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Sesshōmaru subtly breathed in, then out. Again, and again.
Without any indication visible on his outward visage, the powerful DaiYōkai’s airflow once again aimed to quell the racing of his pulse. Quite possibly being the 127th attempt made. However, consciously conceding to that numeral, as accurately attained as it was from the infallible calculations of his brain, would be a sign that he was anything other than in complete control of his own sense of self. Which, simply, could not be the case.
Sesshōmaru was always in control.
Control, ultimate mastery, superiority to all other Yōkai in regard to his own dominance of inner power were but mere absolutes to his supremacy. And yet, still the rate of his heartbeat exceeded its natural rhythm. Pounding as if demanding attention to some fatal threat overcoming the organ.
Hmph.
As if anything, could merit such consequence.
He continued steadily walking forward. The sound of small feet loyally following reaching his ears. About five light pads for one of his own strides. The sound, a baffling nuisance in its very existence behind him and yet, each delicate step, irrefutably kept the DaiYōkai’s eyes from bleeding red, poison dripping from his claws.
Red, the color that would have painted the stocks of grass beneath the human that dared raise his kusarigama. Red, flowing in deferential rivers, slit from the neck of the boy that dared turn his meager weapon on Sesshōmaru himself. The filth that dared harm…
“Sesshōmaru-sama!”
The ringing of a tiny bell, piercing in its clarity to his senses. Gentle as a chime. Magnetizing, as if the slightest utterance was embedded with the power to captivate his entire focus, breathed out into the night.
“Umm… Thank you for coming for me! I don't know why this happened. Jaken-sama and I were in a patch filled with melons. I was trying to pick the very best ones when all of a sudden, I was whooshed into the air, flying far away! It was that lady that came before and was so rude to Sesshōmaru-sama that one time…”
The DaiYōkai listened to her loquacious tale of capture, awakening under guard, attempted flee prevented by the presence of numerous yōkai, conversation over shared fruit as a means to banish her rising anxiety, surprise at being aggressively moved away just when others arrived, her utter confusion at her captor’s sudden change in demeanor, swinging his weapon as if to hurt her, until waking up in a strange lady’s arms only to be filled with joy once again at seeing his presence. He listened to every word, enthralled in her account of events as if he could feel every moment she experienced within his own veins.
He said nothing, allowing the lilt of her voice to drown out the previous, causeless, racing of his blood. Instead directing all awareness to the light yet energetic beat of her heart, the almost inextinguishable sound of air gliding under the swing of tiny arms.
“I was scared…I was so scared I would never see you again. But you came for me! You saved me!”
He continued treading farther and farther away from the scene of what was intended to be her demise. Away from the image of her lying unconscious, with a weapon raised above her head. Her words repeating on a relentless loop, over and over in his mind. Reaching the extensive recesses, as if taking root in pursuit of madness…
Save her?
Why would he save her? Why would that foul, abysmal Naraku ever conceive the notion that her capture would somehow assist his repulsive, pathetic effort in attaining the powers of this Sesshōmaru in the first place? How could anyone ever attempt to manipulate one that could never be conquered? How dare he try to mutilate this Sesshōmaru? Steal what was his.
The insufferable racing began anew with fervor. Something was indeed threatening his immaculate possession of control, as if he truly was in danger of losing something irreplaceable. A vile presence, almost as if it were rage seemed to take away more and more of his ability at rational thought. His body was behaving in a way so completely foreign to himself. The urge to kill consumed. A desperate need for a sense of normalcy, control, power over whatever this thing was…this thing causing his heart to nearly rip out of his chest. Then he smelt it.
Blood. Her blood.
Immediately, every aspect of his being was engulfed by that smell, and what it meant.
She was hurt.
The brash, exasperating excuse of a female that clung to the despicable hanyō had claimed, after bolding taking her in arm, that Rin was fine. Her incompetent assessment could not be denied as the air continued to be tainted by the incontestably recognizable scent.
“You are bleeding.”
Why he felt the need to state the fact out loud, as if remarking upon the truth would somehow alter its circumstance, was beyond him. As though his voice alone could frighten away the deplorable occurrence. She made a minuscule squeak of confusion. He paused in his gait. Slightly tilting his head down his left shoulder, his eyes landed on her face.
Behaving like her anatomy was an unfathomable mystery, she lifted her right hand to inspect it. She brought her exposed palm closer to her eyes, nearly touching her nose, evidently unable to clearly recognize the disruption of her own body tissue. Her eyes widened, her mouth drawing into a small ‘o’ as she finally saw the gash, and tiny droplets of blood oozing from the broken skin.
