Kagome glanced down at Shin, now in his human form. In her arms he was quiet and tense. His blue eyes met hers, wide and terrified. She didn’t know whether it was because of Inuyasha or her or the magic of the well—maybe it was all of the above—but she rocked him in her arms

How long? The words clanged in Kagome’s skull like a funeral gong, sounding above the desperate pounding of her own heartbeat in her ears. In a fleeting moment of sheer panic, she glanced toward the crib. Inuyasha’s piercing gaze followed hers—snapping to Shin where he stood in his hanyou form, staring at them with his

That night, Kagome dreamed. She stood in the clearing of Goshinboku. Not far from the Bone-Eater’s Well but not close to it either. The well was simply an object she glimpsed in her periphery, a presence she felt faintly glowing at her back. It was springtime in Edo, just like it had been the first

No more, Sesshoumaru had said. And he had meant it. There had been a cold, hard finality in his voice, like a steel door slamming shut. Like a forbidding spell. He was gone. Kagome knew it. So why couldn’t she accept it? The bitter pill remained lodged in her throat. She was unable to swallow

Spring approached.  The air warmed. The days grew longer. The ground thawed and greened, and the birds began to sing. Earth, sky and sea, the world around teemed with fresh new life.  But Kagome remained frozen, stuck in the neverending winter of her melancholy. Her eyes saw. Her ears heard. Her senses perceived. But in

Inuyasha looked like he was about to say something else. But Shin gnawing on his wrist drew his attention away. “Hey, knock it off. You’d draw blood if you bit a human like that.” Shin desisted, though Kagome suspected it was more from the rumble underscoring Inuyasha’s voice than from the words themselves. Planting his