InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Half-Breed ❯ Chapter I ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Half-Breed: Chapter I

“Inuyasha!” The word of my mother drifted on the breeze like petals falling from a sakura tree. I raised my head to the sound of her melodic voice, my ears pivoting on my head to capture the noise. Again I heard her call my name and I glanced in the direction of our immoderate home, clutching my favored toy ball to my chest. Without a second thought, I stood from my crouch and dashed barefoot over the bridge to the garden veranda where my mother, in a brightly colored kimono, patiently waited. My mother Izayoi was a beautiful woman by all standards. Her fair face was framed by her flowing ebony hair, which cascaded down her back to far past her waist. She never tied it back or even pinned it up, but left it lying against the red, pink, and green floral pattern of her kimono. Her deep brown eyes glittered with the light of stars and she glowed with an unexplainable gentleness, with hands like the wind, and all the poise and grace of an empress. She smelled of sakura trees and spring showers, and her voice was like a ray of sunshine on a summer breeze. I knew her by sight, by sound and scent, and I knew her by heart.
With a smile, she knelt and took the ball from my hands. “Inuyasha, you haven’t finished your hiragana.”
I frowned and grabbed for the ball, which she held well out of the reach of my six-year-old arms. “But, Mother! I wanna play!”
She furrowed her brow in disappointment, but laughed a bit as she stood. “Inuyasha, your hiragana is important. If you cannot attend school, then you must work at home.” Of course, I knew she would say that, because she grew up in an aristocratic household where they had considered hiragana an art. “Also,” she continued, “we will have company this afternoon, so do be on good behavior.”
I grabbed fistfuls of her kimono and tugged back. “But, Mother!”
“No, Inuyasha. Come now, there’s work to be done.” Holding the ball with one hand, she firmly took hold of one of my silver dog-like ears, which were positioned near the top of my skull, and pulled me to the house. Calmly opening the shoji and dragging me inside, she set me down at my desk and stood over me, one hand on her hip and the ball resting against the other, tapping her foot ever so slightly, just so my delicate hearing hailed it as annoyingly noisy. I glared at her over my shoulder, folding my ears against my head to deter some of the sound, hands in my lap. Well, she may have been cultured, she may have been loving, but she was still my mother and I’ll be damned if she didn’t have a secret to driving my fine senses absolutely insane. She lifted her eyebrows. “Get to work. You can play when you’re finished.” She spun on her heel and left the room, sliding the fusuma open and disappearing into the kitchen where a host of women were already busy preparing a meal for the coming guests.
I glowered after her, stuck my tongue out at the closed fusuma just for good measure, and reluctantly turned to stare defeated at the washi before me. I had tried school, really tried, but hadn’t remained for much more than eight months. I was the exile, the misfit, the freak, mocked and scoffed at, because of the ‘thing’ that people rejected me as. Children teased me. Teachers ignored me. Adults hated me. Some would yank my ears, throw stones, kick dirt at me. Some would sneer at me, make me feel like I wasn’t welcome. Often, I ran home before school let out, begging my mother never to make me go back. I was there the next day. On some occasions, I had been sent home early with a good beating for accidentally scratching another child. With claws like mine that can be fatal. As a young pup, I was still clumsy with the weapons adorning my fingers. But it took the time that I had near dismembered a boy’s arm for insulting my mother to make her realize that I didn’t belong there, and I was forever forbidden to return. I could care less about going back anyway.
‘This is so unfair!’ I thought angrily to myself. ‘How come Mother never made Sesshomaru do hiragana?’
My older brother Sesshomaru, who was, in fact, my half-brother, was two hundred eight years old - two hundred two years older than myself. He was a full-blood demon, for both of his parents were of that sort. My mother was human. Sesshomaru was, at times, a charming gentleman, and at other moments, a shrewd villain. His voice was always calm, but haunting, and he often displayed the scent of the land at autumn. His ears were positioned like those of a human, but were pointed at the tips, and he often had a cynical and carnal look in his golden eyes. Beneath each eye was a pair of crimson stripes, and upon his brow was a blue crescent moon. He kept his knee-length silver hair well, sitting silently for hours on end to comb out the tangles with his claws. Sesshomaru had one feature that I never quite understood, however - a large mass of pale rose-colored fur that he would sling over his right shoulder. He used it for many things, such as a cushion, a blanket, a weapon, and even a third hand that could skillfully wrap around objects of all sizes and hold them in a fast grip. After observing his true demon form, which is a tremendous silver dog with scarlet eyes, a tail like a typhoon, and teeth like one hundred swords, I couldn’t decide on why he insisted on hauling the obviously ridiculous thing around with him. I only remember that I had never seen him without it.
