Blood Moon by Dafne U.

Disclaimer: I don’t own Inuyasha

Chapter 1

“Where the hell I am?” she mumbled to herself while she took another hesitant step in the darkness. Supposedly, the moon was out lighting the whole earth up while the sun was on the other side of the planet providing warmth and what not. However, in that particular part of the forest in which she ended up, she could barely see a foot in front of her. “Damn it all” she cursed as a root, or what she guessed was a root, intercepted her foot stopping the forward motion and making her fall face first to the earth. ‘Oh why?’ she wondered while she got up and unseeingly cleaned the dirt from her cloth. ‘Why did I have to follow Inuyasha?  I should know by now where he is. I mean, I know he is with her but I just have to make sure’ readying herself to continue she opened her eyes more. It was a useless action but she needed to see something. She vaguely though she must look like an owl as she took another careful step. ‘Somehow, that thought just sounded stupid’ she told herself. ‘I mean, everybody saw the white snake thingy, right? And then Inuyasha made up some stupid excuse and left going the same way the soul stealer had. It not that hard to figure out who the snake belongs to or where Inuyasha was going but I just had to come up with some unconceivable lie to try and catch the fool in the act’ she laughed humorlessly to herself. “Look where that got me”.

Oh, yes, the cheater, the two-timer, the brawns-and-no-brain half-demon had left after dinner to… What had been his words? Hunt. Seriously, it was the middle of the night with a full moon lazily hanging on the sky. They had restocked not two days before and he was hunting. And what was she supposedly doing? Higurashi Kagome was gathering herbs because she obviously didn’t have a first air kid in her backpack.

“Brilliant, Kagome, really brilliant” she congratulated herself because there was nobody else to do it. “Next time, at least learn something about herbs before going to gather them at such an ungodly hour” she reprimanded herself.

She wanted to go home, curl herself in her comfortable bed and forget that she was half-demon hunting. Or better yet, forget that ever had had such asinine idea. Taking another semi-acrobatic step to not fall once more, she notice the forest was a little bit clearer. Now that there was some visibility, she could notice fewer trees so she assumed that at some point in her search, she had entered a really dense part of the forest allowing zero visibility. With enough light to help her find her way, she continued her trek though the night woods. It took her a while to recognize the place and finally breathe easy and lose the ugly monster called fear that had been assaulting her mind for while. There was a time she actually thought she was hopelessly lost and that some random demon would kill her. Lucky for her, there was no demon in the vicinity and she had hidden her presence so Inuyasha wouldn’t have noticed her; although that didn’t include the sound of her clumsy footfalls. Either way, she was happy that her feelings didn’t get her in too deep of a trouble this time, but maybe it was too soon to assume that since their camp was still a little far away.

As she made her way toward camp, some bushes behind her moved. Her head wiped around fast and stopped to look closely for anything that was not green, brown or unmoving. Her ears tried to capture any sound that might indicate that she was not alone but only the night’s noise like an owl, the wind and the ever annoying cricket reached her. Thinking that she might have conjured the thing up, she turned around and continued on her way. No sooner she was heading back that another rustle of leaves was heard.  By then, she was beginning to freak out. She was in the middle of a forest, alone without protection, she even forgot the bow and arrows –she wasn’t used to carrying it around all the time– and, apparently, something was lurking around. That wasn’t good for her well being. With wide eyes looking everywhere, she continued on her way ignoring the feeling of eyes in her back. That, she decided, was just part of her imagination. It had to be. Just then, a humanoid shadow was cast but soon disappeared.

She was startled and gasped but when she looked up toward where the owner of the shadow was supposed to be, nothing stood there except for trees and darkness. ‘Not good’ she told herself. She had to be hallucinating or somebody was playing some trick on her. ‘Let’s hope is not somebody playing with his food’ she begged.

Hastening her pace, the sound of footsteps behind her soon followed. She knew that was her mind, although she wasn’t so sure that her mind was also making up those she heard around her in the thickest parts of the forest. Trying to ignore them, she couldn’t help but notice that the footsteps were always heading to where she came from. She even thought that it wasn’t just one pair of feet that were making the noise but had little proof to back it up. Besides, that would only scare her more. It was good enough that she had the heeby jeebies. However, curiosity rose and she looked toward the forest to see something silver among the vegetation. The thing was shiny and looked like it floated or just moved from one side to the other. Somehow it looked like hair and it reminded her of a dog eared two timing bastard that made her follow him through a darken forest and was now playing with her.

“Inuyasha” came out the name of the soon to be severely punished half-demon. Her voice was full of the dark promise of pain.

Oh, she had been afraid, but now she was raving mad. Her eyes darkened as she tried to contain the scream and at the same time think of the most horrible way to punish the playful half-demon. No, this time Sit wasn’t good enough. There had to be something else that could teach him the lesson. While, she pondered for an adequate punishment, the silver hair continued into the forest and was almost lost among the trees but she noticed in the nick of time and, in wonderment, she followed.

