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The doors close behind him.
In this moment, there is peace.
He wishes it were more than a fleeting scrap of time, craves it more than drawing his next breath. If he knew how, he would sink his teeth into this moment, devour it so it might become a part of him.
The doors open before him.
Chaos reigns.
-------
“Stop fidgeting, child. A miko stands tall and silent, a stalwart reflection of her inner peace.”
Kagome had many responses to that. The first was that she wasn’t fidgeting, she was simply adjusting the padding beneath her formal robes that had slipped down on their walk to the colosseum. It now sat awkwardly beneath her obi, a sure sign that the proper wrapping technique still eluded her. Everything in the Court was so much more ornate, so much more complicated than she was used to.
The second rebuttal that longed to escape her painted lips was that a girl of nineteen could hardly be called a ‘child’ any longer. Kagome had long ago developed the curves that made all the damnable padding necessary to maintain a proper cylindrical shape when not actively participating in her holy duties. Why her ceremonial dress, with its loose and flowing hakama, was allowed to be so much more comfortable than everyday clothes, she had no idea.
Her final issue with the statement was that it presupposed Kagome had ever found any sort of inner peace in her life. Yes, it was a state of enlightenment that apparently came naturally to her fellow students, but for her it remained elusive. Not that anyone other than her knew it. The only technical requirement to be in the running for the future Shikon Priestess was that she have a natural reserve of reiki, which Kagome most certainly had. It was consistently accessing and channeling said reserve that she struggled with. Presumably that was something ‘inner peace’ would help with someday.
Realizing her hands were creeping up to try fussing with the padding again, Kagome pressed her hands together and tried to focus on something else. For example, it was a beautiful day out, perhaps the most beautiful she had yet witnessed in her short time in Edo. The skies overhead were a perfect pale shade of azure blue, not marred by a single cloud. A soft breeze played with the ornaments dangling from her hair clips, teasing at her bangs in an effort to undo the hours of work Kagome had put into styling her hair just right. The air against her skin was a perfect temperature, just chilly enough to counteract the sun’s golden gaze. It was, she had been told that morning, the ideal day for an execution.
Sneaking a glance up at the woman standing beside her, Kagome was again impressed by just how regal Kikyo was in her bearing. Grace came to her so naturally, every movement created with the perfect conservation of energy. If there was ever someone who naturally fit the role of Shikon Priestess, it was her. So how had Kagome wound up being one of her wards? The other mikos-in-training that stood nearby also held themselves with no small amount of dignity. It was just Kagome-from-the-countryside that seemed to struggle.
Shaken from her thoughts by the sudden stillness that fell across the arena, Kagome blinked and tried to figure out what had caused the gathered mass of people to quiet down. Standing as tall in her geta as possible, she managed to spy that the doors at one end had opened to admit a group of men to whom the term ‘ruffian’ easily applied. All seven looked like they had, more than once, run afoul of the sword of the law– not to mention everyday swords as well, given their many scars. She was surprised to see how well-fed and clean-shaven the group as a whole was, given the fact that they were supposed to have spent several weeks in holding cells.
“The Emperor doesn’t want it to seem like the trial is unfair,” her fellow Shikon Priestess candidate, Eri, explained when Kagome pointed it out. “Everyone knows that choosing the option to fight in the pit is a death sentence, but there’s still that hope that they might beat the Executioner if they’re strong enough.”
“I would rather choose beheading, personally,” Ayumi murmured. “It’s a quicker death than being torn apart.”
“But not nearly as entertaining to watch,” Yuka added. “Which is the real reason the offenders are always so well fed. They need to be capable of putting on a good show.”
All four girls stilled when Kikyo’s reproachful gaze fell on them, their patterned fans fluttering to hide embarrassed expressions. Kagome swallowed down the lump that had formed in her throat as she watched the condemned men stretch and select weapons blessed with holy powers by none other than Kikyo herself. After all, normal blades or arrows would barely make a daiyokai flinch.
In the small town where she had been raised, Kagome had heard the stories of their Emperor’s Executioner: a great inuyokai who was bound to serve the court with the power of the Shikon Priestess. The post of Executioner had always been held by a daiyokai, stretching back as far as the creation of the Shikon no Tama by the legendary Midoriko; however, to have managed to subdue and subjugate one of the members of the powerful inuyokai clan was of particular note to Emperor Naraku’s reign.
Once weapons were chosen, the men turned their attention to a set of heavy iron doors opposite the plain wooden ones that had released them into the colosseum’s white, sand-covered central ground. Kagome found her gaze being drawn that way as well, as was everyone else’s. Doors of such size, crafted from such a precious metal, must have cost a fortune, she thought to herself as a creaking groan reverberated through the air. Slowly the heavy doors opened to reveal a gaping maw of darkness beyond.
For a moment the world as a whole seemed to hold its breath, tension sparking through the gathered crowd as if they were one massive creature rather than hundreds of individuals.
Then the inuyokai sprang forward, the world dissolving into chaos.
She wasn’t certain what she had expected the legendary beast to look like. It would be canid in form, that much was obvious, and she had been told of his white fur that shone like starlight even in the brightness of day. What Kagome never could have guessed was how horrible in his beauty the beast would be.
Silver fangs the size of daggers flashed as he leaped upon the first brigand, barely flinching when a pike grazed off one shoulder. Eyes that sparkled like rubies flashed with fire as a knife was plunged into the beast’s side; he turned and tore the offending weapon wielder in half as easily as if they were made of rice paper. It took Kagome watching as claws sank into another man’s chest to realize the Executioner only had three legs. She was awed even as she was sickened by the sight of so much death. If this was how the daiyokai fared missing a limb, how formidable must he have been with all intact?
The crowd around her was roaring, collectively cheering on neither man nor beast but simply the violence itself. Kagome was shocked to see people who would normally never have raised their voices even in jest yelling for blood. It was deeply disturbing, making her stomach knot. Risking a glance at Kikyo, Kagome was concerned to find that the Shikon Priestess watched the violence with cold approval. Bowing her head behind her fan, Kagome did her best to try and ignore the meaty, squelching noises of flesh ripping.
A collective gasp made her raise her head at last. The final man, desperate and driven into a corner, had apparently managed to grab a fallen pike. He now lay dead, chest torn open in a way that made Kagome too queasy to look at closely, but he hadn’t gone down without a fight. The long weapon was thrust deep into the left of the Executioner’s chest, his white fur quickly staining red.
Kagome watched as the great beast shook his head, snarling and panting as he tried to bend his head in such a way as to pull the pike out. It was an impossible angle. Enraged and in pain, the inuyokai began to pace, each strained breath pulsing out a fresh gout of life’s blood.
He’s going to die, Kagome found herself thinking. Despite the violence she had just witnessed him commit, her heart went out to the suffering creature. It was just a poor beast doing instinctively what it was designed to do. Mama had always said she was too compassionate for her own good. Maybe this proved her point.
“Come,” Kikyo commanded, striding towards the exit through the throngs of people who had gathered behind them. They parted before her effortlessly, leaving a clear path for her wards to follow behind.
Giving the wounded daiyokai a final glance, Kagome hurried after her mistress, strongly suspecting her dreams would be forever haunted with the sight of what she had witnessed that day.
