InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Of Dog Gods & Mortals (new version) ❯ Chapter 14

DISCLAIMER: I'll make this short and sweet. 'Inuyasha' and all characters involved belong to Rumiko Takahashi and not to me. Any questions? No? Good, now on with the story.

 

Author's Note: This chapter takes place late winter.

 

CHAPTER 14

 

It was early evening in Ergos, and in the temple garden a lone figure sat, ignoring the slight chill. It had been a surprisingly mild winter, but it had still been enough to keep her mostly inside for the last two months. Now however, with spring almost here, the weather had been steadily improving allowing for more time outside. There was still a thin layer of snow on the ground, and a chill in the air, but it was more than nice enough that Kagome could sit outside for a while providing she bundled up a bit, which was she was doing right now. It would soon be time for dinner, and she was taking this short break in her duties to take the time to reflect on everything that she had gone through since coming to this place some nine months ago.

 

Kagome smiled as she reflected on how her life had changed, going from the lowest lows to the highest high. When she'd first come here, she'd been all alone, running from a monster in human flesh and with no hope left that her dreams would come true. Now look at her; she was the priestess she'd always dreamed to be, with probably more spiritual power than any one else on Earth, and had become a lover to a God whom she loved with all her heart. Kagome almost laughed as she thought about it, if someone had told her a year ago that her life would turn out like this, she'd think they were either insane or severely intoxicated. But she couldn't be happier that things had turned out the way they had.

 

It had been two, nearly three months since Kagome's powers had been released the day of the bandit attack, the same day Inuyasha expelled Kikyo from the temple. Since then, things at the temple had been much improved for the rest of the temple staff, the increase in their workload being off put by the now much more relaxed atmosphere now that they no longer felt they had to be walking on eggshells to avoid an explosion of temper. That said, things were naturally quieter in the winter, with less worshipers travelling to see them in the colder months, and with little opportunity to do any work to the outside of the temple with the snow. Things were no doubt going to be much harder come spring, when repairs to the temple would have to start and the trains of worshipers would be arriving again. They would no doubt be feeling the loss of a third priestess then, though at this point no one could really bring themselves to mind so much just yet. A couple of wannabe priestess had arrived at the temple in the last few months, though certainly not as many as tried with Kagome's position, but Inuyasha had been unwilling to accept any of them yet.

 

While things for the temple in general might have been relatively quiet these last few months, things weren't so much for the people who ran the temple. It had been an eventful winter for the God of Protection and his temple staff, as far as their personal lives went.

 

Miroku had recently increased his attempts to court Sango this winter, following the scare he received after coming home from that trip several months ago to hear that she had almost been killed. The knowledge that he came so close to loosing her had an obvious impact on the high priest, far beyond his initial panic and refusal to leave her side for several days. Ever since then, Miroku seemed to have turned over a new leaf in regards to his lecherous tendencies. That's not to say he stopped being a letch, far from it. In many ways he was even more of a letch than before, and couldn't seem to keep his hands to himself for more than a few minutes at a time. No, what was really different now, was the target of his… um, attentions. In the past Miroku would flirt with anything that was attractive, female and in the immediate vicinity. Granted, ever since he had been courting Sango he'd never actually done anything with any of the women he flirted with, but he would still flirt with random women on a regular basis. It was because of this that Sango had so far refused to allow their relationship to develop anywhere near as far as Miroku would have liked. There was no question in anyone's mind that Miroku loved Sango, but he just couldn't seem to control himself and Sango was determined that until he did she would not allow their relationship to go any further. She refused to let any man, regardless of how much she cared about him, take advantage of her if he could not remain loyal. Miroku had been trying for months to become the kind of man Sango wanted, and had made some progress, but before that trip it had seemed like he still had a long way to go. In fact, if you listened to gossip around the village, Miroku would most likely be old and grey before he learnt to control himself enough that Sango would allow their relationship to develop more than it already had. That was, until Miroku learnt how close he'd come to loosing her forever. The shock of just how close his beloved Sango had come to death had done what many once thought impossible. Almost overnight, Miroku had become a one-woman-man, devoted solely to the fiery guardswoman. While he was still the biggest letch in town, the only one he groped, flirted with and/or otherwise annoyed was Sango. While Sango wasn't exactly over the moon about being fondled every few minutes they were together, in public no less, she still considered it a big improvement over the high priest's wondering eye. As a result, the two had been spending much of the winter becoming ever closer, and both were very happy. New rumours about the pair were starting up around town now, which all seemed to agree that marriage might be in their future before much longer. Sango had confided in Kagome about a week ago that she wasn't so sure that she trusted Miroku's transformation enough to truly consider that idea yet, even if he did offer, but she might be willing come summer if he keep things up the way he had been going.

