Sesshoumaru stood, his stiff joints cracking at the motion. At once, the humans ceased their chatting, looking up at him in surprise as he strode past them to the door.

“Wait,” the girl said, her voice pitched with anxiety, “where are you going?”

“Out,” he replied flatly.

“But it’s cold out,” she protested. “You should stay indoors and rest.”

Ignoring her, he pushed past the curtain, a small smirk pulling at his lips as he sensed her stark frustration. The cold was of no consequence to one such as he. Rather, it was the oppressive company inside the hut which he could no longer bear.

Stepping out onto the porch, he breathed in deeply, hoping to cleanse her maddening scent from his lungs. There was no point in continuing to sit there, drowning in her presence, while the old woman was there to interfere.

Bringing a lock of his hair before him, he frowned at its stiff, matte texture, his clothing similarly unkempt. He knew of a stream nearby and set out for it, his legs feeling strong once again beneath him. In truth, with the departure of the fever, his strength had returned rapidly. Naraku’s shouki was more curse than poison, and once broken, its effects were easily remedied by his indomitable constitution.

Another low, hanyou trick, he thought acidly.

And yet he had almost succumbed to it all the same. If anything ailed him, it was that knowledge. He had been thoughtless, careless—too wrapped up in that wretched girl.

But soon he would be free of her petty torments. Soon he would be himself again.

As the stream came into sight, he snagged an unsuspecting rabbit by the ears. Sitting seiza on the stony bank, he crushed its neck in his fist and began devouring it, fur and all. Red dripping strings of meat sheared off in his fangs, blood spilling hot and wet down the back of his throat. He crunched the bones and chewed the marrow, considering the rabbit’s wide, blue eyes for a moment before he ripped them out.

A neat, clean pile of bones lay beside him. Licking the last traces of blood from his claws, he slipped fully clothed into the icy stream. His hakama and loosened haori billowed about him in the current. Once they were washed through, he stripped off his heavy clothes and laid them out on the opposite bank to dry.

The chill of the water was bracing. Plunging briefly beneath the surface, he began to unravel the tangle of his hair, until the long strands ran through his fingers like silk once again. Satisfied with the effort, he leaned back against the smooth surface of a submerged boulder, the stream flowing briskly around his hips.

With nothing to distract him, his thoughts returned inevitably to the girl. Lashes descending, he remembered the flush on her cheeks, the glaze of desire in her eyes as she recounted the events of the night before. He remembered the radiant feel of her heat against his fingers, the heady fragrance of her arousal, the heaving swell of her breasts. His groin ached at the memory, his hand lowering to soothe it.

As he clenched his fist around his thickening length, he envisioned that pale, taunting slip of her skin beaneath her shirt, as she exposed herself to him at his command. In his mind, the exposure continued, his grip sliding fast and hard as he imagined her creamy breasts spilling out before his view, the mark he had left upon her darkening her fair complexion.

He could feel his release coming upon him as a branch snapped at the edge of the trees, his eyes snapping open to find her standing there with a basket clutched to her chest, staring at him in apprehension.

“S-sorry…” she whispered.

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi