Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction / InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Clenching Water ❯ The Fox is Out of the Bag ( Chapter 6 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: Pretty in Pink 
Fox meets girl.
Anime/Manga: Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction / InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 10.04.2008 | Pages: 4 | Words: 5.2K | Visits: 913 | Status: Completed
Fox meets girl.
Anime/Manga: Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction / InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 10.04.2008 | Pages: 4 | Words: 5.2K | Visits: 913 | Status: Completed
Wow, I thought I’d never get this out. I had the ending written already, but I started getting all these happy reviews (thank you so much for all your wonderful comments, by the way!) and didn’t have the heart to put it out the way it was. It was very sad. Not even bittersweet, just a cold, bitter end. I think you all would have been very, very disappointed. So yeah, in light of your enthusiastic reception of this piece, I rewrote the ending!
Written to: Ingrid Michaelson’s “Corner of Your Heart” and Enrique Iglesias’ “Hero.”
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Clenching Water
The Fox is Out of the Bag
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The curtains were drawn, blocking the afternoon sun and casting the familiar pink room into a semidarkness. Soft, low music washed across the space from the radio on the nightstand, a glass of water set in front of it distorting the glowing red numbers until they were unreadable. Little pink slippers lay, discarded, in the floor beside the bed.
As Kurama moved across the room, the figure in the bed never moved. He stopped at arms length from the edge of the bed, calling softly to its slumbering occupant. “Kagome?”
He waited, but she never stirred.
The “sleeping herbs” she’d spoken of the night before must have been very strong. Closing the distance between them, he knelt at her side, silently observing her sleeping façade. Her face was relaxed, unblemished by the worrisome pull of her brows he’d so often seen there in the past. Her sleeping face had always been his favorite. He remembered watching her for hours as she slept.
It seemed so long ago since he’d last touched her. His fingers ached to reach out to her, to run his hands over her body, to feel her skin alight with fire under his touch.
Instead, he reached out and lovingly ghosted the backs of his fingers along her jaw, sweeping away the inky waves that had rested there. He smiled as her nose twitched in her sleep and her eyes moved behind her lids.
A soft whisper escaped her lips. “Roses?” Brilliant blue was revealed to him as her eyes fluttered open sluggishly. His hand stilled.
She stared in mild confusion. “It wasn’t a dream,“ the little miko mused to herself.
Kurama, fearing she had yet to release her ire from the night before, retracted his hand and leaned back onto his feet. He noticed the warmth of longing light her eyes in the darkness. He still had a chance.
“You’ve been asleep for quite a while, Kagome,” he told her gently. He watched her cautiously, not sure if she was still under the influence of the herbs.
The girl rubbed the sleep from her eyes, kicking off the covers and rising to sit stiffly in the center of the bed. The softly lit jewel dangling at her throat briefly caught his attention as she looked around her room, taking in the empty chair across the room, the red haori laid across the back. “Where’s Inuyasha?”
Kurama masked his annoyance, smiling reassuringly at the girl. “Your hanyou friend is downstairs, enjoying his ramen.” He left out that he’d had somewhat of a verbal battle with the boy to get up the stairs.
‘Damn mutt needs to learn his place,’ Youko grumbled.
Kagome seemed to suddenly realize who she was talking to and turned wide, vivid eyes on him. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Just what were you doing with those youkai yesterday, Shuichi? That boy in the jeans could pass as human, but the three-eyed guy… There’s no way you couldn’t have known what he was.”
Kurama, for the most part, had expected this sooner or later. It seemed she was fully lucid now, and remembered the events from the previous evening. This might be difficult to explain.
He startled when he felt Youko begin to pour his youki into him. His aura flared around him, causing Kagome to instinctively lean away from him.
Youko! What the hell are you doing?! he growled out to his counterpart.
The fox only shrugged nonchalantly. ‘Experimenting, Red.’
Experi-
‘Just watch.’
Kagome, overcoming her immediate apprehension of the youki swelling against her senses, leaned in to Kurama. Her quick eyes scanned over his aura, his serious expression as he observed her, and the gold beginning to overtake his irises. But the demon energy still didn’t feel like him. Her eyes widened in understanding.
“Shuichi-kun!” she whispered conspiratorially, “There’s a demon inside you!”
The shock showed plainly on her face as he responded calmly, none of his dread coloring his voice. “There is.”
She leaned back again, her face scrunching up with worry. “Well, how long has he been there?”
“My whole life,” he answered evenly, watching the emotions play across her face. Confusion, and hurt. Betrayal. He saw his chances slipping away.
She turned her face from him to hide her pained expression. The whole time! The whole, entire time! He’d known about demons, about the supernatural world the entire time!
All that time, their time, wasted keeping her double life a secret from him. All that time she could have held him, could have talked to him, could have kissed him, wasted keeping rogue youkai at bay and covering her bloody trail.
This was… astronomical! This was completely, utterly impossible! How had she not seen it?
He was beautiful. Rich, crimson hair that put the finest silk to shame framed a perfect, flawless facade. A milky, pearlescent complexion and an angular face, features better fit for some sleek, feral animal. Gems for eyes that radiated intelligence, calculation, following every movement like a predator does his prey. For all their time together she had struggled to determine exactly what it was that irked her. Now she knew. He was inhumanly beautiful.
But he was human. She was sure of it. He felt human. But there was something else, another entity inside him that was completely separate but in some places nearly indistinguishable from him. Like the other had leaked into him, began melding and merging itself with his own spirit. It was like nothing she’d ever seen before.
