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The Tale of the Demon Lord	By : Arianawray Category: InuYasha > Yaoi - Male/Male > InuYasha/Sessh?maru > InuYasha/Sessh?maru Views: 56279 -:- Recommendations : 4 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha or any of its characters, and I do not make any money from these writings.

Chapter List
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XXXIX: Doing What Must Be Done
Kikyo's face was pale and drawn from a recent spell of poor health, which made her stern expression all the more stark.
Inuyasha and Sesshomaru had gone to the village the morning after the new moon with Totosai. Kikyo and Kaede had been informed a few days ago by the messenger Yuno that Inuyasha had been hurt in an assassination attempt, but that his condition was stable, and he would visit them soon.
As the prince and his brother approached, however, Kikyo could sense even from a distance that the situation was far from good, and her dark eyes were clouded with concern as the visitors landed in the heart of the village.
The formal greetings and exchange of gifts concluded, Totosai took it upon himself to fascinate the villagers with his fire tricks and amusing stories, while the brothers took Kikyo and Kaede aside to tell them what had happened. They took out the iron box in which the glass shards extracted from Inuyasha were resting, fused now into one shard, and kept still and inert by the spell Lady Shirakumo had put on them through the amulet. The box itself was secured by a strong barrier.
The account of what had transpired upset the priestesses, and the evil emanating from the shards in the box worried them as they thought about the piece inside the prince that was even more vicious than the ones that had come out. But Inuyasha put on a brave face and told them that he would survive whatever came – they were not to worry, he said.
Kikyo suggested that he visit the great tree with Kaede while she discussed the possible treatment options with Sesshomaru.
He knew it meant that she had words for Sesshomaru that she did not want him to hear, and feared that they would fight. But Sesshomaru nodded to say that it would be all right, so Inuyasha left the hut with Kaede.
Kikyo, now alone with Sesshomaru, sat on her mat with her back against the wall. He sat on a cushion his attendants had laid on the floor of the hut for him.
Although she had behaved with the proper respect towards him in front of all the villagers, and continued to behave with dignity now that they were alone, the expression on her face told him in no uncertain terms how disappointed she was with him.
"My sister and I protected Inuyasha as well as we could, with the few resources we had, for fifty years," she said coldly. "He suffered no lasting harm in all those years. But after living with you for a little more than a month, he has returned to us in mortal danger from a magical shard that was intended for you? How could you allow this to happen?"
She broke off then, seized by a coughing fit. Sesshomaru could smell the illness in her lungs. That, and the scent of her humanity as well as the aura of her priestess' powers all repulsed him, until he remembered that his beloved brother too had been perfectly human in his arms last night. He thought of Inuyasha's scent and his lovable human features, and suddenly the priestess seemed less offensive to him.
Kikyo took a sip of water, collected herself, and knew that she had been too free with her words. She inclined her head to Sesshomaru before saying: "I ask pardon for speaking so disrespectfully to the king of the lands I live in. I spoke thus because I was upset for Inuyasha. I should not have allowed my emotions to rule my speech."
"You need ask no pardon, Priestess," Sesshomaru replied. "You were not wrong to say what you said. It is my fault that Inuyasha's life is in danger. You did protect him very well for fifty years, and you entrusted him to me thinking that I would continue your good work. I have failed."
Kikyo said nothing for many moments, but at last she silently exhaled the resentment she had been holding in, and said quietly: "No, I know very well what Inuyasha is like. He is loving and brave, and protective of those he cares for. You would not have been able to stop him from throwing himself in front of you. I see from the looks in your eyes and his, and from that precious jewellery he wears, that you love him well enough to make him yours. We humans do not understand these things – we do not take our siblings as our husbands or wives, and few of us choose partners of the same sex as ourselves – but I know it is different for demons."
"Our societies are not the same."
"They are not. But Inuyasha is half human, don't forget. You must have shielded him well last night, when there was no moon, and I hope you will do that on every moonless night he lives through."
"I intend to, but times are uncertain, and there are no guarantees that anyone will live. I have always known that from my father, who fell despite all his power and strength, but I had to be reminded of it by a wolf demon two days ago."
"Your words suggest that you intend to face the spider demon who sent the assassin. But who will love and protect Inuyasha if things do not turn out the way you hope they do in your encounter with the enemy?" Kikyo asked. "My sister and I are old. I don't know how much longer we have to live."
"Neither do I, although I can tell you frankly that the scent of blood I detect from your lungs does not bode well for you. Perhaps medication and your priestess powers can help you heal, but what we need to know more urgently is whether you can remove that shard from my brother."
