B I N D E D
A/N in regards to the fic title: I've received many comments on how the title is grammatically incorrect and should be Bound instead of Binded. I'm very well aware of this, lemme tell you first. But there was already another Inuyasha fic with the same title, and me being a stickler for originality, plus I didn't put much thought when this fic was created on a whim--and after a long while it was too late to change it. So it became stuck as 'Binded'. Let me get that out of the way first.
Disclaimer: This work contains dark themes and sexual content in later chapters. Reader discretion is advised.
Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi and its respective owners.
Check out the lovely fanart from RannyYunny who's an amazing artist! Take a look at her other works too! https://rannyunny.tumblr.com/post/173852194660/fanfiction-fanart-binded-by-lucy-morningstar
A Miko with a Peculiar Housemate
The Hatsumode period was seeing more visitors than usual, huge crowds decked out in their vibrant new-year clothes, praying for a fresh stroke of good luck. As a miko now serving in the Yukino Shrine, Kagome Higurashi was elbows deep in her duties, as she scurried around to serve the guests in any way possible. There was never a time to dally. Kagome could not remember the many times she demonstrated the purification ritual upon entry, or the endless amount of omamori charms she dispensed from the souvenir shop.
Thank god she had Amari Kirihata, another fellow miko two years her junior. Sweet-faced and patient, and usually poised at the fortune-telling station, she would bestow each incoming group of visitors with a typical list of dos and don'ts within the shrine.
The hours rushed through. Everyone congregated around the large fire when the shrine began burning old good-luck charms, the townsfolk tossing in other aged sacred items of their own. Out with the old, in with the new. Dusk had settled before they knew it. As Amari was bidding farewell to the last of their guests, Kagome joined her from behind.
"Darn, talk about a field day. Have you seen such a deluge of visitors before?" Kagome blew an exhausted breath as she soothed an aching shoulder.
Amari covered her laughter. Her short bob-cut swayed each time she laughed. She was either bashful or flustered at any given time and her mannerisms only heightened her appeal. Kagome thought she was the sweetest girl she had ever met. She admired Amari for her gentle patience, and her high tolerance towards even the most asinine of personalities—qualities Kagome seemed to have lost over time.
"Yes, I was extremely overwhelmed! Especially the foreigners, they couldn't understand a single word I said."
"But you know Amari-chan, Yukino-jingu is only but a small shrine. You should see the other ones, like Nezu and Meiji. I bet they are still packed as we speak."
"You must have had a lot of experience being a miko, Kagome-sama. After all you served here longer than me."
"Not really. And didn’t I tell you to lay off the honorifics? Just Kagome-chan will do!"
Amari laughed again and Kagome relaxed, as she faced towards the cold, darkening sky. Slowly they prepared the shrine to close for the day and began sweeping the heaping snow on entrance grounds. Kagome wiped the perspiration off her forehead. It was still winter although they had seen lesser snowfall in that part of town in recent years. Her back internally groaned when she did a stretch. She was more tired than she wanted to admit.
"Well that's that!" Kagome announced, throwing her rake aside. "I'm calling it a day after this. Maybe a short stop to the nearby Family Mart. Are you walking home with me, Amari-chan?"
"What—so soon?"
"Yeah, I kinda have someone waiting for me back home..."
She wished she hadn't uttered that out. Amari's eyes instantly lit up. "Someone?" she pried. "You mean someone special?"
"No, not that like that. He's just a friend. Wait, that's not true, we're not really friends. An acquaintance then? An old ally? Gee, it's already complicated."
Amari giggled at Kagome. "Okay, okay, I get it. But er, aren't you worried about what the head priest will say if he catches you knocking off early?"
Kagome cast a dismissive wave. "Oh pooh, what's he gonna do, dock my pay?"
Amari clutched her rake hard, darting her eyes to her friend. "Shush, don’t let him hear you!”
"Oh, to the hell with him. But speak of the devil,” Kagome muttered, as she turned her head, “there he is, watching us from behind."
Narumi Jyohaku, the head priest of Yukino Shrine stood quietly at the dark entrance hall, his tall kammuri hat accentuating his already impressive height. And was that a scrutinizing glare thrown towards them? The two women quickly ended their chit-chat, heaving their rakes with gusto.
"Hey Amari, seems like he's looking the other way," Kagome then gave a conspiratorial whisper. "I think I'm gonna slip off now. You sure you don't wanna go?"