Kurama remained stock still, worrying over the myriad of emotions playing over her pretty face. He watched, entranced and amazed as she finally settled on one: determination. He couldn’t be sure if it was good or bad. “I’m still me, Kagome-”
“Why now?” she whispered, still not looking at him. The girl kept her eyes trained on the far wall, refusing to meet his eyes.
“Pardon?” It wasn’t the reaction the fox had been expecting. Perhaps fear or repulsion or… But if she’d shown him any of these, she wouldn’t have been Kagome. It was why he’d fallen in love with her in the first place.
This time, she did meet his eyes. And he saw there the same anxiety and distress he imagined was reflected in his own. Her voice was stronger now, edged with resolve and an underlying anger. “Why are you telling me this now? When it’s too late?”
‘Too late…?’
Kurama shook his head in disbelief. She didn’t just say… For the first time in his life, the avatar struggled for words. His mind slowed, froze over. He felt his world drop from beneath him. Before him, painted in her beautiful, agonized face he saw his future slip away from him.
The year without her had been so lonely, so hard. But he had consoled himself with the knowledge that it was for the best. That he was doing her a favor by staying away. That they could never be together because of what and who he was.
But then he’d seen her there, fighting with youkai like a seasoned veteran of war, as if she belonged in the tumultuous world of demons and spirits. And the burning ember had swelled into a hellfire, swept through him and consumed him. It had filled him with hope and determination. He could have her. He would have her.
Now that he knew they could be together, now that she was so close, so obtainable, he couldn’t let her go. Not a second time.
He couldn’t have predicted that she would be the one to stand in his way.
‘Fix this!’ the fox in his mind snarled, a desperate note in his usually collected voice.
How? he replied despondently.
‘I don’t know! Just do something, damnit!’
“What do you mean too late?” It was all he could think to say, the only thing his mind could conjure. Too late…
Kagome turned her eyes from him again. She couldn’t look at him. Not with what she was about to say. The pain in his eyes was too much, and to know she was the one doing this to him was killing her. She’d dreaded this moment for months, knowing that someday she would have to see him again and it would be all the harder to stay away.
“Shuichi, I am the guardian of a powerful and dangerous jewel, the Shikon no Tama,” she gestured to the gem hanging innocently around her neck. “I was born with it, and it’s my responsibility to keep it out of the hands of those who would use it for evil or selfish purposes.” She laughed self-depreciatingly. “I haven’t done such a good job so far.”
Her thoughts turned to a young miko who had visited Kaede’s village a few weeks ago. She had traveled from the west to find Kagome with some hopeful news.
“The well out back is a portal to the Sengoku Jidai. I have been traveling back and forth between eras since I was fifteen. The power of this jewel is too much for the world of men. I want to get rid of it, to destroy it once and for all. But so far I’ve had no luck.”
At this point, she turned her eyes back to him, unable to keep them from him for too long. She hoped he could understand, could see the honesty in her eyes. The girl viciously bit back the tears ready to fall at his sullen expression, so pained.
“Shuichi, next week I’m leaving for China. Five hundred years ago.”
His expression hardened. Was that all? “I’ll wait for you, then.”
Kagome shook her head sadly, eyes glossy with sympathy as she reached out a pale hand to cup his face. The fox leaned into her touch. “I’ll be gone for a year at least. There’s a priest on the far end of the continent who says he can-”
“I’ll come with you,” he interrupted with no hesitance.
She smiled a bittersweet smile. “You can’t, Shuichi. The well doesn’t allow anyone but me and Inuyasha to pass through.”
“I’ll find a way,” the fox told her sternly, covering her hand with his own.
Her brows knit in mild irritation at his stubbornness. Didn’t he understand? Didn‘t he realize what he was doing to her? “Why are you doing this?”
Kurama watched her and wondered what could possibly be going through her mind. Wasn’t it obvious?
‘Go ahead,’ Youko urged him quietly. ‘Tell her how we feel.’
We? he asked, somewhat surprised at the admission.
The fox shot him an annoyed look, but began weaving himself into the avatar’s arms so he could feel Kagome’s hand under his own. ‘If it’s what it takes to get her to see reason, then tell her.’
Kurama came back to focus on the girl before him, noticing the way her brilliant blue eyes glittered, shining with an inner light that seemed to overcome the darkness of the room. The fabric of her pajamas was wrinkled and askew. Her thick, inky waves were mussed and tangled from sleep. Even so, all he could think was how much he wanted to wake up to her beautiful face every morning.
He’d never wanted anything more in his life. They had never wanted anything more. And if anything could be said for Youko Kurama, it’s that he always got what he wanted. With that in mind, Youko’s voice and his own melded into those three words, his last hope. “Kagome, I love you.”
The silence stretched on forever. He watched warily her reaction. Surprise lit her face at first, then confusion and a sad frown. But her eyes told a different story, one that lit an echoing warmth in his chest. He could see, somewhere deep she still felt the same.
“How can I believe you after what you did? You left, Shuichi, and told me that morning, as if it was an afterthought,” she accused. Her brows knit in anger as she continued. “You never even called. Nothing for more than a year and then you just waltz back into my life and think you can tell me you love me and everything will be just dandy?!”
Kurama tried to keep his desperation from coloring his voice as he rushed to explain, clasping both her hands in his now. Youko was raving inside his mind, clamoring to be heard. “I left because I loved you, Kagome. I left you alone so that my reputation wouldn’t put you in danger. There are many, many who seek my death and they are not above using those close to me to gain the upper hand.”
She looked doubtful, so he resorted to his last bit of ammo. “And,” he continued, struggling with this admission, “the truth is that I was anxious that you would reject me if you ever knew the truth of what I am.”