Yet, for all of the differences between my brother and I, we shared many similar qualities. We both bore the charming golden eyes and beautiful silver hair of our father, as well as great physical strength, enhanced agility, incredible speed. Our basic senses were improved by hundreds and hundreds of degrees. Even as a half-demon, my eyes could see through the shadows of a dark cave and past the blackness of a cloud-covered night, though in the dark images would only appear before me in shades of gray. My hypersensitive ears could catch any of the faintest sounds, the most inaudible, the closest to absolute silence, and narrow their source down to within millimeters. My sense of smell was fine to the scents that surrounded me, and I could pick up every individual aroma for miles around, especially that of blood.
Our father Sugimi Inu no Taishou was a demon among demons, once the ruler of all the Western Lands - or so I’m told - and his greatness was proclaimed by not only the magnificent display of incense and ikebana decorating the tokonoma across the room. His was a dog demon, a class of demon titled the so-called ‘eccentrics’ of demonic society, because dog demons have always had a way of being attracted to humans. Sesshomaru described Father as the image of a warlord with all of the power and supremacy of an emperor. His fine hair was often tied into a tail that reached to his knees, and his intense golden eyes peered out from under his silver bangs, framed by a jagged azure streak on each cheek. He frequently wore a heavy cloak of ivory fur, fastened to his shoulders by two pieces of riveted armor of barbed steel, and a katana at his hip. Mother said that Father spoke like the ocean, deep and mysterious, and he smelled of leather and steel, but he was as gentle as a falling leaf on any autumn morning. He did not have a single malign thought toward humans, but sought to protect them and their mortal lives… Mother said that I was like him.
I had never met my father. He was killed in battle against a powerful demon named Ryukotsuei when I was but a new infant, but everywhere you turned you were reminded of his once majestic presence. Sesshomaru hadn’t taken Father’s death in easy stride, most likely because he felt that Father’s passing was associated to his relationship with Mother. My brother bore no such love for my mother or me because of our ‘dirty blood’, as he called it. He had honored Father and respected his wishes, which is the only reason that he ever considered so much as conversing with us. Father’s last command had been to protect me.
Mother never spoke of the fight in which Father had perished. I imagine that she found it too painful, but when I was young, my brother had often told it to me as a fascinating bedtime tale of pride and glory, recounting the events and the spectacular scenes of Father’s last noble stand.
The raging fires burned, licking at fallen huts and smoldering fallen men, around Father who was poised as strong and unbending as a mountain before the massive, wicked dragon demon, though arrows protruded from his chest and arms, and blood seeping from multiple open wounds. The orange and amber glow of the flames cast a golden heat over his body, shimmering in his hair and reflecting in his unbridled gaze. Father stood between Ryukotsuei and my mother like a wall of stone, his katana held out to the side, the fires glinting off of the blade. Mother fearfully peered out from underneath the crimson kariginu that had been draped protectively over her head, the magical kariginu which I now wore. Clutching her new child close to her chest, her voice filled with fright and distress, though she desperately tried to hide it, she said to Father, “The boy has no name. What shall we call him?” Why she asked in the middle of a battle, I swear I’ll never know. Father, a melancholy smile playing upon his lips, replied with, “Inuyasha.” Without removing his fixed stare from Ryukotsuei, with the last words that he would ever utter, he told my mother to run, and he rushed headlong at the evil demon, katana steadied to take out the enemy’s heart.
