“What happened to Jakken?” Shin asked, pulling back from Kagome’s embrace. “I sent him flying,” she replied, glancing west. Shin squinted in that direction. “How far?” “Not far enough,” Kagome said dryly. Shin grinned toothily. “Listen, Kaa-san: I know a way we can leave him in our dust.” Kagome laughed, ruffling his black hair and

“Now look what you’ve done!” Kagome and Jakken blurted at one another. Kagome froze. Then, she punted Jakken as far away as she could in the opposite direction, and she went off the road into the woods, on the trail of her sulking son. As she drew closer, she saw something blue and shimmery on

“You again,” Kagome said through clenched teeth, striding forward with her fists balled at her sides. “How many times do I have to tell you to buzz off?” The imp peeped out from the cover of the trees—not at her, of course, but at Shin in his inuyoukai form. Lingering on Shin’s crescent blood mark,

In the morning Kagome and Shine woke bright and early. While he wolfed down his putrescent fish in a few stomach-churning chomps beyond the trees, she grimaced over her own bowl of breakfast. Shaking water from his hair, he returned fresh-faced from a plunge in the creek, and together they finished off the rest of

Seven Years Later Kagome walked along the country road, humming a pretty little tune she’d picked up in the last village they’d visited. It was spring. The countryside was in full bloom, a patchwork of shining green grass, glowing blue water and rose-white sakura trees, shedding petals like spring snow in the breeze. Kagome breathed