“Ehh? I must have hurt my hand as I fell. My feet got caught when I was trying to run away… I don’t know why Kohaku…”
While speaking she slowly brought a curious finger to the cut, wincing when she made contact, as if only now her body could feel the injury.
“Ouch!” she whispered quietly, her face contorting in pain as more of her blood tried to escape the wound.
In a flash, less than a moment, he was kneeling before her.
The tiny catch of her breath, and consequential exhalation fanned his face. Lighter than the briefest caress of the wind, yet the sensation still seeped into every pore. Without allowing curiosity to take root, or wonderings at feeling it again, he reached forward, guiding her hand to his mouth, and licked the wound clean. Only once he felt his salvia adequately heal the graze, coaxing the flesh to meld back together did his brain finally catch up to his actions. There was no thought, only instinct.
She was hurt. She was bleeding. He needed to stop the blood flow.
She was hurt.
In painfully slow increments, he was able to recognize that he could no longer taste or smell exposed blood and that his mouth was on the thinnest layer of skin, fragile as that of the finest silk. With a gentleness he did not know he possessed, he brought her hand away slower than any natural movement, as if the delicacy he held could shatter, returning it for her inspection.
Despite having released her hand, and the proof of its healing before her, she simply stared deeply into his eyes. Her features filled his entire view. He could see nothing beyond her face. Her large brown eyes. In the moonlight, thousands of illuminated hues of color and light danced within her orbs. Enchanting in the endlessness of their variation, demanding willing acquiescence to be drowned in for all eternity. Never had existence seemed so still, so singular, so significant, so infinite. There was no fear, accept within that of his own, as the purity of her gaze possessed visceral power to see all within. All of him.
When she finally drew in breath, he was able to come back to himself, hear his surroundings, feel the cool of evening on the grass beneath his knee, remember all that had just occurred and what had brought him to this position before her. Still hypnotized by the impossible force that tethered him to this moment, he asked her a question. The only thing that mattered.
“Does it hurt?”
Recognition briefly flashed in her eyes before she finally looked down to the palm occupying the space between them.
“No! It doesn’t hurt at all. It feels a little tingly, warm and good."
She raised her eyes back to his as if having witnessed the most exquisite of magic.
“Thank you so much!”
Her voice was soft, almost a whisper, yet the depth of earnestness was deafening. Aware that the spell of her eyes was aiming to claim hold of him again, he prepared to move away, to distance himself from whatever sorcery the creature before him could unleash. He needed to clear his senses of her so he might begin to attempt to understand why. Since the moment he laid eyes on her, all his actions contradicted everything that he knew to be true. The instant he sensed her presence; he should have killed her.
He was wounded. Physically battered from withstanding a direct hit from Tessaiga. The resulting lacerations were the worst injury he had ever experienced. In that moment, his body told him that he would die. But it was the psychological torment, pain, shame, anger and despair he felt upon awakening that made him wish he had. Nothing had ever hurt as deeply.
It was as if all the grief, disappointment, and confusion swirled within his veins like that of the blackest pernicious toxin. One that even he could not withstand. The injustice of his father’s death, the everlasting taunt of the hanyō’s disgraceful existence, the stolen claim to what was rightfully his, the loss of his left arm and the possibility of being nothing more than a desolate disillusionment of his existence’s purpose, crashed down on him all at once. For the first time, it was a weight he could not bear.
In that darkness of misery, disconnected from all strength, conviction, and desperately needed control, his senses were overwhelmed with the presence of the foulest of creatures…Human. More annoyed than anything at the vermin’s incredulous audacity to approach at such an intimate moment of desperation, he channeled a small amount of his inner yōki to terrify the insect before it met its self-inflicted death. He turned, baring his fangs and blood red eyes, allowing a sinister growl to erupt from his throat. All directed at the insulate, filthy, tattered thing, condemned to be his prey... A small human girl.
She did not scream but merely shook with shock. Emitting only the slightest gasp, the human then proceeded to do the most inconceivable thing the great Daiyōkai had ever witnessed. With a look of absolute determination, all sense of fear vanished from her being. Staring him directly in his still bleeding eyes, she approached him…
He did not kill her. Why didn't he kill her? Why couldn't he kill her?