Her eyes seemed to soften at this, and Kurama breathed a silent sigh of relief. At least she didn’t look ready to bolt at any moment now. He watched as her shoulders slumped tiredly and she seemed to give in.
Tentatively, the young miko leaned forward and placed both her hands on either side of his face, looking into his gilded emerald eyes, contemplating. Then, “I don’t know what you are, Shuichi, and I don’t care. But I know who you are. You know that. You couldn’t have so little faith in my affections, could you?” she smiled teasingly.
‘Affections…’ the fox in him grinned. ‘Did you hear that, Red?’
Kurama, feeling confident that he had won the little disagreement, pulled her into his arms for the first time in over a year. She willingly slid into his lap, settling into the familiar spot with ease. The feeling of fitting so perfectly was something she’d thought she’d never feel again.
“So, it’s settled. I’ll be going to China with you,” Kurama said confidently, reveling in the feel of her in his arms again, pressing kisses to the crown of her head.
Kagome giggled and wrapped her arms around his neck fondly. “I love you, you big jerk,” she smiled, raising up to lovingly caress his lips with her own. She laughed into his mouth when it was returned tenfold, her back meeting the edge of the bed as Kurama leaned her back over his arm for better leverage.
The kiss deepened as the avatar pressed them together, molding her body to his lovingly. He slanted his mouth over hers again and again, determined to show her just how much he’d missed her, how sorry he was. Youko had fully woven his own spirit through his, wanting to feel every breath and every caress, wanting to hear the pounding of the little miko’s heart as they took her to new heights.
Some time later they parted for breath, Kagome gasping for air, a deep blush across her cheeks and a smile on her bruised lips. She leaned back into him, keeping her arms firmly around him. She laid her ear down to his hard chest, delighting in the steady rhythm she heard echoing her own.
“So,” the fox said, loving the familiar feeling of her fingers running through his hair and skimming over his collarbone.
“So,” she echoed with a smile. Her attention was drawn back to the youki in his aura when it fluctuated under her gentle ministrations. Her brow crinkled as she concentrated on the feeling, trying to discern the nature of the energy. “The demon in you, does he…?”
Kurama understood her unspoken question. Youko had stilled at his mention, fully focused on the curious girl in their lap. For once, their feelings and thoughts were in tune with each other when they gave her a smile.
“You want to meet him?” the boy asked her.
She considered the question, searching his eyes for any sign of hesitation. There was none. He was completely confident in the demon’s benign intentions; he wouldn’t harm her. If he trusted the creature that much, then she would, too. “Yes.”
No sooner had the word left her mouth than Kurama’s eyes were completely flooded with warm gold and his hair became streaked with silvery moonlight. She watched in fascination as his round human ears grew, stretched, and shifted until they were two large, silver triangles atop his head. His bones lengthened and he grew broader with a series of painful-sounding cracks and pops that Kagome had long ago come to associate with Inuyasha’s transformations. Behind him, a silver tail sprouted from the base of his spine, the long, silken fur of which shone with brilliant bands in the little slivers of sunlight that leaked through the blinds.
Her attention was drawn to his face as it too changed. The difference was almost negligible, but she noticed that it had become even more angular, his eyes taking a more traditional almond shape, his cheekbones perhaps set a bit higher and his lips thinner. The boyish charm of Shuichi’s face had been replaced with the smoldering, heated allure of a man. But it was still his face; Kagome thought it looked almost as if Shuichi had aged ten years in ten seconds.
As the little miko came out of her awe-induced stupor, she was startled to discover a fanged grin directed in her direction. The golden eyes of the male were sparkling with mischief and a barely restrained rapture as he looked her over.
“Um,” she gave a nervous giggle under his heated gaze and shifted in his lap, feeling strange and uncomfortable in such a familiar position. “Nice to meet you. I’m Kagome,” she supplied uselessly.
The beautiful creature chuckled richly, the sound of it quivering through her chest and exciting a delicious tickle in her stomach. She wouldn’t say it put her at ease or relaxed her, but it did make her feel more comfortable with him. At first he had almost reminded her of Sesshoumaru with the cold, unfeeling sort of air about him. But his laugh was warm and genuine.
“I know,” Youko grinned, lifting a large, pale hand tipped with deadly claws to lay gently against her cheek, watching, fascinated, the movement of his own hand as it stroked over her smooth skin.
Kagome watched him wearily. She hadn’t made it this far trusting every strange demon that laid its claws on her. But his hand was gentle and she soon relaxed completely, reveling in the gentle emotion he communicated through the simple touch. He had been waiting, too.
But, there was something nagging her, in the back of her mind. Something that demon in black had said. He’d called Shuichi some weird name and for some reason her mind couldn’t leave it alone. What had it been? She struggled through the fog in her mind that surrounded the rushed events of yesterday.
… Kurama! The demon had called him Kurama!
It was an odd thing to call a human boy named Shuichi, but somehow it seemed so famil-
“Youko Kurama!” she shouted in disbelief, causing the demon before her to still his ministrations and look up at her with hopeful eyes as she fell backward in her excitement and spilled onto the floor.
She quickly righted herself and scrambled out of the amused demon’s grasp to stand and point accusingly down at him. “You’re Youko Kurama!” she said triumphantly, eyeing his long tail and the twitching ears atop his silver head. Their movement nearly caused her to lose her momentum and she struggled to pull her eyes from the furry appendages.
“I might be,” he answered, but a vulpine grin told her everything she needed to know.
“You are! Oh, my god! The Youko Kurama is sitting in my room having a conversation with me,” she exclaimed with a dazed expression.
Another chuckle from the sleek creature as he stretched lazily and turned to recline against the edge of her bed. “My reputation precedes me,” he laughed easily.
