffy bunch. Miroku himself is a pretty good example of this.

AN: First and foremost, enormous thanks go to Chri for a thorough and insightful beta-reading (especially thanks for your help with the last scene!) and to Aoi for her sharp and honest opinions.

Next, a couple of notes concerning the story itself: (No, it's not dead!)

Thicker Than Water will be changed to an R rating within the next few days - the current stay of PG-13 is meant to give advance notice to anyone who habitually doesn't check the R section. It was slated for a ratings change in the future, but with ff.net's recent policy, I feel it better to switch sooner than necessary.

By now, you should all know that this story makes some pretty liberal use of Japanese folktales and mythology. This is my one and only disclaimer for future liberal use of same. Takahashi herself certainly isn't sticking strictly to them, and neither will I. Just thought I ought to make that clear.

And lastly, I know - my update habits suck. Please be assured that this isn't due to any lack of interest on my part, but rather a lack of time. Entering my last year of college and attempting to figure out a grad school and fellowships tends to eat up a good part of my free time. In any case, this story is not dead, and will not be dead in the foreseeable future. For those of you who've stuck with it (and those new to it), thank you for reading, and I hope you continue to enjoy it.

Melodylink - I guess I sort of quashed your hopes for a quick(er) update, didn't I? Sure you aren't getting frustrated with the unrushed storyline in light of that? ;) I'm glad the story strikes you that way, though - it is the effect I was hoping for.

Silver Nitte iz - Thanks for the compliments! I'm trying to avoid clichéd Inuyasha-Kagome fights. Happy to know I'm getting some part of it right.

Kris-chan - Well, Inuyasha is my favorite character in the series, so… I'm glad you think I'm doing him justice. As for the future course of the plot, all I can say is that there will be numerous complications, both political and supernatural.

Karris - As always, I'm flattered. As for my (alleged) extensive vocabulary, you should thank my beta-readers that it comes out enjoyably and I don't drown you all in a sea of overly flowery prose. ;)

Scripted Muse - I'm glad the problems you found earlier eased off as the story went along - I often find that it takes me a few chapters to warm up my characterizations. (Hopefully, I haven't jinxed this chapter's characterization by saying that.) I'm glad you're enjoying the story, though, and I hope I don't drive you nuts with infrequent updates.

Chri - You already know what I had to say, but I can't skip over you. ;) Thanks again, though - you've been a great help.

Redmage2 - Well, I generally figure that most readers are more interested in what the characters are doing than in anything I say, so it makes more sense to put the notes at the end. Glad the story caught your interest, in any case. (Suppose I should think of a better summary, though. ;))

Nani - Thanks for the compliments! Hope it wasn't too bad of a cliff-hanger last time. (Well, perhaps not. The one for this chapter is pretty bad - hadn't even realized it till I reread your review.)

Skittles the Sugar Fairy - Ask and ye shall receive. Don't expect me to make a regular thing of it, though. ;)

Shaid - It's a given that this fic is in a constant state of continuation. Just very, very slowly. It's not going to die anytime in the foreseeable future.

Selenity Jade - Thank you very much for all your reviews - it always makes my day to see what you have to say. Hope you continue to enjoy.