It turned out the horror wasn’t quite finished.
Kikyo led them down into the stony depths under the arena where the cold, heavy air settled onto the intruding mortals that dared to plumb beneath the surface of the earth. They waited there, increasingly frozen flowers of feminine grace, until an unexpected entity joined them.
“Please, do not prostrate yourselves,” the Emperor’s voice was like silk, wrapping around the listener to ensnare them into hanging onto his every word. As he waited for the women to right themselves, Kagome caught his gaze.
For a moment it felt as if the world shrank until it contained only the two of them. They were connected by an ephemeral thread pulled taut, a tension that grew until it seemed to be trying to pull Kagome closer, tried to encourage her foot to take a step towards him–
“Is everything prepared, my lord?” Kikyo asked, her solemn voice enough to snap the tenuous thread.
Kagome sucked in a lungful of air as if she had been holding her breath for minutes instead of seconds, hurriedly looking away and therefore entirely missing the gleam of interest in her emperor’s eyes.
“It is,” Emperor Naraku confirmed. “I hope your girls will not be negatively affected…?”
“If they are to become the Shikon’s priestess, they cannot be,” Kikyo replied, which did absolutely nothing to soothe the unease Kagome felt growing in her chest. What, exactly, had they been led down there to do? Come to think of it, wasn’t it odd that the Emperor was here at all, much less alone? Shouldn’t he have guards?
Kikyo led the way into a room that somehow felt several degrees colder than the halls they had just been standing in. A wall of thick iron bars divided the room in two, keeping the entering humans from the beast beyond. A soft gasp escaped Kagome as she realized exactly what that mound of white and red beyond them were.
“One of the Shikon Priestess’s duties is to attend to the Executioner when he is damaged,” Kikyo explained in her calm, even tone. “Wounds caused by holy weapons can only be mended by reiki, rather than his own natural healing processes.”
“Only the Priestess, or her students, are allowed this task,” Naraku added, gaze again falling on Kagome. “Only they are trusted enough.”
“Kagome.” The girl jumped slightly when Kikyo said her name. “Today will be your first true test.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Kagome said softly, managing to bite her tongue in time to keep from pointing out that she had already passed numerous tests to have advanced this far in the selection process. It wasn’t as if just any girl could walk in off the street and be accepted as a candidate for the most prestigious role of any miko in the land.
“He’s quite harmless to us,” Naraku gestured towards the daiyokai’s still form. “Do you see the necklace he wears?”
She had to step closer, but Kagome nodded when she spotted the deep purple beads and bone-white magatama encircling the Executioner’s neck.
“That is the Kotodama no Nenju. So long as he wears it, he is bound to the Shikon Priestess’s command,” the Emperor moved to unlock a heavy door set within the bars. “Should you become the next Priestess, you will be taught the sacred rite.”
Nodding, Kagome swallowed down her fear as he preceded her into the cell where the inuyokai lay motionless.
“I simply need to heal him?” she asked, glad that the length of her sleeves hid the way her fingers trembled.
“Yes. If you are careful, your pretty kimono should escape being ruined in the process,” Naraku said, eyes gleaming with amusement.
The last thing Kagome had been worried about was her outfit. Clothes, after all, could be replaced; any ripped off limbs, a little less so. Walking as quietly as her geta would allow, she approached the lump of fur with her heart in her throat. Up close she could see that he was in fact moving slightly, though he must be breathing very shallowly. Had one of his lungs been punctured?
“Hello,” she said, feeling foolish as she did so. Would the inuyokai even understand human speech? The only encounters with yokai that she had had were with the lesser ones that resembled animals almost perfectly, save for being slightly bigger or perhaps with additional eyes. Legends said that daiyokai were almost an entirely different species in comparison.
Whatever the reality, the Executioner didn’t respond to her. Carefully circling around until she could see his massive head, Kagome frowned when she saw his eyes were open but dull, staring vacantly into the black nothingness of the back of his cell. That certainly couldn’t be good. The only time she’d seen that expression on an animal’s face was when they were deathly ill, such as the final hours before her beloved cat Boyu’s passing.
“I’m going to try to make you feel better,” she said, holding out her hand to him as she would for a significantly smaller and less demonic dog to sniff.
His nostrils barely flared.
Alright, then.
Pushing her sleeves up to her elbows in an attempt to get them out of the way, Kagome knelt beside the wounded beast. Momentarily she was distracted with irritation– if Kikyo had known this was the plan, why make her students dress up in impractical outfits?-- before sucking in a breath and attempting to find that ever elusive inner peace. Reaching out, she placed her hand on the daiyokai’s neck, her fingers sinking though silky soft fur until they found the skin beneath.
She was shocked when her reiki easily welled up in response to the powerful yet latent demonic energies dwelling within the creature. She had been told, and experienced on rare occasions, that yoki was a disgusting, writhing energy that would seek to suppress and overwhelm her if she allowed it. Yet that wasn’t true of the energy she now felt. The yoki within him didn’t feel foul, simply alien, and it was doing absolutely nothing, as opposed to even attempting to counter her own powers. What Kagome felt instead of disgust was an aching sense of numbness that made her molars hurt with its emptiness. Something was terribly wrong, something deeper and more spiritual than physical wounds.
Those injuries weren’t helping anything, though, and they were at least something she could understand. While she had never attempted to heal a yokai, theoretically it was the same basic principle as healing a human, right? Follow the energy lines within the body to where they were broken or tangled, then smooth them out until they reconnected. Kagome always had to close her eyes as she worked, or else she became distracted by the sight of the physical wounds reknitting. Now, to struggle as she always did, with achieving the proper zen attitude–
–only it took no time at all. Somehow, the vast expanse of quieted yoki seemed to reach out to her, to envelop her within it, not in a strangling way but a supportive one. Her reiki responded in kind, rising up to spill over into the injured body. Careful, so as not to injure the daiyokai further with a burst of holy powers, Kagome guided it to the snared tangles where piercing holy weapons had disrupted the usual lines of healing. Beneath her hands she could feel muscles relaxing and, as a lung repaired itself with a soft pop, heard a deep breath being drawn in.
“Be careful not to wear yourself out.”
Kagome shrieked softly as a warm voice ghosted over her sensitive ear, turning in alarm to find the Emperor himself crouching beside her, watching her with deep crimson eyes. Her heart caught in her chest as her handsome ruler’s lips curled in a smile that only broadened when he turned his attention to her work.
“You healed him so easily?” he said. “What is your name?
“K-Kagome, my lord,” she replied, trying to will her heart to resume its normal pattern of beating.
“Kagome. I’ll be interested to see how your training under Kikyo progresses,” Naraku said as he stood and offered a hand down to help her do the same.
Taking it and trying to ignore the feeling of heat rushing to her cheeks, Kagome rose– only to stumble and nearly fall flat on her face, saved only by the Emperor’s strong arms catching her to hold her upright.
“As I feared. You aren’t used to having to use so much power all at once,” he chided gently, guiding Kagome out of the cage. Behind them the inuyokai didn’t stir.
“Forgive me, my lord,” Kagome murmured, feeling exhausted to the point of nausea now that her task was over.