"My sister and I can probably purify it so that it becomes inert and will be unable to respond to its master. But how long we can keep it that way, I do not know. The magic I feel from the object inside him, and the piece in that iron box, is dark. It has a familiar aura that I had hoped not to sense again."
"A familiar aura?" Sesshomaru asked, remembering what Minister Atsushi had told them. "I must ask if it feels familiar because it reminds you of a particular assault on you by a disguised demon some fifty years ago?"
Kikyo looked startled. "How did you know about that?" she asked. "It was fifty-one years ago, several months before Inuyasha wandered into the forest near our village. A demon disguised in a white baboon pelt tried to rape me. My powers did not seem to work as well against him as they did on other demons, which made me wonder if perhaps he was a half-demon. Fortunately, a power from the great tree shielded me – I could sense the tree's disgust with him for attacking me. I cannot 'hear' the trees as well as Inuyasha can, but I could hear the sacred tree that day. It seemed to be saying that the demon was an abomination. Another demon, a kind one, helped me back to the village after that. I never told Inuyasha about the incident. I didn't want to upset him, especially as he was so conscious about being someone with demon blood living among humans."
"If you find the aura of the shard familiar, then the demon who attacked you and the one who tried to assassinate me must be one and the same. Naraku, the spider lord. He is indeed a half-demon, but an unnatural one, not born of a union between a male and a female."
"If the great tree protected me against him, perhaps it can help Inuyasha," Kikyo said hopefully.
"I would be grateful if you would find out how it can help."
Kikyo got to her feet, only to be doubled over by another violent fit racking her lungs. "Excuse me," she murmured once she got the coughing under control, and went over to a small box on the floor. She opened the box and took out a package bound with string, which when unwrapped proved to hold a fresh batch of medicine in the shape of spherical pills.
Sesshomaru guessed that the priestess must have just finished her last batch of pills, and now needed to unwrap a new lot. Kikyo swallowed one, washed it down with water, and was about to put the pills into a pouch she wore and close the box when she saw something else inside. She paused, reached into the box, and took out what had caught her eye.
It was a necklace of large beads and small fangs, and it emitted a curious aura.
"I'd almost forgotten…" she said softly to herself.
She contemplated the object for some moments before turning to Sesshomaru.
"This necklace is enchanted," she said, looking from the beads in her hand to Sesshomaru's face with a rueful smile on her pale face. "I have never used it. I put a spell on it fifty years ago, soon after Inuyasha came to live with us. I sensed a dangerous demon side to him, and I created this necklace to control him, in case he ever turned against us and destroyed himself. But he was such a kind-hearted boy – gruff and defensive at times, but so good-natured that the villagers quickly came to trust him, and all of us became fond of him. I never had the heart to use the necklace, and I know I never will."
Kikyo put her other hand over the necklace and spoke an incantation that removed the spell from the beads. She then picked up a small knife and severed the thread. The beads and fangs, powerless, scattered over the floor of the hut. She gathered them up, put them back into the box, and turned to Sesshomaru with a look of quiet determination on her face.
"No one can have power over Inuyasha now," she stated firmly. "I have severed the necklace to show that I hold no claim over him – but he needs your love and companionship more than ever, even though he is his own being and must always remain so."
"I understand."
"I hope you do. Now let us see if the tree can help us remove that disgusting object from his body."
~ - ~
"What's wrong, Inuyasha?" Kagome asked, looking up at the half-demon as she slipped her tiny hand into his much bigger and more calloused one.
"What do you mean, kid?" he asked, smiling down at her as he pressed his other hand against the bark of the great tree.
"You're not all right," Kagome spoke in the most subdued whisper Inuyasha had ever heard from the lively child.
He looked down into her huge, brown eyes, which were wide and fearful now – fearful for him, thanks to her growing priestess' abilities which made her sensitive to spiritual disturbances.
"It's true – I'm not well," Inuyasha admitted. "But I hope your grand-aunts can help."
"We will do all we can – you know we will," Kaede assured him.
"You're in the right place," Kagome said in a strangely distant manner, as if she was trying to focus on something faraway while continuing to engage in the present conversation.
"What is it, child?" Kaede asked her grand-niece.
"It's…" Kagome murmured. "I don't know… I can hear…"
"The tree," Inuyasha said suddenly. "You can hear the tree. I hear it too."
