InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Little Bits ❯ Reviving Hope ( Chapter 3 )

 

Reviving Hope

The elderly nun felt crushed with sorrow. She had not thought she would be. So many years separated from her family, all the things that she had seen in her long life.

But nothing had prepared her for the dark gloom that held her family's home in its grip. So many dead, of the epidemic that had swept through it during the winter. Children, elderlies, even the younger adults. Almost one in four. Including the two family members she most still cared about -- her brother, the head of the family. And her niece. Izayoi. Beautiful, clever and strong-willed -- and tainted.  Freely claimed by a youkai lord...

"My lady?"

She looked up at the quiet query. The samurai escorting her and her fellow nuns back to the temple continued as she looked at him. "My men are preparing a meal. If my lady would desire to walk a bit...?"

"Yes, thank-you." At his gesture, the carriers of the palanquin lowered it. He helped her to her feet, then thrust her staff into her hand and quickly withdrew, not meeting her eyes. Turning back slightly, she made sure that the item that had been generously swaddled in several layers of cloth and placed next to her was not disturbed. It was, she suspected, the real reason why the new lord had specifically summoned her, rather than just send a simple plea for spiritual assistance, to lay to rest the many restless spirits. Not that he would ever admit it. He hadn't even acknowledged its existence. But even though it had been given to her, in private, from the hand of a servant, he had to have planned the transfer.

She forced herself to look around. It was supposed to be springtime. But, as if nature itself were still mourning her family's losses, the air still held some of that cold bitterness from winter's stubborn grip. Patches of snow still abounded where the sun had no direct touch, and the edges of the stream glinted with ice. The younger women had spread some cloaks on the ground in a sunny spot and were kneeling in a huddled flock, looking tired and dispirited. She studied them with a fond sadness. They were all children to her, young women with spiritual gifts, who had made their way to the Buddha's path. Their skills--and more importantly, their compassion and emotional stamina--had been sorely tested by the experience of having to gentle and send on so many spirits, while also dealing with the grief and need of the survivors.  They had done well, she thought. She--

There was an equine squeal of startlement and fright, and then shouts. "Mononoke!" screamed one of the men, in utter horror.

"Where?" The samurai, who had been hovering near her elbow, whirled, drawing his sword. She turned more slowly, as other horses reacted to the one's panic.

"It's the dog boy!" yelled one of the other soldiers, sounding terrified. "It's alive--it's still alive!"

She completed her turn it time to see one of the pack-horses rearing, a small red- and white- something clinging to the half-open pack. Several bags and jars jostled free, fell to the ground, the latter shattering. "Get it!" yelled the samurai. "Use your spears--knock if off the horse--kill it!"

The horse came down and bolted forward. The creature leapt free in the opposite direction, and the woman gasped as she clearly saw the small figure, with the white hair -- and the white dog ears.  "Take it down!" rose the samurai's voice again. "Use your spears--kill it, now!"

"No!"

She didn't know she was going to speak until the word was already out of her mouth. "That is Izayoi-sama's son!"

Her voice was firm and commanding. Within her view, soldiers froze, their spears half-raised to throw. But what she really saw was the small boy jerking to a stop and whirling to face the humans. He stared straight at her, his body tense, ready to flee, his arms clutching several bags possessively to his chest.

The samurai loomed up in front of her, glaring down at her. "Revered lady," he said angrily, "this is none of your concern. The lord ordered the mononoke destroyed."

She met his gaze without flinching. "My nephew is not here, and dealing with spirits--whether good or ill--is what I do." She lifted her chin, and spoke with an air of authority she had long since learned how to project. "Now stand aside."

He resisted. She took a small step forward, gripping her staff tightly, to keep herself from limping. At her second step, he moved backward, and then, as she continued to slowly advance, he stepped aside.

The hanyo, she noted, had not moved. Step by tiny, careful step, she moved forward, her eyes focussed on the ground to save her uncertain feet. When she had passed the last of the soldiers, she halted. Leaning against her staff, she shifted her gaze back to the boy. "Come here, Inuyasha."

He started, ears jerking straight up. "You--you know me?! Nobody's ever called me by my name before, except mama! Did you know mama?"

"Your mother was my niece," she answered quietly. "I saw you once, when she came to my temple to beg shelter, after the youkai who sired you was killed."

