Drawing up at Kohaku’s side, Sango, Kirara, and Hikari appeared in the open doorway of Kagome’s room, their easy conversation ceasing at the sight of Sesshoumaru. From the cradle of the taijiya’s arms, two sets of doe-brown eyes peered inquisitively up at the demon lord. A double-blessing, Hikari had glowingly dubbed them—this pair of twin girls who had been born and nursed in the very rooms of this accursed, lonesome castle.

“Sesshoumaru-sama,” Sango greeted him quietly, civilly.

Following the birth of her daughters, the taijiya had sought him out to offer her apology for insulting him. While she could not condone his methods, she did not doubt his noble intentions. Sesshoumaru had accepted this, for Kagome’s sake if nothing else, and so a truce of sorts had been established between them. Returning her greeting with a polite incline of his head, he left her in peace.

At once, the lilt of female voices resumed behind him. Glancing back into the room, Sesshoumaru saw Hikari take one of the babes into her arms, fussing over the little pinkish creature as if it were her own. Would Kagome do the same, Sesshoumaru wondered, if she were able? Would she one day wish to hold a child of her own? It did not seem unlikely to him; she was a loving person, and most females, loving or otherwise, appeared to desire having children—

Though he found it very difficult to envision Kagome wishing to bear any child of his.

Turning rather sharply from the scene, Sesshoumaru strode past his yawning cousin, out into the hall. Heavy footfalls followed after him. Barking at a few loitering guards to replace him, Ryouken fell into step beside the Western Lord. Taking a fortifying swig of sake from his hip flask, the inuyoukai captain glanced back toward Kagome’s rooms with a snort.

“Such a to-do over those human pups,” he rumbled, low and smiling. “My sweet little flower has breeding on the brain, my lord. You can smell it.”

The only thing Sesshoumaru could smell was drunken delusion. His nose wrinkled as he tersely sighed.

“I don’t want to hear this nonsense.”

“Oh, come now, Cousin,” Ryouken chuckled, taking extra liberties with Sesshoumaru in his fatigued state—as the daiyoukai captain was wont to do. Shaking back the sleeve of his haori, he put forth his indigo-striped wrist for inspection. “This shade of marking would well-complement her coloring, would you not agree?”

Sesshoumaru arched a brow. “I did not realize your intentions toward Hikari were as serious as that.”

The Western Lord was hard-pressed to recall Ryouken ever taking anything seriously—apart from swords and dice.

“The bitches will go howling across the four lands, ’tis true,” the captain said with a rakish grin, “but my heart has settled upon her, minx that she is. It’s the twilight demon in her,” he continued knowingly, relishing another drink from the flask, “a seductive lot, that kind.”

“And a strange choice to take for a mate,” Sesshoumaru replied, simply trying to discourage him—for the sake of all concerned.

“The strangeness is in us, my lord. Chichi-ue’s father once mounted a common hound.”

“Gods,” the Western Lord bit out, glaring at him.

Ryouken chortled. “He was drunk, of course—when he did it, and when he told me.”

Knowing the reputations of his grandfather and cousin both, Sesshoumaru imagined that among the lurid tales they’d exchanged, this one had been relatively mild. As they ventured out of the castle, into the forested yard beyond, the demon lord caught sight of Inuyasha. Perched conspicuously in an approaching tree, the hanyou sat in a rigid cross of arms and legs. Determinedly, he glared away from them, as if they had intruded upon his solitude—when in fact, Sesshoumaru could still see a flattening in the grass where his half-brother had launched himself up into branches shortly ahead of him.

Since their falling out, this had become a regular occurrence. Not content merely to ignore Sesshoumaru, Inuyasha wished for Sesshoumaru to see that he was being ignored. If the hanyou expected the demon lord to acknowledge such puerile antics, he would be sorely disappointed. Coolly, Sesshoumaru glanced away.

Next to him, Ryouken released a ponderous, sake-infused sigh.

“Forgive me, sire, but I grow weary of playing peacekeeper between you two.” Before Sesshoumaru could point out that no one had designated him as such, the captain barreled on, “Clearly, the whelp seeks to make amends, my lord, yet his pride cannot bear it. It is a delicate thing, this ego of his—more delicate than ours, on account of him being half-blooded.”