She began pacing across her floor and he watched with interest as she shook her head in disbelief. “Shuichi told me the story about your escape and how you hid yourself in the body of a human. I never dreamed it was him!”
Youko watched her in amusement as she gained momentum. “And he hid your life and his memories under the guise of fairy tales, that jerk!” He was mildly surprised when she spun on her heel to look at him with a wild expression. “If I smack you, will he feel it?”
“We can worry about that later,” he soothed, not liking where this was going. He wanted to touch her, to hold her. The novelty of being able to talk with her directly, to be with her still hadn’t faded. Most of all, he wanted to finish what his counterpart had started.
The miko stopped to look at him, a thought suddenly occurring to her. “You’re not going to steal anything, are you?” she asked suspiciously, scanning the room to assure herself that everything was in its place.
“I assure you, darling, there is only one thing worth stealing in this room,” he gave her a rather suggestive look, molten gold eyes sending a shiver through her body. He was so intense.
A blush flamed her cheeks and she took a nervous step backward. Seeing this, Youko rose with animal grace to his feet and strode confidently over to her. Instead of crushing her beautiful, oblivious lips like he wanted to, the fox settled for taking her tiny hands in his own.
He lifted them to his eyes, ignoring her quiet gasp, and turned them over, inspecting. He lightly ran the pads of his thumb over the length of each of her fingers, the light tan of her flesh contrasting with the ethereal snowy pallor of his own. He trailed his claws gently, carefully up the lines of her palms, tapping the calluses on her thumb and forefinger curiously. Finally, he lifted his eyes, letting the swell of affection he felt show through them, trying to communicate his desires to her. The fox held her gaze as he lifted both her hands to place a trail of kisses across her knuckles.
Kagome shivered at the touch, feeling his fangs graze her hand harmlessly as he caressed her knuckles with sensuous lips. “I have waited a very long time to meet you, Kagome,” he said against her skin, his hot breath fanning over her hand and causing goose pimples to rise to the surface.
She swallowed, struggling for coherent thought under his intense gaze. Briefly, her blue eyes flitted above his head when his ears twitched. “You have?” she asked absently.
“So long,” he whispered, beginning to extend his attentions up her arm. Her natural scent of orange blossoms filled his nose like a heady perfume, the taste of her skin just as delicious. Her blush was deepening. So close, he could hear the rapid beat of her heart.
“You were always there?” Kagome asked as her mind was immersed in a sensual fog, her nerves tingling all along her body, the fox lighting a fire along her skin as he worked his way up her shoulder and to her neck. It was so strange. She didn’t know him, at least not properly; she shouldn’t be letting him touch her so familiarly, shouldn’t allow him such liberties. But somehow, it all seemed so familiar. She neither wanted nor felt the need to push him away as he finally made it to her lips and stopped a hairbreadth’s away from kissing her.
His lips hovered over her mouth. She held his golden gaze, something so familiar in their molten depths. She thought she could see Shuichi there, too, as if he was looking out at her through a window.
“Yes, I have always been here. You just couldn’t see me. But I could see you, and I could feel you,” Youko told her, finally closing the distance to demonstrate.
Immediately, Kagome melted under the familiarity of the kiss. His youki now the dominant energy in his aura, she felt Shuichi’s reiki flare underneath its smothering presence. His lips moved over hers in the same pattern, the same rhythm. He looked, different, he acted different, but he felt the same. And she suddenly understood.
They were the same.
The young miko pulled back and looked up with flushed cheeks and curious eyes. A little smile tilted her mouth as she saw the contented expression that had made slack the fox’s, her fox’s, usually rigid façade. “I think I understand,” she told him quietly.
Curiosity lit his eyes, and he raised his silver brows in query. “You do?” His voice was huskier than it had been, roughened with emotion and passion.
“You and Shuichi, you’ve shared a body for his whole life. So your souls and your spirits leaked into each other; they started merging where they touched. You’re not the same Youko Kurama from Shuichi’s stories. And I imagine he isn’t the same Shuichi he was born as. You’ve changed each other,” she said softly, quietly. “And in some ways, I think you’ve become one.”
“You’re starting to sound like Shuichi; are you sure it isn’t you who is doing the merging?” the fox asked, neither admitting nor denying the truth of her words.
Gently, the little miko smiled and raised a hand to his face. “But you haven’t changed since I met you. I’ve always known you. You’re still the same person, just with a different name. And ears.” She giggled when said ears twitched, as if annoyed they were being talked about as if they weren’t there.
Youko took notice of the glowing jewel around her neck again as it pulsed, delighted to feel a demonic aura so close. He easily resisted the passing urge to touch it. “You kept a lot from us,” he told her.
“You did, too,” she defended herself. “I thought you were just some normal human guy. How was I to know Shuichi housed an ancient fox spirit? And besides,” she began, her voice growing softer with sorrow. “I guess I was a little afraid. That you would hurt me. And you did.”
“It was never our intention,” Youko soothed.
“What is, then?” Kagome asked, meeting his gold eyes with her own grayed orbs.
The fox shifted, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her against his chest, feeling the warmth of her skin through the thin material of her shirt. He lowered his mouth to her ear, kissing it, and whispered, “We want to keep you. Forever.”
Kagome smiled against his skin, feeling one of his ears twitch in her hair where it was trapped between them. She had waited forever to hear that; to hear that she was wanted, not for her jewel or what she could do. Her heart swelled with love for the man she had found, this strange mixture of shy, powerful human and mischievous, intense fox. In that moment, she felt that her soul had found its home, its shelter, and its temple.
“I can live with that,” she smiled.
