#rareshipweek

naraku is a marine biologist focusing on deep sea creatures we’d call mermaids

sessh is one of them

naraku took interest in studying sessh bc no live documentation of these exist since the 1800s and since then they’re supposed to live near the bottom of the ocean leaving naraku confused as to 1) what the fuck sessh is doing here 2) why he even can be here and has the ability to breath if it’s virtually useless to his kind

sessh is p much impossible to catch bc they cant harm him but whenever a boat gets near sessh destroys it 

after the moment i illustrated naraku tries to gain sessh trust and eventually manages to have him captured 

following is a montage of naraku trying to get the allowance to vivisect the dude but they need to figure out if that might be a little inhumane bc the public knows abt the catch

shortly before he does get the allowance naraku changes his mind, doesnt really wanna cut open this fish after studying him for so long (see title picture) 

so he steals him

I frown, wondering what it was about her old home that could have made her react in such a way, but before I can ask anything else Grandpa comes wobbling in and sits himself down at the table, and Souta starts crying, and Mama has to dash away to comfort him. I’m left alone with Grandpa, watching him loosen his bones as he sits until he looks soft and fragile.

“Did Mama not like her old home?” I ask him. He looks sadly at me.

“She loved it, she did,” he says. “More’n anythin’”

“More than me ‘n Souta?” I ask, horrified. He cracks a smile at that, reaching out with his trembling hand, and pats me on the head.

“No. Not more’n you two. Nothing more’n you two.”

I nod, sated, and sit back. “Could she go back ever?” I say after a moment. Grandpa shakes his head.

“Never,” he says. “Never.”

+

Mama slips quietly from life on the very eve of my eighteenth. Instead of celebrating, we gather round her bed, Souta and Grandpa and I. We watch as she closes her dark eyes for the last time, watch as her chest, as ever-moving as the sea, goes still. Souta’s lip twists and puckers; his eyes fill with tears as he gazes at our mother. Grandpa nods his head tiredly; I can’t help but thinking that it won’t be long before it’s his time to follow Mama. Instead of saying that wicked thought I slip out of the house and make my way down to the beach.

Though I was never a seal-girl, like Mama was, I still love the sea with all my heart. I love the smell of it, the feel of it, the sound of it.

Today it’s the colour of Mama’s eyes and I dive in still wearing my nightgown. The water is cold and glassy; the air is prickly. I turn my head underwater and the sound of my blood pounding thrums gently in my ears.

+

Seal-wives aren’t ever announced. One day they’re not here, the next they are, another head of long dark hair weaving through the small streets of our village. It doesn’t take long for everyone to find out, mind. News travels fast when you live in a place like this one, so the fact that Lord Naraku got himself another seal-wife on the same day my mother passed is quickly relayed to me.

“You’re alright?” says Kaede after she’s told me, patting my cheek gruffly. I nod.  

“But what are we going to do? Mama used to greet the new wives,” I say.

“Lord Naraku doesn’t allow his wives to be greeted the same way as the others are,” mutters Kaede, scowling. “She’ll be coming to our next blanket washing day though – I expect that is when someone will have to do it.” She looks at me sharply. “Don’t s’pose you want to do the honors?”

“The honors?”

“Greet the new wife. Tell her about this place. Give her a blanket. All the things your mam used to do.”

I raise my chin. “I can do that.”

“You can?”

“Yes.”

Kaede smirks, nodding. “’Course you can. Well then, looks like you best start making yourself a new blanket.”

+

“Apparently Lord Naraku’s named this one ‘Kikyo,’” says Sango. I pause in the middle of reaching for a string of glistening seaweed, and look to her.

“Kikyo?”

“Mm.”

“How long has it been since Lady Midoriko disappeared?”

“About ten years.” Sango leans down and plucks a large clump of seaweed from the sand. She hands it to me.

“That was terrible,” I murmur. I glance down at the pile of material in my arms. “I s’pose I have enough.”

“That looks like plenty.” Sango presses a stray strand of the plant to her face and breathes in. “Smells like the Mams,” she says. I nod, pretending as though the scent of it isn’t digging into the hollowness that used to be Mama. She may notice the stray tears, but says nothing except, “Kohaku and Souta are playing with the other boys in the storeroom up at the inn.”

“Why?”

She shrugs. “Little Shippo said he found something in that back room, and all the boys ought to have a look.”

I smile. “That boy is so sweet.”

“He’s a real rascal.”