Growling, Inuyasha whirled toward them. “I can fucking hear you, you know! You go around bellowing like a dying ox.”

“Ha! You must needs try harder than that, little cousin, if you wish to wound me,” Ryouken called back. “This one’s pride is made of stone.”

“Just like your head then,” Inuyasha sneered, chucking a fir cone at him—which, surely enough, bounced clean off the captain’s thick skull.

Rubbing at the spot, Ryouken laughed as he turned to Sesshoumaru. “Are there bees about, my lord? I could have sworn I felt the sting just now of a tiny little prick.”

“Ha ha, very funny,” Inuyasha said scathingly as he leapt down from the tree and bounded into the woods. “Find someone else to be the butt of your stupid jokes!”

Glancing after him, Ryouken grinned. “You see, my lord?—delicate.”

Much of the same mind as his brother, Sesshoumaru said, “Return to your post, Ryouken. I wish to be alone.”

Grinning broadly still, the captain bowed. “As you command, sire.”

As his cousin sauntered off, drinking and whistling a bawdy tune, Sesshoumaru walked on, through gardens which had been increasingly reclaimed by the surrounding wilderness. Ridiculous as Ryouken may be, he was not entirely off base about Inuyasha. If the rift between them was to be mended, Sesshoumaru would have to bridge it first. Turning east, he set off into the woods, tracking his brother by scent and signature.

Near a creek up ahead, Sesshoumaru heard him, conversing with someone or something.

“Don’t be stingy—you’ve already had four!”

A huffy rustle of feathers ensued. As Sesshoumaru approached the thinning line of trees near the bank, he spied his brother prising a fat silver fish from Korin’s gold-and-onyx beak. Spearing the gutted fish through the middle, the hanyou set it over a bed of hot coals to roast, as the giant falconess settled down sulkily beside him and started preening.

Amber eyes glared toward Sesshoumaru as he approached them. “What the hell do you want?—if you’re here to remind me of how much of a half-breed bastard I am, don’t fucking bother. I get the message loud and clear.”

Lowering himself down to the opposite side of the coals, the Western Lord regarded him steadily. “You asked me once, who most resembles our father. I told you that no one does, but when I think upon it now, I realize that the one who resembles him most is you.”

Inuyasha frowned, glancing away. “Yeah, well, what difference does it make? It was a stupid question.”

“I think it was an important question,” Sesshoumaru objected. “Perhaps the most difficult and important question I have ever been put to, for I have been asking it of myself ever since, and still finding the answer far from my liking.” Ears dipping, Inuyasha looked toward him, caught off guard by such an admission. “Before he died, Father asked me if I had someone to protect. At the time, I did not. To be burdened with protecting others seemed to me a weakness. But you were the one who showed me otherwise, and I am stronger now because of it.”

The corner of Inuyasha’s lips quirked faintly. “Since I was a kid, all I ever wanted was to become stronger. I kept thinking if I got powerful enough, then maybe you would acknowledge me. Maybe then you would call me your brother. That’s why I went after the Jewel, so that I could become a full-blooded demon just like you. Then, you would have to accept me.”

“It seems,” Sesshoumaru said, smiling slightly in turn, “that had I brought you here long ago, we would have saved each other a good deal of trouble.”

Inuyasha’s eyes glinted. “I think we both had some growin’ up to do first.” Looking back toward the tower rising above the trees, he added, more softly, “And I think…we both needed to meet Kagome.”

Following his gaze, Sesshoumaru nodded. “I think you are right.”

Taking the fish off the coals, Inuyasha plucked at it with scalding fingers, offering a mushy portion to Sesshoumaru, who declined. Shrugging, the hanyou tossed the morsel to Korin, who snatched it out of the sky before rewarding Inuyasha with an affectionate peck to the shoulder. He flinched beneath the force of it—even for her kind, Korin was notably large and ferocious.

“I had heard this falcon to be unapproachable,” Sesshoumaru remarked.