Downstairs, there was a clamor of dishes from the kitchen and shouts of triumph from the sitting room where Souta played his video games. A feline hiss melted into a squall. Inuyasha had the cat again. But they paid no attention to it.
Youko’s silver tail swished behind him. Kagome found it adorable.
“I’m still going to China with you.”
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~FIN~
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AN/ And they all lived happily ever after. Or so we’ll assume. Yes, I believe you will all like this ending so much better than the original. You would have killed me.
Written to: Ingrid Michaelson’s “Corner of Your Heart” and Enrique Iglesias’ “Hero.”
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Clenching Water
The Fox is Out of the Bag
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The curtains were drawn, blocking the afternoon sun and casting the familiar pink room into a semidarkness. Soft, low music washed across the space from the radio on the nightstand, a glass of water set in front of it distorting the glowing red numbers until they were unreadable. Little pink slippers lay, discarded, in the floor beside the bed.
As Kurama moved across the room, the figure in the bed never moved. He stopped at arms length from the edge of the bed, calling softly to its slumbering occupant. “Kagome?”
He waited, but she never stirred.
The “sleeping herbs” she’d spoken of the night before must have been very strong. Closing the distance between them, he knelt at her side, silently observing her sleeping façade. Her face was relaxed, unblemished by the worrisome pull of her brows he’d so often seen there in the past. Her sleeping face had always been his favorite. He remembered watching her for hours as she slept.
It seemed so long ago since he’d last touched her. His fingers ached to reach out to her, to run his hands over her body, to feel her skin alight with fire under his touch.
Instead, he reached out and lovingly ghosted the backs of his fingers along her jaw, sweeping away the inky waves that had rested there. He smiled as her nose twitched in her sleep and her eyes moved behind her lids.
A soft whisper escaped her lips. “Roses?” Brilliant blue was revealed to him as her eyes fluttered open sluggishly. His hand stilled.
She stared in mild confusion. “It wasn’t a dream,“ the little miko mused to herself.
Kurama, fearing she had yet to release her ire from the night before, retracted his hand and leaned back onto his feet. He noticed the warmth of longing light her eyes in the darkness. He still had a chance.
“You’ve been asleep for quite a while, Kagome,” he told her gently. He watched her cautiously, not sure if she was still under the influence of the herbs.
The girl rubbed the sleep from her eyes, kicking off the covers and rising to sit stiffly in the center of the bed. The softly lit jewel dangling at her throat briefly caught his attention as she looked around her room, taking in the empty chair across the room, the red haori laid across the back. “Where’s Inuyasha?”
Kurama masked his annoyance, smiling reassuringly at the girl. “Your hanyou friend is downstairs, enjoying his ramen.” He left out that he’d had somewhat of a verbal battle with the boy to get up the stairs.
‘Damn mutt needs to learn his place,’ Youko grumbled.
Kagome seemed to suddenly realize who she was talking to and turned wide, vivid eyes on him. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Just what were you doing with those youkai yesterday, Shuichi? That boy in the jeans could pass as human, but the three-eyed guy… There’s no way you couldn’t have known what he was.”
Kurama, for the most part, had expected this sooner or later. It seemed she was fully lucid now, and remembered the events from the previous evening. This might be difficult to explain.
He startled when he felt Youko begin to pour his youki into him. His aura flared around him, causing Kagome to instinctively lean away from him.
Youko! What the hell are you doing?! he growled out to his counterpart.
The fox only shrugged nonchalantly. ‘Experimenting, Red.’
Experi-
‘Just watch.’
Kagome, overcoming her immediate apprehension of the youki swelling against her senses, leaned in to Kurama. Her quick eyes scanned over his aura, his serious expression as he observed her, and the gold beginning to overtake his irises. But the demon energy still didn’t feel like him. Her eyes widened in understanding.
“Shuichi-kun!” she whispered conspiratorially, “There’s a demon inside you!”
The shock showed plainly on her face as he responded calmly, none of his dread coloring his voice. “There is.”
She leaned back again, her face scrunching up with worry. “Well, how long has he been there?”
“My whole life,” he answered evenly, watching the emotions play across her face. Confusion, and hurt. Betrayal. He saw his chances slipping away.
She turned her face from him to hide her pained expression. The whole time! The whole, entire time! He’d known about demons, about the supernatural world the entire time!
All that time, their time, wasted keeping her double life a secret from him. All that time she could have held him, could have talked to him, could have kissed him, wasted keeping rogue youkai at bay and covering her bloody trail.
This was… astronomical! This was completely, utterly impossible! How had she not seen it?
He was beautiful. Rich, crimson hair that put the finest silk to shame framed a perfect, flawless facade. A milky, pearlescent complexion and an angular face, features better fit for some sleek, feral animal. Gems for eyes that radiated intelligence, calculation, following every movement like a predator does his prey. For all their time together she had struggled to determine exactly what it was that irked her. Now she knew. He was inhumanly beautiful.
But he was human. She was sure of it. He felt human. But there was something else, another entity inside him that was completely separate but in some places nearly indistinguishable from him. Like the other had leaked into him, began melding and merging itself with his own spirit. It was like nothing she’d ever seen before.
Kurama remained stock still, worrying over the myriad of emotions playing over her pretty face. He watched, entranced and amazed as she finally settled on one: determination. He couldn’t be sure if it was good or bad. “I’m still me, Kagome-”
“Why now?” she whispered, still not looking at him. The girl kept her eyes trained on the far wall, refusing to meet his eyes.
“Pardon?” It wasn’t the reaction the fox had been expecting. Perhaps fear or repulsion or… But if she’d shown him any of these, she wouldn’t have been Kagome. It was why he’d fallen in love with her in the first place.
