InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Forget Me Nots ❯ Kagome-sama ( Chapter 1 )

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

I woke several times, sometimes during the day, sometimes at night. Each time my mind would begin to clear, a gnarled hand would appear in my line of vision and stuff some kind of herb in my face, nearly smothering me. I plunged headlong into the darkness again.

I woke again, this time to blindingly bright light. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to turn my head away from the source of light – presumably the window on the far wall, as I was still in the same little room. I swear I heard something pop and crack as I moved, whether it was my bones or the bandages, I’ll never know.

Once I was staring at the wall right next to me, I opened my eyes and let them slowly adjust to the light. I turned my head back toward the rest of the room. I was still getting a sunbeam right in the eye, but other than that my vision seemed to be about perfect.

I surveyed the room. A small fire crackled merrily in the center, cooking some kind of soup or herbs. The futons were stacked neatly in the corner. There were no people in the room – a hut, really – save myself, and I suddenly knew that I wasn’t exactly a "person." Not in the normal, human, sense of the word, anyway.

I was…

Um…

Well, I didn’t know what I was, much less who I was.

I decided to sit up and get a real look around.

Easier said than done.

I spent about a quarter of an hour trying to bend my stiff body into a sitting position, and then ended up leaning back against the wall anyway.

I looked down at myself. My legs were in wooden splints and there were bandages covering everything else. I started pulling the bandages off, gave up, and simply shredded them with the claws I had found at the ends of my fingers. Underneath, my skin was clean and healthy, with only a few blemishes here and there that may have once been open wounds. They looked to be almost completely healed. If I was in this condition under those bandages, then perhaps… I ripped off the splints and climbed to my feet.

I stood up. I shifted my weight around, moving my legs and feet into different positions that felt natural. Okay, so my legs held me. It seemed that I healed very quickly, even things like broken bones. And I knew that my legs had been broken. I sat back down on the futon, panting, and wiped at the sheen of sweat that I hadn’t realized was there. I may have been healed, but my body was still stiff and tired.

I bent my arms and legs into different positions, trying to work the kinks out of the muscles, and thought over what I knew about myself. When all I came up with was, "I have claws, I’m a man, and I need to find some clothes," it was not very encouraging.

I stood up again, this time more steadily. There was one thing on my "To Do" list that could be taken care of. I rummaged through the many items that had been stuffed onto the rickety shelves lining the back wall of the hut, tossing aside bags of herbs, casks of foul-smelling potions, and crackling old scrolls. At last I found, folded up in a wicker laundry basket – who would’ve thought to look for clothing in there? – a pair of red hakama (thankfully in the men’s style – there was no way I was dressing up like some priestess!). Underneath these was a plain white under-tunic, though there was no sign of a haori to go over it. I quickly put these on, then sat on the futon again to think.

I had been in some kind of battle, I remembered. I had come out barely alive and …triumphant? Triumphant against what? Who? I didn’t know. Correction, I had once known, but now I couldn’t remember. One of the bandages I had removed had been around my head, after all.

So what now? I thought some more. Someone was trying to keep me asleep for some reason, which meant I was probably a) among enemies, and/or b) dangerous. I glanced at my clawed hands again. That last thought was pretty believable. But it wasn't like they were guarding me very heavily, so… maybe they weren't enemies after all? I scowled and sighed in frustration. What to do, what to do..?

The shuffling sound of feet and the murmur of approaching voices caught my ear, and I suddenly knew exactly what to do. Well, I didn't really know, but I was acting on it before I could think. In one fluid, obviously practiced movement, I had crawled out the window and onto the roof of the hut. I stayed low, watching as two human females - one an old, hunched miko and the other a young woman dressed in a simple yukata but carrying a giant boomerang on her back like it was nothing more than a daypack - entered the hut, talking cheerfully to each other.

I was strangely satisfied - okay, smug - when I heard the startled gasps and then saw the two women come running out, looking around franticly.

"Where could he have gone?! I didn't see any sign of him on my way back…" the younger girl said, looking both anxious and angry.

