InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ To Shed a Little Light ❯ Chapter 2 ( Chapter 2 )

A/N: A big THANK YOU to thyme_cat, who beta'd this fic. Her help has been invaluable! And also to dsm1980, whose brilliant suggestion has given this fic its direction! Which direction, you might ask? I'll tell in you in the author's note at the end of the very last chapter. Maybe you will have guessed it by then, maybe not.

 

And thanks to my reviewers on FFnet who I couldn't answer directly,

 

Single Spark - sesshys_jaded_samurai

 

Mmorg - thyme_cat, ashimi, coldTenshieyes, mspotts, ashtonreed, Megan Consoer, Too lazy to sign in, dk1022, shadowwolf_02, Amoraluv, docbevculver

 

Chapter 2

 

Kagome heaved a heart-felt sigh and stared moodily at the dark clouds looming on the horizon, blotting out the sinking sun with an ominous finality. A thick and surly gray, they roiled through the sky toward her, trailing misty tendrils to the tops of the trees like giant jellyfish floating over a bed of kelp.

 

`Rain,' Kagome thought despondently as she shifted to make herself more comfortable. `And here I am, stuck in this stupid tree.' A clingy, emotionally unstable hanyou had left her high in the boughs of an ancient tree, telling her to stay put until he returned with something to eat. As if she could go anywhere: the closest branch below her was an uncomfortable drop, and the ground was sure, agonizing death unless she was lucky enough to break her neck on impact, which she seriously doubted. No, with her luck, she would shatter both legs and die of exposure or be eaten by wolves or something equally gruesome and painful.

 

Why he felt the need to put her in a tree was beyond her, and his insistence to hunt for their meal, instead of making Ramen, was downright befuddling. He certainly hadn't had a problem leaving her alone and unprotected before. Kagome huffed irritably, her patience running short on dog hanyou who went through more moods than she changed outfits before a trip to the mall.

 

She supposed she should be grateful that he'd stopped being so damn rude, but this new, smotheringly possessive side of him was almost worse, in a way. Oh, he was as gruff and rough on the edges as ever, but he'd suddenly made it his mission in life to meet her needs, whether or not they needed meeting. This wasn't the first time he'd disappeared to hunt, nor the first time she'd watched the clouds from a perch in the treetops. No longer content to leave her alone on the ground, he wanted her `safe' while he was away.

 

She'd put her foot down when he'd tried to drag her into the trees to sleep, though. The first night after they had left the village, he'd asserted that it was the only way he could protect her and had dragged her into the lower branches of nearby tree, only to find himself planted in the dirt face-first with an angry girl straddling his back. Thinking back to that night and the ensuing argument, Kagome shuddered to think what could've happened if she sat him from a higher branch. In the end, she'd gotten her way about the sleeping arrangements and slept in her sleeping bag on the ground, except for the fact that he now slept sitting next to her against the base of the tree. Within easy reaching distance. Ugh.

 

The whole `protection' thing was out of control. If she'd suspected him tailing her to her baths before, now she was certain because he sat in a tree or on the bank, in plain view, with his back turned to her. No amount of pleading, cajoling, threatening, or sitting would get him to leave. Her wonderful baths had become exercises in efficiency and more than once, she dreamed of her steamy shower five hundred years in the future with its solid door and lock. Even her potty breaks were somewhat monitored, though a few shed tears had convinced him to stay out of sight. At least if she couldn't see him, she could pretend that he couldn't hear (or smell) her peeing. The only time he would truly leave her was on his hunting forays, and then he would ensconce her high in the forest canopy.

 

The food issue was just as perplexing. Not that she minded having fresh meat, but there was no way on god's green earth that she would clean the carcasses he brought back. His first kill had been presented to her with a triumphant grin and a flourish of dead rabbits, limp and still warm, which he placed in her lap. Kagome had almost fallen out of the tree in her hasty retreat from his `present', but he'd scooped her out of the air, rabbits and all, and brought them safely back to the ground.

 

Looking hurt and put out, he'd groused at her, pointing a finger at the unfortunate bunnies, “What the fuck is wrong with them?”

 

“They…they've still got their eyes!” she finally exclaimed, shuddering a little as the glassy gaze of the rabbits seemed to fix on her. Fish eyes were one thing: cooked, they didn't look like eyes so much as cloudy marbles. But freshly killed bunny rabbit eyes…

 

“You want I should clean `em?” came Inuyasha's slightly perturbed question, as if he'd been expecting her to do it.

 

“If you want me to eat them, then yes!” she'd snapped, feeling ungrateful and slightly queasy.