Amari glanced over her shoulder with a forlorn look.
"I'll guess I'll wait first for Jyohaku-sama."
"Alrighty then. I'll see you tomorrow. Ah—and a happy new year to you, Amari-chan!"
"Happy new year, Kagome-sama!"
Kagome stopped before her door, her bags of groceries hanging heavily from her forearms. She flipped through the contents of her handbag for her house keys. Nope, can’t find them through the wrinkled receipts and dried, old pens. And why did she even bother bringing that set of cosmetics knowing she would never use it?
Soon the last remnants of her patience completely disappeared. Tossing the grocery bags onto the floor, Kagome belted out a colourful string of curses as she ransacked her bag.
"I'm home," she muttered morosely once inside. She walked straight into the kitchen to lay down her marketing, passing by the living room where a strange male figure sat.
He had a peculiar face. A pair of almond-shaped eyes with irises of bright gold, but not necessarily of a warm hue—in fact they invoked a bone-deep chill in the person observing them. His cheeks were high-set, embellished by sweeping magenta markings and eyelids tinted in the same shade. A magnificent mane crowned his head, moonlight in its colour and lustrous in its shine, their long strands pooling to the floor.
His face was peculiar, but beautiful in a disconcerting way. There was something otherworldly about his features, something in his aura that was not quite tethered to the earth. Surely such an unnatural being could only be a borrowed presence in this world. The only natural thing about this curious-looking creature was the way he was sitting enraptured before the television, watching a Japanese dubbed version of High School Musical.
Kagome’s nose twitched. Having sorted the groceries out, she strode to the dining area and lifted the dish-cover on the table. A fragrant rice bowl of tempura donburi awaited her, alongside a bowl of miso soup and some fresh salad.
Her fatigue instantly melted. Nothing beats a steaming bowl of rice after a particular hard day at work!
"Itadakimasu!" She scarfed down her food like a ravenous glutton who had been starving for days.
Then, as if she had just remembered something, Kagome threw a glance to the living-room. Her sight was fixed on her mysterious guest, the one she had been sharing her house with for the last few months. Guess she could safely call him her housemate now. Only his long hair trailing down his back could be seen, his face turned away, his rigid figure still glued to the same spot since she had been home.
So I gave him a body, Kagome mused to herself, and he utilizes it to the fullest by watching the telly constantly. Talk about being a TV addict.
An hour later the credits began to roll. Troy Bolton was no longer dancing, but there was no hint of disappointment—or any other emotion for that matter—on the stranger’s face. Quietly he stood up and stepped into the kitchen, flipping his long hair over his shoulder. Centuries might have passed but his hair still shone like silk, perpetually glorious.
For this Sesshoumaru, at least.
Something caught his attention. He turned for the dining area. The table still bore Kagome's empty dishes, bits of rice and crispy batter decorating the tabletop generously. Sesshoumaru's jaw tensed.
Humming an old Do As Infinity song, Kagome exited from the shower smelling of lavender soap. She affected a quick pirouette in her room, ballerina-style, then regretted quickly in the cold. She laid a pair of black satin pajamas on the bed. Then she unfurled her towel from her body. At that precise moment, Sesshoumaru entered her room.
"The dirty dishes," he started.
"Kyaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"
A blood-curdling scream and a toss of her pillow later, a dressed Kagome sat on her desk and filched out a book from her drawers. Its covers were of soft mauve velvet, the word "Diary" inscribed on it in cursive, ostentatious letters. Perhaps it was too childish to belong to a 25 year-old woman. But Kagome secretly relished its feel, as she flipped through and breathed in its scented pages. She set down to write.
01 Jan 20XX
Happy new year! As tradition dictates, it's time to write resolutions! Let's see what I've written for last year.
1. Lose weight
2. Get a bloody boyfriend
3. Visit Europe
For the record, I've gained five extra pounds over Christmas. I'm still single the last time I checked, AND I'm severely underpaid as an apprentice at Yukino Shrine. So spare me the agony of talking about a vacation to Europe, when I can’t even afford a trip to Hokkaido! (I’m screaming internally as I write this)
On a more serious note, it's been three months. Three exact months since I've had him staying at my house. Sesshoumaru. Even now it feels strange to say or even write down his name. I'm still unsure how to approach him. All the millions of questions I've collected and prepared in my head just poofs into smoke the moment I see him.
