Priceless (an InuYasha FanFic)

Back to Work

Kagome woke the next morning to the sounds of a waking forest. The leaves rustled in the breeze and the birds chirped their greetings to one another as the sky slowly turned from grey to blue. She was lying naked in the grass tucked snugly into her mate's body. Gently disentangling herself, she stretched, fully expecting to be slightly sore from the previous night's activities, and maybe there was a slight, pleasant soreness in her middle and lower sections, but on the whole, it wasn't half so bad as she was expecting after the night they had... She blushed and smiled at the memories. She was glad that her first time had been with him, and she would treasure those memories for the rest of her life, which would apparently be a very long one now that she was Mated to Sesshomaru.

A few moments later, Sesshomaru stirred next to her, one arm reaching out to snake around her waist and pull her back to him. Kagome giggled when he started nuzzling and kissing her neck where he had bitten her last night. 

"That tickles." she murmured as she turned to face him and return his kisses. She noted absently that the mark did not hurt either, which was odd, considering he had definitely broken skin, and she had felt his fangs pretty deep. 

"Hmmm" he replied to her, letting the noise just rumble in his chest, almost like a purr. He still wasn't quite awake.

"We should get back to the hut and get dressed," she muttered into his mouth.

He replied with a plaintive moan, and Kagome had to bite back the laugh that desperately wanted out.

"I know, but Kaede is coming back today, and I doubt she wants to find us like this..."

"Don't care." He humphed and pulled her even closer.

this time she did laugh a little before pulling out her trump card... "I'm hungry though..." She said with a pout she had learned from Rin.

Sesshomaru sighed, defeatedly. If his Mate was hungry, his instincts demanded he feeds her. The whole provide and protect thing. "Fine" he groaned out, as he loosened his grip.

They did finally get back to the little hut and had a pretty generous breakfast from the leftovers of the previous dinner. Kagome was just tying her hair back in one of the linen ribbons provided along with the Miko garb when Kaede arrived with a pack full of supplies. 

The neckline of the robes she wore was low enough as to easily display her new mark, which Sesshomaru had explained on their walk back, did not hurt because the bonding magic had quickly healed the punctures and replaced any scares with his personal crest to look like a light blue birthmark. Kaede noticed the change immediately and smirked knowingly at her new pupil before dragging her off into the forest to hunt down the right wood for Kagome's new bow.

The following weeks were filled with finding the right trees, testing flexibility, carving, boiling, curing, and everything else that came with making her new weapon from scratch. She learned how to shape the wood. How to make the bowstring appropriately taut. How to carve out arrowheads from flint. How to collect and shape the feathers. By the time all was said and done, Kagome had the knowledge she needed to make a bow and arrows to suit her needs, and also the experience and practice needed to control enough of her powers to safely reenter society.

She had learned where and how to access her powers, and how to keep them on a tight leash in tense or emotional situations. Kagome no longer feared accidentally purifying one of her coworkers, and on the other hand, knew that she could easily purify an attacker on command if she needed to.

Kagome found herself, on the morning that they planned to go back to the Taisho manor before heading back home, sitting out on the porch of the hut and wishing they had more time there not spent in training. Sesshomaru came out to join her after ensuring once more that everything was packed up and ready to go back.

"What's on your mind?" He asked, sitting and pulling her into his lap. 

"I wish we had more time here just to relax." She said, leaning her head into the crook of his shoulder. 

He hummed in agreement. "Perhaps we should plan to come back here on vacation in the future. Sometimes when we aren't in the middle of one crisis or another."

Kagome smiled. "Can we?"

"I don't see why not." He replied. 

They sat like that for several more minutes before deciding they really did need to get back. Kagome said goodbye to the little hut, as Sesshomaru transformed for their flight back to the fortress. 

AN... I know it been a while, but I would kick myself if I didn't actually finish this. for anyone who is around to still read this, thank you so much for your patience in sticking with the story with me. I will be back. Please don't give up on me.