Labyrinth

 

Chapter 14: That I Leave to You

 

So close.  He had been so close.  She understood now, he knew she did.  He could have told her the whole story, could have held her, could have convinced her.  She would have listened; she could have loved him, could have ended all of this.  So many people would have been freed of his curse.  And Sesshoumaru had destroyed that chance with a wave of his too elegant hand.  And all Inuyasha could do was stare at the place where Kagome had been just a moment before. 

Inuyasha looked up at his older brother, a slow burning rage building within him.  “Your right?” he shouted, jumping to his feet.  “And who gave you the right?  Who said you could mess with my life.”

Sesshoumaru watched him impassively, “You did not wish the girl to go free?”

Inuyasha looked down at his feet, concentrating on breathing; his palms were still bleeding.  “She would have been free anyway, right?  That was the point of this whole stupid exercise.  I was supposed to learn my lesson and then all this,” he waved his hand haphazardly indicating the room, “all of this insanity was supposed to go away.  They were all to go free, I was to go free.  But that isn’t what happened!”

“It isn’t?”

Inuyasha blinked up at Sesshoumaru, stopped short by the bland question.

“Did it?” he asked.

Sesshoumaru gave the slightest, most delicate of snorts.  His hands disappeared into his sleeves as he folded his arms, “This Sesshoumaru does not go back on his word.”

Inuyasha looked around the room, his brow furrowed in confusion.  “But… I embraced my humanity, my emotions and… it’s still here.” He pointed out, feeling a little stupid because he was evidently missing something, and his brother was just so insufferably arrogant.

“Indeed.” Sesshoumaru observed. “Apparently so.”

Inuyasha actually growled at him and Sesshoumaru quirked a brow.  The pup had the insolence to approach him, pressing his face to Sesshoumaru’s.

“Why is it still here, Sesshoumaru?” he ground out, very low.

“It is stone and earth, Inuyasha.  It will remain until it is worn to dust.  The magic that held you here is gone however.  As is all the magic which ruled this place.  The Labyrinth is no danger to anyone now.”

Inuyasha stumbled back, his rigid stance melting until he seemed almost limp. His face lost its anger and became blank.  “What do I do now?” he whispered, almost to himself.

Sesshoumaru smirked, “That I leave to you, brother.”

And it wasn’t until he was gone that Inuyasha realized it was the first time Sesshoumaru had called him brother in over six hundred years.

 

***

            It hadn’t been Inuyasha’s fault, his being a half-breed.  That blame could only be laid upon his father and the human he had bedded.  Sesshoumaru had never held it against the pup; he had even taught him to fight when he became of age.  He wasn’t certain he had quite forgiven his father though.  After all, the pup was bound to be moody, he was half human, but their father was the strongest demon alive – what excuse had he for falling in love with a human?

            Still, Sesshoumaru had never had a problem with Inuyasha while the boy was growing up.  He had found it somewhat amusing, the way the boy looked up to him and strove to be like him.  That was, he had found it amusing to a point.

When Inuyasha had entered into his first century, however, it became apparent to Sesshoumaru that there was a problem.

Inuyasha was not full demon and nothing would ever change that.  Yet the boy refused to accept his limitations, refused to accept anything about his human heritage.  He seemed determined to ignore that half of himself entirely.  As a warrior Sesshoumaru knew that anything about oneself that one ignored could be exploited.  A warrior must know all aspects of himself fully, especially his weaknesses.  Weaknesses must be turned to strength.  To completely cut away a part of oneself was to invite ruin.  The boy was in enough danger without engaging in such stupid and childish behavior.

Sesshoumaru had been willing to go so far as to discuss the issue with their father, but then he had died, leaving his titles and power split between his two sons.

This did not bother Sesshoumaru in and of itself.  The title given to himself held the most real power, Inuyasha was more of a figure head.  The trouble was that it made him even more of a target than his birth did.  There were countless demons who wanted the title, and the fact that Inuyasha was only half demon made him a tempting target.

The boy fought well enough, and Sesshoumaru knew he had the potential to defeat any who would oppose him, even the strongest of demons.  The trouble was that Inuyasha could never realize that potential so long as he kept half of himself locked away. How could a man who essentially hated himself love his own life enough to protect it?

Something had to be done, but now Sesshoumaru had no father with whom to discuss the issue, and the pup’s mother was long gone.  So he had gone instead to the old tree who had been his father’s advisor for many centuries.

It was with this trusted advisor that he had devised the Labyrinth.

Even after his mind was made up and his course set it had taken him several years to complete the project.  This was a heavier magic than he had ever attempted and he needed it to be self sustaining.  By the time he was finished the spells were so complex that even he had some difficulty keeping track of all the details and the Labyrinth had taken on a life of its own.