Just when the weight of memories, and the panic of his inability to answer to the mountain of antithetical actions he had taken since that first encounter, to those of a mere breath ago, threatened to imperil his sanity... she moved the slightest bit closer.
He froze, immobile, utterly unable to break free from the might of a power he desperately could not understand.
“Sesshōmaru-sama… I am so glad I am with you again.”
There was only truth, as if it was the only truth. The thought that she would never see him again, had frightened her. Not a dangerous, vengeful, desperate DaiYōkai found at dusk in the woods. Not traveling with a monstrous two-headed dragon. Not the berating of a relentlessly impudent imp. Not abduction, nor once again being within the greedy clutches of Death. She was scared that she wouldn’t see him again.
Of the millions of unattainable answers Sesshōmaru could not seem to grasp tonight, she found clarity with utter certainty. Before his mind could catch up with the explanation her honestly gave his soul, she spoke again.
“May I ask you a question?”
Giving only an infinitesimal twitch of his head, he conceded. The movement so small, for an instant, he deduced it could not have possibly been noticed. But she did. Without being granted permission, a part of him swelled with acute awe at the enigma before him. As terrifying as it was, she saw him.
“Since the moment I first saw you, when I found you in the woods, there has been one thing that I have wanted. And still want…”
The mystifying creature seemed to lose her grip on the confounding confidence she possessed. Breaking contact with his gaze, she nervously wrung her hands together. A displeasing line of doubt stressed the space above her eyebrows.
Overwhelmed by the vexation of seeing her so uncharacteristically distressed and impatiently ravenous to know what desire inspired her startling behavior when they first met, as well as her trepidation now, he let her know she had his full attention…and was waiting.
“That is not a question.”
The palest pink painted her cheeks. Soft as a petal, like the flowers she so ecstatically adored, and unceasingly presented to him. Seemingly convinced the vegetation she plucked from the Earth the finest jewels of the world, and as such, were the greatest gift she could share.
She appeared equally embarrassed at her own reluctance as well as pleased at his prompt to continue. With a breath that exaggeratedly lifted her slight shoulders up to her ears, she returned her intense gaze to his. Fixing him with that determined look.
“Sesshōmaru-sama… Please…May I touch your face?”
In that moment he realized he did not have any previous idea as what she might have wanted to ask him, but after hearing her request, it was absolutely clear he would have NEVER expected it to be that.
Time froze, raced forward, flipped backwards, turned upside down, all simultaneously in such a scramble that it was grievous to organize the individual words together in the correct order to fully understand what she just said.
She wanted… to… touch … his face?
When she stumbled upon a violent DaiYōkai, alone, in the fading light of the setting sun... she wanted to touch its face? That's what gave her the courage to approach? She wanted to touch its face?! No, not simply the face of an enraged, menacing threat to her existence... She wanted to touch his face.
No one touches Sesshōmaru’s face.
He is DaiYōkai. The DaiYōkai of royal lineage. Rightful heir to Inu no Taisho. The most powerful alive. Supreme to all from innate prowess alone. Refined from centuries of immaculate training, killing and conquest. Killing perfection incarnate. It was complete aberration, border line an act of treason to dare to make such a request.
And yet here he was, the great Sesshōmaru, once again, brought to his knees before a human. This impossible human.
Rin
What are you?
Fixed to this spot before her, unmoving until she dispelled whatever magic only she could wield, he was transfixed with the interminable depths of her gaze. Looking into her eyes, he found only sincerity. She was not asking to commit a disgraceful act in the pursuit of defiling the sanctity of the powerful DaiYōkai, currently a mere breath away. She was honest in her plea. It was simple really. She saw him, and she wanted to touch him. The one that she feared she would never see again.
“Do as you wish.”
She gasped, as if she never dreamed that he would actually say yes. Quite frankly, he was just as shocked as she was at his response. Just when the reality of the situation registered… what she wanted to do, what he was going to let her do… that insufferably, now almost familiar, racing of his heart returned.
His body was reacting in a way that was nonsensical, irrevocably out of centuries worth of meticulously crafted control. Feelings of panic, anticipation, wonderment, amusement, and terror attempted to steal his breath. As if he were so weak, as to be dependent on one, or four lost inhalations of air. As if he felt, such ridiculous things as emotions.
Sensations were causing his body to behave irrationally. Alas, this truly must be a plunge into madness. Just as he was about to surge away from the source of all that was inadmissible, he was suddenly blinded by the joy in her smile.