His eyes widened. "Mama--mama told me about that. She said, she said you made the charm that kept youkai from finding me." He took a step forward. "But, but it doesn't work anymore." He shifted his stolen packages to free one hand. He pulled out a dirty leather thong with a pair of beads on it. "Please, can you fix it? Please?"

"I cannot," she told him. "I had to tie the spell to your mother's spiritual power. She is dead, and I cannot renew it."

"Oh." His ears drooped, and he looked away, blinking, gripping the bags more tightly. He looked ready to turn away, but then, after a long moment, he looked up. "You--you took care of mama for awhile. She told me. Please--could you--could you take care of me?" He took a step forward, then another. "Please?" he asked, his expression begging. "I'm so tired of running and hiding, and trying to sleep in a tree," he edged closer, "and being hungry and lonely, and, and scared, and--and I'm hungry all the time, I-I didn't mean to scare the horse, I just wanted some of the food I could smell, and please, please won't you take care of me?"

She blinked, and something in her froze, as she remembered another boy, a long time ago, who had looked at her like that. A boy she had taken care of, after their mother had died, until their father had married again. Her stepmother had wanted her gone, insisting that her unmarried, un-wooed status was hurting her sisters and her brother. She had wanted to go to a temple for years, knowing marriage would never be in her life, but it had the hardest thing she had ever done, turning away from those pleading eyes. Now another boy looked at her--Izayoi's boy--and she wanted--

A hand gripped her shoulder. "You can't, my lady!" hissed the oldest of the young women. "You know you can't!"

She looked around, to look at Tsukiko's angry and frightened expression. "He's only a child, Tsukiko--"

"It's hanyo! Youkai! You know what they're like--you've purified enough!"

"He's not like them, Tsukiko," she remonstrated quietly. "He's a lonely boy who is missing his mother."

"My lady, it's ensorcelled you!" The younger woman grasped her upper arm with both hands. "Look, you're tired. Let's take you back so you can rest, and we'll take care of everything, that thing will never hurt any-one..."

The younger woman faltered, her mouth hanging open, as something changed. Closing her eyes, the elderly woman sensed the spirit swirling around, and paled, pain wringing her heart, as she recognized it. Izayoi!? Not just dead, but unsettled? Clinging to the world, unable to go on? A ghost, that might transform into a true mononoke if it could not be pacified. No! Surely not! Not Izayoi! Surely the taint had not grown that bad--how could it, when she had looked into Izayoi's eyes that time, when the new mother had begged for even a single night's shelter, and for all that she had looked, the only shadow on that soul had been those cast by sorrow, not by the evil that was supposed to come of mixing human and youkai blood. Not even the boy, she remembered--she had clearly sensed the human heart: shadowed, yes, by the potential of his youkai blood, but not evil.

A whimper, and the sound of objects dropping to the ground, brought her back from her thoughts. The hanyo was staring at her, the golden eyes starting to fill with tears. "You--don't want me," he whispered. "No one wants me. Every--everyone hates me."

She looked at him, and felt hope dying.

In the springtime. When hope, like life, should be reborn.

Around her, she felt Izayoi's ghost flare with despair, felt it fighting to manifest itself, desperate to go to her child, to comfort him. She felt Tsukiko praying, trying to force the ghost to rest, using her greater spiritual power to stop the ghost from showing itself. She felt Izayoi's wails, as Inuyasha repeated the words that he had been trying for moons not to believe, felt the grief that wanted to make spring into winter, that wanted to believe that warmth could never come again--

"Enough!"

She opened her eyes, swinging her staff to rap the younger woman sharply on the shoulder. "Enough," she repeated. "Both of you." She looked back at Inuyasha. "Tsukiko, go to the palaquin and get the item that's wrapped in white silk, and bring it to  me." She looked back at the hanyo. "I do not hate your mother's child, Inuyasha. Now come here."

He obeyed this time, scrubbing at his face with the back of a dirty hand. Fixing her staff firmly in the ground, the old woman used it to  ease herself down onto her knees, trying not to wince. The cold dampness instantly penetrated her heavy robe, but she ignored it, raising her free hand to touch his face. He didn't--quite--flinch from her touch, his eyes uncertain and apprehensive. They were the wrong color, those eyes, and the pupils were wrong. But their shape was Izayoi's. As were his jawline, and his nose, and the set of his mouth.