“There’s nothing to apologize for, Kagome,” he said as he continued to help her to a stone bench outside of the inuyokai’s room, presumably where guards sat during their watch.
Her name used so casually by her emperor only made Kagome blush more. When she looked up to her teacher, she saw a flash of something in Kikyo’s normally cool expression. Was that anger? Jealousy? Pity? It was gone too fast to be properly identified.
“I would recommend a day of rest for her,” the Emperor said to his high priestess, to which Kikyo said nothing and instead only nodded. “You have done well in selecting your students this time, Kikyo.”
Kagome missed her teacher’s reply as the world quietly and gently faded to black around her.
-------
Is pain better than numbness? He can’t tell. It hurts too much to think.
He struggles to breathe.
Then there is relief.
More than relief of his pain, it’s relief of his soul. For a moment he isn’t alone. For a moment he feels something other than pain or numbness.
Then it is gone, as is the pain, and he sinks back down into nothingness.
-------
It was a few days later before Kagome found time to slip away from her training after dinner one evening, an extra meat bun stored in her sleeve. Despite how exhausting the work was that she had to do each day, practicing to take the future role of Shikon Priestess, whenever Kagome laid her head down on her pillow to sleep she saw the listless, dying eyes of the Executioner. Yes, she had seen the inuyokai brutally kill several men. Yes, just the thought made her stomach clench with nausea. Yet none of that stopped her heart from aching for the suffering creature she had healed of external wounds.
She was just checking to make sure that her healing had held, that was all. It had nothing to do with the fact that touching the Executioner’s yoki had somehow helped her enhance her powers, and it certainly had nothing to do with the fact that she was feeling extremely lonely and isolated. Among the other girls, she was the only one from the countryside and, as polite as they were, she knew they viewed her as a backwards bumpkin. Kikyo wasn’t exactly a comforting mentor, either. Used to being surrounded by nature rather than the mostly stone walls of Edo, Kagome instinctively sought out the companionship of the only other creature she knew who seemed as out of place as herself.
To her surprise, there were no guards standing on duty outside the doors to the stairs that led down into the rocky prison, nor were there any she bumped into along the way. Kagome had planned a whole little speech about wanting to check on her ‘patient’ that the Emperor had had her heal, but apparently it wasn’t needed. Was there really such little concern that anyone would try to get to the Executioner, or that he would escape on his own? The holy powers of the necklace he wore must be great indeed.
She slipped into the bare room with its massive bars dividing it in two as quietly as was possible while wearing wooden sandals. The great mass laying beyond didn’t seem to have moved since the last time she saw him. Surely that wasn’t possible? Approaching the bars cautiously, Kagome peered into the dim darkness against which the inuyokai’s pristine white fur seemed to glow.
“Are you alright?” she asked the faintly moving mound of fur, reaching out to touch one of the cold iron bars. The sound of her voice didn’t rouse him, much as Kagome had hoped he would turn towards her so she could see if any life had returned to his dull eyes.
Biting her bottom lip, the miko-in-training reached into her sleeve to produce her pilfered snack, unwrapping it from a scrap of clean red cotton. Waving it in the air, she hoped the smell might get a better result. Was it her imagination, or did the great beast stir slightly?
“I’m afraid I don’t know what your diet is, though I suspect it must have a great amount of meat in it,” Kagome said conversationally. “We don’t get meat very often, and even this is more bun than filling, but I thought you might like to try some?”
No response.
She edged closer, daring to slowly extend the treat into the cage itself. “Come on. It’s delicious, I promise. I already ate my other one.”
Still nothing.
Kagome stood like that, treat offered in outstretched hand, for several long moments before withdrawing it with a sigh. “Well. I’ll leave it here just in case you change your mind…”
There was the clatter of approaching boots from further up the hallway. Startled, Kagome dropped the bun and looked around for a place to hide– she didn’t think being caught here would be a good idea. With no better idea Kagome darted for where the flickering shadows cast by a single oil lamp were deepest, before gasping as she realized evidence of her presence now lay out in the open. The dropped bun stood out pale against dark stone.
The footsteps were growing closer. Squeezing her eyes shut, Kagome prayed that somehow she would go undiscovered. In the darkness behind her eyelids she heard something that sounded like silk slipping over the ground, then the foot falls stopped outside the room. She held her breath, sure at any moment the bun would be spotted, drawing the guard inside–
–Instead they continued on their way. Slowly squinting out of one eye before both opened in surprise, Kagome saw that the puff of dough had somehow vanished. Looking to the Executioner, she saw that though he still had his back to her he was now laying in a slightly different position.
“You… Did you eat it?” she asked softly, coming forward from the shadows. “Did you do that to help me?”
There was no response, yet it couldn’t be entirely her imagination that one of his floppy ears seemed to perk slightly. Kagome’s heart leaped. Maybe he did understand her, then! Perhaps the rumors about daiyokai being intelligent were true! And, one way or another, her gift had been accepted.
“Thank you. I’ll return soon with more!” Kagome promised before hurrying away, feeling she had used up all of her luck for at least the next few weeks.
Yet she found herself returning sooner than that. The next time she brought with her an apple that she sliced into careful pieces before offering them, one by one, to the inuyokai. Her hope that the tart scent would draw his attention seemed to have been unfounded until she struck upon an idea. Walking loudly out of the room, she slipped off her geta and tiptoed back to peek around the door just in time to see a long, red tongue slip out the Executioner’s mouth, lapping up the chunks of fruit. She let out a happy sigh, alerting him to her continued presence. Immediately he turned and lay down, again with his back to her, but for a moment she had seen a flash of his ruby eyes. They no longer seemed so hollow.
So it continued. Kagome would arrive with a treat that, when offered, was pointedly ignored. Instead of leaving, however, she decided that perhaps he simply needed to be made more used to her presence. She sat with her back against the cold stone and spoke to the inuyokai about, initially, anything, and then, eventually, everything. Normally a chatterbox back in her home village, Kagome had stored up weeks of words that had been locked away by the cold treatment of her mistress and fellow students, the studied way she was ignored by the servants. Now they spilled free in a torrent, sometimes so fast she grew tongue tied.
She told the Executioner of her lessons, how the ones she enjoyed best involved archery and horseback riding, while the ones she liked least were those where she had to sit still and listen to droning lectures from old men with long beards. She spoke of where she had come from, a small village closer to the mountains, where the fields of rice were tended by men and women with strong, tanned arms beneath endless skies.
One day several weeks in, when she came to visit him, Kagome found the Executioner facing her. She met his gaze and smiled slightly when one canine eyebrow raised slightly. “Were you waiting for me, or for the treat?”
He huffed and got a soft laugh out of her. It seemed she had made a friend. Placing his snack on the floor of his prison, this time a ball of rice around a dried plum center, Kagome felt brave enough to sit leaning against the bars as she spoke.
Kagome reminisced to him about her father, who had died in a yokai attack when she was young. How he had left behind his father-in-law to look after Kagome’s mother, brother, and herself. She told the inuyokai of those blissful days of her youth before it had been discovered that she was a fount of reiki; days spent out under the sun, playing in the fallow fields with friends, creating worlds of adventure all their own. He listened quietly, ears perked. Occasionally he would grumble or growl softly, but beyond that he offered no commentary.