Not daring to breathe, he watched as she cautiously raised imploring hands. It seemed she also was able to discern how close he was to fleeing. Right before the tips of her fingers made contact with the skin of his left cheekbone, right above his jaw, just below the second tinted stripe lining the curvature, she looked deeply into his golden eyes. Once more, silently this time, asking his consent. She was giving him another opportunity to refuse her, to end such frivolity, respecting his level of comfort. That display of understanding and concern for his own desire shot through his core, as if she punctured his heart.
No one had ever truly placed such reverence in what he wanted. Not for gain, not for recognition, not for prestige, not for power, just for him. Like she always could, she understood all that he felt. With her mystical discerning eyes, she knew.
He wanted her to touch his face. His original response was the absolute truth. He wanted her to do what would please her.
When finally, the distance was met, another light gasp graced her lips. After the bizarre strenuous regulations his heart exercised this evening, it seemed now content to stop beating altogether.
Feather light touches teased his skin.
Her explorations were so weightless it almost seemed like she wasn’t touching him at all yet trails of scorching fire left evidence of her traces. Her face was in severe concentration, each inch that she caressed requiring her absolute attention, committing every second to memory.
Part of him wanted to push her dainty, unsubstantial whispers of petting away. Part of him wanted to press her hand firmly against his cheek, encourage her to do as she wished, actually touch and get it over with. Part of him was fascinated by one of the most profoundly unique experiences of his existence. And part of him was still so overwhelmingly confused about all that was just so frustratingly irregular in his life right now, that he wanted to fly to the moon, lose all ability to think and get lost in the abyss of stars.
He did none of that. Instead, he remained perfectly still, watching every minute expression that transformed her countenance as she continued administering the innocent torture.
“Your markings are so beautiful…your stripes… the blue moon. You are so handsome, it’s fascinating.”
She displayed no sign of self-consciousness at her rather bold declaration of admiration for his aesthetic features. Her honesty was as alarming as it was flattering.
His only response was a slight grunt in his throat, unable to think of anything to dignify the actions and musings of this insane interaction. A fit of giggles flitted through the air in return as if he had uttered the funniest thing ever heard, proving further how very unhinged this creature truly was.
Whatever it was that she found so amusing also seemed to give her a surge of inspiration as she then boldly traced two full fingers across the stripes lining the right side of his face. He had to repress a shiver as her forceful contact with his yōkai markings sent a bolt throughout his whole body.
They were far more sensitive than he ever previously realized.
Insatiable in her delight, she did the same, with even stronger conviction, on the stripes on the opposing left. No longer restrained, warmth from her hands spread like wildfire. Petting his checks, grazing his chin, lining the expanse of his nose, one finger at a time, until each digit got its chance to cascade down the straight slope. It felt as if his whole body was overflowing with energy, desperately needing to burst out of his skin, to blast away the inflictor of such foreign sensory attacks on his person. And yet at the same time he felt completely numb, helpless to stop her... exasperatingly never wanting it to end.
She had yet to actually touch ‘the blue moon’, as if it was the final treasure, the one that needed to be saved for last. The most special.
As the moments dragged on, her anticipation at finally interacting with her prize became so palpable the DaiYōkai began to share in her excitement. Each second simmered with wondering if she would finally do it. Would she do it now? Now? Would it really be as wonderful as she had always imagined it would be?
So lost was he in her spell the distinction between their separate feelings blurred into one. There was only now, this discovery, this connection of shared wonder, indefinable, and everlasting in its consequence.
When the pad of one reverential finger finally traced the shape of his crescent moon, the great DaiYōkai resolutely released all reservations, fully surrendering himself to this moment. This bewildering, ridiculous, remarkable moment created by this incomprehensible, fascinating, mystical girl. Defying all logic, all that came before, all that he thought he was, Sesshōmaru willing let his guard down. Closing his eyes, he allowed the swelling sensation of utter peace, calm and serenity to encompass him completely.
“Thank you Sesshōmaru-sama. You have made me so happy.”
As he slowly opened his eyes he could see it, as if it was the only thing he was ever meant to see. She was happy. Glowing, as if she was the moon herself, immersing the incredulous kneeling DaiYōkai in her infinite light. Beaming her gracious radiance, only for him.
There was unquestionably too much he still did not understand. Things he could not yet explain, things that were beyond his current ability to grasp regarding the mystery before him. But in that moment, her smile intrinsically made one thing irrevocably clear...
She was his, just as he was hers.