Chapter Text
When Rin noticed Sesshoumaru’s early return before sunset, she was surprised and puzzled. Had he noticed something?
However, thinking of Haru's shivering plea before she fled, Rin pondered for a moment and decided to keep the encounter with the ghost child a secret to herself.
Sesshoumaru sat calmly under the corridor, with his left hand resting on his bent knee, his golden eyes looking aimlessly into the distance. Behind him, the tip of his white fur rolled up and down leisurely. The three little chubby girls around him jumped and bounced, screaming with excitement, but somehow just couldn't catch the dexterous tail.
Inuyasha’s eyelids kept twitching. Even after his stubborn half-brother finally changed his mind and let the children and their mother live in the mansion together, the scene in front of him was still too abnormal to his eyes. "Kagome," he complained to his wife in a low voice, "do you want to take Moroha back?"
"No, I'm busy." Kagome was occupied in the kitchen. It was very rare for the two families to appear in the mansion at the same time. Although big brother never ate human food, nor had he attended any feasts, she still wanted to make this family dinner a really good one. "If you want her back, go by yourself or you will help me cook." Before Kagome finished speaking, she saw Inuyasha roll up his sleeves and obediently enter the kitchen.
Even though the rice balls were already made, Rin busied herself with a lot of work so she didn't have to talk to her husband. After all, she was not good at keeping secrets since she was a child, especially not from him.
After the sumptuous meal, Rin dawdled until she finished cleaning up everything, and had to go back to Sesshoumaru. She wanted to spend a little more time settling the two daughters to rest, but when she looked closely, the two exhausted girls had already fallen asleep in their father's fur.
Sesshoumaru folded his hands in his sleeves, leisurely looking at her waiting.
Rin froze. Just don't talk, she told herself. Otherwise, as long as she opened her mouth, she couldn't hide anything from him.
The couple looked at each other politely for a while, and Sesshoumaru finally broke the silence, "You've provoked something unclean, so don't go out recently." The way that she avoided him all night without saying a word had already explained everything.
Rin stared at him. Sometimes it's not a good thing to know each other too well. She also realized that he just warned her not to go out in the near future, meaning that the little boy was probably still alive. Sesshoumaru seemed to have spared his life.
Then the youkai carefully reset the barrier over the mansion. In the days that followed, the ghost child and the tanuki never bothered her again.
However, Rin became more and more unsettled. She could never forget the face and voice of the child in her mind.
"Mom, I'm hungry..." In the middle of the night, a small voice came into her dream. She packed so many rice balls and stuffed all of them into his arms, but he was still starving. The skinny boy looked up at her sadly. "Mom, mom..." he kept calling her in the dark dreams.
Rin woke up from her dream, tears rolling down her cheeks. She walked on her knees to check on her two sleeping daughters—their plump soft faces smelled of life and health. She remembered the brief separation when they were first born. She held her two daughters tightly in her arms. My children, she was in tears, how could I make you starve?
- How could I leave you alone in the lonely darkness.
When Rin started to make rice balls again on a quiet afternoon in the empty mansion by herself, the aroma drifted from the stove to the distance, and the crying of a young boy, which should not be heard by human ears, was clearly transmitted into her mind. Rin made a decision. She wrapped the hot rice balls in her arms, opened the door of the mansion and walked out through the crack in the barrier.
Between the trees in front of the mansion, at the end of the shadow-dappled path, a sneaky shape was creeping around. Rin took a deep breath and carefully placed the rice balls on the open ground in front of her.
"I'm running out of white rice," she spoke to the shadows hiding in front of her. "These two are for you. Take them, and don't come back anymore."
The shadowy darkness turned into a figure. The swollen big head of the little boy cautiously stuck out. The bushes were dark and Rin couldn't see his face clearly.
"Mom?" he called her softly, "Mom, so you do miss me."
"You shouldn't be here," Rin said, "leave with Haru quickly."
"No," replied the little boy, "You once called me by my name. Mom, I won't leave you."
"But I'm not your mother." Rin answered him bitterly.
The little boy was abruptly silent. After a moment, he took a step forward, the sunlight illuminating his face.
Seeing everything in front of her, Rin couldn't help covering her mouth with her hands.
