Kagome nocked her arrow, bringing it back to rest her hand against the corner of her mouth as she tried to angle her shot perfectly.
"Just fucking shoot already!" She didn't have to look at her friend to know the irritation would be showing on InuYasha's face.
But she only had one shot; they couldn't risk it. The crow yokai had a baby from their village in its claws and she absolutely refused to let it come to any harm simply because she hadn't taken the time to perfectly aim. She had been back in the feudal era for two years now and she just hoped she'd developed enough skill to make the shot and free the baby for Miroku to catch.
Still, to make sure, she let her reiki come forth, filling the arrow with every iota of power she could so that if she missed, the reiki should still obliterate the yokai. Never before had she so fully summoned her own power but she did not hesitate to do so now. Not with a child's life on the line.
Not with her own training so close to complete.
She took a breath and then let the arrow fly free with her prayers to Hachiman no kami to let it fly true.
As the arrow moved through the air, she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear so it wouldn't impede her vision. She hadto see that she'd made the shot. She wouldn't let herself think of any other possible outcome.
She'd aimed for the head but at the last moment, the crow saw the arrow and turned on its wing to try and avoid the arrow.
It flew to the right, the arrow veered a little to the left.
But the crow yokai had been too slow. The arrow embedded itself in the fine bone at the tip of its wing and immediately began sparking with the force of her reiki, exploding in a brilliant glow of pinkish white light.
The baby screeched as it was freed from the yokai's clutches and began falling sharply towards the ground but Kagome didn't dare look away until she was sure the crow had died. She was too far away to help the baby, but she could still get off another shot if it turned out her first hadn't been powerful enough.
Her fears were unfounded. Nothing at all remained of the yokai once her reiki had dissipated and the baby had been safely caught by Miroku.
It was only then, as her reiki calmed along with her anxiety and withdrew within her, that she noticed the familiar yoki in the distance. Sesshomaru, it seemed had appeared for another impromptu visit with Rin.
But she didn't get the chance to dwell on the sensation of yoki brushing up against her own reiki as it withdrew because InuYasha sheathed his blade as he came rushing over to her and immediately began lecturing her on her timing.
Kagome sighed and tuned him out, already mentally cataloging the chores that still needed to be done back in the village. They'd already lost too much time dealing with the crow yokai and she didn't want to leave Sango alone for too long. Pregnant or not, Sango had the tendency to take on too much herself if someone wasn't around to help her.
She turned and, with InuYasha's rant still ringing in her ears, made her way back to the village with Miroku, who had the tiny girl happy charmed and babbling at him now that her ordeal was finally over.
.
.
Sesshomaru stepped off of his cloud as he reached the outskirts of the village, drawing upon his yoki to rise and flare to catch Rin's attention. He had no interest in setting foot in his half-brother's human village but though Rin herself had no powers with which to sense him, she had been around him long enough to pick up on his yoki if he allowed it to flare whenever he arrived.
But the girl wasn't in the hut she shared with his half-brother and his human priestess and so he had to draw upon more yoki than normal to rouse the girl's attentions. Rin, it seemed, had gathered at the edge of the village with a number of other humans, but he cared little for whatever had caught their attention.
Rin turned and he was satisfied; she'd sensed him and would appear momentarily.
But before he could pull his yoki back within his being, he felt something prick at the edge of his awareness, tugging at the yoki he'd expanded to search for Rin.
It pulled his yoki to it and, to his surprise, his yoki went willingly before he could snap it back, drawn to a sudden explosion of pure reiki not too far from where Rin and the other humans had gathered.
Once the yoki met the expanding reiki, an alien sensation washed over him, causing him to shudder.
There were no words to describe the sensation. It was both hot and cold, pleasurable and painful, comforting and disquieting at the same time, all in a way that brought to him such a sense of peace that he lost his train of thought entirely.
As the two opposing powers began to blend, if just for a moment, only one thought entered his mind at all: synchronization.
This priestess—this very human, very attached to his half-brother priestess—possessed reiki so perfectly in tune with his own yoki, opposing yet balanced, that it could only mean one thing: she was meant to be his.
And then the reiki was forcibly pulled back, leaving him bereft and adrift after that tantalizing blend of power, and he could only mourn the loss.
No. His lips thinned. He would not allow it.
He was Sesshomaru. He'd surpassed even his great father and he would overcome this challenge as well.
The priestess—Kagome—would be his. He would make sure of it.
.
.
Kagome stopped short as she reached the outskirts of the village. Miroku had handed off the little girl to her distraught parents and continued on back towards his wife, but InuYasha hadn't followed. He'd stopped short, his hand on the hilt of his blade, and it only took Kagome a moment to realize why.
Sesshomaru had drawn his own sword, tucking Rin behind him with his free hand.