“Yes, a sweet rascal.”

Sango laughs. “Come on, we need to start weaving if we want this finished in time for the washing day.”

+

The blanket feels slippery in my arms as I carry it down to the beach. Sango walks besides me, Kohaku and Souta kicking rocks to one another behind us. As we round the bottom of the cliff, we can see the Mams and children grouped together on the sand. Kaede, close to the edge of the group, breaks off and walks over to us.

“She’s here,” she says. “You’ve the blanket?”

I nod, lifting it up to show her. Kaede pauses, and then she smiles.

“Your Ma would be right proud of you,” she says. I smile back. She beckons us forward. As we reach the cluster of people, Kohaku and Souta break off, running across the hard sand to the rest of the boys where they stand by the sea’s edge. I move straight to the group of Mams and daughters, walking through them as I follow Kaede. She leads me to a girl standing apart from the others, facing away from us. Her hair tumbles down her back, longer than I’ve ever seen, and it shifts slightly in the wind.

“Lady Kikyo,” says Kaede, as deferentially as she can manage. The girl turns to look at us, unsmiling. I stare. She’s beautiful. That in itself isn’t a surprise – all seal-wives are beautiful – but it’s never resonated so deeply within me before. I feel breathless. The girl watches me, curious, wary.

“I’m Kagome,” I choke out, bowing as deeply as I can without losing sight of the girl. “Um, I would like to formally welcome you to our village.” It takes me a few seconds before I remember the blanket in my arms, and quickly I present it to her. “I wove this for you.”  

She accepts the blanket and turns it over in her hands. “What is this?” she asks, detachedly curious.

“A blanket. Made of seaweed I collected on the beach. It’s given to all seal-wives when they first come here. You take it home with you, and it smells like the sea.”

Kikyo nods. “I see.”

I wait, wondering if she is going to thank me, but she doesn’t. “Will you join us with the washing?” I ask quickly, after the silence has stretched out for several long moments. She tilts her head slightly. “You need to wash it every week, otherwise it dries out and becomes brittle.”

“Ah. No.” Kikyo folds the blanket carefully in her arms, then turns to Kaede. “I must return to my Lord.”

“Of – of course,” Kaede says blankly, throwing me a swift look of surprise. Bewildered, I watch Kikyo walk across the sand and back to the path leading to the village centre. Kaede shakes her head.

“She’s a strange one.”

I nod but say nothing. The washing day is the only day the seal wives have to spend away from their husbands, the only day they have for themselves. But then, she was only brought up recently. Perhaps she does not know, I think. I try to ignore the disappointment I feel dully in my stomach, and walk back to the rest of the women.

+

Lady Kikyo doesn’t come the following week, or the week after that. I watch for her despite what is clear becoming a pattern. Every time I am left pondering what she does, shut up inside the Lord’s manor. I wonder if she is unhappy.

It’s not just me wondering, although perhaps I am the kindest in my thoughts. The rest of the Mams are affronted by her refusal to join them, musing on whether she could so quickly adopt the human thinking that regarded some people to be below others.

“I hope her blanket hasn’t broken,” I say to Sango, sitting in the shallow water and dipping Mama’s old blanket into the sea. I draw it back out and the green weed shines wetly, floating around my legs.

Sango frowns. “I hope she’s treating your gift with proper respect. You made it for her with your own two hands.”

“T’wasn’t anything,” I murmur, thinking of Kikyo holding the blanket, smelling the sea and remembering her home.

“You’re kind, Kagome,” says Sango. “Always have been.”

“Mm.”

“Kagome!”

I hear my name echo across the quiet beach and turn, looking past the cluster of Mams to where Souta is running down the steps. He hadn’t come with us to the beach that morning, preferring instead to stay inside and talk to Grandpa. His approach is frantic, reminiscent of the sprinting he used to do when he was small and didn’t have full control over his limbs. His knees pump jerkily. The closer he gets, the wearier I feel.  

“Souta?” Sango gets to her feet to stand next to me. “What’s happened?”

I could almost mouth along as he says, “It’s Grandpa.” I set off across the sand. The sound of my feet slapping against the damp ground is familiar – soothing. Souta is behind me, sprinting back up the way he had just come, following me as I push open the doors of our childhood home to find Grandpa slumped on the floor.

His eyes are open.

His expression is peaceful.

I sink to my knees.