Being the eldest son, Sesshomaru was left the fortune of ruling the Western Lands, and lived in Father’s old fortress high in the mountains where he had grown up, occasionally visiting shortly to make sure that Mother and I were still alive. A long-time comrade of my father, a bloodsucking flea demon named Myoga, often came to our home since Father’s passing. He claimed to be guarding the tomb of my father and, with it, Father’s magnificent sword Tetsusaiga, which had been forged from one of his fangs. Myoga declared many times that my father had left the great blade in my possession though I had not once seen it. The Tetsusaiga was fabled to kill one hundred demons in a single stroke, used to protect the mortal lives of humans. Yet for all of the wonderful tales of power and superiority, I was convinced that the sword was just that… a story. “Seeing, yet never seen. Protected, yet never known to its protector.” That was the riddle that Father had left with the legend.
Half-blooded children, like myself, born to demon-human couples were rare. That is, they were rare because ninety-nine percent were killed either at or before birth. The few that survived were doomed to live terrible and lonely lives of alienation. I had a very clear idea that my life would not be any different for as long as I walked the earth, which could even be thousands of years, if I was lucky - and intelligent - enough to live to maturity. Time, to a demon - or a half-demon - doesn’t exist, and age isn’t a barrier. Sesshomaru, even if his two hundredth year is past, doesn’t look a day over twenty. My father was probably pushing seven hundred when he died, yet he was the vision of a man not even thirty. Immortality they call it. It’s a fake name. Long life is a gift granted by sharp wits and the ability to quickly repair wounds, not immunity to mortality. Demons can cheat life, but they cannot cheat death.
I took the brush in one clawed hand and dipped the tip into the black ink. My mother couldn’t smell the ink on the same level as I could, and she would never know how it sickened me, a potent scent that could drop me into unconsciousness if there was enough of it. It has happened once or twice when I was a pup. I had more than swiftly learnt not stick my nose in an ink pot, or otherwise face the circumstances of passing out, followed by a killer migraine when I awoke, and sensitive ears did nothing to aid a pounding head.
Pausing with the brush held above the washi, I covered my nose with my free hand, and I remembered the words to a singing game that my mother had taught to me. I bent my head over the desk, gingerly scrawling the lyrics with a careful hand, quietly speaking the words as I wrote them. “Kagome, Kagome. Kaga no naka no tori wa itsu itsu deyaru? Yoake to ban ni. Tsuru to kame ga subetta ushiro no shoumen dare?”
Maybe a minute had passed and I leaned back in my chair, already feeling more than a little bored with my hiragana. Setting the brush next to the washi, I gazed around the room with a listless sigh. Father had built my mother this beautiful summer home near the river as a gift for her and the child that she carried. The sitting room was lavishly decorated with sumi-e of water lilies floating gently on the stream and cranes dipping their beaks into the shallow water near yards of lush blossoms. Kakemono graced the walls, with picturesque poetry of waterfalls, mist-filled valleys and the reflections of swans against ponds in the light of early sunrise. Handcrafted porcelain jomon with illustrations of monks climbing the steps to mountain temples, geta on their feet, and earthenware vases with pictures of women dancing, multihued umbrellas against their shoulders, proudly sat upon the shelves and tables, displaying bouquets of colorful flowers from our gardens. Zabuton sat solemnly on the tatami around the low table, the afternoon sun shining through the intricate window frame to illuminate the bonsai settled in the center. Wicks of incense steadily burned, ingraining the room with the scents of sagebrush and cloudburst, and the lulling melody of my mother’s music box gently rang out.
My ears perked and turned toward the sound of my mother quietly humming in the kitchen. The smells of tsukudani and gohan drifted through the fusuma and rushed my sharp senses. I looked over my shoulder, my long, silver hair tickling my cheek. No doubt she and her sisterly maids were putting the luncheon in order for the guests that afternoon, the lords and ladies of the village across the river. The banquets were common where nobles would gather to feast and play patrician sports. Frankly, it was all that kept my mother in high standings. I was welcomed into the games only because of my title as a young lord and because I was my mother’s son. In any other case, I would have been pushed to the fringes of the group due to my demon heritage. I hesitantly frowned and turned away, reaching for the brush to continue my practice.
