Chapter Text
It hurt. Not just every inch of her body but every nook and cranny of her heart and soul. For the first time she was alone, truly alone. Kagome had never been alone before — she’d always had her friends and family in the modern era, or her Feudal Era companions in the past — but now she was alone.
Soundless tears dripped down her cheeks as she mourned for the loss of her entire world.
“You may think it is the end of the world but it is not.”
Kagome glared at the speaker, a near stranger, someone who was not a friend but the only person who knew about Kagome’s past.
“I don’t care Akane-san. As far as I’m concerned my world Has ended.”
“So you’ll let the mortal realm be thrown into chaos and destruction? Because you’re too busy weeping?” Akane asked scornfully.
Kagome wanted to leap at the older woman and hit her, but she didn’t. There was something in the dark watchful eyes that screamed power. Besides Kagome felt like Akane was waiting for Kagome to do something silly, like attack her physically. Akane was a much more experienced and stronger fighter, very much like Sango only Akane did not restrict herself to hunting only youkai. Kagome shuddered remembering just how Akane had found her.
“You might feel like you have no purpose but you do. The Kamis reward their most faithful and productive servants with harder tasks, it is but the way of the world.”
Kagome choked at the ancient twist on a very familiar modern saying: the reward for a job well done is a harder job.
Kagome brushed her tears off with the back of her hand and straightened her spine. “I’m not a fighter,” she confessed. “I’ve always been with others who protected me. I will fight if I have to but I’m not very good at it.”
Akane was not sympathetic. “No human is born a fighter. It is something you learn. Or are forced to learn,” she added darkly.
Kagome bit her lip and nodded because it was the truth. “What do I have to do?”
“You can start by helping me replenish my herbal stocks.” Akane gave her a thoughtful look. “Good healers are always in demand and sought after.”
Kagome nodded mutely and stood up from her seat on the floor to follow Akane out of the tiny hut.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
In the months that followed Kagome cursed the ones responsible for her current situation. Cursed them because she had been thrown farther back in the past, trapped because the Bone-Eaters Well was not working, alone with no friends or allies she could call on. There was no Edo village, only a trappers hut in the area. From the forest growth it was definitely way before InuYasha had been born.
For some time she had considered the possibility of going to the Western Lands, to the Inu no Taisho. Then common sense asserted itself and kept her put. She could not risk changing events, changing the past. If she went to InuYasha’s father she knew she would be tempted to try and save him, to protect Izayoi, to give InuYasha a family. If she did that everything would be undone. Kagome remembered her history teacher’s lessons on philosophy and war.
If you were given the chance to go back in time, and you had the opportunity to kill Hitler, to prevent him from being born, would you do that? All of you who answered yes without hesitation have failed this exercise. Preventing a great ill is not always the best and most responsible path to choose. Sometimes you have to let society, the law, do what it is supposed to do. If you take it into your own hands, for the Greater Good, what you are doing is anything but. You are patronizing your society, your government and law enforcement officials by effectively claiming they are less intelligent, less capable than you. There is a reason why comic book heroes do not kill; they capture the villains and hand them over to the authorities. If they do not they become what they fight: criminals.
Kagome was not capable of that much hubris. She could not risk setting something worse than Naraku free in her quest to make the world a better place.
But at the same time Kagome had to grudgingly admit she had become stronger in a way she never would have become if she had stayed in just the Feudal and modern eras. With no InuYasha to defend her Kagome learned to fight and defend herself. She didn’t have the strength to be a fighter like Sango but Akane taught her the ways of kunoichi, female warriors who used whatever weapons were available to them, be it looks or poison. Thankfully Kagome was generally overlooked, seen as too innocent to be a real threat.
Kagome asked Akane many times why she was training Kagome so thoroughly but she was never given a proper explanation, just orders to review her lessons or practice.
The miko sighed as she shifted into the first position of the new forms she had been told to memorize and practice.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
“It’s time for you to go now.”
It had been ten years since Akane had found Kagome and taken her in.
Kagome blinked. The words had been so unexpected it was a struggle to comprehend them.
“What?”
Akane gave her a tolerant look. “It’s time for you to go now.”
Kagome was confused. “Go where?”
Akane sighed and began rolling a string of polished jade beads between her fingers, before she began passing beads between thumb and middle fingers. The solid clacking sound helped Kagome center herself and clear her mind.
“Where do I need to go?” she asked more calmly.
Akane smiled and inclined her head. “You need to go out into the world and serve.”
Kagome frowned. She had spent four years as a reclusive healer near a respected monastery. It was easier than trying to explain her modern habits and hide an unexpected aspect of her new reality: she wasn’t aging, she would never age, the Shikon which had been reabsorbed into her body would see to that, to ensure it had an eternal protector.
“It can’t be in Japan. Too many have heard of the Shikon, know the feel of its power. You need to go to the mainland.”
Kagome bit her lower lip. Finally she had a reason for all those lessons in different Chinese and Indian dialects. Akane had even found a merchant who taught Kagome the basics of Farsi and Arabic.
“Avoid the courts, the overly wealthy and powerful,” Akane warned. “You are meant to help those who the trained and over-educated healers will ignore.”
“I will not do something wrong? Save someone who I’m not meant to?” Kagome asked warily.
“Time is a circle. Every action taken ripples outward and will eventually reach its source.” Akane murmured vaguely. Then her eyes sharpened. “You have a very important Destiny Kagome. You must survive to fulfill it, to meet Him.”
Kagome shivered. InuYasha?
“Not your hanyou or anyone in these lands, or even the mainland. Someone from the far west, beyond the deserts and mountains in a land of cool forests and mountains.”
Kagome frowned. That description sounded like some place in Europe. Russia perhaps?
“Your paths will cross.” Akane stated knowingly. “You will know the moment you set eyes upon Him.”
“What am I supposed to do?” Kagome wanted to know.
“Protect his heart and soul. Anchor his mind when it fragments. Do what is needed.”
“And until I find him?”
“Do as you have always done. Heal and serve.”
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome spent the next fifteen years doing what Akane had told her to do, healing and serving the less fortunate, wandering all over Asia. Staying in one place was not wise for a healer good enough to be called a miracle worker.
As she travelled she continued to form casual friendships with the innkeepers and merchants; the local priests were not the type to look favourably upon an unmarried foreign woman. Pretty soon she discovered Christian missionaries were trying to claim credit for her deeds, claiming a fair-skinned, black-haired, blue-eyed angel of mercy had to a European. That annoyed Kagome because even though she had European ancestors she considered herself Japanese and a servant of the Kamis, not Christ.
But Kagome couldn’t remain annoyed for long. It didn’t take much time for her interest to be engaged by the gossip and tales being shared by the merchant who was travelling to Persia, to sell his silks to the carpet weavers.
At the first opportunity she had she approached the middle-aged man. “I am looking to join a caravan travelling west. I am a skilled healer and fairly good with a bow.”
“My ship will depart from Hangchow and go as far as Hormuz.”
“If I wish to continue travelling west?”
“The Ottoman tariffs are too expensive for a poor merchant such as myself. But I can introduce you to my trading partners. For a price.”
Kagome smirked. “I’m sure I’ll accumulate enough trading for my services along the way.”
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome did not have a great deal of difficulties in her travel west. She strongly suspected the Kamis were smoothing her path to ensure she would be where she needed to be. She didn’t mind. She enjoyed having a pleasant journey over one fraught with danger.
In Arabia she had the good fortune of saving the favoured grandchild of one of the nomadic tribes. They took her in and she travelled with them to Egypt. In Alexandria she purchased a passage on the first ship heading north across the Mediterranean to Europe.
She ended up criss-crossing through various lands, making friends and contacts in each one but being driven on by some instinct. Kagome knew there was some other place that she had to be, that this was not her place to stay and put roots.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
“You want to ask Johan to join his caravan to Vienna,” she was told by a rather threadbare merchant. “My run takes me through the smaller princedoms to Wallachia. The voivode is not in the good graces of the Ottoman Emperor. Many believe it is only a matter of time before war breaks out.
Kagome shook her head. “No, I want to go to Wallachia.” And she really did. Yes, there was the ever present threat of war but the strict enforcement of laws ensured travellers and residents were more or less safe. Oddly enough it was one of the more stable lands in Eastern Europe this time period. And more than that, the same instinct that had kept her moving across the continents and seas was telling her that she needed to be in Wallachia.
She had heard so much about the current ruler, Vlad III Draculae. In her time he was the basis for the fictional story of Dracula, a blood-drinking immortal creature, a vampire who was eventually defeated by an Englishman. Kagome wondered if there was any truth to the tale, like the legend of the Shikon. If so what had really happened? How did the vampire come from the man? Was he some kind of hanyou whose bloodline awakened? If so Kagome was doubly reassured because she of all the people around could best defend herself against hanyous and youkais. Then another thought struck her mind… If Vlad III Draculae was a vampire-slash-hanyou was his defeat at the hands of Abraham Van Helsing real or fiction? Kagome was curious but not she was not going to go digging for answers. She had learnt the hard way it was wiser to wait and let them come to her.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
“Have you heard? The Princess is dead.”
