Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction / InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ A Question of Intimacy ❯ Chapter 5, Plans ( Chapter 6 )

"Kuwabara is a baka," Hiei said by way of greeting as Kagome entered the room.

"Perhaps, but some of the wisest things ever said have come from the mouths of fools and children," the miko responded as she took hold of his hand once more, "I can create some barriers to filter out things if you want. I gathered my materials for ofuda from the shrine."

"No," Hiei said brusquely, "I'd rather be aware."

"Of course, " Kagome nodded, his reason did make sense to her. Inuyasha had said much the same more then once. "The main worry I have for you is the connection between your youki and your emotions. The adrenalin in your body directly effects the output of youki. This would be no problem if it were possible to directly suppress the production of the hormones. Adrenalin is the key hormone controlling the physiological and psychological states of arousal, hence the situation."

"Hn," was the fire apparition's response as he attempted to listen without comment. What the miko was saying made sense even if it was rather unpleasant to contemplate.

"I can understand if you don't trust me yet, but you have my word and whatever other reasonable measure you want that I will guard your privacy to the best of my ability. You have nothing to fear from me." Kagome stated with quiet seriousness, she understood the unpleasant implications of her little biology lecture. No one could control the production of their hormones completely. There was a sort of mind over matter element to them, particularly with adrenalin, but it was a matter of control rather then a true shutting off of the adrenal glands. Any adrenalin was potentially problematic for a youkai in the grips of their season. It was thought that the practically ritualized combat both over and with females in heat was strongly keyed into the psychological response of arousal from the hormone.

"Where will you sleep and how can you monitor such things in your sleep?" Hiei asked after a long period of silence. He understood well enough that what she was saying meant very little privacy for him and no fighting for the safety of the others.

"Wherever. I could try to ward the room to wake me or we could just do shifts," the miko answered. She was starting to get a headache from all the things she had to take into account for her latest self imposed mission. She was also starting to feel the first whispers of phantom pain. "Yukina-san feels like a healer youkai and should be sensitive enough to notice a change. Genkai-sama would definitely be able to do some monitoring. The tall redhead is also talented in that area, I suspect, you would know better then I there. Actually, you would know better then I about all of them. I can go for several days without sleep, but not for two months." Kagome answered as she thought about the youkai's friends and their abilities that she could pin down right off. The young youkai she had decided to rescue was definitely of the standoffish sort. He seemed to be all rough edges and very slow to warm. She had to wonder if he would warm to her in the next two months since they would be forced into such close contact. "I will need to use some scent masking spells starting in a couple days so as not to put undo stress on you," she thought aloud, completely losing Hiei as she jumped to a totally different train of thought. "I will need to do the same for the rest of the females as well. Perhaps I should just put a ward up for that. Hrm... I think that will be tricky, but I believe I can do it with a little research." Kagome babbled as she tried to think through the little conundrum.

"Why" Hiei asked brusquely. He wondered what in the hell she was going on about, but was hesitant to just look into her mind the way he ordinarily would to find out.

"Why what? The spell or a ward rather than a spell?" the miko essayed for a clarification.

"Both" Hiei answered shortly with an expression of mild curiosity.

"The ward because it would be a more efficient use of power and less prone for slip ups. It would also leave me with a greater reserve just in case." Kagome answered the second question first because it was the less embarrassing. Here she was a grown woman, a widow even, and such simple things still embarrassed her to discuss with men. "You probably never bothered to pay any attention to it, but human women are on a very different cycle from demonesses. It's a large part of the reason why so many youkai males enjoy human women so much. Unlike youkai, we never cycle off to a true rest state for long. To make things more confusing, our 'heats' only last for three days, but we don't bleed until fourteen days later. There is a period of rest after the cleansing, but everyone's is different. The people who study this sort of thing think the system evolved to confuse the males and make them stick around The result is that humans are constantly fertile for both genders.

"That explains a bit," Hiei commented sardonically. He couldn't help but think of Yuuske and Kieko. Then of course, there was Kuwabara's relentless pursuit of his sister that had finally been resolved about a year ago. He still didn't know why she tolerated the idiot, but she had Claimed him as her mate so he couldn't kill the baka. He almost felt sorry for his brother in law. His sister would go into heat soon if he was in season and the poor fool would never know what hit him.

"Doesn't it just" Kagome snickered in agreement. "Anyway, even though you might not ordinarily notice that sort of thing, it is probably wise to deal with it beforehand just in case. I am, of course, assuming you are completely heterosexual otherwise I would have to mask all arousal." She pointed out, ignoring the slight blush on the youkai's face and thinking on the matter further. "Actually, I should do that anyway. It would be better if you could not be located by scent so simply. Can you think of any other wards for me to put up?" she asked feeling like she had to be missing something.