‘What could Inuyasha be doing here?’ she wondered. ‘And where is he going?’ this time stupidity took the place of curiosity as she once again entered the forest following the inept half-demon.

***

Inuyasha had spent the last two hour enjoying Kikyo’s cold flesh and he was somewhat satisfied but he needed to get back to camp in case they became too suspicious. He even thought of hunting some rabbits before remembering that they were probably sleep in their little caves; which reminded him that his companion could have figured out that he was with the undead priestess. Meaning, Kagome knew it. Giving a heavy sigh he knew that he had to explain but therein laid the problem. How was Inuyasha to explain that he had gone to Kikyo because it was the night of the Blood Moon? They wouldn’t understand. Well, at least not Sango and Miroku because they were humans and feared the occurrence each time it happened; and being a human who could blame them. During the nights the moon turned red, many females disappeared from their villages only to appear sometime later or to just simply never return to their home. Well, who would after being ravaged by a demon? Did it sound as savage as he thought it did? It wasn’t like the demon attacked anything of the opposite sex and ate them afterwards. To male demons, the Blood Moon was some kind of holyday. It was the day they cherished their mate and, many of them, choose that day to take their human lover with them and, let’s just say, cuddle under the moon. Those that were not mated, celebrated the occurrence all the same for it was unusual and far between. However, they showed their respect for the female anatomy more than their love for the woman and they did it by bringing their companion to the most delicious peak they could.

Inuyasha was balancing between the two. He loved Kikyo but it just wasn’t the same anymore. She was cold and not only her skin, her personality too. She probably accepted him to spite Kagome or he didn’t think she would have let him near her at all. Besides, the woman was dead even when he felt he owe her his loyalty, something Kagome also deserved. But he just couldn’t bring himself to forget the more unfortunate priestess. Moreover, even if he wanted to celebrate the Blood Moon with Kagome, he was sure she would sit him to hell and back for even mentioning it to her.

Finally reaching the clearing where they had camped, he noticed that the occupants were awake. It was late and the moon had yet to change colors, but they should be sleeping. Why, then, were they awake? Looking around camp and assessing everything that was in it, he noticed that a very important someone wasn’t present. Furrowing his brown thinking where the girl could be at that time of night, he decided that questioning his so called friends was the faster way of solving the puzzle.

“Hey, where’s Kagome? Wasn’t she supposed to be sleeping’ with the lot of ya?” he asked not too delicately.

“Well, you see…” mumbled the nervous Sango. She knew how Inuyasha was going to get when he found out and she didn’t like it when he screamed. It could attract unwanted attention in this unholy night. She felt a lot of movement in the vicinity and, even when nobody had attacked them, she still felt that the worst was yet to come.

“What Sango is trying to say, Inuyasha, is why isn’t Kagome with you?” asked the monk accusing the half-demon of doing something to anger the young priestess.

“With me? Why would she?” wondered their dog-brained friend in his boisterous voice.

“Because she followed you after you left to find Kikyo” replied the now angry demon slayer “She said she was going to gather some herbs. Ha, that’s just as funny as a half-demon hunting rabbits at midnight”.

“Wha-? What does that have to do with this? And didn’t feel her at all” replied the half-demon.

“Of course not Inuyasha. If she went after you, do you think she would be flaring her aura for everyone to know? She was trying to catch you in the act so why would she let you know she was around?” reproached the slayer.

“Keh” was the only thing he said in his defense.

“The thing is, Inuyasha, she hasn’t returned yet” informed the monk and that seemed to do the act.

“Oh, Monk, do you think she saw what this dog was doing and ran away into the forest trying to put some distant between her and this two timing…”

“Hey”

“Now, my dear Sango, that, I don’t know. But let’s hope she is not lost and that she returns before the night is over” tried to sooth the monk.

“Oh no, we’re not waiting, we have to find her before it's too late” he said without thinking, not that he ever did.

“What do you mean Inuyasha?” asked the slayer looking at him with a dangerous glint in her eyes.

“No-nothing, just that tonight’s the Blood Moon” that was enough to make both humans pale. “Now don’t look like that, it’s just a demon celebration not mindless idiots eating innocent maidens” he assured them.

“But maybe one of these demon forces himself upon Kagome” said the worried woman.

“Nah, I don’t worry about those, the wench know how to use bow and arrow, she can shoot ‘em” replied the half-demon offhandedly but soon followed the pointing finger of the demon slayer. “Shit. Still, those demon don’t worry me, one does though”.

“And who could be this ‘oh so greatly feared demon’, Inuyasha” asked the monk with a little too much sarcasm for the half-demon's liking.

“Sesshoumaru”