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runicloreThe Five-Pointed Star, part I
Author: Amber Michelle
Genre: Gen? Adventure? I don't know anymore.
Word count: 4982
Rating: T
Warnings: n/a
AU/Canon: it might be AU, now. Or a divergence, maybe?
Concrit: sure.
Previous installments
1: Optique - 2: The Moon-Viewing Room - 3: A Second Frozen in Time
Theme: originally for 'encyclopedia.'
Notes: Many liberties taken with geography, some mythology, and some history. For some reason Wikipedia didn't have every single thing I've ever wanted to know.
Am also stealing liberally from an anime called "Otogizoushi," since I can't find any reliable information on onmyoudo. :p
.........................................................
Kagome's memory of the place her friends were defeated was a mix of impressions: a full moon in the sky, the tight press of tree trunks and choking underbrush, the tang of pine needles. The clearing was barely lit and she only got a glimpse of the shrine, distinguishable from the forest only because the thatch roof was lighter and welcomed the moonlight. She didn't remember the area being large. She couldn't remember what the shrine master looked like, but his chanting had burrowed into her bones and become the voice of nightmares. Rin pyo to sha kai--
His tone, deep and strong as if chanted from a stage with perfect acoustics, pieced together a mantra she knew well from rituals her grandfather conducted at the shrine - rituals she thought, until now, were just for show. Even with proof of her own power Kagome questioned. So purification is real, she reasoned, but yin-yang magic? Astrology? Was she supposed to believe that on any given day, traveling east might be unlucky for her, and possibly fatal if the stars said so?
The mysterious shrine keeper had given her a wake-up call. But Kagome hated rude awakenings. They were... well, rude. And unnecessary.
She followed Sesshomaru through the forest, keeping to his left so she wouldn't trip over his pelt, and wondered when they'd take to the air again. He said it was dangerous to draw attention to the area around the well, as the town their enemy assumed she hailed from would surely be watched; after allowing her to stop by Kaede's hut to borrow a bow and quiver, he had led her straight back into the forest, away from the path, away from the well. The position of the sun told her they were heading north when she finally caught a glimpse of it.
"Sesshomaru," she said when the sun had risen a little higher.
He turned his head slightly so she could see his pointed ear, but kept walking.
Kagome twisted her fingers together. "Do you... know where the onmyouji is?"
"I remember the way," he said.
Do you remember what happened? Were you there? Will you tell me? She let him have his silence after that. Without her props - books, pictures, a brush and ink and paper - she wasn't sure what to say to hold his attention. This Sesshomaru was not the one she had grown to like over the last month. This was his mask, his public persona. It was just enough like the face underneath that she'd been fooled for a moment when she came through the well earlier and let herself leap over the edge to run to his side with a smile and a greeting.
He'd nodded-- and walked away, commanding her to follow.
It took Kagome an hour to remember why she'd been happy to see him in the first place, but it was coming back to her now, slowly. He was still polite when she had to stop to take care of personal matters, and when she asked for rest, he acquiesced silently. While they walked she watched the minute shifts in his pale hair, fingers twitching to touch it and wrap the silver around her fingers, maybe braid it. She couldn't decide if he would care or not; braids weren't common in Japan at this time and didn't carry the stigma of being feminine, but since he never did anything with his hair to begin with, he might object to styling on principle.
She missed the more decorative clothing he wore at home. The red-on-white pattern was stark, the shapes more and more like blood splattered on his shoulder and sleeves. Fitting for an assassin.
Kagome had begun to forget, coddled in the peace of the western estate, who she was associating with. It was easy to see the beautiful exterior, and forget that death coiled in his claws, only waiting for his whim to be released. He was deadly, poisonous - so much so they hadn't encountered any other youkai in their long walk, even in passing. The forest was quiet where he walked. The birds chirped more softly, the bushes were still, the smaller animals driven away by his aura. It caressed her arms like warmth from a bonfire.
They stopped for the night below an overhang next to the North Road, where it rose to cut through the hills and toward the mountain pass. The trees crowded against the rock face, but there was a tiny space where the jutting cliff pressed against the higher branches of the trees and cast its shadow over the ground, invisible to travelers on the road and completely hidden from the rest of the forest - the ground was bare, the area big enough for a small group of people, and the seemingly inpenetrable wall of trees were dense enough to constitute protection. Kagome dropped to the ground immediately when it was clear what he intended, and flopped onto her back. She didn't see him leave, yet wasn't surprised when she finally sat up and discovered he was gone.
He always does that, Rin told her the first night they camped together. Sesshomaru had vanished as soon as they started to set up camp, and by the time dinner was prepared and eaten, and her friends ready to bed down, he was still nowhere to be seen. Kagome had weighed many ideas that night, after Rin assured her he would appear again in the morning. Was he hunting? Did he eat? Maybe he was bathing, because he had to some time, after all, to stay so impeccably white. Or was he roaming the forest, assuring their safety?
It wasn't that she worried about him, exactly. She and her friends weren't attacked by anybody but Naraku when Sesshomaru was with their party. Kagome saw no reason to think it would be any different for him when he traveled on his own. If anything, he would be unencumbered with her own incompetence and have the freedom to strike whenever and wherever he wished. She was a fair shot with a bow after so many years of practice, but she was no master, nor was she fast enough to evade youkai reflexes.
If this journey ended in battle after all - if the onmyouji refused to release Miroku from his curse - Kagome knew she would only be in the way. She knew how to fight with Inu Yasha and the others, but Sesshomaru was as much an enigma in battle as he was at home. How could she support him if she didn't know what he might do next?
Kagome grabbed a handhold on the rock wall and hauled herself to her feet to collect firewood. This time she found her matches without incident, and the clearing was soon thick with the scent of burning cypress and pine needles. She dragged her bag over when the fire was big enough to read by and pulled her books out. She wasn't quite hungry yet, so a little research was in order.
The encyclopedia she'd grabbed from her bookshelf was a single-volume abridged version of the Oxford Encyclopedia, which she'd learned to love during her first year in high school. Most of the entries were only a paragraph long, but they were accompanied by pictures and diagrams, and the sources listed always told her where to look if the book didn't have her answer.
