Kagome’s blood ran cold.

“What?!” she cried out, rushing over.

Dropping to her knees, she ripped up the tatami and pressed her face to the floor, attempting to peer through the narrow gaps in the boards. But her shout, combined with her thunderous approach, seemed to have flushed out the eavesdropper. There was a sound of scurrying in the crawlspace beneath her home, as if she’d sent some large animal running away scared.

Nostrils flared, Kagome cut her eyes wrathfully to the door, though she knew that any further pursuit would be worse than pointless. She’d only make more of a scene. Riotously, her cheeks burned. At her sides her fists clenched in impotent fury, her nails carving crescents into her clammy palms.

“Shall I silence her?”

Kagome spun toward Sesshoumaru, almost as unnerved by the nonchalance of his offer as she was by the discovery itself. Cool and collected, he evenly returned her reproachful glare.

For the second time in as many minutes, Kagome found herself spitting out, “What?”

“Your servant girl.”

“Stop calling her that,” the miko snapped, rising from her undignified crouch. “She’s not my servant.”

Thoroughly disgusted, she made her way over to the bath that was already drawn. Lukewarm from the coals that had long-since settled to the bottom, the water that enfolded her felt hardly more clean than she did. Closing her eyes, she let her head fall back against the wooden edge of the tub. A beleaguered sigh left her lips.

“Just go away,” she said to Sesshoumaru. “And stay away—I need some time to sort this out.”

Beneath the hard tone of her voice was a thin note of appeal, and his sharp ears didn’t fail to catch it. Kagome tensed as she felt him approach her soundlessly from behind. Brazenly, he cupped her beneath the jaw, regarding her coolly still—even as her eyes seared up at him in vicious warning.

Against the fiery skin of her cheeks, his clawtips were like points of ice.

“I will go away,” he said at last, “but when I return, I want more from you.”

Kagome’s expression steeled, her voice pitching to a low growl. “You’ll take what I give you.”

“What you ‘give me’ is not enough,” Sesshoumaru stated with brusque finality. His features darkened as he titled his head into a fall of shadow. “I find myself less and less satisfied with it.” Wicked and green, feral eyeshine gleamed from his one shadowed socket. “Would you have me seek satisfaction elsewhere?”

Reiki simmered beneath Kagome’s skin, her worst fears manifesting as anger. “Are you threatening me?” she seethed.

“I am only apprising you of the circumstances.” His claws scraped against her as he withdrew his hand. “The choice is yours.”

There was a gathering of youki behind her, swift and sudden as a wind storm, and then, abruptly, he was gone.

Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi