InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ A Tale of Ever After ❯ Chapter 217

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

I do not own InuYasha or any of the characters created by Rumiko Takahashi


Chapter 216


Kagome watched with interest as Haname picked up her fiber, wetting her fingers in the little bowl of water, and then turning the wheel, and skillfully pulled out another length of thread. Winding it back, she almost got the thread wound before she started to cough, a hard and heavy cough that left the ailing woman almost no chance to catch a breath.

Akina moved from the fire pit and patted the older woman on the back.  It didn’t help much. Reaching towards a tray next to the ailing woman, she picked up a medicine cup. “Drink this, Okaasan,” she said gently.

Haname held onto the cup with both hands. They trembled as they moved, and she coughed once more before she could bring it to her lips, but she managed to swallow first one, and then another sip of the potion, making a twisted face at the bitterness of the medication.

She quickly handed it back to her daughter-in-law. “I don’t know which is worse, the coughing or the cure.”

“My okaasan used to say that you knew how good the medicine was by how bad it tasted,” Kagome said. “I never wanted to believe her.”

“Mine did to,” Akina said as she moved to put the medicine away.

“It’s an old saying,” Kaede said, nodding. She moved across the room, sitting down next to Haname. “Still, the cough might kill you, even if you don’t think it is serious,” she said, with her usual reassuring calm, resting her hands on her thighs. “The taste, though, merely makes you think you might die. Alas, I know of no good way to hide the bitterness. It pushes through the sweet.”

“Like so many things in life,” Haname said, working to get her breath again.

“True, true,” Kaede said. Kagome quietly sat down next to the old miko.

Akina, replacing the medicine cup back on the tray, looked back up at her mother-in-law. “Would you like some water now?”  

Haname waved her off. “Not yet. I don’t want the taste of the cough medicine to spoil whatever I drink next. Give me a few moments.” Her daughter-in-law nodded, and went back to her place by the fire pit.

“So, we know the cough is not going away. How are your dreams?” Kaede asked. She rested a hand on Haname’s forehead and looked carefully at her eyes.

The ailing woman pulled away. “I doubt if you learn anything that way, Miko-sama. I haven’t had a fever since the second day. So you want to know about my dreams? They’re awful.” Haname looked at her, tilting her head to the side. Why?”

“Sometimes, they tell us what’s happening,” Kaede said. “Especially if it’s more than an illness behind it - a kami, a fox, a ghost.”

Haname shrugged. “Fever dreams or hauntings - I can’t tell the difference. Or even if they’re just ordinary. I’m always being chased, always.” She finished winding her thread back up, but pushed the basket of fiber away. “Enough spinning for a while. I think it’s tiring me out.”

Akina got up and pushed the wheel against the wall to get it out of the way.

While the younger woman did that, Kaede looked at Haname thoughtfully. “Do you remember any of your dream from last night?” she asked.

“She ought to,” Akina said, moving back to her tea-making table. After checking the kettle, she measured tea into the pot. “It woke us up.”

“That was a bad one,” Haname said, nodding. “I’m not surprised. Something was chasing me. It had long claws and glowing eyes. I think it was black. I never could quite make it out - only that I was terrified that it was going to eat me, and we were both running through a forest in the dark. There was some light ahead. I knew if I could get to it, I could be safe, but it seemed to keep moving. The monster was growing closer and closer, but Tsuneo woke me up before the dream ended. Evidently I had been calling out in my sleep.”

“You did, Okaasan,” Akina said. “I woke up in the other room. Even the girls woke up.”

“I’m sorry, child. I know with Joben taking care...of that...that one and things aren’t particularly pleasant right now.” She turned back to look at Kaede, and gave the woman a hard look. “There’s something here that’s disturbing you, isn’t there? What are you worried about, Kaede-chan?”


While Kaede and Kagome were entering the room where Haname was staying, InuYasha, sitting down by Tsuneo’s fire pit, laid his sword down alongside of him and shifted in his seat to get comfortable. He looked first at Tsuneo, and then at Michio, both watching him expectantly, but he was not exactly sure of what to say.

Tsuneo, sensing his uneasiness, broke the silence first. “Well, friend,” the elder said, “I’m not Daitaro, and I don’t have his bottle of sake that makes hearts open and loosens our tongues, but since we keep meeting in these odd moments, I’ll give you the best I have.” He picked up the teapot and filled a clean cup with the pale green infusion, and handed it to the hanyou. “What brings you to this side of the village today?”

“I followed Kaede and Kagome on their rounds today,” InuYasha said simply. He took a sip of the tea, and as Tsuneo hinted, it was very good. Holding the cup in the base of his palm, he looked up at both Tsuneo and Michio. “After yesterday, with Seiji...”

“Seiji’s bad news,” Michio said, nodding his agreement. His face showed his displeasure with the man, a deep frown, as if even the man’s name left a bitter taste in his mouth. “If I didn’t know that he was safe in the lockup, I’d be more than worried about Chiya. I learned a long time ago you can’t trust him.” Michio grabbed a fire poker and began stirring the coals. “That ass has something going on in the back of his mind and I don’t like it.”

The hanyou nodded. “It’s not just him. I don’t trust his brother, either,” he said. “Not really.” He brought the teacup back up to his lips, holding it in both hands, letting the steam and scent fill his nose, then drank once again. “He’s smaller, but he carries an attitude just as stupid.”

Michio put the fire poker down. “Yoshimi’s been trading on how his brother was willing to back him up a long time. Outside of a few good souls like Tadaki who put up with him, there’s not many who will put up with him. He’s a snake. I think he’s got fewer friends in the village than Seiji. We know him for what he is, a conniving weak man who likes to use his brother’s muscle.”