Eventually, she even found herself confessing to him of her loneliness. Her bright countenance fell away and Kagome felt herself weeping bitterly. It was now winter, many months since she had first arrived in Edo, and yet still she had no one she could call a friend beyond him. Training to be the highest priestess in the land was isolating work, even from her fellow students. They had seen how Kagome was growing in her power, how both Kikyo and the Emperor seemed to favor her, and shunned her for it.
“I-I have no one,” she sobbed, face buried in her hands as she sat with her back against the bars of the cage. In that time she had built up calluses on her hands from the use of a bow, calluses that now scratched against her eyelids as she tried to dam the flow of tears. “I miss Mama and Sota and Grandfather and buildings made of wood, not stone, and…”
She froze in shock as she felt something warm against her cheek, something licking the salty tears away. Slowly she turned her head to find the Executioner crouched beside her, kept apart only by the thick iron bars. He made a low whining noise deep in his throat and continued to wash her face with his tongue until the odd texture was bringing giggles out of Kagome rather than sobs.
“Y-You’ve finally decided I’m okay?” she asked him, slowly reaching out with her hand. It hovered in the air over his snout, both of them watching the other for a suspended moment in time… before he lifted his nose to press it against the inside of her wrist.
Kagome grinned, well aware of just how precious the gift she had just been given was. The Executioner wasn’t necessarily a safe or even kind creature. She’d seen him perform his duty many times since their first meeting, had watched Kikyo, Eri, Ayumi, and Yuka heal him. The latter three expressed their disgust each time, apparently repulsed by his yoki which they described as typically disgusting and foul. Kagome never understood that. Every time she brushed his energy with her own it was like sinking into a warm onsen, only without the ever present smell of sulfur hot springs always carried with them. In short, it was delightful, something she’d even grown to crave.
Now she reached out again with her reiki, allowing it to flow out from her in open invitation. For the first time, she felt a responding surge of yoki. Their two powers met where skin touched fur, mixing, mingling, and sending tingles through Kagome’s arm. She gasped, making the daiyokai flinch away.
“Oh, no! No, I’m sorry,” she apologized swiftly. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Only… I’ve never felt anything like that. Have you?”
Slowly sitting back on his haunches, he tilted his head slightly before slowly shaking it. Towering over her, Kagome knew she should have been scared of the massive beast. Instead, she felt like a tremendous weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She no longer felt so alone.
Though she had to leave soon after, the tingling Kagome felt didn’t fade. Instead it stuck with her, carrying her through the next day with a lighter step than usual. That afternoon, when she was practicing shooting a blessed arrow, suddenly it no longer felt like a struggle to push enough reiki into the projectile. Instead it flowed from her easily, too easily, as when she loosed the arrow it burst apart before it could reach the practice target in a hail of holy splinters. Blushing as she was chastised by Kikyo, Kagome failed to notice that the Emperor was watching her from high above in his palace; failed to notice that he wasn’t the only one.
In her room that evening, as she sat with her eyes closed, Kagome was supposed to be meditating on the holy texts. Instead she was dreaming of her next encounter with the Executioner when there was a soft knock at the door. Looking up, Kagome was shocked to find the Empress herself standing there, as regal, beautiful, and untouchable as a wild crane.
“My lady!” Kagome gasped, moving to prostrate herself–
“There is no time for that,” Empress Kagura said, stepping inside and shutting the door behind her. “Rise, child.”
Getting to her feet, Kagome froze as the Empress took her chin in one delicate hand, turning the younger woman’s face one way, then the other. Their eyes met and Kagome felt as though her very soul were being searched. Kagura dropped her hand, suddenly looking tired.
“As I feared. You’re a good girl, aren’t you?” the Empress sighed, shaking her head.
“My lady?” Kagome said, confused.
“Listen to me, child.” Kagura said firmly. “You are in grave danger. You must run.”
“I… I don’t understand…” Kagome tried to protest only to be cut off with a cold stare.
“This will be my only warning. Leave Edo. Do not return home, he’ll find you there. If you can, go to the nearest port and sail for the lands to the west. My husband’s influence doesn’t reach that far. Yet.” Kagura turned on her heel and prepared to leave.
“Wait! Please, I don’t– is there something wrong? Have I done something wrong?” Kagome pleaded.
Kagura paused, glancing over her shoulder. “No. Far worse. You’ve done something right.” With that she was gone, leaving behind a befuddled Kagome in her wake.
Uncertain and disturbed, Kagome knew she wasn’t going to be able to return to meditating, much less sleeping. It was risky, she knew, going to see the Executioner two nights in a row. Though the men guarding him didn’t seem overly concerned about anyone sneaking in, Kagome still had to be careful…
…But she needed comfort. It took some time to bundle up against the biting cold of winter, but soon she was hurrying across the palace grounds, breath ghosting out as fog. She paused outside the colosseum’s looming walls, watching as a pair of patrolling guards walked past the steps leading to the prison beneath, before hurrying to pad her way down them. At least the cold weather meant she could switch out her geta for quieter, cloth wrapped boots.
“Hello,” Kagome said softly as she entered the Executioner’s room. The inuyokai’s head was already up, looking at her curiously. “Sorry, I don’t have any treats today. I just… Something happened…”
He lowered his head, touching the bars with his nose in invitation. Gratefully, Kagome reached through to stroke the short soft fur of his muzzle. Even though this was only the second time that they had touched so familiarly, the gesture seemed comfortable and rote, as if they’d been doing it forever. Instinctively she reached out with her reiki and felt his yoki swell in return. It was then she began to breathe easily again; Kagome hadn’t realized her breaths had grown shallow in her anxiety.
“The Empress came to see me,” she said at last, after letting several quiet moments of peace pass between them. “She… warned me. Said I was in danger.”
The Executioner growled.
“I think she was warning me about the Emperor. But I don’t understand. He’s only ever been kind to me,” she trailed off as the growl grew louder. “What is it? Do you know something? I wish I could speak with you…”
Kagome gasped as she felt the daiyokai’s demonic powers swell. She could feel him pulling at her reiki, as if asking for more, so she gladly gave it. The mixing of their powers made her tingle again, only now it was more intense than before. Much more intense. Closing her eyes, Kagome found herself gripping an iron bar to stabilize herself, worried that she might lose her balance as the sensation overwhelmed her.
Beneath her fingers, she felt something odd. The soft fur seemed to melt away, replaced with soft… skin? Her eyes flew open, revealing that she was no longer caressing the snout of a great beast. Instead her hand was covering the nose of a devastatingly beautiful man with the same crescent moon and stripes on his cheeks as the Executioner, kneeling on the ground with his eyes closed in concentration. His left arm was missing.
And he was very, very naked.
She yelped, jerking her hand away, then clapped a hand over her mouth, terrified that she had inadvertently summoned the guards. The man’s eyes flew open to reveal they were a beautiful shade of gold rather than blue on red like the Executioner’s. Only. As Kagome gazed into them, she realized that despite the color change, they were still the same eyes. Perhaps even more damning proof than that, however, was the necklace that still hung around his neck, purple beads standing out starkly against his pale chest.