It wasn’t long before the guests began to show, wandering into the house with my mother to greet them with a respectful bow, and they to her. They casually strolled around the sitting room while waiting for the other aristocrats to arrive for the luncheon, mostly gazing at the tokonoma and shaking their heads, wondering why such a cultured young woman would openly and willingly display such devotion and praise to her dead demon love - demon being the key word here. One lord, his hair tied into a topknot, with squinty eyes looking out from underneath bushy black eyebrows, stopped to give one of my ears a sharp, painful tug with an empty smile of detest. I glared up at him from the washi, bringing a hand up to rub the stinging spot on my ear, the beginnings of an aggravated growl resonating from deep in my chest. He merely chuckled under his breath and spun on his heel to engage in some useless diplomatic banter with another nobleman.
I was never one for social talk, and I was particularly irritated by the gatherings that my mother held, but I diligently put up with them for her sake. It didn’t take me six years to discover that the ones like me were better off left in the dark, on the outside of the crowds. Humans did not welcome us nor were we accepted by demons, because demons deplore human blood and humans fear demon blood. Thus, we were stuck in between. Only very few of either group embraced and respected us for whom we were and not what we were, those such as my mother.
As the remaining company arrived and they found a place on a zabuton around the dinner table, several of Mother’s serving maids filed out of the kitchen and into the sitting room where they set dishes of tsukudani, sushi and gohan, a cup and hashi before each of the nobles. Each of the lords and ladies offered thanks to the maids and my mother as they were poured a cup of green tea, and began the meal. As they ate, they talked of random topics that I didn’t pay much attention to, but every now and then, a statement would catch my notice, and I would give my ears a twitch.
The nobleman who had interrupted my writing snorted at the unusual rotating and hitching movements of my ears. “That’s awful, Izayoi. Your son is more a dog than he is a boy.” I glanced up with a growl, furrowing my brow at the man.
“Nonsense,” Mother declared simply. “He is as much a boy as any.” I looked up at her, my tense features easing. In the eyes of a human, demons are the summit of all that is evil. True, not all demons are created equal, but we’re all bad to some extent. It’s just how we are. I glared back at the man. So if he could see my demon side, why couldn’t he see the half-human heart that beat inside my chest?
His eyes met mine and he lowered his eyebrows at my angry gaze. “What are you staring at, dog-boy?” he snarled loudly enough that the guests raised their heads in curiosity.
My mother’s visage turned cold. “I beg your pardon,” she said with calm fury, and she set her glare over him. “I’ll not have you speak such in this household.” There was a long, drawn out silence as she stared the man down, and he could not match her suddenly harsh eyes. He lowered his gaze to his bowl. “Inuyasha,” she began. “Please take your dish to the wash basin and go outside.” I glanced in her direction, wondering if I had done wrong somehow. I hesitantly got to my feet and made for the kitchen, standing high upon my toes to set my bowl in the wash basin. Quietly, I opened the shoji, feeling a dozen pairs of eyes on me, and I stepped out onto the veranda, closing the sliding panel behind me.
While Father had built the home in which we lived, Mother had grown the gardens in which I played. She had cared for the yards like they had been children, lovingly cultivating only a bare lawn into a brilliant courtyard. A path of silvery stones wove its way beneath a wooden arch decorated with blooming vines, passing by a couple of pink sakura trees and a little koi pond where marbled amber, silver and ebony fish swam about under a few blushing lilies floating atop the water. The walkway continued beside the river, coming to a junction that led to either the courtyard, or across the arching white bridge, overshadowed by a weeping willow tree, to the opposite bank. There, it slipped amongst a terrace of colorful flowers, like a crack in a sunlit diamond, and ended at a small circular area with one bench to sit and watch the river gently passing below. There was a fountain next to the house that bubbled crystal water from the mouth of a silver dragon, and most important of all, a shrine to my father, a mark of respect to his honor and a tribute to his beautiful soul, and an eternal lament for his sacrifice. This was our backyard. The front yard, though no less magnificent, was much plainer, with only a great slab of stone, a few small gardens of rich blossoms framing it, and a pair of noble and powerful dog statues, keeping their ever-watchful guard over our shoji.