Kagome just sighed. She had a pretty good idea who'd started the fight but right now, she was tired, hungry, and wanted a bath and all of that would have to wait until her chores were done. If she waited until the two brothers fought things out, she'd never get around to the bath that was calling her name.
And she couldn't simply let them fight it out, either, because the last time they'd fought unsupervised, InuYasha had nearly destroyed the well with his Windscar and Kagome had spent the rest of the day by the well, crying.
The well might not work anymore, but it was the only link she had to her family in her own era and she wasn't ready to see that link destroyed due to InuYasha's negligence.
"InuYasha, Kaede-san still needs your help," Kagome reminded her friend as his ears flattened, striving for a tactful tone. If he felt she was nagging, he'd only get more stubborn.
InuYasha's ears flattened as he glared at his half-brother but to her relief, he let his sword slide the inch back into its sheath. "Keh." One ear twitched. "Ain't like we don't already know who's stronger. He's just lucky the arm grew back."
She felt Sesshomaru's yoki fizz for a moment before it settled down but more than that, she felt his yoki spark against her latent reiki, almost as if pleading for it to emerge from within her.
"Rin." Sesshomaru looked down at the young teen tucked behind him. "Go with InuYasha."
Rin looked surprised but she shrugged one shoulder in a gesture Kagome was almost positive she'd learned from Kagome herself and she felt a twinge of guilt as Sesshomaru raised a brow.
But Rin didn't protest and evidently Sesshomaru saw no reason to address the behavior. Rin simply followed InuYasha as he stalked off, still muttering to himself about how he'd really shown 'the bastard' last time they'd fought.
"Hello, Sesshomaru," she greeted him as Rin and InuYasha left her sight. She didn't know why he'd sent the girl away but she suspected he must have some reason to talk to Kagome alone.
She blanched. Did he expect to have 'the talk' with Rin? Rin was thirteen now and in feudal times, that was young, but not exceptionally so. Some girls in the village were only a few years older and already married. Oh, kami, what if he did? She and Sango had had a general conversation with Rin when the girl had begun her cycle a year before but this was a whole other level entirely.
Sango. Kagome seized on that. If Sesshomaru asked her to have that talk with Rin, she would get Sango to help. Yes, that's what she'd do.
But instead of any of the words Kagome might have expected to leave his mouth, Sesshomaru said, "Summon your reiki."
Kagome blinked. And then blinked again. "My reiki?" she repeated, half-expecting Shippo to appear and laugh at his joke.
But Shippo was away at school and Sesshomaru didn't look like he intended to repeat himself. He simply indicated the bow in her hand with his chin.
"Um." Kagome licked her dry lips and wondered why she was suddenly so thirsty. "Why?"
A slight wind picked up, blowing some of Sesshomaru's hair towards her, but he made no move to tuck the silver strands behind one ear as she'd seen him do in the past. After a moment, he rumbled, "You will see."
Kagome thought through her options quickly, sensing his impatience, and finally nodded, seeing no other way out of the confrontation. She allowed a small amount of her reiki to gather around her like a thin blanket, hoping that it would be enough to satisfy him. Without knowing what he wanted, there was no shape to give to her reiki.
"More."
Kagome reluctantly allowed more of her power to seep out, flowing around her in fluttering swirls as it grew more dense with power.
And then the most curious thing happened. Sesshomaru tucked his sword back into its hilt and allowed his own yoki to expand, the white of his eyes turning crimson as his irises and pupils contracted until the gold of his irises vanished completely. His hair began to flow about him in the maelstrom of his yoki and yet she never sensed a hint of danger within the blazing power.
Suddenly, he reached out and pulled her to him, shifting her to his side and tucked her against the white fluff he carried rather than the side where he bore spikes on his armor.
His yoki swirled around her, tinged with red, and then, in a single moment, came into contact with her own reiki.
The feeling of a light blanket was suddenly replaced by a feeling of a warm, fluffy blanket wrapped tightly around her to keep out winter's chill as she settled against a campfire, a cup of cocoa in hand. It felt so soothing, so comforting, that she couldn't even keep her eyes open.
Her eyelids fluttered as the maelstrom abruptly quieted, flowing around her like the cool, quiet flow of a slow river. She had never felt safer in her life, despite knowing that it was Sesshomaru's own yoki that blanketed her.
And yet, at the same time, she felt feverish. The two sensations were as opposed to one another as a low baritone and a high soprano, and yet blended together in harmony.
She opened her mouth and yet nothing came out because there were no words to describe how she felt.
"Synchrony."
She opened her eyes and looked up to find Sesshomaru's eyes on her own, a curious softness to the fullness of his lips.
"Synchrony?" Kagome repeated, suddenly feeling a strong desire to do something with her hands. It felt odd, keeping them at her side, especially with Sesshomaru's hand at the small of her back—and oh, when had that happened?—but there wasn't enough room between them for her to do anything but move her hands to his side and she couldn't fathom him allowing her to touch him so intimately.