“Y-You…” Kagome tried to find somewhere to look, but nowhere was safe. Feeling her cheeks heating, she tugged off her coat and thrust it through the bars– and nearly dropped it when his long fingers brushed hers. “It. Are. What.”
The man pulled the coat around his shoulders, where thankfully it draped enough to keep him somewhat modest, but not before Kagome had gotten a more than enough of a look at what he was equipped with. Not that she was any expert, but she’d seen naked men before– it was part of living in the ‘uncultured’ rural areas of Nippon– and based on her experience the strange pale man was well endowed, to say the least, and she desperately needed to try and think of something else.
“Who… who are you?” she asked, blushing hard to the tips of her ears as she tried to calm down.
“Sesshomaru,” he replied, voice raspy and soft as if emerging from a long hibernation.
“Sesshomaru,” she parroted dumbly before realizing it was his name. “Oh, ah, I meant– you– you’re the Executioner?”
The title made him snarl slightly, just enough to flash a hint of fangs that looked no less deadly for being smaller and placed in a human mouth. “I… am forced… to be.” Each word sounded like it pained him.
“Oh. Hold on!” Kagome hurried from the cell, looking around for… there! The guard station had a barrel of relatively fresh water. Filling a cup, she carefully carried it back to Sesshomaru, offering it over. Come to think of it, Kagome noted as he drained the vessel of its contents, the bowl in the corner of his cell was always dry. She had just assumed he had always drunk it all away before she visited. What if it was worse? That no one cared enough to make sure he was hydrated? She heard it was next to impossible to kill a daiyokai, but that was no excuse.
The empty cup was offered back, the inuyokai watching her closely. “Your name is Kagome.” It was a statement more than a question.
“I am,” she nodded, slowly crouching down so they were on the same eye level. “I… I didn’t know daiyokai could… well. Do this.” She gestured to his new form.
“Hn,” he huffed softly. “I, also… forgot.”
“How could you forget?” she asked, scooting closer.
“I… forgot many things,” Sesshomaru replied, eyes closing for a moment. Kagome waited for him to continue, letting her eyes roam over his new form. The pointed ears that peeked out from the mane of long white hair, the stripes that curled around his cheeks, wrist, hips and ankles; so many indications of his true nature, yet they didn’t bother her in the slightest. Should they? He was,after all, still the being who had patiently listened to her rambling for months, who had shown her kindness in wiping away her tears.
When his eyes opened again, he caught Kagome staring at the slice of chest revealed by where the fabric of her borrowed coat gaped open. She blushed as he raised a pale eyebrow.
“So. How did you forget?” she prodded gently.
“I have been lost in my own mind for… a long time,” he admitted. “Ever since the hanyo caught me.”
“Hanyo? A half-demon?” Kagome’s brow furrowed.
“Yes. The one you call your emperor,” Sesshomaru watched as her cheeks paled and eyes went wide.
“E-Emperor Naraku? He’s not a hanyo! He defeats yokai, keeps us all safe from them!” Kagome protested.
“He defeats yokai so that he may consume them and steal their strength to supplement his own,” Sesshomaru replied, shifting where he sat. “That… That is what he did with my mother and father.”
“W-what…” Kagome stared at him, heart feeling leaden in her chest. Surely. Surely it must be a lie, right? “You must be lying.”
“I am no liar,” Sesshomaru snarled at her, eyes flashing as the whites gained a tinted red hue. Kagome flinched but held her ground. “I have been his… his plaything for years. I know what truly happens, what he hides from his people. He doesn’t even bother to try and disguise his scent from me. He knows– he knew I had lost myself. He…”
His hand was shaking where it rested on his knee. Without thinking, Kagome reached out to hold it tight, making Sesshomaru look up at her.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I shouldn’t have called you a liar without hearing all you have to say. I was surprised, but that’s no excuse.”
The daiyokai seemed to relax slightly.
“You said… You said he killed your parents?” Kagome asked, stroking her thumb across the back of his hand.
“Yes,” Sesshomaru said, the word sounding like it had to be dragged out of some deep part of himself. Yet once it was free, more came tumbling out. “We were on a hunt. Father had heard of a large herd of deer that had been spotted to the east. Mother refused to leave his side, as he had been badly wounded by a battle with a dragon prior, but knew she could not forbid him to follow his nature. We were to have a great feast after. I was proud to be hunting alongside such mighty warriors.
“It was a trap. The deer… I do not know what Naraku did to them, but their flesh was poisoned even while they still lived. He is a coward who knew he could not fight my parents at their full strength. I suspect he was behind the dragon’s attack that weakened my father as well. He led his army against us. Mortal men that once would have been little more than flies to my dam and sire now plunged holy weapons deep into their bodies. I tried to fight. I tried to protect them. I was too weak,” Sesshomaru’s voice was steady, yet his body was trembling in minute tremors that Kagome could feel through his hand. “I have always been too weak–”
“How old were you?” Kagome interrupted, hating to hear the self-loathing dripping from the inuyokai’s tone.
“I was eleven–”
“Eleven?!” She squeezed his hand tight. “What could an eleven year old do against a whole army, much less one that defeated his parents? You shouldn’t blame yourself.”
“What do you know?” Sesshomaru said bitterly, then jerked back when Kagome’s palm met his cheek in a sharp slap.
“How dare you?” she said quietly, glaring at him with horrible empathy. “You’ve heard all of my past. You know. I lost my father to a yokai attack when I was seven. He was protecting my family. It took me years to stop blaming myself, to stop hating myself for not being stronger, for not being able to summon my reiki and blow them all away…” Her grip on his hand tightened. “...but that was a waste of energy. More than that, my father wouldn’t want me to live my life crippled by circumstances I can’t change. Would yours?”
Sesshomaru was staring at her in shock. “You… you hit me.”
“Yes. Well,” Kagome bit her bottom lip and worried at it for a few seconds. “Sorry about that. Mama lectures me for my temper… Wait, why are you smiling?”
“I am not,” he said, the slight curve of his lips flattening again.
“You’re weird.”
“Says the strange woman who has come to spend many, many of her evenings talking to a monster who slaughters men by the dozens.”
“Then we make a fine pair, don’t we?”
Kagome’s grin was infectious, as Sesshomaru’s lips curled into the slightest smirk again.
They sat quietly for a moment, Kagome still holding his hand with both of hers. Sesshomaru finally broke the silence. “You said Kagura warned you against Naraku.”
“Oh!” Kagome winced, having almost managed to forget about that. “Was she warning me because he’s a hanyo?” She still wasn’t sure she believed that, but she wasn’t going to call the inuyokai a liar again.
“It is worse than that,” Sesshomaru said. “He is an ancient monster, Kagome. He has existed for centuries.”
“What? How is that possible?” she blinked. “He’s only been the Emperor for a couple of decades!”
“To cheat death, he is reborn at the end of each ‘lifetime’ with the aid of the Shikon Priestess,” the daiyokai explained. “He creates many new potential vessels in which to place his corrupted soul.”
“But the Shikon no Tama and its Priestess are deadly to yokai!” she pointed out.
“I know,” he shook his head. “I do not know how he does it, exactly. Only what my father and mother told me, what he himself has gloated. The Empress, Kagura? She is a failed vessel, created by him. They smell one and the same.”
“I… I don’t know if I can believe all of that,” Kagome said apologetically.