It was then that he had lured his brother into the castle and sealed him there.

He did not doubt that Inuyasha, and the rest of the world, saw this as punishment.  He knew well that other demons thought he was jealous, angry at having to share his title and power.  It was beneath him to pay heed to such rumors so he made no attempt to set the record straight.  Let the fools believe what they wished.

It was only later that he realized he had made an error.

It was nearly unthinkable.  He did not make errors.  And yet he had.  He had overlooked one thing so very small and yet so very important.

He had forgotten that the title Inuyasha bore required him to be an arbitrator for the lower demons and that the two titles were meant to be one. Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru were essentially two halves of one ruler.  And so, the barriers he had erected to keep out all other demons became cracked the moment he left Inuyasha in the castle alone.  As long as he was outside the walls of the Labyrinth lower level demons could get in.

His only option was to remain in the castle himself.  But even if it were possible, if he had not had lands to maintain and peoples to rule, he would not have done that.  It would have defeated the entire purpose.  Inuyasha would not face his humanity unless he had no other choice, and Sesshoumaru knew from experience that boredom was the only true motivating factor in Inuyasha’s life.  To return to the Labyrinth would be to offer Inuyasha a distraction, and this he refused to do.

Instead Sesshoumaru consoled himself that the barriers around the castle itself remained strong.  Demons could not get in and Inuyasha could not get out.  It was enough, if only Inuyasha would open his eyes…  

 

***

 

            Inuyasha had never understood life.  There wasn’t one thing about it that made sense to him.  As a child he had been too innocent, too protected to notice much outside of himself.  His world consisted of himself, his mother, and occasionally his father.  But as he got older he began to notice things.  Like the fact that he was different from everyone else in their castle.  He noticed other things too, like the fact that even the lowliest servant seemed to look down on him.  He thought it might be because they were demons, but then he had discovered that his mother’s people hated him too.

He knew they all hated him because he had been told they did.

He hadn’t been told by his mother or father, of course.  It had been a boy from his mother’s family.  He still remembered that day clearly.  The other children had been playing with a ball.  Inuyasha had never had any companions his own age and he eagerly tried to join in.  But the other children picked up the ball and moved away from him.  He had followed and then one boy, the one holding the ball, had turned back and sneered at him. 

“Fetch doggie.” He had called jeeringly before throwing the ball far from Inuyasha.  Inuyasha had watched it in confusion for several seconds before turning his attention back to the other children, they were snickering.  His ear twitched in confusion.  The ring leader had his fists propped on his hips.

“Stupid half-breed.  No one wants you around.  Everyone hates you because you’re stupid.”

And then they had all walked away, and he had let them go.

They hated him because he was stupid?

He didn’t think he was stupid.

He could already read and write and he knew numbers.  Most people didn’t know those things.

But he didn’t know how to play the games the other children did.  And sometimes he accidentally broke stuff, so maybe he was stupid. Maybe that was why his parents didn’t let him play with other kids, because he embarrassed them.

Whatever the reason Inuyasha quickly learned that humans would never accept him.

And then there were the demons.  Demons didn’t make fun of him or call him names – they just tried to kill him.  The first time had been when he was sixteen.  He hadn’t looked sixteen of course; by the age of twelve his body had already slowed its physical progression.  It was only natural since demons, and presumably hanyous, lived so long.  One of his father’s vassals had attacked him in the forest.

Fortunately for Inuyasha his father had been nearby.  That night he had heard his parents talking about it.  The other demons thought he was a sign of his father’s weakness.

And Inuyasha finally thought he understood something.

Humans were weak.

They hated him because he was stronger than they were, and demons hated him because he was weaker than they were.

So all he had to do was become the strongest of all.  Then he would be respected by demons and it wouldn’t matter what humans thought at all because he would be able to crush anyone who ridiculed him.

That was when he had met his older brother, Sesshoumaru.

When Inuyasha had first seen Sesshoumaru he had been in awe.  Sesshoumaru looked very much like their father, but because he lacked the warmth of Inutaisho he seemed even more regal and commanding.  Everyone was afraid of Sesshoumaru, even people who weren’t afraid of his father.  Inuyasha was glad when Sesshoumaru informed his parents that he had come to train him.  Inuyasha wanted to be strong and feared, just like Sesshoumaru.  He might have to work very hard, since he had to overcome his human blood, but he was determined to do all he could to become stronger.

Inuyasha had observed Sesshoumaru carefully, not just during their combat lessons.  He observed the way Sesshoumaru walked, the way he gestured, the way he spoke.  He especially watched the way Sesshoumaru dealt with other people.  It seemed to him that Sesshoumaru didn’t care what anyone thought of him: those who were useful he used, and those who were not he ignored.  Sesshoumaru ignored almost all humans, unless they were in his way and refused to move – then he killed them. Inuyasha decided that maybe he could ignore humans too.