“Weak men often act like small angry dogs,” Tsuneo said. “They’re sometimes more willing to bite when they feel threatened, especially if they see an opening where a bigger dog won’t chase them off.”

InuYasha’s ears twitched at the dog reference, but Tsuneo either missed seeing them or pointedly ignored the gesture. After a moment, InuYasha relaxed and nodded. “Keh,” he said. “I just didn’t feel right letting her run across the village without being there to keep an eye on things.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Michio said, nodding.  

“Indeed,” the older man said. “Yoshimi’s caused enough trouble sneaking around the village. More than one bottle of sake has disappeared when he’s walked by, and if you hire him to work, you’d better be there to watch him do it.”

“What I want to know is what’s going to happen when they let Seiji out of the lockup?” InuYasha asked.

“That’s a good question,” Tsuneo said. “I’ve been thinking about it.” Michio refilled his tea cup for him, and he took a thoughtful sip. “Tameo wants the elders to decide what to do next. I really think he’d like to kick him out.” He picked up the plate of rice cakes and offered one to InuYasha, who shook his head no. “It’s an attractive idea,” the older man said. “Seiji’s been causing trouble for years. But it comes with its own problems.”

“Being cast out is a hard fate. Man like Seiji’s just as likely to turn bandit as to do anything sensible,” the hanyou remarked.
 
Michio sighed. “Maybe you should have done something more than knock him out,” he said. “You always were someone he saw in a bad way. But now, he’s going to be really out for revenge.”

InuYasha rocked back, and rested his hand on the hilt of his sword, stretched out next to him. “Let him try.”

“You have to watch out for those little ones,” Michio said. “Sometimes, they sneak behind you and tear up your things when you aren’t looking. Spiteful.”

“Enough of this darkness,” Tsuneo said, standing up. “Let’s go outside. I want to check and see if that’s straw’s getting taken out to the fields. It was Tadaki’s day to do it.”

“You don’t trust Tadaki?” Michio asked. He and InuYasha stood as well.

“It’s not that I don’t trust him...” Tsuneo shrugged. “Maybe I’d just feel better being outside. This house has gotten gloomy, and it only seems to be getting worse.” He headed towards the door.

Michio took a deep breath. “After this last week, I’m not sure but that the whole world’s gotten gloomy.” He, with InuYasha close behind, followed the older man out.


In the added-on room, Kaede took a breath, and sucked on her lip, then looked at Haname squarely in the eyes. “You should have been getting better by now. You were given a nasty tonic, but most of that seems to be gone. Your heart handled the poison. Your body rested from the fever it gave you.”

Akina took a breath, and nodded. “Okaasan has been holding on, neither getting worse nor better.”

“To sit up for more than an hour makes me feel like I’ve worked in the fields during the rice planting,” Haname said. It was not a complaint, merely a statement of fact. “It has been that way since it happened. Why?”

“And it sounds like you didn’t sleep well, even with Morio out of the house last night,” Kaede said, tapping her chin.

“That’s true,” the ailing woman said. She began to cough again, not a long spasm, but as she finished she slumped forward, resting her forehead in her hands. “Akina-chan, help me back to my bed. I don’t think I can sit up any more.”  

Akina, who was bringing teacups from a cupboard, hurried and put them down next to the tea pot.

“I’ll help you, if you’d like,” Kagome volunteered.

“Ah, young, strong backs,” Haname said. “Remember when we had backs like those, Kaede-chan?”

“Indeed, I do,” the old miko said, nodding. She watched as Kagome got on one side of Haname, and Akina got on the other. Haname threw off the lap robe she had been using. Akina put it out of the way, draping it across the spinning wheel. Looking at Kagome, she gave the young miko a nod, and the two women wrapped their arms around the ailing woman’s waist.

“Ready, Okaasan?” Akina asked.

Haname draped her arms around their necks. “Slowly,” she said. “I get dizzy standing up.”

Slowly, they helped her to her feet, and giving her a moment to catch her breath, and they moved the ill woman, careful step by step back to her bed, where they reversed the process. Akina grabbed the lap robe off the spinning wheel, and tucked her covers around her legs, and helped her smooth her shoulder wrap. “Is that better, Okaasan?”

The older woman sighed, clearly exhausted by the event. “I suppose. At least it doesn’t make keeping my head up such a hard job.”

Kagome moved out of the way and let Kaede kneel next to her. “Let’s see if we can’t figure out why you aren’t getting better.”

Haname held out her arm and looked at Kaede. “You want this, I suppose?”

“I do,” the healer said, taking Haname’s pulse. After that, she pressed on the woman’s abdomen, felt around her throat, rested a hand on her forehead.  

“How long did you wear that amulet for?” Kaede asked, sitting back with a thoughtful look.

“That amulet?” Haname rubbed her lips. “Most of two days, I think.”

“Was it cursed?” Akina asked.

“Cursed? No, I don’t think it held a curse. But it was powerful magic. Far more magic than that yamabushi had in his body,” Kaede said. “I wonder where he got it?”

“Considering the state of him mind today,” Haname said, her lips curled up into a bitter, frustrated look, “I highly doubt we’ll ever get that answer.  I don’t know all the reasons the kami did what he did, but answers to our questions weren’t part of it.”

“Magic things like that, they can do unexpected things,” Kaede said.

What Kaede said made Kagome look up at the older miko. “That is so right. Look at all the damage the Shikon jewel did,” she said. “Was this that strong?”

“Few magic things were as strong as the Shikon no Tama,” Kaede said, “Nor do they draw evil so strongly. I don’t think this one is that bad, but it is powerful.” She put her finger to her lip, thinking. “You, more than most, have had experience with strong magic like this. I wonder...”

“Am...am I ever going to get better?” Haname asked. “Has it marked me for the rest of my life?”

“We will do the best to make sure you get better,” Kaede replied. “The best we can.”