 

Kohaku had also been busy this winter, and like Miroku, he had a new attitude that related directly to the bandit attack and Sango's near death. Kohaku had spent many days following the bandit attack looking back on the moment he saw Sango run through with that villain's sword, and not surprisingly he did not like the way it made him feel one bit. He had never felt so much hatred, so much pain, so much fear, as he did in that moment, seeing his only family wounded in such a grievous way. But even more than that, there was another horrible feeling that had been flowing through him at the time, and it was this feeling that more than anything - once his fear for his sister's wellbeing had faded significantly enough for him to stop fussing over her, anyway - haunted his dreams and plagued his thoughts for hours on end… in that horrible moment, Kohaku had felt completely and utterly hopeless. More helpless than he had ever felt in his entire life. There he was watching Sango take a sword straight through her body, take on a wound that should have by all right killed her… and he was unable to do anything to save her. He couldn't stop her from being injured, he couldn't help her fight off her attacker, he couldn't even fight to avenge her. All he could do was stand by and watch as that bastard tried and nearly succeeded in killing his beloved older sister. Words could not describe how horrible that felt, and still felt. Which was why when Sango was saved and everything had calmed down to the point where Kohaku could think clearly again, he made a promise to himself that he would never allow himself to feel like that again. Never again would he feel so utterly helpless. In the past he had refused to learn his family's trade as the village guards, and had joined Inuyasha's temple as his priest instead. After everything that had happened his views on that decision had changed slightly. He was still Inuyasha's priest; in fact he was eve more devoted now than he had ever been. How could he not, after seeing his God defend his town like that? He could not regret that decision, but he did now regret his decision not to learn how to fight from his father when the old man had offered when he was younger, and now he would never be able to seeing as his father had sadly entered into Yura's embrace four years ago now. Well, maybe he couldn't learn how to fight from his father, but he still could learn how to fight which is exactly what Kohaku had been doing all winter long. It seemed that every minute Kohaku had that he was spending working in the temple, eating or sleeping he was spending learning to fight from either Sango or the other members of the village guard. Having worked for years with Sango, and their father before that (and with some of the eldest guardsmen, their grandfather as well), the guardsmen were more than happy to help Kohaku in his new desire to learn to fight. After what had happened that day, with those bandits being defeated and killed by no other than the God of Protection himself, it would likely be a long time before anyone would dare attack the village again. Kohaku knew this, but he also knew that if anyone ever did attack again, he sure as hell refused to stand by and watch again. Next time someone attacked the village, he would be right there by his sisters side fighting to defend it, just like she did, and their ancestors had.

 

Kaede had also had a very busy winter, for several reasons. Kaede had actually taken on so much during that winter that at times Kagome had wondered when the High Priestess had found the time to sleep, but Kaede had seemed to somehow handle it all okay. First of all, there was Kagome herself. With Kagome's spiritual powers suddenly awaking, and her being not Kagome's immediate supervisor at the temple, but also the priestess with the strongest trained spiritual powers for miles around, Kaede was naturally thrown into the role of helping Kagome adapt and learn to control said powers as soon as possible. Of course Miroku had helped her when he could, and even Inuyasha had done his best to teach Kagome to control her new powers, but the bulk of the teaching had fallen on Kaede's shoulders. Not, Kagome reflected, that the old priestess had appeared to mind. In fact, Kaede had seemed to thrive on the challenge of teaching Kagome. If there was one thing Kaede really loved about her role as a priestess, it was that it gave her the opportunity to teach people. She taught the villagers about Inuyasha, she taught younger priests and priestesses the ways of the temple. She had taught Kikyo to be a priestess, how to use her spiritual powers and how to heal. She had been so sad when Kikyo stopped wanting to learn from her, and not only because it was another way that Kikyo had been growing more dangerously arrogant and distancing herself from her aunt and the rest of the temple staff. Kaede had truly missed the challenge and the joy that had come in teaching Kikyo, and so was genuinely delighted when Kagome had arrived at the temple months later and gave her another chance to be a teacher. So when it became clear that Kagome now needed someone to control her spiritual powers as well, although it was quite a bit of extra work especially at first, Kaede took to the challenge like a fish to water and was truly happy about it. Another reason why Kaede was busy was something she was not nearly so happy about. As mild a winter as it was, there were still a number of diseases brought about by the cold season, and as village healer it ultimately fell upon Kaede to help. Fortunately, none of the illness the villagers contracted were very serious and Kagome had been there ti help Kaede whenever possible, so that between the two of them they were able to help all of the infected villagers recover relatively quickly.

