Chapter Text
"I know that face…"
Kagome yanked another bolt of fabric from the line. The smell of the clean linens was barely enough to distract her.
"You might as well tell me, instead of letting it out at dinner…"
The sheet she attempted to fold became a ball of clean white fabric, and Kagome threw it onto the basket next to her with a thud.
"Kagome, I can tell you're upset-"
"I'm livid! Our village doesn't have enough problems, we have to go out and find more?!"
"There it is…" Sango said, waxing the surface of her weapon. Her sister was never one to resist the bait if the line was left out long enough.
"I mean, we have people in this village with barely enough to eat, the last storm ripped off more than a few roofs...Those are real problems. But our men are needed to fight an enemy that barely pays us any mind? Its...its…"
"Go on and say it…" Sango suggested.
"It's barbaric."
Sango sighed and set her weapon down. "Listen, I agree with you. It's why I refuse to go with them. It'd be one thing if the demons were actually attacking us. But we haven't even seen one in months. I don't see why they have to antagonize them…"
"Maybe if you talk to him-"
"He won't listen to me, you know that. I'm just his daughter," Sango replied, remembering that it wasn't just her conscience that kept her from joining the men as they hunted.
"But you are his daughter." Kagome knelt and extracted the linen, sitting on her feet to fold it properly.
Sango pressed her lips together, recognizing the sad tone to Kagome's voice. "You're as much his daughter as I am." Kagome responded with a chuckle, devoid of any warmth or happiness. "We can talk to him tonight. Both of us."
As if summoned, the group of men crashed through the nearby brush, drunk on their own measly power and laughing louder than they had reason to. Kagome's brow bent, and her back followed suit, hoping they wouldn't be noticed.
The group passed, with Sango's father barely giving them a glance, but both women picked up the conversations overlapping each other.
"...won't see wolves around here anytime soon…"
"...smoked 'em out…"
"...flea bitten monsters…"
Kagome stood up faster than Sango's eyes could follow her. She thought it was to chase after her father and his men, and demand what exactly they did. It would ruin any chances of speaking civilly to each other later that night, but it wasn't unlike Kagome to act first and think later. When Kagome ducked into their hut and emerged holding a sack of her medical supplies, Sango barely had time to ask where she was going and for what purpose. Kagome offered a hurried goodbye before disappearing into the brush where the men had just emerged.
Sango looked over the line of trees and saw what alarmed her sister. Against the bright orange of the setting sun, angry black smoke filled the sky.
Kagome knew where she was going, for the simple fact that she'd been instructed not to go there under any circumstances. When she was given this command, she felt it pertinent to know where exactly she wasn't allowed, so that she could best avoid it. That is what she told herself the first time she stumbled across the mountain that led to the wolves den, and what she told herself every time after that.
The woods between her village and the wolf den were dense, and when she arrived at the base of the mountain, Kagome hoped to find a place to sit before she began the climb. What she found were no less than four dozen wolves, all of whom turned to stare at her at the same time. She guessed, from the nostrils that flared at her arrival, that they weren't staring simply because she was a disheveled human woman, bursting through the trees with a bloody arm, in front of their home. Kagome was aware of their keen senses, and if she knew anything, they picked up the scent of her long before she arrived. The same scent of the men who set their dens on fire.
"I...I'm sorry," she began, scanning the crowd for a sympathetic face, but finding none. "My villagers destroyed your home, and I'm sorry, but I...came to help."
Flared nostrils were replaced by snarls, rows of teeth that made Kagome take a step back. Sensing an attack, Kagome regretted her decision, and nearly turned to leave when a figure bounded down from the mountain. He was a head taller than any of the other demons gathered, and used its massive size to carry three wounded adults, bending to deposit them on the ground. Each was covered in ash, and ran to embrace what Kagome guessed to be their respective families.
In the commotion, Kagome tried to creep away, before he focused on her.
"Who did this?!" The voice was deafening, a roar that nearly brought her to her knees. The question was followed by loud coughing, a sign of lungs trying to expel smoke and take in air, too full of one to accommodate the other.
Kagome covered her ears, and repeated her plea. "I came to offer aid. The men from my village destroyed your home, and I came to…" Kagome paused, asking herself why she had come. She couldn't admit that she'd been fascinated by the wolves since the first time their howls stirred her from sleep, and she followed the sound to their den months before. That it thrilled her to see them in their natural state, fur gleaming under the moon. That she tracked their hunting patterns and the births of their little ones with earnest. That the thought of her narrow-minded village thinking they had the right to exterminate them out of fear, made her blood boil.
