Chapter Text
Which way is it to the human village?
Leaves crunch noisily underneath her bare feet, surroundings blurring into fading greens and browns as she runs deeper into the endless forest. Branches twist and contort around her from all sides, catching and snagging on her green kimono ( green, like the color of her eyes, he had once said) like sharp claws, the ripped cloth trailing in fluttering strands behind her. The stars hide from her, not a speck of light escaping the thick canopy of greenery overshadowing the path.
She shivers, - I´m your mother, but- holding the bundle closer to her chest. Despite the cold, sweat drips across her temple and down her nape, salt on her tongue when she licks her lips. The primitive forest cages her in, offering no consolation to her panic- where should I go, - endless and inescapable, each looming tree identical to the one she saw last.
I must have gone the wrong way.
Kotoha trips, landing on her knees, mud staining her striped kimono. For barely a moment, she contemplates remaining there, bruised and crying and kneeling, to beg for mercy in the only way she has left. The bundle in her arms squirms- I’m so, so sorry- , as if sensing the danger lurking at a mere distance. Taking another shuddering breath, the moment passes, and her race across the forest resumes.
I always choose the wrong people.
The sight of unfeeling eyes gazing upon freshly-slaughtered human corpses remains fresh in her mind like an open wound, festering the longer it lingers. Begging would not help her find leniency, nor humanity in them, not when there was none to begin with.
She is less clumsy this time, more agile, and less prone to falling, and for a split second, a seed of hope blossoms among the growing despair. Below her, the ground becomes less and less crowded by roots as the trees grow sparser, the narrow pathway widening to reveal the sky and-
She skids to a stop, jostling her ankle harshly as she narrowly avoids plummeting to the precipice just a few feet in front of her.
The flower wilts as soon as it blossomed, crushed petals adding to the growing rot.
I needed to keep it together, but-
She knows, as prey detects the gaze of a hungry predator, that there is no place left to run. Douma (demon, man-eater, monst-) lurks nearby, Kotoha’s skin erupting in goosebumps the closer he draws nearer.
There's no other place to run.
‘’I’m sorry, Inosuke.’’ Tears drip from down Kotoha’s cheeks and onto Inosuke’s (pinky promise, pinky promise, I will protect you) , her baby staring up at her curiously. ‘’Your mommy’s so stupid Inosuke, now we’re both going to die-’’
Below her, barely audible even through the eerie silence, the faint ripples of a river can be heard.
I’m going to die, but at the very least Inosuke can…
A sensation like a thousand insects crawling under her skin erupts all over her neck, creeping over her body and sending shivers down her spine. There's no time. There is no gentle way to do it, no other choice left but to hope that he’ll be able to survive the fall. She thrusts her arms outwards, lets her baby fall from her arms. Not a second later, pain erupts across her backside, a fan sharp enough to cut through human flesh swishing through the air lazily.
Something in her back, something important, snaps. The pain ebbs, like waves drifting over and under her body, like the waters that will either save her son or drown him. Kotoha was dying.
‘’There’s no way you could have saved him by dropping him over the cliff.’’ Douma’s voice rings out, tinged with the same faux sadness he most likely wore even now like a mask. Kotoha couldn’t tell for sure, splayed as she was over the cliff’s edge. ‘’But you were stupid to the very end.’’
Douma sighs. ‘’Dying because his mother dropped him from a cliff. How pitiful.’’ There are tears dripping from his eyes, now, Kotoha is sure, even as he continues to mock her. Kotoha wonders how many years this demon must have stolen, to be able to replicate human emotion so flawlessly.
Kotoha prayed to gods, more times than she could ever hope to count. She had prayed to escape her mother’s harsh words, and stinging neglect, hoped for a husband to whisk her into a fairytale. She had prayed on her wedding day, cheek bruising, bridal garments damp with her own tears at the startling realization that she had simply traded one cage for another. She had prayed after the birth of her son, cradling her treasure in her arms as she hoped to have enough strength for the both of them to one day be able to flee. She had prayed the day Douma took her in, too, thanking every deity that might listen for giving her a place to stay.
Perhaps she was foolish, Kotoha realized, but here, bleeding out at the feet of a monster, Kotoha found herself praying once again, hoping (hoping to flee, hoping to live, hoping to protect) that the wishes of a dying mother would be strong enough to protect her son.
She fades away.
(Had the human still been capable of sight, perhaps she would have been able to admire the faint glow of stars above her. They were beautiful, radiant, and glorious in their eternal unawareness of the human torment below. Why bother? The death of one human was like the death of any and all others, fragile bodies crumbling into ash and dust to make room for others to grow. The wind will continue to breathe, the water will never halt its flow. The sun may set, but it only does so to rise once again. Over and over and over. The cycle is endless, and to fight against it is futile.)
(The sun rises, and then sets again. Perched on a rock overlooking a river, a certain white-haired demon hears the cries of a drowning child.)