InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Transitions ❯ Chapter 1

A/N: Hey, everyone. Time for a bit of cultural enlightenment cleverly disguised as yet another PwP blanket fic: at New Year's, the Japanese give New Year's cards (nengajyou) to family, friends, coworkers, pretty much everyone one knows, kinda like Christmas cards here, but more important-and while I'm on the ol' soapbox, Christmas isn't celebrated quite the same way thereabouts, either, except by Christians and maybe families with young kids. Aside from its more secular nature, that holiday is really marked in Japan by another, very distinctive tradition that may seem odd to Westerners. You'll see in a bit…well, a very long bit, but good things come to those who wait. Maybe.

(Yes, it's a coupla days late. It's about 40 pages in Word and I didn't start on it till after Christmas. Whaddya expect? ^_^;;)

~

Kagome threw her bag onto a half-frozen tangle of roots, then let herself drop next to it with a despairing sigh. "We might as well just try to sleep right here."

From their position at the edge of the forest bordering the village, Inuyasha eyed a gaggle of teenage girls clustered a few yards away, and they stopped whispering amongst themselves with little shrieks of fright, dispersing like spooked quail. His scowl deepened, and he recrossed his arms. "Feh. We could always ask those wenches if any of `em got groped in the past coupla hours and where the pervert went."

"Not while they were trying to find a place to stay and in this weather, he wouldn't. I think." Kagome squinted at the sky, shivering and pulling her thick jacket tighter. "If you still can't smell anything and we can't find them, we'll just have to think of something else."

The trouble had started not long ago, when the tired, cold little group, on the trail of a Shikon shard far from Kaede's village, had noticed snow clouds gathering and headed for an out-of-the-way hamlet Miroku had once visited. Unfortunately, isolation hadn't done much for the villagers' peace of mind; Inuyasha had been so busy arguing with Kagome about something she was trying to explain - about "New Year cards," stupid customs on which no sane person would ever waste time and money - that the group had run straight into a cunningly concealed youkai trap on the outskirts. No one had actually been hurt, but the hanyou had nearly been knocked out by a blast of powder similar to the stuff Sango carried.

By the time Inuyasha could correctly identify how many fingers Kagome was holding up, snow had started falling lightly, and Shippou was shivering violently. Miroku had voiced concern over whether the villagers would be tolerant of their bringing in three nonhumans all at once, and proposed they split up for the time being: he and Sango would conceal Shippou and Kirara, then acquire a room for the night, while Kagome would stay with Inuyasha till he recovered and meet up with them as soon as possible. There was only one inn nearby, and no matter how densely prejudiced these people might be, the monk had enough money - "liberated" that morning from a bandit who had been attacking travelers - to persuade even the most suspicious innkeeper to give the odd strangers someplace to sleep that night.

Of course, in their weariness and eagerness for food and warmth, they had overlooked one simple fact-namely, that it was Miroku who was carrying their money. None of them could have guessed that a second inn had been built since he was here last, either, and when she figured this out, Kagome also realized she had no clue to which their comrades had gone, leaving her and Inuyasha penniless and alone in a none-too-friendly village.

Even with these slight complications, it normally would have been no problem for them to ask around and locate their friends at one place or the other, or, at the very least, for Inuyasha to sniff out the monk and slayer. Unfortunately, whether Miroku had paid handsomely in advance or not, neither establishment wanted the custom of a hanyou and a strangely dressed human girl, and no amount of pleading or threatening could persuade either innkeeper to let them see for themselves that their friends had never come in; Inuyasha's nose was still incapacitated with cold and the remnants of the powder, which prevented him from locating them that way. To say their options were drastically reduced was a bit of an understatement.

"This is fuckin' pathetic." Inuyasha shifted his weight impatiently. "I don't see why we can't just bust in there and make `em tell us where they are. One of those places had to be lying."

"You're not going to run in and start breaking things, Inuyasha," Kagome said firmly, rising and patting her stiff, frozen rump with a grimace. She hefted her bag, grunting as the weight rubbed a sore spot on her shoulder, carved into her skin through her jacket from carrying the damn thing all day. Her other shoulder was even worse. "Maybe they'll come out and look for us."

Inuyasha snorted and glanced over at her. "Yeah, right. You're about to freeze. Why don't you change into some normal clothes and try asking again by yourself? No one'll listen to you looking like that."

"Speak for yourself," Kagome snapped. "And I'm not sleeping inside while you sit in a tree and turn into a Popsicle. If they won't let you in, I'm not going, either."

"Stupid. If you wanna freeze to death, it's your ass." The curt insult was softened somewhat as he stepped forward and gently lifted the bag away from her. "Damn, wench, you have your own room in this thing or something?"

"No…" I wish I did. Then we wouldn't have to deal with these jerks. She crossed her arms, assessed the clouds - getting heavier and much, much darker as the sun went down, and the temperature with it - and made a very reckless decision. "C'mon, Inuyasha, we're going to that second inn, and we're getting a room, or else."

"Why the second place? They're just gonna tell you the same thing as the first one again." After they had been coolly informed at each inn that no one in their party had come by and there was no space available for them, they had paused on the way out long enough to pass someone coming in and watch as the innkeeper quickly and courteously led them to a room. The first innkeeper had even come back and bowed goodbye to them afterwards, and it was all she could do to restrain Inuyasha, who was still almost visibly steaming. "Don't tell me you're just guessing."

"It's closer, and that place has a bigger teahouse, so Miroku probably picked it." Inuyasha couldn't find fault with that argument, and she rushed on before he could disagree on something else. "And we're not sleeping outside. I don't care what people like that think most of the time, but I draw the line when it means we get stuck out in a blizzard."

Any further inclination Inuyasha might've had to argue was dampened visibly by an increased flurry of thick flakes battering their faces. "Keh. I still say it's not gonna work."

"Just shut up and come on." Kagome caught his hand and nearly dragged him along behind her.

"You got a plan?" Inuyasha had to raise his voice over the wind. He scowled at two older women carrying firewood till they ceased staring at Kagome in open horror and scurried off.

"Nope," Kagome muttered, unaware of the exchange behind her back. They were at the plain but sturdily built little inn in a few more steps. Why they'd bothered erecting this place at all when the village population probably couldn't even fill the other, smaller inn was beyond her. Well, it's not like they're smart or anything… Kagome heaved a sigh as she came inside, tugged off her boots with some difficulty, and plastered on a brightly apologetic smile. "Hello?"

"Welcome…" The hostess's matching smile slid down her narrow face like snow plopping off a maple branch as Inuyasha shook water from his bare feet, still scowling. "Was there something else you needed?"

Time to pull a Miroku. This had better work… "Yes, I wanted to apologize if we were rude earlier," Kagome said cheerfully, bowing deeply enough to be able to elbow Inuyasha warningly without the surprised hostess or her husband noticing. "I forgot to mention that we can pay you for your trouble."

Inuyasha sputtered, and the hostess began to shake her head, expression settled into grimly polite lines, but Kagome charged on. "We wouldn't bother you at all, but it's freezing outside, and it would just be too much trouble if you had to get rid of our bodies in the morning." She cranked up the wattage in her smile a few hundredfold and added some saccharine for good measure. "I assure you neither of us will even set foot outside whatever space you might spare us till we leave, as soon as possible, of course."

"Ah…" The human couple floundered momentarily. After a few glances back and forth, the husband spoke hesitantly. "As we said before, mistress, we're afraid there's simply no room."

"Yes, you did say so, just before someone else got a room," Kagome said airily, enjoying the way they twitched in perfect unison. "I'm sure that kind of thing happens all the time, with all the coming and going around here…" She let that hang in the perfectly still and quiet air, then deftly extracted an odd little net from her pocket and pulled out her trump cards, depositing three very shiny and conspicuously golden coins on the floor between them. "They're not much, but they are very rare," she confided modestly, elbowing Inuyasha again without looking. Luckily, the innkeepers were too busy gaping at the coins to notice.

The woman was the first to recover, and she had to swallow several times in order to speak. "…W-Well, mistress, that is-there's no argument as to space, or payment, of course…" Kagome half-bowed, keeping her face as blankly innocent and cute as she knew how. "But, well, you do understand…" The hostess flicked a glance at Inuyasha. "There is some small measure of propriety involved."

"Please don't worry about that," Kagome said over a soft growl at her back, smiling wider and smothering down panic and anger. What's wrong with these people?! She bowed deeply, gritting her teeth against a sudden flash of inspiration. If it worked… "My husband is extremely well-behaved, and we'll avoid your other guests as much as we can."

The noise behind her died away into a strangled gulp, and the respectful nervousness wreathing the couple's faces vanished. Kagome had to lock her knees against the cold contempt in the hostess's voice. "Very well, mistress. We shall take your word that there'll be no reason to regret your stay." Kagome swallowed covertly as the bony woman barked at her husband, startling him out of his openly speculative appraisal of the girl: "Take them to the back room. That should suffice."

"Which…?" A slow, creeping grin finished the man's sentence for him, and Kagome unconsciously leaned back into Inuyasha as the innkeeper bowed almost mockingly. "If you'll come this way…"

Kagome didn't bother to try restraining the hanyou as the growl started up again, taking comfort in the vibration against her shoulders. In accordance with their supposed status, he moved in front of her as they walked, but he didn't resist when she slipped a hand into his. The chilly, callused skin of his palm had never felt so reassuring, particularly as they went towards what had to be the very back of the place, passing a few young men in one corridor. She really didn't like the looks either of them got, or the knowing nods passed back and forth between the human men. Geez, I got more respect when I was being an airhead with a pet hanyou. Was it something I said?

She was profoundly grateful when the ratty little man finally stopped at the very end of the hall, indicated the room with a short wave of his hand and stumped back to the front without further ado. If she had paid more attention, she might have also noticed the way Inuyasha paused long enough to look directly at the men for the first time and show his fangs, stepping inside only when they moved further away and began muttering again, this time in consternation.

Kagome's relief and gratitude died abruptly as she stepped into the room and flinched at an icy draft against her cheek. "What the…why is it so cold in here?!" A cursory inspection answered her: there was a hole high in the wall big enough to throw Shippou through, probably made by accident and not fixed yet, permitting wind and snow in freely. Rage seeped into her slowly, warming her to the tips of her toes. Her fists clenched into trembling balls, teeth grinding in pure frustration. "They gave us this room on purpose!"

"You're lucky we got anything after the shit you just pulled." She whipped around and nearly gawked at him in the waning light. Inuyasha's face was almost as grim as the humans' had been as he slammed the shoji closed and threw her bag at the single futon. "Do you have any clue what you've done?"

"I lied, yeah." Kagome defiantly turned her back and fumbled with the bag's straps, rubbing her hands to get some warmth and mobility back. "If you want, I can always go back and say, `Never mind, I'm just his shard detector and we're just looking for our friends.' Maybe then they'd tell us if Miroku was here or not."

"Too late." Inuyasha sank to his haunches beside her, growling quietly when she refused to turn her head. "You're not leaving the room till morning. If it wasn't so cold and you weren't such a weakling, I'd make you leave now."

That got her attention. Her hands stilled, even as she bristled but kept her eyes on the bag. "And why is that?"

"For one thing, they think you have more of that gold, and I don't know how you did get it, but now they think you…" He bit the words off and got to his feet, stalking over to the hole.

"What?" Kagome gave up on the buckles and blew on her hands, risking a peek at his back. From what she'd learned of Inuyasha's moods after nearly two years, she knew he wasn't just angry, but agitated and…worried? She rubbed her palms together hard. "They think I'm what? Weird? Stupid? Rich?"

"Do I have to spell it out?" he snarled, half turning. "If you're just traveling with me, I could be a bodyguard or a pet or some shit like that. If you go and tell them we're married, then they think you're either a slave or a whore."