+

Kaede offers to watch over us for now. She makes dinner without any discussion and instructs two boys from the village to remove his body from the house. I remain as long as it takes for Souta to hiccup himself to sleep, his eyelids clinging together as tear tracks dry on his cheek. I pull the sheets up over him and Kaede pats his head. Then I leave.

Down the path to the part of the beach where no one goes. I throw myself into the water and strike out. The water is warm with summer and buoyant, and I lie on my back staring up at the sky as it darkens gradually. By the time I’m ready to return to shore, the moon has risen on a crust of stars to shine a ladder down onto the sea.

It’s a gentle night, and I hardly shiver when I leave the arms of the ocean.

“Kagome.”

I start violently, almost collapsing into a heap on the ground. Then I feel a hand on my shoulder, pulling me around until I am looking into the dark eyes of Lady Kikyo. She lets go as soon as we are facing each other, and steps back, studying me.

“Your Grandfather died,” she says. I have nothing to say to that. Her gaze flickers between my two eyes, and she moves back, producing a large something from under her gown. I’m startled out of my silence. I say,

“Your blanket!”

She nods, stepping into the water. In the moonlight the seaweed is indistinguishable from the waves that lap against the pale land. All around there is a quiet breathing of the sea. As I watch Kikyo wash her blanket, I frown.

“Why don’t you wash them with the rest of us?”

She straightens, her feet hooked through the lower loops of the blanket to stop it gliding away in the swell.

“I do not intend,” she says, “to make friends here.”

I gape at her. “What?”

“I will not be here long enough to learn these mockeries of my sisters.” She leans down to the water and trails her fingers through the frothing bubbles. “I must leave.”

“Leave? You mean return to the ocean?”

She nods.

“No one has ever returned before.”

She shrugs, supremely unconcerned. “I will be the first.”

“Will you take the Mams with you?”

“If they wish to come.”

Out of the ashes of my sadness I feel embers of anger begin to alight. “You would take the mothers from their children? Their husbands?”

“Yes.”

I open my mouth to retort, but immediately close it again. Kikyo stands in shadow, her hair shifting heavily about her, and in that moment it occurs to me how unhuman we are on this island, far away from everything else. How strange. I blink and wish with all my heart that my mother were here to speak with me.

She is not. I turn from Kikyo and walk back up to the house. My head is heavy and full.

+

“Where’re you going?” I ask, catching Souta by the back of his collar before he can run off down the path. He turns to me, looking determined and very small in Pa’s old cap.

“I’m goin’ to get a job.”

“You are?”

“Yep. I’m the man of the house now, Kaede says.”

I smile despite myself. “Is that right?”

“Yeah. So I’m gonna go ask Miroku if I can be dishwasher at the Inn. Shippo told me he needed a new one.”

“You’ll do his dishes but not ours?”

“You don’t give me anything when I do it,” says Souta, sticking his tongue out. I swat at him.

“Go on then.”

He does, rounding the corner and making his way into town with a gait that seems much older than I remember. I shake my head. Sango appears at the door only moments later, smiling.

“Souta was headed somewhere in a hurry.”

“He’s off to find a job, now that he’s the man of the house.”

We both laugh.

“So what are we making today?”

“There’s a big to-do down in the town centre soon. I’ve been instructed to cook up,” she produces a heavily marked cook book, “all the meals on pages with folded down corners.”

“Do they have anyone else working on this?”

“Kaede says all of us girls have been hired out to help with the evening. Apparently every year this comes around she gets more work for us than any other time.”

We both sit down at the table and Sango props open the cookbook.

“Sango?”

“Mm?”

I bite my lip. “Does your Mam ever… does she ever talk about the sea?”

“She used to. When I was younger. She was younger too, I s’pose.”

“Does she miss it, d’you think?”

Sango pauses. “Perhaps,” she says after a moment. “I think, yes. She doesn’t go out to the sea as much, but when she does she always has this look. Like she could stare at it for hours and hours. Like she wants to be… swallowed by the sea.”

I shiver. “I wonder if Lady Midoriko missed the sea.”

“Kaede would know,” says Sango. “You can ask her when she comes to collect the food this afternoon.” She looks up at me. “Why’re you so interested in this all of a sudden?”

I shrug. “Mama didn’t like to think about the sea,” I say. “I was just wondering… if she was really as happy as she could have been, living up here instead of down there.”

Sango says nothing.  

+

Kaede corners me after she comes to pick up the buns Sango and I spent our day kneading into shape. They lie on trays on my kitchen table, looking soft and white, and I feel disproportionately proud of them.