I moved down the path with a leap and a bound, softly landing on top of the fountain dragon’s head without a touch of difficulty, and crouching upon its brow, reached to let the cool water run through my fingers. I paused as I caught sight of my reflection dancing on the surface of the water, and reluctantly dropped to the lip of the fountain. I looked directly into my own eyes, watching as strands of silver hair fell across my shoulders and my ears bent to the sounds that encircled me. I was different, I knew. Honestly, I understood that while I had features of a human, I had countless characteristics of a demon - unusually colored eyes, oval pupils, the triangular ears of a shibainu, knife-like claws, and razor fangs - and not only in appearance, but temperament. In many things I did and said, my rougher, more aggressive demon half shone through as clearly as sunlight through a pane of glass.
“Inuyasha!” my mother called, and I looked up at the sound of her voice. I slipped from the rim of the fountain and rushed for the open courtyard where some of the noblemen were rebounding my ball back and forth across the large circle in which they stood. Mother waved to me from the veranda, and with a smile, gestured to the game. My ears perked with anticipation, and I darted into the center of the ring, leaping for the ball as it flew over my head. My fingers brushed the orb and one of the aristocratic men wearing a blue juban and hakama knocked it back with a blow from his knee. He grinned kindly at me and I chased the flying ball across the circle, bumping into the man who caught it. The men were chuckling and the women, who observed from outside the ring, giggled as I jumped up to the ball, waving my arms. I knew that they were trying to be tolerant for my mother’s sake.
The nobleman holding the orb - the one who seemed intent on ruining my day - snarled at me, “You should have been killed at birth, half-breed.” He intentionally struck the ball from the circle and it went bouncing away across the bridge. I eagerly gave chase, my arms held out in front of me, ready to snatch up the leaping orb. As I crouched to pick up the ball, that last statement was still resounding in my ears, and I inquiringly turned to face the nobles on the opposite side of the river as they left to head for home.
I creased my brow in uncertainty, considering the man’s words. “Half-breed?” Dropping the ball, I rushed to my mother’s arms, looking up into her starlit eyes. “Mother, what’s a half-breed?”
Tears began to form in her eyes, and a stray drop fell down her cheek, which she promptly brushed away. I frowned, biting my lower lip, twisting my expression with mixed confusion and apology. She was crying. I hated it when she cried. At first I thought it my fault that she was weeping, but no, she was crying for me and what she knew my life would become - a life of being pushed away, neglected, hunted by humans and demons alike out of suspicion, fear, and often, hatred. My mother sat cross-legged on the veranda, looking out to the river as I settled in her lap, her loving arms holding me to her heart, the way she always did. And in the silence, I thought that I could put together a definition of a ‘half-breed’ - always a part of humans and demons, but never of them.
My mother broke the peace. “The new moon will be tonight.” I glanced down at my knees at her words. I detested the new moon with a raging passion, for it was the night that I became of full-human blood, as all half-demons did. For some, it came when the moon was full, or halfway through its change. For others, on a waning or waxing crescent. For me, my transformation fell on the first night of the new cycle. For the length of the night, I lost my supernatural strength and demonic powers, and they were replaced by the bitter taste of defenselessness and frailty. It was every half-demon’s worst nightmare and greatest secret. Should an enemy learn of the night of transformation, a half-demon would be slain in those hours of mortal weakness.
“I hate the new moon,” I grumbled under my breath.
My mother nodded. “I know, but it can’t be helped.” A growl of frustration came from my chest, and she bent over my head to look into my indignant eyes with a caring smile, her hair falling from her shoulders to dance across her knees. “You can stay in my room tonight. How does that sound?”
I reluctantly looked up at her with a halfhearted grin. “Good.” She smiled and planted a loving kiss on one of my ears. For a time we sat, watching the day pass us by, watching fireflies light up the hasu flowers as the sun started its descent over the western hills, leaving streaks of gold and red in the sky, and glittering stars on the eastern horizon. I tugged at her sleeve, feeling that familiar panic begin to creep into the pit of my stomach, my voice whispered with misgiving. “Mother…” I didn’t have to speak another word for her to understand my plight, and she carefully unfolded her legs and stood. I clung to her haori like I would fall to sudden death should I let my grip ease. Like a ghost in the darkness, my transformation haunted me for one night every month, the blackness holding me tightly, binding me like chain, until the sun rose up in the morning and I was restored to my natural countenance along with all of my dormant power.