Anger and bitter derision spilled into the last sentence, and Kagome's chest clenched into a tight, aching bundle, mouth falling open without sound. Tears blurred her vision, but even the warmth of them escaped her. "You…" Her throat closed. A faint tremor settled into her limbs; she gripped her knees, but it only made her hands shake all the worse. She pressed her fingers to her lips, letting the cold burn into the soft flesh.

Inuyasha turned back and crouched, meeting her wide, distressed gaze head-on. One corner of his mouth twitched humorlessly. "Yeah. Shoulda thought of that before you got that desperate to get us in here." He saw no reason to elaborate on what they'd take from her as payment should they decide to "rescue" her, either. "Calm down, wench. They're not gonna bug you while I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere."

Her head shook blindly, desperately, and he frowned, leaning in close as she removed her hand, almost squeaking on a trembling whisper. "They…the only way we'd marry…forced or paid me?"

One ear flicked restlessly. His head dipped in the briefest of sardonic nods. "Don't tell me you didn't know. Why else would you?" Inuyasha snorted in quick self-reproach. "But if you had known, you wouldn't have said so. Next time, just say your pet's hungry and they might buy it."

"Shut up!" Kagome was leaning over and yanking his head down by one hank of white hair in a heartbeat. His own heart skipped a few at the combination of volume, proximity and the tears leaking down her cheeks. "I've never heard anything so stupid my whole life! Don't even tell me you think they're right!" She yanked a little harder, and his heart felt funny again. "You're a million times better than those hypocrites!"

"Calm your ass down already. It's the same everywhere. We just don't run into it when Sango and Miroku and the brat around, too." Inuyasha swore he would never understand her: upon finding out that every human male except Miroku in the vicinity now thought of her as easy beyond all belief - why else would she openly claim she belonged to a hanyou? - Kagome only got upset because she thought they were being unfair to him.

"I don't want to calm down! I want to go beat some sense into them!" Inuyasha had to jump up and grab her arm to keep her from leaving the room and trying to do just that. "Let go!"

"You're not gonna change anyone's mind, Kagome, and if you step outside, I'll end up fighting the whole damn inn by myself." Dimly amused at the role reversal - so this was what it was like to be the one in control of his temper…talk about weird - he tugged her back down to the floor, ears flattening as she scrubbed angrily at her eyes. "Stop crying!"

"I'm not crying! I'm just mad!" Kagome sniffled wrathfully. "How do you put up with it?"

"I don't. I didn't want to come here in the first place, remember?" She gulped, and he shrugged, kicking himself for inadvertently rubbing her face in it. Naïve or not, Kagome didn't deserve to be exposed to this. "Besides, you get used to it. I don't give a rat's ass what those humans think."

"Liar. You never get used to people hating you." Kagome rubbed her eyes again and missed his slight start. "You never should have to go through it." She tried to smile and managed a tense, apologetic half-parody. "Just `cause your ears are cuter than theirs is no reason to-"

"Shut up," Inuyasha said tersely, heaving himself around so that his back faced her. They were cutting too close to things he didn't want to talk or think about. "Anyway, point is, they'll be looking for you and that gold, so you'd better get to sleep and not-"

"Osuwari."

Whump went Inuyasha's face into the cold floor. The moment he could pry his head up, he creaked around to glare at her. "What the fuck was that for?!"

"For being who you are. A jerk. It's better than getting punished for what you are, isn't it?" Kagome stuck her tongue out. "Think about it. And turn around so I can get changed."

Inuyasha obediently spent the next few minutes working his body off the floor and pondering the unpredictability of the female mind, while Kagome slipped her bulky jacket off, removed her sweater and unfurled the futon, burrowing deep under the musty cover before she changed into an oversized, frigid sleeping kimono. Her own clothes were warmer and easier to manage, but she had been wearing them for almost a full day now, and she was starting to smell ripe. "There," she said presently, shuddering despite herself. The room was barely warmer than the space under the trees outside.

The hanyou merely snorted. "There what?"

Kagome opened her mouth to sit him again, then shut it with a click. There was only one futon, and he was more or less in his favorite pose for sleep-that is, sitting upright and alert. "Nothing, I guess."

"Good." Inuyasha adjusted Tessaiga more comfortably and moved himself between her and the shoji.

Kagome made a face at his back and hunkered down, trying to conserve warmth. "Hey, Inuyasha?"

He grunted, keeping his body stock-still.

"I'm sorry I lied without asking you. I just wanted to shock that lady into rethinking things."

"Well, you kinda did, `cept you just made her think you were desperate."

"Well, we were. Just…not for the stuff everyone assumed," she finished lamely.

"No, you were. I wanted to sleep outside so we wouldn't have to put up with this shit." Inuyasha shifted uncomfortably as she sneezed twice. "We're not even gonna get any food, forget about a bath. If we did, it'd be poisoned."

"Like we'd get to eat or bathe out in the snow, either," Kagome retorted, sitting up to dig at her bag again, losing the little warmth that had accumulated around her torso. "Are you sure you didn't hear any of the others in the hall or anything? They could be here."

"Nope." He had been too pissed at the leers Kagome was getting and thinking up ways to take the humans apart if they so much as stepped toward her to notice. "Just go to sleep. What're you doing?"

"Rats. I had a bunch of stuff for you guys." Kagome finally managed to slip both buckles open, wriggle her hand down through the cold, tightly packed and mostly soaked odds and ends, and extract a small sheaf of wet paper shapes. "See? I bought postcards for everyone."

Keeping one eye and ear on the door, Inuyasha turned to examine the proffered cards. "Don't tell me you were actually serious about those things."

"Paper's a lot cheaper and easier to print in my time, Inuyasha, and it's a tradition to give these to everyone you know," Kagome said patiently, peeling the top one off. "See, this one's for Shippou." Inuyasha frowned at a picture of a cartoon panda and a silly rhyme. On the back were the kit's name and Kagome's. "And for Sango…" He gave up trying to puzzle out the foreign words on the first card and looked at the second. It was slightly larger, with Sango and Kagome's names on one side, a flower he didn't recognize and some lines about friendship on the other. "Miroku…" This one was a little more formal, with no pictures, just the same configuration of names and an encouraging message on different sides.

"Still seems like a waste of time. If you want to say all this crap, you can just say it and not blow your money on these." Inuyasha tapped the space where the addresses were supposed to go. "The hell is this for?"

"People have friends and coworkers who live too far away for that, Inuyasha, so that's so you can tell the post office where to send the cards," Kagome explained, turning her shoulders and hoping he wouldn't see her separating another card from Miroku's. The paper was sturdy, and the ink hadn't run, but the snow had soaked the bottom one almost completely. "And it's the thought that counts, not whatever you write. When you give someone one of these, they know you took the time to buy them a card and write things out on them, and then mail it. Plus, you can keep them and look at them later when you're feeling bad."

"What's the point if you have to do it?" Inuyasha craned around to look at what she was doing. "What's that one?"

"It was yours, but you probably don't want it." She deliberately shifted around and managed to extricate the card without tearing it, out of his sight. Jerk. "We can always make a fire with it instead."

"Well, if it's mine, then give it to me." He moved onto the futon, forgetting the shoji in his curiosity as Kagome twisted to keep it away. "C'mon!"

"No!" Heart fluttering a little at the way he was pressed against her - after all, they were alone, a rare circumstance these days and one she hadn't really contemplated till now - Kagome hunched over protectively. "You don't even like the idea. Why would you want it?"

"`Cause it's mine." Inuyasha made another grab for it, smirking a little as she ran out of retreating space. "Hand it over."

"No!" This was more than a little silly, especially considering how much time she had spent mulling over which card to get for him and what to write, not to mention the anticipation of seeing his reaction; contrariness and habit were stronger, though, and Kagome was not giving it to him without a good game of keepaway at the very least.

"Now you're just being stubborn!" Inuyasha feinted to the left, then made a speedy grab at her right hand and almost got a hold of the card. "Dammit, give it to m-"

Unfortunately, neither had noticed that her kimono's excess did not necessarily translate into more fabric over the places it was usually expected to cover, and their calisthenics had twisted the folds around so that…well, a tiny, still-functional part of his brain reasoned, he was surprised she hadn't noticed a draft across her torso yet, `cause there sure as hell wasn't much to block it.

The wind rose in a shrill howl outside, blasting a new wave of cold into the room, and Kagome began to suspect something even as Inuyasha couldn't help noticing that she hadn't noticed yet. All she knew was that Inuyasha seemed to be holding very still, without saying anything, and she wondered vaguely if he'd decided to try another tack, waiting for her to drop her guard so he could grab it. "Inuyasha?"

No answer. Kagome wriggled around to get a firmer backrest, frowning as he made a sound suspiciously like a squeak. "What're you doing?" She looked at him narrowly over her shoulder, pressing her cold chin into its bare flesh to warm herself. It sure was cold all of a sudden-

And he wasn't looking at her face, not even as she glared at him impatiently, then uneasily. He was just staring, wide-eyed. Huh. Kagome glanced down to follow his gaze. Can he see the card, or "KYAAAAAAA!" Face almost as red as Inuyasha's, she scrunched down, snatching her kimono shut. "OSUWARI!"

Dun went his head on the futon, and some fairly impolite thoughts went with it, effectively flattened by the familiar meeting of his body and hard surface.

"It's not my fault you can't even dress yourself, bitch!" He very slowly hauled himself up, massaging his chin angrily. It was lucky he hadn't stared longer, or else other parts of his anatomy would really be feeling it now-plus his voice would be three octaves higher. "And it's not my fault you wouldn't shut up about those stupid cards and then wouldn't show me mine!"

"If it'll keep you from staring at me, then here! Take it!" Kagome slapped the wet rectangle down next to the indent his head had made and whirled around, arms clutched to her chest angrily.

Glaring at the curve of her back and willing his eyes not to slide anywhere else, Inuyasha shook himself, then scooped up the card and scowled at their names on the back. All four cards were so different that writing out names was a waste of ink. He flipped the thing over, noting a small picture of a dog and scanning the neat lines quickly. Then he reread it, brows drawing together, read it again…and tossed it aside with a snort. "See, that wasn't so bad. You wanna go to sleep now, or are you still pissed?"

Kagome would have loved to sit him again, and just barely reined in her temper. She sat up slowly, speaking very pleasantly but ruining the effect by doing so through gritted teeth. "That's an excellent idea, Inuyasha. I would love to."

The chill in her tone made the room seem positively cozy. Inuyasha shrank back a little. "What the…"

"Forget it, Inuyasha. Now move." Without waiting for him to oblige, Kagome shoved herself into the small space of futon not occupied by Inuyasha's rear, pulling the cover up firmly and ignoring the cold where her kimono rode up her legs and the skin rested right against the rough fabric. "Good night."

Inuyasha snorted again, but he didn't move as the wind blew harder and the sound of teeth chattering scraped his ears. "Night."

Reluctantly, as he was pretty warm, even if she still would've liked to hit him, Kagome prodded at his side. "Get off."

"Why, so you can get a cold and keep me up all night sniffling?" He folded his hands into his sleeves and stuck his nose in the air. "Forget it. My ass is staying right here."

"Then mine isn't." To his dumbfounded irritation, Kagome raised herself onto one elbow and began rearranging her kimono so that she could get out with some modesty-there was just enough light left to make things potentially awkward again.

"What the hell are you doing?" Inuyasha turned around and draped his legs across hers heavily. "Get back in there."

"I have to go to the bathroom," she snapped, and even to her ears it sounded petulant. The only thing worse than lying to get away from him was knowing they both knew she was just lying to get away from him.

"You went less than an hour ago." Inuyasha kept his legs firmly in place as she struggled to get up. "Don't even bother, wench. I told you you're not going anywhere, `specially not outside with all those humans waiting to jump you. Now, what's your real problem?"