This time, she did meet his eyes. And he saw there the same anxiety and distress he imagined was reflected in his own. Her voice was stronger now, edged with resolve and an underlying anger. “Why are you telling me this now? When it’s too late?”
‘Too late…?’
Kurama shook his head in disbelief. She didn’t just say… For the first time in his life, the avatar struggled for words. His mind slowed, froze over. He felt his world drop from beneath him. Before him, painted in her beautiful, agonized face he saw his future slip away from him.
The year without her had been so lonely, so hard. But he had consoled himself with the knowledge that it was for the best. That he was doing her a favor by staying away. That they could never be together because of what and who he was.
But then he’d seen her there, fighting with youkai like a seasoned veteran of war, as if she belonged in the tumultuous world of demons and spirits. And the burning ember had swelled into a hellfire, swept through him and consumed him. It had filled him with hope and determination. He could have her. He would have her.
Now that he knew they could be together, now that she was so close, so obtainable, he couldn’t let her go. Not a second time.
He couldn’t have predicted that she would be the one to stand in his way.
‘Fix this!’ the fox in his mind snarled, a desperate note in his usually collected voice.
How? he replied despondently.
‘I don’t know! Just do something, damnit!’
“What do you mean too late?” It was all he could think to say, the only thing his mind could conjure. Too late…
Kagome turned her eyes from him again. She couldn’t look at him. Not with what she was about to say. The pain in his eyes was too much, and to know she was the one doing this to him was killing her. She’d dreaded this moment for months, knowing that someday she would have to see him again and it would be all the harder to stay away.
“Shuichi, I am the guardian of a powerful and dangerous jewel, the Shikon no Tama,” she gestured to the gem hanging innocently around her neck. “I was born with it, and it’s my responsibility to keep it out of the hands of those who would use it for evil or selfish purposes.” She laughed self-depreciatingly. “I haven’t done such a good job so far.”
Her thoughts turned to a young miko who had visited Kaede’s village a few weeks ago. She had traveled from the west to find Kagome with some hopeful news.
“The well out back is a portal to the Sengoku Jidai. I have been traveling back and forth between eras since I was fifteen. The power of this jewel is too much for the world of men. I want to get rid of it, to destroy it once and for all. But so far I’ve had no luck.”
At this point, she turned her eyes back to him, unable to keep them from him for too long. She hoped he could understand, could see the honesty in her eyes. The girl viciously bit back the tears ready to fall at his sullen expression, so pained.
“Shuichi, next week I’m leaving for China. Five hundred years ago.”
His expression hardened. Was that all? “I’ll wait for you, then.”
Kagome shook her head sadly, eyes glossy with sympathy as she reached out a pale hand to cup his face. The fox leaned into her touch. “I’ll be gone for a year at least. There’s a priest on the far end of the continent who says he can-”
“I’ll come with you,” he interrupted with no hesitance.
She smiled a bittersweet smile. “You can’t, Shuichi. The well doesn’t allow anyone but me and Inuyasha to pass through.”
“I’ll find a way,” the fox told her sternly, covering her hand with his own.
Her brows knit in mild irritation at his stubbornness. Didn’t he understand? Didn‘t he realize what he was doing to her? “Why are you doing this?”
Kurama watched her and wondered what could possibly be going through her mind. Wasn’t it obvious?
‘Go ahead,’ Youko urged him quietly. ‘Tell her how we feel.’
We? he asked, somewhat surprised at the admission.
The fox shot him an annoyed look, but began weaving himself into the avatar’s arms so he could feel Kagome’s hand under his own. ‘If it’s what it takes to get her to see reason, then tell her.’
Kurama came back to focus on the girl before him, noticing the way her brilliant blue eyes glittered, shining with an inner light that seemed to overcome the darkness of the room. The fabric of her pajamas was wrinkled and askew. Her thick, inky waves were mussed and tangled from sleep. Even so, all he could think was how much he wanted to wake up to her beautiful face every morning.
He’d never wanted anything more in his life. They had never wanted anything more. And if anything could be said for Youko Kurama, it’s that he always got what he wanted. With that in mind, Youko’s voice and his own melded into those three words, his last hope. “Kagome, I love you.”
The silence stretched on forever. He watched warily her reaction. Surprise lit her face at first, then confusion and a sad frown. But her eyes told a different story, one that lit an echoing warmth in his chest. He could see, somewhere deep she still felt the same.
“How can I believe you after what you did? You left, Shuichi, and told me that morning, as if it was an afterthought,” she accused. Her brows knit in anger as she continued. “You never even called. Nothing for more than a year and then you just waltz back into my life and think you can tell me you love me and everything will be just dandy?!”
Kurama tried to keep his desperation from coloring his voice as he rushed to explain, clasping both her hands in his now. Youko was raving inside his mind, clamoring to be heard. “I left because I loved you, Kagome. I left you alone so that my reputation wouldn’t put you in danger. There are many, many who seek my death and they are not above using those close to me to gain the upper hand.”
She looked doubtful, so he resorted to his last bit of ammo. “And,” he continued, struggling with this admission, “the truth is that I was anxious that you would reject me if you ever knew the truth of what I am.”
Her eyes seemed to soften at this, and Kurama breathed a silent sigh of relief. At least she didn’t look ready to bolt at any moment now. He watched as her shoulders slumped tiredly and she seemed to give in.
Tentatively, the young miko leaned forward and placed both her hands on either side of his face, looking into his gilded emerald eyes, contemplating. Then, “I don’t know what you are, Shuichi, and I don’t care. But I know who you are. You know that. You couldn’t have so little faith in my affections, could you?” she smiled teasingly.