 

“Feh, stupid girl,” he'd griped, but had them efficiently skinned, gutted and beheaded, all with his claws, in a matter of minutes, much to Kagome's dismay and stomach upheaval. If she hadn't been so hungry, and if the rabbits hadn't smelled so good as they roasted on spits over her cooking fire, she would never have been able to choke them down. That had been three days ago, and now everything he brought back was dead and cleaned, which was all fine and dandy, except for the reason he was doing it in the first place. He wouldn't answer that question, except to say that she was too scrawny. It was almost as if he were trying to prove something, but what?

 

And if she were being completely honest with herself, she would admit that she would have liked the attention if it came from another source. However, Inuyasha's constant vigil over her prevented any kind of romantic encounter with her lover; his hunting expeditions took no more than twenty minutes. The ache her lord had left in the wake of his hasty departure had yet to subside and her lie to the hanyou had become a frustrating truth. Deep in her sleeping mind, her lover stroked her, nipped her, kissed her, licked her until she woke in a sweat, tense, frustrated, and unsatisfied.

 

A fat drop of water landed on her hand with a splash and Kagome jerked out of her thoughts. Glancing up at the sky in consternation, she realized that the rain clouds were now almost directly overhead. Great. Just great. She was about to weather a storm while sitting in a tree with minimal overhead coverage. Pursing her lips and glaring at the offending atmospheric conditions, she shrugged out of her cardigan and tented it over her head just as more rain splattered down.

 

Within moments, it was pouring, the tattoo of water on leaves crescendoing to a dull roar. Her sweater-umbrella did little to help, the sodden fabric weighing heavily against her arms and springing several small leaks that dripped onto her dark hair. The rest of her was drenched, her skirt clinging to wet thighs, shoes filling with water, the front of her blouse plastered to her breasts. Cold and shivering, Kagome tried to draw her knees against her chest to conserve body heat without compromising her precarious seat on the branch. Where was her lover when she needed him?

 

“Inuyasha!” she shouted into the downpour, hoping that the hanyou hadn't strayed to far. “Inuyasha, get me down! Now!” She emphasized her demand with a small stamp of her foot against the bough.

 

“INUYASHA!”

 

“Alright already!” the hanyou's voice came from behind her, almost drowned out by a rumble of thunder. With one arm behind her back and the other under her knees, he whisked her out of the tree, upsetting her meager covering and allowing her head to join the rest of her body in its wetness.

 

“How could you leave me in a tree when a storm was coming?” she asked plaintively, struggling to keep hold of her sodden sweater but not let it touch her already clammy skin.

 

“What's your problem? It's only rain!” he snapped back, but she didn't like the way his fingers were curling over her bare thigh. She recognized wandering claws and his were rapidly approaching that point.

 

“Only rain? I'm cold and wet and I could get sick!” His fingers tensed again, the tips of his claws digging into her skin. `At least his fingers aren't traveling north,' she thought with small comfort. He grumbled something in reply, the only audible word being `pathetic', and even then she couldn't be sure, so she decided to let it drop. He seemed to be doing something about it anyway, zipping through the lower branches so fast that the forest had become a soggy, gray-green blur.

 

Minutes later, he bounded out of the trees and in front of a small, inconspicuous hut with a tattered roof and no mat over the door. On closer inspection, as Kagome approached with a hesitant `hello?', the hut was deserted and hadn't seen use for quite a while. The small fire pit in the center of the floor had a few pieces of charred wood but the floor was coated with a thick layer of dust and a steady dribble of water trickled from the ceiling and down a wall to puddle on the floorboards. A small pile of wood sat in a corner of the hut, also dusty but promisingly dry. A rest stop for travelers, Kagome decided as she dumped her bag on the floor and stretched the kinks out of her back and legs, her mood improving rapidly now that she was out of the weather.

 

“Hey, Inuyasha, I don't suppose you caught anything for dinner?” she turned to him, reaching as far over her head as she could, lengthening her spine and exposing a damp stretch of tummy to the musty air of the hut. He didn't answer; instead, his gaze was locked on her midriff and slowly wandering up her body. Exhaling in a rush and dropping her arms, she glanced down to see what he found so interesting.

 

`He's staring at my tits and they're staring back!' she thought with a little gasp, for she'd failed to remember the effect cold would have on her nipples. Sure enough, they stood at attention, poking through the lace bra and wet, clinging, now translucent blouse like bullets. Flushing hotly, Kagome crossed her arms over her chest, wincing at the chill of her shirt, and spun around.

 

“Pervert!” she snapped, dropping to her knees to rummage through her bag for something dry and less revealing. The oversized tee shirt would have to do; though damp, it was better than what she was wearing. Holding the shirt to cover her front, she turned back to the hanyou, almost falling over to see him standing right behind her, gazing down at her with intense, overly-bright eyes.