"I'm sure it'd be a huge problem if your shard detector got damaged, Inuyasha, but I can take care of myself." Kagome contemplated saying It as he began growling softly, then realized that his head would go straight into her legs unless he moved away, and it became obvious after a brief glaring match that that wasn't happening. She pushed feebly at his calves. "What am I, a prisoner?"

Inuyasha stiffened, and Kagome regretted it the second she realized what she'd said. "I didn't mean it that way, Inuyasha."

"Go out and freeze for all I care." He was off her and facing the door before she could blink again.

"You know that's not what I meant!" Kagome threw off the cover and came around to kneel beside him. "I was just mad that you…" She chewed the inside of her cheek. "That you wouldn't let me up. You know I wouldn't go out with all those jerks standing around anyway."

"Like hell. You'd probably run out and get attacked the second I closed my eyes," he snapped, shifting around testily. "They might just come in here and try to get you anyway."

"Why would they do that?" Kagome shivered despite herself at the thought. "You're right here, and there's nowhere to spend any gold around here even if they did think I had any more."

Inuyasha glared down at her. "Not after the gold, idiot. They might try some of that powder again, or just hope I'm asleep."

"For me?" Kagome's contemptuous snort made Inuyasha's ears swivel sharply, and they didn't stop as she shook her head and rubbed her arms for warmth. "Even if they think I'm your slave or something, they're not gonna go through a hanyou just to `save' me. These guys don't look that noble."

"They're not trying to be noble, you idiot!" Inside his sleeves, Inuyasha's hands tightened on his forearms till the skin almost gave way beneath his claws. Was he going to have to tell her flat-out that she was the most attractive female in the whole village, never mind the damn inn, and that all his putdowns were just meant to keep him from having to think about it? "Look, unless you want every dumbass out there to take a shot at you, just stay in here and get some sleep. Okay?"

Kagome couldn't help flushing a little. However he expressed it, he was worried about her. …Not that she'd forgotten about his behavior with the card, of course. She wasn't ready to give in completely yet. "Couldn't we just wait a few hours or something?"

Inuyasha growled so loudly that Kagome jumped. "No, you can't. Now go to bed."

"But…"

"Go. To. Bed. Now."

"Osuwa-"

Inuyasha clapped a hand across her mouth roughly, eyes wide with panic. "Say it one more time and I'll…!"

Kagome ducked away from under his arm, crossing hers rigidly. Her chest was tight with anger again, temper rising steadily under the additional strain, and the words that came out almost did so of their own volition. "Or you'll what? Leave? Tell those guys the truth and let them sort out who gets to go first while you find the others? If you do, do me a favor and take them their cards, would you? I'm sure they-"

Her world turned upside down, as one second saw her staring into Inuyasha's increasingly furious eyes and the next found her flat on her back, gently but very firmly pinned between his knees and forearms as he glared at her.

"You stupid…" The few wisps of air left in her lungs evaporated at the feel of his arms winding under her back and pulling her up against the solid warmth of his front, so that she could feel the vibrations as he snarled in her ear. "Do you really think I'd let them do that?"

"Uh…" Nice as the lack of cold was, Kagome couldn't quite bring herself to enjoy it. Her brain had decided instead to contemplate their position and the possible ramifications, which was a fairly hefty proposition in itself. It also noted that they were alone. And she'd just provoked him. A lot. Her insides went distinctly fluttery, and not from fear.

"Moron." Inuyasha nuzzled her neck hard, just catching himself before he nipped at it. Her suggestion had pissed him off so thoroughly that his powers of reasoning were still struggling to catch up, and they pretty much agreed with him anyway. "If I never let anyone else do it before, why the fuck would now be different?"

"Never let…?" Kagome tried to force herself to focus on words, not the feeling of hot breath and cold skin against hers. "What do you mean?"

"What do you think I mean?" There went that instinct again. He clenched his jaws shut, dimly aware that he wasn't going to be able to hold himself together much longer if she kept this up-"this" being just herself, of course, without even thinking of that stupid card. His voice somehow grew harsher. "D'you really think this is the first time you've ever had any males drooling after you? Remember what happened when we first ran into Miroku? Did you think that was a fucking fluke, or what?"

"Yeah, I remember you said I was just a shard detector!" Kagome tried to lean away, which was either a very good or an extremely bad idea depending upon perspective. With the grip he had on her, any kind of pressure on her part molded them together at key points even further, and they both registered the slight change instantly.

"Quit it, dammit!" Inuyasha gave her a little shake, pulling up to look her right in the eye. "That was over a year and a half ago, Kagome! You've had all that time and all the places we've ever gone to, and you never saw any men looking at you? What the hell have you been looking at?!"

"Not at the men!" Kagome couldn't stand to meet his eyes anymore. How many conflicting messages is he going to send me before I finally go nuts?! "Look, you made your point, okay? I'm sorry I said it."

"You don't believe me." It wasn't meant as an accusation, just an impulsively voiced thought. Inuyasha scowled as Kagome remained stubbornly silent anyway. "Idiot. Just because someone tells you something doesn't mean they don't actually think you're-"

"Stop it!" Inuyasha loosened his grip at her sudden vehemence. She sat up on her elbows as far as their position would allow, hissing almost right into his face. "It doesn't matter whether I believe you or not! Why would I ever get with another guy when I said I wanted to be with you, huh? Did you ever think about that?!" Inuyasha's hands tightened convulsively on the futon surrounding her head, but she was too angry to notice. "I appreciate you looking out for me, but as long as I'm safe, you shouldn't be acting like you think about it any more than that!"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?!" He thought he knew, but he really hoped he was wrong. The argument's momentum was propelling them right into a topic long forbidden by unspoken agreement.

"You know exactly what I mean! How do you think Kikyou would like it if she saw us right now?!" Kagome felt almost sick just saying it, sick with anger at Inuyasha for pushing her like this, sick with disgust for herself, wanting him to be protective of her for more reason than the damn jewel shards and knowing that he had already bound himself to the dead priestess and would just be further conflicted if anything ever happened between them. It wasn't fair, and putting themselves in compromising situations like this wouldn't help anything, no matter how much she loved him.

Inuyasha felt like he'd been run through, words cutting more deeply than any blade or set of claws ever had. It was true, of course, and he'd been the one to break the carefully maintained stalemate, trapping her beneath him and obliquely trying to convince her that she was desirable like this. Even if it had been an automatic reaction, that didn't make it excusable.

Good sense decreed that he make some kind of apology now, or at least get off and tell her to get to sleep. It was easier to control himself when she wasn't up and moving around, arguing with him, being herself and sometimes driving him to distraction…

Two things kept him. One was a glimpse of wet beige next to the futon, where he'd tossed the card. In dismissing it, he had also tried to ignore the puzzlement, the sense of wonder he always felt when he was with Kagome and she said or did something he didn't understand. Right on the heels of her indignation with the people who'd simply been acting on what he'd been taught all his life - that hanyou were worthless, cursed, filthy, dirt beneath youkai feet and no better than dangerous animals to humans - there had been a few simple words on that card, as if he needed further proof that Kagome's loyalty and devotion concealed no ulterior motives, pity, or contempt, as he'd tried to convince himself:

To Inuyasha:

Hello and Happy New Year to my favorite jerk. Maybe this year we'll find the rest of the shards, but till then, at least you're in good company, right? Just do me a favor and pretend you are. Live for the moment once in a while. And smile! It doesn't hurt, I promise.

~Kagome

Even that, he could almost ignore. He could almost get off the futon and pretend nothing had happened, the way they always did.

What he couldn't ignore was the thud of Kagome's heart just behind her ribs, coupled with a sweet, lightly intoxicating tug at his nostrils - well, at least they were working again - robbing him of whatever strength his limbs might've utilized to lift him away. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, reveling in the soft warmth, and abandoned the last shreds of pretense that she didn't love him and wasn't growing more and more aroused the longer he spent around her-never with Miroku, or that stinking wolf, or any of the human men who stopped her to ask for directions, who her father was, pretending they didn't know she wasn't a local just to talk with her. "Kagome…"

Her throat closed. If he didn't get off her now, she was going to lose it, and her pride wouldn't let her even think of it, not in front of him like this. "Inuyasha, don't."

The sadness overlaying her desperate whisper stung his ears, and Kagome involuntarily clutched at his shoulders as he swept her up, breathing deeply and letting her scent flood his awareness. "I'm…" His arms tightened till she could hardly breathe. "I'm sorry."

Kagome went rigid with shock. Getting hugged was unusual enough, but hearing him apologize? And for…what?

"I…didn't mean to throw that thing like that. I know you got it for me." Inuyasha burned inwardly at his own cowardice. He was always doing that, always letting these moments slide and keeping things as nonchalant, meaningless as possible lest he let anything slip, even when it was something she needed or wanted to hear. Worse, Kagome knew, and she never held it against him. She seemed to understand him better than he did, and yet she still…

"It's okay," Kagome murmured, squeezing his shoulders reassuringly. His ears nearly slid all the way back into his hair as it sank in that she knew damn well he wasn't just sorry about the card. "Don't worry about it."

Inuyasha shook his head. "It's not okay." His hands trailed aimlessly down her back, and she shuddered slightly, wondering hazily if he could smell what he was doing to her. Maybe that was why he was looking so ashamed of himself, like a small child trying to make up for something without really knowing how, unwilling or unable to ask for help. "None of this shit has been fair to you. It's dangerous, and it's not even your time."

"Inuyasha, we've been through this. I'm the one who shattered the Jewel, and I'm not leaving you till everything's settled." Kagome tentatively reached up to stroke his hair, relaxing a little when he permitted her to run her fingers through the thick silver-white tangle. "We should go to sleep now."

Inuyasha didn't answer. His body grew a little heavier, pressing her back against the futon more firmly. For a moment, she thought he was going to try to take her suggestion without getting up. He's breathing a little weird for trying to sleep, though…

Hands slid to her waist, and the nearby, all-too-familiar itch she'd been trying to ignore deepened into a sharp ache as long, clawed fingers rested on her hips and began to rub slowly, moving in gentle circles over the sensitive skin. A little sigh escaped her, and the hands lifted abruptly, pushing Inuyasha up and off her.

Disappointment rose like bile, and Kagome tried to remind herself why it was that she had wanted him off, not touching her. This was for the best. They'd just regret it if-

"Kagome." The rasp in her ear drove her sense of responsibility off like a cockroach under a kitchen light, and she twined her arms around his neck..

She wouldn't have thought anything could've affected her more than the sound of her name on that pleading note, so unlike anything she'd ever heard from Inuyasha before. A light touch against her lips proved her wrong, though, as he leaned down almost fearfully and kissed her, once, so gently that she might've mistaken it but for a tiny breath as he lifted his head. "Kagome, I'm…I'm not…"

Kagome's mouth fell open, heart squeezing painfully. Even after all this time, he was afraid to say anything or go further. Was it fear of rejection? Or shame?

"They think you're either a slave or a whore."

The words circled around her mind, burned into her memory, and she almost shuddered. If it hurt her just to hear them, how did he feel, telling her? Did he even half-believe that it had to have some truth in it, that no one could ever love a hanyou as he was?

Inuyasha waited for her reaction, not daring to breathe, and closed his eyes against the stinging smell of salt. She was crying, or tearing up, and he'd caused it. Again. Had he ever seen her cry for any other reason?

He heard and felt her take a deep breath. "Have I ever told you guys about Christmas, Inuyasha?"

Inuyasha grunted softly at the unexpected question. "The hell is that?" The name sounded vaguely familiar. What was it? A kind of food? No, some foreign religion. He didn't really care for that kind of thing, but so long as it kept her from crying, he'd talk about whatever she wanted.

"I told you about it when I was gone a week ago, Inuyasha. It's a holiday you spend with your family and friends…" She swallowed. "Or with your…uh…significant other. Boyfriend, or husband, or whatever." When she'd called her friends Christmas Eve, Eri had informed her that Yuka had fibbed to her parents and gone out with her boyfriend. Kagome had been the only one who wasn't eager to get all the details the next day, though she knew just as well as her other friends how they'd spent the evening.