“Sango says you were asking after Lady Midoriko.”

“I was. I want to know more about what happened to her.”

“She passed,” says Kaede brusquely. “Nothin’ more to it.” She lifts one of the trays of rolls from the table and begins to walk carefully out the front door with it. I follow.

“I thought she disappeared.”

Kaede mutters something that sounds like a curse. “That’s what I meant.”

I glare at her. “Kaede.”

“Why’re you askin’ all these questions?”

“I’m curious.”

She passes off the platter to another girl, Ayame, and turns to me. “You’re curious, are you?”

I nod. Kaede looks me up and down once, and then sighs. “Alright,” she says. “I’ll tell you. But later, mind. I’m far too busy to do it now.”

I beam at her. “Thank you.”

She just gives me a final strange look, and disappears off down the darkening path.

+

I begin to notice, slowly, surely, over the next few days the behavior of the Mams. They move cheerfully enough, smiling amongst one another, talking and laughing as they always have, but there is an edge. Perhaps I always saw it and had ignored it, perhaps I hadn’t wanted to see it, but now it is everywhere. In everything they do.

The sadness.

Each and every mam wishes to go back to the sea. In some, like Kaede, the desire is innate and quiet, something she no longer gives any mind to – but of course it’s still there. In other younger women it’s an overpowering ache that seems to murmur through them constantly. As I watch them go about their lives around me, it hurts me deep to know that they suffer so. And I’m filled with an anger like fever at the men, the fathers, for deeming to bring them up in the first place, and for keeping them. I see it now.

Each and every woman on this island is being held captive. We pretend like it’s not true, like everything is happy as the women sing and the men laugh, but it is.  

I close my eyes and think of Mama. The idea that she lived her life, taunted by the close proximity of the sea, seems to reopen the wound of her death. Every day I bleed.

+

Sango joins me on my trip to Kaede’s house. I didn’t expect her to, she didn’t speak to me of the Mam’s missing the sea anymore after that evening, but she comes. We walk down to the little house where Kaede lives alone. I knock on a door made of driftwood, and it feels silky under my knuckles. Kaede emerges, watching us gravely.

“Come in,” she says.

We enter, removing our shoes, and join Kaede in the sitting room. A pot of tea stands, steaming quietly. We all lower ourselves down, and Kaede pours us drinks.

“Midoriko,” she says, “was beautiful. Very beautiful. She was kind and strong and Lord Naraku loved her.” She looks at us. “You remember her?”

I do. I only met her once, at the festival, but she danced with me on the cobblestones and laughed with all the others. Her smile made me think of the stars. I remember, too, the day that it was discovered she had gone. All the women, huddled together, whispering. My own Mama crying softly in her bed, with her blanket pressed close to her face. Every face was pale that day, pale and tired.

Kaede nods. “The day she left, Naraku bade us few who knew what happened not to tell the others. The Mams all knew she’d passed, possibly of some illness, and to the children it was put that she simply disappeared.” She sighs. “The real truth is far worse.”

I feel something cold pooling in my stomach. Beside me Sango is ashen-faced and silent, clutching her skirt.

“She tried to go home,” says Kaede. Her face is lined with shadow; her voice is soft. “Without her skin, the poor girl. She stripped naked and ran through the town to the cliff, and down to the sea. And she swam.”

I understand.

+

That night I run down to the shore. Kikyo is standing in the water, looking for all the world as if she’s waiting for me. I clear my throat.

“I’m sorry,” I say as soon as she turns to face me. “I’m sorry about the night my Grandpa died – I wasn’t in a place to be rational.”

“Yes.”

“And I didn’t give much thought to what you were actually suggesting when you said you needed to leave.”

Kikyo looks at me. “What is your point?”

“I want to help,” I say in a rush. “You. Get your skin back.”

Kikyo says nothing.

“I understand now, in a way that I didn’t before – possibly I never thought about it – how much pain it causes you to be apart from the sea. I can see it, and I want to help in any way I can. But,” I say, “a child shouldn’t be without it’s mother. The children need to go to sea too.”

Kikyo takes a step towards me. I can smell salt water everywhere; the wind presses damply against my face.

“I do not need your help,” she says.

I say,

“No matter. You’re getting it anyway.”