“I heard she killed herself.”
“Hush. It is not wise to speak of such things.”
“It’s not like everyone doesn’t know. The priests refused to allow her to be buried on sanctified grounds.”
“It’s a cruel thing. She did it out of grief and fear, not spite.”
It was hard to ignore the whispers, not when everywhere she went she heard the same things. And it was unbearable the way the Christian Church condemned those who committed suicide. And refusing to honour them only made it that much harder for the survivors, those left behind. How could one mourn if the priests refused to perform the necessary rites, the dead were not granted their proper honours? It was disgraceful.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
It was not hard to find out where Princess Elisabeta was buried, a plot of land outside Târgoviște. It was part of the voivode’s lands so technically Kagome was trespassing but she refused to let it deter her. She was not a poacher or desecrator. She only wished to honour the Princess to the best of her ability.
She stripped off her cloak and folded it carefully, placing it on a fallen tree trunk and sitting on it to unlace the thongs securing her boots to her feet and calves. It was cold but she removed her socks and pulled on a pair of tabi and geta sandals. She was not fond of the traditional red-and-white miko outfit but it was required to do the proper rituals.
She had barely gotten started when she was interrupted.
“What are you doing!?!”
Kagome froze and turned to the speaker. His ferocious voice and growling tone matched his appearance — warlike, large, weary with red-rimmed dark eyes and a rough unkempt appearance, dark stubble along his jawline, black hair hanging in messy oily knotted strands around his face. He was wearing leather pants and a long undyed woollen smock-tunic. He was probably a woodsman, someone hired by the Prince to watch over his beloved wife’s grave. Kagome relaxed minutely and smiled gently.
“I’m performing the burial rites of my people to honour Princess Elisabeta.”
The woodsman froze. “Why?”
“She died doing her duty as any samurai lady would.”
The woodsman looked very confused. “Samurai?”
Kagome laughed. “Oh, you would not know.” She thought for a moment. “Samurai are vassals of the great landowners of my homeland, the daimyos. They follow a code called Bushido, the Way of the Warrior. Samurais strive to serve their masters faithfully and loyally, to die well if necessary. Bushido requires frugality, kindness, duty, self-discipline, respect, morality, ethics, honesty, care of family members and elderly.” She smiled kindly at the woodsman. “I know the priests of Christ say it is a sin to commit seppuku or jigai but it is expected in my land.”
“Sep-pu-ku?”
Kagome gestured at her stomach. “A samurai who feels he has dishonoured or failed his lord will commit seppuku, kill himself so his failure will not taint his clan and lord. A samurai’s wife or daughters may also commit jigai, kill themselves to prevent dishonour.”
The woodsman looked away into the distance. “Elisabeta killed herself.”
Kagome was confused. Who was this woodsman to address the princess so casually? But he was hurting so she did not ask, only tried to comfort him.
“The priests of Christ say it is a sin but my people do not see it that way.”
“Elisabeta did not worship your heathen gods.”
“Perhaps. But doesn’t the Bible call Jesus Christ the son of God? Jehovah? Who is to say Jehovah did not have other children, the heathen gods as you call them?”
The woodsman looked stunned at her counter. “Your gods?”
Kagome shrugged. “The Kotoamatsukami, the first gods came into existence in Takamagahara, the world of Heaven. Who is to say that Jehovah did not create them?”
He eyed her shrewdly. “I suspect what you just said would be considered blasphemous by the priests of your land.”
Kagome laughed and nodded. “Yes. But I have never been one to follow convention. If I did I would not be here,” she explained gesturing around. “In Wallachia. I would be in Nihon.”
“What are you doing here?”
Kagome blinked. “Here? I’m performing burial rites of my people to honour Princess Elisabeta.”
He shook his head. “No, what are you doing in Wallachia?”
Kagome shrugged. “I felt drawn here.”
He sat down on the grass beside her, clumsily mimicking her kneeling posture, sitting awkwardly on his heels. Kagome debated for a moment before holding out a stick of incense and watched as he clumsily accepted the item, mimic her actions to light it and shake the flames out, then stick it in a small bowl of sand set in front of the stone grave marker. She did not react as he watched her perform the basic rituals to honour the dead.
“I was not able to honour you in the first seven days but I will burn incense until the hundredth day has passed,” Kagome murmured.
They remained kneeling there in silence, each deep in their own thoughts. Finally the woodsman broke the silence.