"Perhaps the townsfolk have seen him," the hag replied, sounding equally shaken, and began shuffling off toward the west. I blinked and looked in the direction she was headed. I had been so intent on these women that I hadn't noticed my surroundings at all: I was indeed on the edge of a small village.

The younger girl nodded, and started in the other direction, heading out of the town and toward the forest that I was also just noticing. "I'll go find Miroku and Shippou," she called over her shoulder, and broke into a steady jog, hurrying toward the trees. I looked between the two quickly departing figures, and on an impulse chose to follow the girl in the yukata.

I kept to the trees, following silently behind her. She jogged down a well-worn path, looking all about her like a rodent watching out for a predator. A bend in the path led to a small clearing and revealed a man dressed in the robes of a Buddhist priest, quietly playing with a kitsune cub next to a weather-beaten old well.

I couldn't help narrowing my eyes and drawing a sharp breath as the girl skidded to a stop in front of the monk and cub. There was something very familiar about all this. I couldn't put my claw on it, but there was something I seriously did not like about this place.

"Miroku!" the girl called out. The monk looked up, apparently answering to hi name.

"Sango? What is it?" he asked, immediately dropping his antics with the kit and becoming serious when he saw the look on the girl's face.

The girl, Sango, looked around the clearing, scanning the surrounding trees where I was - of course - carefully hidden. "He's gone," she said bluntly, turning back to Miroku.

The monk's eyes widened. "You mean..?" At Sango's nod, he continued. "But.. I thought Lady Kaede was keeping him incapacitated. Wasn't she?"

Sango looked back at him gravely. "She was, but she had to leave to see to a sick child in the village. I ran into her on my way back from exterminating that youkai in the village west of here. When we got back to her house, he was gone, and all his bandages had been discarded."

"We haven't been here for very long," the cub finally spoke up, hopping up onto the monk's shoulder. "Maybe he came this way before we did."

Both humans seemed to blanch at the brat's comment. "You don't think.. he went after Kagome-sama?" Miroku said hesitantly, and they all looked at the old well as if expecting it to suddenly explode or something.

Once again, I found myself tensing up at the mention of something - or someone, in this case - that I knew I had known before. So the hag, now identified as "Lady Kaede" was supposed to keep me unconscious, eh? And this Kagome-sama.. Whoever it was, the bouzu obviously held quite a bit of respect for them, and the thought of me seeking out this person seemed to worry them.

I watched silently as they held a small discussion about what to do, at last deciding to split up and search the forrest, with the kit running back to the village to alert the hag of their plan. I waited for them to leave, and then turned my attention back to the well they had all been so preoccupied with. So their leader was through there, huh? I smirked, and hopped down, landing perfectly on the wooden rim.

It looked like any old dry well. I scowled in confusion and hopped to the bottom of it. No sign of a trap door, no portal, not even a magical aura. Just dank wood and damp soil. I snorted in disgust and jumped back out in one bound.

As soon as I landed outside, I jumped back in surprise, caught off-guard by the change of scenery, and successfully fell right back into the well. I landed hard on the bottom, and an oddly familiar sensation of being slammed into hard-packed earth washed over me. With a grunt, I managed to get up onto my hands and knees and look up. A moment ago, the ceiling of a small wooden building had replaced the view of the sky, but now all was back to normal.

I huffed in annoyance. So there was a portal in there, but it somehow didn't have any detectable aura. I scowled and growled as I wiped the dirt from my face and then jumped straight up into the air to land right back in the well again.

This time, I was ready for the change in environment as I leapt out. I landed easily on the dirt floor and looked around the small building warily. Oddly, there were no guards, no seals, and no traps that went off as soon as I emerged… nothing to signify that I had just stepped into hostile territory. I took a step forward, towards the short staircase leading up and out, when a wave of nausea washed over me. I stumbled, attempting to stay on my feet and wondering vaguely if I had somehow been poisoned.

It only lasted for a few second, only a few images flashing before my eyes. A girl, beautiful despite her tears and the angry flush of her cheeks, stood before me. She was screaming angrily, her blue eyes flashing, her ebony hair flying out around her. Then she hit me. I stumbled back, more from shock than pain, and then I was in the well-house again.