“If Kagura warned you, perhaps she knows that you are his next choice,” Sesshomaru said bluntly.
“But then– if she’s part of him, why would she try to help me?”
“Perhaps she is tired of being his puppet.”
Kagome winced as she bit her bottom lip too hard when she drew it into her mouth it while she thought, drawing a drop of blood. Sesshomaru removed his hand from hers to reach up and wipe it away. Her eyes widened as he moved his bloodied finger to his lips and licked it clean almost absentmindedly. Catching her stare, he raised his eyebrow again.
“You should go soon,” Sesshomaru told her, tongue flicking out as if seeking to taste more. “You do not want to be missed.”
“Ah… Alright..” Kagome began to remove her hands only for one to be caught in his again.
“You will come back,” he said,his tone speaking the words as a command, but his eyes betraying the plea beneath it.
“I will come back,” she promised, accepting her coat when he offered it over and pointedly looking only at his face. Pulling it on, she hurried from the cell, hearing the air shift behind her and the sound of claws as they paced across the floor.
Kagome never would have thought that she could have fallen asleep after all that. Perhaps she was more tired than she realized, or maybe the pleasant buzz where her and Sesshomaru’s powers had blended soothed away her concerns, but the second her head hit the pillow, Kagome was asleep.
-------
He lies in his cell. Nothing has changed. Not really.
So why does he feel again? Why do memories start to bubble up again to the surface? They are painful. He does not want them.
Yet.
He also feels warmth. The warmth of a gentle touch. Of his first conversation with someone in years. Of a smile.
He does not want the pain of his memories. But he will tolerate it if it means he can keep the warmth.
-------
“The Emperor wishes to speak with you.”
Kagome looked up from where she knelt with her fellow miko-in-training, listening to their wizened history teacher as he enumerated the many successes of Emperor Naraku’s reign. She could hear Ayumi and Yuka whispering furiously to each other, could feel Eri’s glare boring into the back of her skull. Calmly, Kagome rolled up her scroll and rose to her feet, tucking her hands into her sleeves before anyone could see them shaking.
It had only been a couple of days since the Empress’s warning, since Sesshomaru’s transformation and own ominous comments. Kagome wasn’t sure if she fully believed him; after all, all her life she had heard about how the Emperor was keeping them safe, allowing humanity to flourish in the previously-yokai-ruled lands of Nippon. And wasn’t the proof of this claim the fact that, well, they were all here today?
And yet. Something niggled at her. She couldn’t just dismiss what Sesshomaru had said out of hand. Perhaps that was simply what he believed? Maybe he had been lied to by his parents or they could only imagine a mortal man as being as powerful as the Emperor by making him half yokai?
And yet…
Following the pale-haired messenger towards the Emperor’s chambers, Kagome did her best to reach inward and find a place of calm. Despite not having been back to see Sesshomaru, she found she could now easily find that zen state, could easily access and control her reiki. It was exciting. She looked forward to seeing how far she could push herself. Perhaps, then, she’d earn a nod of approval from Kikyo. Even if the woman was cold and distant, Kagome still craved her praise as a teacher to her student.
A door slid open and Kagome was ushered inside. She lifted a hand to her nose to chase away the strong, potent smell of sickly-sweet smoke. The Emperor himself was seated on a raised dais, lounging against many plush pillows, a long opium pipe in one hand. His vestments were worn loosely, almost disheveled. This was not what Kagome had expected. Catching herself staring, she quickly fell to her knees to offer proper supplication. What was going on?
“M-My lord?” she stuttered, jumping slightly when the door closed firmly behind her.
“Ah, Kagome,” the dark-haired man said, smiling up at her. “Please, come. Sit.”
Kagome swallowed down a lump of trepidation, carefully moving to kneel on a cushion positioned before the dias. She lowered her gaze politely, but found herself thinking that while she had once found Naraku handsome, compared to Sesshomaru he now ranked a distant second in her opinion. The daiyokai’s warnings floated to the forefront of her mind no matter how she tried to quash them.
“How are you, Kagome?” the Emperor asked, inhaling deeply from his pipe.
“V-Very well, my lord,” she replied, refusing to look up.
“Is something wrong?” A pale hand reached out to cup her chin, making her look up and meet Naraku’s eyes. “You appear frightened. Surely not of me?”
“No, my lord. I mean, yes, my lord. That is, you are my Emperor, my lord,” Kagome stumbled over her words, cursing herself even as her heart began to beat faster at his touch.
“Yet you have never behaved afraid before,” he murmured, smoke coiling out of his lips as he spoke.
“I… I cannot explain, my lord. Perhaps the smoke is affecting me?” she suggested, trying to breathe shallowly.
“Hm. Normally it has the opposite effect. It’s supposed to calm you, rather than heighten anxiety… But then, you are special, Kagome,” Naraku purred, sending a tremor down Kagome’s spine. Something was wrong. His smile, which she had once found so appealing, now didn’t seem to reach his eyes. There was something almost hungry gleaming there instead.
“Not that special, my lord,” she said.
“Do you really not know?” He let go of her chin, instead trailing his fingers down her neck. “Do you not understand how unique you are?”
“N-No…” His touch burned against her skin.
“If I tell you that I have selected you to be the next Shikon Priestess… Then it will be a genuine surprise? Ah. I see it is,” he chuckled as her eyes widened in shock. “How pure your heart must be.”
“But. My lord. I’m not–” Kagome tried to remember how to breathe. “Surely Eri, Yuka, or Ayumi would be more fit? They can control their reiki much better than I and they–”
“--are little more than children playing in the shallows of their power,” Naraku interrupted with a dismissive wave of his pipe. “While you, my dear, are just now beginning to swim in the ocean of yours. I’ve watched your progress with much interest. Yes, you are inexperienced, but we will work on that together.”
“My lord?” she whispered, clenching the fabric of her beautiful kimono which now felt too heavy, as if it were trying to trap her in its soft silks.
“There is more than that, of course,” the Emperor mused, his fingers now resting at the slight vee of skin where her kimono overlapped, just above her clavicle.
“I… Perhaps I should…” she was frantically attempting to find a proper excuse to flee.
“You have been to see my Executioner, have you not?”
Kagome’s attention fully snapped back to Naraku, her heart stuttering against her ribs. “W-What?”
“Do you really think that your trips have gone unnoticed, sweet Kagome? That it’s been negligence to thank for your lack of running into any guards?” he smirked as her blood turned cold. “No. I saw how you looked at him, the poor wounded dog. I suspected you would be drawn back to him out of some misguided attempt at kindness… but also, perhaps, because you sensed something. Have you found that your reiki becomes easier to control after brushing it against his yoki?”
“I…” she could barely breathe, the world around her darkening.
“I will take that as a yes,” his smirk grew, becoming almost cruel. “Did you know, my dear, that reiki and yoki are, in reality, two sides of the same coin? One is yin, one is yang. Without the other, either power can only be practiced so far. Your fellow trainees have stunted powers. Perhaps, given enough time, they could overcome that little issue; however, I have no desire to waste my time with them when you are here.”
“W-Why are you telling me this?” she knew he could feel her trembling and hated herself for it.