"No, " Hiei sighed, he wondered if the woman ever shut up and how she could embarrass him so easily. "Why are you so hung up about scents?"

"Canine youkai. I spend most of my time surrounded by wolves, dogs and foxes. It is so bad, I don't even take offense at being called a bitch about half the time in the Meikai. Some days I think they think with their noses." she said with a laugh.

Hiei smirked. Yet, something was tickling the edge of his consciousness about the way her face moved when she laughed. There was something subltely off about it.

"Why so many canines?" he asked to see if he could not observe the young woman and figure out just what the flaw was that was nagging at him. He didn't particularly care about the answer, he just needed to keep her face moving to spot what wasn't right.

"Just about the first youkai I ever met was an inu hanyou. The first was actually a centipede demoness who attacked me, but the first friendly one was a canine. The rest just happened to take a liking to me along the way.Keh," He gave a short mirthless laugh, and then he saw what he was looking for. The muscles under her skin were not quite moving correctly near the ears and the hairline. "The wolf tribe still mostly calls me onee-sama despite everything, " she shrugged it off lightly.

Hiei narrowed his eyes and glared at the woman beside him. Extracting his hand and backing away he had her complete attention. "Who are you really? Your face is an illusion," he stated coldly.

"Intelligence and better than average powers of observation, that is how you came to survive so long. Most people can't spot the illusion. I have yet to lie to you. My face is disfigured. Most people can't look me in the eyes without the guise of my original appearance." Kagome answered honestly and without the hesitation or other key tells of a lie, merely a slight visible sense of embarrassment. She had expected him to have found out through connections or in her Reikai file if they were able to get ahold of it. It both surprised and impressed her that he figured it out on his own even if it did make things more difficult for her by making him suspitious.

"Take it off, onna" he commanded with a growl. 'It is hard to trust some one who conceals her true face after all,' he thought to himself. He had no idea why he was even beginning to give her the benefit of a doubt.

"As you wish, but you have been warned, the damage is pretty bad." Kagome agreed with a flinch. She hoped by so easily giving in on the point she could restore any lost faith to the keen observer. She truly didn't like to show anyone her ruined face. Her family had recently started looking into reconstructive plastic surgery. She would never be back to her original appearance, but it was worth a shot. With a pass of her left hand down the front of her face and right arm, the illusion fell away. "There. See for yourself a face to make children cry."

Her face was perhaps not so badly disfigured as she believed it to be, but it was bad enough. The left side looked mostly normal, save for the tiny claw marks in her cheek giving her the faint impression of whiskers. The right side had clearly been crushed. There were some rather obvious scars along the jaw from pins into the bone. The miko was clearly fortunate to be able to eat, let alone talk enough to make Hiei wonder if she could shut up for longer then ten minutes at a stretch. The cheekbone that had once been there was completely gone as were most of the bones forming the eye socket. She kept the lids closed as best she could, but it was hard to miss the fact there was nothing behind them. Her hair also had streaks of white showing where the scars went back beyond the hairline. The miko's blouse was long sleeved, revealing only a scared hand with three fingers. Her pinky was gone from some point in her palm. Only the first knuckle remained of her ring finger. The fingers appeared to have been sheered off at a sharp angle and the skin burned severely.

"Leave it off when we are alone, onna," Hiei said after a rather critical examination. He didn't flinch from her scars though he could see how they would bother her. Murkuro had on occasion mentioned something about that for her face as well. He, however, preferred to be able to see exactly who he was dealing with so that he could truly read the little tells from their facial expressions.

"As you wish, I'll call that a reasonable measure. Add that to the to do list. I'll link it to a talisman or something so that I can take it off more easily. Perhaps we should ward for sound as well so that sound comes in, but doesn't go out." she sighed. The small man's reaction was much better then she would have expected. His face showed surprise, but not the horrified revulsion she had come to expect when she took down the illusions in front of strangers. "I'd rather not let the others see me like this. It is known that I am disfigured, but most are unaware of to what degree and I would like to keep it that way."

"Fine," he said sounding more disgruntled then he actually was.

A knock sounded at the door in the resulting silence. Without a word of warning, the miko released Hiei's hand which he had only just permitted her to recapture and restored her illusions with all the affectation of long practice. Hiei eyed the illusion before nodding. He wondered if she actually slept with it on like that, it had to drain her energy a fair bit to maintain.

"Go ahead and enter," she called out. Pinching the bridge of her nose in a vain attempt to ward off an incipient headache the miko waited for the youkai's friends to enter. What she didn't expect was the voice that spoke next.