Only In Memory by Kokuei Sogekihei
Only In Memory Do We Recall Her
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Idea by Kougoura>
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Chapter One: Only In Memory Do We Recall Her
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"Why are you here?"
He was dreaming again.
It was always the unchanged, yet constantly different.
She was always there.
"Dreams...are a funny thing, Sesshoumaru." Her voice was as light as the water lilies in a pond and made one feel strangely at peace.
In front of him stood a tigress demon in the otherwise empty, cold abyss. Brunette hair blew around her small frame softly, no wind blowing...but dreams always contained the unexplained and strange. Azure tiger stripes marked her arms and face. Her eyes were chocolate swirled with a deep oceanic blue. Her kimono was simple, yet elegant, ivory and cerulean with blossoms flowing throughout the sinuous fabric.
"Why are you here?" he growled out once more. He took a graceful step forward that spoke of power and strength, but also harmony within one's self and self-assuredness. "Tell me."
"Sesshoumaru," she laughed, "there is little you can do to me in a dream. Why try to act intimidating?" The demoness showed no fear, which was...puzzling.
But dreams often were mystifying.
"Fine." He moved to sit and a cushion appeared beneath him, made of fine fabrics with a dragon embroidered on top.
They were suddenly in a room. The tigress sat on a pillow like his; in front of them was a matching table, low to the ground, as the time period demanded. The walls were crimson and most of the space was taken up by thousands of compartments filled with scrolls. The tigress waved her hand and a set of cups appeared, along with drink.
"You have not answered me," came Sesshoumaru's baritone voice, a tinge of annoyance reverberating within the growl. The tigress poured them herbal tea for the two of them and took a sip, her eyes closing in alleged pleasure at the taste and simplicity of the liquid.
Of course, pleasure is rarely experienced within dreams...
"You know why I'm here, Sesshoumaru."
He was...irate. Not only was she evading a direct answer, she was not adding the honorific to his aristocratic name.
Ah, but she never had before.
"No, I do not know, so if you would enlighten me, I would be much obliged," he said in his usual bored tones.
The demoness rolled her eyes. "I've been visiting you for three moon cycles. Do you even remember my name? If you would recall, I asked you if you knew me on the first night I have visited and you have yet to answer me."
"Why are you here?"
"I am wasting my time if you do not wish to even speak my name. Do you fear me, Sesshoumaru?" There it was again, that lilting tone that held underlying amusement.
Sesshoumaru shot her a glare and inwardly sighed, his face practically etched from stone, unto which no emotion could be encouraged upon.
Must she be so complicated?
"I believe you are named...Kougoura," he stated jadedly, pausing for effect.
The demoness' lip twitched, but she made no further movement. "So... my time here has not been
"Again, I question your presence."
"I was going to tell you." She stood and grabbed a scroll from a cupboard and glanced at it before putting it back, searching the other compartments.
"It is about your mother," she replied softly to his previous question, fingering through a pile of scrolls currently settled beneath her feet.
"She is dead."
Kougoura stopped her searching to send the demon lord a withering look. "Yes, you always were observant," she remarked, sauntering back to the table with a scroll held securely within her dainty grasp. "It is about why and how she died."
Sesshoumaru's eyes narrowed slightly, but he nodded once to show she had his interest.
"Do you even feel anything anymore?" she inquired, sitting down.
"Why must you ask?" he queried, looking to the kanji on the parchment. He had...and eerie feeling that he knew what the scroll contained, yet he could not read it, for it was illegible, even from this distance.
"Do you remember...how your mother died?" Kougoura laid the scroll on the table, using her claws to finger the seal.
He was silent for a moment. "Yes."
The kind of carnage he had witnessed that fateful day was not to be easily forgotten. No, he could never forget her death.
"And you feel nothing over it?" the tigress asked with a hint of disbelief that he was truly so heartless.
He did not speak.
"You do..." her voice rang with conviction, the corners of her lips kicking upwards.
Silence reigned with an iron fist as Sesshoumaru idly traced a claw in the wood graining and the large carving of the dragon that lay etched within the table's smooth surface.
"I thought you didn't care. At least...that's what you told me."
"You and I both know I have an image to keep and a reputation to uphold," he replied smoothly and without fault.
"At the young age of five?" she questioned, her voice thick with incredulity and skepticism.
The demon started to say something, but held his words instead.
"Exactly. Your father mourned, even if it was only for a day of two."
Sesshoumaru waved his hand dismissively, a slight frown upon his lips.
"She died as many others have. It means nothing to the present." He glanced at her, only to find her shaking her head as she gazed at the scroll now within her hands.
"You're wrong. Oh, so very wrong."
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