“Because, in the future, you will be helping me. Helping your country,” Naraku slid a finger down between the crossed folds of her kimono, hand drawing worryingly close to her breasts. “That is the role of the Shikon Priestess, after all.”
“I… I thought her role was to… to help keep out yokai? B-Blessing the weapons and…” Kagome was frozen in place, despite how much she wanted to run.
“And assisting me in all that I require,” the Emperor tugged with his hooked finger, pulling the fabric apart slightly to reveal more of her skin. “One of which is creating the future Emperor.”
“...T-The Empress…” she whispered.
“For all intents and purposes, she is… barren,” Naraku said. “And I, as a hanyo, am technically infertile. However, there are a few ways to go about creating the vessel through more creative means. One in particular is the most fun for both involved. Shall I show you?”
“M-My lord!” Kagome gasped, jerking back as his hand moved to cup her right breast. A hanyo?! “This is– I’m not–”
“Oh?” he smirked and took another lungful of smoke before calling out with opium-laced breath, “Kikyo!”
Kagome jerked her gaze to the side of the room where another door opened to reveal her teacher– cold, graceful, perfect Kikyo wearing nothing but her juban. Silently the woman came forward, placing her hand in Naraku’s outstretched waiting one. He pulled her down almost on top of him with a cruel laugh at Kagome’s expression.
“So surprised? Kagome, so sweet and innocent… I look forward to tasting it,” the Emperor purred. “Normally I wait until after the ceremony, but… if you would care to join us? For your teacher to instruct you, intimately?”
That was enough to break the strange spell that had locked Kagome’s limbs in place. She leaped to her feet, nearly tripping over herself as she darted for the door, followed by laughter that carried no joy.
“Kagome!” She froze, hand on the door. Slowly she peeked over her shoulder and promptly wished she hadn’t. Naraku was palming Kikyo’s bare breast, rolling her nipple between his fingers. “I trust you are intelligent, girl. Don’t think of doing something foolish. Say, attempting to run away? You should know. There is nowhere I will not find you.”
A sob tore from Kagome’s lips as she bolted, running blindly past servants with downcast eyes. How had she been so blind? She had ignored Kagura and Sesshomaru and–
–and somehow she was stumbling into the room containing his cell, tears pouring down her cheeks. Instantly the inuyokai was on his feet, growling in confusion.
“You were right!” she said, voice strangled by the tightness of her throat. “You were right! He’s a… He’s…”
She reached out for Sesshomaru and felt fingers close around her hand. Looking up, she met golden eyes that shone with rage. Yet she wasn’t afraid.
“I… I’m going to set you free,” she said, running to the door of the cell. She jerked on it and was shocked when it opened without protest. Looking at Sesshomaru in confusion, the daiyokai reached up to gingerly touch the beads around his neck. “What…”
“These bind me here,” he said softly. “I cannot leave this cell without the Shikon Priestess’s permission. Leaving the door unlocked is a cruel joke.”
“I’m going to be her in the future!” Kagome stepped into the cell and without hesitation went to the inuyokai, no longer bothered by his nakedness. Or bothered in different ways, but she was too panicked to pause and wonder at that. “I can…”
She reached out and took the beads in her hand, blushing as she touched his bare chest. Closing her eyes, Kagome tried to force the spell around the necklace to bend to her will, tugging on Sesshomaru’s yoki to lend her aid. Sweat beaded on her brow as she pushed at it—!
“You will be her someday. You are not her now.” A hand was placed over hers, strong and warm. “You should go–”
“It shouldn’t matter!” Kagome interrupted, looking up at him with fresh tears in her eyes. “I won’t leave you here! Together, we can…”
His expression, one of quiet hopelessness, broke her. She pressed herself against him and cried. Trapped between them, his hand squeezed hers before slipping away to wrap around her waist, holding her close.
“I have tried for many years to thwart him, Kagome,” Sesshomaru said, voice dull. “What can be done against him?”
“I don’t…” she sniffled, wiping at her nose with the sleeve of her kimono, not caring if she soiled the expensive silk. “I…”
Looking up at him again, Kagome felt the strange, strong urge to kiss the inuyokai, kiss him until that hollowness left his eyes. So she did. Standing on tiptoe, she brought their lips together, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Somehow, from there, she soon found herself laid out beneath him on the stone floor of the cell. He kissed and nuzzled at her neck as she divested herself of her clothing, one layer at a time, until they were both naked.
“I haven’t–” Kagome started to say.
“Neither have I,” Sesshomaru kissed her, slipping his tongue into her mouth, and she forgot to be worried. Forgot to do anything beyond be with him, there, in the moment.
Her world became a collection of sensations, of skin against skin, breath against breath. She arched her back as his lips traveled down to worship her breasts, as she ran her hand down his arm, feeling the tight muscles there as he supported himself over her. Entangled with him as she was, Kagome felt an almost overwhelming sense of comfort and relief that chased away any remaining chill and any lingering memories of her looming future.
Reaching down, she pulled his head up so she could kiss him again, parting her lips to tangle their tongues together as she spread her legs wide for him, inviting him to settle against her core, which was already wet with wanting. It took some maneuvering, some gentle guiding, but soon Sesshomaru was pressing inside of her. Initially it felt like too much, Kagome groaning in pain and causing her lover to pause. Having heard the stories, however, of pain that would soon bloom into pleasure, she encouraged him to continue until at last their hips met.
“You are… okay?” he panted, voice ragged with raw desire.
Her response was simply to wrap a leg around his waist, trusting him entirely. As he began to move, she resigned herself to simply tolerating the sensation… and yet, after a few thrusts, Kagome began to feel it. Began to experience the heat growing, racing through her to make her toes and fingers tingle. Gasping, she found herself clinging to Sesshomaru, unable to do more than hang on as he drove them both towards a mutual peak of pleasure.
When she reached said peak, Kagome cried out his name as she tumbled over into a depth of bliss she hadn’t known existed before. It was sweet, overwhelming, and like fire. For a moment she couldn’t hear anything beyond the pounding of her heart. As sound returned, she realized Sesshomaru was murmuring her name in panting gasps against her ear. Her heart swelled as she hugged him close. It was a long time, full of touches and whispers, before they both finally found the solace of sleep.
She was awoken by a cry. Before she could fully rouse herself, Kagome was yanked from Sesshomaru’s embrace. Hearing him roar in anger, she added her own enraged cry to his only to find herself being punched. Not slapped, not just hit, punched in the gut. Gagging, she doubled over. Further blows rained down on her, a blow to the head sending her ears ringing and drowning out the agonized cries of her inuyokai lover.
The blows stopped and something was thrown over her. Looking up, one eye already swelling closed, Kagome saw Kikyo standing over her. The Shikon Priestess’s expression was carefully blank, yet Kagome thought she saw a glimmer of pity in those dark eyes. Maybe even a sort of understanding.
“Get up,” Kikyo said, her voice a command that couldn’t be ignored.
Slowly, painfully, Kagome got to her feet, pulling the threadbare kimono that had been thrown at her around herself as she did. Her legs trembled, yet she held her head up in defiance. She wasn’t sorry for what she’d done–
Sesshomaru! She turned to see him, to–
“Don’t.” Kiyko reached out and jerked Kagome’s head back to face her own. “Foolish child.”