"…And?" Inuyasha tried to keep his voice appropriately bored, though his hackles were already a little raised. Did this have a point? "What'd you do?"

"Went to a hotel with three or four guys and had some fun." Kagome tried to suppress a giggle at his choking noises. "I'm just kidding! I was with my family." Her face went slightly warm, but she ducked her head and continued, quiet with disbelief at what she was about to say. "It was nice, but I really wished you were there. We never get any time to ourselves any more…" She shrugged. "And look at us now."

"…So, you weren't serious about the other guys, right?" Inuyasha sniffed at her, more suspiciously this time, and Kagome sighed in exasperation. He reminded himself that there hadn't been any weird smells on her when she came back and nodded shortly. "Okay, okay, I get it." Inuyasha arranged himself to block as much as possible of a renewed gust of snow-laden air. "Not much I coulda done in your era. You guys won't even let me leave the house."

"You wouldn't have to leave the house for the kind of-" Kagome choked to a stop. Why was she telling him this?! "Forget I said that. The point was, I thought of you. Okay?"

Inuyasha grunted again. Useful as this pointless nammering was in distracting him, and as used to it as he was, it was really getting annoying. Maybe because it really wasn't that pointless… "It's not gettin' any warmer. You'd better get to sleep."

"Tell me about it." Kagome didn't know whether to be relieved or annoyed that he hadn't taken the hint-or that he had and was trying to ignore it. Either way, she was starting to contradict herself. Time for sleep, and no more horny/angsty vacillation. "Good night…."

"Night, Kagome." Melancholy was unmistakable, and Kagome scowled up at him as he sat up. He scowled back defensively. "What?"

"If you're thinking you've done something horribly wrong again, quit it." She tweaked his hair lightly and smiled. Then, on pure impulse, she rather imperiously held out her arms. "You're warm. Gimme some and we'll call it even."

There are certain times when a single moment becomes frozen indelibly in one's mind, to be recalled with perfect clarity any time thereafter, sometimes with good reason and sometimes not. The former was true now, as Inuyasha glanced cautiously at Kagome in the near-dark and saw her all at once in startling detail: soft mouth curved impishly, eyes also mischievous and a little hopeful, hair strewn in a disarming mess across her neck and the white kimono…and arms open so that he couldn't possibly hope to mistake the request. His breath stuck in his throat at the impact such a little gesture had made-she was asking for a hug, not propositioning him, after all.

Asking. Even now, with no response, Kagome was starting to lower her arms. When he still didn't move, she turned away with a sigh of mock pique, but genuine resignation. "You're no fun." She shifted onto her side, facing away from him, and his mouth flapped soundlessly like a fish, trying to explain himself. Her ears naturally caught nothing, so she yawned. "Oh, well. G'night."

His legs wouldn't move. All he could see was her smiling at him, and the first time anyone had ever actually asked him to touch them. Culturally, it was a fairly intimate request, and she did still smell extremely aroused…but that hadn't been all that was behind it, he knew, or else she wouldn't have left him the choice of refusing.

To put it simply, Inuyasha was fully - if precariously - capable of resisting appeals made by Kagome's body. What he had no intention of ignoring this time was one directly from her heart.

Kagome was roused from a haze of hurt rationalization by a touch on her shoulder. She sat up, blinking up at Inuyasha. "Yeah? What is it?"

Inuyasha didn't answer. He flipped the cover aside and stretched out again, settling down on his side this time and pulling her up against his chest in a secure embrace before she could protest. Her pulse picked up steadily as Inuyasha stroked her cheek with one rough thumb, raising her head so that their eyes were almost level.

Kagome suddenly found out that one's heart skipping a beat was actually possible, then swiftly forgot as Inuyasha closed the short distance between them to kiss her again, still gentle and hesitant, with ample room to pull away if she so chose.

She didn't pull away. Kagome chose instead to edge closer, resting one hand on his chest and trying to put as much assurance that this was okay as possible into the press of her lips, letting her eyes drift shut. Inuyasha rumbled, sending little tingles through her palm, and she found herself held tighter, one clawed hand moving to the back of her head. Contentment washed over her, eroding her disappointment and uncertainty till she couldn't even fuzzily recall what they'd been fighting about just before.

When he abruptly broke it off, the shock was like a dash of ice water to the face-not surprising, considering how warm and nice-smelling he was compared to the musty, frigid air, but still unpleasant. Kagome rolled her lips in to retain some of the warmth and feel of him, burying her face in the rough haori with a little sigh. Well, it had been something, at least, and the thud of his heart, the rise and fall of his chest, were downright soothing, the perfect complement to a good night's sleep.

The hand at her neck moved up to her hair, separating and smoothing through till his fingers reached her scalp. She relaxed, mistaking the motion for an impromptu massage till it tightened, drawing her head back to look him in the eye again.

By now, her human eyes could only discern faint golden gleams, but what she did see literally took her breath away, and that was all the warning she got before his mouth descended yet again, more rough this time, almost demanding.

The ache returned full force, sharpening as Inuyasha pulled away, only to flick wet warmth against the corner of her mouth, then roll her onto her back and dip his head to begin licking the column of her throat. Kagome gasped sharply and tried to wriggle away, but he had already moved to trap her thighs between his knees. "Inu…"

Inuyasha merely lifted her so that her head naturally fell back and turned his attention to the skin under her left ear. Hot and cold ran up and down her leg with each stroke, warm breath and instantly cooled saliva wreaking similar havoc on her nerves. Kagome shuddered and arched her back, craning her neck to allow him better access as the sensations rapidly ceased to feel alien and became incredibly pleasant instead. She tried to move her legs again, arching just a bit further, and made a soft noise of approval when he rumbled against her chest and tightened his grip. Somehow, the notion of being trapped wasn't annoying or panicking anymore: it was downright erotic.

"Do that again," he mumbled against her right ear, catching the lobe between fang and tongue to pull at it very gently, steadying her head with his forearm. Kagome yelped, grabbing at his shoulders blindly as her body flexed against him and stayed there; Inuyasha chose that moment to trace the curves leading into her ear, wetting them lightly and then delving swiftly into the canal itself.

Her reaction was completely unexpected, as her slender frame thrashed around hard and Kagome cried out loud enough to startle them both. Inuyasha snarled very quietly, stilling her almost instantly save for a few whimpers. "Damn, woman…" Mindful of his newfound power over her, Inuyasha leaned in, smirking at the way she trembled and her scent spiked yet again just at the touch of his breath. His voice dropped to the barest of whispers. "Kinda sensitive there, huh?"

Kagome took a deep, shuddering breath. Her hand snaked up to stroke one of his ears gently, and he almost went limp at the first touch, exhaling on a groan as she used thumb and forefinger to run across the velvety inside and outside at the same time. "Uhhhh…" Inuyasha let his head drop to her shoulder, nuzzling the wet trail on her throat feebly. His knees began to buckle. "That's not fair."

She rested her cheek against his head and paused her stroking to scrub the cold damp off one side of her neck. One knee shifted to take his weight, while the other foot made her yelp at a frigid tap on her ankle. "Don't stop," he mumbled without knowing he had spoken, easing one leg between hers and letting almost all his weight fall across Kagome's body.

"Your feet are freezing." Kagome let herself enjoy the heavy warmth, then pushed at his shoulders as yet another blast of wind hit him full in the back. "Come on, it's warmer under the cover."

Inuyasha started, just enough for her to feel his muscles jerk involuntarily. "Underneath? That's not a good idea."

"Why?" Kagome forced a few deep breaths to clear out her brain. It largely didn't work, but her powers of speech were still functional, at least. "Do I have cooties all of a sudden?"

Her teasing went right over his head, which was just as well. "There's nothing wrong with you. That's the problem." A shift of his hips brought her attention to a hard lump against her pelvis that didn't feel like the surrounding flesh, bone or muscle. Her eyes widened, and she waited tensely for him to speak. "Yeah." He heaved a short sigh. "I think…that's enough, Kagome. You need to get some rest, and there's still the chance someone might try to break in." He burrowed into her neck, giving the skin another nuzzle before slowly lifting onto his side again.

"But…" To be brutally frank, she wanted more, and she doubted that necking was all he'd had in mind when he started, either. It seemed a little slutty to say as much, though…. Feeling a slight prickle of shame, Kagome sighed and nodded ruefully. Stupid hormones. And feelings. "Yeah, I know. Just…could you just stay under with me for a few minutes, till it gets warmed up again? You kinda let most of it out."

Now that was an invitation if he'd ever heard one. Inuyasha could feel his left ear quivering ever so slightly at the thought. It had been juuust a little alarming to discover how difficult it was to get the taste of dried sweat, the soft cling of her hands, and those little sounds she made off his mind, and keep them off. Inuyasha shook his head, forcing his voice to stay firm and his brain to focus. "Sure, but just for a minute."

It wasn't till after he'd arranged himself comfortably against her back beneath the cover and noticed that his pelvis fit rather snugly under her thighs that he remembered: he was supposed to have told her no. "Fuck!"

"Hm?" Kagome turned her head, then turned back and yawned.

Inuyasha's eye twitched. "Nothing. Go to sleep."

To his upper head's vast relief - and the lower one's grumbling dissatisfaction - Kagome finally did fall asleep, after several minutes, leaving him with a warm, sweet-smelling but safe armful. His second brain would get over it, he reasoned cynically. It always did. Its attention span was irritatingly dedicated, but he'd learned that if he ignored it long enough, or forced himself to think of something else, i.e. his brother naked-yep, there it went, cringing back into hiding. Another crisis averted for now.

No, he mused, he and Kagome had done more than enough, taken a bit of the edge off the ever-present tension without really crossing any lines. Not the most honorable way around it, but if she wasn't going to worry about it outwardly, he wouldn't, either. At least not tonight, anyway, and tomorrow they'd be able to relocate their friends, and everything would be back to normal. He tried not to feel put out about that, concentrating on the rare feeling of having someone to keep warm and keep him warm instead, and found that that worked nicely.

The last solidly coherent thought he had was that he might even be grateful to the assholes who ran this place, without whom they never would've gotten to be alone for this long. Kagome turned over, cuddling in her sleep, and he tipped her face up to brush his lips against hers in one last gesture of affection before morning and normalcy returned.

Without waking, the girl sighed deeply, creeping up against him till he wondered dimly whether she could still breathe, and looped an arm around his neck, giving him renewed difficulty in thinking properly. As Inuyasha moved to put some space between them and distract himself again, Kagome suddenly shifted up, yanked his head back with her free arm and attacked his throat-there was no other word for the way she scraped her teeth down the side hard enough to leave burning tracks, then latched onto his pulse point and sucked the taut flesh into a knot between her lips.

Well, Brain Number Two didn't give a fuck where she had learned how to do that, or why she was doing it now. All Inuyasha knew now was that if it was gratifying to be doing this to someone who enjoyed it, having that someone unexpectedly return the favor was rapidly turning his bones into mush. Even after the initial shock lessened somewhat, pushing her off or asking questions didn't even occur to him: the frail, weakling human girl had the powerful hanyou whimpering and straining into her feebly within seconds, and he couldn't have cared less what he looked like so long as she kept going.

Of course, as the ferocity gradually died down to a line of light nips around his chin and the world started to reassert itself, Inuyasha slowly shook himself awake, glanced down at the dark head nestled against his shoulder, and reluctantly patted her back. "Oi." His voice was cracked and feeble. He swallowed hard, shaking her more vigorously. "Kagome. Wake up." The pressure on his neck sharpened, and he yelped involuntarily at the answering twinge in his groin. Not even that was going to convince him it would be okay to fuck her without even waking her up, and he shook her in near panic lest it somehow make him forget that. "Wake up now!"

