“Hoshi-samaa!”
the girl cried out, her vaginal walls clamping hard onto the monk’s swollen
shaft, sending ripples of pleasure through his body. The burning sensation that had been building
between his pistoning hips flooded through him and he
moaned out his pleasure as his seed spilled deep into his temporary lover’s
body before collapsing beside her.

In the morning, he would
leave her with sweet words and promises that both knew would never bulfiulfilled. She’d told him her name, but
he didn’t remember it, neither did she know his.

As she curled into his side
to sleep, he promised himself, just this once, he would stay until
morning. He tried to be a good man, an
honest man, but he was only a man, and he needed release—release from his body,
the hard road he traveled, the guilt on his shoulders, the curse on his right
hand.

He lifted the accursed hand to stare at the
gaping hole he knew lay beyond the prayer beads and dark cloth. He could feel the impatient wind siphoning,
always, and the road to Naraku was long and tedious.

He brushed a few strands of
hair gently from the beautiful woman’s face.
‘Maybe this time,’ he thought, soul weary, ‘maybe
this woman will be the one to bear my child, surely he would be a beautiful
man.’ Miroku
sighed softly. He was desperate for a
son. He needed a son to defeat Naraku if he failed, but more than that, he wanted someone
to love, not the temporary love he felt for the women who made room for him in
their beds, but a deep love that was daily, traveling from moment to moment,
growing larger and larger until it was too much to bear—a burning love. Deeply, and without reservations, he wanted
it, a love that wasn’t about the body.

*~*~*

Shi’en pushed the water through his hair. It had been weeks now, and his throat still
hurt from sobbing. He’d been exiled; if
he ran into any of his people out here, he would probably be killed. Kouga had left him
for that dirty human, his father had disowned him, all
he had now was Ananda, his cobra, and his two jewel
shards, which he kept getting attacked for.
And the kicker, the real bitch thing about it, was that if Kouga was just here with him, he wouldn’t give a damn; if Kouga was here it would be fine.

Silent tears streamed down
his face, burning venom patches into the wild grasses beneath him. “Kouga,” he rasped
out. Kouga was
with that human, being touched by that dirty human, fucked by that dirty,
gods-forsaken human, and he was liking it, probably
begging for it. He choked, nearly
vomiting every time he got a mental image of the two, of Kouga
showing the human a passion Shi’en never got to
see. ‘Yes, do it to me Miroku. I want it Miroku. It feels so
good Miroku.
Fuck me harder, Miroku. Miroku I love
you. Miroku Miroku Miroku!’ Shi’en could
imagine it and couldn’t stand it.