Godlike by Rachel
The Demon Queen
Hiya, folks! So, despite having this idea tickling my brain all last month, I couldn’t do anything about it because of NaNoWriMo – four year winning streak, baby! – but now I’m here, it’s December, and I hope that this story will win some hearts...
This is for Madison’s “Myths and Legends” challenge. I originally planned for this to be a one-shot, but after some consideration and being asked to do more chapter stories, I decided that this is going be a bit of a longer venture...
While there are some changes that have been made for artistic purposes, this story is based on the myth of ‘Cupid & Psyche’ as written by Apuleius in his novel The Golden Ass, (Latin, written in the 2nd Century AD). Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Apuleius’ version of The Myth of Cupid & Psyche, nor do I own Inuyasha or its characters.
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High up in the greenest hills, above the clouds and the moldering villages of humankind, lived the demon queen Vinasu, the Lady of the Western Lands. She was widely known as the most beautiful creature ever to have lived, and she never hesitated to flaunt this fact. Her silver hair was as soft and well-tended as her colorful kimonos; her golden eyes like the purest amber, brighter than the sun; porcelain skin, lit from the inside out as if by the moon.
Vinasu was a just and benevolent ruler, who basked in the opulence of her lifestyle and the praise that was heaped upon her daily by the desperate humans who yearned to garner her favor. In exchange for gold, silver, jade and fine silks, the youkai queen gave the devout worshipers her blessings and protection, be it for a joyful and fruitful marriage, a healthy child, or the safe return of a soldier from battle. If the worshiper was worthy of her favor, they received it.
But the Lady was not without her faults, even when she refused having them so adamantly. She was vain, more vain than the lake demon who, in his time, had spent his days staring at his own reflection to the point of death. She was worshiped more often for her beauty than she was for her power or her position as a ruler, and that suited her quite well. In fact, in many ways, she preferred it that way.
But a vain woman, demon or human, is always hyper-aware of competition. Vinasu never hesitated to eliminate such females, but she did so in a way that would never raise suspicion in her human or demon followers. If and when a human female reached the age of 18 and was overheard being compared in looks to the great Queen Vinasu, the Lady would seek the servitude of said woman and put her up in her grand castle, never to be wed or seen by outsiders again.
Her worshipers always considered this a great honor to their family, to have their daughter be taken under the wing of the great demon queen, and never questioned the matter. The Lady enjoyed the irony when newlyweds would come to her and pray for a healthy baby girl who would grow into a woman worthy of Queen Vinasu’s consideration.
Vinasu’s castle was full of beautiful young women, as well as old women who had been considered beautiful in their youth. Generations of such servants had passed through her castle, and the Lady considered it a suitable way to sustain the loyalty of her subjects and worshipers. None of her servants were demonesses, however, for the demons of her court knew never to compare themselves to the Lady; humans loved to praise their beautiful females, thereby attracting the attention of the envious queen.
And she was envious. Vinasu knew she was more beautiful than the most delicate of flowers and the most well-crafted of katana swords, but any human woman who was said to be as beautiful as she would be envied until suitably removed from the sight of her human family. Queen Vinasu’s pride was a dangerous thing to temper, her envy was a dangerous retaliation, and to experience it was to lose one’s daughter with very little warning.
It was true that very early on in her life she had taken a mate – a dog general named Inutaisho, and by him, she had birthed her only son. But in time, she had discovered that giving her a powerful son was just about all the demon had been good for, and after a few centuries, she removed him as her mate and left him to dally about with his human concubine with her own kind. The Lady did not know what had ever become of the general, but she cared very little about his fate, for in his stead was the son of their brief union, and he was a suitable replacement.
His name was Sesshoumaru, and if Vinasu were to offer praise unto someone other than herself, he would be the one to receive it. As a pup, Sesshoumaru had shown great promise as a warrior, and as he’d grown and trained with the best of his mother’s samurai captains, he’d come into his own as the most powerful killer in all of the Western Lands. He was cold, removed, aloof and unfeeling. He was masculine in stature and build, but his countenance was of such divine beauty that it could have been considered almost feminine.
Vinasu held no motherly love for her son, but only the highest regard. She considered him the closest thing to perfection next to herself, and offered him all of the freedom and pleasures in the world to prove it. When he’d reached his first century, Vinasu told her subjects that they would continue to offer her praise, both directly and through her son. She told them that if they prayed to Sesshoumaru, he would gift them with his protection and his judicious opinion in matters concerning the laws of the land. Sesshoumaru never wished to be deified, but the humans and demons were persistent, and he had no choice but to do as his mother bid.
For a time he had traveled far and wide, training and killing. He had wished to escape being worshiped for both his own powers and those of his mother, but as he became more and more a man, Sesshoumaru had ceased taking advantage of his mother’s allowances and began keeping himself close to home, instead. The Lady did not mind this for some time, but when her servants had taken to seeking the attentions of her son, Vinasu’s envy reared its fearsome head again.
So, the queen did what any self-conscious mother and ruler would do – she asked her son to remove the females who had bid for his attentions, offering their unworthy hearts and bodies to him in marriage or even as concubines, in the only manner he knew how. Vinasu would be the only woman Sesshoumaru would worship, would devote himself to, the only woman he would ever kill for, and she told him this through her orders to kill the human servants who desired him.