Here Kagome was, having the most pleasant dream imaginable, and something was trying to ruin it. It even sounded like Inuyasha. She stubbornly set her jaws. He ruins everything. Maybe if I bite hard enough, he'll shut up…ow!

The grip on her hair vanished as she squirmed away. Cool air slapped her in the face, and Kagome jerked awake. "Wha…?" She pulled back, legs encountering a solid mass, and grimaced. Where was she? "Mmmmmph." Her lips were cold….Why was her mouth wet? Panicked, Kagome swiped at it, licking her lips for the familiar copper of blood. No, that taste wasn't blood, not like anything she knew of…what the…?

"Oi." Inuyasha's voice startled her again, right next to her ear. Belatedly she realized that that must be the rest of him under the cover, which meant they were sharing a futon…at the inn. Right.

Kagome closed her eyes, frowning slightly, and swallowed again. Why was Inuyasha breathing so hard?

She wasn't left in suspense. Inuyasha nudged her onto her back and deliberately pressed his hips into hers, drawing back at her gulp. "You do anything else to me, bitch, and I'm not responsible for what happens. Got that?"

The dream came back to her in startling detail, and she suddenly realized why her mouth was wet and what that taste had been.

Funny, she really should've been embarrassed…but Inuyasha was sounding pretty desperate. Hmmm.

Kagome tilted her head this way and that, contemplating it with apparent calm, though he could hear her heart racing. With the way her scent rose to near-smothering intensity, her thoughtful answer shouldn't have surprised him as much as it did. "You know…I think I'd like that, actually." She sealed both their fates and held out her arms again.

His hand fisted in her hair, mouth crushed hers, hips ground into her pelvis till her legs slid apart and he could settle comfortably between them, rocking himself hard against the yielding softness. Kagome braced herself to twine her legs around his, gasping as he twisted away from the kiss and changed the angle of their heads in order to plunge into her mouth, stroking her tongue aside and tasting the smooth planes behind her teeth, around her lips and the roof of her mouth. His fangs met the slick wet of her tongue, and she winced, then moved so that the pressure was more pleasurable than painful.

Every nerve in Kagome's body was afire now, ache only partly soothed by the increasingly rapid motions against her center. As Inuyasha drew her up against him and continued exploring her mouth with quick little thrusts of lips and tongue, she wriggled impatiently against the fabric separating them. He pulled back, perceived that the sudden movement wasn't resistance, and smirked. She was getting impatient already, was she?

One of his hands caught each of her wrists, which he transferred to one hand and easily held above her head, just off the cold, rough floor. Kagome tugged at them and felt that odd exultation again: she couldn't move, leaving her fully exposed to Inuyasha's eyes and other hand. She rocked her hips experimentally and was rewarded with a grunt. "Hold still." His legs moved into a more effective cage, and Kagome noted with satisfaction that she was almost immobilized.

Icy air on her skin made her jump, but Inuyasha ignored her half-hearted protests and leisurely skimmed the huge kimono folds away from her collarbone, undoing the frogs to expose her inner curves. Kagome couldn't see anything but silhouettes in the dark, but she could feel where he stopped and hear his breathing as he lowered his head. Warm puffs of air as he sniffed up and down her torso had her wriggling anew, and he chuckled darkly. She was waiting for him to say something again when a cold, rough palm dropped lightly onto her breastbone and callused fingers fanned out, tips barely resting on her breasts.

Inuyasha moved to capture her mouth again, pressing down softly all along her body as she arched and twisted beneath him. "Easy, bitch." The derogative term felt more possessive to her ears than scornful, and she subsided, trembling with renewed excitement as he moved his claws in light circles. "That's better." The cold dissipated with the descent of Inuyasha's head and a wet, hot tug on her right breast.

Though he effectively prohibited her from moving, Inuyasha didn't stop her from making noise now, enjoying the soft, gasping moans and the fact that she was not only permitting but encouraging him immensely. So far as he knew, no other male - and of course no females, as titillating as that thought briefly was - had ever touched her like this, and he had every intention of showing his appreciation.

As he knew by sound and smell, he really didn't have to exert much effort to do so, because Kagome was almost mindless with pleasure already. The feeling was nothing like what she'd imagined: no fantasy could ever replicate the exquisite pain of his fangs and lips scraping, pulling and devouring the hypersensitive flesh, moving with carefully reined eagerness to make it clear that she was his without inflicting real damage.

The clincher was that she was pinned and couldn't move away or stop the assault, yet enjoyed it knowing that he'd cease immediately if she asked; he alternated mouth and fingers till her breasts were just beginning to grow sore and his tongue slowed. He released her arms, running the claws of his cold hand across her belly, and sighed hugely as her arms promptly hugged his head to her breasts, wetting his cheek.

Nearly a minute passed in that fashion, Kagome stroking his ears idly and catching her breath, Inuyasha nuzzling her occasionally in order to keep from ripping the rest of their clothes off and hurting her quite a bit. He knew a little about women's bodies thanks to bits and pieces picked up as a child, and chunks thrown at him by Miroku, enough to tell him that he had to be careful in the actual mating, which would probably be painful as it was. What else had the bouzu said…?

The weight around her legs lifted, and Kagome moved around to restore the circulation, mouth going dry. Was he…? "Inuyasha?"

Hands on her hips paused, and he leaned over to kiss her briefly. "Don't know what I'm doing, `cept for instinct. Stop me if…if I screw up." Linguistic capabilities exhausted, Inuyasha moved away long enough to shrug off his haori, and Kagome caught at it, clutching the rough fabric like a lifeline. She was too aroused to be scared, but a little thrill of nervous anticipation slid up her spine as Inuyasha shoved the last of his garments aside and carefully sank back down next to her, wearing nothing but his beads and Tessaiga close at hand. The difference was immediately apparent to each, Kagome taking as much interest in the feel of Inuyasha's surprisingly smooth skin as he did in hers.

A strangely rubbery, warm and wet poke on her thigh got Kagome's undivided attention, and Inuyasha frowned faintly as she shrank back a little. "What?"

"Um…never, uh, seen one before. It's kind of…" Kagome gulped and tried to peek inside the futon, which was naturally far too dark to reveal anything. "Can I…"

"Can you…what?" She didn't answer. Inuyasha didn't get her meaning till her small hand groped down his chest, found his hip and slid down hesitantly.

Every fiber in his body tensed, and it was with supreme effort that he reached for her hand, resting it in his and going no further. "Are you sure?" He was sure he'd explode if something didn't happen very fucking soon, but he was determined not to scare her away.

Face burning, Kagome butted her head into his bare chest, closed her eyes, and rubbed his hip, freeing her hand to trace a line of sinew down to his groin - she'd always loved that muscle - and spread her fingers, palm flat like his had been on her chest, creeping over his belly so slowly that Inuyasha squinted his eyes shut, fangs gritted against the urge to scream.

Kagome encountered little snarls of hair, delved lower, and finally felt a hot push against her thumb. Inuyasha's hips jerked as she curled her thumb around the base and carefully ringed the shaft with her other fingers. A disbelieving groan, another jerk of his hips, and Kagome made a swift series of discoveries: hard as the tissue itself was, the skin was amazingly soft and elastic, stretching easily as she moved her hand down the strained length to find the very wet and soft head, and all she had to do to pleasure him was take her time exploring.

Inuyasha's whole body went rigid, hips thrashing helplessly when Kagome moved her fingers over the tip and spread a bead of wet around the head, circling the sensitive area ruthlessly. "Ka…" He shuddered violently, biting his cheeks till he tasted blood to keep from shoving her down and taking her as hard as his body told him she was asking for.

Even that thought evaporated at a stroke on the tiny ridge underneath where the head met the rest of the shaft, arguably the most sensitive place on his body. Kagome jumped as Inuyasha threw his head back on a choked, gasping moan and grabbed her hand, unable to stop himself from pumping the increasingly soaked length through her curled fingers, spreading the natural lubrication to keep the skin from catching. "I…c…can't…"

Too fascinated and gratified to be disgusted by the strange wetness, Kagome murmured an assurance and tightened her grip. Inuyasha's hand also closed further as the speed and intensity increased, rocking both of them with each buck till her hand felt ready to cramp. His lips sought her neck, fumbling kisses down to her shoulder and clamping down as he abruptly stopped, moved his other hand to the joining under the covers and jerked convulsively, trembling so hard that she was briefly afraid he'd hurt himself when he finished.

A muffled scream next to her ear scared Kagome half to death, and Inuyasha ground himself directly into her palm, back bowing so that he nearly shoved her straight through the floor, and more wetness spread through her hand, trickling through her fingers into his waiting hands. His face stayed in her shoulder as the jerking slowed, and with one last gasping thrust Inuyasha went limp, hips still shuddering from time to time.

Wow. Well, that takes care of Inuyasha's Christmas present… Kagome deemed it best not to move her cramping fingers yet, running her free hand through his hair to calm him instead. She could feel his heart thundering against her breast, and a light film of sweat coated his lower half beneath the futon despite the ever-deepening chill.

Inuyasha's rasping, irregular breathing soon began to slow, and he had to swallow several times before he could speak. "Sorry. Didn't mean to…go that fast." Now that it was over, he couldn't quite believe he'd done that right in her hand. Had he even given her any choice about it?

"As long as you enjoyed it, don't worry about it." Kagome rested her cheek against his, then lifted her head away so he could sit up again.

Inuyasha snorted. Hell, he'd enjoyed it enough for fifteen people-he'd thought about Kagome every time he touched himself for over a year now, but none of those occasions had ever included reassurance that he wasn't somehow indirectly defiling her by doing so. "Here…" He eased their hands away from his gradually softening flesh, pulled them out of the covers, and raised them to his face. Even she had to be able to smell it, he thought absently as he contemplated what to do with the mess, then shrugged nonchalantly and began to lap it off their fingers and her palm.

Kagome realized what that odd smell was - kind of like peanut butter, almost - just as he started cleaning up the most effective way available, and she wondered hazily whether he'd have to clean her up the same way, because she had to have soaked through her underwear, possibly the kimono by now. Her free hand crept down awkwardly, around his legs and between hers.

Inuyasha cleaned the last bit off her palm and sucked her forefinger into his mouth instead, raising an eyebrow at her sharp moan. It couldn't just be…nope, sure enough, he noted by glancing down under the covers, she'd gone and cheated on him. "Oi."

"Huh?" Kagome withdrew her hand, which was deftly captured by the wrist, brought up to Inuyasha's face and subjected to a long inspection. It really wasn't necessary, as he could smell the stuff on her fingers about five miles off on a good day, but it gave him an excuse to sniff it over thoroughly and savor the prospect of what he was about to do.

"Inuyasha?" Kagome found herself scooped up and laid out on the futon more comfortably. To her consternation, Inuyasha kicked the cover aside entirely again, exposing her uncovered body to the cold. "Are you crazy?! Give that back!"

"This won't take long. Just relax." Inuyasha wished for more light as he lowered himself over her for another nip at her neck, taking his time moving down her breasts, nuzzling and licking in passing, nipping her belly and placing a restraining hand on her stomach as she tried to sit up. "I said to stay down." A twinge of instinct brought him back up, pressing her to the futon with his body, where he stayed for a second, sitting up and mouthing her throat when he was satisfied she'd gotten the point.

Kagome's flesh pebbled as his warmth and the cover were withdrawn, though his hands on her hips did make for decent distraction. She shuddered from cold and pleasure at the scrape of material down her thighs-there went her panties. With nothing covering her down there, the air was really cold against the wetness. Kagome crossed her arms and shivered, anticipation rising as Inuyasha pushed her thighs apart and started to come back up. Maybe he could lie down on her again and-

And wet was no longer cold, but hot from his mouth forming a tight, gentle seal over her inner lips, tongue running a warm trail up from there to the nerve-rigid nub of flesh just below her belly…and pausing to bathe it, pressing hot dabs of his lips and tongue as it became apparent from her gasping shrieks - restraint was nowhere to be found on either of their minds now - that this spot required quite a bit of attention.