Today it did have an answer for her. The entry for onmyoudo, which she was directed to from onmyouji, took up more than half the page with illustrations, text, and cross-references.
A natural philosophy transmitted from China in the fifth century that evolved under the influence of Shinto and Buddhist practices. She skimmed the rest of the first paragraph. It went on about the connection to other religions and the possible connection to the immortals called senin, and then: the onmyouji resembles the Shinto priest. That was news to Kagome. Onmyoudo began as a doctrine of the five elements, represented in the seman, attributed to Abe no Seimei.
The seman diagram showed the five elements of wood, fire, earth, metal, and water, and the path of affinity between them that took the shape of a pentagon. Within the lines was a five-pointed star drawn in red. Path of destruction, the caption said. And this was credited to a Japanese scholar? The entry ended after a few sentences, and she didn't bother to look for Seimei. She knew who he was, and also that he was dead, so half-kitsune sorcerers were the least of her problems.
Kagome paused, gaze lingering on the kanji of his name. Half-kitsune...
"Go to sleep, priestess."
She started. The book slipped out of her lap. Someone needed to break him of his horrible habit of sneaking around and interrupting her thoughts. "I'm not ready yet."
Sesshomaru circled the fire and sat cross-legged beside her, emulating her posture as much as his stiff carriage allowed. Even when he leaned forward to stare at her, his spine remained rigid. She could see where Inu Yasha got his 'stick-up-the-ass brother' comments from, though Kagome thought that was unfair. Sesshomaru was a lord - it was his job to look upright and dignified, or whatever the youkai equivalent was supposed to be. She didn't know anything about their father, but the lord's mother looked like the type who would groom her son properly.
He was still staring at her when she surfaced from the swirl of her thoughts. "What?"
The demon lord pinned her with his eyes. "Are you well?"
Kagome blinked; once, twice, three times. No, she wasn't well. Her back hurt, her feet hurt, her stomach ached for some reason, and she felt just a little nauseated, probably because she hadn't eaten since morning. But she hadn't felt like it while they walked, and she still didn't now. It was one of those months. "Of course I'm fine. Why are you asking me this?"
Instead of answering, he leaned closer, until his nose was only an inch from her ear, and breathed deeply. His eyes fluttered closed for a moment, and then opened again to put her on the spot.
The hair at the nape of her neck stood on end, prickling her skin. Kagome tensed to suppress a shiver. "I still don't get--" Then it dawned on her, and she scrambled clumsily away, pressing her legs together and returning his stare with wide eyes. "Fine! I'm fine!" She swallowed and licked her lips, and tried not to think about what he was looking at, or where. "Your mother," she said, looking away. "She knows this guy we're after is an onmyouji, right? She's positive?"
She heard him straighten. "She would not make the claim otherwise."
"Okay." Kagome took a deep breath and tried to relax her muscles, shifting so she sat with her legs stretched out flat against the ground. "When-- I mean, I don't remember that much, but you must have been there. That-" she pointed to her encyclopedia, "-says onmyouji are like priests. Is that why my arrows didn't do anything the last time we fought?"
Sesshomaru nodded. "He is not youkai, nor unholy."
"But he had--"
"Shikigami," he said. "Not youkai."
But what were shikigami, really? Kagome frowned. "How are they different?" She saw his eyebrow tilt sharply. "You know I didn't mean it that way."
"They are not of this world," he said. The firelight licked his pale hair and silks, touching them with orange and yellow highlights, imparting their warmth. His eyes, normally flat as mirrors, reflected the lively jump of the flames. "Their nature depends on the summoner."
She sighed. "But how do you fight them? If they're not of this world, shouldn't I be able to just..." Kagome mimed shooting an arrow.
"You need not worry about them."
"What do you mean, I 'need not worry'?" she said. "They almost killed us! I want to be prepared!"
Sesshomaru breathed one of his rare sighs and turned his gaze to her without moving his head. He was so still his silk didn't rustle, even when he breathed. "There is another task for you to perform. Your participation will not be required."
Like hell I'm not going to participate! She clenched her fists around her green silk. It was wrinkled and dusty from traveling. "And what would that be?"
"The barrier."
She slumped, and her fingers loosened their hold on her hakama. "I don't-- I can't do anything."
He moved, reaching for something tucked behind the leather plate of his armor: a knife. Silver, as long as her forearm, it looked small in his hand when he extended it toward her, hilt first. She stared at the leather strips woven tight around the hilt and the pearl caged at the end. Kagome had never seen one so big in her life. It was tinted red by the fire, like his claws and hair.
"This belongs to my mother," he said. "She seems to believe it will do what you cannot."
Kagome took the knife with both hands and almost dropped it when it wasn't as heavy as she expected it to be. Her bow and arrows were heavier. She waited, but he didn't provide a sheath, and when she took a closer look at the blade it appeared to be dull, rounded at the edges. It wouldn't cut her vegetables, then, but it must be of some use if he was letting her borrow it.
"The spell was anchored with seal stones, I believe." Sesshomaru nodded to the blade. "Use that to destroy them."
She let the knife blur, still holding it up to the fire, and focused on the demon lord. Funny, but the thought of him putting his faith in what amounted to a magical butter knife hadn't occurred to her as a possibility before now. She felt stupid even using the word 'magic' in her head, but there were stranger things going on in the Feudal Era that Kagome managed to accept. "Okay." She laid it flat over her thighs and wondered where to keep it. In the quiver with her arrows, maybe? "I'll do my best."
*
They left the forest the next morning, and Kagome was wrapped in the pelt and held to the demon lord's side when they rose into the air. She assumed they were far enough north of their normal haunts that he didn't think revealing their presence would draw anybody's attention. He didn't explain, because Sesshomaru did not explain himself outside the walls of his estate, apparently. He didn't ignore her exactly, but met every one of her questions with a blank look, a lifted eyebrow, or, when he was feeling eloquent, maybe a shrug. By the time they left the ground, she'd stopped asking.