 

Kagome smothered her first instinct to cower under his predatory glare. Sometimes she forgot he was half-demon and could kill her as easily as she could swat a fly: easier, maybe. “Inuyasha,” she croaked through a throat suddenly gone dry. “Turn around so I can change.”

 

He stood stone still for several seconds, the only movements betraying him were the rise of his chest as he breathed heavily and the sporadic clenching of his claws. “What's wrong with you?” Kagome couldn't help but to scuttle backward on the floor, her hands and feet helping her bottom scoot her away from him. “Turn around or I'll say it!”

 

He jerked as if someone had suddenly cut strings that had been controlling his body, blinking rapidly at her glowering form huddled on the ground. “Keh. You better not, wench!” Stomping over to the pile of wood, he gathered several pieces in his arms, his broad red back facing her. “Hurry it up already.”

 

Kagome scrambled out of her wet clothes and into dry ones, her eyes fixed on his back and ready to subdue him if he so much as twitched wrong while she was changing. It was too much: all the things that had happened to her over the past week or so, and now Inuyasha was behaving even more strangely than normal. Her nerves were beginning to fray and despite her duty to collect the jewel shards, she desperately needed a break. Giving him quiet permission to turn, she grabbed her lighter and approached to help him start a fire, wracking her mind for a good excuse to go home. `You and my lover are stressing me out,' was not something she could tell him.

 

They were silent as they built the fire, avoiding eye contact as they coaxed the kindling to a merry blaze and added large pieces of wood. She'd set her cooking pot outside to collect water and now she brought it in to boil, since Inuyasha had not caught anything for dinner. That was fine with her; she didn't want to feel indebted to him with the way he was looking at her earlier.

 

It wasn't until they were slurping up the dregs of their ramen that she'd screwed up enough courage to broach the subject of going home, an already sore topic she knew from past experience.

 

“Inuyasha…”

 

He grunted noncommittally and tossed his empty container into a corner of the room. Kagome followed it with her eyes, knowing she would have to retrieve it and irritated that he hadn't just handed it to her. “I was thinking…”

 

“Spit it out.”

 

Frowning, Kagome set her empty container on the floor in front of her. “I want to go home for a couple of days.”

 

“No way.”

 

“Inuyasha-“

 

“You said you didn't have any of those `test' thingies for another half a moon cycle.”

 

“Please, Inuyasha? Just a couple of days?” she gave him her best doe eyes and battered her lashes.

 

He looked slightly unnerved and she almost thought she had him until he crossed his arms over his chest. “No.” Maybe she shouldn't have changed out of that wet blouse.

 

“Yeah, but most of my clothes are ruined and…and I need stuff!”

 

“No fucking way. You've got plenty of stuff!” he gestured to the backpack and its strained seams.

 

“No, I mean female stuff.” It always worked at school: a mysterious ailment that involved `female' or `feminine' could get her out of just about anything with a male teacher.

 

“What kind of female stuff?” he asked suspiciously.

 

Kagome could not believe he was being so dense. Was it a negotiation tactic to feign ignorance so that the embarrassment that one's opponent was trying to instill in one was flung back? Well, that wasn't her only weapon and she really didn't have to work hard to use it. Hanging her head to let her bangs cover her eyes, she sniffled.

 

“What are you doing?” he asked, his voice nervous and uneven.

 

A film of tears covered her eyes and she squeezed the lids together, forcing the drops to roll down her cheeks. `Shame on you, Kagome,' she scolded herself, guilt curling in her stomach.

 

“Are you crying?” he reared back, panic evident in the lines of his body. “Don't cry!”

 

She sniffled again, letting her frustrations rise to the surface and push out more moisture.

 

“Fine!” the hanyou waved his hands in a warding-off gesture as his resistance crumbled. “If you want to go home that bad, I'll take you! Just don't cry!” Kagome allowed herself a mental happy dance before glancing up, hoping that the `I'll take you' part didn't mean that he'd come with her to the future, but deciding to let it slide for now. Choose your battles, after all…

 

“Oh, thank you Inuyasha!” she clasped her hands in front of her and bestowed him with a glowing smile. She still felt like a heel for making herself cry, but if he weren't so difficult, than she would never have done it. It was all his fault.

 

Inuyasha blushed and tucked his hands into his sleeves. “Keh. Two days.”

 

XxxxxxxxxX

 

Kagome snapped out of another erotic dream to the sweltering heat of her sleeping bag, her entire abdomen pulsing uncomfortably with a now familiar yearning as she lay on her side facing the fire. Turning away from the flames, she squeaked at the sight of Inuyasha's eyes burning down on her, his lips drawn up in a strange snarl. In an instant, he was straddling her hips, hands pressing her shoulders into the floor, face buried in her hair as he inhaled. Kagome froze, her heart pounding wildly, pretty sure what it was he smelled.

 

“Inuyasha,” she whispered hesitantly, not wanting to encourage him but needing to take control of the situation. He growled lowly, gliding his nose over her neck and igniting the burn in her belly in spite of herself. Pushing against his chest with her hands, she tried to suppress a shiver as his tongue laved the skin over her thrumming pulse.

 

He lowered his body, pushing her hands down as if they exerted no pressure, until the fronts of their bodies were flush with one another. Kagome began to squirm as his nose traveled lower to the collar of her shirt, nudging aside the fabric as he nibbled at her collarbone. Her movement only seemed to goad him on, as one of his hands abandoned her shoulder to run down her side, fumbling for a breast that was pressed between them. Kicking frantically until his legs stretched out to trap them against the floor, Kagome tried ineffectually to throw him off. He wouldn't budge; instead peeling the sleeping bag down between their bodies with the hand that wasn't massaging a breast.

 

“Kikyou,” he muttered against her chest, pressing a hard length against her belly.

 

“Hey!” Kagome shouted, the last of the arousal from her dream dissolving with that name. “I'm not Kikyou!” His hands paused in their quests and his face lifted from her chest, glazed golden tinged with red and swirling with confusion. “Get off me!”

 

He complied to her request with an alacrity that left her stunned, and by the goggle-eyed look on his handsome face, him as well. Hitting the wall with a crash that shook the rickety frame of the hut, he shook his head as if coming out of a deep sleep. Kagome thought it must have hurt but couldn't sympathize, for the reason of his hasty departure was now choking the hut with an immense, wrathful aura, towering over the both of them in soggy white silk.

 

Red eyes blazed down on her, framed by waterlogged, silver-white hair and a crescent moon emblazoned on a noble brow. He held her immobile with his gaze for a full minute before briskly shaking his head, tossing the water out of his thick mane and onto everything else in the hut. Hunkering down in her sleeping bag and wracking her brain for something to use as a weapon, she met his gaze and tried to calm the wild palpitating of her heart. He was just so beautiful this close up!

 

“Don't come any closer!” she squeaked out, thrusting a hand in front of her as she scooted backward, feeling for her bow and arrow with the other. Kagome knew her situation had gone from bad to much, much worse. This youkai, though related to Inuyasha by blood, was cruel, vicious and despised human frailty. The last time she had seen him, he'd tried to melt her with poison and would have succeed if not for the sword that Inuyasha was now drawing from its scabbard.

 

“Sesshomaru! Get away from Kagome!”

 

The demon's eyes slid away from her, but not before she saw a strange flicker in their crimson depths. It was so brief and intangible that she would have chalked it up to her adrenaline-wired imagination had she not been studying the demon so intently. She couldn't define it, was too scared to try, but she had seen it nonetheless.

 

Lip curled in the slightest of sneers, he advanced on his half-brother, easily dodging a clumsy swing of Tetsusaiga and raising the hanyou off of his feet by a handful of his firerat robes. With a swirl of starlight and moonbeams, the males were gone, leaving Kagome alone in the hut and wondering what had just happened.

 

He'd left her alone, hadn't even attempted to hurt her before taking off with his brother. To the casual observer, it may have appeared that he'd saved her from an uncertain ravishing, but Kagome knew better. He'd come for the Tetsusaiga and her rescue was an unintentional, and probably unpleasant, side effect. Metallic crashing and shouted curses overrode the steady patter of rain and Kagome shook herself into action. Grabbing her bow and quiver of arrows, she made a mad dash for the entrance of the hut, ready to defend the hanyou from the poison claws of his youkai brother.

 

Stepping out into the rainy night, she futilely scanned the road and forest for a sign of the brothers. In the short time it had taken her to get outside, they had disappeared and not even the sounds of the battle could reach her.

 

“Inuyasha!” she called, clutching her bow to her chest. He may have been overly frisky with her but no one deserved to be melted into a puddle of effluence.

 

“Inuyashaaaaa!” Besides, he probably smelled the effects the dream was having on her and his instincts got carried away.

 

“INUYASHA!” Though why would he say the name of that dead priestess who sealed him to the God Tree? And in passion, no less, while he was kissing her, Kagome!

 

“Humph!” Kagome frowned and stomped back into the hut, once again soaked on account of that stupid Inuyasha. Throwing her bow and arrows onto the floor, she clambered back into her sleeping bag in an indignant snit, disliking the way her wet hair stuck to the back of her shirt but too irritated to do anything about it.