"Mom, I've been waiting for you." The little boy said, "Haru banned me from coming back, so I sneaked out by myself. Even if she warned me, I still want to see you."
"But," he took another step forward, "that lord is so scary, his aura is too powerful. In his territory, I could barely maintain my original face..."
Dry blood dripped from his sunken eyes and the corners of his mouth, covering his tattered clothes.
"Mom, I've been waiting for you. Why haven’t you called me by my name."
Haru's warning words echoed in Rin's mind - don't answer him, don't call him by his name.
Rin moved her hand away from her mouth. Her hands were still trembling, just like her rapid heartbeat at the moment. Tears slipped out of her eyes.
"I'm sorry, Hosomaru," Rin closed her eyes painfully, "but I'm not your mother."
Light suddenly disappeared. The mansion and sunlight were no longer visible. The boy in human shape dissolved into the instant darkness, leaving only the echoes of empty resentment.
"Mom, why did you abandon me?"
Rin slowly opened her eyes, the dark forest extended silently in front of her eyes.
Let us pass, let us pass.
Where does this narrow path lead?
It is the path to Tenjin Shrine.
Please let us pass.
Those without good reason shall not pass.
To celebrate the seventh birthday of this child
I've come to make my offering.
Going is fine, but returning will be scary.
It's scary, but
Let us pass, let us pass.
A ballad echoed in the boundless dark forest. A young mother walked through the deep forest with Hosomaru. The little boy's excited voice echoed through the trees.
"What a tall tree! So many birds! Look at that fat tanuki!..." The young Hosomaru couldn't stop looking around, while the mother just kept her head down on the path. The boy didn't dare to hang around for too long, and quickly followed the footsteps of his mother. He was the youngest in the family and was born with a weak body. In the following years of famine, Hosomaru continued to starve. His huge swollen head barely managed to balance on the stick-thin body. Because he was too weak to go out, Hosomaru was mostly kept in the house by his family. He always envied other children running around and playing outside. Only this time, the young mother decided to take just Hosomaru out of the house.
Hosomaru was so excited, this was the first time he had walked out of the village. The elders warned the kids that in the forest there are youkai that eat people, old trees that had become spirits, and tanuki demons who love to tease the travelers. But Hosomaru was not afraid, his mother's warm hand was holding him tightly the entire time.
In front of an abandoned shrine deep in the woods, the young mother left Hosomaru on the moss-covered stone steps. "Don't wander off." She told Hosomaru, the shadows covered her face and masked her expression. "Keep the rice balls, don't get hungry." There was a strange vibration in her tone. A warm wrap of rice balls was tucked into Hosomaru's skinny arms. For the very last time, a gentle hand stroked the top of his big head, and his swollen cheeks from years of starvation.
Hosomaru nodded sensibly. Finally, mother was able to take him out, of course he would behave. He watched his mother turn and leave. Her figure gradually disappeared into the dense forest.
Hosomaru sat on the steps, patiently waiting for his mother to come back. He unfolded the cloth wrap, revealing the rice balls made with previous white rice that the entire family only got to eat during the harvest season. A rare treat that is a hundred times sweeter and softer than the brown rice, and his mother decided to make them all into rice balls just for him. Hosomaru carefully picked out a rice ball like holding a treasure, and slowly started to eat.
However, until all of the rice balls were eaten, night fell, and the youkai opened their creeping eyes in the dark forest, Hosomaru's mother still did not come back.
Let me pass, let me pass.
Does this narrow path lead to the Underworld?
Ghost lords are waiting ahead.
Please let me pass.
Those without good reason shall not pass.
To mourn the death of my seventh-year-old child
I've come to make my offering.
Going is fine, but returning will be scary.
It's scary, but
Let me pass, let me pass.
Yet the young mother, she never came back.
"Mom, where are you?" Hosomaru's tiny figure sitting on the stone steps was gradually devoured by the darkness.
"I am so hungry, mom..."
Pairs of small childlike eyes opened in the darkness, scrutinizing Rin. A child's voice full of resentment floated in the air.
"Mom, why did you abandon me..."