If they had made the trip from the house to the well in less than a day, it occurred to Kagome they might find the onmyouji before sunset. Sesshomaru seemed to know where he was going. His instructions the night before sounded like the voice of experience as well. How many sorcerers had he fought before? Or were these his mother's instructions? Or maybe he knew the guy.
That was unlikely. Onmyouji were human after all. Whatever he wanted, he wouldn't have drawn Sesshomaru's attention by living this far north.
Kagome made the mistake of looking down and pressed her face into his shoulder. Her nose was freezing cold, but the fur blocked all but the worst gusts of wind from touching her. It was almost too warm; her own body heat was supplemented by the fur, which emanated its own form of energy, until it felt as if she'd been squeezed between two giant heating pads. The roar of the wind and the cold brush of its fingers were all that kept her from slumping in his grasp and falling asleep. Her cramps were history.
Too bad I don't have a Sesshomaru handy every time my period comes around, she thought, eyelids drooping. He's so useful. Her grip slipped a little bit, and his arm tightened over her waist, pressing her to his side. It would have been uncomfortable without the fur to soften the ridges of his armor. And that hand-- His fingers clamped over the swell of her hip to make her stand still.
"Just because your legs don't cramp doesn't mean mine will stop," she mumbled into his fur, looking up. He didn't reply or look down at her to acknowledge he'd heard, even though she knew he must have.
Just as rude as Inu Yasha. It must run in the family. She didn't have a rosary for him, though, so she let her forehead fall onto his shoulder again and stroked her fingers over the fur by her cheek. Unlike her cat's short fur, this was long enough to dig her fingers into and so fine that it clung together in tufts as soft as rabbit fur. Right now it smelled a little like grass, with a musky undertone that must be natural to the fur, or even Sesshomaru himself.
Some hours later - Kagome had forgotten to replace her watch when she went home - they started to descend, and she had to leave her little cocoon of fur when they touched ground. The path he'd chosen looked vaguely familiar and wound up the gentle slope to disappear around a stand of pines whose branches had tangled and grown together.
"Where are we?" she asked, straightening her robe and retying the obi. She tucked the knife behind it.
"The Ou mountains, west of Sendai," Sesshomaru said.
That was farther north than she thought they'd gone. Kagome frowned at the trees. "Are you sure?"
He didn't dignify that with an answer. "Do you feel the barrier?"
"No." She fingered the hilt of the dagger and twisted to look behind them. The path sloped sharply downward, and the area was cut with rocks and choked with grass and green weeds that looked thick and stubborn enough to be trees themselves. "I didn't feel it last time either, until we went through."
Sesshomaru's hand rested heavily on her head, his fingers and thumb at her temples, and turned her around to face him. "Concentrate, priestess," he said softly, and pulled his claws over her scalp, through her hair.
Kagome's eyes fell closed. Yes, he was definitely nice to have around. He left her scalp tingling and drew her hair away from her neck, claws grazing her nape. "You know..." She sighed. That isn't helping me concentrate. Not on barriers, at least. It made her hyper-aware of the crisp quality of the mountain air, how cold it was when she breathed in, and the icy sting in her cheeks from flying. Her own breathing was loud, but there weren't any other sounds to focus on - no birds, no small animals creeping through the weeds, not even wind. Sesshomaru's aura was like a bonfire at her back. The space ahead was empty--
--then it moved, billowing like a curtain caught in a breeze, and she felt it: water. Ice.
Kagome opened her eyes and pointed ahead, to the left of the path.
Sesshomaru withdrew and stepped off the path, following her directive. She sighed and rubbed her neck, following slowly. Did he have to do that - trick her into doing what he wanted, make her think he was going to-- well, whatever he was doing, and then stop? For a stand-offish, human-hating demon lord, he sure was touching her a lot.
But Kagome didn't think he was stand-offish. Not really. He was a good host. Even now that they were in the public eye, he wasn't as inconsiderate as he used to be. Maybe she should just count her blessings and continue to keep her mouth shut.
The mountainside opposed her at every turn. The slope was covered with grass, some alive, most still tangled, yellow, and dead. Rocks peeked through the messy thatch of ground cover, but more hid underneath, waiting to trip Kagome and send her sliding down the hill. That fear was never realized, but the ground had a habit of crumbling under her when it looked perfectly solid, and more than once she accidentally stepped into old gopher holes and tripped. Her hakama were covered in dirt to the knees by the time their path leveled out again and Sesshomaru paused to let her catch up.
They were close to the barrier; the air tingled with cold energy. Kagome half-expected the forest to shimmer as it would if she confronted a barrier erected by a priestess, but whatever the encyclopedia said about Onmyouji and their relation to the priesthood, they obviously weren't similar enough that this power signature felt familiar.
"There's--" She paused, chewing her lower lip, and pointed to the left. This close, she couldn't help feeling a sick familiarity. "A-- a focus point of some kind is over there."
"Can you sense the barrier well enough to stay outside?" When she nodded, Sesshomaru turned to face her and pin her with his gaze for the first time since their discussion the night before. "Find it. Use the knife to destroy the seal, and wait there until I return for you."
"But what about the--" He arched a brow, and Kagome glared. "No, don't give me that. How can you expect me to wait there when I can do something to help? How do you know he won't send something after me once he knows I'm there? He's going to notice when I bring his precious barrier down."
Sesshomaru closed his eyes, and a faint line appeared between his brows. "He is worthless as an onmyouji if he does not already know where we are and why we have come."
She sighed sharply. "I won't cower and wait for you to save me. I'm not like women in this era."
"Very well." He opened his eyes. "You will suffer the consequences of your own actions."
Kagome looked away, and saw him leave in her peripheral vision. The wind turned cold for just a moment when he walked through the barrier before shifting back to neutral. Was he trying to remind her this was her fault, or was that just an unlucky turn of phrase?
