Written for the upcoming SessKag Festival event (Theme – Surrender, Day 2: Capitulate) —

  This can be read as a prequel to Good Girl 😉

It had been there from the beginning, if Kagome thought back on it. From the first time she’d seen Sesshoumaru smirking down at her from that monstrous oni’s shoulder. From the first time he’d disdained her as a ‘creature,’ and then, still looking down his nose at her in disbelieving contempt, had the gall to demand of her, ‘What are you?’—even after she’d done what he couldn’t and pulled Tessaiga from the stone.

It had been there later, when she’d shattered the spiked pauldron of his armor with her sacred arrow. When he’d plucked her next shining shot from midair and slanted his golden eyes toward her in a glare that could have scorched through solid stone. When he’d phased from view with a flicker only to reappear just before her, looming over her in open menace, and she’d met his searing eye dead-on—and if it hadn’t been for Inuyasha coming to her rescue, she didn’t know even now just what might have gone down between them.

She had the sense she wasn’t the only one who still wondered darkly about this.

Because it couldn’t just be in her head—of that, she was becoming increasingly certain. It was too tangible, too electric, this shared current of scintillating animosity that sparked to life between them whenever they were near.

It was something that went beyond the frisson of youki and reiki, something more primal, more raw and visceral than that kind of elementary clash. Something deeply personal.

He knew her name, and he called her ‘miko’ anyway. How could she not take that personally? The more their paths crossed, the more he chafed at her. His arrogance, his demonic condescension. He thought he was so powerful, so high and mighty. With flashing eyes, Kagome traced the smug, aristocratic lines of his inhuman face, and felt his own slit-pupiled stare scoring over her mortal self just as keenly.

No one else noticed these unspoken, heated exchanges. This was a private cold war they were waging, though why and to what end remained unclear. But the focus seemed to sharpen a bit more each time they crossed paths, pointed glance on pointed glance.

He’d taken in a little orphan girl. He’d stopped trying to wrest Tessaiga from Inuyasha. By and by, he’d turned his bloodthirst on Naraku instead. Sesshoumaru wasn’t a total monster. But he was still an infuriating prick. He made her teeth grind in indignation when he spoke about her to others as if she wasn’t standing right there. He made her blood boil with his cool glinting looks and scathing half-smiles.

The worst of it was, she couldn’t stop thinking about him.

He made her furious, and it made her even more furious that she was so furious in the first place. She resented that just by being a jerk, he’d hijacked her emotions in this nefarious way. It was maddening. The only silver lining to her internal fuming over him was that it distracted her from the fact that Inuyasha was still hung up on Kikyou.

Kagome didn’t even realize he’d gone off again to meet up with her until she and her friends were sitting around the campfire, and she felt everyone’s eyes resting uncertainly on her. She’d been scowling again without realizing it, re-hashing the last time Sesshoumaru had gone out of his way to subtly antagonize her. She could only imagine the dark stormclouds that were shadowing her features and disconcerting her friends, who could only assume she was ruminating over Inuyasha and Kikyou.

“Oh,” she said suddenly, dispersing her thunderous expression with a smile and a wave, “sorry—I’m okay.”

“Are you sure, Kagome-chan?” Sango asked, frowning.

Kagome nodded, beaming back at her. “I was just lost in thought, that’s all. We’ve had a long day, haven’t we?”

Over the course of dinner, she managed to reassure her wary friends. The last thing she wanted to do was worry them, especially over something she couldn’t begin to put into words anyway.

This ratcheting whipcord of tension between her and Sesshoumaru—

Kagome felt there was nothing for her to do except to wait for it to break.

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi

Revised 9/17/23

I know things have been a little quiet around here lately, but there’s a good reason for that – yesterday I finished drafting my first ever original novel 🙂 Being down in the trenches wrapping up that project certainly took it out of me, but I’m really excited to have achieved this personal milestone and to share it with you guys in the not-so-distant future! <3

Coincidentally, the Gilded Sapphire group’s SessKag Festival is coming up mid-September, so I’ll be taking a brief pause on The Pact to pen my festival fic (Of course, y’all get to read it here first 😉 ). Hope you enjoy it! Should just be 1-2 more parts I expect, then we’ll be back to our usual programming 🙂

Welp, that’s all for now – happy reading, y’all, & have a great weekend!! <3