It was easy to imitate Sesshoumaru’s fighting style.  Inuyasha had inherited the fluid grace of his father and he was a quick study.  It was much more difficult to imitate his bearing.  Sesshoumaru had all the emotional depth of a block of ice.  But Inuyasha found that he had difficulty locking away his emotions.  Even in battle he was often distracted. Sesshoumaru was constantly reprimanding him, reminding him to stay focused.

Inuyasha thought that meant that he needed to find total calm, to become totally devoid of emotion, like his brother.  But Sesshoumaru confused him as much as life did.  Sesshoumaru began to tell him to focus his anger, to make it sharpen his mind, but Inuyasha didn’t know how to do that.  And he didn’t see the point.  Emotions were a human weakness, if he was going to achieve his goal he had to purge himself of all of that.  Sesshoumaru had no emotions, so why did he want Inuyasha to have them?

By the time Inutaisho died Inuyasha was thoroughly frustrated.  No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t ignore his emotions.  And Sesshoumaru seemed to have given up on him entirely.

And then Sesshoumaru had locked him away in the Labyrinth.

Of all the things in life that made no sense, this made the least sense of all.

What really confused him was that Sesshoumaru’s parting words to him had been “until you embrace your humanity you will never find your strength.”

Inuyasha had puzzled over this a long time.  Not at first of course, at first he had been too angry to think.  He and Sesshoumaru had never been close.  Not even in the years the elder demon had trained him.  He knew Sesshoumaru didn’t love him. But he hadn’t thought Sesshoumaru had anything against him either.  After many years the burning anger he felt had been pushed to the back of his mind, ever present but no longer all-consuming, and he had begun to mull over his brother’s final words to him.

It confused him more than anything else ever had.  The one constant in Inuyasha’s life had been the knowledge that demons were strong and humans were weak.  He had to be strong, and to do that he had to abandon his humanity.  It had been so simple, and it had been a part of his life for over a century.  But now Sesshoumaru was saying that that had been wrong.  But Sesshoumaru was a demon, and demons disdained humans.  How many times had his sensitive ears picked up the whispers of the servants?  How many times had he heard them blame his father’s declining power on the human woman he had mated?  How many times had he been told that he was weak?  How many humans had Sesshoumaru killed without thought?

So why did Sesshoumaru want him to be human?

In six hundred years he had never figured it out.

Until he had met Kagome.

Kagome was human, but she was everything that was good and strong in humanity.  Kagome had survived the Labyrinth.  She had taught him that there were some things about humanity that he could respect.  But that hadn’t made him understand Sesshoumaru’s words.

When Sesshoumaru had threatened Kagome Inuyasha had felt a rush of emotion such as he had never experienced before.  Panic, pain, anger, love – they had all welled up in him so quickly that he had acted instinctively.  It didn’t matter that he wasn’t impassive or level headed; all that had been important was getting to Kagome before Sesshoumaru did.

He hadn’t even felt the pain of Sesshoumaru’s claws piercing his arm.

And then Sesshoumaru had given him that look.  It was as if he was trying to bore into Inuyasha’s mind and impart to him some revelation.  He looked… almost proud.

And Inuyasha suddenly realized what he had done.

Sesshoumaru had not been holding back.  Inuyasha had outrun him, even though Sesshoumaru had the lead.  

Inuyasha had never outrun Sesshoumaru in his life.

And then a second thought.

He had just disarmed Sesshoumaru.

As far as Inuyasha knew no one had ever lived to make that claim.

Words from his youth echoed through his mind. “Harness your anger, your fear, make them your weapon instead of your weakness.”

How many times had Sesshoumaru told him that?  And he had never understood – until now.

Now he saw that these things were a part of who he was.  He could not ignore them, could not cleanse himself of them.  He could use them, or he could allow himself to be crippled by them.

And if he could use those emotions, then he didn’t have to be afraid of other emotions either.

The other demons had said his father was weak for loving a human.

But Sesshoumaru was the strongest demon he knew, and Sesshoumaru did not seem to agree.

Inuyasha had looked down at Kagome, and the world had suddenly made sense.  In that moment he knew that he could face anything that happened, because he could rely on both his humanity and his demon heritage to see him through.  He could be the best of both worlds instead of the worst.  He could be what she needed, but even if she refused him he could still be worthy of her.

He would be, even if it meant losing her.

After all, what good was it to hold on to her if she was unhappy?

And she had understood all the things he couldn’t say and couldn’t explain.  And she had accepted him as no one else had.

And then she was gone and he was once again left reeling by his brother’s parting words.

“That I leave to you…”