+                                        

I meet Kikyo every night down by the sea. In the half-light of the moon we discuss possible hiding locations of the skins, how we can get all the women and children together and away from the men without arousing suspicion. After the first night she stops telling me she doesn’t need my help and seems to accept it quietly. We spend hours together, sitting on the sand, and yet I still haven’t seen her smile.

It’s trivial, but I’m slightly upset by it.

One night we sit together, having exhausted all possible places where the skins could be held. Kikyo is gazing out to sea, hungry and distant.

“What was it like?”

She looks at me. “The sea?”

“Yes. When you lived there, as a seal. No one will talk about it in the village.”

Kikyo considers, and as she does I see a change come about her. She leans low on the rock, looking more at ease than I have ever seen her. Her face softens.

“It is hard to explain,” she begins, “in your language. There is no… time, at least not as you know it. I couldn’t tell you how long I was down there, or where I went. It’s all… flashes of colour. Grey and green and blue. And the sensations of the sea, sharp and smooth and cool.” She pauses. “Seal life… is very different from human life. Things happen, but there is no sense of the happening. It just is.”

I smile. “This is the most I have heard you talk. I like it.”

Kikyo tilts her head. “Tell me about your life,” she says. “Up here, on land.”

I only return to the cottage when the sky is a pale purple. I am thinking – almost dreamily – of the sound of Kikyo’s voice, when Souta appears in front of me. I nearly scream, clapping a hand over my mouth as he scowls.

“What are you doing?” I whisper, ushering him back to the house.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he replies. “Why’ve you been disappearing every night?”

“It’s nothing.”

“I’ll bet.”

“Souta –”

“Mama’s gone,” he says, “and so is Grandpa. You’re not allowed to leave too.”

I stare at him. “You think I’m leaving?”

He flushes a little, and nods. I reach out and hug him. He’s grown taller.

“You’re so old,” I say. He pulls away and grins up at me, sniffing slightly.

“You’re ancient. But really, what are you doing down there?”

“Souta.” I put my hands on his shoulders. “If I tell you, will you promise not to tell anyone else? Not even Kohaku?”

He nods, serious.

“Alright. I’m planning, down there, with another girl, to sneak the mam’s skins back to them.”

His eyes widen. “So they can go back to the sea? But what about all the kids? What about the dads?”

“That’s part of the plan. We’re going to send all the kids to the sea as well.”

He goggles at me. “Me too?”

I pause. “I – I hadn’t thought about that.”

“But you need the skins to do that.”

“Yes. Finding them is the first part of the plan.”

“But that’s easy,” says Souta, blinking at me. “I already know where they are.”

+

Souta pushes open the door and peers inside. He leans back out, finger to his lips, and beckons me forward. I walk past him into the backroom of the Inn, and look around.

“They’re in here?” I ask, bewildered. He shakes his head.

“Not quite. They’re through there.” He points to a large padlocked door. I walk quietly over to the door and press my ear against the rough wood. No sounds come from the other room.

“You’re sure?”

“Positive. Shippo found it a while ago, he showed it to me and Kohaku.”

“That rascal.”

Souta grins.

“How are we going to open the door?” I ask, giving it an experimental push. It doesn’t budge.

“I know the boy in charge of locking the door,” Souta says confidently. “Every Friday his friend comes over and they go into a secret closet together upstairs. I caught them in there once, and he promised me that if I didn’t tell anyone he’d do me a favour.”

I almost laugh out loud at how perfect it is. “You are the best brother in the whole wide world.”

He blushes. “When are you gonna tell Kikyo?”

“Tonight,” I say. My heart pushes up into my throat – I can feel it pulsing against my vocal chords. I wonder if this will make Kikyo smile.

+

It made her cry.

+

I sit beside Kikyo as she sobs. Whether out of happiness at having found her coat or sadness at having lost it I can’t tell. All I know is the way tears roll over her cheeks and disappear into the water below us.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

“I didn’t find them,” I say, truthfully. She shakes her head.

“Thank you for… for your company.”

I stare at her. “Why are you thanking me?”

She says,

“Because you made it bearable to be human.”

+

After Souta tells us about the skins, everything else falls into place. The festival is approaching, and the men will all gather in the Inn for drinks after it’s over. We tell the Mams on the washing day, five days before the festival, and in each pair of eyes I see a glimmer of something more alive than I’d ever seen before.

Kikyo doesn’t smile, but she nods beside me.

I had expected there to be a few Mams who would go against us, or tell the men of our plans, but there are none. There is even a Mam who suggests sewing the children into the crying blankets to make them seals.