 

The final reason why Kaede was busy that winter was almost a combination of the first two reasons, and didn't actually come into play until just a little over a month ago when Kaede had opened up a almost mini-school for teaching healing techniques. Seeing how as most of the illness contracted that winter could have been treated by the villagers themselves if they just knew how, but that few to none of them did, Kaede thought that maybe it was time for them to try and learn. So with Inuyasha permission Kaede had been holding lessons in the temple once or twice a week for the last several weeks in which she instructed the villagers, mostly women, how to do simple healing teas and potions which could be easily brewed at home. This had been something Kaede had wanted to do for a long time, but had never had the opportunity to start before now. Kaede had been worried at first about approaching Inuyasha with the idea of opening a school for healing within his temple, but Inuyasha had been a surprisingly good mood all winter long and had supported the idea as soon as Kaede had brought it to him. When asked about why, Inuyasha would reply that he liked the idea of the temple doing that little something extra to help the villagers and that he also supported the idea of teaching the villagers to help themselves if they could. And so, with her God's support, Kaede's school of healing began. Most of her students were village women, mostly mothers, along with a couple of villager elders and one peculiarly pessimistic guardsman who wanted to learn how to better treat the wounds he felt he and his colleagues would undoubtedly receive at some point in their careers. All of the previously mentioned would turn up for classes when Kaede held them and would pay attention to what she had to say, but none of them sought her out at other times hoping to learn more, or seemed to want to learn to be a true healer. They were happy to learn how to treat wounds or illnesses when a healer wasn't around, but it was clear they still wanted to rely on Kaede and those like her when they had a real health problem. Kaede had only one student who had the ambition to be a real healer, and worked hard to achieve that goal. One student that Kaede gladly took under her wing and did her best to teach despite many of the villagers disdain for her. That one student was Salome, the daughter of Filia whom many of the villagers, rightfully or not, believed to be a former and Salome to be the product of one of her business transactions. Upon hearing that the revered and respected High Priestess Kaede had taken the fourteen years old of questionable parentage on as an unofficial apprentice healer, many reacted with disbelief while others reacted even worse. There were many who felt that such a girl should not receive such an honour and tried to convince Kaede to abandon her plans to teach the girl. A couple even went that one step further and tried to speak to Inuyasha and have him make her set the girl aside. Kaede told them what they could do with their opinions then went about ignoring them while she continued to teach Salome. As for the ones who went to Inuyasha… well, lets just say that after news of what Inuyasha said and did to the first one who tried that tactic no one was willing to try again. And truthfully, as the weeks went by it quickly became clear that Salome was in fact a truly dedicated students who could very well make a very good healer in a few years time. As this became more obvious, the scornful talk became quieter and eventually stopped all together. No one doubted that people with low opinions of the whole situation were still around but at least now they kept their opinions to themselves, which is something Kaede, Salome and the temple in general could only be happy about. Having had the opportunity to get to know her better the more she learnt from Kaede, the more Inuyasha and the temple staff got to know Salome and they were all growing quite fond of the girl. She was rather quiet and shy, rather unsure of herself and slow to open up to people. But once you got through that, she was a very sweet girl with a good heart who was slowly winning the hearts of all those in the temple bit by little bit.

 

Poor Hojo on the other hand had a rather boring winter when all is said and done. Like everyone else his workload was lessened in the winter months. In fact he had even less work than the rest of the temple staff as a big part of his duties the rest of the year was to look after the temple gardens and there really isn't much gardening work that can be done when the flowers are under snow and the ground is frozen. The difference was Hojo was the only one who didn't find something else to occupy his time. The poor boy had therefore spent a lot of the winter months walking around with a lost look on his face like he wasn't sure what he should be doing. Poor guy had seemed to feel left out a lot of the time when he saw his colleagues running around following their various pursuits. After a while he had gone back to his old standby of practicing his poetry but he could quite seem to get into it a lot of the time. Probably a good thing in the long run, Kagome supposed, as it actually seemed to her to be getting worse rather than better. Some people may be born to write, Hojo on the other hand seemed born not to.

 