She kept as much distance between herself and the barrier as the terrain would allow while she followed it to the node of energy they were assuming was a seal stone. Her footsteps dragged, sinking in the soft soil and dry pine needles with muffled, snapping sounds. There weren't any animal tracks, and no signs of other humans. They were attacked fairly close to the barrier the last time they were here; trees had been felled, fire scorched the ground, the surrounding trunks, and the rocks. Kagome remembered more rocks than she saw here. They must have tripped another seal - the earth stone, she guessed, conjuring a memory of the encyclopedia diagram. South and east.
The stone was buried under the twisted branches of an old, stunted pine. Kagome used her bow to knock the loose debris off the surface, but she had to crawl under the branches to get to it, and once she was there it was difficult to sit back and think. How was she supposed to get rid of the seal? If she touched it the onmyouji would be alerted. The tree would make shooting it difficult. That left the knife.
She pulled it from her sash, eyeing the blunt tip and smooth edge. Some weapon - it probably couldn't even break her skin.
You merely shoot it. It's like you're not using its spiritual power.
Kagome bit her lip. Sunlight broke through a gap in the trees at a sharp angle from the west, bright orange and yet lacking warmth. She closed her eyes and listened to the barrier hum with its own energy signature, like a heartbeat. You're not using its spiritual power. Kagome frowned. The knife stayed stubbornly cold, but had a hidden edge she could barely sense; Kagome turned the knife in her hands and raised it above her head, her eyes shut tightly. Then she brought it down with all of her weight behind the blow and it connected with an electric jolt that numbed her fingers.
When she opened her eyes the blade was embedded in the stone, and the kanji for 'water' had bled onto the surface. She turned the blade clockwise and watched the granite ripple.
The barrier went silent. Kagome pulled the knife out slowly, but it didn't return. The rock crumbled like dried mud.
She backed out from beneath the branches. Her hair kept catching on the dead wood and needles, and she had to gather it over her shoulder. When she was out she wove it into a braid and dug into the outer pocket of her backpack for a band.
"So very relaxed, even after striking first."
Kagome jumped and dropped her band with a yelp and spun around.
"I should be insulted."
Again the voice came from behind. She turned quickly, still clutching her braid. "Who--"
A man stood just beneath the branches of the pine grove. The needles were frosted, the trunks flaking white with ice along the path the barrier had taken. He looked solid; the wind shifted the hem of his robes and pulled them against what looked like a solid body, but Kagome couldn't shake the feeling she was looking at a ghost.
"You're a smart child." He smiled, and his lips were bloodless. "Aren't you?"
"Your name," she said, reaching for the knife in her sash.
His head tilted. "No." He wore the small black cap of an official over long hair, tied in the back with a long satin ribbon. It made his face look twice as pale, but she thought he was wearing some kind of powder, like the courtiers of the old days. "If you leave now, I'll let you go without harm. You have my word."
Kagome's grip on the knife tightened, but she didn't draw. "Remove the curse on the monk," she said, "And I'll go."
The onmyouji's eyes narrowed. "You're in no position to bargain."
"No?" She looked him up and down, anywhere but his eyes, which were black like stone. They reminded her of Kanna's mirror and lent to the otherworldly air about him. "Sesshomaru isn't interested in any kind of negotiation. You have a better chance making a deal with me before he finds you here."
He laughed deep in his throat and exposed a row of perfect teeth. "Sesshomaru," he said, drawing the syllables of the name out. "Yes, he is the difficult element in this puzzle. But a weak bargaining chip, priestess." He wore large sleeves and a ruffled under-robe in the Chinese style. They flicked in the breeze, white and light blue, drawing her eyes over and over.
Kagome clenched her teeth to keep her face blank. "Your life is a weak bargaining chip?"
"My life is not in danger. Your safety, however, is becoming more and more precarious."
"Why are you doing this?" Kagome released her grip on the knife and let her hand fall to her side. "We didn't attack you on purpose. The only reason we're here now is to ask that you remove the curse. Why won't you do it?"
"Why won't you stop pursuing Naraku?" he asked, reaching for the fan in his sash. Her own hands immediately drew an arrow and pulled the bow from her shoulder, but he made no move to open it. "Why not let destiny run its course, and take the jewel from him when it becomes whole again?"
"And let him destroy more lives?" Kagome knocked the arrow, but kept the string lax and the point to the ground. "I can't do that."
"He ruins lives regardless of your interference." The onmyouji tapped his chin with the fan, assuming a thoughtful pose and looking up at the sky. "Tell me, of the villages he has attacked or caused to be destroyed, of the innocents manipulated by tainted shards, how many have you actually saved? Ten? Perhaps not even that much."
Kagome frowned. "What do you know about--"
He raised a hand. His fingers were slender and tapered. "You cause more destruction by fighting him, and the jewel still isn't yours." His hands disappeared into his sleeves, the fan with them. "I've watched the jewel for longer than you or your friends have been alive. I know how it manipulates its way to freedom."
"You're lying." He couldn't have been much older than she was; his face was smooth and narrow, free of wrinkles. His hair, what she could see of it, was solid black.
When he lifted his hands, the fan poised, they were most youthful of all. "Again, you insult me."
Kagome lifted her bow and drew the arrow back. "Whatever you're trying to distract me from, it won't work."
"Don't worry about the Western Lord." His lips turned up again and he spread the fan, black eyes glittering. "He should be amusing himself over there somewhere," the onmyouji said, turning slightly.
Her throat constricted, and she released the arrow. He didn't even try to dodge - it struck, and he disappeared in a flash of magenta light, leaving a cold wind to wash over Kagome's face.
A paper figure fluttered to the ground where he was standing. There was a hole in the center where her arrow went through, and it was burned around the edges.
Sesshomaru. The forest was silent.
Kagome grabbed her backpack, slung the bow over her shoulder, and ran toward the trees.
*
I'm still not sure if this is what I want it to do. Ironically, though I have a long backstory for this onmyouji in my head, absolutely none of that seems to be coming through right now. His part in this chapter is minor, though, so I hope that will fix itself later.
It ends here because of the way I'm dividing the story, but.. eh. It won't be posted anywhere until the installments are done.
I started this in April. Then project time struck. :P
Author: Amber Michelle
Genre: Gen? Adventure? I don't know anymore.