“Do your people have special ceremonies for anniversaries?”
“On the first, third, seventh, thirteenth, and thirty-third years the family will perform matsuri, a special memorial service. They also honour all revered dead on Obon. It is similar to Samhain Night of the druids, a night to honour the dead. The ancestors return to visit their kin. We hang lanterns in front of our homes to guide them to us, make offerings at the temples and graves. After the festival we put floating lanterns in rivers, lakes, and seas to guide the spirits to the realm of the dead.”
“Do you think Elisabeta is happy? Wherever she is?”
“The dead generally are,” Kagome replied honestly. “They are not plagued by the suffering of living in the mortal world. I refuse to believe she would be barred from peace for not wanting to dishonour her lord and land.”
He eyed her shrewdly. “Would you have done as Elisabeta?”
Kagome met his eyes squarely. “No. I would have gone down fighting, made my enemies pay in blood for every inch of ground.”
He nodded looking rather distant.
After twenty minutes Kagome rose, changed her footwear, donned her cloak and made her way back to the cottage where she had leased a room from a widowed seamstress and embroiderer.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
It had been a busy day with the flu and fever season at its peak. Kagome had been very careful to couch her instructions and herbs with proverbs and lore from the Bible. She really did not want to be driven out as a witch.
A tap on the door frame broke her out of her musings. She turned and was startled. Standing in the doorway was the woodsman from Princess Elisabeta’s grave. He was dressed more neatly, in a clean linen shirt under a leather tunic and pants. A gray woollen cloak tossed over his shoulders looked heavy enough to keep the biting wind off.
Kagome gestured, inviting him into the kitchen. Tasia had agreed to let Kagome meet her clients in the kitchen if Kagome paid half the cost of food stuffs and prepared the meals. At that very moment Kagome was glad Tasia was in town delivering the garments she had been commissioned to embellish with embroidery.
“How can I help you?”
“Are you going to Elisabeta’s grave?”
Kagome blinked, taken aback by the abrupt question. “Yes,” she said slowly. “After I finish cooking dinner.” She gestured at the hearth where a small fire burned and a small iron pot was suspended on a hook over the flames.
“How long?”
Kagome checked the stew. It was almost done. “Soon. I just need to bank the fire and set the stew on the table.” She hesitated. “Are you hungry?” she asked, obliquely offering to feed him and was relieved when he shook his head. There wasn’t enough in the pot for two women and a very large man.
After banking the fire she went to the back room to change into thicker, warmer clothes, a heavy grey wool dress and a tan wool cloak. She picked up the bag with her supplies and went out, hooking the latch that would keep the door closed until a well hidden cord was pulled by Tasia.
They walked in silence, following a less used trail into the woods. It wasn’t long before they were at the clearing with Princess Elisabeta’s grave.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome did not know but it would become part of her routine over the following weeks, the strange woodsman accompanying her. He did not talk at first, simply watched her burn incense and murmur prayers for the dead. It wasn’t until the tenth visit that he spoke.
“She was my wife.”
Kagome froze. She had expected to hear him claim the princess as a lover. As much as Kagome disapproved she could not begrudge a woman trying to find happiness in a lonely world, even if it meant dishonouring a political marriage.
“I knew she was fragile but I thought she was safe. I did everything I could so she would not worry.”
“Did you tell her of what was happening?”
“Of course not!” he snapped.
Kagome nodded calmly. “Sometimes that is best. But I’ve learnt through experience that denying someone information is the same as closing doors and windows. They do not see alternatives because they are in the dark.”
“I only wanted her to be safe.”
“She knew that. She knew she would not survive long as a prisoner so she took the only option she saw available to her.”
“She didn’t wait!” he roared at Kagome. “She didn’t have faith in me.”
Kagome did not flinch. “Having faith means standing at the heart of the storm and trusting your companions to guard your back. You might have loved her but you didn’t have faith in her strength,” she stated calmly.
He reared back shocked by Kagome’s counter.
Kagome reached out and cupped his rough stubbled cheek, forcing him to meet her eyes. “I never met the Princess. I do not know her but everyone tells me she was a gentle woman. She cared and loved. The world does not treat such beings well.”
The Prince laughed harshly. “So true.” He eyed her cynically. “So tell me, how does someone like Elisabeta, like you, survive?”
Kagome looked away with a wistful smile. “For the longest time I had a protector and I thought he would always be there. Then one day he was gone and I learned I had to fight for myself, because if I didn’t no one would.”
The Prince looked taken aback. “My condolences.”