She was escorted by a full guard to a different set of cells, these the ones that normally held the human prisoners before they were sent before the Executioner to die. Shoved inside, the door locked behind her. Kagome spun around, calling out to Kikyo’s retreating back.
“What will happen now?” she demanded.
“What do you mean?” Kikyo asked calmly. “Things will proceed as before. You are still the future Shikon Priestess.”
“W-what?” Kagome’s hands began to shake. “But…”
“One of your first tasks, I believe, will be to subdue the Emperor’s new Executioner,” Kikyo said as she turned a corner, disappearing from Kagome’s view.
As that sank in, Kagome slowly fell to her knees. Wait. Did that mean… She hadn’t thought of that! She hadn’t thought Naraku would kill Sesshomaru– She hadn’t been thinking at all! For a moment she was tempted to cry, but Kagome refused to let any more tears fall than a few shocked ones that initially escaped. No. She wasn’t going to allow herself to cry any more. Somehow, she was going to stop this!
Yet no matter how hard she thought, how much she tried to plan, Kagome came up empty. For three days and three nights, if the number of meals she was given were anything to go by, she was left alone to pace her little cell and try to plot. There had to be a way. How could she be given all this power, which she could still feel boiling just beneath the surface, and have no other option?
When Kikyo arrived with a trail of servants in tow, Kagome leaped to her feet from where she lay on a thin, straw-packed futon.
“What’s happening? What’s–” Kagome swallowed down the rest of her questions at the expression on Kikyo’s carefully made up face.
“You are to stand beside me this afternoon,” the Shikon Priestess said, moving to unlock the cell door. “The Emperor has decreed that you are to be presented as my heir.”
“What about Sess–”
“It is a joyous day,” Kikyo interrupted. “We are getting a new Priestess and riding the world of one more yokai.”
“No!” Kagome lunged forward in a desperate attempt to escape, only to have her forearm caught in a vice-like grip.
“Be reasonable, child,” Kikyo said softly. “What can you do? Any further disobedience on your part will only end in pain for your family. Your village. You are lucky the Emperor has decided to show you grace, deciding your actions were done out of a foolish girl’s fear at being presented with such a drastic change in her future.”
There was something in her teacher’s tone. Kagome searched her face, trying to find some hint of… of anything… but could find no comfort there. She drooped and stepped back, allowing the servants to pull her away. Cold water splashed over her as Kagome was given the most thorough bath of her life, much to her embarrassment. She was dried and dressed in elegant robes richer than anything she had previously worn, makeup skillfully applied to her eyes and lips. Her hair was pulled up in an intricate design held in place by many beautifully carved pins and combs. She felt like a doll about to be offered up for inspection.
Well. It wasn’t all that inaccurate, was it?
Kagome silently followed Kikyo up and out of the cold stone prison, up many stairs until they emerged in the Emperor’s box where he overlooked the white sands of the coliseum. Her eyes skipped over the man himself, seated in an ornate chair, and instead searched the ground for Sesshomaru.
“I suppose I should be grateful, in some ways,” Naraku’s voice slid around her like a snake, tightening into chains as heavy as actual iron. “At least now I know you aren’t shy about lying with demons, dear Kagome. I will keep this in mind.”
She refused to look at him, still searching, now in the crowd– A hand reached up and grabbed her chin, forcing Kagome to look down into Naraku’s cruel, cold eyes. He looked her over and chuckled. “Keep that fire, my dear. I’ll enjoy breaking you.”
Kagome shuddered but otherwise didn’t react. The Emperor smirked as he let her go.
“Enjoy the show,” he said as he sat back, apparently to do just that.
She turned– and stifled a gasp as she saw Sesshomaru being dragged out by several heavily armed guards. He was in his true form, bound snout to tail in faintly glowing chains interspersed with the same white magatama as adorned the binding necklace. Blood stained the white sands as he was laid out at the center of the colosseum floor, iron stakes hammered into the ground before the chains were fastened there. It was all a show, Kagome realized with a sick feeling in her stomach. A play, just like all the other executions, put on for the entertainment of bloodthirsty humanity.
From the opposite side of the sands approached a young man in full armor that was lacquered until it shone. He stopped beside Sesshomaru’s great head, turning to bow deeply to Naraku before drawing a sword so imbued with reiki that it blazed almost as bright as the sun currently hiding above behind a shawl of clouds. Maybe an ordinary sword wouldn’t be able to kill a daiyokai, even by cutting off his head, but that one could.
Kagome couldn’t stop herself.
“Stop!” she cried out, rushing to the edge of the box in which they stood. “Stop, it was my fault! He did nothing wrong!”
“You see?” Naraku’s voice rang out even as Kikyo’s hand darted out to drag Kagome back. “The monster has gone so far as to bewitch a poor, innocent girl– and not just any, but the future Shikon Priestess!”
The crowd rippled with rising sounds of anger.
Naraku smirked cruelly at Kagome as he gestured for the armored man to continue. The brilliant blade was lifted and, after a horrible pause that seemed to last all of eternity, began to fall–
It all happened in an instant. Kagome cried out for Sesshomaru and was rewarded for it by a sharp slap from Kikyo. Hearing his name, the inuyokai struggled to lift his head, fighting against the holy chains that bound him, roaring in agonized anger as the sound of the blow echoed out among the cries of the crowd. Kagome’s head spun as she felt his yoki trying to respond, to meet with her reiki, as the sword fell–
And then.
There was no end to the power blossoming in her chest.
Kagome felt something break and shatter. There was the sound of snapping restraints, a blur of white, and suddenly Kagome found herself pressed up against Sesshomaru’s side. Not Sesshomaru the Executioner but Sesshomaru the man, his single arm wrapped around her even as purple beads fell from around his neck to scatter on the floor below. He pulled her away and back into open air, Kagome turning back to see that Kikyo had collapsed– but not before she had rammed a dagger into Naraku’s chest. Her body lay with limbs splayed out at awkward angles, as if she were a puppet whose strings had been cut all at once.
Then they were streaking away through the sky, a strange cloud gathering beneath her and Sesshomaru’s feet. She clung to him, pressing her face against his chest.
“Is Naraku dead?” she asked after several moments of simply trying to process what had happened.
“No,” came the rumbled reply.
“Am I the Shikon Priestess now?” she asked after several more moments. What else could explain the breaking of Sesshomaru’s binding spell? Or Kikyo’s sudden death?
“I believe so,” Sesshomaru said after a moment of thought.
“What are we going to do?” Kagome murmured.
“We will get far, far away. For now.” There was a threatening edge to his voice that promised he hadn’t forgotten all the trauma that Naraku had caused him.
She nodded and pressed her ear over his heart, listening to its steady beat. Somehow, despite it all, she felt at peace. Who knew what the future held?
She suspected it would be difficult, dangerous, and possibly even deadly. But at least she also suspected she wouldn’t have to face it alone.
-------
He is free.
But not how he had ever pictured it, back when he dared to dream of freedom. Back then he had dreamed of blood, of tearing apart each and every human.
Now, he realizes, he will have to spare at least one. The woman clinging to him, after all, is owed his very life.
Perhaps he is not as free as he initially thought.
Perhaps that is not a bad thing.