The vision in front of Rin distorted, the flames of the burning village slowly lit up this dark nightmare. Rin heard the wailing of the villagers and the laughter of the bandits fade away in the firelight. Slowly, a dying woman crawled out of the ashes. Rin recognized her face.
"Kami-sama, so this is your punishment." She was weeping, unable to make tears with her dried eyes. Behind her, the dilapidated home and her family had just been burned to ashes. It was the bandits who left empty-handed set fire to the impoverished village. Either way, her family would have not lived long in the years of famine.
The woman finally stopped crawling. In front of her, the darkness cracked open. Hosomaru's ghostly figure appeared in front of her.
"Mom, I'm so hungry..."
The dying mother jerked her head up and screamed, "Hosomaru! My poor Hosomaru!" She opened her arms to her former child. "Forgive me…please forgive mom." But she didn't have anything to feed him anymore.
Hosomaru threw himself into her arms. His hungry teeth gnawed at her feeble soul. The light of life faded from the woman's eyes. The last drop of tear fell down her cheek.
The woman's body disappeared along with the burned village. Hosomaru stood up slowly, wiped the corner of his mouth, and looked back at Rin. The dried blood that belonged to him and his mother dripped from his sunken eyes and mouth, and stained his tattered clothes.
"I'm still hungry..." he murmured.
But neither he nor his mother could shed any more tears.
"Hosomaru, Hosomaru..." Rin called to him softly. She cried for both of them, "Poor child..."
The little boy looked back blankly at where his mother's body disappeared, then turned to look at Rin again.
"So, you're not my mom," he said.
Rin nodded painfully.
"You're right." Hosomaru continued slowly, "You have made rice balls for me, you know my name, but you're not my mother." He looked back at the disappeared memory, "I actually always remembered, that my mom had abandoned me, and she also died. She'll never make rice balls for me again."
Black resentment rose from his body, Hosomaru closed his eyes wearily. He used to trap the souls of young human women as his mother. But when they saw his true face, they were always frightened and disgusted. He also hated Haru for always managing to free these women from his nightmare, telling him that none of them was his mother. He hated Haru for warning him to stay away from this woman who lived in the hidden mansion. She said that this one was also not his mother, and he would be killed if he continued to approach her. The truth is always cruel, and there is no point deceiving himself anymore. He should have turned into a ferocious ghost long ago, instead of clinging to the naive wish he used to have as a child. Hosomaru let out a long sigh, letting the dark anger in his heart gradually engulf his body.
"Hosomaru, wait!!" Rin scremed. She thought of Miroku and Kagome, but she was neither a monk nor a miko. What can she do to quell this resentment soul that is going crazy.
Suddenly, the darkness in front of her was torn apart. A dazzling light fell from the sky. The silver hair youkai strode in front of her revealing his ferocious claws.
"Don't look," he said to her without looking back. She heard the icy crackling of the knuckles from his unfolding fingertips, like a bestowed harbinger of death.
Rin suddenly understood. Her body jumped into action before reason could reach her mind. The mother's instincts drove her, as she grabbed his deadly youkai hand.
"— Don't!!"
"— Please!!"
At the same time another high-pitched voice rose. A fluffy and chubby tanuki swooped in front of Hosomaru, protecting the sullen boy in her arms.
"My lord! I beg you!!" Haru the Bake-danuki stared with her round eyes at the towering Sesshoumaru, trembling - he had warned her that if they met again, it would be the day they die, as he himself was the embodiment of death. "Please, let me die with this child! Or he would be afraid when he went to that world alone." Under the cruel gaze of the youkai, Haru couldn't help sobbing. Tears flowed out of her tiny round eyes, and fell drop by drop on Hosomaru's tiny body in her arms.
After a long time, Sesshoumaru nodded slightly, as if accepting this last request. The graceful death bestowed by his own hands would be the glory of any youkai.
However, unable to move, his arm was tightly grasped by a pair of slender human hands. His young human wife looked up to meet his golden eyes and shook her head stubbornly at him.
Under this great demon's will, nothing in this world could stop him. However, at this moment, Sesshoumaru had no choice but to drop his arm, watch the human woman gently reassuring him, and then continued to watch as she turned around and walked towards Haru and the little boy. He watched her every move vigilantly.