“The magic of the night, the magic of itself will do the rest,” she explains to me. The rest of the women laugh amongst themselves, but now it’s real laughter of happiness. Kaede, standing by the two of us, smiles at me in a way I have never seen before. Through years of quiet unhappiness her beauty shines, and I am warmed to my soul.

But still something bothers me. Souta’s words about what would happen to us – to all the older children, the motherless children – what would we do? Would we be left behind? I try to imagine living on the island with no one else but the men. Our fathers and uncles and grandfathers. It is hard to feel badly for planning this when they are ultimately the cause of this pain.

I only voice my fears to Kikyo one night, when we are lying by the sea. I roll onto my side to face her, and she shifts to face me.

“What am I to do once you have gone?” I whisper. I can see the stars reflected in her eyes.

“What do you mean?” she asks. Her voice is soft.

“Once all the mam’s and the children are gone. What shall I do?”

Kikyo raises herself on one elbow so she looks down at me. “But you’re coming too,” she says.

I sit up. “What?”

“To the sea. You are coming too, are you not?”

I stare at her. I can feel a smile, curling like a rose, blooming on my face as I look at her. “Yes,” I say. “I am coming too.”

Kikyo beams.

“I would not leave you here,” she says.

+

The night approaches. Every day I wake, my heart pitter-patter against my chest, my dreams filled with the accusing eyes of the men, hard stares, silence, locked doors.

But the day finally comes, the day of the retrieval, and the men remain silently oblivious to our scheming. During the week I have woven together another blanket for Souta, for he would also be leaving. Sango too had decided to take to the sea with her mother and Kohaku. Every time we passed each other on the street I could feel the excitement, the restlessness of my being mirrored in her own. On the eve of the escape, I wait in by the door for Souta to return with Kikyo’s skin.

The plan for the evening is simple. It has to be, to allow for the number of people attempting to follow it. Souta would ask the boy, the worker at the Inn (I had seen him only once, he was tall with long white hair and golden eyes), for the key. He would open the room, Kohaku and Shippo would enter and gather up the skins. They would distribute them to the children who would mill outside the back of the inn, and rush home to give each skin to their own mother. Then each and every one of them would move down to the beach, where they would say goodbye to their human lives and slip into the sea.

I shiver. The air of the evening is warm, but there is a twist to it that raises gooseflesh on my arm and crawls up the back of my neck. Can the men not feel it?

Time moves slowly. I sit at the table, smoothing over my own instructions again and again in my mind. Take Kikyo’s skin. Meet her at our place. Get into the blanket. Swim.

Souta’s knock at the door sends me jumping to my feet, my body sparking and tingling with the magic and the fear that suffuses the night. He hands me the package with great care; I take it and press it to my face. It smells of Kikyo.

“Do you have the blankets?” he whispers. I nod, patting the bag that hangs at my waist. He grips my hand and we begin to move to the beach. Every step down to the sea is agonizing. I strain my ears for the sound of yells, my eyes for any sight of someone chasing us, to stop us reaching the ocean – but we do. Souta is waved over by Kohaku, his mother having offered to sew him in for me. I tug him in for a last hug, feeling billowy and undefined. He pulls away and smiles at me, I hand him his blanket, and then I run. Kikyo is sitting perfectly still on an outcrop of rocks. When I approach she rises swiftly and pulls the skin from my arms, breathing shallowly. After a moment of standing, her face hidden by the silvery fur, she looks up at me.

“Quick,” she murmurs.

With shaking hands, I pull at the edges of my clothes, pushing them off me. Kikyo does the same until we both stand there, clad in nothing but moonlight. There is a moment where I gaze at her, and she gazes at me, and the hurried evening slows down. She glows. Almost as if in a dream I watch as she raises a hand to cup my cheek, running her thumb across the bone of my jaw. I wrap my arms around her waist, threading one hand into her long hair, and kiss her. When I pull back, she is smiling.

‘Kikyo?’

When Kagome leaves the bedroom, Kikyo is standing before the closed door, staring at nothing.

‘Morning.’

Kikyo doesn’t reply. Kagome pushes her arms out above her head until she hears a faint crack, and sighs. She moves closer to Kikyo, poking her gently on the shoulder. ‘Hey,’ she says, ‘how was your shift?’

Kikyo doesn’t move. She remains frozen, gazing blankly. Kagome frowns. ‘Hold on,’ she says. She doesn’t expect a reply.