Theirs was a relationship based not on familial allegiances, but on devotion, deification, and respect. And while the Lady knew her son respected her, she did not know that he, above all else, hated her. He hated her vanity, her envy, and her predisposition for abusing power – his power, especially. Sesshoumaru hated the greedy, vainglorious bitch that called herself his mother, but his allegiance was hers, and he would never escape her power over him.
Vinasu and Sesshoumaru lived for centuries up in that high castle, receiving worshipers by day and spending nights far away from one another, ruminating on their own private thoughts. The prince of the Western Lands found himself content enough in this life, killing those who offended his mother on her behalf, hunting in his demon form, patrolling the lands to keep himself occupied. It was a monotonous life, but it was a comfortable one, and the less time he spent in the same vicinity as his mother, the better. And as always, Vinasu was happy and pacified as long as the people she ruled, humans and demons alike worshiped her and placed no one woman above her in beauty or power.
One day, while Sesshoumaru was out patrolling the far reaches of the boundaries of their lands, Vinasu received a young human female into her temple. She was lightly tan, showing she had lead a life of fieldwork prior to her marriage, with dull brown eyes, long black hair, and colorless cheeks. She was altogether plain, but presentable.
The female was pregnant with her first-born, and had come to ask for the same thing all the others had – a healthy baby, who would find love and happiness within a long and honorable life. She had offered the demon queen a beautiful silk kimono and the finest tea-leaves from her stores as praise, which Vinasu had gladly accepted. When the human made her prayer, the queen stood and approached the prostrate woman.
“Do you hope for a girl, human?” she asked. The woman kept her head bowed, but replied dutifully.
“I hope only for a healthy child, my lady, boy or girl, for I am simple in my desires, and would not presume upon your powers for anything.”
Vinasu considered the pregnant human for a moment, pinning her with her golden stare. After a short time, the great queen put out her hand to rest upon the glossy black hairs of the simple human woman – someone so plain would never birth a child of beauty.
“Who is your husband, human?”
“Lord Akio, my lady, of the northern province.”
Vinasu wondered briefly why a man of such high standing had chosen such a plain woman for a wife, but knowing that the doings of humans would always be strange to her, she let such ponderings slip into the recesses of her mind.
“May your child have the greatest of health, love, and happiness, and may it bring much honor and pride to your family and these lands.”
The human woman bowed low once again before rising to her feet and walking backwards out the temple entrance – worshipers were never to turn their backs on the Lady. When the human was gone, Vinasu promptly forgot all about her and her unborn child, just as she did every other pregnant mother who had come to her over the long and numerous centuries. She went back to her altar and sat, glorying in the opulence of her power and beauty while waiting for the next worshiper to arrive with their gifts and praise.
Seven months later, Lord Akio’s wife, the plain woman who had offered the kimono and tea-leaves to the great Vinasu and prayed so dutifully, gave birth to a girl with all ten fingers and toes, strong lungs, and a steady heart. The child was healthy and had great promise. When presented to Lord Akio, the man brushed the downy locks of brown hair away from the child’s brow and kissed it, and when he pulled away he gave her the name “Kikyo.” As the healer took the girl from the Lord’s hands, his wife, still in the birthing room, began to moan in pain. Kikyo was handed off to another healer while the first returned to tend to the new mother.
Lord Akio worried that his wife may have suffered too much in the birthing and was going to die – many had wondered why he had chosen a woman like Masuyo, who was widely considered plain and even ugly by some, but he had seen such a beauty within her that had taken away his very soul. He had taken her from the fields and placed her on the pedestal that had been built by his family name, given her his heart and soul. He would be nothing without her, and continued to fret as his wife screamed in pain in the next room.
After a few minutes, the loud cry of a second child filled the small hut. The healer emerged, shocked but happy.
“Lord Akio, your wife has seen to gift you with a second child. Another girl, my lord.”
“Is she well? Is my wife well?” Lord Akio demanded of the healer. The woman nodded with a small smile.
“She is resting, my lord. Will you not name your daughter?”
Lord Akio’s attention immediately rested on the cherubic face of his second, youngest daughter. His wife had had twins, a phenomena rarely seen in his family. He took the small child into his arms, and was instantaneously awash with a feeling of intense love and happiness, something he had not felt holding Kikyo. He brushed the fine black hairs away from the girl’s forehead and kissed the silk-soft skin, and the pureness of her nearly brought tears to his eyes. When he pulled away, Lord Akio smiled so brightly that the healer had to press a hand to her heart – the love in the Lord’s eyes was that of the love for a child, the tiny infant cradled in his arms.
“Kagome,” he whispered, knowing that while he would love both his daughters dearly, this one would hold a special place in his heart for always. “Her name will be Kagome.”
The healer bowed and turned to the scroll that had been brought out for the birth. On it, Kikyo’s name had already been scrawled, along with her state of health and time of birth. The healer unrolled more of the scroll, dipped the brush in the pot of ink and proceeded to write the name of the younger infant with long, unhurried strokes of the bristles.
Higurashi Kagome.
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And there’s our start! It’s kind of a slow one, but most of the necessary stuff is now out of the way. Obviously Sesshoumaru isn’t going to be Cupid in this, but a kind of...variation, you could say. The time period will be considered the Sengoku Jidai for all intents and purposes, at least by the time Kagome is 18.
Please leave a review! I am excited to hear your thoughts about this. I plan to update soon.
Love,
Rachel