The temple in Ergos wasn't the only temple of Inuyasha that had been seeing some major changes this winter either, Kagome mused, suddenly remembering the letter from Souta that had been delivered to her a week ago. Her brother had been doing well since she'd last seen him, something which Kagome could only be happy about. Two months ago he had officially been accepted into the temple of Inuyasha in Lorinth as an apprentice priest, and claimed to be extremely happy there. News had already gotten out about how his sister served Inuyasha directly at his temple in Ergos, and that she actually held more spiritual power than probably any other priest or priestess alive. Combine that with the fact that he himself had seen and spoken to the God in person and Souta had quickly been given a place of respect among his fellow priests in training, even by the instructors. He had been trying not to abuse this respect, but Souta had had to admit that it felt nice to be looked up to like that. The temple in Lorinth was a happier place anyway lately, ever since Chrysostom had been expelled from Inuyasha's priesthood. The former High Priest had not been popular among his fellow priests, nor were many of his views but unfortunately after he was placed into power it was rather hard for the rest of the temple to get rid of him. When Spiro had returned from Ergos with the news, there was something of a celebration in the temple. After the initial elation had faded the higher ranked priests had gotten together and decided to elect their next High Priest, as someone whose opinions and goals matched those of the majority of the temple priests and what they now better understood as the ideals of their God. Had they done this with Chrysostom he likely would have never achieved the power that he did, unfortunately when the High Priest before him had died suddenly he as the next in line had been appointed without a vote and had immediately set about his almost tyrannical rule of the temple, spouting off about his God's views which just happened to match his own, using the most obscure old records and stories to support his claims and sometimes (his fellow priests suspected) simply making things up when they didn't fit the way he wanted them too. How exactly he was expecting to get away with it when summoned to see Inuyasha in person was anyone's guess. Maybe he had just been telling his stories for so long that he himself had started believing them? Who knew? Anyway, after a number of long discussions and a lengthy vote, the choice was made to appoint an elderly priest by the name of Philander. Philander was a kind hearted man who had been strongly apposed to many of Chrysostom's views especially his views on women and their place in society. The father of three rather intelligent daughters himself he was more than happy to learn that his God did indeed support their right to advance in society. In fact, Philander's first act as High Priest was to reallow priestesses into the temple. At this stage there were naturally still far more priests that priestess in the temple but according to Souta they had been slowly trekking back in since Philander took charge. Kagome couldn't help but feel relief for Souta with all these changes; even if she had been allowed to she wouldn't have wanted to serve under Chrysostom. She was so glad that her brother wouldn't have to either.

 

As for Kagome herself, well she couldn't honestly having a better winter. She'd been busy herself; learning to control her powers; practicing and slowly improving her archery; helping Kaede treat the villagers. But best of all were the times she spent with Inuyasha, which if she was honest would have to say were quite a few. It was all so wonderful and part of her still couldn't believe that a God like Inuyasha could actually be interested with someone like her, but if the looks he sent her when he was sure no one else was looking and the way he treated her when they were alone were any indication, he felt the same way about her as she did about him. Their relationship was still a secret between the two of them, mostly at Kagome's request, but neither of them minded all that much at this point. They were enjoying being with each other too much to worry about when and if their love for each other would become known to the public. Kagome and Inuyasha had been spending increasingly large amounts of time with each other, especially at night when the rest of the temple was asleep. Kagome was rather surprised at first about how much extra energy she seemed to have these days. When they first started their relationship together, Kagome however much she loved her nights with Inuyasha, had found them difficult at time because it meant she would have less sleep at night and therefore less energy to get through the next day. As a result she was not able to be with Inuyasha as often as she would have liked, needing every other night or more to catch up on her sleep. No days though she seemed to have boundless energy and had not trouble going to Inuyasha every night nor getting through the next day. This had worried her at first until Inuyasha had explained to Kagome that this kind of extra energy and ability to go without sleep was not uncommon around those with spiritual powers, especially not ones as strong as Kagome's. Whatever the reason for her extra energy, it was serving well to make her and Inuyasha more than a little happy this winter.

 

Kagome sighed and looked over with a smile as Kohaku called out to her from the doorway into the temple's main hall, successfully bringing her out of her musing. It was time for dinner and for Kagome to come in. With a smile of utter contentment Kagome walked over towards the younger priest, thinking that she honestly couldn't imagine having a better winter. Everything was so prefect.

 

***

 

Run, run, run! She had to keep running. Never mind the stitch in her side, never mind the fact that it was getting late, that she had no real plan in mind. Never mind that there was no way she could truly outrun him if he wanted to get to her again. No one could. She couldn't let herself think about that, or she would break down crying and never be able to stop. Only one thought was on the panic girls' mind… get to Ergos, to the one person in this world who she still felt she could truly count on. What would happen if she was wrong she didn't know, but she refused to allow herself to think about it. She refused to let herself think about anything but running. All she truly knew was that she had to get away, away from the memories and away from him. What she would do after Ergos she would figure out as she went along. None of that mattered now, the future wasn't important only the now where all she could do was run, run, RUN!

 

 

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Hey, I'm back, told you I wouldn't abandon this story. Sorry it's been so long since my last update. I've said this before, but I have no plans to abandon any of the stories I currently have going. I hope not to have quite so long a break between updates in the future, but since it seems every time I say I'll update a story more often something else comes up I'm not going to promise anything. I really will try though. Hope you like this new chapter, review and let me know what you think.