It was an overcast day when they laid Miroku’s remains to rest, as if the gods themselves had selected the backdrop best suited to the occasion—a gloomy, ash grey. The funeral was a bleak affair—what funeral wasn’t? But Kagome was most staggered by the surrealness of it. She couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that all that remained of her friend in this world was contained in the urn Sango held to her chest. The sum total of whom he had been reduced to an inscription, a name carved into a pillar of stone. In time, the wind and rain would wear this away. The urn would crack and crumble and all trace of him would return to the earth.

Kagome looked to his grieving children, huddled close to Sango. She looked to Shin in her arms. She saw his future grief for her foretold in theirs. She ached for them all in her heart, even knowing selfishly what Miroku had always appreciated, and sought after so desperately: a living legacy of his who would carry on after he was dust. This was the only immortality known to mortals. Long after the memory of him was forgotten, a piece of him would yet live on.

Demons were unlucky in this way, Kagome figured. Unless they were killed, they carried the burden of eternity on their shoulders alone. 

Inuyasha wasn’t present for the burial, nor the cremation. Kagome didn’t know where he was. Not for certain, anyway. Since Miroku had died, he’d been carousing around with his mercenary friends—in whatever sordid corner of the region they’d settled into until their next bit of bloodwork came around. Kagome didn’t approve of this. Inuyasha didn’t care. She was beginning to think her very disapproval of it was spurring him on, and so she’d stopped saying anything about it. But once again, he’d taken himself off anyway.

Sango tried not to show that she felt slighted by Inuyasha’s absence, but she did. Kagome couldn’t blame her. She felt slighted by it, too.

The ashes were placed into the crypt. Flowers were laid. Water was poured. Incense was burned. Prayers were made.

The mourners trickled away until only the closest friends and family were left. Kagome looked to Sango, who was gazing at the grave, pale-faced and uncomprehending. Seemingly heedless to the kids who’d grown restless even in their sadness and were tugging at her skirt and sleeves. Kagome crossed over to her.

“Sango-chan,” she said gently, touching her arm.

Sango stirred as if from a deep reverie. Her eyes dragged away from the monument, from the characters of Miroku’s name. She glanced to Kagome, then she glanced away, as if she were ashamed for the lapse. Touching to the shoulders of her twin girls, she steered them around with their brother in tow.

“It’s getting late,” she said to Kagome. “I need to get them home, get them fed.”

“If you’d like some help—”

“No,” Sango said, almost curtly. “Thank you, Kagome-chan, but I think it should just be the four of us together tonight.”

Kagome nodded. “Of course, Sango-chan. If you need anything at all, let me know.”

Sango nodded back. She hastened the kids away ahead of her, as though she couldn’t put the graveyard behind them fast enough. It was the exact opposite of what Kagome felt as she continued to linger there by Miroku’s grave, cradling her son to her chest.

Kaede touched a gnarled hand to her shoulder. Kagome mustered a smile as the old priestess turned to go. Only she and Rin were left of the funeral party. True dark was setting in now. Shin was starting to fuss. Seeing this, Rin walked up to them, putting out her hands.

“If you’d like to stay for a while longer, Kagome-chan, I’d be happy to watch him.”

Kagome bit her lip. “Are you sure?”

Rin smiled, a pale shadow of her old gap-toothed beam. “Of course.”

Kagome handed Shin off to her. As they departed, she returned her attention to the grave. When she was sure she was alone at last, she fell to her knees before it. She dug her fingers into the grass. It was on this same hill where Kikyou had been buried. This was a place of death. Kagome felt the full breadth of this come to bear, past and present, as she bowed low over her folded legs and sobbed, as if Kikyou were still there to hear her confessions.

But Kikyou wasn’t there. It was another who heard her instead.

“Kagome,” Sesshoumaru said.

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi

Revised 12/5/23