And yet, there was an insidious little voice inside her that compelled her to do so anyway, whispering to her of how it could feel to rest against him.
Unbidden, her hands moved.
"When a yokai is young, he will often hear stories," Sesshomaru murmured, his voice so low that Kagome doubted anyone else could hear, "of synchrony of his own and another power. A power so equal, so opposed, that there is a complete balance between the two, and the desire that harmony brings is so strong, it is undeniable. It is believed to be a rare yet fated occurrence and yet this one had thought it to be nothing more than a story to amuse the young."
His fingers flexed against her low back before he brought her in a little closer, her legs tangling with his.
"With you, Kagome, this one has learned otherwise," he said, his breath fluttering against her ear. "Can you not sense it as well?"
His yoki wrapped a little more fully against her and yet in spite of the purity of her own nature, her reiki blended with his own yoki rather than repelling it. "My reiki has never done this before," she breathed, awed at how brilliant the pink swirl of her reiki and the red storm of his yoki looked blended together.
She didn't even notice that their clothing and hair had begun to tangle as well until that moment as she tried to brush a strand of hair out of her face only to discover silver locks instead of black. His hair was as opposite in color to her own as his power was opposed and so, too, was the red on white on his own clothing compared to the white on red of her own priestess garb.
Even their own natures were opposed and yet she could sense nothing but gentleness in the way he held her to him.
"It was made to resonate thus with this one's own yoki," he murmured against her ear, his free hand moving to brush a strand of hair from her face with a gentleness she hadn't realized he was capable of—not for anyone except Rin, that was, and certainly, she'd believed up until this moment, not for anyone romantically. "And it will bring greater strength and harmony if both are allowed to remain in contact with one another for the duration of the time we will exist within these forms."
It sounded, she thought to herself in astonishment, like the human notion of soulmates, but Kagome had a hard time reconciling that notion with the arrogant yokai warrior she knew. The Sesshomaru she'd known up until this moment had never seemed like the type to willingly tie himself to a human.
And yet the gentle warmth of his fingers against her skin suggested otherwise.
She pulled back a little and he let her. She wanted a little space from his warmth to consider his words.
"I don't know anything about synchrony," Kagome said, biting on her lower lip for a second as surprise widened his eyes, "but we humans believe in a concept called 'soulmates.' Two halves of the same soul are put into two different bodies but when they find each other, it's kind of supposed to feel like that, too. The two halves of the soul balance each other out. It's actually supposed to be really romantic to find your other half," Kagome added a little dubiously, still not entirely certain how she felt about the idea of a fated love after the debacle with InuYasha and Kikyo.
Those two had been fated and look at what it had brought them.
He studied her for a moment and she had the feeling he was carefully considering her words. "It is similar," he conceded after a moment, a tiny smile at the corner of his lip as she gaped. "A soul has always been whole once interred within a body but the concept is otherwise correct."
She pressed her lips together. "Would you have wanted this relationship," she stumbled for a moment on the word, "if we hadn't had this synchrony?"
"Would you have accepted me," he countered, raising a brow, "if we did not?"
"I don't know," she was forced to admit. "Maybe."
"You worry needlessly." He chuckled and she more felt the sound against her chest than heard it and the sensation made her shiver—a fact that he was not unaware of, the sharpness of his slitted pupils dipping down to her lower lip as she did so.
He wanted to kiss her, she realized.
And... she wanted him to.
"You have already long since proven your worth." He put pressure on her low back, encouraging her to raise up on her tiptoes to meet him as his head bent low. "It is I that need to prove myself to you. And," he added, his breath warm against her lips, "I will spend every moment we will have together to do so if you will consent to such."
It was more than any other man had promised her. InuYasha had promised her part of a heart that had long since belonged to another. Koga had promised her lust and a place in his pack. And Hojo, back in her own era, had promised her a pure and tender love born of his own desire to heal someone who had never needed to be healed.
Sesshomaru had only himself to offer and yet he had done so without hesitating.
Despite her humanity, despite his own feelings of hanyo offspring, despite the changes the shikon jewel had wrought within her, Sesshomaru had promised her all he had and more, offering to prove himself when she doubted he'd ever felt the need to do so to anyone else but his own father.
It humbled her and she reached out to touch his cheek, delighted by how he leaned into such a simple touch. "You have nothing to prove, Sesshomaru," she told him because he didn't. In that moment, his yoki swirling around him, she saw all she needed to see.
And then she moved that last little inch and kissed the soft lips that awaited her.
It only took a moment for him to kiss her back, pulling her to him as her reiki and his yoki combined to wrap around them and then settle upon them like a blanketed cocoon of swirling power.
Synchrony, she thought to herself, a tiny smile at her lips, and that was the last thought she had in her head for quite awhile as their kiss deepened.