Word count: 4982
Rating: T
Warnings: n/a
AU/Canon: it might be AU, now. Or a divergence, maybe?
Concrit: sure.
Previous installments
1: Optique - 2: The Moon-Viewing Room - 3: A Second Frozen in Time
Theme: originally for 'encyclopedia.'
Notes: Many liberties taken with geography, some mythology, and some history. For some reason Wikipedia didn't have every single thing I've ever wanted to know.
Am also stealing liberally from an anime called "Otogizoushi," since I can't find any reliable information on onmyoudo. :p
.........................................................
Kagome's memory of the place her friends were defeated was a mix of impressions: a full moon in the sky, the tight press of tree trunks and choking underbrush, the tang of pine needles. The clearing was barely lit and she only got a glimpse of the shrine, distinguishable from the forest only because the thatch roof was lighter and welcomed the moonlight. She didn't remember the area being large. She couldn't remember what the shrine master looked like, but his chanting had burrowed into her bones and become the voice of nightmares. Rin pyo to sha kai--
His tone, deep and strong as if chanted from a stage with perfect acoustics, pieced together a mantra she knew well from rituals her grandfather conducted at the shrine - rituals she thought, until now, were just for show. Even with proof of her own power Kagome questioned. So purification is real, she reasoned, but yin-yang magic? Astrology? Was she supposed to believe that on any given day, traveling east might be unlucky for her, and possibly fatal if the stars said so?
The mysterious shrine keeper had given her a wake-up call. But Kagome hated rude awakenings. They were... well, rude. And unnecessary.
She followed Sesshomaru through the forest, keeping to his left so she wouldn't trip over his pelt, and wondered when they'd take to the air again. He said it was dangerous to draw attention to the area around the well, as the town their enemy assumed she hailed from would surely be watched; after allowing her to stop by Kaede's hut to borrow a bow and quiver, he had led her straight back into the forest, away from the path, away from the well. The position of the sun told her they were heading north when she finally caught a glimpse of it.
"Sesshomaru," she said when the sun had risen a little higher.
He turned his head slightly so she could see his pointed ear, but kept walking.
Kagome twisted her fingers together. "Do you... know where the onmyouji is?"
"I remember the way," he said.
Do you remember what happened? Were you there? Will you tell me? She let him have his silence after that. Without her props - books, pictures, a brush and ink and paper - she wasn't sure what to say to hold his attention. This Sesshomaru was not the one she had grown to like over the last month. This was his mask, his public persona. It was just enough like the face underneath that she'd been fooled for a moment when she came through the well earlier and let herself leap over the edge to run to his side with a smile and a greeting.
He'd nodded-- and walked away, commanding her to follow.
It took Kagome an hour to remember why she'd been happy to see him in the first place, but it was coming back to her now, slowly. He was still polite when she had to stop to take care of personal matters, and when she asked for rest, he acquiesced silently. While they walked she watched the minute shifts in his pale hair, fingers twitching to touch it and wrap the silver around her fingers, maybe braid it. She couldn't decide if he would care or not; braids weren't common in Japan at this time and didn't carry the stigma of being feminine, but since he never did anything with his hair to begin with, he might object to styling on principle.
She missed the more decorative clothing he wore at home. The red-on-white pattern was stark, the shapes more and more like blood splattered on his shoulder and sleeves. Fitting for an assassin.
Kagome had begun to forget, coddled in the peace of the western estate, who she was associating with. It was easy to see the beautiful exterior, and forget that death coiled in his claws, only waiting for his whim to be released. He was deadly, poisonous - so much so they hadn't encountered any other youkai in their long walk, even in passing. The forest was quiet where he walked. The birds chirped more softly, the bushes were still, the smaller animals driven away by his aura. It caressed her arms like warmth from a bonfire.
They stopped for the night below an overhang next to the North Road, where it rose to cut through the hills and toward the mountain pass. The trees crowded against the rock face, but there was a tiny space where the jutting cliff pressed against the higher branches of the trees and cast its shadow over the ground, invisible to travelers on the road and completely hidden from the rest of the forest - the ground was bare, the area big enough for a small group of people, and the seemingly inpenetrable wall of trees were dense enough to constitute protection. Kagome dropped to the ground immediately when it was clear what he intended, and flopped onto her back. She didn't see him leave, yet wasn't surprised when she finally sat up and discovered he was gone.
He always does that, Rin told her the first night they camped together. Sesshomaru had vanished as soon as they started to set up camp, and by the time dinner was prepared and eaten, and her friends ready to bed down, he was still nowhere to be seen. Kagome had weighed many ideas that night, after Rin assured her he would appear again in the morning. Was he hunting? Did he eat? Maybe he was bathing, because he had to some time, after all, to stay so impeccably white. Or was he roaming the forest, assuring their safety?
It wasn't that she worried about him, exactly. She and her friends weren't attacked by anybody but Naraku when Sesshomaru was with their party. Kagome saw no reason to think it would be any different for him when he traveled on his own. If anything, he would be unencumbered with her own incompetence and have the freedom to strike whenever and wherever he wished. She was a fair shot with a bow after so many years of practice, but she was no master, nor was she fast enough to evade youkai reflexes.
If this journey ended in battle after all - if the onmyouji refused to release Miroku from his curse - Kagome knew she would only be in the way. She knew how to fight with Inu Yasha and the others, but Sesshomaru was as much an enigma in battle as he was at home. How could she support him if she didn't know what he might do next?
Kagome grabbed a handhold on the rock wall and hauled herself to her feet to collect firewood. This time she found her matches without incident, and the clearing was soon thick with the scent of burning cypress and pine needles. She dragged her bag over when the fire was big enough to read by and pulled her books out. She wasn't quite hungry yet, so a little research was in order.
The encyclopedia she'd grabbed from her bookshelf was a single-volume abridged version of the Oxford Encyclopedia, which she'd learned to love during her first year in high school. Most of the entries were only a paragraph long, but they were accompanied by pictures and diagrams, and the sources listed always told her where to look if the book didn't have her answer.
