en·the·o·gen by xulchibaras

(burn all your things)

Fandom: Inuyasha
Characters: Kagome Higurashi, Souta Higurashi, the Late Higurashis
Word Count: 1073
Warnings: Character death. Violence against a child.

Summary: goodbye lovers goodbye children

Notes: I’m revisiting this to edit it up, elongate chapters, and make said chapters chronological.

***

Sensitive breath.
You’re alive.
Since a long time. There’s nowhere to hide. That I can’t find.
Tracing the lines. Testing the noose. Coffin or not.
I’m coming with you. You were mine.
Before you would know. Grotesque and fine. Whenever you show.
Further now.
We step in the dark. Deeper I feel.
The blade in the heart. You remind me.
Of someone I know.
Is it yours or mine. The blood in the snow.

      True Widow- “Entheogen”

                          a chemical substance, typically of plant origin, that is ingested to produce a nonordinary state of consciousness for religious or spiritual purposes. Lit. “to become divine within”

***

There are men speaking in dry, professional tones. One overshadows the rest as he lays down a list of condemnations in a heavy, solemn voice. "You've betrayed us all with your inaction," he says, grim disapproval ringing in his words. Kagome thinks of an executioner's blade against a whetstone. "You could have very well have brought about the end of mankind... had I not discovered your indiscretion. It is by the gods will that I do this, to save us all."

The men begin a low chant that Kagome recognizes as a prayer their grandpa had shown them once. A prayer asking for blessings and guidance on the path to divine peace. The drone of their low voices is ominous, perverting it. The prayer reverberates over the roar of the fire consuming the shrine grounds.

An elderly voice rises above them all. The old man's voice rough with furious, powerless tears, shouting, "How dare you! How dare you try and use the God's will to justify such atrocities! It is you who walks the road to ruin!" He sobs around a scornful laugh, "And you do so with your head held high, foolish and blind with hate." The old man begins to cough, an awful wet and whistling sound.

Just outside the well house door, a woman murmurs disparagingly, "Oh father, no, no...please..."

"I'm sorry, my daughter. I'm sorry," says the old man, choked with tears.

There is the sound many men moving into formation, the chant gaining fervor. "I give you one last chance to accept judgment with a clear heart," Intoned the first man.

The old man gives another scornful laugh as the woman began to hum, low and soft and sweet and silvery with tears. It drowns out the chant and, hiding in the dark well shaft, a little girl's heart starts to pound in her chest. She clutches onto her brother, pressing her palms to his ears as if she could protect him. Kagome blinks through the blinding tears spilling hot and terrible down her cheeks.

(goodnight

goodnight lovers

goodnight children

goodnight)

Her little brother gasps, painful around a sob, pressing his snotty face into her chest. Kagome shushes him, frantic.

"If that's the way you desire it to be, then so it will be," Intones the man with something like remorse. Heavy blows begin to batter the well house door. The ancient wood gives an alarming groan, then splinters under the barrage. 

The woman's voice breaks, turning fearful. Her voice goes shrill with urgent pleading. At once, the old man's stubborn defiance crumbles into terror. Filling with desperation, he begins to beg lowly. "No, no-- Leave those---p-please leave the children alone, please, please you can't--"

One of the men chanting leaves the chorus with an angry snarl. A sudden thick, wet, sounding impact then a heavy thud sounds out. The woman lets out a horrid, mournful wail that cuts out with terrible abruptness.

The girl--

Kagome

-- sobs. Fear whites out her brain. Instinct takes over. She presses her brother and herself into the dirt corner of the well, as deep into the shadow as she can. A futile effort to hide them both with nowhere else to run. She buries her face in Souta's hair, holding him closer to her heart. Her hands pet his shaking back, trying to soothe him while shushing herself.

The well house doors bursts open in a shatter of wood splinters. The malevolent orange glow of their burning house shines down the dark well. A man's shadow creeps over them, blocking the light once more. Kagome looks up and sees his blackened silhouette swimming through a blur of salt and terror.

"Ah, my child," says the man in the shadow, outstretching his hand. "Rejoice for you are saved."

Another shadow bursts out from behind him. It shoots down the well shaft like an arrow.

Kagome shrieks.

She throws her hand up to ward off the streaking shape cutting through the dirty flame glow like a knife. A bright light sparks to life from Kagome's hand, an icy pulse jolting through her veins. A brittle dome of shimmering power encircles the siblings a split second before the shadow collides. The light flashes brighter at the point of impact. Power strikes back at Kagome, buckling her arm underneath the strain. The shadow presses forward with a light of their own, sharp and unrelenting. 

Sweat and tears pour down her face, blinding her. Kagome releases Souta, thrusting up her other arm against the pressure, "Go away!" she screams. Souta screams along with her. His small hands clutch onto her shirt, white knuckled and desperate. He shoves his wet face into her spine, panicking sobs wracking his body with painful, distracting intensity. 

The shadow rears back then strikes down with multiplied force. Splintering cracks shoot through Kagome's frail light, forcing her to her knees, sending an agonizing shockwave through her body. The well shaft lights up in a fireworks display of scattering light. Time goes slow, tilting on its axis as the weak barrier is overtaken.

Oh, Kagome thinks. Oh no.

The world above mutes.

The crackle of the fire dimming even as the heat of it arcs higher. The false, soothing words of the man (monk) melting into a buzz in her ears. Souta too, felt strangely far away. Even the sensation of his crushing grip around her waist disperses like so much smoke in her mind. 

Mommy, grampa, Souta... They all slip from her mind.

For a fraction of an instant compressed into an eternity, the sensuous grasp of unreality neatly severes Kagome from her body.

All time stops as she met her attacker's eyes.

The shadows in the well have burned away by the lights of the shattered barrier. Kagome sees with more clarity than being under the sunlit center of the shrine.

Wide, dark eyes narrowed with cold assurance set in a beautiful, unmoving porcelain face of a teenage girl. Kagome gasped, soundless. As if waiting, time rips itself back into place with terrible, sudden, certainty. Her surroundings, the sensations, everything, floods in all at once, overwhelming and disorienting.

Defenseless, there's nothing Kagome can do, weakened and helpless already, as the teenage girl's fist slams into her ribcage. 

There's nothing Kagome can do as her world ends, submerged in flames and shattered light.