Before she could find, or succinctly avoid the answer, a shadow fell over Kagome, that of the imposing figure who carried three of his men down from the mountain with ease. She was certain that if she were to die at the hands of these wolves, he would be the one to do it. The ash that covered his face stood in stark contrast to the blue of his eyes, and had Kagome not been overtaken by fear, she would have stopped to admire them. His eyes caught her attention for another reason; they looked at her but only for a moment. They seemed to dart from her hairline to the space over her shoulder, and then to her neck, making a vignette around her person. Kagome's legs straightened as she tried to find the true focus of his eyes.
"Can you see me-" she began to ask, before he collapsed on top of her.
"It was disrespectful of her to...run off like that!"
"She's just a girl-"
"She's a woman, nearly grown..."
Kagome pressed her face to her mat, hoping the sounds of night creatures would drown out the angry voices from the next room. Sango's mother at least tried to keep her voice low, but her husband walked in fear of few men, and had little reason to keep his tone low.
"You know what I say…" he continued, shuffling across the floors.
"Please, not again-"
"She ought to be married already. Make herself useful and bring some sons into our village-"
"Hush; the girls will hear you!"
Kagome pushed herself from her mat, but stilled to make sure Sango was still asleep. When she was sure, Kagome slipped out of the window to their room, stepping carefully between the huts of the village. Thankfully, the men were exhausted from their earlier "hunt", and weren't awake, having one of their raucous parties.
The moon was bright in the sky, even when only half was visible, and she crossed the threshold into the woods. Between her village and the wolves den was a small clearing where Kagome would escape when sleep was scarce, or when she was flooded with memories of her mother. She was grateful for Sango's family, who, saddened by the loss of their son, took her in without question and cared for her. As the years passed, Sango's father seemed more and more ready to rid his household of her, and was not subtle in his suggestions that she marry and form her own family.
At the center of the clearing was a stump, a tree that had been long cut down, and either too old or weary to grow again. Kagome fell against the ground, dead leaves crunching under her as she propped her body against the stump. Her eyes grew heavy and she reminded herself not to stay out too long; to sneak back in before first light. But something about the cool night air, the smell of the breeze through the trees, and falling asleep under the moon kept her mind from racing. And since her encounter with the wolves, all her mind did was race.
The broad body that fell over Kagome pushed back to the ground. She moved to push him off of her, but he was solid; she would do better trying to move the mountain they stood before. Hands closed around his arms, and he swiped back at them, making the helpful bystanders move back. Kagome didn't notice the sharpness of his claws until one hand closed around her arm, spanning the width of it easily. She'd never seen a wolf this closely, and was alarmed by the sheer size of him.
Kagome squeezed her eyes shut and used her free arm to shield her eyes, knowing it was fruitless to try and fight him off.
She clenched her teeth, waiting for the darkness to come as his jaws closed around her throat. Her body, or what was left of it, would be left at the outskirts of the village, a symbol of retribution for the treatment of the wolf clan, and in her final moments, Kagome couldn't blame them.
She did not expect, however, the warmth that spread across her forearm, from elbow to wrist. Kagome's eyes opened wide to see the fallen warrior's mouth hovering over her arm, his breath warming the space before dragging his tongue over the expanse of her arm. The setting sun caught the gleam of his fangs, and in a moment of reckless abandon, Kagome reached for one of the sharp canines and skin stretched over his jaw.
"...My Woman…" came the gravelly voice over her, just low enough for her ears to hear it, but enough to send a chill down her spine.
The effort to pull him off of her doubled, and Kagome gained enough room to move her legs and free herself, but only pushed herself far enough away to see the number of his clan who were holding him back. There were no less than eight able bodied demons pulling at his arms and torso, the skin bare and pressed against his tanned skin.
One of them shouted for her to run, and the command took a second for her to listen and react. Leaves crunched under her feet as Kagome scrambled away, and the sound of a fight behind her. Kagome cradled her arm as she ran, noticing that the gash she received from a thorny bush was already closing up. She guessed that the object of capture was seeking to escape, and Kagome wondered why his comrades held him back from devouring her. She also wondered why the sound of his howls as she retreated made her want to turn back.
Kagome was awoken from her sleep by an arm at her shoulder, and shuffled backwards over fallen leaves as her eyes adjusted to the darkness around her. Two figures stood before her, tall and imposing in their stance, but not primed to attack.
"Come with us. Our leader needs you."