‘Affections…’ the fox in him grinned. ‘Did you hear that, Red?’
Kurama, feeling confident that he had won the little disagreement, pulled her into his arms for the first time in over a year. She willingly slid into his lap, settling into the familiar spot with ease. The feeling of fitting so perfectly was something she’d thought she’d never feel again.
“So, it’s settled. I’ll be going to China with you,” Kurama said confidently, reveling in the feel of her in his arms again, pressing kisses to the crown of her head.
Kagome giggled and wrapped her arms around his neck fondly. “I love you, you big jerk,” she smiled, raising up to lovingly caress his lips with her own. She laughed into his mouth when it was returned tenfold, her back meeting the edge of the bed as Kurama leaned her back over his arm for better leverage.
The kiss deepened as the avatar pressed them together, molding her body to his lovingly. He slanted his mouth over hers again and again, determined to show her just how much he’d missed her, how sorry he was. Youko had fully woven his own spirit through his, wanting to feel every breath and every caress, wanting to hear the pounding of the little miko’s heart as they took her to new heights.
Some time later they parted for breath, Kagome gasping for air, a deep blush across her cheeks and a smile on her bruised lips. She leaned back into him, keeping her arms firmly around him. She laid her ear down to his hard chest, delighting in the steady rhythm she heard echoing her own.
“So,” the fox said, loving the familiar feeling of her fingers running through his hair and skimming over his collarbone.
“So,” she echoed with a smile. Her attention was drawn back to the youki in his aura when it fluctuated under her gentle ministrations. Her brow crinkled as she concentrated on the feeling, trying to discern the nature of the energy. “The demon in you, does he…?”
Kurama understood her unspoken question. Youko had stilled at his mention, fully focused on the curious girl in their lap. For once, their feelings and thoughts were in tune with each other when they gave her a smile.
“You want to meet him?” the boy asked her.
She considered the question, searching his eyes for any sign of hesitation. There was none. He was completely confident in the demon’s benign intentions; he wouldn’t harm her. If he trusted the creature that much, then she would, too. “Yes.”
No sooner had the word left her mouth than Kurama’s eyes were completely flooded with warm gold and his hair became streaked with silvery moonlight. She watched in fascination as his round human ears grew, stretched, and shifted until they were two large, silver triangles atop his head. His bones lengthened and he grew broader with a series of painful-sounding cracks and pops that Kagome had long ago come to associate with Inuyasha’s transformations. Behind him, a silver tail sprouted from the base of his spine, the long, silken fur of which shone with brilliant bands in the little slivers of sunlight that leaked through the blinds.
Her attention was drawn to his face as it too changed. The difference was almost negligible, but she noticed that it had become even more angular, his eyes taking a more traditional almond shape, his cheekbones perhaps set a bit higher and his lips thinner. The boyish charm of Shuichi’s face had been replaced with the smoldering, heated allure of a man. But it was still his face; Kagome thought it looked almost as if Shuichi had aged ten years in ten seconds.
As the little miko came out of her awe-induced stupor, she was startled to discover a fanged grin directed in her direction. The golden eyes of the male were sparkling with mischief and a barely restrained rapture as he looked her over.
“Um,” she gave a nervous giggle under his heated gaze and shifted in his lap, feeling strange and uncomfortable in such a familiar position. “Nice to meet you. I’m Kagome,” she supplied uselessly.
The beautiful creature chuckled richly, the sound of it quivering through her chest and exciting a delicious tickle in her stomach. She wouldn’t say it put her at ease or relaxed her, but it did make her feel more comfortable with him. At first he had almost reminded her of Sesshoumaru with the cold, unfeeling sort of air about him. But his laugh was warm and genuine.
“I know,” Youko grinned, lifting a large, pale hand tipped with deadly claws to lay gently against her cheek, watching, fascinated, the movement of his own hand as it stroked over her smooth skin.
Kagome watched him wearily. She hadn’t made it this far trusting every strange demon that laid its claws on her. But his hand was gentle and she soon relaxed completely, reveling in the gentle emotion he communicated through the simple touch. He had been waiting, too.
But, there was something nagging her, in the back of her mind. Something that demon in black had said. He’d called Shuichi some weird name and for some reason her mind couldn’t leave it alone. What had it been? She struggled through the fog in her mind that surrounded the rushed events of yesterday.
… Kurama! The demon had called him Kurama!
It was an odd thing to call a human boy named Shuichi, but somehow it seemed so famil-
“Youko Kurama!” she shouted in disbelief, causing the demon before her to still his ministrations and look up at her with hopeful eyes as she fell backward in her excitement and spilled onto the floor.
She quickly righted herself and scrambled out of the amused demon’s grasp to stand and point accusingly down at him. “You’re Youko Kurama!” she said triumphantly, eyeing his long tail and the twitching ears atop his silver head. Their movement nearly caused her to lose her momentum and she struggled to pull her eyes from the furry appendages.
“I might be,” he answered, but a vulpine grin told her everything she needed to know.
“You are! Oh, my god! The Youko Kurama is sitting in my room having a conversation with me,” she exclaimed with a dazed expression.
Another chuckle from the sleek creature as he stretched lazily and turned to recline against the edge of her bed. “My reputation precedes me,” he laughed easily.
She began pacing across her floor and he watched with interest as she shook her head in disbelief. “Shuichi told me the story about your escape and how you hid yourself in the body of a human. I never dreamed it was him!”
Youko watched her in amusement as she gained momentum. “And he hid your life and his memories under the guise of fairy tales, that jerk!” He was mildly surprised when she spun on her heel to look at him with a wild expression. “If I smack you, will he feel it?”