I was sweating and shaking, kneeling on the dirt floor. WhatÉ was that..? I thought as I mopped at my forehead with the back of my hand. Well, obviously, it was a memory. But of what..? I shook my head in frustration and climbed to my feet.

I squinted through the sunlight that poured in when I slid the rickety door open. I stepped out and found myself in the main courtyard of a Shinto shrine compound. Set back from the many small shrine buildings was a sturdy-looking two-story house. It looked like the perfect stronghold for someone who would want me dead. I glanced around warily, and began making my way over to the house, keeping to the shadows along the smaller buildings.

I paused at a large tree next to the house and glanced up the wall. There was a window open on the second floor, the breeze making the curtains move and… carrying a familiar smell down to me. I knit my brows, looking harder up at the window. It was the soft scent that had been next to me the first night I awoke. I definitely wanted to see what was beyond that window now.

I began climbing up the trunk of the tree, my claws digging into the bark easily. There was a branch that hung near the window, and I paused as I came level with it. I could see into the room. On the far wall, directly opposite the window was a wooden door of some kind. I looked around, noticing that there were a few decorations on what parts of the wall I could see, mostly things like butterflies and lacey stuff. I snorted. So whoever lived in that room was a girl. HuhÉ Nothing to get worked up over, I thought and began to inch my way out onto the branch.

The door suddenly opened, and a middle aged woman stepped into the room. I scuttled back into the shadows of the main trunk, pressing myself against the rough wood and holding very still. I watched the woman suspiciously. Her hair was cut very short and she was dressed in some kind of strange skirt, shirt, and apron, though she seemed to be a servant anyway. She knelt next to something out of my line of vision, a motherly expression on her face.

"How are you feeling?" the servant asked softly, and whatever she was addressing replied with a sort of pathetic-sounding grumble-mumble-groan. "You can't stay up here forever." The other person sniffled. The servant-woman sighed, sounding exasperated, "Kagome…"

I could feel my ears perk up at that. So this was the person giving out the orders. I had to consciously repress the urge to growl out loud. I waited in tense silence for the serving woman to leave, so I could find out just what this "Kagome" had against me.

After what seemed like hours, the servant sighed again, shaking her head slightly, gently patted whatever it was that I couldn’t see, and then rose and quietly left the room, the door swinging shut behind her. I grinned triumphantly to myself and crawled down the length of the branch to the open window.

I peered into the room, trying to ignore the wonderful scent filling my senses. A desk at one wall, the door, next to it a pair of sliding doors, no doubt leading to some kind of closet or dressing room as this seemed like a wealthy enough house for a noble family, and… My gaze fell on the bed, apparently where the serving woman had been kneeling. There was a lump under the blankets - a smallish person all curled up on themself.

The person's breathing was slow and even, but too shallow for them to be asleep, and every few seconds it was punctuated with a sniffle. So I perched on the window-sill, waiting to be noticed. After several minutes of just sitting and watching the apparently sick person's back, I was getting understandably annoyed. Finally, I simply opened my mouth and said the first thing that came to mind.

"Oi."

The person in the bed tensed, then ever so slowly, as if they were afraid of what they might find, turned over to look at me.

I nearly fell off the window-sill.

It was the girl from my little "vision" in the well-house. Her eyes were puffy and red, from too much crying and too little sleep, and she was staring at me in utter shock, yet somewhere in the back of my mind I couldn't help thinking that she was still pretty. Her mouth worked for a moment before she found her voice. "I-Inuyasha..? What are you doing here?"

I smirked, easily hiding my surprise at the name she had used. "Looking for you, of course." I added the "of course" as an extra little touch at the end. No use letting potential enemies onto the condition of my memory.

"B-but… You… You're supposed to be asleep!"

"So I've heard," I said darkly, and she seemed to shrink under my glare. "I've also heard that you were the one giving the orders to keep me asleep." She paled as I smirked at her again. "So, Kagome," I said, emphasizing her name harshly, "you, are coming with me."

Her eyes widened and I lunged at her.

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Edited 6.20.05, Reposted 7.12.05