Today it did have an answer for her. The entry for onmyoudo, which she was directed to from onmyouji, took up more than half the page with illustrations, text, and cross-references.
A natural philosophy transmitted from China in the fifth century that evolved under the influence of Shinto and Buddhist practices. She skimmed the rest of the first paragraph. It went on about the connection to other religions and the possible connection to the immortals called senin, and then: the onmyouji resembles the Shinto priest. That was news to Kagome. Onmyoudo began as a doctrine of the five elements, represented in the seman, attributed to Abe no Seimei.
The seman diagram showed the five elements of wood, fire, earth, metal, and water, and the path of affinity between them that took the shape of a pentagon. Within the lines was a five-pointed star drawn in red. Path of destruction, the caption said. And this was credited to a Japanese scholar? The entry ended after a few sentences, and she didn't bother to look for Seimei. She knew who he was, and also that he was dead, so half-kitsune sorcerers were the least of her problems.
Kagome paused, gaze lingering on the kanji of his name. Half-kitsune...
"Go to sleep, priestess."
She started. The book slipped out of her lap. Someone needed to break him of his horrible habit of sneaking around and interrupting her thoughts. "I'm not ready yet."
Sesshomaru circled the fire and sat cross-legged beside her, emulating her posture as much as his stiff carriage allowed. Even when he leaned forward to stare at her, his spine remained rigid. She could see where Inu Yasha got his 'stick-up-the-ass brother' comments from, though Kagome thought that was unfair. Sesshomaru was a lord - it was his job to look upright and dignified, or whatever the youkai equivalent was supposed to be. She didn't know anything about their father, but the lord's mother looked like the type who would groom her son properly.
He was still staring at her when she surfaced from the swirl of her thoughts. "What?"
The demon lord pinned her with his eyes. "Are you well?"
Kagome blinked; once, twice, three times. No, she wasn't well. Her back hurt, her feet hurt, her stomach ached for some reason, and she felt just a little nauseated, probably because she hadn't eaten since morning. But she hadn't felt like it while they walked, and she still didn't now. It was one of those months. "Of course I'm fine. Why are you asking me this?"
Instead of answering, he leaned closer, until his nose was only an inch from her ear, and breathed deeply. His eyes fluttered closed for a moment, and then opened again to put her on the spot.
The hair at the nape of her neck stood on end, prickling her skin. Kagome tensed to suppress a shiver. "I still don't get--" Then it dawned on her, and she scrambled clumsily away, pressing her legs together and returning his stare with wide eyes. "Fine! I'm fine!" She swallowed and licked her lips, and tried not to think about what he was looking at, or where. "Your mother," she said, looking away. "She knows this guy we're after is an onmyouji, right? She's positive?"
She heard him straighten. "She would not make the claim otherwise."
"Okay." Kagome took a deep breath and tried to relax her muscles, shifting so she sat with her legs stretched out flat against the ground. "When-- I mean, I don't remember that much, but you must have been there. That-" she pointed to her encyclopedia, "-says onmyouji are like priests. Is that why my arrows didn't do anything the last time we fought?"
Sesshomaru nodded. "He is not youkai, nor unholy."
"But he had--"
"Shikigami," he said. "Not youkai."
But what were shikigami, really? Kagome frowned. "How are they different?" She saw his eyebrow tilt sharply. "You know I didn't mean it that way."
"They are not of this world," he said. The firelight licked his pale hair and silks, touching them with orange and yellow highlights, imparting their warmth. His eyes, normally flat as mirrors, reflected the lively jump of the flames. "Their nature depends on the summoner."
She sighed. "But how do you fight them? If they're not of this world, shouldn't I be able to just..." Kagome mimed shooting an arrow.
"You need not worry about them."
"What do you mean, I 'need not worry'?" she said. "They almost killed us! I want to be prepared!"
Sesshomaru breathed one of his rare sighs and turned his gaze to her without moving his head. He was so still his silk didn't rustle, even when he breathed. "There is another task for you to perform. Your participation will not be required."
Like hell I'm not going to participate! She clenched her fists around her green silk. It was wrinkled and dusty from traveling. "And what would that be?"
"The barrier."
She slumped, and her fingers loosened their hold on her hakama. "I don't-- I can't do anything."
He moved, reaching for something tucked behind the leather plate of his armor: a knife. Silver, as long as her forearm, it looked small in his hand when he extended it toward her, hilt first. She stared at the leather strips woven tight around the hilt and the pearl caged at the end. Kagome had never seen one so big in her life. It was tinted red by the fire, like his claws and hair.
"This belongs to my mother," he said. "She seems to believe it will do what you cannot."
Kagome took the knife with both hands and almost dropped it when it wasn't as heavy as she expected it to be. Her bow and arrows were heavier. She waited, but he didn't provide a sheath, and when she took a closer look at the blade it appeared to be dull, rounded at the edges. It wouldn't cut her vegetables, then, but it must be of some use if he was letting her borrow it.
"The spell was anchored with seal stones, I believe." Sesshomaru nodded to the blade. "Use that to destroy them."
She let the knife blur, still holding it up to the fire, and focused on the demon lord. Funny, but the thought of him putting his faith in what amounted to a magical butter knife hadn't occurred to her as a possibility before now. She felt stupid even using the word 'magic' in her head, but there were stranger things going on in the Feudal Era that Kagome managed to accept. "Okay." She laid it flat over her thighs and wondered where to keep it. In the quiver with her arrows, maybe? "I'll do my best."
*
They left the forest the next morning, and Kagome was wrapped in the pelt and held to the demon lord's side when they rose into the air. She assumed they were far enough north of their normal haunts that he didn't think revealing their presence would draw anybody's attention. He didn't explain, because Sesshomaru did not explain himself outside the walls of his estate, apparently. He didn't ignore her exactly, but met every one of her questions with a blank look, a lifted eyebrow, or, when he was feeling eloquent, maybe a shrug. By the time they left the ground, she'd stopped asking.