The half-formed erection he'd acquired smelling her grew firm instantly at her first moan, and he almost climaxed again at the sound of his name and a fist tangled in his hair, shoving him insistently into what her straining hips were already offering freely. He wound his arms around her thighs and delved into her body itself, thrusting his tongue repeatedly through the tight passage, growling softly when the moaning rose several octaves. Kagome was quite certain she was going to die, or at least pass out from the sheer pleasure of it, especially when the growls vibrated through her flesh and it was all she could do to mouth his name.

His ears, rigidly focused on her, flattened as he snarled and rose to seal his lips against her mound, sucking and flicking in turn till the tightness winding down unbearably in Kagome's loins snapped and she drew a single, huge breath.

"Bitch," she heard distantly. Whether it was a claim, challenge or instinct asserting itself, Kagome didn't know or care as Inuyasha pressed with his lips again and allowed his fang to touch her for just an instant.

If Kagome hadn't subconsciously caught herself and sank her teeth into her own fist at the last split-second, people on the other side of the village would have been roused from sleep by the scream of a hanyou's name, and even then her muffled sobs didn't die out for the count of thirty. When they did, it was before Inuyasha stopped teasing the wet, exhausted muscles into just one more throb around his tongue and let her lay back to rest.

As Kagome panted and stroked his ears slowly in the aftermath, Inuyasha gently cleaned her and reflected, without putting words to concepts, that if they kept this up, one or both of them was always going to be hornier than a kappa's head. There wouldn't be a better time for it, either, with the way they were both relaxed and Kagome wet enough for both of them. He stopped licking and forced himself away from her long enough to retrieve the futon cover.

"Thanks," Kagome whispered as he arranged it over them, and Inuyasha gathered her up against him. Her eyes drooped shut.

"Uh…" Inuyasha tried to quell a shaft of panic. Did she actually want to go to sleep now? "Uh…Kagome?" That dominating instinct seemed to come and go as it pleased. Now he was back to near-shyness-though he supposed he did have an excuse, considering the subject. "Do you…do you think we could…?" He gaped at a soft snore. "Oh, come on!"

Kagome began giggling softly, and he wanted to tear his hair out, settling for a growl instead. "That wasn't funny!"

"I thought so," she said loftily, and turned her face up to kiss him playfully on the cheek. "So, what did you want to do?"

It didn't involve any further teasing, as he made very clear with a hard push into her mouth and by easing himself over her, kneeling between her legs with thinly veiled eagerness. Kagome sobered quickly, returning the kiss with such enthusiasm that Inuyasha had to break it off and clear his head, returning to what he'd been trying to do when they got diverted. "Kagome…" He worked the residual taste of her around in his mouth, swallowing it and looking into her eyes, wishing again that the damn innkeepers had provided some small lamps at the very least. "I really don't want to hurt you. If you want to just go to sleep, we can still leave off here."

Half his primary brain and 110% of the second one screamed at him for his stupidity, but he ignored them steadily, stroking Kagome's face lightly. He wasn't the brightest or most dependable male in the world, but he'd rip his eyes out before he hurt Kagome, no matter how much he wanted her and how little he deserved her.

"I don't want to go to sleep," Kagome said quietly, running her fingers up his arm to emphasize the point. "But…" Now that they were back to Thinking again, she was acutely aware that it wasn't a good idea. But…

She hesitated, fully conscious that she was about to take a huge step, one she'd been avoiding for myriad reasons. Love and lust battled it out with reason and logic, and Kagome closed her eyes in utter agony. What do I do?

Whether it was the tension still humming in the air despite both their releases, or the prospect of losing this chance, or the sudden notion that the first day of the New Year was as good a time as any to clear the air, she didn't know, but Kagome saw quite clearly that she couldn't reject or accept without being completely honest. It was too important: she had to get this off her chest. "Do you want to know the truth, Inuyasha?"

She felt his heart speed up noticeably, and then a slow nod. Here goes… Deep breath. "The truth is, I think…you're…beautiful." It felt good to tell him flat-out, but her heart constricted at the thought of his reaction. For the first time, she was grateful for the darkness. Deep breath. "People look at you, and they don't always see a handsome, sweet, loyal guy with a good heart and a lot of defense mechanisms, and you know what? That's their loss. If they look at you and see just a hanyou, they're…" She groped around for something, anything sufficient to express the depth of her frustration. "They're not worth the time it takes for you to tell them to go fuck themselves."

"Kagome!" Whatever his feelings about the rest of it, at least that had worked: he actually sounded shocked.

"What?" Kagome giggled softly, swiping a tear from one eye. "It's true. I…I really can't think of any other way to put it. I just hate it when they-"

"I don't give a rat's ass what they think of me," he said harshly, cutting her off. "For the last fucking time, I didn't want to come in here because then you would have to put up with everything I usually have to. I can take it. It doesn't matter." A light rap of his knuckle on her forehead. "But you keep throwing yourself into all kinds of shit you shouldn't have to. Cleaning up after you gets old."

Kagome's hackles rose. "That doesn't matter to me, Inuyasha!"

"Yeah, well, maybe it matters to me, okay?" Inuyasha snapped, forcing her to look around at him despite the dark. "You think I like walking around with you and knowing people look down on you because you're with me?"

"Who cares whether they do or not?!" Kagome was ready to strangle him. Back to square one. "What they think is their problem, and whether it gets to you or not is yours!"

"That's not the fucking point!" Inuyasha raked a hand through his hair, unnerved at how badly her admission had thrown him off. "You're wasting your time on me, Kagome." His jaw clenched. Out with it- "I'm not even free to…to love you or not."

"I know that, Inuyasha." He flinched just as she reached to touch his cheek, and she drew back, hurt. "All right, fine. If you don't even want me to touch you any more, just say so." She laced her hands together tightly. "I love you, Inuyasha, but I'm only human, and I can't keep this up. We've already established that I want you, and…well, you seem to have gotten over your aversion to me-" Inuyasha swallowed hard. "But we can't keep going back and forth between only friends, friends with benefits, crush, or whatever."

There was a beat of silence. Kagome drew a long, quavering breath and exhaled. "The point is, Inuyasha, it's up to you-if your heart doesn't tell you that it'd be wrong, then, yes, I'd like to…finish what we started." Kagome winced at her own phrasing. "I'm not saying I want your wholehearted commitment, because it's…it's not yours to give." Gods, that hurt. Her eyes stung horribly. What was she doing? Why didn't she just come out with it? "I know you don't love me. Wanna screw anyway?" "Just make up your mind, okay? I don't want to sleep with you and be the only one hoping it means anything."

Trust Kagome to make such a simple question so complicated. A dry hand had methodically squeezed the air from Inuyasha's lungs and replaced it with sand. He couldn't believe what he was hearing-Kagome knew he couldn't be with her. Even if they did become lovers, there were too many complications standing between them and a relationship of any depth. The Jewel was almost complete; assuming everything went according to plan, his life then belonged to Kikyou, and he'd have to leave everyone, leave Kagome behind. She knew it better than he did, and she wasn't going to force him to change his mind…yet she would still give herself to him now if he asked.

Why? He buried his hands in his hair, aware that Kagome was waiting for his answer, quiet and patient as always when he needed to think and she'd had her say.

Inuyasha knew why. He'd suspected for a while, never allowing himself to think about it lest he have to deal with it somehow…no, because he knew that coming out with it, even just to himself, wouldn't change anything.

It worked both ways, at least. He should know. Life was just so much simpler this way, without Kagome having to acknowledge that loving her stubborn hanyou didn't mean she could spend her life with him, and without Inuyasha having to swallow his pride long enough to tell her he loved her with a depth of feeling that scared the shit out of him, and would rather have her hate him and wish him dead than love him and mourn him when he was gone. So much easier to think of Kikyou instead, longing for the days before Naraku had tricked them into turning against each other and concentrating on his pledge to die for her.

…What else could he do?

Yes, Kagome was brave enough to tell him her feelings and bring it out into the open, knowing he was likely going to hurt her for it, made all the worse by his regret for doing so.

And, yes, she made him feel more peaceful, happy and content with who, where and what he was than anyone ever had. Of course he wanted her to be happy in return. Did that justify sleeping with her now when they had no possible future together?

What had she said? "If your heart doesn't say it would be wrong." Something like that-he hadn't been paying attention, hoping she wouldn't cry, hoping he wouldn't start by listening to her.

His heart? Shit, that was a problem. It hadn't just been his body or ego that'd enjoyed pleasuring her. Part of the reason he wanted her was a chance to show her he loved her without having to put it in words - never his forte - and now that he'd gotten a taste of it, he couldn't imagine ever not wanting to.

Inuyasha scowled into the icy blackness. He hadn't missed how much it cost her to lay out that confession, either. She really thought he just liked her at best and was acting on lust, while she was the only one whose feelings were seriously involved.

The more he thought about it - that she thought his attachment to Kikyou necessarily meant he didn't also care for her - the more it irritated him. Didn't she get anything? He still loved Kikyou, as he always had and always would, and he had every intention of following her to Hell and keeping his promise, but Kagome was so thoroughly different from the dead priestess that measuring them against each other, like the way their friends were always berating him for choosing Kikyou, was just stupid. It wasn't as if he could choose a relationship with Kagome over one with Kikyou, or vice versa; he traveled with Kagome, and waited for the chance to avenge and repay Kikyou. Why didn't they get that?

…

…Wait a minute…

Inuyasha forgot to breathe. Kagome remained silent, not daring to get her hopes up.

He didn't know where that had come from…he'd always thought along pretty similar lines, after all, equating love for anyone else as a betrayal of the woman who'd died because of him. He supposed it was just the strain telling on him, but logic that would have seemed blasphemous not long ago made perfect sense now; was Kagome wrong for loving him and showing it freely, and didn't he even kind of love their other friends in a vastly different way?

He couldn't lie to Kagome and promise her anything except to love her right now. If it was still dishonorable under the circumstances, it was more fair to admit it and proceed thus than pretending Kagome's feelings weren't reciprocated and didn't deserve to be acknowledged. Besides, Kagome hadn't asked him to forget Kikyou, had she? Only for him…

It might not unburden his heart or conscience completely, and there was always the chance they'd regret it later. But if it would help to give Kagome closure when it was his time to die, knowing they had made the most of their time together…

Inuyasha let out a long snort. Even her little card thing had told him to live for the moment. Bloody unlikely he'd ever find a better time to make a decision, quit thinking and put it into practice. "So."

Kagome sat up so fast that she almost hit her head on his chin.

The hanyou folded his bare arms. "I owe Kikyou my life. I will keep my word when Naraku is dead and go to Hell with her."

Kagome nodded slowly, shifting around and ignoring the familiar crunching sensation in her chest. She'd expected as much…but did he have to sound so matter-of-fact about it?

He caught her chin in his thumb and forefinger to bring her head back toward him. "I'm not finished, Kagome. She died because of me, and I'll never forgive myself for that…" His fingers trailed along her skin gently, outlining her jaw. "But I'd be a fucking coward if I went without repaying you, either."

Wrong choice of words. "Repaying? What're you talking about?" Her tone sharpened. "If you mean anything I've done of my own free will and because of how I feel about you, then forget it. I didn't stay with you `cause I expected a reward."

Inuyasha cursed richly under his breath. "No, no, that's not it. I did the… heart…thing…you talked about."

"And?" Kagome said in that sweetly patient tone wise males recognize as meaning their next words should be chosen with the utmost care, Or Else.

"And…" He let his hand drop. How the hell did other people go about this? Or did they not have to, and he was the only one stuck having to explain his feelings? "And it's not fair to let you think…uh…" Shit. Shit shit shit. Inuyasha scratched his head in the beginnings of utter despair. How to say this…?