I gazed emptily through the designs of the window frame, holding my knees to my chest, staring with paranoia as the sky grew dark and the first night of the new cycle began. I trembled and looked blankly ahead at the opposite wall as I felt my transmutation begin. The stinging cramps of my blood altering in my veins crawled from the hollow of my chest, through every limb, every fiber of my body. My claws inched back into my fingers, the cutting edges becoming flat and dull, and my fangs slowly drew into my guns, losing their piercing bite. I squeezed my eyes shut against the prickling sensation of my ears moving down the sides of my head and changing into a smaller pair that resembled a human’s, and the sounds around me disappeared into the deaf silence. I began to feel lost as everything that I had previously seen in great detail vanished into darkness, chased by the fleeing scents of the world. Though I couldn’t see, I was aware that my silver hair had become jet ebony, and my eyes had changed from gold to deep violet. My arms felt weary as they, shaking, hugged my legs close to me, and my hands weakly clung to my knees. My body, this human body, was tired, was frail, was weak. But all at once, it was over. The transformation had been completed in an agonizing thirty seconds that slipped by like infinite hours of torment.
I rocked back and forth, wanting to cry out, wanting to call for my mother to hold me in her arms and protect me from the fears in my heart. I unsteadily got to my feet and started across the room to her futon, holding my hands in front of me to reduce the risk of running into something. Still, I ground my hand against the sharp corner of a desk, and I yanked my fingers to my mouth with a hiss, tasting blood. This body was so fragile. My blood didn’t even taste good. In fact, it was rather flat and wooden.
Keeping my fingers in my mouth, I set my other hand to the wall, running my palms along it to guide me in the dark. That hand slipped through the open doorway, and I instinctively recoiled, my body expecting a vastly painful shock to go bolting through me, but my mind knowing that nothing would. There was a demon ward placed on that doorway, just as there was a ward on every shoji, every window in the house. Mother set them up on the night of each new moon as a way of protecting me. No demon, or individual of demon blood - or partial, in my case - could pass through, nor would any want to. The ensuing magical pulse could have any demon, no matter their strength, down on their bellies in pain. I hesitantly, experimentally poked my hand through the doorway, seeing only the tell-tale pale blue light around my wrist, which confirmed the presence of the ward. It could not harm me this night.
I whipped my head around at the low and unmistakable, foreboding growl of one of the nocturnal beasts that lurked the black timberland outside of our home, and hesitated in fright, my breath catching in my throat. As the sound arose again, I leapt onto my mother’s futon without a moment’s reluctance, landing square on top of her. “Mother!”
She tiredly sat up and looked at me. “What is it, Inuyasha?”
“Everything! There’s something in the forest and my hand hurts ‘cause I cut it on your desk and it’s dark and I can’t see and I hate the stupid new moon!” I cried, all in a single breath.
My mother hugged me to her, gently stroking my hair with one hand, soothing my whimpering. “Shh. It’s okay. You’ll be fine.” She reluctantly let me go and crawled out from under the covers. “I’ll get you a lamp. Wait right there, okay?” I nodded and sniffled, my hands wringing at the blankets as I blindly listened to her step away across the room. Seconds later, I had to shut my eyes against the brilliance. My mother sat on her futon and took me in her arms, wiping my tears away. “There. Is that better?” I nodded and rubbed my nose with my sleeve. After a moment of silence, I glanced up to her face, my eyes glossy, and she gazed at me affectionately, brushing stray pieces of my hair to the side. I always knew that she loved me for who I was and never what I looked like, but I could see it in her eyes that she enjoyed the short time that she could look into my human eyes. Because she was a human, I suppose that she had always wanted a human son or daughter, but instead, she had been blessed with a disobedient, untamable, uncontrollable half-demon. But even if I was of demon blood, I was still a child, her child, and I meant everything in the world to her as she meant everything in the world to me. She planted a healing kiss on my sore hand, and gently rocked me, the comforting sound of her beautiful voice lulling me, and I drifted away on the melody like a leaf on the wind, falling into a restless, vigilant doze.
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