Kagome didn’t bother correcting him, that her protector was not dead. The truth was that he was too young, a child. He would not meet her younger self for several decades.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome knew she should leave Târgoviște. She had become too attached to Vlad Draculae, the voivode of Wallachia. But every time she tried to put together a travel plan she found herself procrastinating, delaying.
~o~
Just a few more weeks, to make sure he’s healing properly. Warriors take it very hard when they think they have failed in their duty to protect.
~o~
He does not have anyone he can talk to about what is truly bothering him. His court is a cesspit of self-centered idiots.
~o~
He needs a refuge, a place where he can forget he is a ruler and just be a man. He is under too much stress with the Turks pressuring him.
~o~
He’s losing his temper and becoming unnecessarily cruel. If I stay I can soften his views, remind him that he always has alternatives to violence.
~o~
She didn’t want to leave and her instincts were in agreement. She needed to be with him.
~ooO Begin Flashback ~o~
“Your paths will cross. You will know the moment you set eyes upon Him.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Protect his heart and soul. Anchor his mind when it fragments. Do what is needed.”
~o~ End Flashback Ooo~
Kagome was certain, as one could be without divine intervention, that Vlad was the Him Akane had spoken of. She was supposed to protect his soul, his mental and emotional state, and she was determined to do just that.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
When Vlad inevitably went to war Kagome found herself corresponding with him through parchment and ink. She found herself eagerly anticipating the arrival of a new letter, composing the next one she would send out while she performed her daily routines.
All throughout she never forgot to visit Elisabeta’s grave and burn incense. Each time she did she renewed a silent vow to the dead woman.
I’ll look after Vlad the best I can. I swear it.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome smiled when she saw who was at the door, Igor, the teenage stable boy who was Vlad’s preferred choice for delivering and picking up their correspondence.
Her smile faded when she saw his expression. He was terrified.
“Igor, what’s wrong?” she asked concerned, reaching out to the younger male who reminded her of Souta.
“Lady Kagome, run!” he burst out before he collapsed like a puppet with cut strings, red blooming over the front of his shirt.
Kagome staggered under twin impacts on her chest. Blindly she looked down and saw two arrows protruding from her chest, red staining her woollen gown. Arrows like the ones protruding from Igor’s back.
Vaguely she noted that it didn’t hurt. She wrapped her fingers around the shaft of one and tried to move it. It didn’t budge and hurt. Barbed to make it very difficult to remove.
There were footsteps drawing close. Feet shod in expensive polished leather boots. Her vision was diming but she could see enough to recognize him as nobility, a lesser member of Vlad’s court, a hanger-on.
“Foreigners cannot be allowed to interfere in the affairs of Wallachia,” he sneered.
Kagome coughed, red staining her lips. “Then what are you doing for the Turks?” she retorted. “You dishonour your voivode with your actions.”
Another sneer. “You are just a whore that caught his interest. He will forget you as soon as one more comely catches his attention,” he told her before walking away.
Kagome wanted to laugh at the fool. She was a virgin. Her relationship with Vlad was anything but romantic. She was counsellor, soundboard, sanctuary, not a lover.
Kagome knew she was dying. She hoped Vlad would find someone else to serve as his anchor in the years to come but she had her doubts. There were too many sycophants, too many enemies, allies to foreign influences. She hoped because it was out of her power now. She could no longer be there for him.
~ooOoo~ooOoo~ooOoo~
Kagome fled as soon as she regained consciousness, woke fully healed thanks to the Shikon bound to her body and soul. There was no way she could stay, not when there was a very credible witness to her mortal injuries.
Tasia had been confused but accepting about Kagome’s announcement. The older woman knew it was only a matter of time before Kagome wandered out of Târgoviște like how she had wandered in.
This time she walked out on foot heading south towards the Balkans. She could purchase passage from any of the ports there to Egypt and then join a caravan travelling along the Red Sea and Arabia to Persia. Kagome was not afraid of being ambushed along the way. Akane had made sure she had the skills to look after herself. Besides the Gods still had a purpose for her — if she was dead she would not be able to fulfill it.
~ooOoo~
Kagome had almost reached the Black Sea when she felt It. A dark power washing over the land. Somewhere someone of great importance had accepted darkness into his heart. The blooming fear gave wings to her feet. She needed to increase the distance between herself and the darkness. She could not risk being captured by a Naraku-like being. Her only regret was leaving Vlad behind, but deep inside she knew there was no real choice; he was bound by his duties as ruler and Kagome was obliged to serve the kamis.