"Do you love me, Inuyasha?" The question was just what he'd been dreading and hoping for. Kagome found his shoulder and drummed her fingers on the warm muscle. The wind shrieked outside, as if to punctuate the moment.

When his answer finally came, it was so quiet that she could barely hear, less than a foot away. "It's…complicated, and I can't…do anything about that, but for what it's worth…uh…" Inuyasha made a tight fist, rebuking himself for holding out on her again, now of all times. She needed to hear it, he had to say it, no more dicking around-

He forced his eyes shut. "Yes."

The word seemed to hang in the air. Kagome made a little noise, half gasp and half sob, and the sound shattered Inuyasha's last reservations as she flung her arms around his neck, afraid she'd heard wrong somehow.

She almost killed him when he interrupted a perfectly good kiss to start talking again. "Are you really sure?" he asked for the last time, petting her hair more like a child than a potential lover. He winced at her rapid nod. "I can't promise you anything, Kagome. You might regret it in the morning, or when all the shards are-"

"I don't want you to promise me anything, Inuyasha, and I don't want you trying to make this up to me, either." Kagome squeezed his shoulders. "I love you-and besides, I just stopped my period. We're fine for now."

Inuyasha could've told her that, but elected to keep his mouth shut about it. "If you're really-"

Kagome looped her arms around his neck, pulled herself up and wrapped her legs around his waist, pressing so that he could feel every nuance of her body against his stomach.

That was all the hint he needed. Control slipping steadily with every breath she took against his mouth, Inuyasha tightened his grip on her torso, positioned her beneath him very carefully, and moved to unwrap her legs. Her whimpers were swiftly and deeply silenced, only to continue unabashed as he pressed her thighs apart with his knees and ran his fangs lightly across her throat, rumbling contentment at her willing surrender.

Aware that his instincts might lead him to accidentally get rougher with her, possibly even bite her shoulders or neck - a common mating reflex with youkai, but potentially crippling or even fatal if done carelessly with a human - Inuyasha turned his face into the softness of her breasts and ran his hands down her legs, urging them just a little wider open as he nudged closer, bringing himself right up against her entrance.

The whimpering was closer to panting now, drawing his head back up to hers for another silencing kiss. Even his mouth couldn't quite restrain Kagome's cry at his first fumbling probe into her body, pleasure almost overwhelmed by surprise and pain at the feeling of invasion, nothing like his tongue; she would have jerked away but for his weight atop her legs and torso.

Inuyasha withdrew, almost unconsciously forcing her legs further apart, body trembling violently and mind screaming at him to forget the subtlety and just slam into her. He circled her slender body with his arms, buried his face in her neck again and sank himself into her slowly, jerking spasmodically, ears cringing back into his hair at her startled sobs. "Kagome…"

Her name jolted her almost as painfully as the relentless pressure stretching the sensitive flesh between her spread legs. She forced herself to relax, trembling slightly, and buried her hands in the silk spilling over her breasts, rubbing his scalp with her nails. "It's…it's okay, Inuyasha. Don't stop. Please." Her breath caught, eyes squeezing shut as he immediately thrust, pulled most of the way out and then nearly buried himself. "Ahhhh…" Kagome tried to open herself a little wider, head pressing back as her back arched and Inuyasha mouthed her shoulder, stopping just short of a bite.

The pain began to lessen, a sharp, burning ache melding with the most incredible sensations as Inuyasha, panting desperately in her ear, crushed her to him and slid partly out, stroking the slick walls roughly with quick, hard thrusts. His ears tingled at the sounds the motions elicited, harsh moans that soon turned demanding as he penetrated as fully as he could and lay still, hips grinding hard against her sweaty skin.

Inuyasha would've liked to stay like that longer, savoring the possessive pride that chased through his veins and the hot, wet clench of her body around him as he locked his lower half against Kagome's and nibbled her neck, licking beads of sweat from under her jaw and the lower curves of her breasts. This wasn't a guilty fantasy or a dream: she was actually and willingly his, and he was in no hurry to let her go.

Kagome had other ideas, though: as much as she relished Inuyasha lying with her like this, filling her body in such a primally satisfying way that she even craved more of its pain, she wanted that dominating friction back, and she wanted it now. Without discouraging his attentions to her neck and breasts, Kagome groped for footholds, braced her thighs and pushed against him, moving them both up and just a touch sideways.

The movement made Inuyasha shudder so strongly that she was afraid she'd done something wrong. "Inuya-"

The air was knocked from her lungs, crushed under his full-body lunge into her, mouth devoured as he flattened her hips, jerked out and thrust so hard that the whole futon rustled at the impact. Sharp pain and surprise at the unexpected force heightened the keen pleasure of him moving inside her as he held her down, reared back and buried himself in the narrow passage, withdrawing only to repeat the motion over and over, leaving her to dig her nails into his shoulders and strain into him helplessly, cries rising to near-shrieks at the agonizing pleasure.

Inuyasha slowed and released her for a moment, licking her mouth and focusing on her scent to satisfy himself that she was enjoying this as much as he was, and then surprised her by adjusting his arms around her waist and shoulders and, still snugly inside her, pulling them both up into a sitting position so that she was in his lap. He kissed her neck in a long, rapid line from side to side, then clamped her down against him as his hips jerked of their own accord and he snarled quietly, pressing his mouth to her ear. "Time…"

Kagome didn't know what he meant till his grip became unbearably tight, lifted her up and then brought her down forcibly. She stiffened at a sharp twinge of new pain - the upright position tightened her more than she'd realized - and Inuyasha threw his head back, pants degenerating to unthinking growls, moans and snarls as his body ground into hers harder. Kagome cried out, writhing against him in dual protest and encouragement, and the claws on her shoulder and hip sank nearly into the skin as his howling scream split the air and the length joining their bodies spasmed, once, twice, more, filling her with liquid heat and consuming him whole.

Black pleasure faded to reality all too soon, and he slumped over, supported them both with a weak hand braced behind him, noticed the smell of her sweat, too much of it no matter what their activities. Even so, the involuntary flexing into her continued, slowing to a gradual stop as his gasping quieted, died down to harsh but regular respiration.

Inuyasha retained his hold, as if he was afraid she'd disappear, nuzzling her neck and face in a paroxysm of wordless affection. Finally he shifted, held her a little apart and registered a slight noise of discomfort. "Did I hurt you?"

Kagome rested her head on his shoulder, debating whether to lie or not, and sighed. "Kind of. …Maybe a little, `cause I'm not used to it." Before he could berate himself, she nudged his shoulder. "Can we lie down again?"

"Yeah, sure." Remorseful, Inuyasha laid her down carefully and slid out, leaving her with an empty feeling as painful as the strain his body had put her through. He couldn't help noticing that her arousal hadn't abated as he kissed her again, moving his hands as gently as he could over her curves. That was great, he told himself irritably: not only did he not satisfy her, he hurt her getting himself off. "Is there…" He swallowed his pride. "What else can I do?"

"Um…" Kagome moved her hips and winced. It was too late to tell him that reentry would be a lot more painful now that he'd withdrawn. If she held very still, she could feel fluid trickling out…was it worth it? She closed her eyes. "If you can, could you…in again?" Her face burned. Maybe it would get easier talking about this some day, but she couldn't imagine getting used to it.

Inuyasha nodded and, in sudden inspiration, lowered his head further down, lavishing attention on her neglected outer center till she was moaning softly again and his own body responded eagerly to the sound and smell. When he judged them both ready, he rose to spread himself over her, gingerly entered the tight wetness and slid in with utmost care, moving very slowly and watching closely for her reaction.

"Faster." Kagome ignored her body's complaints - her legs were getting stiff as well - and forced herself to relax again, letting the pleasure of his presence and his care for her override the pain. She sighed and laid her head to the side, gasping out of her reverie as he drew out and found the sensitive area behind the barrel of pubic muscle by angling himself experimentally before pushing in.

"What? Did that hurt?" Alarmed, Inuyasha started to lean back.

Her blind head shake and a new wave of arousal answered him in the strong negative. Pleased with himself, the hanyou growled in a near-purr, pressing her down gently and rocking back and forth in time to her startled moans.

This was what he'd wanted, he thought in smug satisfaction as Kagome began to twist and grab at his shoulders and he sped up his strokes. Not just a quick fuck, pleasant as that could probably be if one didn't actually care about one's partner; much better to find out what she liked, watch and listen to her beneath him, repeating his name in a tone he'd never so much as dreamed of, much less heard, and know that she was as happy - to put it very simply, as the moaning made an abrupt transition to broken pleas for more and he deftly obliged - as he was.

Kagome was in no state of mind to make comparisons, but the tight, sharp feeling that coiled in her nether regions as Inuyasha's rhythm became less measured, faster, and rougher was much like what she felt when Inuyasha had licked her, but not quite: when Inuyasha started biting his lips and slowing himself to keep from coming before her again, Kagome had only to wrap her legs around his waist and rock sharply against him for a few more seconds to find out the differences.

For one, it was Inuyasha's shoulder that received her teeth this time as her body snapped, clenching in violent ripples from the inside out, and the spasms of muscle went deeper, searing her core till she wrenched her teeth loose and shrieked over the storm outside, scissoring his waist to pull him inside her with each throb. Inuyasha set his own jaws on her shoulder, locking them to do no more than dent the skin at the powerful muscles massaging his in hot, wet, inexorable waves, and it was no more than ten seconds before he gave into the tugging sensation and thrust mindlessly into her, losing his sense of timing and not caring as Kagome drew breath and screamed again: "Inuyashaaaa!"

He was lost. Forgetting her soreness and his restraint and Kikyou and whoever might be listening, Inuyasha snarled and pulled them together harder, his entire being focused on the woman writhing on the futon beneath him. Her name echoed in his mind as her climax petered out and he reached down to jam the pad of his thumb on the engorged nub below her waist and rub in short, savage circles, urging her sated body into another course of-

Footsteps came to a halt just outside the little room. Mind still occupied, Inuyasha only had time to reflexively snatch up Tessaiga before the shoji was flung open and an all-too-familiar jangling assaulted their ears, concurrent with the blinding glare of a half-covered lantern.

"Er…"

Inuyasha bared his fangs and gave a long, rolling snarl as Miroku lowered his staff, looking as if he'd just swallowed Tessaiga whole. Through a fog of residual lust and confusion, Kagome felt Inuyasha draw her down underneath him, and fully understood what was happening as her eyes started to clear and the monk tried to speak. "I…we heard Kagome-sama-"

The hanyou didn't move. The snarling grew louder. Kagome moved a long, sweat-dampened white lock out of the way and looked directly into Miroku's eyes, Sango gaping openly near his shoulder.

Before Kagome could begin to feel real embarrassment, a quick movement of Inuyasha's head blocked her vision and smothered her mouth under his, and two sets of feet backed away from the room as an even quicker, firmer series of movements began lower down, barely concealed by the heavy cover draped over his hips.

It wasn't till she could ask Sango about it some time later, in private, that Kagome understood exactly why Inuyasha chose to claim her in front of the monk and slayer instead of telling them to leave: in his state, Miroku was not a good friend with bad timing, but an intruding male, and Inuyasha was simply making it plain that Kagome was his in the most unmistakable way possible. Though she didn't tell her still-flustered friend as much, Sango was also profoundly grateful that Miroku had been too shocked to indulge in teasing or voyeurism, because there was no telling what Inuyasha might do to the monk if he perceived him as any kind of threat.

At the time, though, all Kagome knew was that Sango and Miroku were possibly watching Inuyasha fuck her, and the knowledge was somehow as arousing as it was difficult to believe. Luckily, belief wasn't required of her at the moment; by the time their combined voices fell silent, the shoji had long since been hastily shut and their visitors gone, though the whole inn had been treated to the noise through the paper-thin walls.