If they had made the trip from the house to the well in less than a day, it occurred to Kagome they might find the onmyouji before sunset. Sesshomaru seemed to know where he was going. His instructions the night before sounded like the voice of experience as well. How many sorcerers had he fought before? Or were these his mother's instructions? Or maybe he knew the guy.
That was unlikely. Onmyouji were human after all. Whatever he wanted, he wouldn't have drawn Sesshomaru's attention by living this far north.
Kagome made the mistake of looking down and pressed her face into his shoulder. Her nose was freezing cold, but the fur blocked all but the worst gusts of wind from touching her. It was almost too warm; her own body heat was supplemented by the fur, which emanated its own form of energy, until it felt as if she'd been squeezed between two giant heating pads. The roar of the wind and the cold brush of its fingers were all that kept her from slumping in his grasp and falling asleep. Her cramps were history.
Too bad I don't have a Sesshomaru handy every time my period comes around, she thought, eyelids drooping. He's so useful. Her grip slipped a little bit, and his arm tightened over her waist, pressing her to his side. It would have been uncomfortable without the fur to soften the ridges of his armor. And that hand-- His fingers clamped over the swell of her hip to make her stand still.
"Just because your legs don't cramp doesn't mean mine will stop," she mumbled into his fur, looking up. He didn't reply or look down at her to acknowledge he'd heard, even though she knew he must have.
Just as rude as Inu Yasha. It must run in the family. She didn't have a rosary for him, though, so she let her forehead fall onto his shoulder again and stroked her fingers over the fur by her cheek. Unlike her cat's short fur, this was long enough to dig her fingers into and so fine that it clung together in tufts as soft as rabbit fur. Right now it smelled a little like grass, with a musky undertone that must be natural to the fur, or even Sesshomaru himself.
Some hours later - Kagome had forgotten to replace her watch when she went home - they started to descend, and she had to leave her little cocoon of fur when they touched ground. The path he'd chosen looked vaguely familiar and wound up the gentle slope to disappear around a stand of pines whose branches had tangled and grown together.
"Where are we?" she asked, straightening her robe and retying the obi. She tucked the knife behind it.
"The Ou mountains, west of Sendai," Sesshomaru said.
That was farther north than she thought they'd gone. Kagome frowned at the trees. "Are you sure?"
He didn't dignify that with an answer. "Do you feel the barrier?"
"No." She fingered the hilt of the dagger and twisted to look behind them. The path sloped sharply downward, and the area was cut with rocks and choked with grass and green weeds that looked thick and stubborn enough to be trees themselves. "I didn't feel it last time either, until we went through."
Sesshomaru's hand rested heavily on her head, his fingers and thumb at her temples, and turned her around to face him. "Concentrate, priestess," he said softly, and pulled his claws over her scalp, through her hair.
Kagome's eyes fell closed. Yes, he was definitely nice to have around. He left her scalp tingling and drew her hair away from her neck, claws grazing her nape. "You know..." She sighed. That isn't helping me concentrate. Not on barriers, at least. It made her hyper-aware of the crisp quality of the mountain air, how cold it was when she breathed in, and the icy sting in her cheeks from flying. Her own breathing was loud, but there weren't any other sounds to focus on - no birds, no small animals creeping through the weeds, not even wind. Sesshomaru's aura was like a bonfire at her back. The space ahead was empty--
--then it moved, billowing like a curtain caught in a breeze, and she felt it: water. Ice.
Kagome opened her eyes and pointed ahead, to the left of the path.
Sesshomaru withdrew and stepped off the path, following her directive. She sighed and rubbed her neck, following slowly. Did he have to do that - trick her into doing what he wanted, make her think he was going to-- well, whatever he was doing, and then stop? For a stand-offish, human-hating demon lord, he sure was touching her a lot.
But Kagome didn't think he was stand-offish. Not really. He was a good host. Even now that they were in the public eye, he wasn't as inconsiderate as he used to be. Maybe she should just count her blessings and continue to keep her mouth shut.
The mountainside opposed her at every turn. The slope was covered with grass, some alive, most still tangled, yellow, and dead. Rocks peeked through the messy thatch of ground cover, but more hid underneath, waiting to trip Kagome and send her sliding down the hill. That fear was never realized, but the ground had a habit of crumbling under her when it looked perfectly solid, and more than once she accidentally stepped into old gopher holes and tripped. Her hakama were covered in dirt to the knees by the time their path leveled out again and Sesshomaru paused to let her catch up.
They were close to the barrier; the air tingled with cold energy. Kagome half-expected the forest to shimmer as it would if she confronted a barrier erected by a priestess, but whatever the encyclopedia said about Onmyouji and their relation to the priesthood, they obviously weren't similar enough that this power signature felt familiar.
"There's--" She paused, chewing her lower lip, and pointed to the left. This close, she couldn't help feeling a sick familiarity. "A-- a focus point of some kind is over there."
"Can you sense the barrier well enough to stay outside?" When she nodded, Sesshomaru turned to face her and pin her with his gaze for the first time since their discussion the night before. "Find it. Use the knife to destroy the seal, and wait there until I return for you."
"But what about the--" He arched a brow, and Kagome glared. "No, don't give me that. How can you expect me to wait there when I can do something to help? How do you know he won't send something after me once he knows I'm there? He's going to notice when I bring his precious barrier down."
Sesshomaru closed his eyes, and a faint line appeared between his brows. "He is worthless as an onmyouji if he does not already know where we are and why we have come."
She sighed sharply. "I won't cower and wait for you to save me. I'm not like women in this era."
"Very well." He opened his eyes. "You will suffer the consequences of your own actions."
Kagome looked away, and saw him leave in her peripheral vision. The wind turned cold for just a moment when he walked through the barrier before shifting back to neutral. Was he trying to remind her this was her fault, or was that just an unlucky turn of phrase?
She kept as much distance between herself and the barrier as the terrain would allow while she followed it to the node of energy they were assuming was a seal stone. Her footsteps dragged, sinking in the soft soil and dry pine needles with muffled, snapping sounds. There weren't any animal tracks, and no signs of other humans. They were attacked fairly close to the barrier the last time they were here; trees had been felled, fire scorched the ground, the surrounding trunks, and the rocks. Kagome remembered more rocks than she saw here. They must have tripped another seal - the earth stone, she guessed, conjuring a memory of the encyclopedia diagram. South and east.