"It's saying…"
Inuyasha's face hardened as he too registered and gradually began to comprehend the significance of the message from the tree. "It's saying that it drove away the abomination before, and it can do so again."
"Abomi-what?" Kagome asked, not knowing what the word meant, but understanding that it was something bad.
"The tree drove away something evil fifty years ago," Inuyasha said, his eyes turning towards Kaede. "It can drive it away now. That means the demon who attacked Kikyo was…"
"You know about that incident?" Kaede asked.
"I learnt about it very recently."
"My sister never wished to tell you about it," Kaede said. "I don't know how you found out. I was a very small child when it happened, even younger than Kagome is now, so I remember little of it. But I remember the wickedness of the demon, and how he fled in agony when something invisible attacked him in return. Kikyo's powers were not working very well against him, so we knew it was something else, and we sensed that it was the great tree that had helped. Does this mean that the demon who has hurt you was the same…"
"Yes," came Kikyo's voice from several feet away, as she and Sesshomaru approached the tree. "It was the spider-demon lord, Naraku. Lord Sesshomaru and I have only just discovered the same thing, and he has given me a name to put to the evil aura I sensed." Kikyo was holding the iron box, keeping Lady Shirakumo's barrier around it intact.
"You should have told me," Inuyasha said.
"And upset you when you were so self-conscious about being half-demon?" Kikyo countered gently. "Anyway, no one knew who that demon was until today. Telling you would have served no purpose other than to make you angry and sad. But now that we know, it gives us some hope. Perhaps we can purify the shard so that it will not grow sharp, and the great tree can drive it from you. Let us find out what can be done."
They stepped up to the tree, while Sesshomaru kept a respectful distance from the silent, giant being which towered over the village and whose aura was so different from that of demons and priestesses alike. It was unique.
"Come, little one," Kikyo smiled at Kagome. "You have an affinity for communicating with trees too, and your powers grow by the day. You can help us."
"Really?" Kagome said, brightening up for the first time since she had sensed that something was wrong with Inuyasha.
With her grand-aunts and Inuyasha, Kagome put her hands to the bark of the tree and squeezed her eyes shut, hoping to listen more clearly.
The quartet stood around the tree for some time, during which Sesshomaru had to be patient, despite his urgent desire to know what they were hearing.
At last, they opened their eyes and stepped back, before bowing to the tree.
"What did it say?" Sesshomaru asked.
"It says that the priestesses can purify the shard, but to remove it without doing greater harm to me, we have to wait for the right time," Inuyasha said.
"I am not certain that I understand what that right time is," Kaede remarked.
"Neither am I," Kikyo declared.
"It has to wait for the other tree," Kagome said, puzzled, again with the air of repeating something she had heard but did not understand.
All eyes turned to the little girl. "What other tree, Kagome?" Kikyo asked.
"I don't know, Aunt Kikyo," she said, biting her lip, feeling frustrated because she could not grasp the meaning behind the 'words' she had sensed in her mind.
"I sensed something too about another tree, but I didn't get it either," Inuyasha said, stooping down in front of the child and assuring her that it was all right not to understand. "Whatever it is, the time isn't right yet. I guess I'll just have to wait here and see."
Kagome smiled and reached a hand out to touch one of his ears, then remembered that she had not asked permission.
"Go ahead," Inuyasha told her, bending her head so that she could reach the furry appendage.
"At least there is hope," Sesshomaru said, gazing at his brother and the human child.
"So we'll wait?"
"You will wait," the demon lord said.
"What about you?"
"I am going to hunt Naraku down."
~ - ~
"Do you have to do this now?" Inuyasha snapped.
He and Sesshomaru had gone to the edge of the forest, where they could speak in relative privacy.
"I am unwilling to put all my hopes for a cure for you on one source," Sesshomaru stated. "I believe the magical spell that controls the glass shard is such that if its originator is destroyed, it will have no more power over you, and the shard will dissolve harmlessly inside you. Naraku has done too much harm – I cannot let it pass."
"What about all the advice your ministers gave you?" Inuyasha asked urgently. "They told you it was not wise to wage war against Naraku while he had a hold over us through the revolting thing sitting in my chest, and I totally agree with them!"
"They advised me not to wage war, and they were right," Sesshomaru replied. "It would indeed be unwise for me to risk all my military resources and put all my soldiers' lives in danger by sending them out against someone who could control my decisions based on his threats against you. But I do not intend to wage war – I intend to engage him in single combat."
"And you think you can do that safely, considering that he still has a hold over you through what is happening to me?" Inuyasha demanded angrily, his voice rising.
