The next morning, Kagome rose with renewed energy. Scarcely able to contain her enthusiasm, she hastened to get herself and Inuyasha fed and ready and out of doors—despite her husband’s excessive grumbling. Even the baby’s aura seemed to reflect her excitement. The glow in her belly was as incandescent as the one that lit her complexion. Beneath her eyes, the stubborn dark smudges seemed lighter as she put down the mirror and set about cleaning and straightening up the house—more to give herself something to do than because the tasks were pressing.

All the while, she kept her senses peeled. At the first whisper of his presence, she dropped her broom against the porch rail with a clatter. Hitching up the skirt of her yukata, she descended the steps two at a time. She cut a diagonal across the village square, headed straight toward the source of that familiar youki signature. Her pulse kicked up another notch as she caught sight of him at last, on the outskirts of town.

“Sesshoumaru!” she greeted with a wave.

A few startled chickens scattered before her in a flurry of feathers. At her hurried approach Sesshoumaru had paused. His brows were slightly drawn as she drew to a breathless halt before him.

“Kagome.” His glance swept over her, assessing. “Are you well?”

“Well enough,” she said, crooking a smile.

His golden gaze took in her flushed face, her bright eyes. “Your dreams didn’t trouble you?”

“No—I mean, yes, I did still have them,” she blustered, her tongue nearly tripping over itself in her exuberance. “Anyway, are you busy? Do you have some time to chat?”

“To chat,” Sesshoumaru said, peering at her.

“I have a few herbs to gather—why don’t you come along with me? I just have to swing back by the house to grab my basket.” Laughing a little, she shook her head at herself. “If I’d been thinking straight, I’d have brought it with me from the start. Oh well—guess the sleep loss is making me fuzzy.”

Already she was turning toward home. The task of herb gathering no longer seemed like a chore at the prospect of Sesshoumaru accompanying her. But as she took a few steps in that direction, she realized he wasn’t following. Glancing back at him over her shoulder, Kagome stopped when she saw him still standing rooted to the spot.

“It’s all right,” she said, flashing him a smile. “Inuyasha won’t mind. I spoke to him all about it last night.”

Sesshoumaru’s gaze sharpened. “Did you?” As Kagome’s smile faltered, he turned away. “If your condition is unchanged, there is nothing more we need discuss.”

The icy formality in his tone hit her like a whipcrack. Her lips parted in surprise as he strode away from her through the deserted yard. Frowning, she followed after.

“Sesshoumaru!” she called out to him, panting as she struggled to keep up with his long strides. “Sesshoumaru, wait!”

Just inside the forest, he halted. Winded even from this short burst of exertion, Kagome clutched instinctively at the swell of her stomach. Leaning her shoulder against a tree trunk, she fought to catch her breath.

“I…I don’t understand. I thought that this would be a good thing. We can speak freely now—”

“I do not want to speak with you now,” Sesshoumaru said, so coldly that she flinched. “Return to the village.”

Kagome stared at him in hurt and confusion. “I’m sorry if I’ve upset you. I just thought…this seemed like the best thing, to start being honest with him about us.”

“Honest,” Sesshoumaru said, glaring at her as he turned. “You have a strange understanding of the word.”

Kagome tensed. “Going forward, I mean,” she said anxiously. “Of course I can’t tell him what happened between us in the past, but from this point on we can be open at least. Inuyasha, he—he’s okay with that, Sesshoumaru.”

“So, you’ve secured his unwitting consent to continue your liaisons,” the demon lord said, clipped and cutting. “How convenient for you.”

“That’s not fair,” she whispered, stricken.

“No, it isn’t.”

Kagome quailed, retreating a step as he stalked toward her. Her dress snagged against the bark of the tree at her back.

“You wish to be honest with my little brother?” Sesshoumaru’s eyes scorched into hers as he closed the short distance between them. “Call him here and tell him whose child you are carrying within you. Better yet,” he said ruthlessly, the heat of his body making her pulse skitter as he leaned in, “take me back to your home. Let him look on while I fuck you in your marriage bed. Then he will know the full truth of things.”

“Please,” Kagome said hoarsely, overwhelmed by his fierceness, his dizzying proximity. “Please, Sesshoumaru, don’t be cruel…”

“I am only responding in kind.” The corner of his mouth rose bitterly as he drew back from her. “If I am cruel, it is because you drive me to it, you little fool.”

There was no bite behind this last condemnation, no inflection in it at all. He said it as if it were a simple statement of fact, and because of this, it wounded Kagome that much more. Crushed, she crumpled in upon herself as Sesshoumaru turned his back to her and walked away—before releasing a short, snarled breath of exasperation and retracing his steps to her.

Blearily, she looked up at him. A gasp of shock escaped her as he pulled her to him and slanted his mouth against hers. Her hands flew to his arms. Her heart stuttered as his kiss abruptly deepened. Suddenly, she was adrift—drowning in a flood of raw and terrible sensation. Unmoored from her fragile principles, she was lost. The taste of his open mouth, the hungry graze of his fangs dashed away what remained of her better intentions.

“There is nothing honest in this,” he growled against her swollen lips, just before capturing them again. “It is shameful.” The rough stroke of his tongue against hers made her ache with desperate need. “Wrong.”

Kagome whimpered as he fit her fully to him, letting her feel through the rise of his armor all the forbidden lust for her he held. Torn between pushing him away and drawing him closer to the center of her own secret shame, she curled her fingers around the spiked edge of his chestplate and endeavored simply to breathe.

The clawed hands at her waist tightened to the point of pain. His lips grated against hers once more before he pushed her back from him. There wasn’t any force behind the shove, but Kagome stumbled nevertheless. Swallowing shakily, she watched as he turned his face from her and raked a hand through his tousled bangs. When his eyes met hers again, they were dark with regret.

Then, in a flicker, he was his stoic self once more.

“I’ve tasked Jakken with making inquiries on your behalf,” he said to her coolly, dispassionately, as though this heated encounter between them just now had never occurred. “If he has anything of worth to report, I will let you know.”

Weakly, Kagome nodded. Sliding down the scratchy trunk, she sat sprawled amongst the roots of the tree. Youki stirred the air as Sesshoumaru collected his power to him. His shadowed gaze lingered on her a moment more before he vanished in an orb of light.

---

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi

Revised 10/27/22

Series Navigation

<< SessKag Series: The Pact, Part 38SessKag Series: The Pact, Part 40 >>