The stone was buried under the twisted branches of an old, stunted pine. Kagome used her bow to knock the loose debris off the surface, but she had to crawl under the branches to get to it, and once she was there it was difficult to sit back and think. How was she supposed to get rid of the seal? If she touched it the onmyouji would be alerted. The tree would make shooting it difficult. That left the knife.
She pulled it from her sash, eyeing the blunt tip and smooth edge. Some weapon - it probably couldn't even break her skin.
You merely shoot it. It's like you're not using its spiritual power.
Kagome bit her lip. Sunlight broke through a gap in the trees at a sharp angle from the west, bright orange and yet lacking warmth. She closed her eyes and listened to the barrier hum with its own energy signature, like a heartbeat. You're not using its spiritual power. Kagome frowned. The knife stayed stubbornly cold, but had a hidden edge she could barely sense; Kagome turned the knife in her hands and raised it above her head, her eyes shut tightly. Then she brought it down with all of her weight behind the blow and it connected with an electric jolt that numbed her fingers.
When she opened her eyes the blade was embedded in the stone, and the kanji for 'water' had bled onto the surface. She turned the blade clockwise and watched the granite ripple.
The barrier went silent. Kagome pulled the knife out slowly, but it didn't return. The rock crumbled like dried mud.
She backed out from beneath the branches. Her hair kept catching on the dead wood and needles, and she had to gather it over her shoulder. When she was out she wove it into a braid and dug into the outer pocket of her backpack for a band.
"So very relaxed, even after striking first."
Kagome jumped and dropped her band with a yelp and spun around.
"I should be insulted."
Again the voice came from behind. She turned quickly, still clutching her braid. "Who--"
A man stood just beneath the branches of the pine grove. The needles were frosted, the trunks flaking white with ice along the path the barrier had taken. He looked solid; the wind shifted the hem of his robes and pulled them against what looked like a solid body, but Kagome couldn't shake the feeling she was looking at a ghost.
"You're a smart child." He smiled, and his lips were bloodless. "Aren't you?"
"Your name," she said, reaching for the knife in her sash.
His head tilted. "No." He wore the small black cap of an official over long hair, tied in the back with a long satin ribbon. It made his face look twice as pale, but she thought he was wearing some kind of powder, like the courtiers of the old days. "If you leave now, I'll let you go without harm. You have my word."
Kagome's grip on the knife tightened, but she didn't draw. "Remove the curse on the monk," she said, "And I'll go."
The onmyouji's eyes narrowed. "You're in no position to bargain."
"No?" She looked him up and down, anywhere but his eyes, which were black like stone. They reminded her of Kanna's mirror and lent to the otherworldly air about him. "Sesshomaru isn't interested in any kind of negotiation. You have a better chance making a deal with me before he finds you here."
He laughed deep in his throat and exposed a row of perfect teeth. "Sesshomaru," he said, drawing the syllables of the name out. "Yes, he is the difficult element in this puzzle. But a weak bargaining chip, priestess." He wore large sleeves and a ruffled under-robe in the Chinese style. They flicked in the breeze, white and light blue, drawing her eyes over and over.
Kagome clenched her teeth to keep her face blank. "Your life is a weak bargaining chip?"
"My life is not in danger. Your safety, however, is becoming more and more precarious."
"Why are you doing this?" Kagome released her grip on the knife and let her hand fall to her side. "We didn't attack you on purpose. The only reason we're here now is to ask that you remove the curse. Why won't you do it?"
"Why won't you stop pursuing Naraku?" he asked, reaching for the fan in his sash. Her own hands immediately drew an arrow and pulled the bow from her shoulder, but he made no move to open it. "Why not let destiny run its course, and take the jewel from him when it becomes whole again?"
"And let him destroy more lives?" Kagome knocked the arrow, but kept the string lax and the point to the ground. "I can't do that."
"He ruins lives regardless of your interference." The onmyouji tapped his chin with the fan, assuming a thoughtful pose and looking up at the sky. "Tell me, of the villages he has attacked or caused to be destroyed, of the innocents manipulated by tainted shards, how many have you actually saved? Ten? Perhaps not even that much."
Kagome frowned. "What do you know about--"
He raised a hand. His fingers were slender and tapered. "You cause more destruction by fighting him, and the jewel still isn't yours." His hands disappeared into his sleeves, the fan with them. "I've watched the jewel for longer than you or your friends have been alive. I know how it manipulates its way to freedom."
"You're lying." He couldn't have been much older than she was; his face was smooth and narrow, free of wrinkles. His hair, what she could see of it, was solid black.
When he lifted his hands, the fan poised, they were most youthful of all. "Again, you insult me."
Kagome lifted her bow and drew the arrow back. "Whatever you're trying to distract me from, it won't work."
"Don't worry about the Western Lord." His lips turned up again and he spread the fan, black eyes glittering. "He should be amusing himself over there somewhere," the onmyouji said, turning slightly.
Her throat constricted, and she released the arrow. He didn't even try to dodge - it struck, and he disappeared in a flash of magenta light, leaving a cold wind to wash over Kagome's face.
A paper figure fluttered to the ground where he was standing. There was a hole in the center where her arrow went through, and it was burned around the edges.
Sesshomaru. The forest was silent.
Kagome grabbed her backpack, slung the bow over her shoulder, and ran toward the trees.
*
I'm still not sure if this is what I want it to do. Ironically, though I have a long backstory for this onmyouji in my head, absolutely none of that seems to be coming through right now. His part in this chapter is minor, though, so I hope that will fix itself later.
It ends here because of the way I'm dividing the story, but.. eh. It won't be posted anywhere until the installments are done.
I started this in April. Then project time struck. :P
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no subject
Date: 2008-06-02 07:26 pm (UTC)I love how you keep Kagome and Sesshoumaru in character.
I'm looking forward to read the next piece!
no subject
Date: 2008-06-03 02:21 am (UTC)