Kagome gasped in protest and relief, a tiny "Ow" slipping out as Inuyasha disentangled their lower limbs and pulled the cover up. He paused in the act of threading his legs between her knees in belated concern. She shook her head, noting for the first time that Miroku had left the lantern in the hall. Wouldn't be surprised if he dropped it. Lucky it had landed right side up… "That was a good ow, Inuyasha. Don't worry about it."

His relief wasn't entirely unselfish; he was too exhausted mentally and physically to be able to apologize properly, but his conscience would plague him for it anyway later without reassurance from her, possibly even with it. Right now, he was torn between the need for sleep, more cuddling, and to guard against further incursion. The best compromise seemed to have been reached already as he held her, one ear trained on the hall, body otherwise relaxed. "Whatever you say." He swiped a trail of sweat off her neck tenderly.

Kagome pondered any number of replies, scolding or comforting or grateful, and decided muzzily to decide when she wasn't so tired. It was a better kind of exhaustion than anything she'd ever felt, exhilaratingly peaceful and guaranteed to have her sawing logs the second she closed her eyes. She did just that, yawning. "Night, Inuyasha. Love you."

Perhaps ten seconds later, Inuyasha remembered that it was okay to be honest. "Same to you, Kagome." …It was a start. He yawned and stretched himself fully, ignoring the wind's thin whistling. "G'night." That still seemed inadequate. "…Love." There. Odd, but much better. There was a distinct possibility he could get used to it.

Kagome was already asleep. Inuyasha grunted and settled down to doze, hoping the wench would stay awake for more than thirty seconds afterward if and when they mated again. Otherwise, knowing him, she'd never hear it.

The facts that they had been caught at it and probably woken up the inhabitants of a place in which they weren't really welcome in the first place snuck up, but he chased them back into hiding by snuffling at her neck one last time, and though his attention remained focused on the door, Inuyasha was largely asleep in less than a minute.

~

Wisely, their friends chose to have Shippou wake them just before dawn, a few hours later.

"You guys were really loud," the kit said with alarming frankness, speaking through the shoji as Kagome located her clothes and grimaced her way back into the cold-stiff, smelly garments. Inuyasha slipped his on in the time it took her to get her sweater buttoned, and they both flinched as Shippou continued thoughtfully. "Miroku and Sango said you were pretty much okay, but they wouldn't tell me anything. How come you didn't go to our room?"

Kagome cobbled a little story together with half-truths, relating the way she had gotten them into the inn by fibbing and implying that the innkeepers had forced them to stay in the room. "Besides, we didn't know if you were all here or not, so we couldn't really do anything."

"But Sango said you could probably smell again and find us really soon," Shippou protested. "And why were you guys yelling? You never fight in the middle of the night."

"Look at the sky, Shippou-chan. See…" Kagome opened the shoji, scooped the little boy up and pointed to the hole. He had been shooed out of the room too quickly to have seen it before. "Isn't that nice? They gave us a room with a view."

Shippou gave her a look that indicated he knew darn well that she was being evasive on several points. "Weren't you guys cold?"

"Sometimes." Kagome set him down and began to roll up the futon out of habit, only to have Inuyasha snort and lift her to her feet. She scowled at him. "What?"

"Let the lazy bastards who run this dump do that." He jerked his head at the wall. "S'not like they don't owe us, no matter how much you paid `em." His ears pricked up at the thought. "You never said where you got that gold, either."

"Gold?" Shippou repeated avidly. "Where? Did you steal some from Miroku?"

Kagome waggled her finger reproachfully. "Nuh-uh, that's a secret till we get out of here." She closed one eyelid conspiratorially. "I didn't lie about it being rare, though. You can't find those coins anywhere in this time."

"Are you ready, Kagome-chan?" Sango came into the room, Kirara poking her head from under the slayer's arm with a mew. There was no sign of embarrassment or awkwardness in her demeanor to suggest anything amiss had happened, a consideration for which Kagome was rather grateful. She'd managed to not recall that till now…

She was also happy that the air was cool enough to counter the heat rising in her cheeks. "Yeah, we're just about ready. I can't wait to get out of this place." Kagome took one last look at the cramped, dirty, freezing little room, almost overwhelmed at how important the place would always be to her now, and stepped out into the hall. "Let's go."

To their dismay, the hostess was waiting for them by the entrance, where she had to have been standing since the previous night. Her eyes were sunken even further with weariness, and the gaunt, fleshless lines of her face tightened as Kagome came to a halt in front of her with a deep bow. "Please excuse us for enjoying the facilities so much," she said quickly as the woman opened her mouth. As if to emphasize that, her sore flesh twinged as she straightened. The slight burn prodded her to remove the net of coins again and dump the contents onto the floor, startling everyone. "It's really nothing, but if you share it with the other guests, it might help to make up for their sleep." She bowed so deeply that her waist creaked and the skin just below protested. "We'll never trouble you again. Thank you for the shelter, and for reuniting us with our friends despite their apparent invisibility."

The hostess's jaws opened and closed, whether with greed, indignation, or the prospect of never seeing a rich customer again regardless of her tastes in men, Kagome didn't know.

"You had more, eh?" A rude, slurring voice from directly behind Inuyasha wiped the smugness off the hanyou's face. They all glanced around at a young man who staggered into the entrance area, squinting at Kagome, and every nose wrinkled in distaste at the smell of sake. The newcomer ignored them or didn't notice, leering closer to the girl. "You're the bitch who brought the youkai in last night!" He hiccupped and teetered in place, nearly falling over, heedless of a murderous, highly warning look directed straight at him. "So, how's he diff'nt from humans, eh? Same? Must pay pre'y good. Or you jus' like screwin' monsters better?"

A backhanded smash across the man's face ended that line of discussion rather abruptly, accentuated with the creation of a new hole in the wall by the impact of his body slamming into and then through it.

Kagome was never really sure how they got away from that one without bloodshed or a mob on their hands. She supposed the gold scattered on the floor had something to do with it, not to mention some healthy fear of the seething hanyou, fast talking on Miroku's part and Sango's promises that they would further repay the village by clearing youkai from the neighboring forests; the girl from the future was too busy pulling Inuyasha into the forest and trying to calm him down to be certain.

It was no use bemoaning the unfairness of Inuyasha getting all the blame, even if the man would live, and even if, had he been human, no one would've batted an eye at Inuyasha killing the drunkard for such a direct insult-indeed, it would've been a more serious transgression to let it go unpunished. But as things were…

As things were, there was nothing they could do but wait for their companions to find them. Kagome knelt beside Inuyasha, reaching to stroke his cheek tentatively. He started to pull away, then hesitated, closing his eyes and accepting the caress. "There's one place we're never goin' again."

"Thanks for defending me-and I don't want to hear anything about it being your fault in the first place," Kagome added firmly. She winced at another unexpected twinge. "I'm just glad we got away from there."

Inuyasha nodded, opening his eyes in time to catch her expression. "You okay?"

"Yep. Just a little sore." She pecked him on the lips and started to rise.

"Mmm." A yank on her waist brought her back down. Inuyasha pulled her into his lap. "Long as we're out here…"

"There you are!" Shippou and Kirara bounded through the undergrowth to find them about ten feet apart. "We gotta go."

"Best to get started now," Sango agreed, emerging moments later, and they were on their way before the kitsune could do more than wonder why Kagome looked so flushed. Come to think of it, she smelled funny, too. So had their room…

A few encounters with lesser youkai in the forest and a hunt for more in accordance with Sango's promise - not to be broken, even to the kind of people they'd just left - almost put it out of his mind, but he caught a distinct whiff of Inuyasha and something interestingly weird as they sat down for lunch. "Kagome? What's that smell?"

He had to wait for an answer, as she nearly choked on an onigiri and had to take several long sips of water. "What do you mean, Shippou-chan?"

"You smell like…kinda funny, like when I was really little and my parents would start acting funny and send me to bed early and OW!" Shippou clutched his head in his tiny hands and set up a loud wail. "Kagome! Inuyasha hit me for no reason!"

"Well, kind of…" Kagome caught herself. "Uh…" An idea tapped at her, much better than sitting Inuyasha when he'd just headed off a line of very awkward questions. "Tell you what, Shippou-chan. I'll give you some of that gold."

"Oi!" Inuyasha protested as she produced one of a few coins that remained in her pocket. "What's he gonna do with money?"

"The same thing I hope the people at that inn do: eat it." The childish play on words satisfied her even more than her friends' faces as the kit sniffed at the round thing, picked at an uneven ridge on the edge, and peeled it back, squealing and chomping gleefully at the chocolate beneath the wrapper.

"Wow. You're evil." Inuyasha spoke almost reverently.

Miroku just caught himself from nodding agreement and coughed instead. "A truly remarkable ruse, Kagome-sama. Do you think you could you spare-"

"NO."

"But, I would be sure to be as honest as-"

"I said no, Miroku-sama."

"But-"

"No means you're not getting anything. Now shut up."

The barest hint of a mutter under the monk's breath about getting things had Inuyasha on his feet, red in the face and clutching Miroku's robes in seconds. "What was that?!"

Ahhh, back to normal… Kagome exchanged shrugs and sighs with Sango, both aware that the monk would be too slippery for Inuyasha to justify the infliction of any real damage. After they ate, it would be back to traveling, looking for youkai and hunting Shikon shards together in the quest that had brought them together so many months ago and would just as surely separate them at its conclusion.

…And yet, somehow, things weren't quite the same…

"OH!" Kagome's hand flew to her mouth, stopping the melee instantly as they looked around wildly. "I forgot the cards in the room! Oh, man, I'm such an idiot!"

"Cards…? Oh, yes." Miroku shrugged slightly. "You could always retrieve them, but I doubt the wisdom of ever trying to return there, regardless of any…attachments you might have there."

Inuyasha's glare didn't so much as dint his veneer of innocence. The hanyou snorted, turning away in a show of irritation. "Keh! I told you, they're pointless anyway."

Or maybe they were.

Kagome gave a long-suffering sigh as they started out again. Oh, well. Not like I expected him to turn charming on me. She smiled a little. Nah, I wouldn't change him for anything. Her mouth relaxed as Kikyou's grave face came to mind. I'd never change him…how could she ever ask him to…

A hand on her waist and a quiet step next to her, and Kagome looked up at Inuyasha. She smiled again, wider, heart melting a little as his face remained grumpy, but his eyes softened till they were smiling back. There was no telling if she'd regret how things turned out later, whether her gamble on Inuyasha's feelings would pay off in the long run or just lead to more heartache for both of them - not to mention some discomfort in walking for a while, a cynical little voice chimed in - but until they found out, she would enjoy being with him in any way she could without worrying about it too much.

A new year, a new stage in their relationship, possibly a new stage in her life…

Kagome's smile widened as one more thing came to her. "What'd you do with your card, Inuyasha?"

"What card?" Indifferent as ever, Inuyasha raised his arms and folded his hands behind his head. "Dunno what you mean."

An off-white corner jutting from inside his voluminous sleeve said otherwise. Kagome giggled, and he narrowed his eyes at her. "What?"

"Nothing, Inuyasha." She waved back as Sango hailed them from further up the path. "We'd better catch up."

"Yeah, we should do that." The way he said it, almost wistfully unless her imagination was acting up, made her falter and nearly trip. Inuyasha raised an eyebrow arrogantly as she stumbled. "C'mon, wench."

Going crazy again… "Yeah, yeah," Kagome grumbled, picking up her pace without noticing him staring at her back.

Inuyasha glanced up at the canopy, allowing himself one last moment to wonder: whether he was taking advantage, whether he was wrong, and everything that had bothered him since whenever the hell it was that he first realized the girl wasn't just an irritating necessity to him-well, not in the way he told himself, anyway.

He tucked the card back into his sleeve and set off. No point in letting her get away from him, after all, or he'd never hear the end of it.

~

A/N: First full-length lemon plus tendency to ramble equals sleepy time. Go easy on me. Too tired to edit last ten pages. Good night.