She pushes open the bathroom door and switches on the light, blinking in the brightness. It’s a clean room with deep blue walls and white tiles. They only have one bath and a shower, but the bath is deep enough. She turns the water on and lets it run until it reaches the brim, almost sloshing over the sides. She pours lavender oil into the water and pads back out into the kitchen. Kikyo hasn’t moved. Her fists are clenched at her sides.

‘Kikyo,’ Kagome murmurs, ‘come here.’ She reaches out with her hand and takes one of Kikyo’s own, massaging the fingers until they fall open and she can thread her own in-between. She grips Kikyo tightly, rubbing her thumb over a knuckle. Kikyo tilts her head very slightly to the left, and her eyes meet Kagome’s for the first time.

‘I ran a bath. Do you want to take it with me?’

Kikyo remains still for a second, then nods abruptly. She moves with a stiffness, a poise that seems almost painful, and stands by Kagome’s side.

‘Alright,’ says Kagome, still holding her hand. She leads her into the bathroom. Inside the air smells faintly of the bath oils and the windows are already translucent with steam. Kagome pulls the door closed behind them and moves Kikyo gently to face her.

‘I’m going to get undressed,’ she says. ‘You can too, if you want, or you can wait ‘til I’m finished and I’ll help you.’

Kagome tugs off her own summer night gown, stepping out of it, and feels the warm air on her exposed skin. Behind her, she hears the faint swish of clothes on the ground. When she turns Kikyo is standing naked and expressionless behind her, her scrubs on the floor in a heap. Kagome steps swiftly over to the bathtub and sinks into the warm water. Kikyo follows her lead.

For a moment they both sit quietly in the water, Kagome with her eyes closed, waiting. Then –

‘Kagome.’

Kagome opens her eyes. Kikyo is sitting hunched over, her chin in the water, and her eyes are bright. Her rapid breathing causes the water to swell slightly, spilling over the sides onto the tiled floor. Kikyo holds out her arms, wordless, and Kagome moves towards her and hugs her.

The oils make Kikyo’s body feel like silk against Kagome, warm and smooth and beautiful. But she’s shaking, and hot liquid drips onto Kagome’s shoulder that isn’t from the bath at all. She slides her arms around Kikyo’s waist, strokes her hair, kisses her shoulder.

‘She was four years old,’ says Kikyo, very distinctly, her clipped voice at odds with the tears still rolling down her cheeks. ‘Her parents thanked me, afterwards. For doing all that I could.’

‘You did do all you could,’ Kagome says fervently, trailing her hand down to rest at the small of Kikyo’s back. ‘You know you’re an incredible doctor.’

‘I couldn’t save her,’ Kikyo says in her smallest voice, the one only Kagome has heard – her broken, human voice. Kagome pulls back slightly. She takes Kikyo’s face in both her hands, pushing a lock of thick hair behind Kikyo’s ear.

‘Listen to me,’ she says sternly, pressing her lips gently against Kikyo’s forehead. ‘Listen to me. You are an amazing doctor. You studied hard, you made it through med school with flying colours, and now you are one of the best doctors in our country. It’s true. But you’re also human. You can’t save everyone, nor can you be expected to, or expect yourself to. Sometimes there isn’t going to be anything you can do. And that’s ok. You hear me? There are so many people you’ve treated, so many lives you’ve saved.’ Kagome rests her hand on Kikyo’s cheek, and glares at her. ‘I am so, so proud of you.’ She grabs one of Kikyo’s arms out of the water and trails kisses up it to Kikyo’s shoulder. Kikyo’s eyes are closed. She leans forward and rests her head on Kagome’s shoulder.

‘I’ll just be a moment,’ she murmurs.

‘Take your time,’ Kagome says. ‘Here.’ She shifts and pulls Kikyo around until she’s sitting against Kagome’s front. ‘Ok?’

Kikyo nods, tipping her head backwards. ‘I love you,’ she whispers.

‘I love you too.’

They stay in the water until the sun shines in through the window, golden bars across the bathwater. By the time Kikyo pulls away from Kagome and turns to face her, she looks human again.

‘When’s your next shift?’ asks Kagome.

‘I have a three days off. Do you have school today?’

Kagome shakes her head, then grins. ‘Come on. We’re spending the day in our pajamas.’

Kikyo smiles. ‘Alright,’ she says. ‘That sounds good.’

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