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It is summer when he visits the child again. He has no excuse of curiosity, but he need not make any. The forest is lush and green, smells of growing things and sap and fresh soil. Sesshomaru stands like a lone white blossom amongst the greenery, taking measured steps closer to the familiar clearing.
There is nothing and no one waiting in the fox den. Sesshomaru pauses. There is no sign that the whelp has been near in months; the fur stole, matted and dirty from years of use is abandoned in the detritus gathered in the old fox den, bones are scattered half buried in the dirt, nearly reclaimed by nature.
Sesshomaru glances around for the devoured remains of the child, but there’s nothing at all, just evidence of his living; marks of claws being sharpened against the bark of a tree, random strands of dark silver hair torn out in sleep. but he is gone, like a ghost, and these little markers are the only proof he’d been there at all. Niggling curiosity assuaged, Sesshomaru starts back on the path home. If the little wretch is dead somewhere far from his hovel, perhaps he will hear of it some day. And if he is still alive somewhere, half wild, half heathenous, worn ragged and thin and rangey with the struggle of survival, then perhaps Sesshomaru will hear of it too.
He is almost through the forest when a streak of red and silver zips passed him through the trees, its scent familiar and tinged in sour fear and panic. He vaguely recognizes the creature, taller now, fuller. His wrist flicks out, whip catching Inuyasha around the ankle to send him tumbling to the earth into a bush trailing angry squawks and curses the whole way down. Sesshomaru catches the scent of the demon chasing after him, the air is thick with the scent of blood and acid, the creature’s yowls chasing after the whelp, startling the birds from the trees.
As soon as it breaches the trees, Sesshomaru’s whip slices it cleanly in two. One of its eyes are gouged out, scratches from small claws litter its hide, it twitches its death throes and then lays still. Sesshomaru glances back at the whelp who watches him cautiously from the cover of the bushes, crouched low as a cat, lips peeled back and the beginnings of a raspy growl in his throat. The dark ichor of blood paints the tips of his fingers, splatters across his face.
He is still half feral, but he is no longer the helpless child abandoned to the will of the wild. He is a predator in his own right, if the stolen food half hidden by his body is any indication.
Sesshomaru tips his head as he regards him coolly and idly wonders if he should kill him, now, just cut him down and rid the world of his stink, now that he is no longer a baby, no longer so weak that it would be shameful to raise a hand to him. Now that Sesshomaru knows he would fight back, futile as the effort would be.
His claws flex and ache with the indecision, watching Inuyasha watch him, before he thinks no, and relaxes.
“What’d you do that for?” Inuyasha demands, jerking his head at the body. Sesshomaru blinks. “I could’ve gotten away. Was bleeding too much. Didn’t need your help.”
“So you are ungrateful and impolite as well as a wretch.” Sesshomaru says lowly. Inuyasha’s cheeks grow hot, his eyes blaze, he crawls from his half crouch to stand. It is impossible to take him seriously when he only comes up to Sesshomaru’s waist.
“You got a lot of nerve, showing up here after so long.” Inuyasha snaps. “If you don’t want me…” He pauses, swallows, shoulders hunching, little fists curling. “If you don’t want me then just go away and don’t come back, instead of showing up and teasing me and making me think--” he snarls, his eyes sunlight and fire through amber. “If you don’t want me, then stop coming back around and making me hope you do.”
Sesshomaru blinks. There is nothing left of the small whelp who smiled at him from the warmth of a fur stole. there is nothing left of the child with the gap in his fanged smile. All his fangs are full grown adult ones, gleaming white, bared at him now like a challenge Sesshomaru could easily take up and win. “You weren’t at your old den.” Sesshomaru comments blandly instead of replying.
Inuyasha huffs. “Got too big for it.” he turns and brushes some leaves from the corpse of a boar, picking it up with ease. He grows so quickly, Sesshomaru notices idly, so like a human, so endlessly weak and delicate. And then, as he shoulders the boar and grunts under its weight, so decidedly different. So much stronger. It is almost fascinating, reconciling what he knows with what he sees. He has his mother’s face, his father’s colouring, and a strange blend of their strengths.
“And you reside elsewhere now?”
“Why, you planning on sending letters?” Inuyasha replies smartly, and starts away. “Told you to stop coming around.”
“I will do whatever I please.” He lunges forward and grabs Inuyasha by the throat, pressing him hard against the unforgiving bark of a tree. Inuyasha’s claws bite into his wrist, his little feet kick out uselessly, his eyes wide with panic. “Someday I will wring your final breath from you.” he says it coolly, and Inuyasha goes limp in his hands, despair writ across his features. He looks like his mother. It’s repulsive. “Towards that end, I need always be aware of your location.” he drops Inuyasha, watching blandly as he falls to the forest floor, rubbing his neck.
“Get in line. You're not the only one who wants to kill me.” he wheezes. As soon as he regains his breath and the tattered remnants of his will to live, he leaps away, wary and hard eyed and growling in his raspy way.
“But I am the one to whom your life belongs, for sparing it so often.” Sesshomaru feels suddenly as though the situation has run away from him. This isn't what he wanted, or what he hoped for when he came. Maybe he was looking for that carefree gap toothed smile. Now, he's met only with an impertinent brat.
“If owing my life to you mattered, you'd want me.” Inuyasha replies forcefully. He grabs his stolen kill up again, and starts away. “I’m in a cave on the other side of the mountain now. You got a sharp enough nose, you'll find me if you try.”
Sesshomaru doesn't bother to answer or follow. He carries on his path out of the forest.