“If you’d been in pain all your life, you wouldn’t be so friendly, either,” Inuyasha said with a scoff. “Some demon asshole used her for target practice when she was a chick. I plucked out about a hundred of these weird glass needles from under her feathers—when she finally let me, anyway. Dumbass bird.”

Korin screeched indignantly.

Rising with a stretch, Inuyasha said, “It’s getting late. We’d better head back to check on Kagome. Hikari will bitch me out if I’m not there to have dinner with her.”

Sesshoumaru found it hard to imagine that the soft-spoken demoness would ‘bitch out’ anyone, least of all his younger brother. “I did not know that you and Hikari were now taking your meals together.”

“Huh?” Inuyasha said, his features screwing up. “No, not Hikari—Kagome. I have some soup and make some stupid small talk, while Hikari feeds her. Sango does, too, or anyone else if they’re around. But at least me. Something about eating as a pack, or whatever…” The hanyou’s voice fell to a mutter. “It’s the latest thing she’s been trying. You know, to get Kagome to wake up.”

Sesshoumaru felt a prickle of resentment. “Why was I not told about this?”

Included in this, his mind amended sourly.

“I don’t know,” Inuyasha snapped. “Because you’ve been away at war?—because Hikari’s scared of you? Anyway, do you even eat soup?”

“No,” the demon lord said flatly.

“Well, I don’t care for it much either—it’s nowhere near as good as the stuff Kagome used to make. But I choke it down for her sake. Maybe you can, too.”

Sesshoumaru would eat far worse things than soup, if it meant Kagome would regain consciousness. Nodding, he started to lead the way back to the castle as a powerful sweep of wings disturbed the air, and the falconess’s shadow fell over him.

“You can hitch a ride with us, if you want,” Inuyasha called down.

Conscious of his exhausted youki, Sesshoumaru accepted. Springing lightly into the air, he settled onto Korin’s back behind his brother, mussing her feathers in the process. The falconess clicked her beak in distaste.

“I know, I know,” Inuyasha mumbled to her. “It’s an imposition.”

Sesshoumaru shot him a withering look. Together, they soared high through the sky, and in a matter of moments, were touching down upon the gravel of the inner courtyard. Entering the castle ahead of his brother, Sesshoumaru’s brow furrowed at the crowd of gossiping servants and guards choking the halls before Kagome’s rooms. Snippets of hushed conversation battered his ears like hail.

“…dead, do you think, or—”

“—was sleeping for such a long time—”

“—only a human, after all…”

Panic flared white-hot within the demon lord. The anxious throng parted not nearly fast enough, as his unrestrained youki forced them bodily aside. In the antechamber, a pale-faced Ryouken attempted to block his path, the demon lord’s fangs baring in a vicious snarl as he seized him by the chestplate.

“Out of my way,” he seethed, acid searing from his claws.

“Please, my lord—ugh—you must listen to me! Kagome-sama is awake, but—”

Abruptly, Sesshoumaru released him, the word ‘awake’ hitting him like a hammer blow. For a moment, all the panicked aggression went out of him—before returning in a vengeful rush.

“Why was I not informed of this immediately?” he demanded, seizing Ryouken again. “Never mind,” he grit out, shoving his elder cousin from him as he strode toward the screen. “…I will deal with you later.”

“My lord,” Ryouken rasped after him as he struggled with his warped, smoking armor, “please, wait!”

But Sesshoumaru did not wait. Wrenching the door back so violently that it snapped in his claws, he entered the room to find Kagome not only awake—but sitting up in bed.

The demon lord’s throat slammed with feeling—a riot of awe and relief and adrenaline so powerful it swept him away completely. So completely that he did not notice the too-white faces of Hikari and the others, the blanch in Kirara’s youki. These he would notice later, in stark, distressing relief.

But for now he saw only her, upright and looking forward—looking at him. It was only as he moved closer to her, as if in a dream, that he saw her gaze did not follow him as it should. As it should follow any man or creature or object that approached her. Still as a statue, she continued to stare on—past him, through him, even as he dropped to his knees before her and clasped her by the shoulders. Even as he spoke her name and tilted back her face to look directly into her slowly blinking eyes. Open just before his own, they stared back, unfocused and unseeing.

Beautiful and blue and empty.

---

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi

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