And he looked so young. Terribly young--far too young to be on his own. Though that might be just the way his youkai blood made him look--how many years had it been, since her brief contact with him? Thirteen? Fourteen? She wasn't sure--her later years were hard to tell apart. But it didn't matter. She looked into his eyes, with more than her eyes, and she saw what she had seen before. A human heart, shadowed by youkai, but not controlled by it. Not, at least, as long as it remained strong. And it was strong, but it was suffering badly. From loss, and from loneliness, from the growing fear that the loneliness would be--forever.

And she knew she could not take him in. She had no means of support, beyond that provided by the temple, and she had no real place for the boy, even assuming the others would even consider letting him stay. Which they would not. And even had she a place and means of her own, how long would she be there for him? Not long--not long enough, and he would only have his heart torn again, before he was old enough to bear it.

She placed her staff on the ground and accepted the silk-wrapped item. Gently removing the cloths, the small, gray urn was presently revealed. Behind her, the young woman gasped as she recognized it: Inuyasha looked at it in bewilderment and--perhaps--faint awareness of what it was. She waited until he looked up at her.

"Inuyasha, I will order that you be given food, but I cannot offer you shelter." Hurt welled in his eyes, and she hurried on. "I would if I could, child, and I regret that I am causing you pain. But I do need you to do something very important."

He blinked at her. She held out the urn. "This contains your mother's ashes. She needs you to take this to some place she will like -- she loved to watch the moon rising over water. Bury the urn, and put a stone over it. Stay with her for seven days, telling her how much you love her, and how much you want her to be at peace.
Then, later, when you need, come back to the stone, and talk to your mother, telling her what is in your heart. Can you do that?"

The boy stared at her, then suddenly snapped his head up. "Mama?" he breathed. She felt the yearning of the ghost, and nodded.

"Yes, she is here, Inuyasha," she told him. "She can't be at peace, until her ashes are safe, until they are somewhere you can visit. You can do this?"

He pulled his gaze down, and he nodded. He took the urn and held it carefully against his chest. "I---I miss mama," he whispered, eyes starting to swim again.

"I know. But she wants you to be brave -- did she ever tell you the story of the flower of winter's end?"

He nodded. "The only flower that was brave enough to face the snow and cold, to let people know they should have hope, because spring was coming."

She smiled at him, and reached out to caress his face again. "You need to be that brave, Inuyasha-kun, but to bring hope for yourself. No matter how many people-or youkai--turn against you, someday, someone will look at you and like you for as you are. I believe that--and I hope that you can, too."

He nodded again, a bit tremulously, his eyes glimmering. Suddenly, he whispered, "Can I--can I please hug you? Please?"

She could not deny the lonely boy his gesture. Cautioning him to be gentle, because her old bones creaked, she held out her arms. He set the urn down, very carefully, and then wrapped his arms around her, rested his cheek on her shoulder, and promptly broke into tears. She clutched him tightly, her own tears streaming down as she let her own grief out, as she had not been able to do before. The crushing sorrow lightened, as she remembered her own faith and belief that the souls sundered from life would return, and as she held in her arms a child of her family. There were many gone, but many more still living: more to love, more to help. And when their tears had ended, when he pulled away, snatching the urn back to his chest and looking uncertain and vaguely embarassed, she gave him a gentle smile, before raising her voice to give some firm orders. She watched as he took the bag of food dropped a length away by a sick-faced soldier, and carefully tucked the urn--rewrapped in the length of silk--in the top of the bag. He gave her a final, uncertain look, gave a barely audible 'arigato,' then abruptly whirled and dashed off, running up the road aways, before turning and leaping into the woods. She smiled to herself, and lowered her gaze to a tiny flower surrounded by a patch of snow. Very gently, she ran her finger over the fragile white petals, and the purple, lavender and gold center: her little namesake. She had been a lonely child herself, though not as lonely as he would be. The story of her flower, told to her by her mother, had always been her favorite, and she in turn had told it to her baby brother. Who had apparently passed it on to his daughter, who had passed it on to her son.

Stories passed on; hope renewing in the spring. As it should.