Questions...all about the past. About the feudal era I left behind. And most importantly all my old friends...
...and that one person.
I guess that's the only reason I conjured a physical body for Sesshoumaru. I KNOW—it’s forbidden to pray to a dark god like Inugami and I’ll probably regret it later (probably) but I’m so insanely curious about my past. I need to know. The only thing I ever wanted was to sit down and talk to him. But as a person, you know. Not to a diaphanous, wavering spirit.
Ugh, Jyohaku would blow his top if he knew—the stupid priest can’t stop harping to me every day since the exorcism. That's right, I still haven't fully explained the details in my diary.
It's a long story, but I promise to write down everything when I have time.
Kagome glanced at the clock. It was ticking close to 11PM.
"You know for a demon, you watch way too much TV," Kagome said behind Sesshoumaru, munching on a yogurt bar. Said demon did not flinch from the television. His ears were still ringing from her blood-curdling scream.
"It is my only connection to the outside world," Sesshoumaru stated matter-of-factly, his eyes attached to the screen. "Until I have gained my strength, this is the only way I can learn what kind of topsy-turvy place this world has altered into, for the last few hundred years."
Kagome hummed in thought. "You're right, in a way. Everything is topsy-turvy if you're comparing it that old era you were from. But really, the media is like the worst place for you to learn. Especially this movie. Titanic. Hollywood is a complete bluff. You gotta take everything you see with a pinch of salt."
She turned to leave for bed, then remembered something.
"Oh, thanks for dinner, by the way. I'm seriously impressed. Looks like those cookbooks I gave you really brought forth a budding chef, eh?"
She laughed to herself as she walked away.
Sesshoumaru reclined his back and gave a light snort. He hoped she did not assume he was doing it for her. No, he was just bored and was tinkering around the house as usual, and his homely adventures usually found him steeped in household chores. After all there were so many things to do—the miko lived in a pigsty that required constant maintenance. That and watching an unhealthy dose of Hollywood movies, which, as stupendous as they appeared, intrigued him to no end. Call it a cultural study if one would: a quiet (and shocking) evaluation of the modern society he had woken up into.
On the screen Rose floated on a wooden board in the middle of the freezing North Atlantic Ocean, telling her lover Jack not to let go. A much perplexing scene for him to grasp. The way humans acted when possessed by their emotions was always beyond him. That lone emotion, or rather, that compulsion called love would encompass everything in their daily lives. Even the woman he was living with now, had she not once too shared a similar sentiment with his...
Sesshoumaru shuddered to even remember.
~* .*. *~
Kagome's eyes opened groggily in the morning. A sleeping face materialized beside hers, hovering, so pale it was almost translucent. Such beautiful dark eyelashes. Long and fluttering, like the giraffe she had seen in the zoo when she was a child. And what strange markings on its face...a blue crescent moon on the forehead and...
Kagome sprang up from the futon and staggered backwards, her hand cupped over her mouth. Why was Sesshoumaru sleeping beside her? And he was curled up like a baby too! She tried her darndest to stifle her scream.
It had been too long. Ten years to be exact, just long enough to make her forget who Sesshoumaru really was. His existence served like a fleeting phantom from her blurry past, one that she sought hard to re-connect. There were a few bits and pieces that came around however—Sesshoumaru was some sort of lord among his demonkind, and not exactly the friendly type in her memory. But the most important fact that she had established from him was that he had been a blood-relation to that person.
She observed the long tresses of his shimmering hair cascading down his head. Kagome's hand reached forward and allowed his hair to slip through her fingers.
Delicate. And real . Sesshoumaru's breath hitched.
"Cold," he murmured in his sleep, his voice deep and disturbed.
Cold? Kagome’s own breath hitched as well. She could feel him. And he could feel himself. The after-ritual was a definite success. Sesshoumaru was no longer a haunting spirit.
She bit back her excitement. She would celebrate later. But the poor thing. He must have laid next to her, unused to his new body, seeking for warmth.
Kagome rubbed the sleep from her eyes. The sunlight had creeped in through the curtains, casting bright lines on the walls. It was time to get ready for work. She thought of the shrine and how it was going to see another deluge of visitors that day. Sighing, she pulled her blanket off her and covered Sesshoumaru with it.
To be continued…