Rin picked up the two rice balls that had been left on the ground. The remaining heat spread into her hands.
Haru looked at her in surprise, tears and sweat all over her face. Just then, a voice came from her arms.
"Haru, why are you crying? Your face looks so messed up."
Hosomaru was hugged tightly in Haru's furry arms, and his familiar black eyes looked at her worriedly. His face and body were stained with the tears of the tanuki. Blood stopped bleeding from his eyes and his mouth, as the dried blood on his clothes was also washed away by the tears. The dark resentment slowly subsided. Once upon a time, when Hosomaru was young, he had been held in the same warm embrace, with a pair of gentle hands caressing him.
Shocked, Haru didn't catch her breath and started coughing. Hosomaru patted her chubby body with his small hand carefully.
Rin walked over and tucked the rice balls into Haru's arms. The tanuki looked at the rice balls in her own claws, and then at Hosomaru. This would be the first time she handed Hosomaru his favorite white rice balls. From the very beginning, in the dark forest, she curiously followed the little boy and the young mother. She carefully hid behind the tree to accompany him while he waited for his mother who would never return. To the very end, she mustered up the courage to jump out of the bushes and drive away the youkai that had come to devour the little boy. She took his fragile and mutilated soul in her arms.
"Who are you? Are you mom?" Hosomaru, who had turned into a ghost, looked at her blankly. At that time, the wild Haru, who had been growing in the mountains and forests, suddenly panicked, "I am Haru, Haru the Bake-danuki. I-I will not leave you alone." Since then, the nagging Haru took Hosomaru into the deep woods.
Rin quietly retreated into the distance. Haru watched as Hosomaru took the rice balls from her claws for the first time, carefully stuffing them into his mouth. Haru finally said what she had always wanted to say but dared not to, "If you don't mind, please let this Haru be your mother."
At that moment, the sweet aftertaste of the chewed rice bloomed in Hosomaru's mouth. It was the first time he really tasted the rice balls. The curse of suffering was fading. Hosomaru touched his bulging belly, and he suddenly knew that he would never starve again.
Rin and Sesshoumaru stood side by side, watching Haru holding Hosomaru's hand and bowing to them deeply. Then the tanuki and the boy turned away from the mansion and walked back into the deep forest that they belonged to.
"Mom, you look so ugly when you were crying just now."
"Don't be so rude! Where is your manners?"
. . .
Their conversation slowly disappeared into the woods.
Rin turned her head slightly, and Sesshoumaru also looked at her at the same time. The youkai's golden eyes met the human's brown eyes. Rin felt that Sesshoumaru was about to tell her not to be so reckless next time. However, he ended up saying nothing. Such willful actions had happened more than once in the past and would likely happen again, he would just accompany her every time. Sesshoumaru didn't say a word, he just leaned over and picked her up in his arms. Rin reached out and tucked a strand of his long hair around her fingertips.
"It turned out that the tanuki had been taking care of the boy like a mother." Rin said to herself, also as if explaining to Sesshoumaru.
Sesshoumaru was a little confused, it was quite obvious. When he met Haru and Hosomaru outside the mansion for the first time, he only glanced at them quickly and assumed that this Bake-danuki was the guardian of Hosomaru. "Keep an eye on him." he warned her at that time. This young resentful ghost was ignorant of all the rules and boundaries. The fact that he dared to cause trouble on Sesshoumaru's territory had shown that this Haru was obviously not very good at disciplining her child. However, Sesshoumaru did not tell his wife about these quarrels between the youkai parents.
He did not say anything, just buried his head in the crook of her neck, and took a deep breath from her soft cheeks. Rin hugged him back, while gently caressing his pointed ears. During the long breaths, their heartbeats gradually merged into the same deep, slow rhythm.
After a long time, there was a rustling sound from behind. Rin lifted her head and noticed the two chubby half-demon daughters wrapped tightly in the thick fur behind her husband. Still yawning, they opened their sleepy eyes, watching curiously at their hugging parents.
"Let's go home." Rin smiled softly at her husband.
Sesshoumaru lowered his head, hugged her tightly and turned around. Together, the tall youkai carried her and their children and slowly walked back to the mansion.