“We can worry about that later,” he soothed, not liking where this was going. He wanted to touch her, to hold her. The novelty of being able to talk with her directly, to be with her still hadn’t faded. Most of all, he wanted to finish what his counterpart had started.
The miko stopped to look at him, a thought suddenly occurring to her. “You’re not going to steal anything, are you?” she asked suspiciously, scanning the room to assure herself that everything was in its place.
“I assure you, darling, there is only one thing worth stealing in this room,” he gave her a rather suggestive look, molten gold eyes sending a shiver through her body. He was so intense.
A blush flamed her cheeks and she took a nervous step backward. Seeing this, Youko rose with animal grace to his feet and strode confidently over to her. Instead of crushing her beautiful, oblivious lips like he wanted to, the fox settled for taking her tiny hands in his own.
He lifted them to his eyes, ignoring her quiet gasp, and turned them over, inspecting. He lightly ran the pads of his thumb over the length of each of her fingers, the light tan of her flesh contrasting with the ethereal snowy pallor of his own. He trailed his claws gently, carefully up the lines of her palms, tapping the calluses on her thumb and forefinger curiously. Finally, he lifted his eyes, letting the swell of affection he felt show through them, trying to communicate his desires to her. The fox held her gaze as he lifted both her hands to place a trail of kisses across her knuckles.
Kagome shivered at the touch, feeling his fangs graze her hand harmlessly as he caressed her knuckles with sensuous lips. “I have waited a very long time to meet you, Kagome,” he said against her skin, his hot breath fanning over her hand and causing goose pimples to rise to the surface.
She swallowed, struggling for coherent thought under his intense gaze. Briefly, her blue eyes flitted above his head when his ears twitched. “You have?” she asked absently.
“So long,” he whispered, beginning to extend his attentions up her arm. Her natural scent of orange blossoms filled his nose like a heady perfume, the taste of her skin just as delicious. Her blush was deepening. So close, he could hear the rapid beat of her heart.
“You were always there?” Kagome asked as her mind was immersed in a sensual fog, her nerves tingling all along her body, the fox lighting a fire along her skin as he worked his way up her shoulder and to her neck. It was so strange. She didn’t know him, at least not properly; she shouldn’t be letting him touch her so familiarly, shouldn’t allow him such liberties. But somehow, it all seemed so familiar. She neither wanted nor felt the need to push him away as he finally made it to her lips and stopped a hairbreadth’s away from kissing her.
His lips hovered over her mouth. She held his golden gaze, something so familiar in their molten depths. She thought she could see Shuichi there, too, as if he was looking out at her through a window.
“Yes, I have always been here. You just couldn’t see me. But I could see you, and I could feel you,” Youko told her, finally closing the distance to demonstrate.
Immediately, Kagome melted under the familiarity of the kiss. His youki now the dominant energy in his aura, she felt Shuichi’s reiki flare underneath its smothering presence. His lips moved over hers in the same pattern, the same rhythm. He looked, different, he acted different, but he felt the same. And she suddenly understood.
They were the same.
The young miko pulled back and looked up with flushed cheeks and curious eyes. A little smile tilted her mouth as she saw the contented expression that had made slack the fox’s, her fox’s, usually rigid façade. “I think I understand,” she told him quietly.
Curiosity lit his eyes, and he raised his silver brows in query. “You do?” His voice was huskier than it had been, roughened with emotion and passion.
“You and Shuichi, you’ve shared a body for his whole life. So your souls and your spirits leaked into each other; they started merging where they touched. You’re not the same Youko Kurama from Shuichi’s stories. And I imagine he isn’t the same Shuichi he was born as. You’ve changed each other,” she said softly, quietly. “And in some ways, I think you’ve become one.”
“You’re starting to sound like Shuichi; are you sure it isn’t you who is doing the merging?” the fox asked, neither admitting nor denying the truth of her words.
Gently, the little miko smiled and raised a hand to his face. “But you haven’t changed since I met you. I’ve always known you. You’re still the same person, just with a different name. And ears.” She giggled when said ears twitched, as if annoyed they were being talked about as if they weren’t there.
Youko took notice of the glowing jewel around her neck again as it pulsed, delighted to feel a demonic aura so close. He easily resisted the passing urge to touch it. “You kept a lot from us,” he told her.
“You did, too,” she defended herself. “I thought you were just some normal human guy. How was I to know Shuichi housed an ancient fox spirit? And besides,” she began, her voice growing softer with sorrow. “I guess I was a little afraid. That you would hurt me. And you did.”
“It was never our intention,” Youko soothed.
“What is, then?” Kagome asked, meeting his gold eyes with her own grayed orbs.
The fox shifted, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her against his chest, feeling the warmth of her skin through the thin material of her shirt. He lowered his mouth to her ear, kissing it, and whispered, “We want to keep you. Forever.”
Kagome smiled against his skin, feeling one of his ears twitch in her hair where it was trapped between them. She had waited forever to hear that; to hear that she was wanted, not for her jewel or what she could do. Her heart swelled with love for the man she had found, this strange mixture of shy, powerful human and mischievous, intense fox. In that moment, she felt that her soul had found its home, its shelter, and its temple.
“I can live with that,” she smiled.
Downstairs, there was a clamor of dishes from the kitchen and shouts of triumph from the sitting room where Souta played his video games. A feline hiss melted into a squall. Inuyasha had the cat again. But they paid no attention to it.
Youko’s silver tail swished behind him. Kagome found it adorable.
“I’m still going to China with you.”
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~FIN~
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AN/ And they all lived happily ever after. Or so we’ll assume. Yes, I believe you will all like this ending so much better than the original. You would have killed me.