"I shall kill him before he can move against you," Sesshomaru stated arrogantly.
"Don't be such an ass. It's practically suicide!" the prince yelled, drawing glances from Totosai and the guards and attendants who had accompanied them to the village.
"He tried to kill me and wounded my brother and mate-to-be. It is my duty to do battle with him for my honour and yours."
"That's just your pride talking. If you were using half the sense you have in your head, you would know that this is simply the wrong time."
Sesshomaru did not reply, but he softened in the face of his brother's frantic efforts to prevent him from doing what he felt he must do, as a demon lord and a protective lover.
"Don't upset yourself," he said. "We will continue this discussion later."
"Don't you dare move from here," Inuyasha warned him, before turning back towards the village, leaving Sesshomaru and some of the guards in the forest to protect the perimeter of the settlement. Other guards and the family of demon slayers hired to protect the place patrolled the village itself. Naraku had a nulling stone, after all, and would be able to approach with his aura undetectable by any of the demons, priestesses or slayers. Visual alertness was essential.
Sesshomaru knew that it was unwise to confront Naraku before the shard was removed from Inuyasha. Still, his anger ran deep, and it was only with great self-control that he was able to turn his mind to the matter of how to defend the village while his brother waited in it to learn what the tree and the priestesses could do.
At last, he settled for a sturdy barrier that Kaede and Kikyo put up, one tuned to beings of the same nature as the shard in Inuyasha's chest. It was very thick, and far less subtle than the barrier his mother had put up, however. Those within the barrier would thus know only at the point when something attempted to breach it. That would at least give them warning, but it also dulled their ability to sense other demon auras beyond the barrier. Sesshomaru and the priestesses agreed that it was a sensible compromise, as there was a good chance that Naraku would make further use of the nulling stone, which would make the ability to sense him from a distance pointless.
Sesshomaru and half the guards stayed in the forest outside the barrier; Inuyasha, Totosai and the rest of the guards remained in the village within the barrier.
Late in the night, when Inuyasha was resting in the hut with Kikyo and Kaede, and too occupied with Kikyo's worrying cough and various bodily weaknesses to keep a sharp eye on what was happening out in the forest behind the village, Sesshomaru caught a scent of something on the wind that made his blood boil.
He had barely been able to contain his desire to shatter Naraku into tiny pieces from which he would never regenerate, but had done so through pure discipline and the need not to upset Inuyasha. But what he sensed now caused his anger to swell to a far greater extent than it had before, and at once he abandoned all his self-restraint.
For what he sensed was Naraku at a distance – Naraku within his territories, inside his kingdom. Yet, no alerts had come from the border forces. He knew at once what had happened. The spider lord must have used the nulling stone to shield his presence as he stole across Sesshomaru's border. Once he was deep enough in Sesshomaru's territories for the border patrols not to notice, he must have given the nulling stone to someone else – one of his children, perhaps, and once his helper moved away from him, his own aura would have flared strongly as he let the winds that were currently blowing north carry his scent across this land.
He would do such a thing only because he knew very well that it would be an excellent way to provoke Sesshomaru into facing him.
Of course it was unwise to confront Naraku now. Of course it would be suicidal. But of course he could not let it go.
His rage rising as his determination to face Naraku grew, Sesshomaru began to coldly give orders to his guards and other attendants.
"Yuno," he said to the dog-demon messenger. "If things develop so that it becomes necessary to communicate between the castle and the village, you are to be the one to deliver all communications."
To the captain of the guards with him, he said: "You and six of your guards are to maintain your positions and continue to patrol the forest beyond the village barrier. Alert your prince and the priestesses if anyone attacks the place."
To three guards, he gave these instructions: "Move quietly so as not to wake my godfather Totosai. Go into to the village and stay there. Watch over your prince. Do not tell anyone where I have gone. Only if Totosai questions you about my absence should you tell him that he is to stay with Inuyasha and protect him until I return. All of you are to be especially alert for the mirror demon. Watch for even the tiniest shards around the priestess' hut."
To Isshin, he gave these instructions: "Return to the castle and remain there. Inform my mother that I will be away from both the village and the castle at this time. Do not say why. Tell her that she is to be regent in my absence and the prince's."
Then Sesshomaru mounted his two-headed dragon and took off quietly, vanishing into the night sky which was so poorly lit by a tiny sliver of moon as narrow as the crescent on his brow, that no human or half-demon eye saw him go.
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The Tale of the Demon Lord